CHAPTER 36: They're At It Again

Saphira didn't feel bad about those two. They chose their own lives.

No matter how nonchalant she is, it is still a fact that she is the crown princess.

Even she has the desire to point that out a while ago if Gideon didn't butt in.

She was here because the Emperor called for her, so addressing her identity is necessary.

Gideon sighed before returning his eyes on Saphira.

"I apologize that you have to experience that," he spoke.

Saphira shook her head, "Just look at my attire your highness. I really am not dressed properly as well."

She was still wearing her attire that morning, it is a half formal one.

If not for the fact that it was not a real dress and has a leggings underneath it.

Gideon shook his head as well, "Attire or not, they had no right to act in such a way towards you."

Somehow she was the only one who can wear such clothes even though she was being called in the palace.

Saphira smiled before she walked over to him and the two of them walked side by side.

"It seems, you just came out from a meeting. But this is far from where meetings are being held," she asked.

He smiled, "I was tasked by father to pick you up. He knew you would surely be stopped from the gate. Sending just anyone won't do either."

She thought for a bit before nodding her head, "I can quite see that no one might pick me up if he tasked someone else."

Gideon chuckled.

"Hmmm."

She was looking at him with a smile on.

"What is it?"

"No, just that I really admire you," she said.

He furrowed his brows not understanding what she was currently saying.

"You never crave for power or for treasure," she commented returning her eyes on the path they were walking on.

"No, I do crave for them. You may just not know of it. I can be acting now as well," was his answer.

'You are only human after all, anyone would crave for something but you never craved for something excessive,' she thought but have no desire of voicing it out.

"Have you ever wished that you have Qirin instead?" she asked this time.

Gideon went silent for a bit before smiling and shaking his head, "I have asked that question to myself a lot of times. And the answer that always comes up is the same."

He got close to Saphira and whispered in her ear, "I am scared of fighting. Both scared and hated it."

She looked at him with obvious confusion in her face.

He chuckled.

"I can wield the sword just fine but I am someone who feared for my life more. Feared for my family's life more. I don't want to see them die or to feel my life slowly draining away."

He looked down at her, "That is why I feel bad for my brother. At such a young age he not only need to learn the workings of a royal blood but to have to train his little body just so he could fulfill the duty of the Empire once he grows up."

He shook his head, "And now, all of you are still young but you are already carrying such a heavy burden. That is unfair for me, why must they send children to fight in their stead?"

Saphira could tell how truthful he was with his words, he really deeply cares for Hunter who was four years younger than him.

"Did you know that I had this kind of talk with your sister once? Before you departed to that island?"

She was stunned, Gideon never voiced out his thoughts when the tragedy happened. She had assumed that he felt the same as the others.

They blame Raynisha but they don't blame the family.

He smiled seeing her reaction, "True I don't know what to feel towards her but I didn't see what happened, that is why I willed myself to only think of the Raynisha I had befriended here."

'Now I understand why he has the purest aura among everyone that I met. Because he remembered everyone with the goodness in them and not the bad things that they do.'

But that doesn't mean he didn't feel mad about what was going on.

He simply blamed the circumstances and not the person himself.

"That is why, I guess I can still think of the good memories we shared together. Though I really didn't expect that I will have the same conversation with the younger sister eight years later."

Saphira laughed, "I see."

"They're at it again, aren't they?" he suddenly spoke.

Even though he was not keen at fighting.

He was still trained and he was even more trained with the people at court.

Those venomous looks they throw and words they utter.

That is why he can feel the glare Saphira was receiving from one side.

"Yup, they are the people with a lot of impurities, wanting more power than they can chew. Your kind is truly one in a million," she answered.

She had felt it the moment they started walking but she didn't bother.

"They must be those hungry wolves waiting for the engagement to be dissolved before striking with their daughters," she added.

"That's what I want to ask you as well," he started.

"Your engagement was made back when you were children. When the older ones saw just how the two of you compliment one another."

Saphira knows where his question will go.

"With everything that is happening now, I am currently speaking about the present. What do you think of it? You will have even more difficulties than the past Empresses, because you might not receive the support of the people."

She pursed her lips and then she sighed.

"It doesn't change anything. I will push through with my engagement. I will continue being the crown princess and I will marry Hunter."

Gideon looked in her eyes and he can see the determination within them together with resoluteness.

"That is until he himself says that he didn't want to marry me at all," she added afterwards.