•YUJIN•

We were all aligned in the palace’s throne room. Me, my siblings, my grandparents, and the rest of our family, like cousins, uncles, granduncles, and grandaunts, were all in the first row. The Chinese royal family is by our side. Xiaoting, my date tonight, is just by my side.

“Long live King Choi Hyunbin of South Korea.” The prosecutor and religious leader of the kingdom said after the ceremony and all people in the room started clapping and bowing. My mom and my dad, now wearing my grandma and grandpa’s past crown, were clearly beyond happy, the soft smiles on their faces couldn’t hide it, at least for me their daughter, a thing that only made me smile together with them. I know how amazing they will be as King and Queen.

“Your Royal Highness” The ancient man called my attention, gesturing me to come to the pulpit where my parents were, now sitting on their thrones.

I walked over and stopped just to stop by his side and bowed since he is a kind of pastor. South Korea is a Laic State, so everybody can have their own religion. My family’s religion and the religion followed by the royal family was Christianism, a lighter type of it to be sure. The sermons were mostly about love.

The prosecutor touched my shoulder and gestured for me to kneel. I did and he started.

“And now I formally name, Princess Choi Yujin, the firstborn of King Hyunbin and Queen Yejin, as the rightful heiress and next in the line of succession to the South Korean throne.” He then placed the newly designed heiress crown on top of my head. I looked up after bowing to him and everybody in the room bowed to me. As I practiced during my whole life, I walked till I stopped right beside my dad’s throne. Doyoung and Yeseo came up and stopped beside my mom’s throne. All the guests in the room proceed to formally bow for us and clap.

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“You did great today, Jinnie.” I was back in my bedroom changing dresses to go to the party that was being held in the throne room right now. While I was retouching my makeup, Seungyeon came into the room.

“Monkey? You came!” I ran towards her and hugged her.

“Of course, I came! I wouldn’t miss this important moment for you and your family. Plus, Little Yeseo has been bugging me every day on Kakao asking me to come and bring her a new Z fold for her to play games” she said laughing on my neck.

I truly missed her. She is my best friend and after our little fight, we stayed a week without talking to each other. Even her brother was the one who went to the meetings between Choi Enterprises and Samseng. Truly…I didn’t actually know if she would come today. But made me really happy that she did.

“I’m sorry for pushing things,” I said breaking our hug and looking down.

“It’s okay, Jinnie. I’m sorry for reacting that way too.” She said and I raised my head to look at her. “You are still my sister. And I’m confused with a lot of things right now. Hope that hasn’t changed anything in our friendship”

“Obviously not. You are stuck with me till the last of our lives, dummy” I said hugging her again and moving to continue fixing my makeup. Seungyeon smiled and proceed to sit on my armchair. She was wearing a beautiful black dress that made her body look more beautiful than already was.

“So...” She started.

“What?” I asked while putting on some mascara.

“I saw you and Xiaoting pretty close during your dad’s ceremony. Friends again, huh?” she said while giving me a little smirk.

“First, don’t even start.” I brushed off the teasing with a chuckle. Even though we made out sometimes, I and Seungyeon always had a great relationship, and we knew how to separate things really well. We weren’t jealous over our flings or people we were dating, and that was always the matter that made me confused over my feelings for her.

How can I think I like someone so much when I can’t even be romantically jealous of her? Do I really like her?

“And second, we are on a truce right now.” I continued and let go of my mascara, giving a final look to the mirror, and getting content with my final result. I was now wearing a new dress, and this was literally one of the most beautiful dresses I’d ever seen. It fits my style really well.

“Truce? How so?” Seungyeon asked frowning and I sited on the sofa across hers.

“Xiaoting and her family are going to stay here for some time, we just didn’t want to stay on this cold war during all this time. Plus, we kinda talked last night, and we okay for the meantime” I replied to her and explained a little bit more about the movie that we watched last night and our talk when were only me and Xiaoting in the room.

