Carrying the Child of the Man Who Killed Me

Chapter 11

“Heh heh. Did I hit too close to the mark?”

Yeocheong’s sudden action could certainly be seen as disrespectful, but the emperor seemed to think that Yeocheong had been caught off guard and flustered by the truth, and laughed it off casually.

“It’s been widely rumoured in the imperial palace, so it’s hard not to know. Besides, the Fourth Princess said she clearly saw you in the arms of the Crown Prince of Yeon…”

“Th-That’s not true.”

Yeocheong lowered his head again and knelt down. He wasn’t sure if this was a dream or a divine trick to bring him back to the moment he most regretted before his death. But even if it was an illusion, he couldn’t give the same answer as before.

“It was a scene that could easily be misunderstood by my sister, but it was simply a moment when I stumbled and the Crown Prince caught me.”

“I heard that you had a rather friendly conversation.”

“It was just a moment, not even a minute. It’s nothing Your Majesty needs to worry about.”

Yeocheong denied the statement with a firmer tone than before. Perhaps it was because of everything he had been through, but this time he was not afraid to speak in front of the emperor.

“Feel free to speak honestly. I am not so narrow-minded that I cannot understand the affection of a child.”

“How could I not understand Your Majesty’s generous heart? But it is not so. How could I lie to Your Majesty?”

“Hmm. Do you not think the Crown Prince of Yeon is a good man? If you had feelings for him, I would have reconsidered the engagement with Seonguk and tried to marry you to him instead.”

Yeocheong would not even dream of calling him a good man. He answered without hesitation.

“It was such a short meeting that I didn’t even have a chance to talk to him enough to judge his character. As for the engagement, I will simply follow Your Majesty’s will.”

Yeocheong bowed deeply, not out of nervousness, but to show his strong determination.

“Hmm… tsk.”

The Emperor clicked his tongue in a way that suggested displeasure. For him, this was probably just an amusing incident in an otherwise monotonous life.

With a look of disinterest, the Emperor waved his hand dismissively.

“That is enough. I will inform you of your engagement as soon as it is decided. You may leave now.”

Was this just an illusion created for Yeocheong, who had regretted his decision until the very end? Whether it was a divine trick or a form of kindness, Yeocheong couldn’t be sure, but it certainly felt like a remarkably realistic illusion.

‘So, am I going back now?’

Yeocheong thought to himself, clenching and releasing his fist. He had never known a life of fleshiness or full-bodied health, but for some reason his hand seemed strangely thick, as if it had gained weight – something he had never experienced in his entire life.

But no matter how long he waited, Yeocheong did not return to the world of the dead. Time passed as it always did, and after standing still for what seemed like an eternity, watching the same unchanging scenery, Yeocheong clumsily retraced his memories and made his way back to the palace where his mother had once lived.

“What did he say? No, what exactly did he say?”

“Mother.”

When Yeocheong returned to the palace, his mother was indeed there. At the Emperor’s sudden summons, the Fifth Empress, who had been waiting anxiously, rushed to her son, unable even to put on her shoes properly. The way she had forgotten all the formalities she always observed in front of others reminded Yeocheong of the way he remembered her.

When he saw her face, tears immediately filled his eyes. Before they even had a chance to fall, he pulled his mother into an embrace.

“Mother…”

“No, no. Seventh Prince. What happened? What has occurred? No, we shouldn’t stand here like this… Let’s go inside and talk. Let’s go inside and talk.

The Fifth Empress, flustered, clasped her son’s shoulders as she spoke. Despite the awkwardness of the gesture, her hand caressed his back with tenderness.

“You’ve only been gone a short while, but you act as if I haven’t seen you for years.”

It wasn’t until the two of them entered the room that Yeocheong’s tears finally subsided. The Fifth Empress, who muttered frustratedly that Yeocheong was acting in a way he hadn’t when he was younger, couldn’t help but look at him fondly despite her mild complaints.

For Yeocheong, the Fifth Empress was truly someone he hadn’t seen in years. He hadn’t even exchanged letters with his mother since he had been confined to Wolha Palace.

