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Chapter 114: Father Is Afraid For You

In the royal palace, a gray-haired maid was currently trying to curb her excitement as she made her way toward her master’s chambers. This was an extremely meaningful day to Mia, for it was one which she had been looking forward to yet simultaneously felt a little melancholy toward.

This was the day that Her Highness Nora would fulfill the royal promise and become the protector of the successor of the Ascart House, Roel Ascart, through a grand ceremony.

Mia, as Nora’s personal maid, was heartened by this.

The role of ‘personal maid’ was a special post within a household. Due to the nature of the job, it had stringent requirements, and only the cream of the crop was chosen. In fact, when it came to the successors of major noble houses and the royal family, their personal maid was almost guaranteed to be someone of considerable standing too.

Mia was no exception to the rule. Despite being Nora’s personal maid, she actually came from a noble house, and her father held a significant position in the royal court. Her role as Nora’s personal maid had brought her house significant benefits—her father had been promoted, and her oldest brother had received the recognition of the royal family too.

Despite all of that, however, Mia found herself gradually distancing from her family members. Humans tended to be the most sensitive in their teenage years, and it was at such an age that she had to enter the royal palace all alone. She faced her fair share of difficulties and indignanties, but she had no choice but to bury it all in her heart because she had no kin by her side.

Even on rare holidays, when she was able to return home to visit her family, her family members seemed to be far more concerned about the movements of the royal family than her wellbeing. Her father instructed her time and time again to carry out her job properly, so as to bring honor to the family, and her brothers spoke with her only to seek out better career paths.

Sometimes, Mia felt rather than being a family member, she was more of a tool for her family instead. Her sentiment toward her kin had inevitably thinned over the years, but that couldn’t stop her desire to love and be loved.

Thus, she entrusted her feelings to Nora, whom she had grown up with from a young age. Years of accompaniment with one another had made her feel like she was Nora’s older sister, though she had enough self-realization in her to know that it was arrogant for her to think this way. How could she possibly match up to Nora’s lofty standing? But, despite her rational mind telling her otherwise, her instincts drove her to act with Nora’s best interests in mind, and that was why she decided to make a move.

Not too long ago, Mia used one of her channels to spread a rumor. It was a rumor about two children who were mutually in love but met with numerous difficulties along the way, only to end up being forced apart from one another. It was cunningly crafted to poke at the mental anguish that far too many nobles had suffered through. While no names were used in the rumors, it was not too difficult to piece the clues together to figure out who those two children were.

Mia wasn’t doing this just for fun, of course. No, she had a clear goal in mind, and that was to massively expand the Roel X Nora fanclub!

In the first place, Mia thought that it was a miracle for Nora to actually be interested in someone. Outsiders viewed Nora as a lofty, graceful, compassionate, and dignified individual, an almost perfect being, but Mia could tell that Nora had never really and truly been interested in anyone before. She treated everyone as equals, but from another perspective, it also meant that there was no one she was actually close to.

Such an occurrence, Mia thought, was abnormal. A human couldn’t be without friends. Everyone probably had periods in their lives when they were all alone, but that shouldn’t be the norm.

Yet, Nora happened to be an exception. It was not to say that she didn’t have people by her side—on the contrary, she could easily make plenty of ‘friends’ if she wanted to—but it was another matter to forge a genuine connection. More often than not, two individuals had to be of similar positions to truly connect with one another, but with Nora’s high standing and her overwhelming strength, there was no one in her age group with whom she could really talk to.

On top of that... while it was probably not that good for Mia to put it in such a manner, but she felt that there was something unusual about Nora. There was a time that she had made a mistake and was supposed to be severely punished, but all Nora did was to step on her kneeling body.

One must know that Nora was extremely light, and she hardly used any strength when she stepped down on her too. Could such a punishment really be considered as a punishment? And, why was Nora so excited after carrying out the punishment?

Her Highness Nora must really care for me and is unwilling to punish me, so she just put on a show for it.

Mia convinced herself that this had to be the case before feeling all moved about the matter once more.

Uwuuu, Her Highness really treats me far too well!

With such thoughts in mind, Mia finally arrived at Nora’s chambers and knocked on her door, requesting entry.

...

“Your Highness, you have woken up earlier than usual.”

“I couldn’t fall asleep,” replied Nora with a bitter smile.

Given the strict management of her physical condition, she had never thought that a day would come when she would lose sleep from rampant emotions.

“That only goes to show that Lord Roel is important to you.”

“I guess so.”

Faced with Mia’s teasing smile, Nora fell silent. She was a little shy at having her feelings pointed out, but she didn’t deny the matter. She didn’t think that it was necessary to conceal her feelings—a true monarch would express her emotions freely and leave her subjects to deal with them. Besides, given that the target she was going for was a boy from the Ascart House, she knew that it wouldn’t do for her to half-ass it.

Victoria’s advice had really struck a chord in her heart. Be it Ponte or Roel, the way to deal with this kind of indecisive fellow was to dish out heavy blows one after another. It would be best if she could take him down in a single move, but otherwise, the least she could do was to pin him down, so as to keep other competitors at bay.

