“You are having other thoughts in front of me.”
Elysia hid her regrets and covered Eleon’s cheek with the hand that rested on her chin.
His handsome face with narrowed eyes made him look very dissatisfied. The corners of his mouth turned up and his expression softened.
Watching him from a distance, she wondered if there was some hidden power in her hands that made him happy.
No, that is not. It’s because he likes me so much. That’s why.
When she realized it again, her heart pounded on its own for no reason.
“Do you want to guess what I’m thinking?”
When Elysia asked feeling better, Eleon replied all excited.
“Will you give me a reward if I guess right?”
“I have nothing to offer you as a reward. I gave you everything I had.”
“That’s strange. Now that I think about it, I feel like I have only received words.”
Meanwhile, Eleon was preparing dinner with the barbecue ingredients that the butler had brought.
Elysia sat comfortably in a seat a little farther away and watched what he was doing.
Eleon tied an apron around his waist and, in a familiar move, placed a large chunk of meat on the grill.
Fizz
He skillfully flipped the meat. When one side was cooked in an instant, Elysia clapped her hands in awe.
“Wow! You’re so cool.”
A man who knows how to cook is the best!
Usually, the line from his broad, firm shoulders to his very sleek waist reveals his superiority when wearing a uniform or suit.
However, Eleon with the sleeves of his white shirt rolled up and an apron around his waist looks dreamy.
She hadn’t even tasted a single piece of meat he was grilling, but she seemed to know what it tasted like.
It tastes absolutely delicious.
There’s no way the meat he grilled doesn’t taste good.
Elysia slowly got up and walked up to him from behind.
After hesitating for a moment, she carefully wrapped her arms around his waist and hugged Eleon from behind, feeling the muscles of his back touching her forehead.
“What’s wrong?”
“I’m jealous of the apron.”
Eleon looked back wondering what she meant by that absurd comment.
“I’m holding on to you.”
She hugged his waist.
She left out a word, but Eleon laughed out loud as if he understood immediately.
Elysia sulked and then loosened her arms.
You have done it all.
She wondered why he was laughing when she only tried to do something a bit.
She pouted.
Eleon lowered his head and kissed her gently on the forehead.
When Elysia’s eyes widened in surprise, Eleon asked shamelessly.
“You don’t like it?”
“No.”
She felt her face heat up.
“If you don’t like it, you have to get used to it.”
That’s right. What Eleon says is correct.
Elysia nodded instead of answering.
However, she could not raise her head because she was ashamed of herself since she was the first to come and disturb him when he was concentrating on cooking.
Eleon kissed her cheek once more as if Elysia was cute.
“Stay behind. It’s hot.”
Elysia nodded again, stepped back, and continued admiring Eleon.
I’ve never had a date like this before.
She has never been in a relationship in her previous life.
After graduating from college and getting a job, she only went from home to the library so she could pass her English test.
She thought that all students would be the same in the midst of a job crisis, but it saddened her to see her friends dating, going on trips, and working hard at the same time.
Why couldn’t I do that too?
It was bittersweet to think that the abilities granted to each person would be different, and yet she struggled not to be cut out of other people’s lives.
The swan in the water is elegant, but the swan under the water has to stir the water desperately to float.
This is how I met Eleon after transmigrating here?
Won Yoon-Ji’s life was absolutely superior when reading this book, but in reality, her life wasn’t good either.
That’s the reason why she was able to decide to stay by Eleon’s side.
It’s rude to fall into such thoughts with Eleon next to me.
Elysia began to look around the tent as she cooled her hot cheeks with her hands.
The inside of the tent was quite tall, so she was able to enter without too much trouble with her height.
Suddenly, something like a pendant hanging from a large lamp caught her eye.
“Oh. Can I take a look at this?”
Then Eleon, who had just taken the grilled meat off the grill, walked over, wiping his hands.
He placed the pendant in Elysia’s hand.
The round, flat pendant was quite large.
It was as light as an empty stomach, but she wanted to see the inside, but the lid didn’t open.
“This is how it opens.”
When Eleon pushed the hole in the middle, the lid swung away, revealing a compass.
“It’s a compass.”
“Do you know about this?”
Elysia nodded.
“It is a precious artifact. It will help you find a way.”
“Have you ever been lost?”
“I’ve encountered a sandstorm on the battlefield.”
Eleon told her that the sandstorm hurt.
Just because the sandstorm didn’t make him blind like the fog, the dense sand hurt his exposed skin and made him unable to breathe correctly.
He was at the head of his troops, and eight thousand men followed behind him in a sandstorm that even covered the Asrai’s sun.
“Then this saved us.”
Eleon rubbed the bruised surface of the compass.
“If you know which way you are going, you can walk in that direction even if there is no path.”
“It’s a very meaningful artifact.”
Eleon tucked Elysia’s hair behind her ear, which had fallen forward as she watched the compass.
