Chapter 359 (1/2)

The moment I bit my lip, choked up with emotions, I suddenly recalled what he had told me a long time ago.

When I was still avoiding the then crown prince, my father told me about it when I was depressed after my oath of blood was rejected. He said what our family had been handed down for generations was the oath of blood only, and that he would take care of my problem in the worst situation if I tipped him off in advance.

I didn’t remember well what I replied to him on that day, but I was relaxed a lot by his reassurances. Perhaps this was what my father referred to on that day.

‘Oh I see. That’s why my father seemed relaxed even when I was struggling hard to get over my difficult situation. That’s why the late emperor could not force me to marry his son, even though he wanted it so much. The late emperor was well aware that unlike other nobles who could not willingly use that precious right for the safety of their daughters, my father could use it without any reservation, given that he risked his life to win my mother’s heart. And if the late emperor forced me to marry the crown prince, he knew his ties with my father would go sour even without achieving his purpose. Wait a minute. Did I just mention my father would risk his life?’

I swayed suddenly when I guessed something shocking in my head. He hurriedly grabbed me and asked with a worried voice, “Are you okay, Tia?”

“… Ah yes.”

Although I barely answered, I was still reeling from the shock from my sudden speculation. I felt dizzy as if I was hit by something.

My father, who wouldn’t hear or say anything bad about the imperial family, once asked the emperor unexpectedly as follows.

After hearing that Jiun was pregnant, my father told me with a sigh when I almost lost my mind.

My father spoke with a determined expression!

“Ha…”

I was filled with indescribable emotions deep down. My conversation with my father and his reaction on that day that I thought I had forgotten, and his determined look came to my mind vividly as if I saw him yesterday. At that time I could not figure out his exact intentions, or how he could take me, the emperor’s concubine, out of the palace. His confident voice back then hovered into my ears.

‘That’s why you did so, Daddy? Is what I’m guessing right? Did you also try to use the right to immunity to save me at that time? Was that the reason why you didn’t use the right for yourself and save it for me even when you were falsely charged back then? Or did you make a deal with the emperor to release me at the risk of your life? Right?’

“Aaah…”

I burst into moaning mixed with tears. Although I could not figure out whether all kinds of thoughts about my father’s actions were true or just speculative, my father’s affection for me at that time was as deep as his affection for me until recently, even though I was half in doubt about it at the moment I faced death.

After I read the letter, I firmly vowed that I would never cry, but when I realized the truth of my past after a long time, the bank of tears in my eyes collapsed, after all. I cried loudly, pounding on my throbbing heart, feeling so sad at my belated awakening to the truth and the absence of my father who I wanted to express gratitude.

How much time passed?

A stream of tears gradually stopped flowing from my eyes, and my trembling body also began to subside. Only then did I realize that I was crying, held in his arms. As I wiped away tears, catching my breath, he said, who was patting my back when I was crying, “…Are you okay now? ”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

“I thought you had already known it for a long time…I just can’t understand why your father didn’t tell you about it. Even though I know he kept the principle, you went through so many things, but he didn’t tell you about it to the end.”

“Pardon? What do you mean by the principle?”