“Wow. It seems like your closeness is coming back” She was already holding back her laughter.

“IT’S NOT LIKE THAT, MONKEYYYY” I screamed getting up from the sofa and putting my babyliss on the table after finishing my hair, and she automatically started laughing.

“Okay, Okay. But seriously, I’m happy that you two are getting along again. We had a hard time when things happened in Oxford, and she was kind of a heartless sometimes, but we were too, to be honest, and I missed the times when we used to hang out with her.” She said still with her playful smile plastered through her face.

And suddenly we hear a knock on the door.

“Come in”

“Excuse me, your highness, miss Seungyeon,” one of the palace guards said with his body still out of the bedroom. “Princess, your family is waiting for you to go to the coronation party” I raised my head and saw that Shinwon was the one calling me out, I saw that there were other guards behind him and figured that he had to follow the protocol. I gave him a soft smile and nodded.

“I’ll be right there. Thank you, Shinwon Oppa.” I said and could already see Seungyeon getting up from the armchair she was sitting to go out of my bedroom, and the guards behind Shinwon, going to their previous formations but him.

“I probably won’t see you anymore today because I know you will have your boring social princess duties to make and have to stay with your all night.” She said the last phrase raising her eyebrows. “So, good luck, and I see you at Hyunsik Oppa’s party in a couple of days?” She asked already in front of me.

“Yes, I’ll try to go.” I hugged her since I indeed will probably not see her through the rest of the night because I’m 1000% sure she will sneak out to go home early since today I’ll have a lot of Heads of state to talk to and she hates the spotlight.

“I love you and I’m proud of you. Have fun today and be yourself. You are an amazing heiress to the throne! Don’t let anyone make you think otherwise” she said breaking the hug and caressing my arm. I smiled! My best friend always knows exactly what I want and need to hear.

I was pretty nervous and Seungyeon more than anyone knows that. I’m pretty aware that a lot of people don’t think of me as the perfect candidate for the throne and after today’s formal reassurance that I’m indeed the heiress to the South Korean throne, a lot of people will have something not really kind to say about it.

“I’m going, Jinnie. Shinwon Oppa, a little bird told me your shift is ending soon. I’m going to stay 30 minutes at the party and we should go out to drink after, what do you think?” Seungyeon said talking to Shinwon while she got out of my bedroom.

“Only if you pay for the drinks” Shinwon

Go Shinwon is the son of the South Korean Army Captain of the highest rank in the whole country and also one of my father’s best friends and right arm, Go Daehyung. So, he grew up in court with me and my family. He is one of my best friends either. And me, him, and Seungyeon were a little trio.

I chuckled a little after hearing their conversation and looked at my reflection in the mirror for the last time. I have to make the best of impressions today for the other rulers to see that I’m capable to rule this country in the future. And this whole scenario just made me so nervous.

•XIAOTING•

“These people are pissing me off already, Gege,” I said taking a sip of the champagne in my hands. I need something stronger if I’ll have to swallow these people the whole night.

“Relax, Shǎguā¹, just keep your cool and stay with me. Try looking more interested in what they are saying too. You literally just yawned in the British Prime Minister’s face.” Yangyang said suppressing a laughter.

“If I stay with you, I will probably die of boredom and anger. These men are super ists, it’s disgusting how they invalidate women right in front of a woman.” I said and turned the remaining champagne in my glass, receiving a bad look from my mom that was looking at me from the other side of the room.

“I know and I get angry but there is nothing that I can actually do with these jerks. Where is your for you to bug her and not me?” Yangyang said laughing and I just rolled my eyes. At the same time, we hear the ‘announcing melody’ that always plays when the South Korean Royal Family is arriving at an official schedule. When King Hyunbin and Queen Yejin entered, the whole room had their heads lifted to the gallery connected to the stairs that would make their way to where all the guests, including me, were. And then she came. Wearing a pretty greyish blue dress. Her hair was loose like a brown cascade falling through her shoulders. She had her new crown placed on her head and she looked like the most angelic being I’ve ever seen in my whole life. Suddenly I felt this cold sensation inside of my body, my stomach was doing summersaults and all my suppressed feelings of crushness for her suddenly came back.

