CH 22

A Special Guest

Since that day, Kyrie tried very hard to avoid Nathaniel. Because of her action, everywhere in the mansion, the servants had been saying that it was a lover’s fight, but it didn’t matter.

‘Did he see it?  Did he hear everything?  Why was he standing over there?’

Kyrie bit her, barely healing, lip again. There’s nothing more humiliating than showing something you don’t want other people to see.

‘Would he think that I’ll bear grudges because of my anger over having a father like that? Or would he feel that I am pathetic for not being able to stand up against my father?’

In her mind that can’t seem to stop wondering, Nathaniel’s words and expressions in her head become more and more twisted.

She would not have been so ashamed if Maria or Laura had caught her.

But it’s Nathaniel. A man who was a portrait of a perfect elegance that every nobleman desired to be. 

Even the air seemed to move around him as the centre, and she often felt as if everything in the world was focusing solely on him. 

He said that he disdained people who didn’t have dignity, but how much effort it required to always have dignity?

So she felt more miserable. She seemed to be an ugly duckling who thought of herself as a swan.

Her lips, where the scab had barely healed, were bleeding again.

*** 

“Are you really not going out?”

Rimo asked.  She was serving Kyrie on behalf of MarryAnne.

Kyrie, who stayed in the room until the wounds on her cheeks, lips and body healed, stiffly turned her head.

“……. Is he in there today?”

“Yes.”

Nathaniel continued to drink tea in the same spot inside the garden. The spot where he spent time chatted with Kyrie ever since they were arriving in the mansion.

Except for the servants who were serving the tea, no one dared to go nearby. Everybody says that only around that particular area, the air seems so chilly.

Under the sunlight, Nathaniel was beautiful. She was afraid to show herself, so she didn’t even try to go near the window at all. At the very least, until she healed all her wounds.

Rimo, who didn’t know her thoughts, snooped over the curtain to take a peek.

“Isn’t he waiting for you?”

“Is he? For me? It can’t be.”

“Men are all like that! Because they have a strong pride. Besides, from the look of him, he is the type who looks like he never had to wait for a woman.”

Kyrie laughed helplessly at Rimo’s words. There was never a powerful man who would wait or even waiting for a person, much less for a woman.

“I’m sure he just liked that place.”

“But…….”

Rimo blurts the words while taking a glimpse at the window.

“There are two cups.”

With those words, Kyrie felt something burning inside her stomach.

“Are you sure you don’t want to go out?”

“He didn’t even look for me.”

“He didn’t look for you, but …”

Rimo hesitated. The young maid who loved to chat muttered a little while wiping the leaves of the bonsai tree with a damp cloth.

“But it was the first time I saw the young lady enjoying so much… because you both got along so well.”

It was unexpected. Kyrie blinks.

“….I looked happy?”

“Yes.”

Rimo laughed. Getting excited, she continued to talk more.

“Of course, I like young lady, the way you are before, but since Lord Nathaniel came, you had more diverse expressions, and you also laughed more often, and… “

Rimo approached and whispered.

“It’s also a trouble to the Lord!”

“Pfft”

Kyrie laughed a little. Seeing her young lady cheered up a bit, Rimo looked a little relieved.

“Are you surprised? We all know that Count said harsh things for your own sake because of what happened, but we’re still depressed when we saw you come back after you got scolded. “

“Thank you, Rimo.”

“So I don’t think it’s not entirely bad that he gives you hard times. Since even though Lord Nathaniel is scary, you still look livelier when he’s around.”

She didn’t know it looked like that.

Kyrie lowered her eyes and leaned on her back. Obviously she can’t avoid it forever.

“…..Later.”

Her eyelashes trembled.

“I will wait a bit longer, then I’ll go right away to see him.”

She didn’t know if she can do it. But she already said it, anyway.

Rimo grinned. Somehow she felt relieved.

“Hehe, just do whatever you want to do! If anyone says bad things, just shut their mouth and kick them.”

“Huh.”

“Then these all are invitations for the Young Lady.”

Rimo, who just left, came back inside with a silver tray full of invitations addressed to the esteemed daughter of Count Buchanan. Kyrie, who was sitting, sauntered to approach it.

