Chapter 31

Yvette, having recalled the same fact, cautiously opened her mouth.

She too knew of the Averon tragedy.

There was no way she could not know. It was an event that held considerable weight in the original work.

“There’s no way my clothes would fit you.”

Noel let out a soft laugh and turned his gaze to Yvette.

“Rather than me, why don’t you look after your own body? Don’t collapse like last time.”

“……You don’t have to tell me. I take perfectly good care of my own body.”

Yvette lightly shot Noel a look and muttered.

How long did they walk like that?

At last, just as the two were about to enter the party hall, someone hurriedly blocked their path.

“Um, excuse me for a moment!”

‘……A student?’

Her surprise at the sudden appearance was brief.

Yvette widened her eyes and studied the other party.

Two students in academy uniforms came into view.

One was a female student with silver bobbed hair that reached her chin and black eyes, and the other was a male student with dull blond hair and violet eyes.

Perhaps they had just run over, for both were panting heavily.

“I’m truly sorry for speaking to you so suddenly. But I felt that if not now, I wouldn’t have another chance.”

The silver-haired female student bit her lip hard and then let go as she spoke.

Seeing her restlessness, she seemed quite intimidated.

“……You’re the daughter of the Theron marchioness, aren’t you.”

That was when Noel spoke indifferently.

Unlike the flustered Yvette, his face suggested he was quite used to situations like this.

‘The Theron marchioness’s daughter?’

Yvette widened her eyes and studied the female student before her.

Now that she looked again after hearing that, there were indeed many features that resembled the Theron marchioness.

“Yes, that’s right! I am Chapelle Theron. It is an honor to meet the two most famous people in the empire.”

The female student, who introduced herself as Chapelle, smiled brightly and nodded.

The dimples that faintly appeared on her cheeks whenever she smiled were quite charming.

“Nice to meet you, Lady Theron.”

Yvette, greeting her belatedly, smiled awkwardly.

Come to think of it, she remembered hearing about this from the Theron marchioness.

‘I think she said she was a fan of mine.’

More precisely, she would be a fan of the real Yvette Blanche.

‘If she has fans, it seems the past Yvette really was famous.’

Yvette knew nothing about Yvette Blanche’s past.

Even the fact that she was a Luhen graduate had only been learned through someone else’s mouth.

‘I hope she’s not disappointed in me.’

She was a little worried, but fortunately, Chapelle did not seem to find anything strange about her.

“You’re many years my senior, so please speak comfortably. And if possible, rather than Lady Theron, I’d be happier if you just called me Chapelle.”

As Chapelle beamed and spoke, the male student standing beside her scoffed.

Unlike the excited Chapelle, his face held a strange air of dissatisfaction.

“She won’t even let other people call her by her name to save their lives, but in front of her idol she’s putting on airs.”

When he spoke sarcastically, Chapelle drove her elbow with all her might into his side.

“Terry, don’t say useless things in front of the Countess.”

“What. It’s not like I said anything wrong.”

“Be quiet. Say one more word and I’ll sew that mouth shut.”

Yvette watched the two bicker with rather heated words and blinked slowly.

She was debating whether to step in or not when—

“……What. Why are you all here?”

“Why else? We came to greet them too!”

“That’s right. It’s not fair if only Chapelle gets to greet them.”

A group of students, who had approached before she knew it, surrounded Yvette and Noel.

It seemed they had been waiting for a chance to approach all along, and had gained courage upon seeing Chapelle.

“Hello, Duke! I’m Anna Lerorian. I’ve heard so much about you from my parents.”

“Me too, Duke! You have no idea how excited I was when I heard you were coming to the reunion today!”

Most of the students who approached them were young girls who looked to be in their early to mid-teens.

Perhaps because of that, they clustered especially around Noel.

Noel stared expressionlessly at the female students surrounding him.

His gaze was so cold that Yvette, watching from beside him, felt embarrassed.

“But who is the person next to you? I don’t think I’ve seen her face before.”

The female student who had introduced herself as Anna Lerorian gestured with her eyes toward Yvette.

At that, the other female students murmured in small voices.

“That person is the Duke’s fiancée. She was in the newspaper last time.”

“Ah, right. I heard she was coming too.”

“I was surprised when the Duke got engaged. But don’t they suit each other better than I thought?”

“Well, I’m not so sure.”

Girls. I can hear everything you’re saying.

Yvette looked at the female students with narrowed eyes.

‘This is another scene I’ve seen plenty of times in novels.’

She had thought a situation like this might happen at least once, but she never imagined the other parties would be young female students.

‘Well, I can roughly understand how they feel.’

They were not trying to harm her, so she decided to let it slide with a generous heart.

But the situation unfolded differently from her expectations.

“Do you even know what kind of person Countess Blanche is to be saying things like that?”

Chapelle, who had been quietly watching her classmates murmur, spoke up.

At that, the female students could not easily answer and exchanged glances among themselves.

Chapelle clicked her tongue as if she had expected this and continued confidently.

“Countess Blanche is practically a legend in our department. She was top of her class three years in a row, and in a department where repeating a year is commonplace, she graduated as the youngest in the entire academy!”

……Wait a minute. This is the first I’m hearing about this too.

Yvette, who had suddenly learned of her own past, looked at Chapelle in bewilderment.

‘Top of her class three years in a row, and graduated as the youngest?’

For an extra with no page time, isn’t this setting a bit excessive?

* * *

Inside the carriage heading for Witley.

Yvette stared out the window with her fists clenched.

Her mind was a mess with the facts she had newly learned today.

‘I was quite an impressive person, it seems.’

Until now, she had lived without paying much attention to the past.

Because not knowing the past did not particularly interfere with daily life.

But now it seemed she could not remain so carelessly at ease.

‘Earlier, I almost asked if that was really true.’

The moment she asked such a question, everyone around her would have found it strange.

Because it made no sense for a person not to remember their own past.

‘Thank goodness no one noticed.’

Starting with Chapelle’s sudden outburst, the female students had quietly dispersed.

Most of them seemed more fed up with Chapelle’s fervent fandom than interested in Yvette’s past.

Thanks to that, Yvette was able to return to the party hall with Noel without any particular commotion.

‘……Anyway, I was so flustered I forgot to ask which department.’

Chapelle had only said Yvette was a legend in ‘her department’—she had not mentioned the exact name.

Because of that, Yvette still did not know which department she had graduated from.

‘It’s probably not the magic department…… so what’s left is swordsmanship and the general department.’

If she had been in the swordsmanship department, her muscles should be far more developed than they were now.

‘Which means it’s highly likely it was the general department.’