Chapter 14

Chapter 14

The nobles that were only peering at the appearance of the ‘handsome’ servant Aiden turned their heads at Mia’s actions and focused their eyes on him openly.

Just like watching a monkey trapped inside a cage.

‘Why on earth did this banquet hall grow so big that it divided people into groups?’

If it was the right size, there would only be one group focused on today’s protagonists, my brother and the princess.

Then I would never have had to go through such a bizarre play. The situation was almost at the level of an audience-participatory play.

“I’m thirsty… I can’t lift my glass because my wrist hurts. Would you hold a glass of lemonade and follow me?”

Aiden’s eyes were kindly folded. It was a smile that I had already seen before.

‘As expected, the epitome of professionalism.’

He bowed, grabbed a glass of ade, and followed Mia.

‘Aiden… Ade… Aiden… Ade… Aiden with an ade…*’

Soon after, the smiling attention seeker, Mia, and Aiden, who followed her, arrived in front of me.

Mia smirked at me and blinked.

‘Do you like Selena that much?’

“Ah, give me the cup. Great job.”

Mia wasn’t even looking at Aiden, only her hand stretched out behind her.

Aiden, still grinning, pushed the glass between the gap of her open hand. Without even turning her head, Mia swung the glass toward her.

Of course, as you could expect, the ade in the glass overflowed, and Mia’s red dress was dyed even redder.

“Kyaaa-!!”

At Mia’s tearful scream, I looked around, wondering if anyone else was thinking about covering their ears like me.

Although, when I turned my head, I saw everyone looking at us with sparkling round rabbit eyes without even thinking about their bleeding ears.

Mia slowly lowered the hand she had raised.

“Thi- what is this!? Do you know how much this dress costs?!”

“I apologize, Young Lady Mia Rashapel!”

“Sorry? Are you sorry? You think this will be solved with that lousy apology?!”

Mia pressed her finger on Aiden’s shoulder to accentuate her words. The problem was that his shoulder would be pierced since Mia’s pointing nail was not soft at all…

I quietly looked at the scene and admired it.

Surprisingly, I didn’t open my mouth once after saying it was bothersome to be around Mia. That meant that the current commotion was completely made up of Mia’s solo act.

‘What an amazing person…’

The nobles surrounding us were already buzzing.

Some of Selena’s former sidekicks came out and looked at Mia pitifully. Some even gave a cliche, pretentious, ‘What to do? How could that happen…?’

Although, of course, through the natural telepathy of the wicked ladies, they could know the scam behind such a commotion.

The person to be worried about in the current situation was Aiden, who was likely to have a hole in his shoulder soon.

I shook my head and observed the situation. I felt like I was watching a cliché soap opera, so I wondered if the next scene would be exactly what I had imagined.

Mia couldn’t argue against Aiden alone the whole time, so she moved her head and drew closer to him. Then she whispered to him in such a low voice that only a few people nearby could hear.

“You beggar without a clear origin… Even if you don’t know which shitty dump you came from, if you go to work, you should do it properly. Do you want to be kicked out to the slums again? That half-half** face of yours will be quite helpful.”

‘I guess this is the soap operas’ peak of drama… it’s like love and war…’***

Despite the humiliation and the sexually harassing remarks, Aiden only bowed his head, repeating “I apologize.”

Apparently, today’s king of the beggar was Mia.

‘Mia, no matter how much you want to show Selena your evil deeds, there are things you can say and things you can’t.’

If you thought about it, although Selena was a crazy mean girl, she never sexually harassed anyone like that. If the past Selena was a crazy b*tch, then Mia became a crazy f*cking b*tch.

‘What should I do? If I speak up, everyone will look at me. Of course, even now, everyone is looking at me…’

However, simply glancing at me since I was part of the surroundings and paying direct attention to me were two different things.

‘Ah… you’re finally getting tired. It’s the highest peak; yeah, you’re so great.’

I should give her an award. An award for the most truly bothersome idiot of all.

Even while I was pondering about speaking up, Mia still uttered vulgar words in a voice that could only be heard by me and the person involved, Aiden, who was continuing to bow his head.

‘I can’t help it. Again, I’m not that shameless. It is said that kindness should be repaid. Starting today, my name is Magpie****. The Magpie who repaid favors… Wait, wouldn’t I be a swallow? Animals do a lot of favors. They’re even better than humans…’

Anyway, I stepped forward to repay the favor from earlier. Noticing me behind her, Mia turned her head. Her eyes were sparkling with anticipation.

In response, I stood in front of Mia, that is, between Aiden and Mia.

At the sudden proximity, Mia was startled and took a step back. Aiden on the other side also seemed to have been startled, as I felt his body moving slightly.

“Young Lady Mia.”

In fact, if I were to take Mia’s side moderately, I could comfort her by saying ‘no matter how harsh it is, your words were very harsh.’ She might’ve even apologized. She wouldn’t have other options. She would probably blurt out some meaningless words. Everyone knew it was worse to apologize than to receive an apology.

However, she would keep bothering me, with the thought that we became close.

Mia’s face brightened, thinking I was going to take her side.

A beautiful friendship drama that would harm the people around you but never you, that may have been painted in your head in advance.

‘But what should I do…?’ The title of the drama that would be on air right now was ‘Reverse Drama.’

