Chapter 10
Chapter 10
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: penny
Chapter: 10
Chapter Title: Don't Dismiss Our Meeting as a Mere Mistake
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Esther's cheeks flushed a lovely pink. The sight stirred Helios, and with a low chuckle, he opened his mouth.
"I see the Empire's Little Sun, Your Highness the Crown Prince."
Her cheeks rosy and endearing. As that thought flitted through his mind, Helios chuckled softly and spoke.
"No need for such formalities, Merchant Guild Master. Raise your head. I only wished to chat with you briefly in passing."
At his words, Esther, who had hesitated, lifted her gaze to meet Helios's.
Helios found the sight utterly satisfying. How long had he waited to once more behold that bright smile directed straight at him?
"I offer my deepest gratitude for your boundless mercy."
Her polite words, drawing a subtle line between them, furrowed Helios's brow deeply.
He wanted her to treat him as she had at their first meeting.
Back when neither knew the other's status, chatting freely and happily, when she had vented about her father's mishaps.
"Do you remember meeting me?"
In the two years since, he had become a man past twenty, and his feelings for Esther were no longer mere youthful infatuation.
Perhaps that was why he could summon the courage to approach the first love he had only watched from afar.
"Y-yes?"
Esther's eyes widened at the unexpected question, her words stumbling.
Helios felt a surge of delight at her expression. She was still as lovable as ever, a woman he couldn't help but adore.
"I remember it vividly still."
That day—your smile that made me happy just to see it, your retreating figure I counted the days to meet again, your every cherished moment.
"Do you remember too, Merchant Guild Master?"
Helios gazed down at her with eyes so tender and warm they could hide nothing. To anyone watching, he was a man unmistakably in love.
"O-of course I remember. How could I forget?"
"I was truly delighted to meet you then. And you?"
I hope you felt the same. Give me a chance to call your name fondly—or at least leave room for me to try.
His heart pounded wildly, lost in the fever of unrequited love. Then, her lips parted.
"I..."
"..."
"I was delighted too, Sir Knight."
Two years. Time spent treasuring just that smile, capturing her silhouette in his heart. Helios had thought it enough.
But in this moment, he realized it had been arrogance.
When the nineteen-year-old beauty's eyes curved prettily and her lips formed a perfect arc, he wondered if his heart might leap from his chest.
The memory of their first encounter shattered, clouding Helios's vision.
"Your Highness?"
"...You've forgotten it all?"
Helios seized Esther's hand before him in desperation. She let out a small gasp at his grip, tight enough to hurt.
"You've forgotten everything?"
Stunned by his sudden action, Esther couldn't even think to pull away.
"Is that truly what you think?"
Helios whispered to her with pleading eyes. At the same moment, Esther's hand slipped from his grasp.
His senses sharpened instantly, overwhelmed by an unbearable terror and dread—the same feeling from the carriage.
"Didn't you tell me how your father, the Merchant Guild Master Ete, left important contracts behind, calling him such a scatterbrain? That he was always fumbling for things in his hands."
"Your Highness, as I said earlier..."
"You said the roses in the garden were so pretty. That you hated how your red hair drew everyone's stares."
"..."
"You called me 'Sir Knight' and told me how kind the people at your guild were. You said you'd repay the favor someday and invited me to visit."
It was only natural for Esther to be flustered by Helios reciting their encounter from two years ago so vividly.
How could he remember it all so clearly? Was this truly the man who had used and discarded her?
"Esther..."
She flinched at Helios calling her name like a plea.
This couldn't be. He had never looked at her like that before. He had only said her name in formal settings, reluctantly at best.
Something was wrong.
"Please tell me what I did wrong, why you've come to hate me."
"..."
"I want to keep a good relationship with you going forward."
What "good relationship"? One where he took what benefited him and tossed her aside? A formal tie on paper, kept at arm's length?
Esther bit her lip against the bitter taste in her mouth, swallowing her resentment.
She mustn't forget—he was the sort who always seized usable cards for himself.
"Your Highness, we can maintain a good relationship. I want that too."
"Then you..."
"You're a valued patron of our guild. How could I possibly dislike you? Such words are too presumptuous even to utter. Please, no more."
"..."
"Also, from now on, address me as Elpis Merchant Guild Master. Others might misunderstand if they hear. Unlike me, with no care for rumors as long as I survive, you must be more cautious, Your Highness."
Don't say my name again, Helios von Evgenia.
You, bound by noble etiquette, bask in recognition there as the Crown Prince, and everything's solved.
"I apologize for my ignorance in not recognizing you back then. I truly thought you were a knight. If I'd known how shameful such ignorance was, I could have made up for that past mistake."
"Mistake?"
The word crushed Helios's heart. She saw their meeting as a mere mistake.
That fleeting freedom from his confined role as Crown Prince, repeating the same duties—she called it a mistake.
"I apologize for wasting your time chattering lightly about my personal trifles and forcing you to listen."
"No, that's not—"
It wasn't meant as something to apologize for, Esther.
Don't apologize to me. Don't write it all off as a mistake.
Please don't.
"I earnestly beg you to forget my unseemly behavior from back then."
Forget? Impossible. If she knew how beautiful she had been, she wouldn't say such things.
As her words severed the fragile thread connecting them, Helios desperately sought another way.
If this could keep any link to her, he'd offer any weakness. It didn't matter what.
In that fleeting moment, amid swirling thoughts, Helios spoke.
"Since you find it so embarrassing, I'll share my own shame. Then you won't feel so bad."
"Pardon?"
Helios gave a wry smile, one corner of his mouth quirking up.
"Lately, I've been having strange dreams, feeling odd emotions."
"..."
Esther sat frozen, unable to respond. Helios glanced at her and continued.
"But oddly familiar. I've never experienced anything like it, yet it feels like my own memory."
"..."
"And you're always there."
Esther's hands trembled faintly.
"When I wake, I remember almost nothing. But one thing sticks."
Impossible. It couldn't be.
"Your eyes glaring at me with resentment. That's vivid. Lately, I even hear murmurs of a crowd."
Esther clasped her visibly shaking hands, hiding them in her skirt folds.
This couldn't be. Surely...
"Feels like I got too close to you for no reason, leading to these thoughts. Sharing something personal like this—quite the blunder on my part, no?"
"..."
"Is that alright?"
Esther wanted to scream and flee this absurd situation, but her legs had gone weak; she couldn't even stand.
"Are you hurting somewh—"
Helios leaned toward her with a worried face. Esther just wanted to escape. Then came a knock.
"I'm late, it's Carter. May I enter?"
"Come in."
Helios clicked his tongue regretfully, returning to his seat, whispering near her as he passed.
"I've made a big mistake too, so now that we've shared our blunders, wouldn't it be nice to get closer?"
Unlike Helios, who listened to the product introductions with a somewhat eased mind, Esther's face was deathly pale.
As the talk wrapped up, Helios addressed her for that reason.
"Merchant Guild Master, your face is ashen. You should retire and rest."
Mumbling a reply, Esther stepped into the corridor and turned the corner—only to pale further. Silver hair, all too familiar, approached her.
"I see the Empire's Little Sun, Your Highness the Crown Prince."
Noel de Micarus. Why was he in the Imperial Palace?