Chapter 202 (2/2)

“…Really?”

“Yes. I heard that he hurt his finger when he held the glass too hard while drinking…”

“What? Why did you tell me only now? Where is he now?”

“In your late mother’s bedroom…”

Even before she finished speaking, I ran to my mother’s room. When I opened the door without even knocking, he looked back in surprise, while looking out the window.

My heart sank when I saw the bandage wrapped around his hand.

When he noticed I was watching his hand, he said with an awkward smile, “I think I’m old. I hurt my hand while sparring…”

“Daddy.”

Tears welled in my eyes quickly. I felt guilty, looking at him smiling at me, saying it was nothing.

“I didn’t get hurt much. What’s wrong with you?”

“Sorry, Daddy. I’m really sorry… ”

“It’s not a big deal, honey. Don’t cry. Why are you crying over this trifling thing?”

“I’m so sorry, Daddy.”

When I said sorry repeatedly, he pulled me silently and stroked my back with his other hand.

Tears kept dropping and wet his shirt.

How frustrated he was enough to drink alcohol that he didn’t like? He must have held the glass so hard as to break it because he was so distressed.

As he lived as the late emperor’s closest aide for a long time, he might have quickly understood what it meant for me to burn all the dresses. He must have been heartbroken so much when he realized that his only daughter gave up being a woman and treated herself as a dead person.

Actually, I did that because I wanted to get rid of everything related to the imperial family. I couldn’t go back because I already made the choice. But when I saw him agonized and distressed because of me, I was very sorry. I felt even more sorry because I would never give up succeeding my family even though he didn’t like it.

How much time passed?

Only when my voice was hoarse and my eyes were swollen with tears did I realize that my father’s clothes were also wet.

As I lowered my head, embarrassed, he reached out and put my dishevelled hair as if nothing happened.

“Are you okay now?”

“… Yes, Daddy…”

“I’m fine. It wasn’t a deep cut.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I’m okay, honey.”

I felt so warm as his hand gently touched my back. As if to remind me of something, he said, looking around the room, “Do you know where you are now?”

“Isn’t it my mother’s room?”

“Yes. When she was alive, your mother was always sitting by that window and reading a book when I was away. She never went to sleep, with the lights on all the time.”

“… ”

“Even though I came back late, I was very sorry, but happy to see the room where the lights were on. I’m sorry for her who was waiting for me despite her fatigue, but at the same time, I was happy that I had a home to come back to. ”

I silently looked at the spot where my father was gazing at. A portrait of my mother was hung there.

Like Sir League told me one day, the mother in the picture looked almost like me. The only difference was her wavy magenta hair.

As my eyes were swollen, I barely opened my eyes and looked at him. From an objective point of view, she was inferior to him in many ways. Then what made him like her so much as to devote his love?

“Daddy?”

“Um?”

“Why did you like your mother?”

“… Well I didn’t fall in love with her at first glance. I was taking care of her at the emperor’s order, so I wasn’t that much interested in her. I don’t know why I came to love her.”

Then he said, staring into the air, as if he was lost in memories.

“I began to like her little by little, and when I realized that, I knew I could not live without her.”

“I see. Then that’s the reason why you swore…”

“…Well, I don’t want to hurt your feelings, but your mother was also poisoned like you. It was because of my promise that bound me at the time, but the main reason I swore was because of that, above all.”

“Pardon? What do you mean?”