<Only the Spirit of Time can stand shoulder to shoulder with me. Only when his power returns can I balance and get greater power.>
‘Ah~!’
No wonder Phoebe called him by the name of Karnov – Phoebe, who even called the emperor a landlord! – so that must be why.
‘Is Prasti among the opera members? Or…’
Phoebe shook his head.
<Isn’t there someone who urged you to do evil? That singer must have surrendered to his power. That’s Prasti’s strength.>
‘Then, it must be the employer after all?’
Prasti for the person trying to disrupt her small shop? Alexei had given Asha a hint about the identity of the person who hired Zoya.
‘What should I do? Do I do it like I did to Ivan?’
Ivan, who recently regained a strand of emotion, was still focusing on sword training. It seemed like achieving something through hard work became his determination.
<Yeah. I can do something if you feed me a lot of things you made.>
‘Okay, then I’ll…’
Just as Asha and Phoebe were pondering over it…
“Your Highness! His Majesty has come.”
Upon hearing the voice from outside, Lise, who had briefly stepped out, relayed the news with a surprised tone. Asha’s eyes widened.
“Grandfather? Here?”
“He’ll be here soon. You have to hurry up and get ready to greet him.”
Asha only looked at Lise with a bewildered face as she held her spatula.
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“It’s because of Grandfather.”
“…What?”
Mikhail turned his head with a furrowed brow. It was Alexei’s idea to take Asha to the opera. Mikhail readily gave permission to Asha’s cousin when he said he wanted to show her an interesting performance.
However, he did not anticipate that something unpleasant would happen on the way back, souring Asha’s mood. Despite directly summoning Asha’s close maid, Lise, and questioning her, the emperor didn’t gain much information.
He was clueless on how to cheer up his granddaughter, so he came to see her personally during afternoon tea time.
And his granddaughter presented him with a stack of about ten pancakes, claiming they had just been made.
“You’ve heard everything, haven’t you, from Alyosha.”
“Keum.”
The emperor coughed dryly.
Of course, shouldn’t you have a solution before you visit your granddaughter? Fortunately Alexei spoke without hesitation.
The fact that someone falsely complained in front of the store that Asha signed with Baroness Saratov, and that person ended up standing on the opera stage where they were going to watch the performance, and that it was Valery, the son of the emperor, who hired the actor.
”Why, is it my fault? Are you going to lecture me saying I raised my children poorly?”
“How could I say something like that to Your Majesty?”
It sounded like he was going to say something to Valery. The emperor, looking at his granddaughter in that manner, silently revised his treatment of Valery in his mind.
“If it’s not about lecturing me, how is it my fault?”
“I’m talking about Zoya’s problem!”
“Zoya?”
The servant whispered softly beside him.
“Your Majesty, the name of the opera singer.”
The emperor nodded.
“How can it be my fault?”
“Why would Zoya do such a thing? It’s because there’s no child support.”
“That’s my fault?”
“Whose fault would it be if it was your people who made a choice that they shouldn’t make while struggling from pain?”
Until just a moment ago, she was a granddaughter, whose lips had pouted indignantly a moment before, but now her voice was as stern as if the goddess of justice was dividing sin and punishment.
It was hard to believe what came out of the mouth of a ten-year-old girl, so it was even more strange. The emperor, who was cutting the pancakes with a fork, stopped moving and looked at his granddaughter quietly.
In the meantime, Asha was eating the pancakes and berry combo she made in a combative move.
“…Yes, it’s my fault.”
“That’s right. It’s grandfather’s fault.”
The emperor did not want to admit that he was relieved by the fact that the title that came out of his granddaughter’s lips had returned from ‘Your Majesty’ to ‘grandfather.’
“Then what do you want me to do?”
The chamberlain leaned slightly next to the emperor again.
“Zoya’s son is named Niki.”
The emperor nodded.
“Would you be satisfied if I brought him back?”
“If it were up to me, I would rather live without my father who abandoned me and end up resenting him. I wouldn’t even want to see him.”
“Then do you want me to kill him?”
“Oh my! Give them money.”
“Money?”
Asha told Lise to bring vanilla ice cream and scooped a large scoop into the emperor’s bowl with all her strength. Asha, who held the bowl and leaned it further towards the emperor, grinned broadly.
“Niki’s dad ran away without taking responsibility, so he should repay it with money!”
“I got it.”
“Oh! But what if Niki’s dad says he’ll give the money but keeps postponing?”
The emperor had now completely stopped the knife in his hand. His granddaughter looked at him with innocent eyes, then took a big bite of the pancake. With a sigh, the emperor picked up a napkin and wiped the syrup from Asha’s mouth.
