Chapter 13

༺ The First Letter (13) ༻

My dejected gaze turned to Seria.

The once proud and strong-looking girl was now bowing her head while holding a pouch filled with gold coins.

It was a scene that could lead to the misunderstanding that a mean senior was extorting from a weak junior, especially since Seria’s body that was trembling evoked an immense sense of pity.

That meant she was nervous. Maybe her fear of me hadn’t faded yet.

Judging from the size of the pouch, there are at least 200 gold coins inside.

One imperial gold coin is worth about the monthly living cost for a family of four. If the value were to ever soar or plummet beyond that, the Empire would step in and adjust the price.

So it meant that in that pouch there was enough money for both Emma and her herbalist father to live for more than 33 years.

Even though I was noble, a low-ranking aristocrat like me was burdened to spend even a dozen of gold coins. However, if the amount of at least 200 gold coins was called ‘a small gift’, even if she was a young lady, it truly showed that at the end of the day, she was still a daughter of the Yurdina family.

The question was, what on earth did I do to deserve such a large sum of money?

But I can’t give back such a response to the woman, who was trembling while keeping her eyes tightly shut, so I said in a slightly mellow tone.

“Hey, Seria? What do you mean by ‘gift’?”

“…… Ah, ah!”

Seria raised her head again in surprise as if she had just realized that she forgot to finish speaking.

Both of our eyes met. Those sapphire eyes glowed, the moment they met my gaze, soon they gently shifted to the floor.

I used to think that it was because she looked down on others, but looking at her reaction now, it didn’t seem to be the case.

On the contrary, isn’t she too nervous when socializing with other people? I then spoke in a soothing tone so that she wouldn’t bite her tongue again.

“You can speak slowly. I won’t go anywhere anyway.”