She opened her eyes wide in confusion. What's wrong with him? Is having a tutor a burden for him?
However, Tashian was frustrated to see the innocent woman in front of him with her eyes wide open.
What is a tutor? These are the young people who just graduated from college, aka scholars. Their work is to implant basic common sense to people, but comes with cheap income.
Under the name scholars, whose job is to teach various things, such writing, playing musical instruments, dancing and painting, they are able to make connections to the nobles easily. This has been serving as the string for the scholars to enter politics.
Having acquaintances in the circle of nobles, made it easy for the scholars to establish high positions in teaching society and academic class.
However, there is a big disadvantage for the nobles. The teachers were to teach the young noble maidens in an enclosed room alone. Usually, they held classes for hours, thus making it easy for them to do something obscene to the maidens they were teaching.
In fact, the most famous gossip in the Capital of Cremons was the secret love story of a young noble maiden and her teacher. Notwithstanding an unimaginable number of cases it had brought damaging reputations of the aristocrats, the obsession the maidens have for the teachers rarely subsides.
There was only one reasonable excuse for Tashian, who was well aware of such circumstances, could have.
"Anyway, having a teacher… Don't do it."
It was a warning from Tashian to her. She was a bit stupefied at his fierce expression, but at the same time, she was curious. However, since he was wearing a frightening expression, she just accepted his words.
"All right, I'll think a little more about having a tutor."
"Don't even think about it. Never. You must not."
Eun-woo burst into laughter when she saw him being stubborn like a five-year-old child. Soon she was smiling up and her shoulders shook as she laughed.
Tashian asked her in pure bewilderment.
"What's there to laugh…?"
"Pfft! Ahaha! You're really stubborn like a child!"
"Stubborn? I'm just thinking of you…."
But Eun-Woo cut off his words and laughed louder.
Tashian, who was watching her from the side, wrapped her cheeks in his big hands like a hot-tempered person. Then he pinched them lightly on both sides, as if stretching a dough.
"You're really….!"
"Hahah, Ta, Tashian! Let go of my cheeks...!"
It was then that the booklet he gave to Eun-woo, which was on her lap, fell on the ground. With his amazing reflexes, he successfully managed to catch the cover of the book. But his sudden actions had a great impact on Eun-woo, whom he was pinching her cheeks, and her body swayed to the opposite direction.
"Ah…!"
Going forward, he wrapped her body in his iron-like arms. Her body was laid on the bed with a soft thud. She blinked, feeling the touch of the bed from the back of her head. Tashian's face was so close to her. He was fairly surprised as she was, and his eyes widened in shock at their distance which was less than inches away.
Eun-woo shrank her body in his arms, feeling the muscles of Tashian from her back, tightening and firm. His body above her was huge, with his clothes. Seeing him from underneath, she felt like his body would completely cover hers.
Eun-woo fell down like a puppy bitten by a mother dog and couldn't move.
Suddenly, something itchy and hot damped on her cheek. He was breathing unsteadily. From his hot breath, her hair seemed to be rising one by one. The overlapping sounds of their heart together were clearly ringing to both of their ears.
Whenever he breathed in and exhaled, her shoulders would move up and down noticeably. She had an impulse to sweep his strong shoulder above her with her hand.
She suddenly came to her senses. Eun-woo immediately stood up like a person with wax drippings on her feet.
"Oh… I'm sorry! It was my mistake!"
"No, it's all right."
She sprang to her feet and stood with her back facing him like a lost person. Catching her breath, it seemed like it was going to rip my dress open.
He, too, pulled himself out as soon as she got up. She could hear him coughing.
"A, all of them were thrown away."
She bent down in a hurry to pick up the scattered papers. At the same time he also bent down kneeling down and began piling up the papers that had slipped out of the booklet.
As quickly as they were embarrassed, the floor had become clean. But that was the problem. As both of them were competing with each other with their quick hands, their hands laid on one of the papers on the ground.
"Ah…!"
His large hand covered Eun-woo's small hand, which touched the last paper first. His hand, which contrasted with her fine and slender hands, remained even after laying on her hands. It was a stark contrast. Both hands, which hesitated as if the world were to stop, fell hurriedly as if they had been burned on a heated iron plate.
She felt numbness in her skin. It seemed to heat up in an instant.
He was perplexed and tried to reach out to the piece of paper, but it was the same. There, too, her hand came first and waited. On such a few left pieces of papers, two pairs of hands were making a fuss, going back and forth. They were stuck in that same situation.
In the meantime, Eun-woo's ears turned red.
Eventually, the last piece of paper was held by Eun-Woo. Even that wasn't possible because Tashian, who held the paper at the same time, apologized in the air and let it go quickly.
"H- here it is! Then, Tashian, I'm going to get going…!"
"Wa, wait!"
Eun-woo handed the last paper to him and left the room, running.
Tashian, who had another pile of papers on top of the tower of papers he was holding, stood there, unable to catch her as she was running away.
He sighed deeply and swept his hair. Then, after roughly organizing the remaining book, he slowly left the unused room.
