Chapter 94. Tell-tale and thin (2)
“…The guy is too.”
Lloyd grinned.
A bitter laugh flows out of me.
Julien standing in front of him.
Seeing him made me feel warm and proud.
But at the same time, the limbs shriveled mercilessly.
It was even more so when I looked back at what he had just said.
“So you won’t hate me anymore?”
“…uh yes.”
“It sounds like you hated me a lot before.”
“Yeah it was.”
“So what are you going to do now?”
“Uh, that….”
“Are you warm?”
“Um, not that.”
“then? friendly?”
“….”
“Totally warm, warm, sweet and soft?”
“…Oh Mr.”
Julien’s face crumpled.
A mischievous smile formed on Lloyd’s lips.
“Now do you understand what you just did?”
“Whoa, yes.”
“Are your hands and feet shriveled?”
“uh.”
“I got chickens all the way down to my toes, man.”
“….”
“Don’t ever say such a dirty word again.”
“….”
“Oh, I almost had a spasm in the duodenum, really.”
Lloyd patted his stomach.
Actually, the words were mean, but I didn’t feel bad.
No, to be honest, I was overjoyed and satisfied.
Just by getting a lot of RP?
It wasn’t.
Of course, the visible nuclear gain reward of RP was pleasing, but the warmth felt in the heart was much greater than that.
It was because I suddenly thought of my childhood.
‘At that time, I thought it would be nice to have a younger brother too.’
It was a thought that people who actually have siblings would be horrified and stopped (?) if they heard it.
Still, he was sincere.
Growing up as an only child, I couldn’t help it.
So, sometimes I tried to scold my parents.
I want to have a younger brother too.
He wants to play with his younger brother like the kids next door.
Then it was around the age of eight.
One day, I even hit an accident on the living room wall with crayons.
I drew a crookedly drawn Taekwon V robot that any young boy would know.
He was about a hand taller than he was at the time.
He also took a dynamic manse pose.
Even the coloring was wild.
That evening, he told his parents, who were surprised to see the mural in the living room out of nowhere, that he was his younger brother starting today.
Did your parents at the time just laugh bitterly as if they were embarrassed rather than scolding you?
So I didn’t know at the time.
The fact that he himself was barely born through an in vitro procedure.
‘…Let’s not think about it.’
sometimes no sometimes
Old memories that pop up like this are the problem.
Without warning, people are plunged into useless sentimentality.
With a light sigh, Lloyd pressed the tip of the flickering memory into his chest.
And looked at Julien.
“Anyway, I’m going back to the Baronies tomorrow. Oh, of course, I’ll have to digest it from tonight’s schedule before that.”
“Dinner schedule?”
“uh. The king said that earlier. There’s going to be a great party in the evening, so make sure you attend.”
“party?”
“uh. banquet. It was said that it was a royal banquet to commemorate the completion of the suspension bridge. It’s obvious no matter what. The orchestra plays music, and in between, I keep an eye on the nobles and build up my personal connections. Then, when a rude young aristocrat messes around, it’s a duel! and shout Isn’t that a completely common repertoire?”
“Hyung, your imagination is richer than before.”
“I’ll tell you that you’ve become smarter. Anyway, let’s go there together.”
“uh? me too?”
Julien’s eyes widened.
Lloyd laughed.
“of course. You’re the master’s younger brother. That alone deserves it. Besides-”
His voice changed significantly.
“As I said earlier, if you attend that banquet, you will run into a lot of high-ranking nobles.”
“Ummm then….”
“There must be people from the family I told you about during the day.”
“Isn’t that a bit embarrassing?”
“No, rather, you should be proud to attend. Because literally you didn’t do anything wrong. because the victim But what about hiding? Nonsense.”
Really.
The more you do this, the more confident you should be.
You have to put all your strength on your face and wrap the titanium iron plate tightly.
“So, let’s be a little shameless. okay? That will make your back easier.”
“yea, I got it.”
Julien also nodded, as if he understood the meaning of this.
He’s a smart guy too.
Lloyd felt happy again.
And at the same time, he also made up his mind for himself.
‘Perhaps today’s banquet is not simply a place for celebration.’
The king is not such a lax person.
