Chapter 76 (2/2)

I suddenly broke into laughter. Laughing out loud was against manners, but I couldn’t stop it.

The best thing I could do was to cover my mouth with my hands and muffle the sound as much as possible. I felt as if I shook off my unpleasant feelings as if I was thrown with the mud.

“Was it so funny?”

I just smiled at him who was looking at me curiously. I could not tell him I didn’t know there was such a perfect expression to describe them, and that his description really made my day.

“Anyway, I’m glad to see you smile.”

“Yes, Your Majesty?”

“Smiling face suits you more than your rigid expression.You look like them with that rigid expression.”

I felt embarrassed when he said that. I even felt ashamed because he pointed out that I hadn’t followed the etiquette. When I fanned my face with my hand because I felt hot, he grinned at me. I felt like I couldn’t stay with him any more, so I hurriedly asked for his understanding by saying, “Your Majesty, may I go back to my friends?”

“Friends? Sure, you can.”

“Thank you.”

Breathing a sigh of relief deep down, I was about to go back to my place when someone who looked like Allendis passed by the guests.

‘Is that Allendis?’

I looked around and checked. The moment I almost gave up because of those who spoke to me occasionally, I saw a man with light green hair slipping out of the door of the banquet hall.

I looked around for a moment, but no one noticed me. What should I do? At first glance, his back looked similar to Allendis. Should I follow him?

I carefully got out of the banquet hall and looked around. As it was dark outside, the hallway of the Central Palace looked dark even though the lights were lit. I walked away after hesitating to go back, but I didn’t want to because I felt sorry about finding him so exhausted last time I saw him.

How much time passed? Although I walked quite far from the banquet hall, I could not see his light green hair.

‘Did I see the wrong person?’

When I was about to turn after giving up, I saw a black shadow at the end of the corridor.

‘Who is it?’

The shadow that looked around went into a room. I just tried to pass by, but stopped because I smelled a rat.

Unless it’s something secret, that guy didn’t have to look around carefully. Why is he looking around so carefully to go into that room? I thought of calling a knight just in case, but didn’t. What if I am mistaken? But I didn’t want to give it a pass because I knew something was going on.

‘What should I do?’

I hesitated for a moment then headed for the place where the shadow disappeared.

‘Even if I’m an apprentice knight now, I can’t back down once I have decided to be a knight.’

I put my ears close to the closed room, but it was quiet. While hesitating a bit, I pushed the door slightly. Fortunately, the door opened silently. No one was inside the room that looked through the tiny gap.

‘I think the shadow obviously came in here.’

The moment I was about to close it, thinking I was mistaken, I noticed there was another room inside. It seemed that the structure of the room was designed like that.

As I approached carefully, I heard someone talking inside. Though they talked with a low voice, I could hear it clearly because it was so quiet inside. I decided that if I found something suspicious after hearing them a bit, I should call the knight.

“It’s already the crown prince’s birthday. Time flies so fast!”

“You bet.”

“He is now an adult, so it would be easy to find a new woman without the obstacle. I feel regretful about it.”

“I know. The next empress should be from the anti-emperor noble faction by all means. How can the emperor choose Lady Monique? Absolutely, we can’t let it happen, Duke.”

“Of course. We have to defeat the crown prince in order to regain the power we lost because of the emperor.”

I was bothered by the words ‘anti-emperor noble faction’ and ‘Duke.’

‘Is this guy talking with Duke Jena and his clique?’