“Your words are so vulgar that I think my ears will bleed.”

I meant it. Mia blinked a few times, speechless. It seemed that she was wondering if what she had just heard was an auditory hallucination.

She glanced around. Did she realize that what she just heard wasn’t a hallucination due to the response of the people whose faces had hardened like stones?

Slowly, her face was dyed red.

I nodded slightly, watching Mia’s face turn red with the joy of a farmer looking at the ripe tomatoes.

“Lady Rashapel, today is a special day for my brother, Prince Aaron White, and Her Highness the Imperial Princess Ariel. What is this fuss about?”

“Se- Selena! I’m a victim! You saw that servant spill the drink on my clothes!”

Mia shouted at me without realizing her tone of voice. She seemed quite upset to hear me say she was vulgar.

“It seems to me that it was not intentionally spilled, but flipped over, and I think the lady was the one who took the glass and moved it carelessly in the first place.”

“Wh- what are you saying?! Selena!”

Mia shouted my name sharply. The eyes under her frowning brows went beyond anger and even sorrow.

‘No, go back. I don’t want to side with you. A child must be raised strictly. Ah, of course, without overdoing it.’

‘So think of this as a spoon of love, Mia.’

With my determined expression, Mia looked back at the young ladies around us. The ladies, who had just been siding with her and offering meaningless consolation until now, were staring at her with hardened expressions on their faces.

“Then, I’ll ask the young ladies here. Please tell me. Am I seeing things because I’m not feeling well right now, or am I right?”

Yep, in short, the answer was already decided.

It was on the same level of asking someone to take off their clothes, do a striptease show in the middle of a rodeo and get taken to the police station or eat some chicken. One didn’t even have to check which one was the correct answer. It was clear, and you just had to say it.

The ladies surrounding us must have thought the same, since they slowly stepped back and just glanced at Mia.

Indeed, it was a wise decision.

“That… umm… Yes, it looks like young Lady Rashapel turned her hand holding the glass… It looked like it had spilled… on her…”

“That- that’s right… That’s what I saw… with my own eyes…”

Mia’s face, that seemed unable to turn red anymore, became even redder at the stuttering words of the ladies.

‘Really… There are no limits to the human body.’

“Selena! What’s wrong?! You may not remember, but this servant was your toy! Doing this to me is like spitting on your own face!”

Mia bit her lips, leaned her head towards me and whispered. She clenched her molars so hard that her pronunciation was muffled.

“I honestly don’t remember anything. Should I just do it because I did it in the past…? Ah, do I have to pay a fine for not doing it?”

“What do you…”

Mia’s expression showed how lost she was. She couldn’t grasp the situation at all.

“Oh, I thought that there was a quota system that I didn’t remember. Something like, ‘We promise to bully the servant three times a day~ if you don’t do it, you’ll be kicked out of our group~!’”

“…kik… kik… what… Selena! We were friends! I was just playing the pranks you usually liked to get your memories back! Aren’t you being too much?”

‘You could say any lie right now since I don’t remember. When did Selena ever say such harsh things to Aiden?’

Of course, she made a lot of trashy remarks, but it wasn’t that bad.

‘Wait, am I trying to defend the perpetrator right now?… Selena, Mia, both of you kneel down and raise your hands…”

But one thing was certain. Friends? Unfortunately, Mia was not a friend to the real Selena… that was for sure.

To Selena, Mia and the other young ladies were seen as Lady 1, 2, and 3 who would simply pass by. It was just that Mia lasted a bit longer.

‘I swear on my toenail that none of them are on the list of ‘people I wish were at my funeral’ at Selena’s death.’

‘…Probably, right? Right? I’m betting my toenail… ‘

“That’s right. We used to be friends… but not anymore.”

“Oh?”

“We’re not friends anymore,”

I shrugged.

Everyone’s eyes were focused on us.

‘Well, will you complain about it? Bring it on. Ah, not to me. But to Aiden or Lucas over there.’

She slowly blinked, glaring at me. I opened my mouth again to point out what was bothering me.

“So, from now on, don’t talk too comfortably to me. Marquis’s young Lady, Li- Mia Rashapel.”

At my words, Mia’s red face instantly turned pale. It wasn’t Chinese magic, it was a fellow with a very peculiar talent… having a talent like that, Selena should have played a better role.

‘Good. If you’ve caused this much trouble, you have to leave now.’

Unlike attention-seeker Mia, I hated people’s eyes on me. In addition, there would be a dance soon…

I couldn’t even dance. However, I had to cope with idiots who couldn’t connect ‘I lost my memory’ and ‘I can’t dance’ together. So I would have to keep repeating ‘I’m sorry, but I can’t dance…’

I looked behind Mia to see if Lucas was still sitting in the corner and at that moment I made eye contact with him, who was approaching.

Lucas was wearing his usual polite business smile.

——

tl/n:

*ade is a suffix used for a fruit–(often citrus) flavored beverage.

**She’s saying his face is somewhat pretty.

***Slang: All’s fair in love and war. Means everything is acceptable cause nothing is out of bounds.

****Magpie: In Korea, the magpie (까치) is celebrated as “a bird of great good fortune, of sturdy spirit and a provider of prosperity and development.” It is also said that some children used to sing a song to the Magpie after losing a tooth so the bird will bring them a new one. So cute~~

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