Chapter 41
Chapter 41
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Following Ellea, Terban went inside. He was here once before so the inside was a bit familiar.
Remil greeted the two happily as they walked in.
“Miss Ellea, you’re here?”
“Yes, and how is the Director?”
“Thanks to you I’m well. Oh, you’re here today with the person who came last time.”
Remil wasn’t really surprised and welcomed Terban happily. Ellea explained the situation.
“We know each other, so he came with me today. He wants to keep his promise to the children.”
“I see. Thank you for coming.”
Remil listened to Ellea and expressed her sincere gratitude. But she immediately looked troubled.
“But what am I supposed to do? I have to go out now.”
“Don’t worry, go ahead. I’ll take good care of the children in the meantime.”
“Well then, please do. You all have to listen to Miss Ellea, okay?”
“Yes!”
With that, Remil left, leaving Ellea, Terban and the children behind. However, the children’s eyes were already focused on Terban.
The long-awaited figure of a person had appeared in front of them, so it was only natural that nothing else was visible to their eyes.
“You guys know him from the last time, right? So this person is…………..”
Ellea first tried to introduce Terban to the children, but was momentarily at a loss for words. She didn’t know how to tell the children who he was or his name.
Noticing her confusion, Terban spoke up.
“Call me Ban.”
“Ban?”
“Yes, I came here today to keep my promise to you.”
The name Terban gave confused Ellea, but he continued his introduction naturally.
The children rejoiced wildly, shouting at the top of their lungs that he had come.
Next, Ellea brought out the items she had brought for the children. It was carefully prepared by Borence and Jane today.
Instead of being bothered, they said they wanted to come here with Ellea next time.
“This is a snack for you guys, and this is what you said you needed last time. You know that you need to share it well, right? If you fight again like last time, I won’t bring it anymore.”
“Yes, I understand.”
“You’re really good at answering.”
But today, the children’s main concern was Terban. They started begging,
“Let’s play!”
However, Ellea firmly stopped the children because there was something they had to do before that.
Even though Terban was here, she didn’t take it easy with the children.
“There are things you have to do before you can play. Did you do everything I told you to do? Your homework?”
At her words, the children immediately quieted down, unlike before. Then the kids sneaked behind Terban, trying to hide.
“But Uncle came today.”
“Uncle?”
When the children called Terban “Uncle,” Ellea couldn’t help but burst out laughing.
Then, softly, she looked at him, finally stifled her laughter and said resolutely.
“It’s no use hiding. You can’t play unless you do all the studying you have to do today. Now, go bring out your notebooks and pencils.”
“That’s too much.”
“All right. I’m terrible, so hurry.”
At Ellea’s urging, the children went to their rooms as if they couldn’t help it.
She looked at Terban, who was still unable to adjust to the sudden situation. Nonetheless, the nursery was short handed today, so she was going to make use of what she had.
“We haven’t even started anything serious yet.”
“That’s even more surprising.”
“There will be more surprises to come. First of all, I’ll see to the children’s studies.”
“Study?”
At the word “study”, Terban couldn’t hide his curiosity. He thought all they needed to do was to play and help out with some work, but study?
“I’m teaching them to write. I’ll take care of the little ones, Your Majesty can take care of the bigger kids. Don’t be too strict because they’re in the learning stage.”
From the moment Terban stepped into the nursery, he had already been overturned, so Ellea decided to think only of the children.
Because it was obvious that he could help them.
On the other hand, her sudden request made Terban wince.
‘’I’ve never taught anyone before………”
But his voice was buried by the children’s voices, who each showed up with their schoolwork. Ellea told the children what to do, and the bigger kids went to Terban.
“It’s small here in the living room, so you can go to the dining table in the kitchen over there. Please take care of them.”
“No, that’s not it…..”
“Let’s go Uncle Ban. Let’s learn quickly and then we can play together.”
Once again, Terban’s words were ignored and unexpectedly led to the kitchen, accompanied by the children.
At the sight of the children leading Terban, who was at a loss unlike the stern emperor who ruled the country, Ellea laughed and sat down in a huddle with her little ones.
“Let’s check out the homework that I gave you last time. Did you all do well?”
“Of course.”
Meanwhile, on Terban’s side, the children spread out their notebooks and frolicked. The only one who was quiet was Terban.
They wanted to finish quickly, the constant noise made Terban eventually lose his patience and hit the table hard with one hand, drawing the children’s attention at once. The children were surprised by the sound and stopped talking.
As long as he was in charge of the job, he didn’t intend to let it go easily, so he threw some words at the children first.
“Didn’t we agree that you can’t play unless you finish this?”
“Yes.”
“Then I think you’d better get it over with.”
“Right. Then let’s get it over with. Let’s finish it quickly.”