***
"The path of learning is wide and endless. Speaking Germant, being able to understand Jwiland, grammar, rhetoric words, astronomy, and math education are one of the indispensable education. And also… "
Johannes' endless lectures continued. Eun-woo tried to keep her head straight, which was constantly falling down while listening to the lecture. Of course, Selena, who was sitting next to her, remained upright, as if a bamboo was sitting in a chair.
Eun-woo was curious how she could take the class for such a long time while maintaining a straight posture for several hours without a break.
'If only Selena showed signs of exhaustion, I might be able to ask for a rest…'
Of course, it wasn't worth it. Eun-woo soothed her regret and sighed and pulled herself together to concentrate on the class again.
"… Today we'll have a quick look at the main languages spoken on the continent, including Hellasium. Often referred to as a liberal language, and one of basic knowledge one must acquire, especially for the head of a family."
Eun-woo had also heard a lot about foreign languages here. The national language is Hellasium, but she heard that the official language of the empire, Inbrtan, is the most widely used.
"The principle is that all official documents and literature in the empire should be written in Hellasium, but in fact, very few people use this language as their native language. Most of the people here, including myself and the Lady, speak Brittany. Have you ever heard of other languages?"
"My grandparents are from Flanders, so they use that language."
Selena replied right away and Johannes said.
"In fact, only a few speak Hellasium. Most of them speak Brittany, Basque, Flander, and Patosis, and in the southwest part were linguistically torn apart in numerous dialects."
Eun-woo asked softly, unable to hide her mixed feelings about the languages.
"All those languages… Do I have to learn them?"
"That's not it."
At Johannes' remark, Eun-woo breathed a sigh of relief.
"But it is common practice to infer a person's rank by intonation or from their dialect. Therefore, it was determined that proper education was necessary until the two of you could read and write Hellasium completely."
She slammed the desk by putting the thick textbooks on the table, making a loud sound. The loud noise made Eun-woo retreat, and Selena looked at the comparable height the books have and Johannes. It was taller than Johannes' sitting height, which startled her.
"Language study begins with infinite repetition. From this day on, you two will write all the papers in Hellasium."
Johannes ordered in a solemn voice.
***
It was time to leave Johannes' office after the first Hellasium lesson. Eun-woo sighed and trudged away as she went out. Selena, who saw her doing weird actions, asked her carefully.
"…Lady Miller, was there anything you didn't like about today's lesson?"
"No, Selena…."
It would be in vain if she would tell the top student about her suffering, while Selena was enthusiastic in learning, not looking away from the class, that Eun-woo couldn't keep up.
Eun-woo was about to say something, but when she saw Selena's bright face, she sighed again.
"I miss my older brother more than anything today."
The word 'Older Brother' was used to refer to Diego Miller.
She murmured, and Selena nodded with admiration at their brother and sister's friendship. But her emotion didn't last long.
It was because Eun-woo gritted her teeth and murmured.
"Just come back. I'll never let you go."
Selena stepped back hearing her. Eun-woo cut her words and put down her shaky fist and coughed. The reason why she started to study hard while taking these classes is because of Marquis Diego Miller's great contribution.
She had to do it, thinking of her brother, who had left the city with some excuse and had not returned for weeks.
"Learning Hellasium is a little difficult, but once we learn it, it'd a very useful. Let's work together."
Selena smiled gently and encouraged Eun-woo, who was struggling with language classes.
They walked slowly along the garden sponsored by the Duke. It was on the side road of the back door facing Johannes' office. It was also a place where Selena was often seen with Ikshid.
Eun-woo looked at Selena's hair like a red tarpaulin tied with a plain cloth.
It was always attractive and beautiful. She was like a fairy in the garden. She was always like this whenever she saw her, but she then wondered what is Selena in Ikshid's eyes?
"Selena."
Eun-woo slowly took one step at a time and began to rhyme her unhurried words.
"The Crown Prince... We've seen each other quite often these days."
Selena answered calmly. Her voice, unmoved by emotion, sounded as if she was talking about someone else, and not the Crown Prince of the country.
"That's right. There are many opportunities where we can see the Crown Prince these days. It's the chance to get acquainted with him."
I wonder if it was just friendship. These days, Ikshid has been obsessed with the duke Castle saying almost all sorts of excuses to visit it. It was safe to say that he was not able to accommodate and eat comfortably because of his high status, and that he was carrying out almost all of his schedules here.
Eun-Woo, who knew the reason for his actions very well, had no choice but to watch Selena, the cause of Ikshid's weird action, with curious eyes.
"His Highness is a very pleasant man. When I saw him from a distance, I thought he was a man of majestic dignity and a very befitting Prince.…."
Eun-woo could see that Selena's face telling the story of Ikshid was a little different from usual. It was only after much thought that she realized that the emotion Selena had was excited.
Selena continued with an unusual look of excitement.
"There's something funny about him."
Eun-Woo was shocked.
She couldn't believe Selena was being swayed.
She had no choice but to admire the greatness of love that allowed Selena to express the prince's personality as only one year old. She couldn't help but admire the greatness of love that made it possible for the character to express her feelings to the prince with just one stroke.
This is love. That's true love, too.