Chapter 37

“What the hell are you doing?!”

One man shouted at another while holding up a sheet of paper.

It was the itinerary that Cynthia had roughly thrown together.

“What is this lazy excuse of a plan?! You said it was hard-won intel, so I had high hopes! But it’s all wrong!”

These men were members of the Liberty Council, a group that despised the royal family, and they had not given up on their “plan to kidnap Cynthia.” They even followed her all the way to Medeia, waiting for the right moment to do so.

‘She’s someone the Brigadier General needs, so he’ll do whatever it takes to save her. We’ll use her as much as we can, then hand the princess over to the enemy.’

In truth, they were receiving support from an enemy nation. The Liberty Council, though claiming to “oppose the monarchy’s return,” was closer to a spy organization in disguise.

But spotting the pair among the crowd of people carrying umbrellas was no easy task.

So they waited at the destinations listed on the itinerary, only for it all to be in vain.

Fuming, the man held up another piece of paper.

“And this! It’s just a detailed list of famous restaurants!”

“But at least our meal today wasn’t a bust thanks to it. The vegetables we had were cooked just right even though Medeia food is usually terrible…”

A disgruntled junior member started complaining.

Another member chimed in.

“It definitely seems like she’ll be staying at the palace, so how about we sneak in disguised as tourists?”

“You’ve got guts trying to fool the Medeia royal family. If we get caught, they’ll break every bone in our bodies!”

As a senior member yelled, another voiced their concern.

“But I heard that she’s protected by the Goddess of Fortune. All those who tried to assassinate her ended up dead.”

“Hah, don’t talk nonsense. How could that possibly be true?”

Just as the senior member began to feel uneasy upon hearing that, one of the other members pointed at the ferris wheel that had come to a stop.

“Oh, it looks like the ferris wheel broke down. Talk about bad luck for the people stuck on it.”

“If there’s a couple up there, aren’t they the lucky ones?”

“Ugh, now I feel miserable. Looks like today was a waste of time, so let’s just head back.”

The members of the Liberty Council sighed as they walked past the ferris wheel.

Little did they know that the couple trapped on the ferris wheel were the ones they were looking for.

Had the ferris wheel been running normally, they could’ve crossed paths.

***

Inside the stopped ferris wheel, I flinched in fear every time it rattled in the occasional gusts of wind.

Massera, who had been quietly staring outside, gently pushed me off as I clung to him like a scared little octopus and said—

“It’ll start running again soon.”

“I hope so. But please stay still. You’re big, so when you move, it shakes even more.”

Clunk–!

Just then, the ferris wheel lurched and moved for about five seconds before stopping again.

“Eek!”

When I came to my senses, I was sitting on Massera’s lap with my arms around his neck.

Massera looked down at me with cold eyes.

“Is clinging to people a habit of yours?”

“You’re the only one I can cling to right now.”

“You’d do the same even if it were someone else?”

“Even if it were Eugene… Yeah, probably…”

“Do you have some kind of affection deficiency?”

At Massera’s sharp tone, I widened my eyes.

“Do you know a lot about psychology? I have wondered if I have an affection deficiency. Whenever I read about the characteristics of people who have it in magazines, it feels like they’re talking about me…”

“That’s not what I meant.”

He looked frustrated, like he was having trouble saying something outright.

In the end, I asked him directly.

“Are you perhaps bothered by me being close with someone else?”

“As a married woman, acting like that with another man wouldn’t look good in the eyes of others.”

“I wouldn’t ride a ferris wheel alone with a random man, okay? Besides, I’m only clinging to you because we’re married, General.”

I grumbled as I let go of Massera’s neck.

At that moment, the ferris wheel wobbled lightly, and I swayed. He quickly grabbed me by the waist and frowned.

“I meant like at the reception when you were being escorted by a man other than me.”

“Huh? Didn’t you escort another woman too? Isn’t that double standards?”

“I don’t know what ‘double standards’ even means, but I only spoke to the duchy’s princess briefly at the entrance. I was…”

Clunk, rattle.

“...waiting for you there.”

His words were drowned out by the rattling noise.

The ferris wheel jolted again like before, and then suddenly the door opened.

A staff member stood there, eyes wide as he stared at us.

While we faced each other and had been lost in conversation, the ferris wheel had resumed and brought us back to the starting point.

