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~Chapter 13~
No, to be precise, perhaps pet life is beautiful.
Eugene went outside, packing some fruit in her pocket to eat during her walk. Today, she decided to try going in the opposite direction from her usual path. As she turned a corner, a different landscape appeared, and she hummed a tune as she walked leisurely.
And in the place her wandering footsteps took her, she encountered a dazzlingly beautiful creature.
“This, this is…!”
Large, round eyes were pitch black and flawless, looking pure and innocent.
The neatly arranged dark brown coat shimmered with a satin-like gloss.
The long, outstretched neck was supremely elegant, and the four legs standing proudly were full of strength.
Frrrrr.
Whether it was because a stranger approached without greeting or just because it was bored, even the way it pawed the ground was cute.
“You’re so, so pretty…!”
It was a handsome dark brown horse. As Eugene admired it with sparkling eyes in front of it, the dark brown horse stretched its long head towards her.
“Hello? Hello, hello?”
Thinking it was greeting her, Eugene greeted it back cheerfully, but the dark brown horse pushed its head past her face.
Sniff. Sniff.
Sniffing with its nostrils flaring, it had definitely sensed what was in her basket.
“…!”
Touched that the beautiful horse was showing interest in her—well, more precisely, in the fact she had food—Eugene smiled widely, the corners of her eyes crinkling, and pulled an apple from her basket.
“Oh, oh. Did you want this?”
In the ridiculous, high-pitched voice people use with animals, she cooed at the horse as if it were a puppy and offered the treat.
Crunch. Crunch.
The brown horse, without any shyness, neatly took the apple from Eugene’s hand and ate it.
The sound of it munching the apple was cheerful. The large apple disappeared into the horse’s mouth in an instant.
Kyaaaaah!
Eugene screamed internally. She couldn’t scare the horse that had approached her so familiarly, so she tried hard not to show her excitement.
But her already wide, beaming smile gave her away completely.
Eugene took out another apple, fed the cute horse, and gave its neck a nice scratch.
Maybe it was just her feeling, but the horse seemed to like her touch.
No, it definitely liked it. Even after the apple was gone, the brown horse didn’t go back inside but stretched its long neck towards her, asking for more scratches.
“Hey, hey. Do you like it that much?”
Of course, Eugene excitedly used all her strength to stroke its neck, shoulders, and even its lush mane.
She was absorbed in this interaction with the horse for a while when…
Rustle.
From the other side of the stable, came the sound of someone stepping on the straw spread on the floor.
“Wh-who’s there?”
The one who appeared, trying to sound as tough as possible, was…
‘Huh?’
…a still-young boy.
Clutching a broom tightly with a tense look, the boy cautiously peeked out from behind a post to check the unfamiliar intruder.
“Hello.”
Eugene greeted the wary-looking boy first with the most harmless expression she could muster. She didn’t want to scare the child, who seemed frightened by the appearance of a strange adult, and wanted him to relax.
“Huh?”
She didn’t realize that in terms of outward appearance right now, there wasn’t much difference between the boy and herself.
Perhaps relieved that it was just a young girl petting the horse, the boy approached with a somewhat relaxed face.
“Ah, what. I thought a horse thief had come in while I went to the bathroom or something. You scared me.”
“Horse thief?”
“Well, this is inside His Highness the Crown Prince’s palace, so no low-class criminal would dare come in. The guards would catch them anyway!”
Watching the boy talk to himself, reassured, with curious eyes, Eugene listened to his chatter.
He said he was worried it might be a thief, or that a steward had come in while he was briefly away and was waiting to scold him. After talking for a while, the boy seemed to suddenly remember himself and introduced himself.
“Ah! I’m Hans. I’m learning how to manage the stables from Uncle Bernard here!”
He boasted that he’d been doing chores like distributing feed for the horses and cleaning their sleeping areas for a while now, that he now knew how to give them baths, and that he’d soon learn how to groom them.