The invitation at the top was in golden coloured.  The invitation had golden beeswax on its golden envelope. The pattern on the seal was a leopard.

‘The symbol of the Royal family.’

She smiled bitterly. The event she had expected to come around this time has finally happened.

A thin finger lifted the wax and opened the letter. The content was simple.

「We invite the esteemed Young lady of Buchanan house to attend a celebration engagement party of the Crown Prince Eden Orewinbridge, and The honourable young lady of Baron Cassner,  Rubinia Cassner.」

However, there was something that even Kyrie did not expect.

「In particular, The Patriotic Knight Lore Leschaux will attend as well.」

*** 

Boutiques all over the capital were on the hyped.

For almost seven families, It’s an expected practice for the house of aristocrats to have seamstresses called in, but the impact of The Patriotic Knight’s appearance made this basic practice even more expected. 

Since it had been 100 years long, The Patriotic Knight had not appeared in public. All the nobles across the empire were now busily trying to make new dresses and attires to impress.

‘Sorry. Currently, there is no available direct door-to-door business.’

‘Unfortunately, because of business trips, our store is currently closed.’

The very few luxury boutiques’ business trips were all tailored specially only for the nobles of dukedom. 

The other nobles were resentful for the fact, but resentment will not make the dresses.

Thanks to this, the nobles had to make their way themselves to the tailor shops. Kyrie, coincidentally, could meet Laura because of that.

“Dressed beautifully, really!! Do we really have to impress The Patriotic Knight?”

Laura, a green-eyed young lady who had scarlet curly hair, cried out loud. The youngest daughter of the lively and nerdy Marquis of FortDucane seemed to have a lot of frustrations.

“Beautiful dresses are very much appreciated, of course! But somehow it feels like we’re too eager trying to flirt with Patriotic Lord!”

Kyrie smiled at Laura’s amusing words to express her feelings.

“My father does too. As soon as he knew that Patriotic Lord was coming, he came to me and told me to do full-bodied skin care.”

“You too? Me too! What’s wrong with us? What if you’re ugly? If men have to be rich. Women should only just need to look pretty!”

“Is that so?”

“Money is fine because I have it!”

Her friend has a knack for saying amusing things. Kyrie laughed every time she heard her talk.

Not only Laura but also the entire capital was heated up by the story of the National Hero, so his name could be heard even while walking down the street.

The Protector Lore Lechaux. He was the national hero of Trevereum. In return for his great contributions to the founding empire of men, as a non-human, his territory, which occupied one third of the empire’s land, was recognized as an independent territory.

The National Defense Commander (The Protector) had all of its territory managed by neighbouring aristocrats, but it was not far from wealth. 

He was in fact the only family member of the “Lore” family, and the wealth that had been passed down from generation to generation was naturally enormous.

Thanks to this, the nobles with unmarried daughters were in a hurry. Sel Arellano overflowed with people who wanted to somehow capture the man in the legend and get involved in his private life.

Thanks to this, Kyrie and Laura, who were not interested, were forced to get number tags from the dressing room. 

As soon as Laura sat down at a nearby café, she snorted looking at her number tags back and forth.

“It would be nice if Maria also came. Our pretty girl is from the house of a Duke, so I guess she came to pick the dresses directly from the boutique.”

“Isn’t Maria the successor of Duke Old Ciudad?”

“To be honest, I’m not jealous of that at all, I am more jealous with the fact that she doesn’t have to ‘sell’ herself to some single men to take her as a wife! Imagine how many deals I missed while we were doing these insignificant things?” (P/R: “sell” as in rolling up one self to look attractive to be seen as an excellent candidate for marriage’s deal)

It was like the Top of Fort Ducaine’s Marquis. (T/N: Top is like a guild)

Laura was also an outstanding businesswoman who turned her gaze away from the inland trade tightly held by Edenhall and expanded the market to maritime trade.

“Have you finally decided to leave the top after all? How about the Marquis? It’s also the time for him to pick a successor. ”

“I can’t decide! It’s troublesome for me to take over as a successor, I am having a great time accumulating the wealth but I really hate taking over the family!”

Laura, who had been complaining about it for a long time, turned to Kyrie.

“Kyrie, how about you? Is your brother still the successor of your house?”

“Well. Isn’t it expected?”

