The day before she was due to leave for Oclama, Eleanor finished every errand she had outside the estate and stayed home for the entire day.
She needed to conserve her energy before departing the next morning, and she also wanted to make one final check to make sure she had forgotten nothing.
After carefully packing the gifts she intended to give her aunt, Eleanor stretched leisurely. Everything was ready. In just a little while, she would leave the estate with Lisa and two escort knights.
The thought of traveling alone without Lydia filled her with excitement. It felt as though she was finally stepping outside the heroine’s orbit and becoming independent for the first time.
Eleanor sprawled across the sofa, nearly lying down altogether. She had already organized the clothes she would wear tomorrow and sent Lisa away to finish packing the luggage, leaving her alone in the room.
For once, life felt peaceful.
Tapping the back of her hand lightly, she hummed to herself.
She hoped the peace would last a long while.
Unfortunately, it shattered the moment someone knocked on the door.
“Big sis, it’s me!”
Eleanor, who had been about to get up and open it, froze.
For some reason, the cheerful voice from outside filled her with unease.
Strange. She can’t possibly be here to beg me not to go or insist on coming with me this late… so why do I feel nervous?
Ignoring the warning bells ringing in her instincts, Eleanor opened the door. After all, she was not the kind of older sister who ignored the heroine’s visits.
“Big sis!”
Lydia beamed brightly.
Her glossy hair fell naturally over her shoulders, and she wore a dress with puffed sleeves and flowers decorating the bodice. The gloomy expression she had worn for the past few days ever since hearing about Eleanor’s trip to Oclama was finally gone.
“What is it, Lydia?”
“Hehe, you’re leaving for Oclama tomorrow, right? Let’s spend time together today!”
Lydia bounced like a rabbit as she linked arms with her.
Her rosy cheeks and affection-filled eyes were as lovable as ever.
Eleanor smiled. Her younger sister was adorable when she leaned against her and acted spoiled like this. Besides, she had nothing else left to do today. It wouldn’t hurt to play the role of the loving older sister until she left tomorrow.
“Alright. Sounds good.”
“Yay! This is exciting!”
The moment Eleanor agreed, Lydia practically jumped with joy and tugged her outside.
Matching her sister’s energetic pace, Eleanor began to wonder what exactly they were planning to do.
“But what are we doing?”
“We’re having a party with my friends! Since you’re leaving for Oclama tomorrow, we’re throwing a farewell party so everyone can wish you a safe trip.”
“…Ah.”
A party. With her friends.
The corners of Eleanor’s lips slowly sank.
Her steps faltered slightly.
Lydia had many acquaintances, but the people she truly called “friends” were very specific.
Four men who hovered constantly around her under the title of friendship.
It would be Eleanor’s first time seeing them since Edward confessed to Lydia.
The memory of their condemning voices and accusing eyes resurfaced vividly in her mind, making Eleanor frown.
Completely caught up in her excitement, Lydia failed to notice the subtle change in her sister’s expression.
“…Lydia, don’t you think it’d be a little awkward for me to join when it’s your friends hanging out together?”
“Hm? Not at all! You know all of them too. And everyone said they’d love it if you joined us!”
Of course they did. Those men would probably say yes even if you invited a dung beetle.
Unable to refuse Lydia outright, Eleanor pictured the half-frozen smiles the men must have worn while reluctantly agreeing, and pressed a hand to her forehead.
She hated pretending to get along while sitting at the same table with people who clearly didn’t want her there.
Especially those male leads.
Even brief greetings with them were exhausting enough.
Still… if the others were there, then Leopold would likely be there too. One way or another, she would eventually have to greet him.
Maybe it would actually be easier to sit with them briefly and then pretend to feel ill before excusing herself upstairs.
And besides—
Rejecting her younger sister’s eager hand coldly was not something an older sister should do.
So Eleanor endured it, telling herself she would be leaving for Oclama tomorrow morning anyway.
“Ah, there they are! Everyone, we’re here!”
Lydia pointed ahead and waved enthusiastically.
Eleanor looked forward with a thoroughly reluctant expression.
As expected, four men sat around an outdoor table in the Stikoff estate’s famous hydrangea garden.
Would it kill fate to bring different people for once?
The sight of the four male leads seated together like figures in a painting immediately gave her a headache.
Keeping pace with Lydia, Eleanor approached them.
“Eleanor Stikoff greets Your Imperial Highness.”
As always, the Crown Prince was the first person she greeted.
Leopold merely inclined his head indifferently. There was a faint shadow around his eyes, and perhaps because he was looking at Eleanor, he didn’t seem to be in particularly good spirits.
