I’m the Main Character’s Child

“My lady, you’ll fall down.”

“Yes.”

Vinset Square was full of energy as the harvest festival was just around the corner.

There have already been several times that I almost fell over a stone beak while looking at the buildings with splendid decorations.

Elvin, who followed me as my escort, approached with a worried look.

“The square is dangerous, but alleys are especially dangerous. You must never go there alone.” 

“Yes!”

Looking at Elvin speaking more harshly, I answered modestly.

There were several alleys around Vinset Square.

Among them is the alley of 6th Street, where the man’s scented candle shop was located. Shops with a cute atmosphere were gathered together.

“Elvin, it doesn’t look dangerous at all. The alley is so cute.”

“That’s because it’s an alley on Sixth street. Each alley has a completely different atmosphere. There are also many dangerous alleys where you may be robbed as soon as you enter.”

“I see. I want to come play with Papa next time.”

Looking at the shops with a mellow atmosphere reminded me of Cardin, who couldn’t come today.

Cardin, who still had a lot of work to do, took a heavy step to the palace this morning.

Before getting on the carriage, he gave Elvin an order to protect me because he didn’t know where I might run.

I stomped my feet, saying, “Don’t treat me like a child,” but the carriage drove away ferociously.

“But… Elvin. Everything else is cute, but what’s wrong with this part?”

I looked around the alley and then looked at the store in front of me and asked. 

Unlike other stores that are harmonized with cozy pastel colors, the store in front of me was gloomy.

First of all, the exterior of the store was unconventional.

The wall of the store was full of bumpy stones, and wooden boards were entangled on the ceiling.

Beyond roughness, the bright red ribbon hanging from the windows of the ruins-like store emphasized the incongruity.

“This store must have gone under. Let’s go, Elvin.”

Compared to other clean and cute stores, I was briefly curious about its very foreign appearance, but it soon disappeared.

My priority was to find a scented candle shop rather than looking around now.

“M…… my lady. I don’t think you have to go.”

“What?”

“Here.”

Where Elvin pointed his finger, there was a sign of a ruined store that I had been looking for a while.

[Scented candles that brings happiness] 

“Why is it here?”

The sign was the same as the name of the store that the man told me.

I really don’t want to go in.

When I opened the door of the spooky store, I felt like a mouse would pop out right away.

“Is it really here?”

“This is the only candle shop in this alley.”

“Is that so…….…?”

This was the only scented candle shop I saw while passing through the alley.

I remembered the man’s words that his business was not doing well.

“I understand why there are no customers.” 

I wanted to grab the man who was depressed because there were no customers and ask him if he really didn’t know why.

“I’ll take the lead.”

Elvin took the lead and grabbed the handle of the store door.

When he opened the door, the sound of an old hinge rang out like a scream in the store.

I followed Elvin inside with an unwilling step.

“Oh.”

Unlike the exterior, the interior was clean and well-organized.

Various scented candles were neatly placed waiting for their owner in the wooden display case.

“Nice smell…”

The scent flowing into my nose made me feel at ease for some reason.

“Oh, you’re here!”

Then a man appeared from inside the store.

“The store is a bit of a mess…… I was cleaning up.”

The man said, scratching his cheek shyly.

Perhaps it was true that he was cleaning, a mass of dust settled on the man’s head.

“I think you should clean the outside rather than inside….”

Her true feelings came out, but the man seemed to have not heard it because I murmured quietly.

“Welcome. It is a scented candle that brings happiness!”

The man greeted us loudly, saying he wanted to greet us formally. Then he introduced himself. 

The man’s name was Jacques Robben, and he asked me to call him Jacques comfortably.

Jacques, who left his home at the age of 15, wandered around until he met his current teacher.

Since then, he has been wandering around the country with his teacher to learn about various herbs, and eight years ago, he set up a small store in Vinset Square and settled down.

“I made up my mind and decorated the store myself. We don’t have as many customers as we expected. Haha.”

“Did you decorate it yourself? Outside the store…?”

“Of course. The part I cared about the most is the outside of the store!”

That?

Jacques had a special pride in his medicinal herbs.

He said that he decorated the store from the inside to the outside in order to properly utilize the eco-friendly and healthy feeling of herbs.

“I think it’s a little boring. So, I even put a cute ribbon on the window…….”

