The Interrogation That Wasn't
I kicked my legs wildly on the bed the moment I got home after rescheduling my next meeting with Everett to return the handkerchief. Only my upper body was lying down, but that was more than enough.
After burying my face in the pillow and screaming into it, I finally calmed down.
I carefully got up, making sure my shoes didn’t touch the bed, and spun around in circles inside my tiny room.
‘This is a green light, right?’
I’d already made my move, and now I was starting to worry.
What if I was just being completely oblivious and throwing myself at him?
My heart kept flipping back and forth by the minute. I felt like I’d turned into Count Asura.
‘Still, if we keep meeting, things will sort themselves out one way or another.’
I sat on the edge of my worn-out desk, tugging at my hair, then comforted myself and decided to go to bed early.
‘Yeah, yeah. Just sleep for now.’
It was pure escapism.
The next day.
Thanks to an overdose of dopamine, I woke up earlier than I needed to.
I’d already finished getting ready for work, but there was still a lot of time left. After some thought, I decided to head in a little early.
‘I’ll just catch up on the backlog.’
I skipped the shared carriage on purpose and walked all the way to the office, yet the place was still completely empty.
I brewed a strong cup of tea and sat down at my desk.
The moment I took a sip before starting work, it was like a signal—the office door opened and Connie walked in.
“Lina, you’re early today?”
After confirming I was the only one there, Connie raised both hands and waved them wildly.
“Yeah, so are you.”
I waved back shyly in greeting. Connie immediately strode over to me.
“Perfect timing.”
She had a mischievous glint in her eyes and a wicked smile that made me instinctively take a step back.
It was the kind of evil grin that screamed she was up to no good.
“Perfect for what?”
I edged backward, trying to put some distance between us, but Connie closed the gap in one swift motion and linked her arm with mine.
“I was so curious yesterday I couldn’t sleep at all.”
The conversation was already heading in a dangerous direction.
“Who was that guy you went to the restaurant by the fountain with yesterday?”
Connie gripped my arm like she was putting me in a chokehold.
“Restaurant? Guy?”
There was a one hundred percent chance she was talking about Everett Rohas, but I decided to deny it anyway.
“Lina, are you seriously keeping secrets from me too?”
Connie released my arm, planted her hands on her hips, and started huffing dramatically.
“I have proof. You know my childhood friend Heather, right? The kid who used to live next door to her saw everything.”
“That kid was you! You said Heather’s house was right next to the temple!”
“Exactly. I saw it all, so just confess already.”
I let out a deep sigh at the thought that I’d been caught red-handed by Connie of all people.
“That person… is Sir Everett Rohas, isn’t he?”
Connie’s instincts were terrifyingly sharp.
She guessed his identity in one shot.
“Are you two dating?”
And just like that, she immediately treated the idea of me and Everett being in a relationship as an established fact.
I waited for Connie to calm down a little before carefully denying it.
“It’s not like that.”
“You went to the lovers’ sacred ground—a restaurant—just the two of you on your day off, and you’re telling me you’re not dating?”
It was like she’d learned interrogation techniques while locked up in the imperial temporary detention center.
Connie’s questioning was surprisingly sharp.
“If sharing one meal makes us lovers, then I guess I’ve been dating every single student at the academy.”
But I wasn’t going to go down that easily.
‘Because we’re not actually dating.’
“And those people didn’t split a couple’s set with you at the lovers’ sacred ground restaurant, did they?”
For a second I thought Connie had tailed us and watched us eat.
When she accurately pointed out the exact menu we’d ordered yesterday, I flinched without meaning to.
Noticing my reaction, Connie gave me another one of those wicked smiles.
“So you did order the couple’s set, huh?”
One careless comment from me had handed her another card.
‘Did she go to the imperial detention center to get interrogated, or to learn how to interrogate?’
My resentment somehow ended up flying straight toward Duke Camelot.
‘If that man had just lived properly, Connie’s leading-question skills wouldn’t have improved, and I wouldn’t have gotten caught eating the couple’s set with Everett!’
But my attempt at escape was ultimately caught by the scruff of the neck by Connie.
“Oh my, Lady Carolina Diaz, your eyes are looking somewhere else entirely. Are you thinking about Sir Everett right now?”
“I said it’s not like that!”
When I snapped, Connie burst out laughing.