“Big sis, sit here!”
Noticing there was only one empty chair, Lydia immediately offered up her own seat.
It was not a welcome kindness from Eleanor’s perspective.
Anyone could tell Lydia had just vacated that chair, which meant Eleanor was effectively stealing the heroine’s place.
“It’s alright. I can wait until another chair is brought.”
“No! Your legs will hurt if you stand. Annie, could you bring another chair?”
Ignoring Eleanor’s refusal, Lydia firmly pushed her into the seat and instructed a maid to fetch another chair.
While Annie went off to retrieve it, Lydia stood behind Eleanor with her hands resting on her shoulders. A sweet fruity scent drifted from her younger sister.
“Since Big Sis is leaving for Oclama tomorrow, everyone thought they’d miss you, so we decided to throw this party. Let’s have lots of fun so it won’t feel sad while we’re apart!”
Lydia clapped brightly.
Looking at the utterly uninterested faces around the table, Eleanor felt embarrassed on everyone’s behalf.
These were people who would forget her existence the moment they turned around, even if she disappeared to the moon itself.
And yet here she was, sitting among them merely because she was the older sister of the girl they adored.
This reminds me of my childhood birthday parties.
Back then, Eleanor had no friends of her own, so Lydia’s friends—despite being two years younger—had been invited instead.
The seats had all been filled perfectly.
But the true center of the party had always become Lydia.
Eleanor, the actual birthday girl, would sit quietly eating cake alone while watching Lydia and her friends laugh together.
This situation felt painfully similar.
It was supposedly a party for Eleanor, yet everyone present were Lydia’s friends—people who liked Lydia.
Instead of feeling celebrated, Eleanor only felt isolated and pressured.
Worse still, this entire gathering existed solely because Lydia wanted it. Eleanor herself had never asked for it.
Yet the resentment of the four unwillingly gathered men would inevitably be directed at Eleanor.
And if Lydia were to leave even briefly…
Just imagining it was horrifying.
“I’ll go to the kitchen and ask them to make your favorite strawberry whipped cream cake!”
That declaration was somehow even more terrifying than the end of the world.
Eleanor hurriedly grabbed Lydia’s wrist.
Lydia blinked at her with wide eyes.
“Wait, Liddy. You can just ask a maid to do that.”
“No! I’ll go myself!”
Why is she being so stubborn today?
Suppressing the urge to cry, Eleanor forced a gentle smile onto her face.
“No, really, let’s have a maid do it. You’ll tire yourself out running back and forth. Or I could go myself—”
“But it’s a cake for you, Big Sis. I want to personally watch them make it! So I’ll go quickly and come right back!”
Lydia gently pushed Eleanor’s hand away with her small palm.
“Talk with everyone for a bit while I’m gone. I’ll be right back!”
With that, Lydia cheerfully spun around and dashed away.
Even the sight of her running was puppy-like and adorable.
But as Eleanor watched her retreating figure disappear around the corner, it felt unbearably cruel.
Only after Lydia vanished completely did Eleanor reluctantly turn back.
Now left alone with the four men who adored her sister, she smiled awkwardly with her lips sealed tight.
A maid placed a teacup in front of her and poured tea.
“……”
The atmosphere without Lydia became unbearably cold.
Eleanor genuinely had no idea what the heroine’s extra older sister was supposed to talk about with the four male lead candidates.
Without Lydia, they would never even meet.
Silence stretched endlessly around the table, as though everyone were playing some kind of nerve-wracking game.
At last, Ernst spoke first.
“I heard you’re leaving for Oclama. How long do you plan to stay?”
He smiled warmly.
Relief washed over Eleanor the moment she realized Ernst was the first to break the silence.
Out of the four, he was the one she felt most comfortable with.
“Father told me to stay as long as I wanted until things quiet down. So I’m planning to remain there until society loses interest in my affairs.”
“Oclama has wonderful weather and beautiful scenery. It’s the perfect place to rest and recover. You should stay comfortably until both your body and mind heal.”
Ernst smiled gently.
His crescent-shaped eyes curved kindly.
Though whenever Lydia was involved, he could still criticize Eleanor without hesitation, he was at least the only one among the four who bothered pretending to be courteous.
“That’s the plan. Thank you for your concern, Ernst.”
“It’s nothing. You’ve suffered because of a strange man.”
“She brought it on herself.”
The smooth conversation shattered when Vincent cut in.
He looked at Eleanor with blatant displeasure.
His expression resembled that of a sulking child so much that Eleanor almost smiled fondly.