I couldn’t think about anything else. I had my eyes glued on her when she stopped at the end of the gallery with her parents and siblings by her side, and then our eyes met. She looked at me and I could see opening slightly. Her movements are really small and studied, is like she thinks before doing anything. And her eyes were glued to mine too. It looked like we were in a staring contest, but I just couldn’t not look at her. She looks mesmerizing.

I couldn’t even notice when she stopped by my side and smiled at me. Her family was already mingling in with the other guests at the party and Yangyang wasn’t by my side anymore. At the same time, I gave her a small bow and she replied by doing the same.

“I’m so happy I already found you, I’m not in the mood to hear these disgusting old men saying stupid things about me and at me today.” She said widening her eyes a little bit to demonstrate how bad the situation she just mentioned was and I just nodded. I wasn’t thinking straight yet. She looks too beautiful.

“What were you doing?” She said interlocking our arms and starting to walk slowly with me at the party while greeting some people. I froze. I wasn’t expecting that. You look like a teenager that has never seen a girl before, get your together, Xiaoting!

“Oh, I was just drinking and talking to Yanyang Gege.” I forced myself to say while she gave me a light nod, still looking to the sides and greeting the guests. “Almost forgot, I also spoke with the other Kings, Presidents, and Prime ministers here. Worst experience ever.” I added and she automatically sighed. I can just imagine how hard it must be to be the heir of a country being a woman when we live in such a ist world. There were of course other female rulers but the numbers of them were too little if compared to the number of male rulers that this world has. And the huge majority of those male rulers think they are superior and better than women, which makes everything more difficult to deal with.

“You were drinking, right? Let’s get you another glass.” Yujin said and I could sense she was a little nervous. She was trying to hide it with her all-confident pose, but I could see, she was indeed nervous.

We got two glasses of champagne and sited on a far pillow chair. Closer to the garden exit. More distant from the crowd that was talking in the center of the salon, some sitting in their chairs and some up on their feet discussing business or international relations matters.

“Do you want to take a walk tomorrow? I realized that has been so long since you last visited” she said resting on the chair back.

“I would love it, but would it be, okay? Since your dad’s coronation was today, I think tomorrow the fuzz will be bigger. Would it be safe for you to go out?” I asked. I’m actually a little bored to be inside all the time but I don’t want her to risk herself over this.

“Own, our Tingbao is worried about me. Imagine how many people would be jealous of me knowing that the most desired princess in the world worries about me?” She teased me while cutely blinking her eyes with her hand on her chest and I rolled my eyes with a true smile on my face. “But anyways, I will check tomorrow with Shinwon Oppa but even if we can’t go, we can at least have a bike ride by the front and back garden.” She said before grabbing her champagne glass and taking a sip while closing her eyes a little. I could see she was getting relaxed because of the alcohol and the talk.

“Unnie, don’t you remember?” I asked, running away from her eyes.

“What?” She asked with her cute eyes open widely and eyebrows raised. A habit she always does when she is waiting for someone to reply to a question. Cute.

“I don’t know how to ride a bicycle” I spat that and drank from my glass looking to the sides, where I could see some people looking at us surreptitiously.

“You still haven’t learned? Xiaoting I can’t believe that” she said with a playful smile on her face and I pouted. “It’s okay. I will teach you, then. Don’t need to pout, Tingbao” she said with a light chuckle and smile through my pout. It’s insane how she lighted my mood. I don’t even look like the Xiaoting from a couple of minutes ago.

“Excuse me, your highnesses. I just wanted to congratulate and greet the crown princess and our treasure Chinese princess.” We looked up and saw the French President and the Spanish King alongside some men that looked like some huge CEOs that I didn’t remember the name of but had already seen at my family’s balls back in China.