“They said this is where the scary Crown Prince is, so I was a little scared when I first came to the palace. But now I’m completely used to it, so it’s fine! Of course, I’m almost always around this stable area, so I haven’t really been to other parts of the palace…”
He chattered on about whether it was true that there was a room filled only with jewels in the palace and that the attendants serving His Highness always smelled nice, going off on tangents. Finally, he focused his gaze on the girl who had been quietly listening and asked.
“Where are you from? I mean, who did you come with?”
“Me?”
Eugene asked back with a puzzled expression. It was because ever since she wore the collar, no one in the palace failed to recognize her.
It seemed Hans, who said he was mostly in the remote stable area of the palace, hadn’t heard the widespread palace gossip about ‘His Highness the Crown Prince’s puppy’—to be careful when attending to her, a management priority.
Eugene chose not to announce who she was.
She thought it wouldn’t be appropriate to explain in detail to a child, ‘Actually, I’m an adult, but I luckily met a royal master and am enjoying my longed-for royal pet life. Simply put, I’m His Highness’s dog.’
‘Children must be protected.’
How harmful it is to be exposed to wrong values in childhood! Eugene spared the words for the sake of the pure child’s innocence.
“My name is Eugene.”
That was enough for Hans. He seemed satisfied just being able to talk excitedly with a kid his own age.
Even without Eugene saying more, Hans chattered away to his heart’s content. His stories about the names of the horses he tended to and what each horse liked were interesting to Eugene too.
The two walked around the stable, talking about the horses until the girl had memorized all their names, before parting ways.
Eugene was still doing nothing and becoming completely accustomed to her daily life in the palace.
Sometimes she visited Hans to listen to his stories, and when bored, she explored the rooms in the palace she hadn’t seen yet.
The Crown Prince’s palace of the vast empire ruling the continent, despite having the familiar image of European palaces seen on TV in the past, was full of novelties.
It wasn’t just a palace of simple splendor; since it was a world where magic actually existed, some rooms had fascinating devices added.
Sometimes, when she opened a door, she’d see a physically impossible spectacle, which made palace exploration so fun she couldn’t stop.
Originally, a guest visiting the Crown Prince’s palace wouldn’t dare wander around recklessly for fear of being seen as disrespectful to the royal family if they entered places not permitted to them.
And the master of the palace, who had the right to go anywhere, was too busy to waste time on useless exploration.
As a result, Eugene was the only one striding through the imperial palace as if it were her own home.
Isn’t the place where the master lives my kennel? The master’s domain is my domain.
‘It’s my house.’
Eugene didn’t bother asking if it was okay to wander into the palace rooms.
‘Have you ever seen a pet asking for permission about which rooms it can enter?’
What dog ever politely asks, ‘Master, am I allowed to enter your bedroom, bathroom, and dressing room?’ If you don’t want a dog coming in, you should have closed the door.
And as Eugene pushed open another closed door in the palace, she thought.
‘Of course, a smart dog opens closed doors too.’
Can’t help it if I’m smart.
Originally, a pet’s actions are done first, and then the master must accept the consequences.
Eugene explored the palace as she pleased, and when hungry, went down to the kitchen to get food.
Sometimes, when she peeked into the Crown Prince’s office, the untouched desserts there became her share.
‘It’s leftover anyway. It’s better to eat it before it gets stale.’
Good for whom? Without really thinking about it, Eugene devoured the fondant chocolates placed on the office desk.
She didn’t know this, but after seeing the snacks on the desk completely disappear whenever the Crown Prince briefly left his seat, and after hearing reports on who the culprit was, the desk in the office was always kept full of snacks from then on.
Today, happily observing the new snacks that had been added and sending them straight to her mouth, Eugene ate her fill and went back out into the hallway.
‘I’m bored.’
Maybe it was because she had wandered around enough for now. She wanted to do some static activity.
She wanted to sit quietly on a sofa, stare at a tiny phone, and waste an eternity. She wanted to devote all her time to a game from eye-opening to eye-closing, meaninglessly deleting a day.
A thirst for modern civilization rose up in her for the first time in a long while. She suddenly grew curious.
