🔊 TTS Settings
Chapter 9
Hide-and-Seek of Tears (1)
“Loser has to eat all the vegetables?”
“Yes. Do you like the idea?”
I decided to use Edwin’s desire to mess with me.
Edwin seemed quite interested in the condition and asked again.
“What are we betting? I don’t want Monte.”
He looked wary, probably remembering what happened yesterday.
He must think he can never beat me at Monte.
Then does he think he can beat me at something else?
‘That’s a pretty cheeky way of thinking.’
I tapped my mouth lightly with a napkin and continued.
“How about hide-and-seek?”
Hide-and-seek.
At that single word, the prince’s eyes lit up.
“That’s my specialty!”
He jumped up from his seat like he was about to run outside.
“Hide-and-seek? Ria wants to play too! Ria too!”
Emilia, who had been sitting next to him, also got excited and tapped the table with her spoon.
I lifted the princess slightly and said,
“Her Highness Emilia and I will be the seekers.”
“Kyaaah!”
Excited, Emilia shouted while waving her hands above her head.
Meanwhile, Edwin raised his eyebrows confidently.
“Hmph, you’ll regret it.”
“The location will be limited to the first floor where the dining hall is.”
“Fine. That way you won’t get lost.”
Edwin shrugged as if he was being generous.
I looked at him and added calmly.
“If I find Your Highness, I win. If I fail to find you, Your Highness wins.”
“And the loser eats all the remaining vegetables. Right?”
Edwin confirmed the rules again and grinned.
“Don’t regret it.”
Edwin Anaxinian Bentrum, the 3rd prince of the Ventrum Empire.
He was 11 years old and rarely had a chance to play with children his age.
No noble would send their child to play with a prince who could bring them no benefit.
He could not get close to anyone, and aside from the late Emma, no one really cared for him.
Because of that, Edwin did not easily open his heart to anyone.
But paradoxically, even the smallest bit of attention made him melt easily.
That was also why he had been tricked by Gale’s group into playing Monte with a bracelet on the line.
It was rare for someone his age to ask him to play first.
“Hmm, not here either.”
Today, however, the prince seemed unusually excited.
Edwin peeked into the storage room attached to the kitchen.
‘Where would she never think to look?’
After thinking hard, he chose a large vegetable crate.
The crate, half-filled with carrots, was big enough for him to fit inside easily.
Edwin climbed into the crate and closed the lid.
‘Perfect. She’ll never find me here.’
He curled up inside and giggled quietly.
Then he heard footsteps nearby.
He peeked through a gap in the crate lid.
Luckily, it wasn’t Rachel.
“I’ve never seen someone that handsome in my life.”
Two maids who had entered the storage room were chatting.
“Really? The king of Adamanth is that handsome?”
“Yes! I thought he’d look scary because of the ‘Wolf King’ rumors, but he wasn’t!”
With black hair like the night sky, slightly tanned smooth skin, and amber eyes shining like stars—
The maid exaggerated wildly, squirming as she spoke.
“His body was incredible too! I thought he looked like a statue from a temple!”
“Stop exaggerating. No one looks like that.”
“He does! I saw him!”
The maid shouted back and hugged her arms tightly.
“Ahh… if only I could be held in those arms once, I’d die happy.”
“Come on. Do you think a king would even look at a maid? Hurry up and let’s go.”
“You never agree with anything I say.”
The complaining maid walked toward the exit, then came back again.
“Oh right, I forgot to leave this here. Rats have been getting bad lately. That would’ve been a disaster. Hey, help me carry it!”
“Stop acting weak!”
The maids came closer to Edwin’s hiding spot.
Thud—
A heavy sound came from above, then their footsteps slowly faded away.
The storage room became quiet again.
Edwin, who had been holding his breath with his mouth covered, sighed when he confirmed they were gone.
‘That was close. I almost got caught by maids.’
He almost lost his pride as a master of hide-and-seek.
Inside the cramped crate, he sat with his knees pulled to his chest.
“Ugh.”
Time passed.
Even when other maids came and went, his nanny still did not appear.
Edwin shifted uncomfortably.
‘This is uncomfortable.’
It was hard to breathe, and his legs were getting numb.
‘It feels like I’ve been in here a long time.’
His face gradually darkened.
A bad memory surfaced in his mind.
— “Do you want to join them too?”
The sneering face of his older brother, Prince Lloyd, who resembled the emperor.
Behind him were the laughing noble children.
At that time, Edwin had not even understood hostility yet, and had simply followed them happily.
— “Hide here. No one will find you, Edwin.”
— “What about you, Brother Lloyd?”
— “I’ll find another place. You stay here. If you get caught, shout so I can hear you. Got it? That way we can win.”
Lloyd placed a hand on his younger brother’s shoulder and smiled.
— “But don’t come out until the seeker finds you. If you do, we lose because of you.”
Because the crate was in a remote place, and because no one had been told, no one came to find Edwin for hours.
Because of Lloyd’s warning, Edwin couldn’t even open the crate himself.
If Emma, his nanny, had not come after hearing the news, he might have spent the entire night inside.
— “Your Highness!”
When the crate finally opened, Emma’s tearful face appeared.
But what Edwin saw first was not her face.
It was the faces of the servants behind her.
They had been called out at night, holding torches.
And in their eyes, Edwin could clearly read their feelings.
‘A troublesome burden.’
‘A foolish prince.’
‘A spoiled child who only thinks of himself.’
That day, his pride as a prince shattered completely.
The prince bit his lip.
‘…This is boring.’
The moment he tried to open the crate—
Clunk. Clunk.
The lid wouldn’t move.
“What, what?”
Edwin panicked.
It felt like something heavy had been placed on top.
‘Don’t tell me it’s those maids?’
His face turned pale as he remembered the loud sound earlier.
He had heard that sometimes heavy stones are placed on storage boxes to keep rats or cats from damaging food.
‘Then I can’t get out?’
His small heart began to pound violently.
It felt like it was ringing in his ears.
He shut his eyes and covered them.
No one would come for him now. No one knew he was here.
‘No… maybe no one even knows I’m missing.’
Maybe he would be trapped here forever.
Just as fear from the past began to swallow him—
The lid suddenly opened.
“Found you, Your Highness.”
Above him was his nanny, Rachel.
Her expression was indifferent. Her voice was indifferent. Her actions were indifferent.
There was no warmth at all.
So why did she overlap with Emma in his mind?
At that moment—
Tears burst from Edwin’s eyes like rain.
‘Children are really unpredictable.’
Why was he crying buried in a pile of carrots?
I was slightly confused, but kept a calm expression.
“Then it means I win the bet—”
Just as I was about to declare victory—
Edwin suddenly burst into loud crying.
“Why, why are you so late! You idiot! Waaaaah!”
He really was impossible to understand.
Just yesterday he was avoiding me, and now he was crying because I was late.
“Big brother, why are you crying? Don’t cry!”
Even Emilia, who was on my back, started tearing up from his crying.
‘This is insane. What am I supposed to do?’
I sighed internally and reached into Edwin’s armpits, lifting him out of the box.
“Both of you, stop crying.”
It looked absurd—like he was crying and asking to be rescued at the same time.
Even after escaping the crate, Edwin kept crying.
‘Troublesome.’
Adults stop crying quickly with a bit of pressure.
Children don’t.
That’s why I was always bad with kids.
Beings you can’t understand or predict are difficult.
‘No choice.’
I wasn’t good at comforting others, but I had no choice.
If he kept crying like this, he might get dehydrated.
I hesitated, then wiped his tears with my sleeve.
“I’m sorry I’m late.”
An awkward apology that didn’t sound comforting at all.