“You can have it.”
“Why?”
“Because now we will always be together wherever we go.”
Eleon knelt in the grass and looked at her.
“Wherever you go, I go. So you can have it.”
“Eleon.”
His calm, casual words were so sincere that Elysia felt like crying.
Do I deserve this kind of love?
Is it okay to be with him?
She had nothing she could give him.
She had already given herself to him.
She felt overwhelmed by Eleon’s love for giving her a precious artifact that saved the lives of 8,000 people.
It is said that soldiers and sailors are so sensitive to superstitions, regardless of their bravery.
This is really meaningful and wonderful.
Still, Elysia was overjoyed and carefully looked at what he had given her.
Eleon took the compass from her hand and hung it around her neck like a necklace.
Eleon let out a long sigh as Elysia smiled widely as she fiddled with the compass.
“I think I just came out for nothing.”
“Why? It’s refreshing and nice here.”
“I want to kiss you, but there are no curtains.”
It wasn’t too dark yet as the sun was still hanging its red over the treetops.
“Then let’s hurry up, eat dinner and go to the room.”
The Grand Duchess’ room with lots of curtains is a nice room to kiss.
“Haha.”
Eleon smiled with pleasure and put the meat that had been served for a while back on the grill.
“Darn it. The knife used to cut meat is missing. Bernard!”
Eleon called out to the butler.
However, there was no sign of him.
Eleon frowned as he belatedly recalled that he had warned everyone not to go near the back garden because he wanted to have a good time with Elysia.
“I’ll go get a knife.”
“I’ll go get it.”
“No. I’m faster. Just rest here.”
Eleon kissed Elysia’s cheek, waved his hand, and headed towards the mansion.
“Huhu. So cute.”
It was good to see him having fun.
She’s happy to see Eleon smiling so happily.
The feeling of loving someone was strange.
She’s more satisfied with giving than in receiving.
Eleon looked like a desperate man wanting to do everything for Elysia.
When she was ‘Rona’, she worried and took care of Eleon, but it wasn’t just goodwill and good feelings.
She was working for a paycheck, and that’s why she was just working hard.
“You must have been very frustrated when you were blind.”
Because she knew of his painful and difficult days, it was so precious to be able to see those sides of him now.
“Elysia is 20 years old, but it’s a bit weird if I think he’s cute, right?”
From 27-year-old Won Yoon-Ji’s point of view, it was a trap to see a 25-year-old Eleon.
In a way, she felt the charm of both a younger man and an older man.
Sometimes he was cute like a big puppy, and sometimes he was like a hungry wolf that would bite her at any moment.
Elysia stomped on the ground but stopped shortly after.
“I should have gone with him.”
She got bored in these few minutes while waiting for Eleon.
She thought she knew his heart who kept asking on reading him a book after begging her to sleep with him.
“Then, should I go find him?”
It was then that she got up from her chair to look for Eleon.
“Ugh.”
A hand reaching out from behind covered her nose and mouth with a handkerchief.
Oh, no.
Her world shook in a blur.
She saw the lights of the firewood surrounding the nicely cooked meat, and the small glass lamps in the tent that Eleon had decorated, but her vision soon dimmed.
After a while, Eleon came back with a sharp knife.
“Elysia.”
However, the figure of her that he expected to welcome him was nowhere to be seen.
“Where did she go? Did she go wash her hands?”
Eleon’s gaze went back and forth from the mansion to the meat so it wouldn’t burn.
But when she didn’t come back after a while, the expression on his face gradually disappeared.
“Elysia!”
Eleon’s expression running towards the mansion calling her name was the face of a ferocious beast.
* * * * *
The sun began to set.
A man’s shadow appeared beside the winged lion-shaped statue that adorned the roof of the old Clevent Palace.
Sonatek, a man in a black priest’s suit and a white mask, looked down at Eleon, who was running towards the mansion while calling Elysia’s name with a stern look.
Under the expressionless mask, a joyful laugh came out.
“You are one step late. God’s chess piece.”
As Eleon ran, the assailants carrying the fainted Elysia in a black sack managed to climb the ridge that had neither a fence nor wall.
Sonatek understood as he stood looking over all of this.
Just as an ant crawling on the surface of an apple cannot know the shape of the whole apple, so Eleon will never know or understand the law of causality that drives him.
“Although Elysia’s death is too late.”
Sonatek felt like the superior and great transcendent of this world.
And that feeling temporarily covered the nervousness of waiting for the ending to come back to reality.
“No matter how hard you look, you won’t find her.”
He would hear the news of Elysia again in the obituary.
T/N: obituary is a notice of a death, especially in a newspaper, typically including a brief biography of the deceased person.
“Accept your fate, Eleon. That’s your mission and God’s will.”
Then Sonatek murmured grimly.
“This time, Won Yun-Ji. I must deal with her.”
