Chapter 121: The Friend on the Balcony

Chapter 121: Chapter 121: The Friend on the Balcony

The winter night wind cut like a knife. The closed balcony doors and the soundproofing matrix completely blocked out the bustling noise behind her back.

Lomita leaned her back against the railing, her aimless gaze dropping to the garden below.

Her mind was still a tangled mess. She didn’t even understand why she cared so much in the first place.

Her initial interest in Jeremy... No, in Sylas, stemmed purely from the fact that his hair color was exactly her type, and his face suited the taste of someone who favored good looks like her. So back when they were studying at the Empire’s Preliminary Academy, when she discovered he was being ganged up on, she began to keep an eye on him.

She was even stupid enough to secretly back him up for a whole year.

But truthfully, she really couldn’t like or understand Sylas’s personality.

Too gloomy, too reticent. Facing bullying, he acted like an outsider watching someone else get beaten, not bothering to value himself in the slightest.

She didn’t particularly want to know the reasons that birthed that personality either.

She inherently wasn’t the kind-hearted type. That initial care was just a passing whim. So after a year of helping and seeing the other party still stuck in his ways, that thin sliver of interest vanished with the wind.

No matter how much his appearance and hair color suited her taste, she didn’t necessarily have to cling to someone with a personality that clashed with hers to be friends.

She originally thought their paths would never cross again after that. But years later, upon stepping foot into St. Aetherwing Magic Academy.

Just because of a tournament for freshmen, she once again paid attention to him.

In the solo match with Amber that day, watching him continuously plunge his blade through the Crown Prince’s flesh, it had been a very long time since she had tasted a thrill that seeped deep into her bones.

Perhaps because the transformation in the other party’s personality brought too great of a surprise.

To the point where by the time she realized it, she had already begun keeping an eye on everything related to him.

The more she interacted with him, the more she admired him. Then the more she liked him.

She thought that besides Linna, who had grown up with her since childhood, she would have another friend.

Yet after a few short months, that friend vanished.

The crux of the matter was, if he was gone, he was gone. In all fairness, they hadn’t known each other for that long, so why did she have to care to this extent?

Lomita was both angry and stifled. Especially that bizarre emotion that kept tangling in her chest refusing to let go, making one restlessly crazy.

"Ah a a a a! So annoying! Jeremy, you liar! I hate you..."

She vented straight into the night. But halfway through the sentence, she suddenly remembered that the name "Jeremy" had returned to its true owner.

But what use was correcting it now...

The longer she stood, the more stifled she felt. Even the winter wind hitting her face seemed tinged with anxiety.

Lomita was just about to find an excuse to return to her mansion and be done with it, when suddenly, a voice carrying a lazy tone rang out.

"Oh, my young mistress, weren’t you just saying you liked me a few days ago? Haven’t seen you for a few days, why have you already switched to hating?"

"Changing your mind so swiftly like this truly breaks a person’s heart."

Lomita froze.

The door behind her was still shut tight.

The voice was as clear as a stream flowing over rocks, completely unfamiliar. But the intonation and manner of speaking were...

She thought of something, braced her hands on the railing, and lowered her eyelids to look down at the first-floor garden.

This balcony belonged to the back side, opposite the banquet hall’s main entrance. Below was a small garden set up separately as a resting area.

Following the direction of the voice, she very quickly spotted a youth lazily leaning against the trunk of a magnolia tree.

When did he leave the banquet hall? It seemed he had just gotten down here.

But what did that sentence just now... mean?

If it were a normal day, having her complaints heard in full like that would definitely make her want to dig a hole and hide. But at this moment, Lomita only wanted to know one thing: whether that sentence meant exactly what she was thinking.

"..."

She stared down for two seconds. Then abruptly braced her hands on the freezing railing and jumped straight down.

She was on the third floor. The garden was on the first floor. And because this was a royal banquet hall, the height of each floor was double that of a normal house.

That action was indeed a bit startling.

Jeremy had originally intended to rush over to catch her, but the distance between the two sides was a bit far. The thought had just kindled when Lomita landed as steadily as a cat; the hem of her skirt only flared out for a beat before falling back down.

"Explain clearly, what did that sentence just now mean?"

Lomita pinned her eyes on every muscle on his face as she strode over: "What do you mean by just a few days ago I said I liked you? Isn’t this the first time the two of us have met?"

Recalling the first impression the other party gave her, Lomita had already vaguely guessed something in her heart, but didn’t dare to finalize it.

