Chapter 14 (1/2)

After the man left, the room had grown cold. Ernst had long since realized that the fire in the hearth had gone out. Shivering from the extreme cold, Ernst curled up his quaking, trembling body within the cold bedding.

That man, just what did he say…

Even though Ernst had submerged himself in blankets, sleep never came for him.

Morning eventually came, and Ernst hadn’t even gotten a wink of sleep. Seeing that the candles and firewood had burnt themselves out, the butler turned a condemning glance on Ernst. With his head fuzzy from a lack of sleep, Ernst ate his breakfast, which was the same food as yesterday.

In his office, Ernst cast his eyes over some of the documents that the head butler had gathered.

The number of villages in Meissen, the number of towns, their population, demographics, militia count, the resources within the fief, the resources they imported from other territories, the number of livestock, the acreage of farmland, the rate of usage. The relationship with the neighboring Lux Kingdom, the relationship with Grude Continent, the previous Lord’s reign.

There was no end to the things he had to know, and even if he did learn them all, there was still more to come.

Yet not a single thing stuck in Ernst’s mind. It wasn’t because of his lack of sleep. Even Ernst knew that.

Last night, what was that man saying? Ernst had deliberated over the meaning of what that man had told him all through the night.

Loved him to the bottom of his heart. Loved him. L, o, v, e.

Ernst now noticed that the concept of ‘loving a person’ was a gaping wide blank in his understanding.

After all, he had been the crown prince. For sixty years since his birth, up until a few months ago, he had been the crown prince. This wasn’t an existence where he could frivolously fall in love, and the partner whom Ernst was to love was to be some powerful noble’s daughter, as decided by the leaders of the Kingdom.

It was an existence where, regardless of Ernst’s wishes, he would have to usher in several people as his consorts. Ernst’s circumstances had nothing to do with falling in love with anyone.

That was how it was supposed to be. Ernst himself had thought that this was how it should be.

Falling in love…

What type of feeling was it, to fall in love?

All throughout the night, he had thought this over.

Even now, while he was looking through the information on his territory, most of his head was filled with that matter.

In the royal palace, people were ‘things’. [1]

The head butler, the butlers, the maids, and the royal guard, all of them were ‘things’. They were the same as the desk, same as the chair, same as the walls, same as the pillars. Even if the person were replaced, nothing would change except for the face; it was no different from re-upholstering the back of a chair.

It was for this reason that Ernst never asked for anyone’s name. He had looked at them the same way he looked at objects. The ambassadors from other countries who had come to visit the royal palace were also ‘things’. There was no difference between anyone or anything.

Ernst, who couldn’t discern people from objects, let alone pick out individual people, couldn’t possibly do something like fall in love.

But, he pondered.

From now on, he was free. He wasn’t royalty; he was going to live as just any other noble now. Ernst could now choose his own partner to love at his own discretion.

In that case, he considered.

Do I fall in love with that man?

He had never considered something like taking a man as his partner. It couldn’t be helped. He had been royalty, after all. That was something who had to leave behind a child no matter what. That wouldn’t be possible if his partner were a man.

But from now on, he was free. In the first place, the races of Schell continent lived longer lives than races from other continents, so they didn’t find much worth in having children. Marriage itself involved a painstaking exchange of contracts, and only royalty and nobles bothered to go through with it.