Chapter 45

“Yurina.”

Raynald’s face, which strode in front of Yurina, was covered with sweat.

“You’ve been running…”

Before Yurina could even finish her words, Raynald held her hand with a stiff face.  From his gaze sweeping through her palms, Yurina knew that he had heard of the incident.

Yurina felt a long conversation coming so she sent Bessie out with a look.

“Ray.”

“…….”

“Ray.”

Whether he heard it and pretended he didn’t or he really didn’t hear, he looked at Yurina’s uninjured hand.

The sweat from his forehead ran down her cheeks and pooled on his chin. It somehow felt strange.

‘Did he teleport?’

Raynald had developed so much skill that he could even perform space movement magic without any notice.  The fact that he ran without even thinking of using magic meant that he wasn’t that crazy.

“Is this the only spot hurt?”

“This side, too.”

Yurina gently extended her opposite hand to him, he clasped her two hands together. Yurina looked down at her hands as he suddenly put her hands together and wrapped his around hers.  Raynald’s hands were large enough to cover hers.

‘He grew a lot.’

Unlike him who was serious, Yurina had such a thought.

His hands, which had been thin bones with wounds here and there, now had thick calluses in several places. Perhaps because he learned swordsmanship.

She tapped his calluses with her fingertips. Raynald clenched his hand once as if not to let her go.

Even though he confirmed that there was nothing wrong, his face was stiff as it was when she came in.

“Did you teleport?”

When Yurina reached out and touched his hair, Raynald took a step back and expressed his refusal to do so. Her white hands, lost in her way, wandered aimlessly in the air. Yurina smiled and shrugged as if nothing had happened.

Raynald, who was catching his breath with his eyes closed, belatedly approached again.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to avoid it.”

He bowed his upper body to meet her at eye level, grabbed Yurina’s hand, and pulled it toward his forehead.

Keep going. He didn’t talk, but his expression, calmly closing his eyes, seemed to be saying this.

Yurina wiped his wet bangs and flipped his hair back.

“What did the professor say?”

Raynald opened his eyes. His gaze at Yurina was so calm that Yurina was embarrassed at the moment.

“Is that important now?”

“…….”

He grabbed Yurina’s hand and pulled her toward him.

“Why are you so calm?”

“Calm?”

Yurina was stunned as if she had been hit in the back of the head at the unexpected word.

“Me?”

“Yes.”

“Why do you think so?”

“I think you…”

Emotions soared, so he closed his eyes and took a breath and opened his mouth again.

“You almost died.”

“Yes, I know.”

Raynald raised his eyebrows at Yurina’s calm answer. Yurina shrugged and opened her mouth as calmly as she did with Bessie and Dave.

“But I’m fine.”

“Yurina.”

“Look at this. Even if I’m a little hurt, Dave’s treatment….”

She wanted to talk calmly, but she couldn’t continue. Emotions suddenly soared and choked her up.

Yurina tried hard to swallow the negative emotions that came up her throat and smiled at Raynald.

“I’m… I’m fine.”

She knew Raynald wouldn’t believe this straight away. He was no longer an innocent 12-year-old child. Yurina has also shown him a lot of fear of death so far.

He wouldn’t believe it. Still, she wanted to tell him an obvious lie. If she said she was not okay, he’d be more distressed, who’d be suffering anyway. She wanted to ease the burden in his mind even a little.

“I’m really fine.”

“I’m not okay.”

Raynald spat out as if he were chewing every word.

“You may be okay, but I’m not okay. I’m not okay. When I heard from Aiden about you, how much I…”

As it went to the end, his voice went up as if he couldn’t control his emotions. He bit his lips tightly and continued to sigh, perhaps surprised even after he said it.

“It’s not anywhere else, here at the academy, it’s not the empire without me, and you almost died here. Why did I come all the way here and learn magic? Why did I try so hard? Why…”

Eventually, he couldn’t continue talking and hugged Yurina. Yurina leaned her cheek against his chest.

Pit-a-pat, pit-a-pat. She heard his heartbeat so fast that the owner was out of breath. The sound was telling how nervous he was.

“Yurina.”

After a long silence, Raynald whispered in Yurina’s ear.

