Follow Your Heart [EN]: Chapter 27

As his heart led him – #27

#27.

Lee Jae received word that the king would arrive after the hunting competition.

Instead of inquiring about his well-being through others, she went outside herself.

Just by looking at him, she could gauge his condition more accurately than anyone else.

The moment she saw him walking from afar, a faint smile graced her lips.

Lee Jae knew this must be his fate, yet she was relieved to see him safe.

When Roderick saw Lee Jae smiling as if deeply moved, he felt a little awkward.

He scratched the corner of his eyebrow and asked,

“Did you have a good time?”

“Yes.”

“Didn’t we agree to exchange greetings directly?”

Lee Jae chuckled. He seemed perfectly fine without her needing to ask, though she sensed a slight depletion in Roderick’s energy, indicating fatigue.

“Did you even sleep while you were there?”

He then produced the prayer bead bracelet from his pocket.

“I stayed up all night guarding it, worried someone might steal your precious item.”

*He really has a strange way of saying he didn’t sleep well.*

But Lee Jae, receiving back a piece of herself, smiled brightly and placed the bracelet on her right wrist.

Seeing her expression brighten considerably, Roderick raised an eyebrow.

“How can you be happier to see that bracelet than me?”

“Your Majesty, please also consider who I entrusted it to.”

“Ah, so you’re admitting you’re happier to see the bracelet. You’re not denying it.”

“……”

“Is this how you greet a husband who’s returned home after a week?”

When Lee Jae didn’t answer and merely chuckled, Roderick laughed in disbelief.

*She’s a fox, really.*

“Your Majesty.”

“Yeah, what?”

“Did you win?”

“No, I failed.”

The king placed significance only on participation, and the King’s Wings [an elite group of knights] ensured victory for the king.

So, in fact, it was more honorable, but Roderick made unnecessary remarks, curious about the queen’s reaction.

Lee Jae chuckled.

“That’s okay, Your Majesty.”

*No one knows, but you actually won this time. The vengeful spirit didn’t harm you.*

But Roderick was blunt.

“What’s okay about it? I caught one thing and disgraced myself.”

“That’s not true.”

“……”

“Your Majesty’s life… can’t be ruined by something like that.”

*She’s driving me crazy again.*

Roderick was about to rub his face but stopped, realizing his hands were dirty.

Instead, he held out his hand to Jade [a royal attendant].

Jade handed him a luxurious cloth pouch.

He took out a squirrel from it.

The live animal sat still on Roderick’s palm, seeming to recognize its rescuer.

But as soon as Lee Jae saw it, she was horrified.

“Ew, what is that?”

“A squirrel. Have you never seen one before?”

Lee Jae waved her hands dismissively, then became serious.

“How can you bring an animal that lives in nature here like this? It might die if the environment changes. If it gets used to people, it can’t go back.”

The people who had roughed it while camping for a week were taken aback.

The queen, who they thought would just exclaim, ‘Wow, what is this?’ didn’t accommodate them at all. But in fact, it was surprisingly common sense.

Roderick said, a little sullenly,

“Either way, it would have died there if I hadn’t brought it.”

“……Why?”

“I rescued it from a trap when everyone was withdrawing and brought it after treating it.”

“……So, Your Majesty saved it?”

“Yeah.”

“Really? Why?”

Because she couldn’t readily understand why someone who went hunting would save something and bring it back.

*Did the squirrel look cute?*

“Just for you to see.”

Then, after thinking for a moment, Lee Jae chuckled.

“Ah, for the wife, that not enough… that?”

Lee Jae swallowed the rest of her words, but eventually burst into laughter.

Roderick was about to tap her round forehead but stopped himself, realizing his hand was dirty.

She looked at the squirrel a little more carefully, with different eyes than before.

Then Roderick also brought his hand a little closer.

The king brought it simply because he was thinking of the queen and wanted her to see it and be happy.

But she was Kang Lee Jae. Her perspective was very different from others.

‘Squirrel, you were destined to die, but you met a benefactor. Then you have to live.’

Her eyes became even sharper.

Just as hunting couldn’t change the king’s great fortune, this rescue activity didn’t affect the king’s flow [destiny].

Still, Lee Jae said,

“Your Majesty, you did a good thing?”

“Well, not really.”

“Still, you did well.”