He will definitely try to keep himself by his side.
A grandiose official position or a jaw-dropping reward. He would hold out all kinds of jars of honey and try to force himself into the royal capital.
It must have been that he called himself here to test his ability to pamper him like that in the first place.
‘Of course, I have no intention of staying behind.’
Until now, his future hope was to be an unemployed person like a bee.
I didn’t want to suffer any more.
It was also a specification to live while working too hard.
Now he wanted to go back to the barony, pay off his debts, and live on honey.
So, now was the time to make the final cut to return to the barony.
♣
A slow, graceful melody tickled the marble floor.
The chandelier full of sparkles flowed down like starlight.
Such a splendid and magnificent palace banquet hall, the Hall of Glory.
Among them, Lloyd was wearing a uniform.
When the king approached him, he set an example.
He said it as if he was giving a head start.
“Long live the great King. And Seong-eun is embarrassed, but I hate it.”
“…What do you hate?”
One eyebrow of King Alicia Terrmina Magentano raised sharply. It’s a fact I always feel, but he’s a really shameless and mysterious guy.
The king asked again.
“Jim hasn’t asked anything yet. But what on earth do you want to reject so much that you start by saying no to Jim?”
“You weren’t about to tell me that from now on you’ll bestow me with an appropriate fiefdom and title.”
“A load?”
“It is.”
“why?”
“You didn’t mean to tell me to accept a royal office.”
“Hmm, have you at least mastered mind-reading?”
“No.”
“if?”
“I notice.”
“under.”
click.
The king smiled briefly and set down the crystal glass.
He took a new cup from the chamberlain’s tray.
over the rim of the slightly tipped glass.
I lowered my eyes and put Lloyd in my eyes.
“At this point, I can’t admit it. Your guess is correct. Jim intended to give you a suitable fief today and a huge amount of gold coins. At the same time, I tried to bestow you with an official post worthy of you.”
“Did you throw a banquet to publicize it?”
“It is true.”
The second glass tilted.
The first glass is a sparkling type that is dry and has high acidity.
From then on, the flavor is ambient red system step by step.
That was the drinking pattern King Alicia enjoyed.
She said, faithfully following her routine.
“So Jim is curious. I’m going to give you a title, fief, money, and even an official position, but why do you say you don’t like it?”
“There is no particular grand reason. Just-”
“Just?”
“I just like to be buried in the grass and be quiet.”
“…Is that the only reason?”
“It is.”
Lloyd bowed his head even deeper.
The king fell into silence as he tipped his third cup before he knew it.
I thought while watching her reaction.
‘good. It’s rolling as I thought.’
Suddenly, I remembered what happened earlier.
He was the one who had been thinking over and over again until he attended this evening’s banquet.
The king’s recruitment proposal that will surely fly.
How would you like to reject it?
Even while wearing formal clothes, tying my hair, and loading my body into the carriage, I was constantly thinking about it.
And I drew my own conclusions.
It was said that the correct method would be the answer.
‘Because if I make a clumsy excuse for no reason, I could end up getting caught.’
In fact, there are many ways to make excuses.
Whether you are sick or have troubles in your family.
Or that you are busy or that your mind is not ready.
If you touch it, everything can be an excuse.
He could come up with any number of excuses, like lying to use his monthly rent to leave early to go to the infirmary.
But did someone say
The only person who succeeded with an excuse in Korea is Kim Geon ×.
Lloyd believed that the quote still applies to the current situation.
‘Because the moment I make an excuse, I’m caught in a spider’s web I made myself.’
If you can’t get a government job because of your health, you just have to be healthy.
The same goes for troubles or busyness in the family.
The moment the cause of all excuses is removed, the next excuse disappears.
Even more so, the person who should be excused now was the king.
If you refuse a government post by making a lame excuse against the king, you may later become a subject of the king with your nose sewn up without being able to take it off.
‘I’m just like Hwang-hee and Jeong-seung.’
late Goryeo period.
It was Hwang Hee Jeong-seung, who was a classmate of Taejong Lee Bang-won and the past exam.
But what about later?
He was selected by Yi Bang-won’s son, King Sejong the Great, and had to work only on national affairs without rest until he died of old age.
