Chapter 3
“Your Majesty.”
Luke opened his eyes. He hadn’t been sleeping anyway. The glass that had been precariously balanced in his hand fell to the floor, but the empty glass didn’t break, rolling on the soft carpet until it collided with someone’s shoe.
His dazed gaze followed the glass. When he recognized the person, he murmured slowly.
“Gideon.”
Now a habitual gesture, he pressed his forehead with his fingers and stared at Gideon, his loyal knight. Gideon spoke up.
“I wish to descend to my estate, Your Majesty.”
“Only now that you’ve finally tasted power?”
It had been three years since the rebellion.
The seemingly eternal civil war had ended, and now Luke, who had barely grasped the power befitting an emperor, chuckled at the sight of Gideon, his first-class confidant and knight who had elevated him to this position.
Whatever. He owed his life to him anyway. Whoever had kept him alive until now.
“My wife is unwell, Your Majesty. I wish to go down to the estate to take care of her.”
Wife, wife.
Luke tried to remember who Gideon’s wife was, but nothing came to mind. They had married quite a while ago, and they had no children. Gideon had always been reticent, and apart from mentioning his wife’s illness during important events, he hadn’t said much else.
Still, they seemed to get along. Luke had even seen a handkerchief that his wife had embroidered at the last hunting competition… Envious. There were lovers who were alive and moving.
Why am I alone?
The swirling thoughts in his mind remained uncontrollable, and the negative and destructive impulses that suddenly emerged continued to torment him. He wondered how long he could maintain his sanity.
For the past three years, Luke Olfenster had come to the same conclusion at the end of countless sleepless nights.
Before long, he would either go mad or die.
—
Gideon Edant’s announcement that he would leave the capital came as quite a shock to many.
Finally, the Emperor’s closest confidant, now that he has grasped power, is willingly descending to the countryside, where he can simply enjoy the favor of the ruler.
Moreover, when it became known that his reason for leaving was to care for his ailing wife, most people couldn’t understand it.
To think that Gideon Edant’s future would be so promising just to honor his wife from a fallen family. Especially considering they have no children.
Initially, many people took it as a joke, but gradually, as they realized Gideon was serious, they tried to persuade him.
Especially three years ago, when the emperor’s closest advisors, who knew of the emperor’s severe insomnia and lethargy since the fire at the Langsher Manor, didn’t welcome Gideon’s retirement as they feared the emperor’s sudden and unexplained death without Gideon, who had shown human reactions.
Especially those who knew that Gideon Edant’s wife, Marie Edant, was a concubine of the Empress from the Langsher family.
“Are you crazy, brother? Are you retiring just for that woman?”
Lately, there have been loud voices from the Edant Manor where Gideon stays.
The owner of these loud voices was mainly from the Edant Viscount’s family. He considered her like a step witch, believing that Gideon had resigned himself to the viscount position because of Marie Edant’s shortcomings.
“Watch your mouth, Hayden. She’s your sister-in-law.”
“Brother!”
The emperor’s close advisors, who knew of the emperor’s existence as if he were a corpse, thought that once Gideon left, the emperor might just die one day without saying anything.
Honestly, the emperor’s depression had reached dangerous levels.
In a position where he could have anything he wanted, the emperor showed no interest in anything. He seemed diligent in his duties as emperor, but it appeared more like an obligation than interest. And it wasn’t an obligation he desired.
-How many people have I killed to get this position? I can’t lose it easily. Then what about the dead ones?
Sometimes, with eyes so sunk that there seemed to be no words left even if he died like this, the emperor mumbled words that his advisors couldn’t tell if they were meant for them or for himself.
Deliberately passing it off as a joke, his close advisors knew that was the emperor’s true feelings.
Luke Olfenster was a better emperor than his incompetent and debauched grandfather, but his advisors wished he would become debauched instead.
At least then, they wouldn’t worry about him suddenly dying one day because he had some interest.
-I can’t do it anymore. I’d rather leave before being executed for killing Your Majesty.
-If you do that, it’s just murder. You’ll die!