“Glad to see you all could come today. And thank you so much, Emmanuel. I hope we can progress well together” Yujin extended her hand and shook hands with everyone that was there and then I proceeded to do the same.

“I do hope so too,” Emmanuel said with a small grin on his face. “Even though we still have some doubts at if you are prepared for the work, both at your company and with your country. Let’s be honest, you are not the most eligible person for the job, Yujin.” The French president said laughing and the other men went with him.

Who the hell he thinks he is to talk to her like that? Even more in her home.

I looked at the side and could see Yujin’s worried face and frowned. That’s it? She is going to let them talk to her like that?

“I’m sorry but who are 'we'?” Yujin asked with a low voice and clearly doing her best to keep a strong pose.

“The other Heads of State, and some businessmen I talked to. We are a little worried you might not be ready for this and actually sink not only your family’s work but also ours.” The Spanish King replied laughing as if he just said some funny joke and Yujin looked to her feet. C’mon, Unnie, fight back!

“This won’t happen,” she said, and I was ready to fight them for talking to her like that when she suddenly bit her lower lip nervously and raised her head to look at them. “Well, excuse me but I have to greet the other guests too. Enjoy the ball.”

Yujin gave everyone a soft smile and disappeared in the middle of the crowd of people that were present in the celebration.

“Well, I don’t think our little princess reacted very well to the criticism” The French man spoke and the other people that were with him laughed. I couldn’t even look at him and kept trying to find Yujin in the middle of the crowd. I think I saw her leaving to the garden.

“I hope she doesn’t ruin things in the company with this behavior of her because I invested a lot on the new tech expansion project.” One of the bald men wearing an expensive suit said.

“What could we expect of women in the power? It’s not supposed to happen" They all laughed and I turn my head in their direction. My sudden action made them shiver and their laughter stopped.

“You can clearly expect amazing things from women in the power, King Felipe as your daughter is going to take the rule of your own country one day, right?” I stepped in and said looking directly in the Spanish King’s direction who raised a brow at me.

“You all find yourselves much superior to everyone else but the fact is that you are not showing that amazing behavior that you expect everyone else to direct at you is alarming,” I said and the group was completely astonished and we could see that the people at our sides were starting to pay attention too. I wasn’t shouting – even though I do that quite a lot – but people might have found it weird all those powerful and ‘emotionless' men starting to look angry at a young princess of one of the most powerful countries in the world.

“The fact that you came to a person’s house, disrespected her, and are even talking bad about her behind her back with all those ist dialogues and female deterioration is sickening to me,” I spoke with my chin up and never once unlocking my gaze from them. “She is going to be an amazing ruler of this country and CEO of her company. Don’t ever doubt that. I hope you get better with your thoughts and actions in the future. Excuse me.” I'm pretty sure my mom and my tutor back in the palace would tear me apart right now because of my ‘Vulgar and Aggressive behavior' as they would say and go with that ‘you don’t act like a princess’ story again but this was 100% needed. I won’t let anyone talk about someone that doesn’t deserve it like that. Even more, Yujin whom is such a loving girl.

I directed myself to the garden where I saw Yujin going a couple of minutes ago and saw her at the far end of it. With a cigarette in her hands.

“Since when do you smoke?” I said when reached her side and she shivered and let out a little shout at my sudden arrival letting the Whiskey cup she was holding with her other hand fall in the grass.

“Holy Christ, Shen Xiaoting, you scared the out of me.” She said with her now free left hand placed on her chest.

“You still haven’t answered my question,” I stated wearing a serious face. I hate smoking. The number of bad things it does with a body is unaccountable and I can't believe she is doing that with herself.

“Since England.” She answered turning back to where she was looking before and back to her smoking. "I always carry one with me on this kind of event and I needed something stronger than champagne." She simply shrugged looking at the night sky.