“Urghhhh, I’m not saying anything about your father and I’m still…. Sigh, you have a lot of hardships.”

The conversation was long, but the size of the queue for the number tags didn’t seem to shrink at all. Laura’s whimsical talk wasn’t infinite, so she soon became less talkative.

Finally, Laura carefully put out the topic she had been holding in her mouth.

“Kyrie”

“Yes”

Kyrie replied calmly.

“There are bad rumours these days.”

“Yes. How about it?”

“It’s serious.”

Laura lowered her voice.

“They had been saying about you, who are willing to sleep with any man, and the Crown Prince asked you to break off the engagement because of your shameless behaviour. Even it’s a shame that you crossed your legs first.” (P/R: ‘crossed your legs’ implies that when she was engaged to the idiot she pretended to be innocent/virgin so it’s very shameful when the fact that she is willing to sleep like any man according to the rumours became known to the public. Indicating that she is far from innocent but instead is a slut)

“Is there really anything else?”

“What? Did you know about it?”

“My father said it to me.”

Kyrie said while savouring the scent of tea. Fortunately, the wound inside her lips was already faded enough to be covered with makeup. Laura looked disgusted and frustrated.

“Yes. As well as about the so-called pregnancy, syphilis and so on.”

“Oh, That’s new.”

“Yes, it’s also refreshingly evil!”

Kyrie assumed that the existence of Nathaniel was also adding the fuel to the rumours. However, to Laura, who did not know the situation, it will only appear to be groundless and vicious rumours.

‘Should I tell her about what happened?’

She shook her head at the thought. Besides the fact that the explanation will be a lengthy one, it was also hard to believe. And most of all, she wouldn’t want to get Laura involved in this dreadful situation.

‘And… because he’s a person who will soon disappear anyway.’

Kyrie still didn’t know how she was going to prevent ‘The End’ from actually being.

Sadly, Kyrie has never been a sorcerer, nor has ever felt magical power neither. She then thought to herself ‘I hadn’t done anything that I could be confident of.’

‘Even if the pressure, to prevent what’s about to come, is from the royal family, it’s a fact that I don’t even have magical power, so they won’t be able to blame me too much if I failed to prevent it somehow.’

In any case the favourable outcome would be for Nathaniel to go back to have a deep slumber forever, which sounded unfair, and also for Kyrie to return to her original life, when this is all over.

“It’s okay. Everyone always likes to whisper. It’ll be quiet in a little while.”

With all of that thought Kyrie had no choice but to say that. After seeing her smile, Laura let out a relieved breath.

“You won’t be able to say that if you’ve been to the Salon of Edenhall.”

“Is it that bad?”

“Rubinia Cassner was there.”

Kyrie’s eyes widened at that news.

“In the Salon Edenhall? But isn’t there…”

“Yes. The place has a strict rule of only seven families or prestigious families are permitted to enter. But I assumed she wanted to impress the future Crown Princess in advance, Duchess of Edenhall is.”

Rubinia Cassner, everybody seemed to be gradually assuming that she will, for certainly be titled as the Crown Princess. So like that she decided to distance herself in the future on that very moment.

“Miss Cassner… will surely do an excellent job in carrying out her duty as Crown Princess.”

Laura shook her head at Kyrie’s response.

“Do you truly mean what you just said? She stole your fiancée!”

“I’m of course furious, but it’s all in the past, I’m better off to actually let it all go, perhaps it is for the better.”

Instead of Kyrie who’s calm the whole situation, Laura exploded angrily.

“You don’t even know how badly she is talking right now!  It’s like you……….”

It was then.

Jingle.

A bell sound was heard as the café door opened.

Indeed, she wouldn’t be able to concern herself with the rumours, not when the person who just entered the café took a notice to Kyrie and Laura anyway.

“Oh, is that really you here?”

A charming voice was heard before it was followed by the sound of a pair of pink-coloured shoes tapping the floor.

Kyrie and Laura each raised their heads at the same time when they heard the voice. And there she was, looking at them with a gentle smile while taking off her wide-brimmed pink hat, Rubinia Cassner.

“May I join you?”

******

T/N rant: …… can we seriously throw her out of the scene? Also author, why does Rubinia has a good last name but not Maria and Laura? Why this discrimination?