Situated in what essentially is a beautiful forest on the outskirts and a delicate garden as its immediate surroundings, the palace looked majestic but also lonely.
Irene headed to the quarters of the Queen Radiant. Even though the Queens would live together with the Emperor, for now, they're following the customs and staying in a separate quarter.
The corridors were wide, the floor was plated with golden-red metal coating, the walls were filled with paintings and art pieces from all the over world. The pillars supporting the structure were carved with stories of heroic humans.
Irene walked absentmindedly and before she knew it, she bumped into the door. Touching her forehead, Irene looked left and right, and after confirming no one saw her gaffe, she sighed in relief.
It still felt surreal for her. Was the war really over? Were the abyssals really finished?
While she was telling everyone to get used to the new world order, she herself had trouble integrating.
"And why is the door so hard." She wiped her forehead and muttered.
The large, golden double-door, crafted from the finest wood smelled like roses and lilies. It's studded with precious gems and sparkled every other second. Irene just happened to bump her head into one of the harder gems.
"Fuu~" Sighing lightly, she grabbed the golden handles on the door and pushed it open.
With a small creak, the door gave way and revealed the interior. It was breathtakingly beautiful—the floor covered with plush red carpet and soft rugs, the walls adorned with intricate tapestries and handiworks, the soft lamps casting a gentle light throughout.
Even Irene who didn't like luxury and couldn't care less about aesthetics felt impressed by this interior.
But her impression was short-lived as she soon noticed the mess on the soft and veiled bed.
Hundreds of exquisite necklaces with intricate designs, arrays of breathtakingly beautiful flowers and many small accessories were scattered all over it.
Worst of all, there's a literal mountain of wedding clothes in the middle.
Noticing her arrival, two heads poked out of a mountain of clothes, nearly causing Irene to jump back.
"Oh? Sovereign Irene?" Sarah titled her head.
"We are having a bit trouble here. Selecting a wedding dress is impossible." Sia closed her eyes in defeat.
"Wait, didn't Anna come to help you two? Where is she?" Irene titled her head in confusion.
"She tried her best." Sarah sighed.
"But in the end…" Sia shook her head.
Irene blinked in confusion and looked all around the room. Out of respect, she didn't use her powers in the room.
In the end, she found Anna, curled up under the bed with a bunch of clothes and jewelry.
"…What the hell are you doing here?" Irene looked at her, dumbfounded.
"I can't…" Anna said through gritted teeth.
"Why not? And what can't?" Irene was genuinely confused.
"I can't…" Anna closed her eyes in pain. "I have no idea what to help them with. I…I never married."
"Aren't you a hundre—"
"Shut up, I'm just in my fourties."
Irene patted her forehead and stopped talking to the woman. Anna, the perfect maid, failed for the first time in her task.
"You shouldn't have called her," She said to the girls.
Sarah protested with an innocent face. "It's not us, it's him."
"I can almost hear him laughing at Anna now. He says its his revenge for calling him a virgin that day." Sia said with an amused smile.
"Even after becoming an Emperor, he's bullying me. This is cheating." Anna's groaned under the bed.
ραпdα-nᴏνɐ|-сom Irene chuckled softly and reminisced about her own wedding as she said wistfully. "We have a lot of work to do."
—- —- —-
"Man, I really missed this place."
"Right? They stopped the bot fight here recently or I'd have gambled once more, arghh, my hands are itching."
Varian and Kyle sat at a street restaurant, picking the freshly grilled monster meat and savoring the cheap food with delicious taste.
On the other side of the road, there used to be a small bot fighting ring where Kyle used to lose his money.
Varian laughed thinking back to those times and punched Kyle lightly. "You'll be one of the first members for Imperial Academy of Sciences, you still want to gamble in those bot fights?"
His words caused the other diners to glance at them with suspicion which soon changed into dismissal.
"Rich coming from you. Sovereigns wouldn't visit any restaurant without booking the whole place and you come to this place," Kyle snickered and pointed at the rather old wooden frame of the restaurant. "You call yourself the Emperor. Standards, heh."
This time, Kyle's words caused even the restaurant owner to look at them. He knew what the emperor looked like. Everyone did. And this guy, who his friend, referred as the 'Emperor' looked nothing like Varian.
"Kids these days are smoking some crazy shit," Muttering under his breath, the old owner went back to work.
On the other hand, Varian was not bothered by the weird looks people were throwing.
Cooling his juice to a near freezing point and sipping it slowly, he said with deliberate arrogance. "You don't understand. I don't have to follow the standards, what I do becomes the standard. Want to bet if this restaurant will become super famous if we reveal our true selves?"
Kyle nearly choked on his food at that counter. Gulping down some cold juice, he slammed the table. "Of course it will. But that's power abuse!"
"…"
"…"
The customers in the store looked at them with a new understanding. These guys definitely came for scamming the old owner. Or maybe it's all just a prank and they're recording this from somewhere.
Varian laughed at Kyle's rebuke and was about to continue when his comm flashed.
[Looking forward to the day after tomorrow~]
Sarah's message arrived with a picture of her staring at him with a burning passion.
Varian gulped. Marriage was just a day away but every minute felt like an hour.
Sometimes, Varian just wanted to put himself to sleep and wake up on the wedding day but there's just too much administrative post-war work for him to do that. It's only now that he made some free time to chill out.
[I luuuuv you :3 ]
Sia's message was simple but her picture was her giving him a seductive smile. It was a deadly smile that struck his heart like a lightning bolt.
"Focus, focus, focus..." Varian took deep breaths and controlled himself from teleporting into the palace.
"Why are you sweating?" Kyle raised a brow. "Wait, can you even sweat at that level?"
"I am no longer a mortal, so maybe I shouldn't sweat." Varian put on an expression of pondering the point seriously, just to shift the topic.
But his words riled up the customers around them.
"You boys, what's this new prank called?" A middle-aged man asked.
"Are you preparing for the school drama?" A middle-aged woman, presumably the man's wife, followed up.
"Or let me guess, are you some high awakeners pretending to be noobs so that we get offended and question you, then you show us your real power and faceslap us?" A teenage boy pushed up his spectacles and asked. His glasses seemed to shine for a split second.
"Ouch." The shopkeeper flicked the teenager's forehead and served the dishes to the middle-aged couple. "I said stop reading that shit, that stuff only happens in movies. Why would any rich man would be so bored to come visit my stall in disguise? And you're talking about mighty high awaken—"
"Master! Sovereign Bali is coming for y—"
The street suddenly shook and a man stormed into the restaurant with an urgent expression. "Your majesty, you can't put off picking the colors for the wedding suit any longer. It's the only dye of its kind and would take two days to dry!"
Varian rolled his eyes. "Why pick one when I can have them all?"
"Your majesty!" Bali looked like he was about to cry. 'You're picking a wedding and not a circus tent.'
"Fine, fine. I'll finalize the choices today." Varian got up and walked to the exit.
He didn't pay attention to the customers, the middle-aged couple, the teenager and the owner paying staring at him with wide eyes.
"T-That's S-Sovereign Bali, right?" The middle-aged man gulped and asked.
"Y-Yes, it's him. That demeanor, that aura…it can only be a sovereign." The middle-aged lady nodded.
"Then the one they called his majesty…" The teenager opened his mouth in shock.
"I called the Emperor a kid and got away with it…" The shop owner gasped, feeling lucky and terrified at the same time.
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