𝘼𝙐𝙂𝙐𝙎𝙏 𝘿 |𝙈𝙔𝙂|

Forty-One: Jiun's Rage

~~ JIUN'S POV ~~

I was just a young boy. 

I was a wild teenager who didn't want to be suffocated in the palace, doing the same thing every single day. I wanted it all; a palace, a throne, and a golden goblet: I just didn't want to work for it. 

I was so much smarter than my cousins and uncles. 

While they fought and argued with the king over lineage and the vast future, I sat back and watched with amusement. 

One by one, each of them fell into darkness. My cousins; killed and murdered. My uncles; poisoned. 

My father; vanished in the night and was viciously beaten by bandits. 

Eventually, it was just me and my mother, as well as my youngest cousin. 

I ended up being first in line. 

A life of royalty and pleasure excited me and caused my eyes to light up with greed and lust, I was torn between two things. 

The throne. 

Or the woman I was so helplessly obsessed with. 

    Kim Sanghee came to the palace in her early teens, helping out with laundry and cleaning before moving up to her position as courtmaid. 

   Once I laid eyes on her, it was nearly impossible to look elsewhere. 

It wasn't love. 

It was lust. 

But what's the difference? 

   I had always gotten everything I've ever wanted. So why couldn't I have her? 

    Those thin pink lips were practically asking to be kissed; her thick luscious locks of raven hair alwyas lingered with the scent of fresh vanilla. That perfectly shaped slender body always got my heartbeat racing. I wanted her so badly. 

    Year after year after year she denied me, always remaining close guarded and cold when I would speak with her. Nothing would seduce her. Not money, not jewels, not dresses, not alcohol, NOTHING. Not me. 

    I eventually filled the desperate hole in my heart, frequently spending time with various other women which didn't enthrall my mother very much. 

   However, I never forgot Sanghee. 

   I was determined to have her, no matter what. So much that years later I was even able to manipulate the king into issuing a wedding decree. 

   Despite all of my desperate efforts, there was alwyas this ONE person in the way. 

Muhyeok. 

    A shy and formal young man, Muhyeok was born into a prestigious and aristocratic family. He lived inside the palace, frequently spending time in libraries aside scholars and other noble men in search of a broader knowledge. 

    Me and Muhyeok were inseparable. 

    Since we could begin to walk, the two of us spent every available minute together. We told one another all of our secrets, pranked the eunuchs that assisted my father, teased the little girls that came to visit, and played imaginary games out in the garden.