Vol. 1 - Ch. 23

I was unaware that people in Zhejiang province often only eat breakfast and lunch in a day because I had never traveled to other places.It is said that rich people eat 3-4 meals a day, but unlike the rich people and their time, the impoverished villagers thought it was a luxury to stop what they were doing and eat a meal during working hours.

Due to this, most people satisfy their hunger with snacks packed from home, but maybe because of this culture, most restaurants don't open doors during lunch.

The same was true for my guesthouse.

We couldn't remove the sign or shut the door like other guest houses due to our unique setup, but we also didn't open the restaurant on the 1^st floor during the day.

Instead, roughly speaking, from 11:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., the guesthouse had a total of 4 rest hours.

It was obviously just rest time, but I couldn’t give up the habit of eating 3 meals a day, so I ate a lot regardless of what other people thought, and later I washed the dishes, prepared for dinner, organized the restaurant, and cleaned the guest house; I didn’t really have much time.

Well, why did I have to bring this up?

“Can I eat now?”

It was because of a customer who came in the middle of the day and asked this.

He was a man of medium height wearing this official’s uniform. He opened the front door and came in. He looked at Kyung-ju, who was wiping the table, not at me and asked this.

“Uh?”

I heard Kyung-ju ask back in confusion. I guessed the intentions of the man. He probably thought we were still open for business during lunch since he saw us cleaning the table area.

While Kyung-ju hesitated, I realized that he and the man standing behind him were the duo she spoke of.

The young lord and the warrior. Just glancing at them brought to mind the combo.

As Kyung-ju said, they looked to be over 20 but not older than 30.

The man in front of her was dressed in this white official robe, with a hat on the head, and had this appearance that could be called reasonably handsome.

Normally, I would have glanced at the appearance at least once. But unfortunately, things aren't great now.

Because the appearance of the man behind him was so outstanding, the appearance of this young lord-like person who was a warrior, who can be called the best looking, was buried without a trace.

A short while ago, I was the one who sat across from Ja-hyun and had a meal. If these have decent looks, there is no way I would care about them.

‘Ah…’

The appearance of the warrior behind the one like an official wasn’t great.

And if the scholar wasn’t as beautiful as Ja-hyun too, he was clearly a rare handsome man.

Although I had to admit it, I was pleased with myself for having improved my status in recent years. Kyung-ju was right. The warrior's appearance was noble, and his handsome face was comparable to that of the most handsome.

After admiring the beauty of the warrior over this young man’s shoulders, I turned my head away because I was practically staring at him.

And then I made eye contact with the young man ahead.

“Ah, it seems like the owner who was away has returned.”

When the young man met my eyes, he smiled and said it.

How does he know? It was a time I couldn’t hide my doubts about him.

“You had some errands to run, so we got checked in first, and then the restaurant she recommended to us was closed.”

The young man continued to speak with a smile on his face.

“When I came here, there wasn’t a single restaurant open for me to eat. It doesn’t matter if you can provide us with a basic meal to eat. Right, I will pay the right price for it too.”

“Ah.”

Well? We do have some chicken soup left. I answered after a short thought.

“Fine. Then I will serve you a meal. It isn’t business hours yet, and I am responsible for the fact that you two haven’t eaten anything since you got here.”

“Haha, no, please. It isn’t.”

“Hmm… it isn’t simple, but we do have some chicken soup, would that be ok? We can get your rice instead of noodles too.”

“It would be great if you could do that.”

The young man grinned.

When the young man grinned, I saw his brightly smiling face, and thought he looked so good.

On the other hand, the warrior, who was handsome, just had a cold wind blowing around, he went to a corner and sat down in silence before our talks even ended.

‘No, is that person really a guard?’

When I saw that, I sensed my doubts growing.

Isn’t it normal for an escort guard to wait till the conversation is done and leave with the person being escorted?

Although he was dressed in official clothes and had a sword at his waist, judging by his actions and the odd atmosphere around him, he seemed more like a well-raised young lord than the one I was talking to.

“Then, sit down and wait. I will bring the meal out soon.”

Well, it is none of my business, so I tried to shake off my doubts and turned to the kitchen.

Before moving the feet, Kyung-ju asked, ‘Can I help?’ to which I said, taking the towel from her hands.

“Take care of Eun-young. I will be back soon.”

As I entered the kitchen, I noticed the pile of dishes on a wooden tray resting on the kitchen counter.

It seemed like Ja-hyun had brought the tray over, just as I had requested him earlier. I couldn’t see the person around though.

‘Seriously, that kid…’

I was lost in thought as I put down the dish towel next to the pile of dishes.

‘He is good at doing what he is told.’

This was really surprising to me.

Considering his words and actions towards me, it was difficult to imagine him as being someone obedient enough to follow my words without saying no.

