Chapter 242

“Brother Richard?”

At the appearance of someone he had never expected to see here, Ian’s eyes widened.

“It’s been a while.”

“I didn’t think I’d see you here. And besides, we’re not on terms where we’d greet each other warmly, are we.”

Ian lightly narrowed his eyes.

To think he would run into Richard here, someone he had absolutely no business with.

Seeing the clear wariness in his gaze, Richard cleared his throat and spoke.

“Ahem, ahem, don’t tell me you’re still upset about what happened back then? I apologized then, didn’t I. Wasn’t that the end of it?”

“If it were something that could end with an apology, you wouldn’t have been expelled.”

At Ian’s pointed remark, Richard bristled.

“T-That’s right, I did get expelled, like you said. Then that should be the end of it. Just because we got into one fight, isn’t it a bit much to be this cold?”

“If it was serious enough to get you expelled, can it really be treated as just a simple fight?”

“……”

No matter how dense he was, he should have understood after hearing this much.

That although it seemed like this person had shown up here seeking ‘reconciliation’, Ian had no intention of accepting it.

Being punched himself was one thing, but,

“Hey, if the Duke gets a legitimate child, do you think he’ll just let you be? If you don’t want to die like your dad…”

But mentioning his uncle and his late father was something Ian could never forgive.

“Hey, don’t be like that… ah, over there, what was your name again?”

Emil, who had been pressed against the wall watching the situation with an anxious expression, flinched.

Ian stepped in front of Emil.

“What are you trying to do by knowing his name?”

Because given Richard’s personality, Ian knew that nothing good would come out if he learned Emil was a commoner.

“It’s good to get to know each other, right. Hey, my name’s Richard. House Ulverni, a marquis house. You know it, right?”

Ducal and Marquisate houses were, in name and reality, high-ranking noble families.

Any child of a noble house would have memorized the rosters of ducal and Marquis families, so Richard continued with a confident expression.

“If you stick close with me and Ian, it’ll help you too, you know?”

But.

“I-I’m a commoner, so, um…”

The moment Emil stated his status, Richard immediately frowned.

‘Why is a commoner punk hanging around with Ian?’

He was wearing a tailored suit, so Richard had assumed he was the child of some noble house…

In Richard’s reddish-brown eyes, which had been trying to use Emil as a bridge to reconcile with Ian, a flash of contempt passed.

“Richard, for your own future, you must reconcile with Ian. Do you understand?”

“Right, you never know when another chance will come. Some time has passed, so that child’s anger should have cooled a bit.”

After being expelled from Saint Hennige Academy.

His parents’ arguments never ceased.

They said they should never have accepted Count Azelot’s proposal.

At first, he had been satisfied with a life of lazing around at home without studying hard, but after a party was held at House Bayern, his parents’ quarrels intensified.

It was because the fact that Richard had been expelled for attacking Ian spread among the so-called ‘heirs’.

Because of that incident, Richard’s older brother was subtly pushed to the margins among the heirs of influential families.

If that was the case for the eldest son, what about Richard, the second son.

If Ian were to inherit the ducal title, it was clear that the future wouldn’t be bright, but since that was such a distant future, it didn’t feel very real to Richard.

For now, the household atmosphere was bad, and because of his parents’ admonitions, he was only trying to reconcile.

Normally, he wouldn’t even spare a glance for such lowly trash, but if it meant achieving his goal, he could humor a commoner for half a day.

“If you’re a commoner, you should grab this chance. When else would you get to hang out with nobles like us? The adults will be busy looking at the exhibition anyway, so why don’t we go have fun together?”

As Richard smiled slyly and approached Emil, Ian stepped in front of him and said,

“Brother, let’s just go over there and talk separately.”

“Oh, have you finally decided to reconcile with me?”

“Let’s talk outside. There are too many people here, so this doesn’t seem like an appropriate place to bring up what happened back then.”

Grabbing Richard’s shoulder, Ian gave a small smile toward Emil, who was stiff with fear, and then started walking.

As Ian walked forward, looking straight ahead, his gaze was unusually sharp.

• Author
• Recent Posts

mikan

Latest posts by mikan (see all)