Then Roderick’s expression worsened.

Because hearing praise that he did well instead of a thank you felt strange.

*What kind of treatment is this?*

Lee Jae unhesitatingly reached out to her potentially ill husband.

Then Roderick hurriedly pulled his hand back.

“No, it might bite if it’s scared.”

But Lee Jae reached out again, and surprisingly, the squirrel didn’t bark at Lee Jae or find her difficult.

*It must be because the pure energy she has is similar to the energy of the mountain.*

Roderick, who was staring at the squirrel that had climbed onto Lee Jae’s head and then back down to her shoulder, said,

“It seems like it knows you’re short. It climbed to the top so quickly.”

“I only said nice things to Your Majesty. Why are you suddenly picking a fight again?”

“It’s not picking a fight, it’s because you’re cute.”

“The squirrel?”

*No, you.*

Roderick didn’t answer and looked elsewhere for a moment.

Lee Jae, glancing at the king strangely, moved her feet.

It was to release the squirrel on a tree near the lake.

After letting the squirrel go, Lee Jae called the maids to explain about the food container and the food.

Roderick stood there with the knights, waiting for Lee Jae to return, wanting to talk a little more.

But in Lee Jae’s eyes, returning with a relieved heart, she saw something strange.

A gloomy energy that she hadn’t seen before was creeping towards Roderick.

A spirit, a snake ghost, was licking its tongue.

Lee Jae started to tremble. Having gone a very long distance, she asked Roderick with a ‘no way’ kind of feeling.

“Ho, perhaps… did you kill a snake too…?”

“How do you know that?”

Roderick looked around, wondering who had told such harsh things to the queen.

Lee Jae stepped back and looked at somewhere on the floor with a very disgusted look.

Her face was very disgusted.

“Hailey, there are all sorts of things when you go to the hunting grounds.”

“……Even if you kill all sorts of things, you shouldn’t kill snakes.”

“No, it was about to bite me.”

He didn’t know why he was making excuses, but Roderick was explaining in detail.

Maybe it was because Lee Jae’s face looked so bad.

However, her pale complexion didn’t return.

*Snakes originally have a lot of resentment. The fact that the head moves even when the neck is cut off means that the time until death is long.*

Unlike other evil spirits, they remember the person who killed them.

Moreover, that was a sacred creature.

But the reason why Lee Jae’s complexion turned pale wasn’t because of such deep resentment, but because she simply found snakes disgusting. The memories of encountering snakes while picking greens were all terrible.

“Your Majesty.”

“Yeah.”

“I’m sorry to say this, but could someone else have killed it?”

*Even if everyone else dies, Your Majesty shouldn’t do that now.*

Then the knights who had followed became solemn, because the king was the only one who witnessed and reacted to the situation.

Moreover, that wasn’t the king’s fault. It was disloyalty.

“Hailey, it was an urgent situation.”

“……”

“……Well, what, are you telling me to walk all the way back to the castle?”

“Your Majesty.”

“I’m sorry to say this too, but couldn’t you have walked?”

Roderick laughed in disbelief.

“Then I would have arrived in about four days. Telling the king to walk, you say such cute things.”

“Yes, I’m sorry.”

Lee Jae understood the situation well enough.

From then on, she began to stare at the spirit hard, to overcome this emotional limit.

But in the end, she couldn’t handle it at all and covered her face.

*Western snakes… are very big.*

Roderick was constantly bothered by his dirty hands, so he gently removed her wrist with his fingers.

“Well, should I go back now? Then you wait here for a week. I’ll run back quickly.”

“Ah, why.”

“Hailey, what do you want me to do?”

Lee Jae shook her head, trying to speak calmly.

However, she gradually experienced an increase in emotion.

“I don’t know, Your Majesty. But… snakes are so disgusting. Ugh, I hate them so much, really!”

As Lee Jae ran inside as if fleeing, Roderick laughed in absurdity.

In the end, he saw the ‘ugh’ that he had drawn from his core. But that was a bigger shock than he thought.

“Did she just say she hates it? The snake? Or me?”

“……”

“It’s not like I’m the only one who killed it. Why do I have to hear such things alone?”

“Maybe it’s because Your Majesty is special.”

“I did everything she asked, and I only get cursed.”

Jade rarely comforted him, but Roderick didn’t recover easily.