“I’m so glad to see you’re well, so relieved.”

“What on earth happened to make you act like this?”

Even as she spoke, she patted Yeocheong’s hand gently, as if she wasn’t entirely unhappy with the situation.

Since childhood, he was always overly observant, even with tears in his eyes, still worryingly concerned for his mother…

He had been incredibly fragile, but after his mind had matured a little, he had learned to hold back tears in front of his mother. Seeing him like this now, she couldn’t help but think that there must be an important reason for his behaviour.

The Fifth Empress thought this as she spoke. Yeocheong, his eyes swollen from crying, finally raised his head.

“What did His Majesty say? Did he threaten to punish you for some improper behaviour?”

“No, nothing like that. I just wanted to clear up a misunderstanding. He simply took a slight interest in the matter.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes. I explained what had happened and His Majesty told me to go.”

“Then why did you start crying as soon as you saw him? What made you so upset?”

The Fifth Empress asked in a worried tone. Yeocheong, who did not want to say that seeing his mother’s healthy face, now blurred in his memory, had made him so happy that he cried, could not bring himself to say such an absurd thing, even in a dream. Instead, he mumbled vaguely.

“I suppose… I was relieved. I must have been very nervous.”

“Well, it was your first private audience with His Majesty, so it makes sense. Even I get nervous before my private audiences with His Majesty…”

The Fifth Empress shivered slightly as she spoke. It was strange how comforting it was to see her mother’s habit of stroking her arm when she was anxious.

‘I don’t know what’s happening, but if this is a dream I have to wake up from, I hope I can stay in it a little longer.’

Yeocheong thought, barely holding back the tears that started to flow again. And in a way, his wish was granted.

It took him a week to realise that this dream was not just a dream, but a reality from which there would be no awakening.

* * *

Every night, Yeocheong would close his eyes, thinking that tomorrow would never come, but each time he woke up in the same room in the palace. After a week, he had no choice but to admit it.

This was reality. Yeocheong had returned to a time five years ago, before his marriage to Ji-hyuk.

“Seventh Prince, Your Highness.”

The mechanical greetings of the palace servants, and sometimes the servants who deliberately avoided greeting him and only gave him a cursory acknowledgement as a prince – everything was just as Yeocheong remembered it.

Around this time, an incident had occurred in which a palace attendant had been caught stealing cloth from the palace for personal use, causing a stir in the palace.

“How dare you!”

“I… I’m sorry! I have a sick sibling at home and I must have lost my mind for a moment!”

Yeocheong had been too focused on preparing for his rushed marriage to pay much attention to the incident. In fact, he hadn’t known much about it.

Yeocheong had almost forgotten that such an event had ever taken place until he heard the angry scream of the head palace attendant from the inner chambers. If this world was just a dream or an illusion based on his memories, this event, which he could not remember, would never have happened.

However, unlike in his past life, Yeocheong had learned quite a lot about this incident. Among the information, there were details he could never have imagined.

“I… I’m innocent! It was Sowol who told me how to do it!”

“What are you saying? I never told you anything like that! I swear to God, I never did anything like that!”

“You are lying. You were the one who told me how to get the cloth from the palace. And now you’re trying to escape on your own!”

“That’s a lie! This child has always caused me trouble for no reason. She just wants to drag me down because she’s going to lose her hand anyway!”

‘Now that I think about it, Sowol had said that she worked in the inner chambers until she was chosen to go to Yeon with me.’ 

Yeocheong remembered something Sowol had said. She had worked in the inner chambers before being chosen as one of the palace attendants to go to Yeon with him.

“Take her with you for now. If you’re really innocent, you’ll be released soon enough!”

“I am innocent! I swear I didn’t do it!”

Yeocheong paused for a moment, listening to the sounds of Sowol being dragged away by the soldiers. He fell into thought. If he had really returned to the past…

“You said you wanted to go back to Song. If the consort dies, we can return to Song. We came here under those conditions in the first place.”

Perhaps this was a chance from Heaven to take revenge on those who had betrayed him, the foolish version of himself.