“If you think about it carefully, things have been a bit strange since yesterday.’

I was shocked that Ja-hyun decided to stay in the guesthouse without saying a word because I pressured him to stay back and pay his debt to me. It was something that didn’t fit the character of Ja-hyun that I had read in the book.

This is because, in my interpretation of him, he wasn’t an obedient character who could change his decisions just because someone told him to change.

“What was going through his mind when he decided to stay here?”

Of course, I am grateful that he stayed, but there were a lot of things that caught me off guard.

‘Or maybe my interpretation of the character was wrong.’

Yes, maybe there were some shortcomings in my interpretation of Ja-hyun’s character.

Unlike the characters in the book, the real one tends to be more three-dimensional.

‘Just looking at Eun-young or Wang Dae-geon. Well, it’s definitely three-dimensional.’

I got into problems again when I reheated the lukewarm soup. This time, unlike before, was the pattern that shined on the chest of Ja-hyun and this power I held.

“I tried using it on Eun-young and Kyung-ju earlier, but it didn’t work at all’

Shouldn’t I just shout ‘stop!’? Even though I asked him secretly while cooking, Ja-hyun showed no signs of explaining, like yesterday.

‘More than this… what more do I say… do you…’

It was then,

“Kuak!”

Someone stabbed me in the shoulder from behind. My shoulders perked up.

I quickly turned and saw Ja-hyun standing upright with his back to me.

As soon as I checked the person I was dealing with, I frowned.

“W-why did you surprise me?”

I told him to stop scaring me, but he doesn’t listen at all!

Ja-hyun had been listening silently, but as I complained and ran my other hand over the shoulder where he had stabbed with his finger, he blurted out a word.

“Enough dozing off.’

“What?”

“Standing around like a sick chicken. It is guly, so go in and sleep now.”

“…”

“Or are you really wanting to throw your head into the pot this time?”

I was upset with the words he said.

‘I didn’t fall asleep this time though.’

“As if.”

Ja-hyun snorted. I protested at that.

“I mean it! I didn’t sleep for a… um, I guess I was in deep thought for a moment there.”

I told the truth, but Ja-hyun didn’t seem to believe it much.

No, I really didn’t actually doze off. I simply closed my eyes since my vision turned blurry. I think my mind went blank for a second. Well, it wasn’t that, for real. Sᴇaʀᴄh the NƟvelFɪre.ɴet website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of nøvels early and in the highest quality.

‘Oh no, did I just doze off?’

Before he said anything, I suddenly lost confidence and made the decision to change the subject.

“Forget it. If you are that worried, you should have helped me a long time ago.”

“…”

“Where were you even? If you want to get off work, you should work quickly. If you become a kitchen assistant, your monthly pay will increase, and you will be able to repay the debt you owe me more quickly. Isn’t that right?”

“…”

After a moment of silence, Ja-hyun spoke.

“You weren’t joking then.”

“What? You thought it was. A joke?”

“You are amazing. You don’t know anything about me, and you try to put me under control?”

“…”

Putting him under control and manipulating him. Right, but the tone of his felt different.

“That was a harsh enough expression, huh? Can we not refer to it as a cooperative relationship instead of that?”

“Nope.”

“Of course, people are all about helping one another after all. Right?”

After finishing saying that, I didn’t want to argue with Ja-hyun anymore, so I looked down at the pot and vapor.

“Uh? Why is it already boiling? Ja-hyun, hold on. Please give me some rice. It will help with rice.”

I asked him, but he silently scooped up the rice and handed it to me, like I asked. He seemed to be doing well and paying attention, don't you think?

I carried the clean wooden tray out of the kitchen with two rice bowls and two soup bowls in it.

I turned around, but I could still feel Ja-hyun's eyes following me.

Uh? Why did I order him to cook rice but not serve it?

Answer was simple.

As I previously mentioned, in addition to the fact that there wasn't much of him causing trouble in the original work, but the two people didn’t seem like good news to me, I had this premonition that they were odd people.

First, that warrior was by no means a normal one. Even if he was skilled, he would have been a supporting character. If not, his face looked too precious to be an extra.

Anyway, it felt too premature for Ja-hyun to meet with the characters who might one day appear in the main plot.

“They say they massacred a hundred civilians. He was defeated by Thunder Sword, near Poyang Lake, but was seen after escaping.”

I could see the back of the young man saying something to the warrior across from him.

As I approached, the warrior winked. Only then did the young man turn back and look at me.

“Woah, that was fast.”

“Yes, I was afraid the soup would get too cold; was I oblivious of something?”

At my question, the young man smiled.

“Haha, that couldn’t be. I mean, we are grateful you did this for us.”

Right. But despite his words, his face and attitude were so simple that I smiled slightly along with him.