Chapter 5
“Oh dear, Your Highness has spilled it all.”
Even though she had watched me stick out my tongue and spit it out right in front of her… she still said I had spilled it.
So Reni wasn’t clueless—she was pretending not to notice?
“Your Highness, say ahh again. Aah~”
To refuse the spoon that came up to my mouth once more, I quickly turned my head away with a whoosh.
“How strange. Why won’t you eat? Perhaps you’re not hungry.”
“Abubu!”
With my face buried in the blanket, I slapped the bedding with both hands.
I was hungry, but the thought of having to eat something tasteless made me feel miserable.
“Hmm… could the baby food taste odd?”
“Woo!”
At Reni’s words, I nodded vigorously as if agreeing.
“I think the taste is fine though.”
Reni tilted her head after tasting the baby food herself.
“……”
‘Reni has definitely lost her sense of taste.’
I didn’t know the exact ingredients, but the color alone was a green that looked like boiled and steeped grass. Just looking at it made it obvious it wouldn’t taste good.
“Then I’ll take care of the prince’s meal first. I’ll serve yours later when you get hungry.”
After I firmly refused the baby food, Reni turned her attention to Lucas.
“Your Highness, you must be hungry, right? Say ahh.”
“Aah~”
“Good, now swallow it in one go.”
Lucas swallowed the mysterious baby food placed in his mouth.
He actually swallowed that?
He’s always drooling—did he drool away his sense of taste too?
Remembering the taste from a single bite made me shiver.
“How is it? Tasty?”
Reni seemed pleased that Lucas had swallowed it, and she prepared the next spoonful, bringing it toward his mouth.
“Uegh.”
But Lucas, who had seemed to swallow it fine, suddenly vomited it out.
“Oh my! What do we do!”
Reni placed the bowl on the table and quickly took a towel from the bedside drawer, wiping Lucas’s clothes and mouth.
“Huu…”
I let out a sigh, now certain that Reni truly had no sense of taste.
“Reni, what’s wrong? Oh my—Prince!”
Sylvia, who had stepped away briefly, returned to the room and, seeing Lucas’s messy front, rushed in in shock.
“Reni! What on earth did you feed the prince?”
Sylvia snatched the towel from Reni’s hand and wiped Lucas’s mouth.
“I just thought His Highness seemed hungry, so I brought some baby food… but neither of them would eat it…”
Reni said with a dejected expression, looking at the bowl on the table.
“Is this baby food?”
“Yes. Doesn’t it look tasty?”
“Bweeeeng!!”
Lucas looked at Sylvia, whining and moving his mouth.
Just how bad must it taste for him to cry like that?
Sylvia quickly changed Lucas’s clothes and then gave him a bottle she had brought from the kitchen.
Lucas eagerly sucked on the bottle, as if trying to wash away the taste he had been left with from the baby food.
“Uu!”
Sylvia also gave me a bottle when I gestured toward her while looking at her.
“Don’t tell me you made this yourself?”
“Yes. I ground up oatmeal to make it.”
Sylvia lifted the bowl, seemingly preparing to taste Reni’s creation.
I shook my head while sucking on my bottle at Sylvia’s reckless attempt.
“Gulp!”
Sylvia took just one bite, then covered her mouth and forced the food down.
She frowned and looked back and forth between Reni and the bowl.
“Reni.”
“Yes?”
“You ground up oatmeal… so why is the color green?”
“Isn’t it supposed to be this color?”
Reni asked back with bright, innocent eyes, as if she truly didn’t know anything.
I had no words either.
‘So that was oatmeal? I thought it was weeds.’
“You should never, ever make anything with your own hands again.”
“But I wanted to make baby food filled with my love for the princess…”
“If you want to keep working as the princess’s nanny, you’d better not have thoughts like that anymore.”
“…Alright.”
Thanks to Sylvia, we narrowly escaped a life-threatening situation.
As we diligently adapted to baby life, we eventually learned that Lucas and I had turned seven months old.
We were born in winter when snow was falling, and now it was summer with lush greenery—about half a year had passed.
Now a seven-month-old baby, I had mastered crawling.
“Our princess’s knees will get worn out at this rate.”
Reni worried every time I lay down on the floor, since I crawled so much that calluses had formed on my knees.
She even made padded knee protectors filled with cotton for me.
“Your Highness, even if it feels uncomfortable, you must not take these off. Understood?”
“Kaa-woo!”
“You’re so good at responding—how adorable.”
It’s not my fault if they get pushed off while I crawl anyway.
“Alright, be careful as you go today.”
Reni fastened the knee protectors and set me down on the floor.
“Uu!”
Then, shall we start today’s imperial palace sprint?
