Chapter 25
“Young master, are you all right?”
The servant Laria had pointed out was named Cobb. Cobb hurriedly went to support Evan, but Evan brushed himself off and stood up on his own, looking perfectly fine.
No—just a moment ago, in front of Laria, he had been sagging weakly, completely drained…
So much so that Cobb’s concern felt almost embarrassing. He quickly withdrew his support and folded his hands politely.
Evan casually dusted the dirt off his clothes and fixed his hair. Laria had looked nearly pale with worry, enough that Cobb had even prepared himself to carry Evan on his back and run—only to end up feeling foolish all by himself.
Laria and Evan seemed to be whispering something to each other, but they were too far away for Cobb to hear anything, so he couldn’t quite grasp what was going on.
“I’m fine.”
Evan picked up the wooden practice sword that had been lying on the ground and suddenly addressed Cobb.
“What’s your name?”
“Cobb Johansson, young master.”
“Are you married?”
“No, not yet.”
“Then go. You’re not someone I can ask for advice.”
“Well… I did have someone I dated for a long time. We broke up, though.”
At the word “broke up,” Evan’s brow creased slightly.
Cobb hurried to add,
“Ah—well, I think there’s someone I’ve been getting along with lately.”
“So you’ve met women more than once, then…”
Evan fell silent for a moment, then asked in a cool voice that resembled Kalaudin’s,
“Am I cute?”
Cobb was thrown into a serious inner conflict. It was absolutely clear that Evan was not cute in the slightest, but from long experience, Cobb knew that honesty was not always a virtue.
Before he could stall any longer, Evan spoke quietly.
“Be honest. That’s an order.”
An order, no less…
Cobb answered truly honestly.
“Not at all.”
“Really? That’s what I think too.”
Cobb thought that maybe, with Evan, honesty actually was a virtue. A master with such strong self-awareness didn’t require polite lies.
“There’s really nothing cute about me?”
“Yes. To be blunt, young master, you give off more of a… somewhat mean impression than a cute one.”
“…You’re very honest.”
Evan rolled his eyes once, then asked again,
“Then why would someone call a person cute when they aren’t cute at all?”
“Well… I don’t really use that word much…”
“I’m especially curious what it means when a woman says it to a man.”
With the loyalty he’d just developed, Cobb—who looked more like a mountain bandit than a romantic advisor—recalled the time his ex had called him “cute.”
Once, when he’d worn something strange, his very kind former girlfriend had said,
“That’s… kind of cute, I guess…”
“Well, if that woman is a kind person…”
“She’s very kind.”
That was beyond doubt. Normally, only someone kind would laugh at Kalaudin’s ridiculous jokes. At Evan’s firm statement, Cobb answered quickly.
“I think it’s something you say when you need to say something nice, but there’s nothing in particular you can genuinely compliment.”
“…Ah.”
Ever since he was born, Evan had lived surrounded by people grieving over Matilda.
Kalaudin had said he was angry because he’d been pushed around by his subordinates, not because of Rudva’s words themselves. He had even said, “selling Matilda.” At the core of that overwhelming anger was not Evan, but Matilda.
So Evan had never thought Rudva was entirely wrong. That was why Kalaudin had sent him to the academy.
Since childhood, Evan had believed that if Kalaudin said he had become a completely different person after Matilda’s death, then he should follow him unconditionally.
So even when he was married off at thirteen to a girl he’d never seen before—without being asked for his opinion—he accepted it without complaint.
It had been a marriage with absolutely no expectations…
And yet, strangely, whenever he looked into Laria’s violet eyes, he felt like an ordinary boy. He began to want things, to like things. For example, he liked it when she cuddled into him half-asleep, and he liked the way she held him earlier when he collapsed.
At first, he’d simply wanted to respond to her wish to get along. To his eyes, Laria was bright like sunshine, cheerful, and even lucky.
‘That must be why the horse she picked without thinking won first place at the racetrack.’
He, on the other hand, had brought misfortune to this ducal household from the moment he was born. Some of the cruel things he’d said had been because Rudva insisted he shouldn’t get close to her for Kalaudin’s sake.
But part of it was also because he believed that someone like him could never match an angelic child like Laria.
Yet in this moment, Evan realized something.
The first person who had held him and warmly told him, “This isn’t your fault,” when he was at his lowest.
The person who embraced him and said it was okay, no matter how badly he pushed her away.
The only person in this ducal household who stood on his side.
And perhaps… the person who saw him not as Matilda’s shadow, but simply as Evan Linier Icard himself.
Trying to push her away had been foolish.
If Laria had grown distant because of his behavior, then he would try harder. If that meant doing something unforgivable in Kalaudin’s eyes, as Rudva claimed, then he would do it. Even if she was sunshine, and he was someone sunk in the mud…
Rudva was wrong. He would go back to the beginning—for the first time. Back to when he first saw her and thought they should get along.
Evan’s red eyes flashed.
“Cobb.”
“Yes, sir.”
“What do men usually do when there’s a woman they want to get along with?”
His resolve to follow all of Kalaudin’s wishes remained unchanged. But before all of that, Laria came first.
Because even when he was clearly at fault, she had said that couples were supposed to be okay.
Once he made that decision, impatience crept in—for the first time, he realized he had hurt someone precious.
Seeing the serious expression on the thirteen-year-old young master’s face, Cobb tilted his head slightly. Thirteen… wasn’t that still too young to awaken to romance? He wasn’t sure where or how to even begin explaining.
“Explain it quickly.”
“Well, first, you have to take good care of yourself.”
Evan nodded solemnly.
“You need to look attractive to her.”
“I see.”
“And then, little by little, you get closer. Eat meals together, things like that.”
“Hm.”
“When your feelings deepen, you get married. Then you live together in the same house, share a bed, and live happily.”
“Mmm.”
“And then you have children and all that.”
Evan realized anew just how far his relationship with Laria was from normal. They were already married. They already ate together and lived in the same house.
‘Having children is something you should do after becoming an adult.’
In the end, if he removed everything he’d already accomplished from Cobb’s advice, the only thing left was “self-care.”
But then…
“Because you’re cute.”
According to Laria’s short answer…
“It’s something you say when you need to say something nice, but there’s nothing else to compliment.”
To her, he was a husband with “nothing in particular to praise.”
He’d expected it, but it still drained him. He had ignored her tears when she cried alone at night, snapped irritably at heartfelt gifts, and treated her carelessly—karmic debts piled high. And now, on top of that, he was an unattractive man. Like this, there was no way Laria would want to get along with him.
“How stupid do you have to be to listen to all that nonsense?”
Kalaudin had openly called him stupid in front of her…
“Wouldn’t it be better if you tried harder in your own way?”
She must have thought he wasn’t even trying to live properly.
That stung. At the academy, other students whispered behind his back,
“Look at him, never playing, just studying all the time. Isn’t that kind of creepy?”
Yet in front of Laria, he felt like he’d become a pathetic kid who only lazed around.
“Why did you just stand there and get hit like an idiot… You said you were good at swordsmanship.”
He claimed to like swords, yet what he showed her was himself being beaten one-sidedly by Rudva. In truth, the difference in size and weapons had been too great—he was genuinely good with a sword…
For now, he had to recover the image that had plummeted because of this incident.
“Cobb.”
“Yes?”
“There’s something you need to do.”
Evan lowered his voice and gave Cobb an instruction.
Cobb listened with wide eyes, then nodded vigorously, as if he understood.
