Chapter Text
Secretary Woo Ji-ro, Chief of Staff at Haeungung and right hand to His Majesty the King, Lee Gon, was not a eunuch. Sort of. That wasn't actually part of the job description anymore and she was a woman in any case. That's why they'd changed the title. However, millennia of political intrigue and murder meant that they still didn't like the idea of such a high position possibly becoming an inherited one, so while it was not required to be childless to serve at the very heart of the Royal Court it was understood that you were married to the job--one that required enormous amounts of time and energy, and absolute loyalty to the reigning monarch and no one else. This wasn't too great a burden as this line of work tended to attract the sort of person who wasn't interested in having a social life anyway. It was a conscious decision to give up one possible future for another as you worked to build the nation.
Secretary Woo had decided long ago that her mission in life would be to ease the burden of one who was lonely and grieving, new to the rigors of ruling, and in need of guidance and tutoring in the art of diplomacy and global affairs.
She hadn't known she would have to do it twice.