Sidestory 16.1
Aristine was dumbfounded by this new revelation. When she glanced to the side, she saw Viscount Joaquin giving her an aggrieved look.
‘So he was silenced.’
Now she understood why Viscount Joaquin couldn’t say anything and was desperately trying to change the subject. Naturally, the Emperor and all the other powerful figures must have taken turns applying pressure…
All the people involved were high-ranking officials and their close confidants. Meanwhile, the aides went behind their master’s and passed along the very information their masters wanted to hide.
And most of all, not a single word of this had reached the ears of Her Majesty, Emperor Aristine…
‘If I didn’t know any better, I’d think they were selling the country off.’
It wasn’t even a joke—it was a real possibility.
‘My problem is, why is tteokbokki at the center of this?’
It was practically a tteokbokki-gate! Aristine looked at her people with frosted-over eyes.
Despite her gaze, they stared back at her like children who had been preparing for their school’s talent show.
“Please try it before it gets cold, Your Majesty.”
“No, try mine first, Sister Rineh.”
“I made a lot, so eat as much as you want! You have to eat at least seven, no, ten plates!”
“I made it with special ingredients flown in directly from the East!”
“I’m glad to have the chance to do something simple for my dear friend and her baby.”
“Hah, you are all ridiculous. My little sister always loves what I make. Same thing happened with the chicken, no?”
“You have a talent for distorting history, Brother-in-law. I’m pretty sure my wife preferred my cooking, OK?”
“Don’t you think you’re the one distorting history, Your Majesty?”
Even as they bickered, their expressions were all the same. They wanted to see Aristine eat their food and enjoy it.
Seeing them like this, Aristine felt a laugh springing to her lips.
Swallowing her laughter, Aristine shook her head back and forth.
“Haa, if I eat all of this, my stomach will burst.”
Once they heard Aristine’s sigh, a gloom fell over the faces of the powerful figures at the doorway.
Aristine shrugged her shoulders.
“What are you doing not coming in? I can’t eat standing up.”
“…!”
At those words, their faces immediately brightened up as if their gloominess was never there.
In the end, Aristine couldn’t stop herself from laughing.
The tteokbokki was absolutely delicious.
* * *
After the Meal.
Everyone didn’t leave immediately but stayed back for tea. Who knew how much time had passed.
Aristine had eaten to her fill for the first time in a long while and she began to nod off.
“Oh my!”
“She must be very tired.”
The others who had been chatting away, smiled when they saw this sight.
“Quiet down.”
Tarkan carefully picked up his wife, leaning her against him so that she wouldn’t wake up.
After getting pregnant, Aristine would wake up if she fell asleep in an uncomfortable position and sleeping after that was even harder. His plan was to carry her to bed like this and help her sleep comfortably.
Once he got to the bedroom, the Fería Quartet, who had been on standby in the adjacent room, began to play soft music.
Tarkan laid Aristine on the bed and tightly tucked her in under the blankets.
He checked the temperature and humidity in the room, adjusted the canopy to block out any bright light, and made sure everything was perfect.
After finishing all that, he went back to his sleeping wife and gently stroked her hair.
Then, he gave her a small peck on the forehead.
“Ng…”
Aristine stirred, perhaps sensing his presence.
But thankfully, she didn’t wake up.
‘Well, she didn’t wake up but…’
Tarkan chuckled as he watched his wife’s hand land smack-dab on his chest.
“Haa, seriously. At this point, it’s a habit.”
Even though she was sleeping so deeply that she didn’t wake up while he was carrying her to bed…
“You still managed to fondle your husband’s chest. Seriously.”
Shouldn’t Tarkan be the one teasing Aristine for being a pervert instead of the other way around?
But who was really to blame?
It was all thanks to Tarkan that his wife developed this habit.
He was unbuttoning his shirt and puffing his chest in front of his wife for no reason.
In fact, Tarkan was very, very proud of the result.
‘Maybe I should just lie down and take a nap with her.’
The temptation was certainly there.
‘But I’m sure my competitors are still out there, making moves even at this hour.’
Now was not the time to rest.
It was time to go out and fight for victory.
To earn even more of his wife’s love!
* * *
It was just as Tarkan expected. By the time he got back, things had already devolved into a psychological warfare.
When Aristine was here, they were all chatting peacefully(?) and ‘haha’ing and ‘hoho’ing. But now, they were attacking each other’s tteokbokki with critiques.
“Hmph! This is way too sweet for our thumb princess!”
“That’s nonsense! My little sister has been crazy about sweets since she was a child.”
“Well, people’s tastes are bound to change over time, no? When Her Majesty and I were making scalpels, she mostly preferred—.”
It was a total uproar.
No one was backing down.
Tarkan confidently stepped forward and nodded.
“My wife liked mine the best.”
“What are you talking about? Becoming Emperor must already be blinding you. My dear daughter-in-law ate more of mine.”
“Isn’t that just because Your Eminence kept offering? Our dear Emperor Aristine cherishes her people! In reality, it’s my magical tteokbokki that she really—.”
“Sister Rineh has a crabby temper, so she likes things a little spicy! Like the one I made!”
“Wait. Who are you calling crabby tempered?”
“Aren’t you the one who likes spicy food, Yenika? Are you admitting that you have a crabby temper?”
“Ehe, don’t you see Yenika’s devilish charm?!” Yenika winked.
“…”
“…”
“Wait. Are you calling me crabby tempered?”
“Stop making it seem like it never happened!”
No one was willing to yield.
In the end, the first-ever tteokbokki competition ended in a draw.
.
.
.
Viscount Joaquin, who had been watching all this from start to finish, thought to himself:
‘I mean, it’s not that important for them to be going so far…’
Aristine’s appetite was returning so she had been eating well lately.
‘It tasted somewhat good so I ate it but…’
Viscount Joaquin shook his head.
‘It wasn’t particularly delicious. The chicken was way better.’
.
.
.
A week later, deep into the night.
Viscount Joaquin tossed and turned several times in his bed before his eyes shot open.
‘Why do I keep thinking about it? It wasn’t even that great?!’
He kept thinking about it to the point where he couldn’t sleep. Just remembering it made his mouth water and his stomach growl.
And he had just eaten a full dinner!
‘Why exactly do I keep craving tteokbokki?’
To make things worse, he was craving that spicy tteokbokki that Yenika made, the one loved by people with crabby tempers!
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What a perfect way for this “war” to end. Poor viscount tho