Chapter Three Hundred and Five: New Year’s Festival
“…Yes. It’s as though every part of you has been dyed in my colors. It stirs something tender in me.”
Julius, who had come to the waiting room to escort Karen, smiled with softened eyes.
It had been a few days since their return from the hunting festival. Tonight was the New Year’s Festival.
To attend the festival, Karen wore a golden dress—a gift from Julius. She had not the slightest intention of hiding their relationship anymore.
Though golden, the dress had an elegant, restrained hue that avoided any hint of vulgarity. The neckline was veiled in gold-thread lace, while the back dipped in a deep open cut. The manor had magical tools installed throughout to keep it warm, so there was no chill to worry about.
“Oh? That necklace…”
“The earrings too—you gave them to me before, Julius!”
Karen turned to show him her ears. She wore the earrings over her existing piercing. The jewelry she had chosen to pair with the golden gown was the matched set of gems in the color of Julius’s eyes—the very set he had given her as a token of thanks on the day of the party celebrating Sieg’s recovery.
“Back when you gave these to me, you probably didn’t like me yet… but they’re something special to me, so I wanted to wear them.”
Julius had also prepared many other pieces of jewelry to match the dress, allowing her to choose according to her mood. But Karen had decided from the very start that she would wear this set, and had brought it with her for that reason.
“Is that so?”
“Hm? What do you mean?”
“About when I first began to like you.”
“Back then, you told me plainly that you didn’t like me that way.”
Karen smiled wryly. There had been a time when Julius had asked her to marry him… said that he hoped she would accept. It had been entirely for the sake of demonstrating that the Ehlertt Earldom and Julius stood behind her as her backing. Karen had almost convinced herself that he loved her, only to ask him directly and end up humiliating herself. The memory was too bitter to ever forget.
Julius watched her wry smile with a soft look in his eyes.
“Back then—and even long before that—I made a habit of ignoring my own feelings, so I was remarkably unaware of them. I simply didn’t understand what I was feeling. In truth, I think I had been drawn to you for quite some time before that.”
“What… wait, really!?”
Karen’s eyes grew wider and wider as Julius looked down at her with quiet amusement.
“I wonder when it was, exactly, that I fell for you.”
“I need to know! When was it!?”
Julius gazed down at her as she pressed him, clearly entertained, and deflected with one of his beautiful smiles. But Karen was no longer the sort to be put off by a single charming smile. Just as she was about to press him further, Sieg poked his head into the waiting room.
“You two, stop flirting and come along, it’s nearly time.”
“Yeees.”
Karen took hold of Julius’s arm and linked hers through it, grinning a giddy, lopsided smile. Sieg looked at her, then glanced up at Julius, and murmured quietly.
“…Uncle Julius, you look very happy.”
“Do I?”
Karen spun to look at Julius—but his expression was the same gentle smile as always. Sieg gave a small laugh at her puzzled face.
“Uncle Julius always looks like that around you, Sister Karen, so you probably can’t tell the difference.”
“What—really? Since when? Since when has he!?”
Julius tightened the arm she had linked with his, keeping her from making a dash toward Sieg.
“Shall we go, Karen?”
The New Year’s Festival was ahead of them, and they were running short on time. Reluctantly giving up the interrogation, Karen looked up at Julius as he escorted her and narrowed her eyes thoughtfully.
“…I want you to wear something in my eye color—that pale blue—and yet a black tailcoat suits you so perfectly that I can’t bear to part with it.”
“You do love a black tailcoat, Karen.”
“So you noticed, then?”
“Quite obviously so. That’s why I enjoy wearing this.”
Karen very nearly melted on the spot, then caught herself and asked. Julius must have his own preferences, after all.
“What do you like me to wear, Julius?”
“Your alchemist’s robes, I think. They seem the most like you, and somehow you look all the more beautiful in them.”
Silently offering her praises to Natalia for having gifted her those robes, Karen suddenly realized something.
“I think I’d vaguely known that for a while.”
“So you noticed.”
She looked up at Julius as he gave a quiet laugh, and recalled something from the past.
There was a time when Karen had been so embarrassed around Julius that she could hardly stand being near him. Her feelings, her ulterior motives, had been plain to see, and she had even felt as though she owed him an apology for being near him.
But when she stood as an alchemist, that crushing embarrassment hadn’t come over her nearly as much. Perhaps it was because Julius’s gaze when he looked at Karen the alchemist had always been warm—almost dazzled—and she had felt genuine respect in it.
She had attributed that to the fact that she had demonstrated her power as an alchemist—but had that really been all it was?
Karen decided not to ask him about it at that moment. Julius’s expression had grown tense upon their arrival at the antechamber where Helfried was waiting.
At the hunting festival, apparently, Julius and Helfried had had some kind of confrontation. Helfried was staring fixedly at Julius with a sour look on his face—to Karen’s eye, just his usual slightly intimidating expression, nothing out of the ordinary.
But drawn in by Julius’s air of tension, Karen swallowed nervously and pressed herself close to his side.
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