“We apologize for the inconvenience dur—uh, um… please ride again!”

The staff member, flustered by our embarrassing position, hastily shut the door with a click.

Massera narrowed his eyes and withdrew his hand from around me.

“Kindly move while I’m asking nicely.”

“Hmph. You sure know how to say things nicely.”

As the ferris wheel began ascending again, a long silence settled between us—about five seconds long.

“Oh, that’s the hundred-year-old cafe I was looking into. We can have dessert there.”

I pointed at the cafe visible through the window, face full of excitement, and he nodded.

“Let’s do that.”

Why is he answering while looking the other way?

What is he staring at over there?

His gaze was so focused, as if trying to find something, so I moved closer to Massera and looked out the window out of curiosity.

But to my eyes, there wasn’t anything particularly special.

It just looked like there were some men down below having a serious conversation while looking at a piece of paper.

Massera shifted away slightly as if he was conscious of me sitting beside him, but I just kept talking.

“Do you like night views? Most people go to see them from high places, but I prefer seeing it from somewhere in the middle.”

“That’s unusual. So is how fast you change the topic.”

“From the top, everything just looks like a bunch of tiny dots like stars. But from the middle, you can see each one clearly.”

I traced my finger over a sign outside that read, “Life goes up and down like a ferris wheel,” and added—

“Life’s like that too. Everyone fights to get to the top, but I think it’s just as important to pause in the middle and look around. That way, going down isn’t a fall, but the start of moving on to another path.”

I’m sure you probably lived your life fighting, so I hope you don’t worry of falling again.

I gave quite the sentimental monologue.

“You’re right. I can even see the text on that paper quite clearly.”

Just how good was his eyesight? Guess that’s what you’d expect from a former sniper.

Suddenly, his gaze, which had been fixed outside the whole time, turned to me.

Sticking together on our honeymoon had taught me this—his eyes, a blend of blue and purple, reflected the ever-changing sky.

Clear skies, cloudy ones, sunsets, and right now, they looked like the blue hour before dawn.

Unlike when he looked outside, his eyes were calm now as he looked at me and continued speaking—

“Get close enough, and you also start to see what you couldn’t before.”

The longer his gaze stayed on me, the more ticklish my cheeks felt.

Does having good eyesight mean he sees differently from others? Like, being able to spot a tiny eye booger of mine or something?

I rubbed my eyes and fixed my hair for no reason.

Before I knew it, the ferris wheel had reached the top and began to slowly descend.

“But what happened to the itinerary? You haven’t looked at it once since we left the palace.”

“Oh, come on, of course I brought it wi—”

Huh? Where’d it go?

I blinked as I rummaged through my small bag.

Now that I think about it, it’s gone. Did it fly off in the wind?

“Of course I brought it, but sadly, it looks like I lost it.”

I declared it proudly because I had remembered all the restaurants anyway.

“It didn’t seem necessary anyway.”

Though I found it annoying the way Massera spoke as he brushed back his platinum blond hair, I couldn’t argue since nothing had gone according to plan.

As the ferris wheel touched back down to the ground, I said—

“Still, wasn’t it kind of fun how nothing went according to plan?”

“It’s better that way. After all, the thing soldiers expect most is death.”

Lost in thought, he then asked, “Do you find soldiers who kill their enemies frightening?”

“Are you asking if that enemy were me…?” I wasn’t sure what he was getting at, but I answered honestly.

“A high-ranking officer like me has many enemies. Naturally, his wife would have just as many. She would be an easy target which puts her in much greater danger.”

What was his point?

I stared at Massera as he spoke with a serious expression.

He slowly added—

“I’m concerned because you’re now a soldier’s wife. And as a soldier, I can’t always take your trauma into account.”

Was he talking about when I had those panic attacks from the gunshots and fireworks? Was this his way of saying not to become a burden in the future…?

“General, am I perhaps on your mind?”

I leaned in without realizing and asked him this with sparkling eyes.

Oh!

That must mean I’ve become at least a little important to him.

Because “someone who holds you back = someone who’s on your mind = someone you like = getting married to them.”

‘According to my analysis, this man is a tsundere.’

Saying it in such a roundabout way—how cute.

From now on, I’ll actively seduce him.