We were in the second-floor garden, which was connected to the back of the celebration room where we just came from. The South Korean palace, called ‘Kunsup' which basically means ‘Big Forest’ has an amazing quantity of front, back, and Up gardens, something related to the history of the country, and with the first emperor liking nature a lot.

“It really messed up with us pretty hard right?” I said standing right beside her and looking at the immense amount of cars parked outside of the castle. “but that doesn’t mean you have to up your life with nicotine to deal with your traumas. And you know that."

She gulped down and took a deep breath before looking at me with teary eyes, which startled me at one spot.

“Hey, why are you crying?” I asked already caressing her right cheek.

“I think I just don’t know what to do anymore. I keep getting all this work and responsibility that I don’t know how to manage and don’t want to have.” She let a frustrated whimper out and seated on the white 19th-century bench that was placed right beside us

“What if those people are right, Ting? I cant even take care of my stupid trauma, how can I take care of a company? Let alone a whole country? I can't do this!” Her head was down and her tears were silently rolling down her cheeks. She looked so tiny and fragile. I cupped her hands in my mine and started caressing them.

“Hey, you can do this! It’s not like that, Jinnie. Everyone has some trauma that they have to deal with. You are a human after all. Having trauma doesn’t make you weaker than anyone else. You just have to know how to manage it in a better…healthy way than you are doing right now. And I’m gonna help you with that” I left a soft chuckle and kept holding her hands.

She smiled at me and raised her head.

“What?” I asked looking at her smiling figure.

“You called me Jinnie again. I missed it.” I smiled back at her.

“That was the only thing you took from everything I said, Your Highness?” I said in a mocking tone and she gave me a soft slap on my arm. She was smiling again. That’s what I wanted.

“Thanks, Ting! Seriously. You are helping me a lot these days. And I want to help you too. Tell me if there is anything you want, okay?” She smiled at me and an idea crossed my mind. I would probably help her and me at the same time.

“Actually I do,” I said smiling mischievously at her.

“That was fast. Name it and your unnie will get it for you.” She said making a little bow.

“You could teach me how to ride a bike.”

“That’s it? Of course, I can, Ting-ah. I thought it was something more difficult than that” She was laughing. “Wait, I have a better Idea!” She clapped her hands and I could already notice that bubbly Yujin was back. Don’t know why but that kinda gave me dejavu.

“I know that in your country you didn’t have the opportunity to do a lot of things that are normal during you growing up.” She said and I bit my lip.

That was a sensible matter to me. I remember back in England we already had that talk and I let out things that I didn’t actually want anyone to know.

*Flashback*

“What do you think about going to London with your favorite unnie this weekend, tingbao? I'm kinda tired of Oxford and I think you are too.” Yujin was trying out her new jeans that she just bought, in front of her full-body mirror while Xiaoting lay on her bed.

They were chilling at Yujin’s penthouse, which was placed in the same building as Xiaoting and Seungyeon’s, since the 3 powerful girls couldn’t stay in dorms, much to their dismay and to their parents and security guards' happiness.

“I don’t know, I’m actually still a little scared of going out.” She confessed.

“Huh? What do you mean? Nothing is gonna happen, and we are going together. You don’t have to be afraid of going by yourself" Yujin said sitting on the bed with straight legs and swaying her hands on Xiaoting’s soft brown hair who right now had her head on Yujin’s lap.

“I don’t actually understand that either, but I don’t think is right for me to go out. I feel scared. Mostly of places full of people and having to interact with them.” Xiaoting had her eyes wandering the room, trying her best to not look at the older girl’s eyes. She felt a little ashamed that she was so afraid and had to turn out almost every invitation Yujin made because she had 0 experience of living with regular people and not just people that were almost like robots when interacting with her at court. Even more right now, that she was starting to get certainty from herself that she had a crush on ‘her favorite unnie’ Crown-Princess Yujin. That she was also almost certainly that already liked Seungyeon Unnie a lot.

