Previously
Irenia feels a surge of protective affection for Caesar and decides to improve his speech to prevent further mockery from the nobility. Meanwhile, Empress Cornelia displays her cruelty while feeding her leopard, Shamerset, and punishes the Knight Commander for his failure to control the situation at the Emerald Palace.
“Look. If you put these words together…”
I quickly lined up cards showing “cat,” “dog,” “sail,” and “apple,” forming words from them.
“If you do that, it spells ‘Caesar.’”
Yet he merely stared at the floor, scattering the cards without the slightest interest.
“Is this boring for you?”
Still, I was not one to give up easily. Gathering the stack of cards once more, I picked out words like “ink,” “lemon,” “nest,” and “egg” to form a name.
“This is ‘Irenia.’ That’s my name.”
I glanced over at Caesar, who suddenly appeared far more focused than before. He had shown no reaction to his own name, yet the moment I mentioned mine, his attention was piqued.
What happened next was even more astonishing. Caesar reached out with his ring finger and drew out three cards.
“Ren.”
He had spelled out my nickname using just three cards. I couldn’t conceal my shock.
“Oh—how did you know?”
My astonishment steadily gave way to sheer delight, and my heart began to thud against my ribs.
“Wonderful! What else can you do?”
Sitting right where he was, he pieced together several more words. He sounded out words like “girl,” “pretty,” “wedding,” and “cake,” one after the other. When he even strung them into a full sentence, I had to admit the truth to myself.
I had vastly underestimated Caesar.
‘I see now. It was so simple that it bored him, wasn’t it?’
Even so, the path of learning was like scaling a steep, endless mountain. Merely recognizing a handful of words was not enough to put them into practice.
“Let’s move on to the next step.”
I decided we should try writing this time. Knowing I had to set an example, I touched quill to paper and clearly formed each letter.
Then, I placed a stylus and a wax tablet into his hand. It was the tool children used when first learning to write; pressing the metal stylus into the wax-coated surface left an impression. Since it could be smoothed over and reused countless times, it was ideal for practicing the basics.
He watched me for a moment, let out a soft sigh, and began inscribing the letters on his own. There was a faint hesitation at first, but his strokes quickly grew fluid.
“Incredible.”
Once again, I could not help but voice my admiration. He handled it with such startling grace, as though he had never stopped doing it.
“Would you like to write on paper?”
I handed him the quill I had been holding.
“Hold it like this, and slant the nib so the ink doesn’t splatter…”
I placed my hand gently over his right hand. His skin was warm. Together, our hands rose into the air, descending onto the parchment to dance in harmony, swiftly shaping words.
“You really are wonderful at this…”
Though it seemed he had not held a quill in quite some time, there was no hesitation in his hand. The letters flowed effortlessly across the page—so elegant and refined they could have served as a calligrapher’s model.
Watching this unfold, a tight sensation gripped my chest, a poignant blend of pride and heartache. What beautiful, noble handwriting.
A sudden ache tightened around my ribs.
What I saw there was unmistakable proof of his upbringing. Caesar was a prince; he had undoubtedly received a royal education. Not merely royal tutoring, but rigorous, systematic instruction from his earliest years.
Though the curse had clouded his mind, the marks of that refined upbringing remained vividly etched into him.
I was seeing a hidden side of Caesar, completely distinct from the man I thought I knew. It made me feel as if the distance between us had suddenly widened, chilling the breath in my chest.
It occurred to me that there were countless good qualities in Caesar I had yet to discover—traits hidden beneath the veil of the evil dragon’s curse.
Even a single line of script held immense weight. It was proof that Caesar, whom everyone dismissed as a wretched monster, was truly a prince of imperial blood.
Even without such proof, his noble lineage remained undeniable.
That was why it hurt twice as much. He was never meant to be treated this way.
Perhaps I, too, had looked down on him without realizing it.
Yet Caesar was still the prince who held the rightful claim to this empire’s throne. No matter how circumstances changed, that truth remained.
“Caesar.”
Unable to hold back, I wrapped my arms tightly around him. Not knowing why, he simply laughed softly in my embrace with innocent eyes.