Even with the honor of being a royal counselor, the advisors who tearfully retired, saying they would retire for the sake of their wives’ health, caused countless changes in advisors, who poured sleeping pills and wake-up pills, hoping for a miracle to keep the still-alive emperor alive.
And when the emperor heard the type and amount of sleeping pills and wake-up pills he demanded, the advisors suspected whether they were prescribing the emperor’s medication or ordering medicine to assassinate someone, and they handed in their resignation letters upon seeing the emperor pouring the pills into his mouth in front of them.
It was akin to trying to pass on a box of explosives to someone else. The emperor claimed he was regulating it in his own way, but the advisors accepted it as, “Is he regulating whether he goes to heaven or hell after dying?”
Anyway, because of the advisors who resigned and fled in just one day, the emperor didn’t bother to remember who the royal counselors were. When he called for an advisor, he just saw the human in front of him as a royal counselor.
So when the advisor Ralph, who had been accompanying the emperor when he personally visited the Edant Manor’s annex, had just become a royal counselor three days ago, he was now pondering how to submit his resignation to the chief counselor to escape from the mad emperor’s side.
Already, like all the previous advisors, he judged that it would be quicker for the emperor to die from excessive drug use than for a miracle to occur and cure the emperor’s insomnia.
With the honor of our grandfather at stake, I am certain there is no human who can cure this mad ruler! None at all!
—
“Gideon. Your wife?”
Luke asked, looking around the uninviting Edant Manor’s annex, which didn’t quite suit Gideon.
Grabbing Gideon’s shoulder to stop him from kneeling, Luke buried himself on the sofa in the reception room. There was only one sweating officer standing, who was barely an official visitor.
“She’s in bed, Your Majesty, feeling unwell.”
“Tell her to come out.”
Luke waved to the officer, who, trembling, took out a packet of medicine but hesitated to pour it into the teacup.
“Your Majesty, today has already been enough…”
Luke glanced at him indifferently, then put down the teacup.
Can’t go on for much longer. That man can’t either.
He ignored the advisor and grabbed a bottle of liquor from the table, as if it were a decoration. Gideon watched silently, without any movement.
“What are you doing? Go and bring her here. She said she was feeling unwell, so I brought an advisor myself, and yet you just stand there?”
The tone was sharp, but it sounded more imposing than sensitive, sluggish enough to be almost lethargic.
Seeing the emperor, whose only hobby seemed to be lounging around the room, moving, Gideon’s expression became more strained. Sensing this, Luke smirked.
“Your brother begged me to make sure his brother doesn’t leave the capital. Something about how his future would be ruined because of that witch-like woman…”
“You don’t need to listen to such nonsense, Your Majesty.”
“It was too annoying. Even though it’s your brother, I can’t just kill him.”
After spilling the tea on the carpet, Luke poured alcohol into the empty cup effortlessly. He no longer needed to consider someone else’s feelings or be cautious. There was no need for that.
He was the emperor, and that was a justified arrogance.
“Don’t worry, Gideon. I didn’t come here to kill your wife, as your brother’s wish.”
“Thank you, Your Majesty.”
To hear gratitude for not killing someone. Luke realized anew what it meant to hold power. How much he had desired such power in the past. As passionately as a boy in love.
Touching his chilled ambition, he looked at the alcohol in the cup. His corpse-like face reflected back at him.
Once he had power, what did he want to do first?
“If your wife is leaving because she’s sick, why not just make sure she’s not sick? Use medicine or advisors as much as you want. Here, in the capital.”
Ah, yes. He wanted to make a woman cry.
As much as I cried, as desperate as I was, I wanted to make you feel the same way. And after making you cry for a long time, I would tell you to hang on because I’ll forgive you. And then, what did I want to do next?
If we had a future, what would I have done?
For a moment, the grip on the glass in his hand couldn’t withstand his strength and shattered. With a brief, crisp sound of breaking, Luke wiped away the spilled alcohol and lifted his head. It felt like Gideon’s expression was even stiffer, but he dismissed it as a misconception.
“Anyway… If you say you won’t retire, your brother will probably quiet down too.”
He didn’t like noise. Anything that disturbed his sleep.