After laughing for a long time, she suddenly lowered her voice.
“If you don’t confess willingly…”
Connie paused dramatically to build tension before continuing.
“I’m going to make plans with you every single holiday from now on.”
The utterly wicked expression on her face made it clear she wasn’t going to let this go easily.
I heard footsteps in the hallway outside the office and quickly whispered to Connie.
“We’ve just met a few times. We’re not dating.”
“So you’re not lovers yet, but you’re going to become lovers?”
Connie kept teasing me until the very end. The moment the office door opened, she whistled innocently and returned to her seat.
At that point, I would have welcomed even Donovan, who was probably still swinging a pickaxe in the mines right about now.
‘But it’s Andrew Nopen.’
My relief didn’t even last a full second.
As soon as lunchtime arrived, Connie disappeared and then returned, dragging a chair over to sit beside me. She whispered,
“I looked into it a bit. Sir Everett Rohas—”
I quickly clapped a hand over Connie’s mouth in case anyone was eavesdropping.
Connie made muffled “mmph mmph” sounds and struggled to pull away.
“Listen here, Miss Constance.”
I whispered rapidly into her ear.
“I already told you we’re not dating. What exactly have you been doing?”
If I could, I would’ve grabbed her by the collar and shaken her.
Connie raised both hands in surrender.
Only then did I remove my hand from her mouth.
Connie let out a huge breath, then lowered her voice and said,
“I have some tact, you know. I wasn’t going to ask outright if you were dating. I just said I got to know him through that incident last time.”
His existence.
Connie glanced at me and added,
“I told them I was curious what kind of person the Emperor’s close aide was. Like I was trying to build a connection in case there was something to gain.”
Thankfully, it didn’t look like a rumor would spread tomorrow morning claiming I was marrying Everett next month.
‘Damn civil servant society.’
This was the kind of place where if you asked around for a good doctor because you weren’t feeling well, the rumor would be circulating by the day after tomorrow that you were planning to quit and re-enroll in the Academy’s medical department.
Connie, who had been watching my reaction, whispered like a devil tempting its prey.
“Aren’t you curious? About what I heard?”
To be honest, I was.
Connie linked her arm with mine again.
“Should we go outside to talk? Come on.”
I pretended to give in and followed Connie out.
She dragged me all the way to the most secluded corner of the garden behind the Ministry of Finance building. After checking that no one was around, she finally spoke.
“First of all, Everett Rohas is thirty years old.”
“What?”
He was older than I’d expected.
‘I’m twenty-two, so that’s an eight-year difference?’
Connie watched my reaction and quickly added, as if trying to smooth things over.
“Ah, but they say he enlisted in the army the moment he became an adult, so he doesn’t really have much of a past.”
I pretended not to be particularly interested and continued listening.
“He’s originally from a serf family in the east.”
Most commoners in the empire were freemen, but in regions where feudalism still lingered, serfdom remained.
Being bound to a lord, serfs were at the very bottom of the commoner class.
But Connie, who knew I didn’t particularly care about social status, casually glossed over that part.
“Still, he distinguished himself in the military, received a knighthood, and will apparently be granted a territory soon. And this next part I heard from someone who knows Sir Rohas personally.”
Connie puffed out her chest, proud of her information network.
“According to both subjective and objective sources, his personality is gentle and affectionate…”
‘Gentle and affectionate?’
The image of Everett sending a thug straight to the grave overlapped in my mind.
‘He does have good manners, but he seemed more like the prickly type?’
Regardless of my doubts, Connie kept talking.
“He’s one of the Emperor’s closest aides, and even though he’s quite handsome, he has a clean record with women.”
I could let the “gentle and affectionate” part slide.
People show slightly different sides of themselves depending on who they’re with.
But there was one part I absolutely couldn’t let go.
“That face is only ‘quite handsome’?”
I reacted as if I’d just been told there were two moons in the sky. Connie snorted.
“Why don’t you just say outright, ‘To me, he’s the most handsome man in the world’?”
Connie rubbed at her arms, claiming she had goosebumps.
‘That’s… pretty accurate, actually.’
But I’d already missed my chance to argue.
‘If that face is only “quite handsome,” the empire needs to change its name.’
To something like the Face Welfare State or Ocular Utopia.
I felt incredibly wronged.