Nora thought about the silver-haired girl that was constantly by Roel’s side, and she found herself sighing deeply once more. As it turned out, she was already a step too late from the very start. Alicia had met Roel earlier than her, and they had already forged a strong bond with one another. If Nora were to attempt to play the villain and pull them apart, there was a good chance that it would backfire on her.

Besides, given her standing, it would be inappropriate for her to do so, or else others could misunderstand her intention as sowing discord amongst the other noble houses. This could threaten the stability of the Theocracy, so she wouldn’t be so foolish as to do something like that.

The only comfort she had was that Alicia was still young and naive. Rather than confessing her feelings for Roel, Alicia chose to immerse herself in the warmth brought about by kinship instead. She was afraid to shake things up out of fear that it would ruin their current relationship, or maybe it was simply out of shyness. Regardless of which it was, it mattered not.

What was important was that Alicia had chosen to take on a passive stance. As long as she was content maintaining the status quo, Nora would have plenty of chances to succeed.

Mia picked up the bell on the table and rang it lightly. The crisp sound reverberated for a short moment before an army of maids rushed in several seconds later. They immediately tidied up the room, prepared the gowns, and laid out the cosmetics neatly on the table. Meanwhile, Mia led Nora to the side for a bath.

While the royal palace embarked on a busy day, over at the Labyrinth Villa, Roel was in front of a stoney-eyed Anna as she worked her nimble hands to touch up his appearance. Staring at his reflection in the mirror, Roel couldn’t help but feel amazed by how suave he was.

The Demon Dew sure is incredible. All it takes is a few drops of it, and my looks are elevated to much greater heights. And furthermore, it isn’t just Demon Dew this time around too...

The exquisite bottles laid out in front of him looked no different from small piles of gold coins in Roel’s eyes. Truthfully, none of these cosmetics were prepared by the Ascart House. Despite being high nobles themselves, both Carter and Roel lived their lives relatively crudely. Carter often spent his time in the military and didn’t need cosmetics whereas Roel was different from the typical nobles who spent their days thinking about how to touch up their appearances to attract the opposite gender, especially since there was no need for him to do so.

These cosmetics were actually a gift Roel had received from the Sorofya Merchant Association’s Manager Arwen a few days ago. When he heard that Her Highness Nora was going to become Roel’s protector, he nearly fainted from glee. He never thought that his network of connections would expand in such a terrifying manner just because of an investment of 5000 gold coins he made a few months ago.

Right now, he no longer expected Roel to sell him anything anymore. As long as he could just maintain an amicable relationship with Roel, the Sorofya Merchant Association was bound to do well in Holy Capital Loren. He would be able to tap into the halo of being a close associate of Roel to secure favorable deals for the merchant association, and if things go well, he could become a supplier of the royal family too. Being an official royal supplier would change the nature of the association’s business.

Of course, these plans were still all in the pipeline, and they were contingent on Arwen maintaining a close relationship with Roel. So, Arwen decided to double in on his investment and send over the latest goods of the Sorofyas.

Take the bottle filled with pink powder for example, it was known as Pink Lover, and it had the effect of slightly mellowing down the effects of the Demon Dew to make one’s facial features look more natural. Even a small bottle of it cost tens of gold coins, and it was a yet-to-be-released product too. Their plan was to make a grand release in the following spring, and they were still in the midst of building up hype for it.

In other words, it was a product that one couldn’t buy yet even if one had the money.

It was the usual Sorofyas’ marketing strategy of winning over the noblewomen and young misses in order to access the deep pockets of rich noble houses. It was a natural tendency of humans to pursue beauty, and appearances were even more so important in the circle of nobility.

“Young master, you look good today.”

Despite the inexplicable cold attitude Anna had been putting on for the entire day, she couldn’t stop herself from praising Roel. Following that, she brought Roel down to gather together with Carter and Alicia.

As one of the main stars of the protector ceremony, the Ascarts were all going to be present at the scene. Carter had opted to dress in a formal military uniform instead of his noble suit, and it did make him look quite suave. Alicia, on the other hand, was wearing a flowing white gown that amazed Roel.

Roel sneaked two peeks at Alicia before quickly averting his eyes. Alicia had always been quite beautiful, but that was further accentuated by the gown and cosmetics provided by the Sorofyas, bringing her beauty to a nearly transcendent level. It was to the point that Roel found it a little unreal, reminiscent of a being that only appeared in one’s dreams.

Meanwhile, Alicia was fiddling with the hems of her dress with her head lowered. Her face was so reddened that she could hardly speak fluently anymore.

“Alicia, you look beautiful today.”

“Y-you too, big brother Roel... N-no, that’s not what I meant! I meant to say that you look dashing today too! Ahh, s-shall we hold hands to walk together?”

“Hm? Sure.”

Roel offered his arm for Alicia to grab, and the two of them exchanged glances and smiled together. Anna’s stiff expression finally alleviated a little after seeing the interactions between the two children, and a smile finally returned to her face.

On the other hand, Carter was filled with mixed feelings about this. He glanced in the direction of the royal palace and sighed deeply in his heart.

I wish you a life of peace, Roel.