“We’d better go back to the empire as soon as possible.”

It was a completely different story from being restless because he wanted to be with her for another day.

“I think it’ll be better for you.”

For now. He added quietly with a whisper to himself.

* * *

The person behind the attack on Yurina was caught sooner than expected. As a traitor who opposed the current royal family, the Crohn royal family was already eager to seize this opportunity. They said they had a hard time catching them, but thanks to the men Sir Aron caught they were able to. 

Thanks to this, Yurina was able to stay in the kingdom with a little more confidence as originally scheduled.

Yurina told Raynald that she was going to Dave and headed toward the dormitory. Aiden, who received a note through Bessie in advance, first came out at the entrance of the dormitory.

“Carthia’s Lady.”

He politely held Yurina’s hand and escorted her.

“Are you feeling okay?”

“Yes, thanks to you.”

“Don’t worry about them now, they’ll be caught soon.”

Yurina smiled slightly at him with gratitude. Aiden coughed in vain with a slightly reddish face.

“I didn’t prepare much. He’s not such a young boy so we can have a party like this!”

Aiden chattled in an excited voice, recalling Raynald’s upcoming birthday party.

It was Aiden who first proposed to prepare a birthday party together. He organized a birthday party every year for Raynald, who has no acquaintance in the kingdom, except for some close friends.

Raynald, who initially shed tears, complained about what he had prepared for from the following year. But he didn’t seem to hate it at all, so Aiden and his friends laughed at the blunt voice.

‘How can you not have a birthday party like that?’

In addition, this year was the year Raynald became an adult. As it was a special day, Aiden wanted to prepare more carefully than other years.

However, contrary to his mind, he couldn’t think of what to do. At first, he wanted to invite a sponsor who was in from the Empire, but it was practically impossible.

Raynald said nothing except that his sponsor was an imperial nobleman. Thanks to him, Aiden knew nothing about his sponsor even though it had been five years since he met Raynald.

He couldn’t even send an invitation because he didn’t even know the very basics, like a family name.

‘Even if I sent it an invitation, they wouldn’t have come.’

Aiden was quite quick to catch on. Although Raynald did not tell them about his personal history, Aiden noticed that his sponsor was a significantly wealthy and quite influential aristocrat in the Empire. This was because among the gifts coming to Raynald, there were valuables mixed that not anyone could easily get even if they had money.

A student from the Kingdom sending a birthday invitation to such a noble? Not only would they not come, of course, they were much more likely to not read the letter in the first place. It would be nice if they didn’t get angry.

So what he came up with as the next best thing was to prepare imperial food. Aiden used the pocket money he had saved so far to order an imperial birthday cake in advance from a bakery famous for imperial desserts in the capital.

The biggest and most spectacular cake! Since his best friend was going to eat it!

Yurina appeared in front of Aiden, who had been preparing for such a long time.

Having come from the Empire, she looked close to Raynald. Not only did Raynald seem close, but he seemed to feel special feelings beyond just friendship for her.

She was simply Raynald’s precious person whom Aiden wanted to invite to his birthday party.

‘Of course I have to invite you!’

Aiden tried to invite Yurina to the party from the first day he saw her. However, rather than introducing him to his friend, Raynald missed class and he couldn’t see her hair because she was hanging out.

Meanwhile, helping Yurina became an opportunity. Raynald also no longer stopped Aiden from talking to Yurina. Looking for such an opportunity, he hinted at Yurina.

“We’re going to have a birthday party for Raynald. Do you want to come? It won’t be fancy because it’s prepared by the children, but it’ll be fun.”

Meanwhile, Yurina was surprised when she heard the proposal. It was all to celebrate Raynald that she came all the way here. So that he wouldn’t be lonely in this distant place.

The more people there were, the more enjoyable the party would be. However, unlike the employees who took the initiative to prepare for the party in the mansion, the number of employees who could be brought to the Kingdom was limited.

So she wanted to invite people who were close to Raynald at the academy.

However, after she heard Aiden’s proposal while she agonized over Raynald’s lack of proper introduction to his friends.

There was no reason to refuse what she wanted.

“Okay, let’s get ready together.”

That was how it happened.