Chapter 81

A few days had passed since I started taking horseback riding lessons from Dittmeyer.

It was about a week after the day Ethan and I had dealt with the King Serpent at Seraphine’s Masquerade Ball. 

Based on the rumors circulating about the Imperial Palace, it seemed that the incident at the ball was being resolved to some extent.

From the night the Imperial Palace was attacked, an investigation began to determine the truth behind the incident, and at this point, it was almost certain that the incident was caused by demons.

Currently, they must be conducting additional investigations to ascertain the details.

Separate from the investigation, it seemed that over the three days following the incident, a funeral service was held for the soldiers of the Imperial Palace Guards and some of the servants who were sacrificed.

Apparently, even Empress Eleanor, who had been participating in diplomatic affairs abroad, hastily returned to attend the funeral.

I don’t know the rest of the situation in detail. I could only speculate that Seraphine, the member of the imperial family who had the clearest view of the situation on-site, was taking the lead in handling various matters.

Well, I couldn’t help it since the game’s story never mentioned the details.

In the first place, the information I’ve learned so far didn’t come from my knowledge of the game either. I just heard rumors without even trying and confirmed various stories through the letters that came to Ethan.

After all, as his exclusive maid, checking the letters addressed to Ethan was also part of my job.

‘If he were the original Ethan, he would have only received a few letters about arranged marriages with little substance.’

Perhaps because of his exceptional performance, quite a lot of letters had been flying in from here and there since the incident at the masquerade ball.

Starting with an apology letter from Lizzy of the August family, there was a friendly letter from Orion expressing his desire to build a friendship, and letters from various noble ladies formally addressing the matter of Ethan’s fiancée.

Although I had expected it to some extent, it seemed that his appearance at the official event had quite a positive impact on his image.

Until now, there had been rumors secretly circulating that Ethan was the worthless lout kid of the Blackwood family. In fact, even not long after Ethan woke up from the curse, numerous people visited the mansion to see him in person.

Even then, the power-hungry nobles from remote regions had forcibly tried to match their daughters with Ethan and sent letters regarding the engagement, but that was about it.

At the very least, there had never been a single letter sent directly from a young lady expressing her desire to meet him or hoping for a relationship…

“Today’s letters are no joke either…”

Just by looking at the envelope sealed with a heart-shaped wax seal, I could feel the sender’s blatant intention seeping through the paper even before opening the letter.

Generally, I carefully remove those stamped seals with a knife and check the letters inside one by one as part of my job.

I feel sorry for the young ladies who have to have their love letters read by me instead of the intended recipient, but what can I do? This is my job.

In fact, only about 10% of these letters actually reached Ethan. For the most part, I would just read the contents appropriately, summarize them, and explain them to him.

…Just in case, let me clarify that I’m not jealous of other women approaching Ethan and cutting them off. It’s just that Ethan doesn’t have time to read these letters one by one, so I handle them.

My role even extends to sending “polite replies” to the noble ladies who sent the letters. Ethan was really busy with swordsmanship training and etiquette lessons without a moment to spare.

Thinking about what kind of flowery language I should use to reject them this time made my head spin.

“…The Barburk Count family should have some influence in the story, so I’ll have to set this one aside and show it to Ethan. …Berko Viscount family? Who are these people?”

No matter how young and ignorant the ladies were, I couldn’t believe that a viscount family would so boldly send a love letter mentioning engagement.

Naturally, I had no choice but to send rejection letters to these letters across the board.

It didn’t make sense for the young master of the Blackwood family, one of the most powerful ducal families, to be engaged to a lady from an unknown viscount family.

Well, strictly speaking, Harold’s wife, Thanasia, was also from a remote viscount family, but theirs was a marriage with a backstory of them meeting and dating since their academy days.

In the first place, even if I showed it to Ethan, he would likely refuse. Just recently, he had written a rejection letter to a correspondence letter presumed to be from a lady of a ducal family.

Of course, considering the status of the other party, he had personally written the reply instead of having me ghostwrite it.

The conversation we had two days ago regarding that matter went something like this:

<These are all the letters from the high-ranking noble ladies, young master.>

<Ah, yes. Thank you for your hard work in sorting them out today as well, Maid.>

<…And these letters are from the ladies of viscount families and below. Shall I write rejection letters to them as usual?>

<Yes, I’ll leave that to you as well. I’m glad that you can read and write, Maid.>

With those words, Ethan was only re-reading the letter sent by the lady from the Brimton Ducal family among the numerous letters.

Thinking that she might become his fiancée, I casually brought it up.