A firm resolve settled deep within my heart. I would earn the Empress’s recognition no matter what it took. If it meant bringing Caesar even a shred more peace, I would gladly do it.
With that thought, a question suddenly rose in my mind.
“What exactly is a curse?”
“Curse?”
Caesar lifted his head from my arms. His hunched shoulders and warped, reptilian fingers came into view—a sight impossible to dismiss as a mere illness.
A curse. What a hideous, terrifying word. It meant wishing evil or calamity upon another, an extraordinary malice, yet what had happened to Caesar truly deserved no other name.
Anyone who had lived an ordinary life could never imagine such a thing, especially befalling a noble prince like Caesar. Who had dared conceive of such an abominable act?
“The Dragon’s Curse…”
Before marrying Caesar, overwhelmed by the sudden turn of events, I had only ever thought of it in vague abstractions.
I had never had the luxury of time to ponder why Caesar had been cursed, what its nature was, or how it took hold.
All I knew was that the curse afflicting him originated from the mad dragon Tigrush, who had attempted to destroy the world centuries ago and laid this ruin upon the royal line.
It was part of the founding myth of the Asitria Empire. Legend held that when the mad dragon Tigrush attempted to destroy the world, Archangelo, the majestic first King of the empire, defeated him.
It was said that the dragon, unable to best the King, cast a dying curse with his final breath.
That curse had supposedly passed down through the royal bloodline for generations, yet people had long treated it as nothing more than a worn-out fable.
‘They say that evil dragon died hundreds of years ago, anyway.’
If Caesar had been the one to sever Tigrush’s head, it might have made some twisted sense. If he had been the target of the dragon’s vengeance.
Yet he had not been. All of it occurred long before he was ever born. The thought of a hatred festering for hundreds of years felt almost absurd.
The more I thought about it, the viler that evil dragon seemed.
If Caesar had committed some great wrong to bring the curse upon himself, it wouldn't have felt so profoundly unjust.
‘Just how much venom must fester in a heart for a curse to endure all the way to this day?’
To tell the truth, I didn't even know if dragons were real. I had never heard of anyone actually seeing one.
The tale was merely part of the empire’s founding myth, and like all ancient stories, it felt fantastical and improbable.
What did a founding king and a dragon have to do with us today?
A legend, in the end, was just a legend.
“You damned dragon.”
I found myself cursing Tigrush under my breath. I understood all too well why he was called the “evil dragon.” Dragging out an ancient grudge for this long was sheer spite. He was tougher and more stubborn than iron wire. You could probably call it dragon wire. I had never tasted dragon meat, but I was certain it would be far too tough to chew. What a thoroughly repulsive creature.
“Hmm?”
Hearing my displeased mutter, Caesar seemed to grow anxious, tugging repeatedly at my sleeve. That childlike gesture sent a familiar, bittersweet pang through my heart.
“No, it’s nothing.”
I offered a smile and gently stroked his silky hair. Then, I pulled out one of the illustrated storybooks Delfina had prepared for us.
It was the sort of book nearly every child in the empire read growing up, so perhaps even Caesar had heard of it before.
“I’ll read it to you, so try to repeat after me, all right?”
“All right.”
The moment he heard I was going to read, Caesar’s focus sharpened, and an involuntary smile spread across my face at how endearing he was. The book I had chosen was The Ugly Duckling. The whimsical illustrations had caught my eye, making it the perfect choice for Caesar.
Clearing my throat lightly to steady my voice, I opened to the first page.
“Once upon a time, a pair of ducks lived in a pond, and they loved each other very, very much.”
“Once upon a time?”
“It means a long, long time ago.”
Perhaps in an age as brutal as that of the mad dragon Tigrush, or something along those lines. At any rate, I returned to the story.
“Their love bore several eggs, but one among them was larger and uglier than the rest, becoming a source of great worry for them. Even so, they chose to cradle it with love, telling themselves it was simply an egg bigger than the others.”
“Egg?”
“Yes. Eggs born from their love.”
“Born from love…”
FADE OUT