Despite being socially engaged during palace events and literary classes, Byul spent most of her time alone. Not because she wanted to, she was just used to it. The strict regime she’s been living out since she was born was one reason, and focusing on her current status was another. She had no room to build close bonds within palace grounds, not even with her half-siblings, and her struggle maintain her trust with people didn’t help at all. And because of all this, she didn’t really have anyone to share her concerns about living a life with a part of herself masked, aside from her father who she rarely spent time due to his current duty as King. Even though this regime would be potentially detrimental to her social wellbeing, it was presently keeping her and her father away from their fated death.

Despite all this, she didn’t ‘mind’ being lonely. Actually, she was mindfully desensitised to her own loneliness but not at heart. She still felt it here and there, that emptiness and loneliness of course, but tried to avoid any thoughts that triggered them whenever she could by focusing on what mattered more to her, her potential title. A title, which could grant her the opportunity and power to give people access to justice in a world of injustice.

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Byul was having a day free of scholars, lessons and readings and had planned a search for medicinal herbs, particularly ones she could add to her encyclopedia of herbal remedies. Her current hobby was being a medical herbist, researching remedies for diseases and preventing those causing outbreaks she had heard from courtyard conversations. To keep her hobby though she kept it hidden. She spent those free days sneaking out of the palace which required her to once again mask her identity. She did that by disguising herself as an agasshi. That was really a chance for her to escape palace life, outwardly radiate her female self and explore life outside of the palace. When her sneak outs were deemed unsuccessful she spent her free time eavesdropping on political rallies and meetings.. maintaining her hidden underground makeshift laboratory she had made for herself, which she used to invest her medicinal remedy research.

Byul was in her royal chambers preparing for the second sneak out of the month. She rarely did it because place sneak outs required hours of prepping and consisted of deviating her whereabouts from her several eunuchs and maids. There were many intricate details byul had thoroughly considered, one of which could easily be thought of but hard to come by. It was a vital factor in her escape plan and that was ‘timing’. It had to be a period where almost everyone too occupied and busy with palace chores and festivities to be aware of her activity within the palace.

Unfortunately, her plans were interrupted by the head eunuch who announced the factions had brought visitors for Byul. Considering the amount of effort put in to reach a decent level of progress in her escape plan, Byul was obviously annoyed and frustrated that her plans disturbed by a bunch of girls who she thought would be absurd to build romantic relationships with and impossible to have romantic feelings for. “Absolutely unheard of and out of societal norms,” she thought.

There was only a slight change to her plans “let’s try deviating my whereabouts from these girls who probabl