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Brought to you by Valir Scans! To support our team and enjoy ‌‌‌the latest releases, please read directly on our official site: valirscans.org
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Chapter 28
It must have been several months before her sixteenth birthday.
Anxious about becoming an adult in the coming months, she pestered ‌‌‌‌him more than usual, ‌‌‌‌demanding that he help her ‌‌‌‌‌select clothes and accessories. It was a pitiful attempt to draw his attention.
Barcas, who would normally have ignored such requests, seemed to have ‌‌‌‌grown weary of her relentless nagging and ‌‌‌‌began offering his opinions readily enough.
Perhaps he had ‌‌‌grown ‌lenient, thinking that in a few months she would be free of him. How ‌‌‌infuriatingly smug he was. And yet, if only I could keep Barcas bound to me, I felt capable of anything. The desperation was overwhelming.
Because an ending that had seemed impossibly distant was finally drawing near.
"What do ‌‌‌you think of this dress for my coming-of-age ceremony?"
She slipped into an elaborate silk dress procured from The South and thrust her upper body forward before him with deliberate ostentation.
Barcas, as always, merely cast a dispassionate glance her way. Under that composed gaze, her face grew increasingly warm.
He was now advancing from nineteen toward twenty, and ‌‌his body, having shed its boyish frame, had hardened into a display of masculine beauty. Had ‌‌it not been for those lifeless, ‌emotionless eyes, he would have appeared as an angel descended from heaven. ‌‌‌‌
Talia deliberately raised her ‌‌voice to hide her trembling heart, foolish as she felt.
"I'm asking what you think!"
"...It looks as though a child has stolen an adult's clothing."
At last, his firmly pressed lips parted.
She narrowed ‌‌her eyes. The man added another comment as though annoyed.
"It's terribly unflattering."
Her face flushed crimson as she ‌‌‌glared at him. But since she was the one who had solicited his opinion, she could hardly argue back.
With eyes blazing with indignation, Talia ‌‌‌‌‌stomped her ‌feet and retreated behind the changing ‌‌screen. She began rummaging furiously through the mountain of garments piled there. She was determined to make that corpse-like man blush.
After some time, she selected a far ‌‌‌‌‌bolder dress—one with a ‌‌neckline so daringly low it was nearly scandalous. Talia hesitated, wondering if she had gone too far, but she quickly steeled her resolve and hastily pulled the dress on. Looking into the mirror, a breathtakingly beautiful girl gazed back at her.
She examined her reflection with satisfaction, turning this way and that. The spindly frame, as thin as a birch tree, had begun to transform starting at ‌‌‌age fourteen. Her once-flat chest had ‌budded softly before swelling to the size of apples, and her previously unremarkable hips had begun to gain subtle curves.
Talia felt quite proud of her transformation. The thought that she was approaching the flawless beauty possessed by Senebier filled her with boundless elation. Once Barcas understood what she had to offer, he would reconsider. She would soon become the most beautiful woman in the world.
Buoyed ‌by hope, she burst out from behind the screen.
"How about this one?"
Barcas, who had been gazing out the window with an expression of ennui, turned his head toward ‌‌her. For the first time, something resembling emotion appeared on his ‌‌‌‌face. However, it was hardly a positive emotion.
Furrowing his brow as he surveyed her, Barcas spoke rather sharply.
"The very first dress."
He ‌drew a deep breath and added flatly.
"Wear that one."
There was no trace of the admiration or agitation she had hoped for in his arid tone. Yet the mere fact that he remembered the very first dress among the dozens she had shown him made Talia's heart feel as though it might burst.
She ‌‌‌offered him a deliberately suggestive smile.
"What's this? Pretending to be indifferent, but you were watching closely the whole ‌‌‌time, weren't you?"
He made no response whatsoever. Whatever the case, he clearly just wanted this tedious fashion show to end.
A flash of petulance rose in her, but Talia decided to be magnanimous about it. Even if she ‌‌‌‌couldn't change his attitude immediately, hadn't she resolved to show him a gradually transformed version of herself?
Humming to herself, Talia retrieved the first dress ‌‌‌she had worn.
It was a delicate and elegant velvet surcoat densely embroidered with fairy-folk needlework. This dress would never leave her wardrobe ‌‌‌‌again. After all, it had caught Barcas's eye.
She quickly changed ‌back into it and twirled before him with deliberate flair. ‌‌
"This one, right?"
He gazed at her steadily. He seemed utterly unbothered by how the woman who had been irritable all day was suddenly giggling like someone intoxicated. Perhaps it made no ‌‌‌difference to him whether she rampaged like a monster or giggled like a madwoman.
Yet Talia wanted to believe that his demeanor toward her had changed.
And indeed, it had—those once-indifferent eyes had begun, at some point, to ‌‌‌linger long upon her face. And that was not all. Even the tone of his voice toward her seemed to have grown softer.
Talia's keen senses detected that subtle shift in him, and she felt a fragile ‌‌‌‌thread of hope stirring within her chest.
Could it be that Barcas also found parting with her regrettable? After spending such a long time together, perhaps even he had grown fond of her. Talia clung to that futile hope with aching desperation.
"If ‌‌‌I dance in this dress, won't I look just like a fairy queen?"
At her question, a ‌‌‌‌faint crease appeared between his ‌‌‌‌‌brows.
Was he exasperated by her endless questions? No—perhaps he was actually considering how to answer her. She chose to interpret it in the most favorable ‌‌‌‌‌light.
"Stop standing there like a statue and rehearse with me."
Before he could respond, Talia seized his arm and pulled him forward with surprising strength. The man who would have remained unmoved in the past allowed himself to be drawn along, feigning reluctance.
There, you see. Talia felt a surge of triumph. Something really has changed about him.
She pulled him more forcefully, noting his stiff resistance, and began to twirl. But her foot caught on a trunk sitting on the floor, and she lost ‌‌‌her balance. Instinctively, Talia grabbed his arm.
Barcas uttered something unintelligible and quickly wrapped his arm around her waist.
But the room was in such disarray that there was nowhere safe to step. Clothes piled haphazardly tangled around his ankles, and they both tumbled ‌‌‌together onto the carpet. Talia let out a small curse.
"You should have cleaned this room properly!"
Barcas, who had come to her aid only to suffer for it, raised one eyebrow. He was a knight-protector, not a servant. He could not be expected to perform such menial tasks as tidying. Yet despite knowing this perfectly well, Talia lashed out irritably.
"If I have a bruise on my backside, you'll answer for it. Some guard you turned out to be!"
As she grumbled and tried to push herself up, a sharp pain shot through her scalp. Talia glared at him in disbelief.
"Did you just pull my hair?"
A brief sigh escaped his lips.
"Your hair appears to ‌‌be caught on my sleeve button."
He then carefully drew the arm he had wrapped around her back slightly forward ‌‌‌‌to show her.
As pain pricked her scalp again, Talia cried out and struck his chest.
"It hurts, ‌‌‌you fool!"
He fell still, gazing down at her eyes, which glistened with unshed tears. Though her heart ached, Talia fixed him with a glare.
Barcas released another quiet sigh before wrapping his arm around her back once more. Then he began moving his hand carefully, as if attempting to untangle her caught hair.
Talia sat between his knees, her eyes darting nervously. Only now did she become aware of their ‌improper proximity and position.
The ‌‌‌‌‌faint scent of soap and mint emanating from him made her heart race so fiercely she ‌feared he could hear it.

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Brought to you by Valir Scans! ‍‌‌‌To support our team and enjoy the latest releases, please read directly on our official site: valirscans.org ‌
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