Secret of the Two Kings (89 CHAPTERS - ON HOLD)

제 66 부

Reconvening at their palanquin was not as exciting as it seemed. Jung Min's empty face made the grinning Prime Minister lose his appetite. His onyx-black eyebrows scrunched and assembled together as he sat opposite to his son. "Get that long face of yours out of my face."

He then instructed the palanquin escorts to start moving, as they were about to go home. "Let's go."

Jung Min turned to him, face still as blank as a paper. He just grabbed a book and started reading. With his son ignoring him, the Prime Minister cleared his throat and finally opened up the result of his meeting with the Balhae Queen.

"Son, drop that book and listen to me."

With all due respect, the Prosecution Head folded the book and gazed straight to his father. "What is it? Are you going to tell me that you just successfully manipulated that Queen?"

Jung Ho scoffed, "What? No! It's not manipulating, it's mind conditioning... she agreed!"

"Don't try to sugarcoat it in front of me. No matter how nice and pleasant you twist your words, it's still the same. Before I went out of that room, Queen Songyeon was rigid about her decision. She doesn't want the terms of our King. Now, you're telling me that she agreed?" traces of blood patches filled Jung Min's cheeks—in a suppressed anger. "Tell me. What did you do to convince her? How did you manipulate... Ah, no. How did you condition her?"

"A little exchange of favors. Something that she couldn't resist."

The smirk on the Prime Minister's lips made Jung Min's skin writhe in disgust. He shot a glare of fury to his father, realizing that the woman he had an argument might be correct: Jung Ho's reputation had already tainted the almighty reputation of their Heavenly Kingdom. That he was a seed of a manipulative, vile, and conniving demon.

"And what is that?"

"You!"

"Me?" the baffled son's forehead curled.

"Yes, my son. The end of this small conflict between two big kingdoms depends on you."

"What are you talking about?"

"You... are going to marry their princess."

Jung Min's jaw dropped, his mouth gaping open in shock. Suddenly, the last image of the embarrassed woman looking at him before she climbed back to the palanquin crossed his mind. He then thought, I'm going to marry that woman?

To a certain extent, he had no complete, utter, solid objection of the plan. Jung Min knew deep inside him that the moment his eyes laid with that pretty, dazzling hazelnut, a peculiar yet bouncing feeling kicked his stomach like he was in a Hwarang match. His defenses shattered, his heart skipped not just one beat—thousands of it. It even jumped out of his chest, and he did not mind. The woman's astonishing, perfect superficial features sent butterflies to his fortified stomach. She might have been quite shady for dragging his name with the Prime Minister. But in the end, when the woman's true emotion peeked into her eyes, when her unexpected vulnerable side got revealed, the annoyance that Jung Min felt towards her flew and pulverized into the wind, and he just wanted to see her again... to know her more—perhaps to apologize first and acknowledge his mistake.

However, those reasons alone were not enough for him to marry her instantly. For him, marrying someone just because of infatuation, guilt, or worse because of political purposes pertains abuse and control. Those two were not the essence of marriage. It would not last for a lifetime because there was no solid foundation. Pure selfish theatrical acts of tomfoolery. Was he selfish? Jung Min could not tell anymore.

"This is ridiculous! You've decided on yourself without consulting me?"

"That's what we're doing at the moment. I need you to do it as soon as possible."