"Come here. Sit down and we’ll talk." Jeremy jutted his chin towards a long bench woven from flowering vines nearby.

Perhaps because she wanted to hear the answer so badly, Lomita remained silent for a moment and then obediently sat down.

Jeremy knew full well what she wanted to know.

Actually, the young lady’s gaze back in the banquet hall was so hot it was hard not to notice.

Lomita’s mood was written all over her face. Just a glance at her expression, and Jeremy had already guessed what was running through her head.

He had originally intended to find an opportunity to explain a bit, but as soon as the Emperor announced free movement, she vanished. He had to temporarily shelve it.

Just as he was about to step outside to escape the ridiculous crowd swarming around him, who would have thought Lomita was standing prominently on the third-floor balcony, and the target being name-dropped and cursed was exactly him.

"The answer." Lomita urged.

Jeremy pondered for a moment, then recounted the entire matter of his soul residing in Sylas’s physical body over the past few months. This matter wasn’t public yet, but when it came time to return to the academy to correct his identification data, he would have to declare the truth anyway.

After listening, Lomita remained silent for a very long time before opening her mouth: "...In other words, the person I met in the stands that day was your soul. And the person who has been with me since then has always been you, not Sylas?"

Jeremy nodded: "Correct."

Lomita’s mood became very subtle.

The reality was that after knowing that point, her mood improved significantly.

The interest she had for Jeremy was vastly greater than for Sylas. No — it should even be said that the two were no longer on the same scale to be compared.

Lomita instinctively asked further: "So your younger brother really can’t wake up anymore?"

"No. He will be safe, and he will definitely wake up."

Looking at that reaction, Lomita knew he also cared about Sylas quite a bit.

The Duke and his wife inherently didn’t pay any mind to their youngest son. So what about this eldest son who had suddenly returned...

Recalling the letters she had sent to the Duke’s mansion without ever receiving a single reply, Lomita asked: "...Then how do your parents treat you?"

Jeremy answered truthfully: "Very well."

Lomita hesitated for a moment, ultimately still recounting the events of the past.

But she was too lazy to brag about how much free time she used to have, so she simply summarized that she had sent letters reporting Sylas being bullied, but received no response.

Looking at that awkward demeanor, Jeremy knew the matter didn’t just stop at that level.

Asking carefully, it came out: the timeframe she mentioned perfectly coincided with the period when both the Duke and his wife were absent from the mansion, and all matters within the mansion were in the hands of that wicked butler planted by the Count branch.

If that guy knew Sylas was being bullied, he would be too happy, there was no way he would forward the letters up the chain.

The whole truth came to light.

Lomita also didn’t expect the situation to be so fraught with obstacles.

She muttered: "If I had known, I should have kept an eye on Sylas for a few more years back then. Maybe his circumstances would have been a little different."

But that was merely a hypothetical. She herself understood that with Sylas’s personality, even if she truly did that, things wouldn’t have turned around much.

Jeremy saw through that conflicted look, reaching out to poke the heart-shaped ahoge sticking up on the top of her head: "You already did well enough."

Lomita snatched that hand and brushed it off the top of her head: "Hmph. It was just in passing."

Jeremy smiled, saying nothing.

At that time, everyone knew the fact that the Valmont patriarch Elwyn was severely injured and comatose. In the Empire’s Preliminary Academy, the noble descendants naturally didn’t dare to defy Crown Prince Amber’s orders.

The majority still maintained their bottom line, not having a hand in the bullying games.

But under Amber’s guidance, a segment of descendants from his supporting families took him as the core, ganging up to suppress Sylas to curry favor. The type of person who neither stood by with folded arms, nor participated in the bullying, and even secretly backed him up like Lomita was extremely rare.

Furthermore, judging by the way she superficially summarized the timeline of sending letters, this girl definitely didn’t just help for a month or two, but for much longer than that.

At that time, the Southern region was also submerged in attacks from monsters flooding out of the Wasteland rifts. Managing to do that much was already putting her heart into it.

Lomita asked further: "Then what about the academy side?"

"Still attending school normally. Arrive there, correct the information, and that’s it."

"Then that’s good." Lomita breathed a sigh of relief.

Even though they weren’t in the same department, whenever the academy had a break, they could still gather together.

Otherwise, if he chose to re-enroll next year, then besides the winter and summer breaks, she guessed the chances of bumping into each other wouldn’t be many...