<The lady from the Brimton Ducal family is from a quite prestigious family, isn’t she? I remember it was a friendly letter without any direct mention of engagement, but even if you’re not interested in the engagement itself, how about meeting her once?>

<…Huh? Ah, this letter? I appreciate your advice, but I’m going to send a clear reply to this one as well. It’s better to draw a clear line rather than forcibly making time and giving her false hope when we’re both busy.>

<…Is that so?>

<…What’s wrong, Maid? Are you perhaps interested as to who my fiancée would be?>

<As a servant, the correct answer would be that I shouldn’t dare to have any curiosity… But to be honest, I’m not entirely uninterested.>

<Really, Maid…?>

Why is he suddenly surprised that I’m curious about who his fiancée will be?

Isn’t that a reasonable question for a typical servant to have? At the very least, it’s about the person who might become the wife of the person you’re serving.

Anyway, since I was actually curious, I gave him an honest answer without any denial.

<Yes. As your exclusive maid, it’s only natural for me to wonder who will become your wife someday.>

<Ah, I see… So that’s the kind of interest you meant…>

<But if you’re rejecting even the engagement letters from the ladies from ducal families, are you perhaps considering someone of a higher status as your romantic partner, Young Master Ethan?>

<…What do you mean by that?>

<It just occurred to me that you might be interested in Princess Seraphine. Although you met her while she was wearing a mask last time, she had tremendous beauty even behind that mask. Perhaps with your status and appearance, you could aim for a serious relationship…>

<That’s not it, Maid! I have no special relationship with Princess Seraphine!>

Even though he said that, he might have feelings for her deep down.

In the first place, Seraphine herself is not just a character who ranked third in the popularity poll among users like Lilith, but she is officially recognized as a beautiful character.

Lilith, who is considered a “quite pretty maid” even by the nobles, has a fundamentally different level of beauty compared to Seraphine.

So when Ethan, who had actually seen Seraphine in person before, responded coldly to my question about whether he was captivated by her, I thought he might be in denial.

<I agree that Princess Seraphine is a beautiful woman, but it’s not because I have feelings for her that I’m not getting a fiancée.>

<Is that so?>

<I’m not getting a fiancée because I have other goals. I hope at least you, Lilith, won’t misunderstand.>

<…I understand. Since you put it that way, Young Master Ethan, I won’t dare to speculate about the reason why you’re not getting a fiancée.>

<Yeah. Thank you, Maid.>

I don’t know what this “other goal” is, but anyway, if he says it’s not Seraphine himself, I can’t argue and say, “That’s not true, is it?”

That was the end of the conversation Ethan and I had about his fiancée two days ago.

Recalling the memory of that day a little, I read through the remaining letters that had arrived for Ethan one by one.

‘Could it be that he’s interested in a genuine marriage rather than an arranged marriage?’

After all, an arranged marriage between nobles can only be described as a meeting involving vested interests.

In fact, even though they were nobles, it was quite common for students attending the academy to have genuine marriages.

The most representative example was Ethan’s father, Harold, and Thanasia, whom I mentioned earlier. If Ethan grows up with a personality similar to his father’s, he might have a fantasy about that kind of relationship.  Sёarᴄh the nôvel_Fire.ηet website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

Just as they say blood doesn’t lie, Ethan might also be harboring a delusion that he can only have true love with a partner he meets through a love marriage, unlike an arranged marriage.

‘Well, it doesn’t really matter to me who Ethan dates or marries.’

…But the status of the family of the one he marries is quite important, so there should be a certain level of prestige. At the very least, she should be the daughter of a count family.

Appearance is also important. Since Ethan is not the type to be inferior to anyone in terms of appearance, his partner should be pretty enough to be worthy of him, right? Even if she’s not a peerless beauty like Natalie or Seraphine, she should at least be on the level of a sub-heroine.

Personality is also quite important. A calculating personality like Lizzy’s felt somewhat unsettling. A high-maintenance personality like Catherine would also be quite tiring if she became his fiancée. It would be perfect if she were as kind and friendly as Isabel.

Well, as long as she meets these minimum criteria, it doesn’t really matter to me who becomes Ethan’s fiancée. It’s not like I’m going to serve him for the rest of my life anyway.

With those thoughts in mind, while sorting through today’s letters one by one, I came across a letter with a particularly strange name.

“Peshinal Viscount Family…?”

What is this awkwardly unfamiliar family name?

My head automatically tilted at the strange surname that didn’t seem to fit in a medieval fantasy world setting.

But on the other hand, it felt somewhat familiar to be a completely unheard-of name.

The fact that I have this feeling means I must have seen a character with this surname at least once in the game.

If it’s an ambiguous name that seems to be a recombination of existing words *1, could it be…

“Ah.”

Right, I remember now. The Peshinal Viscount Family.

No wonder the sound of it felt awkward as soon as I heard it.

That’s because the Peshinal Viscount Family is a fictional family that doesn’t actually exist in this world.