‘It’s all bad.’

Yurina was suddenly amused by her own thoughts.

It was just a simple greeting. But she didn’t even want to think what she would feel if Reynard kissed the palm of Chloe now, even her best friend.

After talking about this and that, Chloe went to other friends. After that, people who knew Yurina, as well as curious people who were interested in Reynard, gathered around.

Already feeling exhausted, Yurina took Reynard to a less crowded corner.

Then Raynard said, fanning her:

“I’ll bring you something to drink.”

“No need, it’s okay.”

“I will be right back. Wait a minute.”

Raynard brushed Yurina’s hair away from her face and behind her ear, and turned around.

“Lady Carthia?”

Yurina, who was watching Reynard’s back, reflexively put on a polite smile and turned around at the call behind her.

“I never thought that I would see you here today.”

The person who spoke was an ordinary brown-haired, blue-eyed man.

He seemed to be around Yurina’s age and was slightly shorter than Reynard. In appearance, he was more of a scientist than a knight. With that, and the body was puny, compared to Reynard. And his voice was also higher than Reynard’s.

Having gone so far in her thoughts, Yurina suddenly burst out laughing as if she was disappointed in herself.

‘I compare everyone to Ray’.

If you think about it, from a certain point, Yurina started comparing all the men in the Empire to Reynard. It must have been like this since the first time she saw him grow up in the Crohn Kingdom. Perhaps it was when Reynard settled in her mind as a man, and not just a friend.

“Young lady?”

Hearing a new call, Yurina came to her senses and extended her hand to him. The man bowed his head and kissed her hand nobly. Unlike Reynard’s recent manner, his lips still touched the back of her hand.

“I haven’t seen you for a long time, so I hardly recognized you. And yet, when I look closely, I see your childish face. You are still beautiful.”

The man’s eyes sparkled like a child’s. He wasn’t particularly handsome like Reynard, but he did have a pretty sweet smile.

I guess they’ve known each other for a long time?

Yurina once again carefully looked into his face after such familiar words. He was a man whom she had never met before, but, oddly enough, his smiling eyes weren’t unfamiliar to her.

‘Where did I see you?’

Yurina really wanted to ask such a question, but the etiquette of aristocrats didn’t allow it.

Usually in this case, you need to pretend that you remember something, and then deftly slip out of the dialogue. But Yurina, who was recalling her memories couldn’t reply right away.

As Yurina’s silence dragged on, the man seemed to scratch the back of his head hesitantly.

“I don’t know if you remember, because that was a long time ago. I’m Rupert Kinsell.”

“Ah…”

Yurina couldn’t remember his face, but she did remember that name. Rupert Kinsell. He was the second son of Earl Kinsell. As a child, Yurina met him several times.

‘So this is Rupert Kinsell?’

Yurina looked at the man’s face again. When she found out who the man was, she could definitely see his old face.

“You have changed a lot compared to the past. I heard you applied to the academy, but you have already graduated.”

“I finished my studies this winter. And all this time I longed to see the young lady. I never thought that you would attend today’s party because you haven’t made your official debut yet, but it feels like I’ve been given an unexpected gift.”

The man’s voice was filled with emotion. And he was smiling all the time, as if he wasn’t going to hide his emotions.

‘Do you still like me?’

The first time Yurina met him was on her tenth birthday.

For Yurina, this was the first meeting, but in fact, those two had known each other in absentia before. This was due to the fact that Count Kinsell was a close friend of Marquis Carthia, and the families kept a strong bond. Rupert’s older brother was also close to Riggs Carthia.

Rupert, who came to celebrate Yurina’s birthday with the Count and Countess, became very shy and blushed as soon as he saw her. Noticing this, Yurina immediately knew what was what.

If the real ten-year-old Yurina was there, she might not have noticed, but inside her lived a 22-year-old Senna. It was easy to read the child’s heart, blushing up to the neck.

Perhaps Count Kinsell and his wife knew this too, and secretly pushed the shy Rupert to Yurina. With words that are fun to play with children.

Y Although Yurina was reluctant, she decided to spend time with Rupert in order to match the rhythm. And after half an hour she regretted my decision.

He was a year older than Yurina and really looked like a child. He was a child at the age of eleven, but he was so innocent that he couldn’t even look into the eyes of the girl he liked. No matter how hard Yurina tried to smooth the atmosphere, he avoided her gaze whenever he said something and stuttered over every word.

‘Compared to this Rupert, Ray was fun to play with.’

At that time, 11-year-old Rupert and 12-year-old Reynard were equally small children in Yurina’s eyes, but Reynard was always more fun to talk to, because he quickly reacted to every word he said to her.

But Rupert was different.

And after that, when Rupert was supposed to reappear at the mansion, Yurina hid in her room, fighting back with all sorts of excuses.

Then she learned that Rupert had left for the academy. It was only natural that Yurina would never meet him again.

‘I really hated it back then.’

Maybe because he had secured some sort of life experience, or maybe because he was an adult now, Yurina no longer harbored such distaste for him.