“Your Highness, come with me!”
“Utta-ta!”
I am the wild horse—no, the princess who races through this palace!
Dada-dada-dada.
Before Reni could even finish preparing to follow, I wiggled my tiny rear, making my dress flutter as I crawled out of the room.
Perhaps because I had been confined to a palace in my past life, I enjoyed roaming open spaces despite not being able to walk yet.
Leaving my room and turning at the end of the hallway—
“Ugyaaak!”
I collided with something solid right in front of me.
No, not a tree trunk—someone’s straight, sturdy leg.
I tumbled backward.
“Your Highness!”
Reni, who had been chasing after me, screamed in alarm and scooped me up after seeing me fall.
“Are you alright, Your Highness? Who walks so carelessly inside the princess’s quarters!”
Reni shouted at the other person in a furious voice.
“Oh dear. I greet Your Highness.”
“Taah?”
Even while sprawled on the hallway floor, a calm, deep voice reached my ears.
“Your crawling reminded me of a pill bug, so I failed to notice you.”
‘Pill bug?’
The pleasant voice snapped my dazed mind awake.
‘Have you ever seen such a cute and adorable pill bug?’
How dare he insult little me!
“Unyaa!”
I turned my head in Reni’s arms to see the rude person.
The moment I turned—and our eyes met—
“Woah…”
I turned into a pill bug.
Long red hair flowing down his back, sun-tanned brown skin, and striking blue eyes that contrasted vividly with his hair. Just looking at him made one feel refreshed—so much so that even a baby’s aesthetic sense was awakened.
“Your Highness, your nose—your nose!”
“……”
Huh? My nose?
I lifted my short arm and touched under my nose. It felt wet.
Pulling my hand away slightly, I saw bright red blood.
“Handkerchief!”
Reni quickly took a handkerchief from her dress pocket and pressed it against my nose.
As the sudden nosebleed continued, I frowned, then looked at the man in front of me—and my thoughts stopped.
‘This is definitely a face.’
A face that would stand out just by breathing nearby—how had I never seen it in my past life?
As heat rushed to my face, the stopped nosebleed began flowing again.
“Oh dear, why does the nose keep bleeding!”
“Why is she suddenly bleeding like that? Could it be she’s been crawling too much like an actual pill bug?”
He spoke only irritating words with that wastefully handsome face.
“Sir Bauman! How can you say such things to Her Highness!”
Sir Bauman?
After thinking carefully, I remembered he had been the captain of the imperial knights in my past life.
On the day I was imprisoned, I was also dragged out by the knight captain…
‘Is it just someone with the same name?’
He didn’t look like the same person from my memory.
What had happened in between?
As I wondered this and narrowed my eyes, Reni’s commanding voice rang out.
“Apologize to the princess at once!”
Startled, I looked between the two of them.
Sir Bauman’s face, meeting Reni’s gaze, flushed red.
“……”
I looked back and forth between Reni and the man called Sir Bauman with half-lidded eyes.
“Sir, can you not hear what I’m saying?”
“…I apologize, nanny. I misspoke.”
The same man who had spoken so rudely to me quickly apologized when Reni scolded him.
“You should apologize to the princess, not me.”
“And to Your Highness as well.”
“……”
‘Is that supposed to be an apology?’
He bowed respectfully to Reni, yet gave me only a brief, curt line!
“I should head back to my room now.”
“Then I will escort Your Highness to your room.”
“You, sir? Why?”
Reni asked, looking genuinely puzzled at Sir Bauman.
It was hard to understand why he would escort us to the room when we were already inside the princess’s quarters.
Reni stared blankly at him, and he met her gaze, blushing slightly…
“…sniff.”
I sniffled loudly to break the awkward atmosphere.
“Oh! Your nosebleed hasn’t stopped, Your Highness? Let’s return quickly.”
Reni, seemingly no longer interested in Bauman, lifted me up again.
‘No. I can’t just leave that man like this.’
The person I had just met felt like an opportunity—perhaps, unlike in my past life, I could keep him close instead of losing him as a father figure.
“Atta-ta.”
I looked up at Reni, then firmly wiped my nose with my hand and gestured toward Sir Bauman.
“……?”
“Your Highness?”
Both Sir Bauman and Reni looked at me, confused.
“Taah.”
“……”
Honestly, both of them were equally dense.
Come here.
I gestured again toward Sir Bauman.
“Ta-ta.”
“……”
Sir Bauman cautiously approached.
When he came closer, I motioned for him to bow again.
He complied, lowering his head toward me with a neutral expression, seemingly understanding my intention.
I then pressed the blood on my palm onto his face.
You’re mine.