The children quickly changed their stance, and the sight of their bright eyes with pencils made Terban smile.
“So how much did you learn before?”
Immediately his eyes grew serious at the children’s reply. As Ellea expected, there was no such thing as roughness in his personality.
***
When the appointment with Terban was cancelled, contrary to her original plan, Shanil spent some time relaxing in the palace.
However, no matter how much she thought about it, she still had doubts about the behavior Terban had shown yesterday, so she secretly called the aide.
It was a simple matter to get someone on her side. The first step was to place a mole on the emperor’s side.
“You wanted to see me?”
“Has His Majesty been busy with work lately? Or did he have urgent matters to attend to?”
“No, nothing like that has happened recently.”
The aide shook his head firmly at Shanil’s question. But there was a possibility that his words were not accurate.
“But you’re not His Majesty’s close aide, so there may be things you’re not aware of.”
“Yes, you’re right. I might have missed something.”
“Okay. If you notice any unusual activity, let me know right away.”
“Yes, My Lady.”
After the aide left, Shanil sat leaning deeply on the couch and shook her head in thought.
“Yeah. It’s not like it hasn’t happened before.”
More than anything, she had that aide in her control, so if any visible changes occurred from Terban, she would know about it then. Nothing could pass her eyes.
“I think so. Then.”
There was still work to be done, so she quickly summoned her maids.
“Send these invitations to the young ladies. And lastly, to the Princess…………”
Suddenly, Shanil stopped talking and stood up.
‘No, I think it’s better to give it to her in person.’
In case Ellea would refuse, Shanil planned to deliver the invitation to Ellea herself. Ellea wouldn’t be able to say no if Shanil went out this far.
‘Because you’re the main character of the position, so you can’t be left out.’
Shanil turned away, ignoring the maids, she headed to the palace where the Princess was with light steps.
****
In the meantime, Ellea was concentrating on teaching the children, forgetting that Terban was there.
And so time passed and the study that needed to be done today was finished.
The children were happy, even raising their hands, and she laughed and said to them.
“That’s the end of the study for today. Do your homework until I come back next time, okay?”
“Yes. Can we go play now?”
“Yes, put your things back in place then go play.”
“Yay!”
Watching the children return to their rooms with their own things, Ellea, who remembered Terban, headed straight to the kitchen.
The scene she saw before her was truly an unexpected sight.
“No, this is how you write it.”
“Like this?”
“Yes. And you wrote it wrong here.”
‘’Wow, uncle is very good at writing. It’s amazing.”
Without worrying about whether the children would be scared, Terban even explained the difficult letters in a way that the children could easily understand, showing them how to write them directly.
With that, the children were concentrating on his teaching. Looking at the neat handwriting that was different from them as if it was very fascinating.
‘Actually, I wasn’t expecting much.’
Deep down Ellea was afraid Terban would make the kids cry, but now looking at the sight, it felt natural.
‘I can’t believe it. His Majesty is here now.’
As Ellea looked at him pensively, his eyes quickly met Ellea’s as he raised his head. He asked without much reaction.
“What are you doing there?”
“Huh?”
When Terban asked, Ellea came to her senses and approached the children.
“Is this enough?”
She nodded, methodically checking what the children had studied.
“Yes, it’s enough. Don’t forget to review what you’ve learned today, and you can go play now.”
The children were equally pleased when Ellea gave them permission, grabbing their notebooks and disappearing at a fast pace.
“It would be nice if you like to study like you like to play. Even half of the enthusiasm.”
Seeing the children’s delight, Ellea shook her head in dismay and rearranged the disarrayed chairs.
Then she turned to Terban, who was still sitting, and asked him what he thought.
“How did you like doing it yourself?”
“It took me a while to get them to focus, but they followed along surprisingly well.”
“Right? You were good at it.”
When Terban praised the children, it made Ellea feel better, as if he was praising himself. As she organized the chairs, she spoke quietly.
“Now that they have learned most of the letters, I think it’s time they can learn other things. I’m thinking of teaching books in various fields soon.”
“Why do you have to go that far? Wouldn’t it be enough to sponsor them with money?”
At Terban’s straightforward question, Ellea replied simply with affection.
“Of course money is important, but there are obvious limits to how much it can change.”
“But.”
It was something that Terban could easily relate to. Realistically, when some kids were old enough to leave this nursery.
“Reading and writing is the beginning of everything. So I want to teach them to read books and learn different kinds of knowledge. It’s even better if they find something they like.” (Ellea)
“You want to give them a chance?” (Terban)
“Yes.”
Terban knew at once what Ellea meant. After all, it was for the same reason as when he had asked her why she came to the nursery.
That compassion and conviction to give the children a chance to live a different life somehow seemed to make her shine more.