Among the four men, Vincent possessed the roughest and most aggressive temperament. He was especially sharp-tongued whenever Lydia was concerned.
From the moment he first met Eleanor, they had never gotten along.
By then, Eleanor had already broken off her second engagement because of Lydia, so Vincent firmly believed Lydia was constantly suffering because of her older sister.
“Vincent, don’t speak so rudely to her.”
Perhaps because Eleanor was leaving for Oclama, Ernst unusually took her side.
“No, Ernst. Sir Vincent is right. I really do have terrible judgment when it comes to people.”
Eleanor admitted it with the gentle tone of someone soothing a child.
She had no desire to clash with one of the male leads, nor did she want to argue with a man who felt like an immature boy due to a mage’s distorted sense of age.
As an extra, fighting Vincent would only exhaust her for no reason.
And Eleanor had no intention of wasting her energy on pointless things.
“Terrible judgment? More like completely nonexistent.”
“I was surprised you chose the second son of House Hans.”
Sinclair added calmly after Vincent’s sneer.
“You used to be smarter than this.”
Bright turquoise eyes fixed on Eleanor.
Finding it difficult to maintain her smile, Eleanor lifted her teacup.
The two of them had once attended the academy together as classmates of the same age.
Although they hadn’t graduated together, they had still spent time at the academy side by side.
Eleanor had known Sinclair long before Lydia did.
But as though guided by the wheel of fate itself, Sinclair eventually gravitated toward Lydia instead.
Like the perfect extra older sister, Eleanor had faithfully served as the bridge connecting the male lead to the heroine.
“I thought about it seriously too,” Eleanor replied lightly. “I just didn’t realize my eye for men was that bad.”
Whether in the past or now, she was still the same Eleanor.
If Sinclair thought she had somehow become stupider, there was nothing she could do about it.
“Why did you choose him anyway?”
“He seemed decent at first.”
“Where exactly did you meet him that made him seem decent? One look at him and he seemed spineless, indecisive, and stupid.”
At Vincent’s merciless evaluation, Eleanor merely smiled faintly.
Compared to men who were considered some of the empire’s finest, Edward naturally appeared lacking.
Truthfully, Eleanor hadn’t chosen Edward because he excelled in any particular way either.
As she had said before, she chose him because he seemed like a diligent knight uninterested in women—someone who trained sincerely and quietly.
At first, he really was like that.
Eleanor recalled the first time she met Edward Hans.
Every spring, the capital of the Tritan Empire, Beirn, hosted a grand swordsmanship tournament.
The emperor himself bestowed a laurel crown upon the victor, making it one of the highest honors among knights.
Even those who failed to win still gained recognition through their performance, so participation rates were always high.
Two years ago, Eleanor attended the tournament at Stella’s invitation.
Cain, who was participating, had personally secured tickets and insisted his younger sister come watch.
The arena was chaotic with crowds of nobles and commoners, men and women all mixed together.
Eleanor, who had arranged to meet Stella near the eastern entrance, quickly became overwhelmed.
The sea of people pressing toward the entrance was so dense that all she could see were the backs of heads.
As people bumped against her from every direction, Lisa and the Stikoff knight escorted Eleanor somewhere quieter.
Neither of them had any confidence they could safely protect their lady while simultaneously searching for another noblewoman in that chaos.
Eleanor herself also doubted she could find Stella without getting hurt, so she obediently followed.
“I’ll go find Lady Maxill.”
Leaving Eleanor in Lisa’s care, the knight departed.
While waiting for him to return, Eleanor sat on a tree stump beside Lisa to rest.
Lisa protested that sitting there would dirty her dress, but Eleanor was already too drained to remain standing.
“There are especially many people this year.”
“It wasn’t like this last year?”
“No. There are always a lot of spectators, but never this many. I wonder why.”
Lisa, who had attended the tournament the previous year, nodded seriously.
She wasn’t wrong.
This year’s tournament had been unusually popular, and tickets had sold out incredibly quickly.
If Stella hadn’t received two special tickets through Cain’s participation, Eleanor likely wouldn’t have been able to attend either.
“It’s because Duke Tess’s heir is competing.”
Eleanor answered casually.
“Huh? The young duke is participating?”
“It’s all over high society. Every noble lady probably struggled to get tickets today.”
Eleanor recalled a young noblewoman who had burst into tears after failing to obtain one.
The announcement of Sinclair Tess’s participation had only been made three days earlier, and chaos had erupted immediately afterward.
Massive black-market trading for tickets had followed as people desperately tried to obtain the nearly sold-out seats.
Several noble ladies had even offered Eleanor outrageous sums to sell her ticket.