Jacques explained excitedly and went back to his somber appearance.

“I think it would be nice to decorate it like the stores around you. If you want to feel eco-friendly, you can put plants outside….”

“Yes. At first, it felt more like an abandoned cabin than a candle shop.”

Elvin agreed with her.

Jacques, who listened to me and Elvin, blinked as if he had no idea.

“It might have looked like that. Indeed. “

Jacques smiled innocently, saying that it was the first time hearing such a thing.

Maybe he was originally bright and talkative, but he gradually relaxed as he talked about his teacher one by one.

“When I first opened the store, my teacher was surprised, saying it was amazing. Since I’ve been on the road with my teacher for a long time, I guess it didn’t feel strange.”

I want to ask his teacher what he meant by amazing.

“Thank you very much for letting me know. I’ll fix it right away!”

I and Elvin applauded Jacques, who clenched his fists and showed passion.

Soon after, Jacques guided me and Elvin to his teacher’s lab on the second floor of the store as if he remembered why we came there.

“My teacher always studied Merket here. I don’t know why he studied that ominous flower.”

“Ominous?”

“It’s a flower that only grows in the area where the ballroom is formed. It’s so hard to get, but the nobles want to have it…. Ugh.”

Jacques, who was chatting, closed his mouth in a straight line.

He must have forgotten that next to him is also a noble

“That’s not it.”

“It’s okay. That’s not why I’m collecting merket.”

I shrugged my shoulders and answered in a casual way.

Still, the conversation a while ago made Jacques’s mouth heavier, who was chattering lightly, as if he was alert.

“Then…… feel free to look around.”

When I opened the door of the lab and entered, the first thing that welcomed me was the smell of damp dust.

Thick books, papers filled with unknown pictures and writings were filling the lab.

“Since my Master left, I haven’t touched anything, so it’s very messy.”

In fact, it was more like a messy room than a lab.

The papers on the floor and even the windows stood out the most.

“Your teacher must have been serious about Merkel’s research.”

Elvin looked around the room and said. 

This should give me some clues about Merkets.

“No, it’s…!”

At that time, Elvin, who was sneaking through the research data, lamented with a startled look.

“Why? What is it? What is it?”

Surprised by Elvin’s reaction, I approached Elvin in a heartbeat.

“Look at this. Princess!”

“Yes!”

Elvin held out a paper believed to be research material in an excited voice.

“It’s a really bad handwriting!”

“…..” 

Elvin was genuinely surprised, saying, “I’ve never seen such a bad handwriting in my life.”

I thought he found something amazing.

It was steaming, but as Elvin said, the handwriting was so difficult to read or understand that I wondered if it was an imperial writing.

“Excuse me, Jacques.”

“Yes, princess.”

“Is this in imperial language?”

He looked at other data just in case, but he couldn’t recognize it either.

“I’m sorry… I can’t read his handwriting either. It’s definitely imperial, but I couldn’t read it.”

The years they spent together collapsed in the face of bad handwriting.

“This and that.”

I looked at all the research data recorded by a teacher.

The Imperial language was certainly correct.

The problem was that only words could be read from time to time because of the illegible handwriting, although I knew it was imperial.

When I asked Jacques how he published the book, he said that the research data he gave him was written in proper imperial language.

Why did he write so badly here when he knew how to use imperial language?

Eventually, research data related to Merket became a pie in the sky.

As I stared at the earthworm-like handwriting, I felt empty and disappointed. 

I was about to tell Elvin to go back, but he was greatly impressed by the map attached to the wall of the research room.

“This map. The terrain is very well represented.”

A map that shows the characteristics of the terrain so well is said to be traded at a very high price.

Usually, the lords of each territory were equipped with one to prepare for the territorial war, but it was something that ordinary tour people could not see.

“Hmm?”

Elvin, who was looking at the map in admiration, suddenly inhaled.

Elvin’s face hardened quickly and approached Jacques and asked.

“Where did you get this map?”

“Huh? I don’t know………. It’s something that my Master always carried around……….”

“That’s weird.”

Elvin was now busy looking at the map with his face almost drawn into it.

“What’s wrong, Elvin?”

“There has never been a map like this before. This is the first map in which the topography of the northern region is expressed in such detail.”

Elvin carefully swept the northern terrain marked on the map with his hands as if he had found the world’s rarest treasure.