in the suffocating silence, seira closed her eyes and opened them slowly.

    her gaze, which seemed to have drawn a lot of attention, turned to a particular place. it was where zion, aven, and baron, who made the biggest contributions in the subjugation war, stood.

    baron looked unfazed, as if he had heard of it from aven in advance. but his eyes were terrifying, to say the least. maybe they were mistaken as demons.

    seira walked slowly with louis. their place was closest to the podium where the throne was also situated.

    along the way, each of them left their seats. no one spoke or greeted first. there were only a select few gathered today who had such courage.

    when they finally reached their place, baron opened his mouth, “i never expected you to attend the banquet.”

    as if he had no intention of exchanging greetings with louis, baron only looked at seira. louis didn’t bother to greet him either. he just looked down at seira, with her hand gently overlapping around his arm.

    after greeting a wide-eyed zion, and aven who stood next to her, it was only then that baron’s eyes met seira’s.

    “yes, i didn’t expect it either. it wasn’t planned until a few days ago,” she replied nonchalantly.

    “if i had known in advance, i would have presented myself as your partner first,” baron whispered.

    it was not an exaggeration to say that everyone in the hall was paying attention to their side, but there was no hesitation in baron’s words. he acted as if seira and him were the only people inside the room.

    “well,” she tilted her head to the left and said with a smile. “would it be possible? our commander-in-chief is… he’s an amazing person.”

    “seira…”

    baron’s brow scrunched when he realized what she meant. but they couldn’t continue their conversation. as soon as he tried to open his mouth again, the inner door leading to the platform opened wide from both sides.

    “his majesty has arrived, be polite!”

    the hall became completely calm with the loud cries of the bellows. seira took her hand off of louis’ arm and straightened his posture, and then turned towards the podium like everyone else and lowered her eyes.

    around a hundred people were gathered, but not a single breath was heard. all seira could hear was the sound of calrad’s footsteps across the platform. entering the banquet hall much earlier than the scheduled time, his steps weren’t relaxed.

    “raise your head.”

    the place where calrad stopped was at the end of the platform, not in front of the throne. it was only five steps away from the dukes baron and louis, and the duchess seira.

    “…”

    even after she straightened her back, seira didn’t look at calrad. she pretended not to notice his gaze for a long time.

    in the end, calrad had to give up first. seira glanced at her ex-fiance’s expression only after his head had turned. the anger on his face, as cold as that of baron’s earlier, made seira’s back tingle. it was more fun now because he was scared of something.

    “baron.”

    “yes, your majesty.”

    at calrad’s call, baron immediately stepped forward.

    prior to the banquet’s scheduled start, the prize according to the major was given first. on behalf of kalrad, commander-in-chief baron released a list of awardees and their corresponding rewards.

    not a single soul was dissatisfied with the announcement as it was already coordinated around five days prior to the banquet. most of the items awarded were prize money, but sometimes they asked for something special like in the case of zion.

    ‘fifty beast hearts?’

    it was said that zion originally was offered a title, but he refused and demanded 50 mid-level beast hearts instead. seira shook her head – wizards are sometimes so hard to understand.

    as usual, aven opted for a reward this time, and as promised, seira was exempted from three years’ tax on the askan estate.

    she had to admit that she was a little worried that calrad might break his promise or shorten the deadline because of the last incident, but it was fortunate that he didn’t go down to that.

    at the end of baron’s announcement, calrad resumed speaking.

    “today’s main characters are you, as this banquet is held to praise your achievements while defeating the enemies who threatened the safety of the empire. enjoy the fruits of your labor to the fullest extent, to the point that you’d forget everything else.

    unlike baron’s heavy and low voice, which seemed to be ringing in a cave, calrad’s slow voice, sweet and overwhelming, resonated to the end of the hall, signaling the banquet’s beginning.

    “thank you, your majesty.”

    as commander-in-chief, baron thanked calrad on everyone’s behalf and nodded in response.

    with the go signal, the chamber orchestra began to play. it would have been usually played from dance songs to boost the crowd’s excitement, but there was a melody that suited for conversations more.

    the nobles left their seats and looked at seira’s side, pretending to disperse to their respective places. it was only natural. no topic in viseltium’s social circle in recent years has been more interesting.