She had refused every one.
The ticket belonged to Stella, not her. There was no way she could sell something her friend had given her so they could watch her brother compete together.
“If the young duke really joined, then this excitement makes sense. I noticed far more women here than last year.”
“And Cain is competing too, so that probably added to it.”
Stella’s third brother, Cain Maxill, was also considered quite popular within Beirn’s social circles.
His participation had already boosted ticket sales significantly.
Then Sinclair’s involvement was announced afterward, and the situation exploded.
“The tournament organizers must be making a fortune.”
As if anticipating this, the organizers had quietly raised ticket prices beforehand.
Black-market prices skyrocketed in response.
With one overwhelmingly popular man and another highly popular one between them selling nearly ninety percent of the tickets, the profits this year would undoubtedly be enormous.
“We need to find Stella before the tournament starts.”
“We left early, so there should still be plenty of time before it begins. So don’t wor—”
Lisa stopped abruptly.
A noisy group of male voices echoed nearby.
No one insane enough to harass an obvious noble lady like Eleanor would likely appear, but Lisa still helped her up immediately just in case.
There was always at least one incident near the arena every year.
“Let’s move into the shade, my lady.”
Eleanor followed behind the cautious maid.
She understood exactly what her sparrow-like attendant feared.
Without their escort knight nearby, a conflict between two women and several men could quickly turn dangerous.
As they hid behind the trees, three men appeared on the opposite side.
Each wore a sword at his waist—tournament participants.
“I heard Sir Edward is participating this year too?”
“Wow, he’s got guts. If it were me, I’d be too embarrassed to show my face.”
“How’d he even pass the preliminaries? I thought he’d definitely fail there.”
“Maybe his family bribed someone.”
“With what money? Isn’t he the second son who gets nothing?”
The men snickered cruelly.
It was the first time Eleanor heard Edward’s name.
Then—
Crunch.
At the sound of a branch snapping, she turned her head.
And for the first time, she saw Edward.
One glance at his startled face told her immediately that he was the “Edward” those men had been mocking.
Unfortunately, her realization showed on her face without her meaning to.
Edward noticed.
Awkwardly smiling, he turned his head away.
“Let’s go get ready.”
“Maybe I should loosen up a little first.”
The men disappeared with loud, obnoxious laughter.
Only then did Eleanor, Lisa, and Edward emerge from behind the trees.
Eleanor looked at him uncertainly.
Both of them knew he had overheard the insults.
And both knew the other knew.
It created an unbearably awkward atmosphere.
She couldn’t very well offer comfort recklessly either, so her eyes darted about helplessly.
If she had simply pretended not to notice, they could have exchanged polite greetings and parted ways normally.
Instead, both stood there hesitating awkwardly.
“Um… you don’t need to mind it.”
Edward scratched the back of his head and spoke first.
Perhaps because he’d been caught in such an unpleasant situation, he looked embarrassed.
“I’m used to it. Ah… saying that probably just makes it more uncomfortable, doesn’t it? It’s embarrassing, sure, but it’s really nothing serious, so you don’t have to worry.”
His voice flowed smoothly and calmly.
There was no trace of hurt in it.
That surprised Eleanor.
Most people would have been wounded hearing those kinds of insults behind their backs.
“…Are you alright?”
“Ah, yes. I’m fine. It’s true that I’m not talented with the sword. That’s why I work harder than everyone else.”
Edward grinned brightly.
Everything about him felt healthy—his appearance, his smile, even the way he spoke.
Eleanor stared at the face that showed no darkness at all.
Ordinary brown hair. Ordinary brown eyes.
As a knight, he possessed a solid physique, but aside from that, he was completely average.
Like an extra.
And yet, unlike many others, there was nothing twisted or bitter about him.
His smile was simple and sincere.
In a strange way, he resembled Lydia.
Perhaps it was wrong for an extra to give off that kind of feeling at all—but the moment Eleanor noticed that similarity, she found herself drawn to Edward.
“Well then, I should go practice.”
Edward bowed politely.
Eleanor placed a hand near her chest and inclined her head in return.
Turning around, Edward disappeared into the brush, likely searching for a quiet place where he could train undisturbed.
That had been Eleanor and Edward’s first meeting.
During the tournament that day, Edward was eliminated in the very first round.
It was such a swift and anticlimactic defeat that there was hardly anything to watch.
The audience responded politely enough to the matches involving extras.
But whenever Sinclair Tess or Cain Maxill appeared, the arena erupted into cheers.
In the end, the two of them advanced to the finals.
And when Sinclair Tess claimed ultimate victory, the laurel crown became his.
