Chapter 46: What Time Is It Now?
“……?”
Although Alman was a bona fide virgin, he understood the meaning of such words. He looked up at Evelia and noticed that her small face remained neither red nor pale after saying that.
“Do you need my help?”
Evelia asked Alman again, as if she wanted to confirm his stance.
“Eve… do you know what that phrase means?”
Alman’s expression became awkward again because Evelia leaned towards him as she said this, the angle of her slight bow perfectly directing Alman’s gaze to her strikingly pale skin. He hadn’t intended to focus on that, but his unruly eyes stubbornly darted in that direction.
Congratulations to Alman for achieving a zero-second score in the “not looking there challenge.”
“If you’re feeling hot, don’t you need to cool down?”
“Ah— that’s true.” Alman pressed his lips together, “But… that expression is still ambiguous…”
“Then could you tell me?”
Evelia looked at Alman innocently, her golden eyes filled with curiosity and a thirst for knowledge.
“……”
Alman had always thought of Evelia as an extraordinary woman; she seemed to know everything, yet also seemed not to know it all that well.
“Well— this, it’s hard to say.”
“If it’s not convenient for you, I can ask someone else—”
“Wait a minute!”
—Evelia would definitely turn this into “Alman wants me to help him cool down, so I’m asking how to do that,” and if such words spread, it would be terrifying.
“Hmm? What’s wrong, Mr. Alman?”
Evelia had already taken half a step forward, looking as if she was genuinely going to ask outside for the deeper meaning of that phrase.
“Well, cooling down… it just— simply means…”
Although he didn’t intend to get into anything, the thought of having to say such things to Evelia made him awkwardly rub his ears. He only wanted to explain this term, yet his mind began to play some far-fetched images: Evelia’s soft and agile tongue, her warm and tight mouth, and her delicate and fair fingers. If she used them…
“Do you need me to help relax your ears?”
Evelia had caught on to the small detail of Alman rubbing his ears and asked with concern.
“—No need!” Alman quickly lowered his hand that had been pinching his ear, stopping those unrealistic fantasies in his mind. “Just— in any case, don’t ask randomly, and don’t say this to anyone, understood?”
“Mm, now that you mention it, I understand.”
She remained unchanged, showing no refusal to Alman’s orders.
But every time this happened, Alman felt a strange sensation, thinking, “It’s great that she doesn’t probe further.”
He had assumed her obedience was merely due to some directive from the Second Prince.
Isn’t it quite ridiculous? A loyal dog to the Second Prince is now wagging its tail at him, yet he doesn’t know when she will bite him.
If only she could truly obey… then maybe those fantasies would no longer be just fantasies, right?
Alman thought this and chuckled inwardly.
He himself wasn’t the type to follow the rules, so how could he demand others to “completely obey”? He was really starting to become what he despised.
However, even so, no matter how lax he was, he wasn’t so naïve as to let others spread wild rumors about him. After repeatedly emphasizing to Evelia not to ask about cooling down or mention such things to anyone, he finally felt safe enough to leave the manor and head off to take care of his work for the day.
But to Evelia, his words seemed to imply, “You can only help me cool down,” and although she didn’t quite understand the other meanings, she remembered that phrase.
Alman didn’t like carriages, so he wouldn’t choose to ride one when he wasn’t in a hurry. He strolled alone along the way to the Knight Order; although he had no attendants with him, he was on the main road of the royal capital, and it didn’t take long to encounter patrolling knights belonging to the Order, who of course recognized Alman. So he nodded here and smiled there, and by the time he arrived, he felt even more exhausted than after a battle.
“You’re here.”
Upon entering the office, Deputy Commander Carly was sitting at Almana’s desk as usual, handling the documents Alman didn’t want to deal with.
“How’s the celebration going?”
Alman tossed his coat onto the sofa, rubbed his stiff smile from walking, and poured himself a glass of lukewarm water from the kettle on the table.
“The celebration is now planned to be more of an entertainment-focused event, eliminating a lot of the tedious formalities, making it less utilitarian.”
“No speeches?”
“None. I canceled them for you.”
“That’s great, only you can do that. Finally, no need to prepare some nonsense speech.”
This was what Alman cared about, as he truly didn’t want to stand on stage thanking the Second Prince for his discerning eye; he would prefer to gouge the Prince’s eyes out and feed them to fish.
However, due to this morning’s incident, Alman envisioned a scenario where he presented the Second Prince’s eyes to Evelia. Her psychological reaction would surely be quite riveting; he wished he could see it someday—perhaps even as a goal to achieve, that could be interesting.
“Maybe cutting off the head and tossing it in front of her would be even more entertaining?”
Perhaps the thought was too amusing; Alman couldn’t help but mumble it aloud.
“What are you thinking again?”
Carly was used to this. Although the two of them had rarely fought together since obtaining their positions, they had been good comrades before, and he understood Alman’s temper during battle. That’s just how he was; whether it was grossing out the enemy or annoying the inexperienced soldiers under his command, he found some pleasure in it.
Of course, the enemies and his own men were not the same form of annoyance. He only joked with his own people.
“Nothing.” Alman smiled and shook his head, sitting at the available corner of Carly’s desk. “Has there been any movement from the Second Prince lately?”
“I knew you were just thinking about that guy.”
“We both know it.”
Alman had disliked the Second Prince for more than just a day or two. Sometimes when he was in a good mood, he would curse the Second Prince a bit, and when he was in a bad mood, he would do the same. Sometimes, Alman would blurt out a subjectless remark, and Carly would know it was usually about the Second Prince.
Carly didn’t know the nature of their past interactions; he only knew the Second Prince had gone to great lengths to eliminate Alman, so he found it normal that Alman hated him and never inquired deeply about why Alman harbored such animosity.
“The Second Prince hasn’t had any major issues. Speaking of which, has the matter from last time been resolved?”
Carly, having set aside most of the documents he was handling, stretched as if taking a break and shifted his gaze to Alman.
“That matter from last time?”
“Yeah, the woman you argued with. Did you apologize?”