“Do you wanna talk about it?” Yujin asked. Still brushing her hand through the Chinese girl’s hair.

“I don’t think there is anything to talk about. I just didn’t have the chance to experience all that. To interact with people from different backgrounds and places, as you and all normal people had.” I let out a soft suffered chuckle. “My parents were always so afraid of losing their little princess, that they deprived me of living a normal life. As normal as a royal could have.” I sighed and looked up, just to meet the cute eyes of Yujin looking at me apologetically.

“See? There was something to talk about" I smile and she did too. Yujin’s capability to rising the mood of every place she goes is amazing. “I kinda get you. I actually lived a normal life, besides the amount of politics, history, and languages I had to study since first grade, but I went to school in different countries including my own, and interacted with so many different people, something that you sadly didn’t had the opportunity to also do.” I bit my bottom lip and looked down. This matter still messed with me even after those years. I'm 18 and never even went to a mall or something like that. Only went to a classroom twice when my father agreed to me studying in Russia when I was 14 but had to come back home on the 3^rd day of class after suffering a kidnapping attempt. When I got home my dad shouted how all the things they have done for me all these years are for my well being and those are the things that happen when I go out and live away from the protection of the court and that I will always be a princess, no matter how much I try to change that.

I talked about all of that with Yujin Unnie and felt that someone was truly caring about my feelings for once.

“I have an idea, Ting!” Yujin said abruptly and clapped her hands, making me jump from my relaxing state on her bed and sit down to look at her, a little pissed of course.

“I will help you do these normal things you never did!” I tilted my head to the side with a curious expression.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Let’s make a list! Of the things you never did but always wanted to. And I'll be doing them with you.” She exclaimed with a cute smile that made her eyes disappear.

“Are you insane, Jinnie Unnie? We can’t do that. The guards will never let us go around doing normal things like walking in the mall or I don’t know…go to the movies.” I stated the obvious, getting a little shy after noticing I indirectly let out my desire to go out with her, and being the clever girl she is, she would definitely notice. She gave me a flirty smirk.

“So you wanna go to the movies with me? You know you could simply ask me out, right?” Her grin grew wider and I could feel my cheeks getting hot.

“You look cute when you are shy.” She smiled and took my hand. “Let’s go make this list" She got up from the bed and took a notebook and a pen, before sitting back by my side.

“So movies first, huh?”

*End of Flashback*

“So, what do you think about getting back with that list we did back in college?” I tilted my head to the side remembering the list and the point we were at in our lives.

“THAT LIST?” I exclaimed and she signaled for me to talk quietly.

“Stop screaming, Shen Shouting” She laughed and I let out a shy small smile. “And yeah, what about that list? We haven’t done anything anyway since we fought and I still have the picture of the list on my iCloud. Let’s do this!”

“Are you for real, unnie? I think most of the things we've put on the list are a little romantic.” I said biting my lip and looking nervously and cautiously at her.

“It’s only romantic if we make it romantic.” She was trying not to show but she was definitely a little nervous too. “So, are you in or not, Ting?” She turned around looking completely at me.

It would not only be good for me but also for her. We would have fun and experience things we don’t normally do, even more in my case. And would even spend some time together.

Truth be told, I missed spending time with Yujin unnie. Romantically speaking or not she was great company.

More pros than cons actually.

“I'm in!”

It wouldn’t mean anything!

But it would definitely be a good diversion while I’m here in Korea.

Hope me and Yujin can keep our truce/friendship alive during this. 

*********************************************************************

shǎguā¹ - idiot, fool

..

Look who is back after 3 months of disappearance? 

I finally got some time to write and kinda got out of my writer's block so I'll be updating this regularly! Thanks for stopping by!

See ya 

**Don't know if you guys noticed but I changed Lucas to Xiaojun. It just made more sense! Hope you all understand it**