The Cursed King

Elise's initial days at Marc Sanderman's office were a difficult period, most of the people disliked her for getting accepted into the company so suddenly.

But a few people started to open up a little with her presence. Her sweet smile every day was hard to resist and they would feel bad about treating her rudely even if they thought she entered the company through nepotism.

"Good morning, Miss Annie!" Elise greeted the attendant in the lobby of the building. It was the same one who made her wait incredibly long for Marc Sanderman, but Elise already let it go.

The woman at the counter waved her hand with a smile. "You're early, Elise... That's a cute lunch box you have."

"Thank you!" Elise walked past the woman and only waved at her before she headed towards the elevators.

Once Elise stepped inside the platform and took several stops on her way up, she found herself meeting and exchanging some polite greetings with people from various departments.

Although the documents she submitted to Marc contained her ID as Madeline York, she still introduced herself as Elise to everyone else.

Alex herself didn't seem to mind at all and went with Elise too.

The troubles of getting associated with the famous history as Madeline York was something anyone wished to avoid for obvious reasons. She wished to be seen as a regular person, not as someone with a famous past.

It was hard to forget the past, but it wasn't impossible.

Elise had a new life now. And she was going to live that life to the fullest. Being a part of the company meant a lot to her. This was her first shot at becoming an independent person.

If it weren't for Loriel's help then she would have never gotten this in the first place.

Elise wasn't going to mess that up by being someone that would make people look at her as less of a person and more of a caricature.

"Good morning, Miss Alex!" Elise said once she arrived at Alex's own office. Compared to other employees, it seemed like Alex had an entire office to herself for being the assistant of their boss.

Elise did whatever she needed to, in order to make sure that people would accept her in the company, and that they would like her as well.

"Ah, Elise you've made it." Alex greeted her back with a smile. "I've got something to show you."

As far as Alex was concerned, Elise wasn't a full assistant yet and more of someone she needed to chaperone and watch over.

But Alex didn't mind it at all, compared to the stunts that her boss, Marc requested of her... this one was easy.

Elise was a smart and eager pupil.

It was a little surprising that she wasn't familiar with computers that much except for the basics, but Alex taught and assisted Elise.

"I'd like you to do market research with me, and it's nothing too hard," Alex said. She pointed to three desktops in front of her that depicted both financial graphs and other figures.

"Nothing's too hard when you're the one teaching me, Miss Alex," Elise said.

Alex bit back a smile and motioned for Elise to take a seat first before she continued. "You don't have to compliment me, but this is Company X and we'd like to see if it's a good match for Sanderman Group's desired standards."

"Standards for acquisition or investment?"

"Yeah, we want to see if it's an excellent fit. Similar to the stock market analysis, I want you to get a fundamental analysis of Company X. So what that means is you'll concentrate on data from various sources available from financial records, economic reports, company assets, and market share."

"I see." Elise stared at the screen and made out the different details that popped out to her. While she enjoyed her baking courses with Chef Lucy, there was something about this task that made her interested in it.

Alex glanced at her and asked. "Do you think you can handle it?"

Elise nodded and smiled. "Yeah, it's similar to making an empire expand by knowing which kingdoms to vassalize."

"A vassal... what now?" Alex raised a brow. She was a bit taken aback by the sudden comparison. While it was true that the Sanderman Group was a large and powerful conglomerate, comparing it to an empire was new.

Elise blinked and sheepishly ducked her head. "Uh, the company reminds me of a kingdom? I'm sorry, I love reading history books and came up with the analogy, I guess. We need to check out if this Company X will be worth putting our investment and energy towards."

"Yes, that is correct." Alex nodded and then stifled a chuckle. "I guess I never really looked at it that way, but it seems similar. And I guess if the Sanderman Group is an empire, then Marc would really like to hear him referred to as a king."

"You think so?" Elise asked and smiled a little. 

"Yeah, he gives me too many orders that are far too much than what I signed up for," Alex said, thinking about all the recent requests that Marc asked from her. "But I guess you'll eventually learn to just not question it."

Elise tilted her face to look at Marc's office from where she was sitting. She thought there was something familiar about Marc. The man actually reminded her of Loriel in many ways.

If she didn't know they were old friends, she would think Loriel and Marc were brothers or as least related. Now, she was wondering what was the story behind their friendship.

Loriel said he saved Marc's life once. What happened back then between them?

Also, was Loriel similar to Marc in his way of life? After working with Alex for several days, Elise had started to pick up on gossips about Marc Sanderman's womanizing ways.

She was wondering if Loriel had dated countless women too in the past.

Suddenly her cheeks felt hot when she thought about it. Why did she care if Loriel had dated countless women?

She was not his girlfriend. She was just freeloading at his place until she could afford her own flat.