No matter how much I begged for a break, it didn’t work.
Even if he used his health as an excuse and heard his family history as a reason, he couldn’t escape it in the end.
He said that he would only die at work until his bones were drained for the rest of his life.
I just worked until I died, and then I really died.
‘Ugh goosebumps.’
Lloyd’s shoulders trembled.
Winning a lifelong slavery that is not even in the sale is a sincere refusal.
So now, it would be better to openly fight with the straight attack method rather than waiting for lame excuses. That would have a much better chance of winning. So Lloyd judged. acted moved into action
I finally got the expected response.
“i get it. I hate it enough to dare to say no to Jim.”
“I apologize.”
“no. If you force someone who has no heart to sit next to you, you won’t benefit from each other. How can a person who only sits without a mind fulfill his duties faithfully?”
A bitter smile crept across the king’s lips.
“Jim is not a tyrant. You are a contributor who has made great contributions here in the capital and even in Cremo. I want to respect your will. So you can go back to your hometown as you wish and spend the rest of your life in peace.”
“Indeed, Seong-eun is devastated, Your Highness.”
“really?”
“….”
“You must consider yourself lucky. The heart also knows. So, I beg you, if you change your mind at any time, please come up to the royal capital.”
“…Are you saying that the door to office is always open?”
“Of course.”
click.
Raising the fourth cup, King Alicia said.
“I promise in my name that fiefs and titles will always be ready for you.”
“Your surname is indescribable, Your Highness.”
“I really hope that in the future it will be devastating. Enough then.”
The sound of the king’s body turning.
The sound of clattering heels faded away.
Only then did Lloyd gently raise his lowered head.
“Whoa.”
The breath trapped in the lungs finally comes out.
The fist that had been sweeping my chest is suddenly clenched.
‘It’s a success!’
Lloyd cheered inwardly.
Fortunately, the straight attack strategy worked.
‘After all, even a king cannot force someone he dislikes into a government post.’
Suddenly, the famous story of the Three Kingdoms, ‘Samgo Choryeo’, came to mind. At that time, Liu Bi also had to run a business with his feet to recruit Zhuge Liang.
This world is also a place where people live, so I thought it would be similar.
Fortunately, that prediction turned out to be just right.
‘Besides, I was promised a title and a fief if needed later, so this is literally perfect for old age security in case of emergency.’
A hearty laugh burst out from the inside.
Now everything is done.
pay off the debt
The only thing left to do is to suck on honey for the rest of my life.
Literally, I felt like I was on the verge of a life in which I had a new 34-pyeong apartment in Gangnam without loans, a German-made foreign car without installments, and my children’s academy fees, college tuition, marriage funds, and my retirement pension.
‘Huh. Just thinking about it makes me want to go back to the Baron’s territory as soon as possible.’
So, let’s play comfortably today.
Enjoy delicious food worthy of a royal banquet.
I thought so and moved on.
After starving for three days, I walked like a person who entered a buffet.
He approached the attendants with trays of food.
But that was then.
A word he hadn’t thought of at all caused him to stop in his tracks.
“The banquet will continue until the moon goes down.”
‘uh?’
An ordinary word came from somewhere.
It was a word that I couldn’t feel at all like the smell of being suspicious.
But the moment he heard that, Lloyd felt as if he had been drenched in ice water.
I had to swallow dry saliva without even realizing it.
The reason was simple.
‘Why is that word coming out now?’
Suddenly, the contents of the novel Iron Blooded Knight came to mind.
Two and a half years from now.
Unfortunate events overtake the royal capital.
It was the case of the attempted assassination of the king.
There was a code shared by those who poisoned King Alicia that day and took her arm.
A very ordinary word.
A word that can’t even feel the smell of being suspicious.
‘That’s what ‘The banquet will last until the moon goes down’.’
So you shouldn’t hear that word now.
It should come after two and a half years.
But now I’ve heard it.
Lloyd turned to where the voice had come from.
Their eyes met with Lord Cherniy, the captain of the guards, who was laughing with the chamberlain.
I got goosebumps.
In that moment, Lloyd was convinced.
He said that he may have found the culprit of the attempted assassination of the king, which was not properly revealed in the novel.