“I will personally provide child support to Zoya, and any money that is owed will be collected from Niki’s father. Even if I don’t know who Niki’s father is, he won’t be able to delay the debt owed to the emperor.”
Asha added another scoop of vanilla ice cream with a wide smile. The emperor looked at his granddaughter’s smiling face and clicked his tongue inside.
‘She let go of her resentment.’
It was almost as if the incident of Zoya, the opera singer, making a fuss in front of the store just because she didn’t have money was being treated as a non-issue.
“Anyway, I heard that the daughter of Marchioness Tataricha is going to attend the tea party.”
Unlike before, Asha, who was eating ice cream and pancakes at once with a rather soft attitude, paused and raised her head.
“That… to be exact, the marchioness sent me a letter. She said her daughter is the same age as me and invited me to come and play. It seemed like it would be fun.”
“Aren’t you going because the Marchioness of Tataricha gave you a good review of the patisserie cake?”
“Ahaha.”
His granddaughter smiled as if he had hit the nail on the head. The emperor waved his hand to show that he did not intend to interrogate her, and winked at the chamberlain. It meant to have a new dress made for his granddaughter to wear to the tea party. As the topic shifted to the tea party, the shadow that had lingered on his granddaughter’s face seemed to fade slightly.
“By the way, you lost your gloves?”
“Oh! That’s right. Yes, I was so upset about it.”
The emperor clicked his tongue again. It was clear that his granddaughter was not capable of telling lies. It’s because she rolled her eyes like that.
“Well, we’ll have to have a new pair made.”
His granddaughter mumbled that she was okay, smiling bashfully. The emperor asked for all the remaining pancakes on the plate to be sent to Ashtad Palace before getting up from his seat.
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“What’s all this, Your Highness the Princess?”
Asha glanced at Karnov, who asked teasingly. The kitchen that Asha received from the emperor itself was open, but belonged to the depths of the Taimir Palace, the palace of the Crown Prince Alexei. In other words, it was a place where not everyone could come and go.
And if she had to choose someone who could walk in and out of such a kitchen, it would be Alexei’s friend, the next Duke of Sedvoyer, Karnov Neustadter, who made great contributions in the last war.
Asha replied to Karnov’s rhythm.
“It’s a pancake made with plenty of milk. I’m making all the remaining batter. Would you like some, Lord Karnov?”
“…There’s still batter left?”
Karnov alternated his gaze between the plate Asha offered and the large bowl on the counter, then composed himself politely.
“How do you make this?”
Thinking that Karnov’s interest was merely out of politeness, Asha elaborated on the process of making this batter with enthusiasm.
First, she put the milk in a milk pan and mixed the flour and yeast while it was heating. She added a spoonful of sugar, made the milk warm without boiling it completely, and mixed it with the powder.
While waiting for the batter to rise, she took out a handful of strawberries from the refrigerator. Only selecting the bright red ones that glistened like jewels.
As she removed the stems and cut the strawberries into small pieces, she added sugar to a pan on the stove and increased the heat. When the sugar melted like caramel, she poured in the sliced strawberries and quickly cooked them, adding a squeeze of lemon juice before turning off the heat, completing a tangy yet sweet strawberry compote.
“After that, you just need to cook the risen batter. That’s what we’re doing now.”
“If you’re not in a good mood, why are you grilling so much?”
“Who says I’m not in a good mood?”
“Alexei.”
“Did Karnov come to the palace because of my feelings?”
“I guess it’s true that you’re in a bad mood.”
Asha tried to say no but she stopped when she looked at her twentieth pancake.
“A little…”
“Why? Because of the singer?”
“Oh, my God. Are there any secrets here? Or do Alexei and Karnov have a very meaningful relationship where you talk about anything?”
Karnov, who quickly picked up a pancake baked by Asha and put it in his mouth, continued with a mysterious expression.
“The latter is not wrong, but the former.”
“Oh, it’s not exactly because of Zoya. It’s just…”
“Just?”
“You swear you won’t laugh.”
“I can’t do that.”
Asha glanced at Karnov, then sighed, poured the last remaining batter at the bottom of the bowl onto the pan, and opened her mouth.
“Then just listen. Well, it’s actually not a big deal. It’s just… it’s the first time I’ve heard someone say that the snacks aren’t tasty.”
“…?”
A puzzled expression appeared on Karnov’s face. Asha, noticing his expression, blushed and stared intently at the bubbles in the pancakes.
“I made snacks for the first time after I came to the imperial palace. Since then, everyone has said it’s delicious… To hear someone say they taste bad for the first time…”
“But it’s not like the opera singer Zoya really meant it. She was hired to make a bad comment.”
