Meeting with Pluvia went much more smoothly than Uheya had anticipated.
Today, Pluvia was clearly in a good mood, appearing completely different from her aggressive demeanor during previous negotiations. And Uheya, now unburdened, didn't mind being polite to Pluvia. So when the two women first met, they hit it off quite well.
Since this was an informal chat between an emperor and a princess, Kenji, who stood nearby, naturally didn't join in and simply waited quietly.
Of course, neither he nor Uheya probably realized that Pluvia's friendliness was largely due to her feeling a sense of shared suffering with Uheya.
Both were women caught in power struggles, both were royal family members, and both faced troubles from their own countries and relatives. In many ways, Pluvia saw a reflection of herself in Uheya. She even wondered if she might have ended up like Uheya now, had she failed in her own power struggle.
