DFBE 14

Chapter 14

Bartholomew didn’t know how he was supposed to react when he saw Lucy’s clear, innocent face.

Her long eyelashes fluttered naïvely.
Her cheeks were tinged pink.
Her eyes glowed warmly.

“Your Imperial Highness…”

Bartholomew cleared his throat.

“You have a talent for saying absurd things as though you truly mean them.”

“There wasn’t a single lie in anything I said to Young Duke Bartholomew.”

Bartholomew shook his head as if to say enough.

“There is no need for you to worry about my illness.”

“So that means…”

“It’s not a fatal disease, nor is someone trying to harm me.”

Lucy let out a relieved smile.

Even if he was only a supporting character, Bartholomew was the person she had spoken with and spent the most time with since transmigrating into the game world.

If Bartholomew—who was practically her first friend here—were destined to disappear so soon, it would have made her sad.

‘No, not exactly. He’s someone I want to become friends with.’

Unlike Lucy, Bartholomew probably didn’t think of her as a friend.

It was obvious he was only reluctantly keeping her company because he felt indebted to her.

“By the way, you chose the wrong person.”

“What do you mean?”

“I can’t dance.”

Bartholomew slowly tapped the book with his index finger.

“I’ve never even learned ballroom dancing.”

Lucy was momentarily speechless.

Among nobles, ballroom dancing was one of the most basic forms of etiquette.

What Bartholomew had just said essentially meant he had grown up without being taught even those fundamental manners.

‘Is it because he’s sickly?’

Even so, how could they not teach him something so basic?

His family was a ducal house, after all.

‘Come to think of it…’

Not once had Lucy seen any of Bartholomew’s family visit him while he was bedridden.

He was always alone in the vast temple, and he looked accustomed to solitude.

Lucy quietly stared at him.

The moment she sensed the loneliness hanging over his profile like a shadow—

“He’s this handsome, so what does it matter?”

Bartholomew slowly turned his head to look at Lucy.

His face was filled with disbelief.

Only then did Lucy quickly cover her mouth with her hand.

Again.

Words full of fangirling admiration had slipped out against her will.

Lucy remembered the Aesthete skill she had forgotten about.

Apparently, the skill only activated around Bartholomew.

Otherwise, there was no explanation for why she kept blurting out embarrassing compliments every time she tried to have a sincere conversation with him.

‘If it’s a skill, shouldn’t it at least have some kind of useful effect?’

How was shamelessly gushing over someone considered an ability?!

Even thick-skinned Lucy couldn’t help feeling embarrassed.

Thinking that, her cheeks turned slightly red.

Ironically, that only made her words sound even more sincere.

“I can’t dance either.”

Trying to break the awkward silence, Lucy spoke first.

“I never had the chance to learn ballroom dancing.”

It was only natural.

Before transmigrating, she hadn’t lived in a world where learning ballroom dancing was considered basic etiquette.

But Bartholomew interpreted her words differently.

To him, it sounded as though Lucy, like himself, had also grown up without receiving proper care.

At times, Lucy felt like someone completely from another world—impossible to grasp.

Yet every so often, the things she said gave him a strange sense of kinship.

At this point, he even wondered if he was the one who seemed like a person from another world in everyone else’s eyes.

It wasn’t entirely wrong.

Rather than truly living, he felt more like an object with a predetermined expiration date.

Something that would have to be discarded when the time came.

This loneliness—the feeling of floating without ever truly settling into the world—

For some reason, he felt Lucy might understand it.

Perhaps, for the first time, he had met someone who shared the same loneliness.

‘…What does that matter?’

Bartholomew quickly suppressed the faint hope swelling inside him.

He had to live as emotionally detached as possible.

Only then would it hurt less when the time came for him to disappear from the world.

‘As if I’m someone incapable of feeling emotions.’

He couldn’t allow himself to be shaken by Lucy like this.

Bartholomew hardened his expression.

Then, in a voice devoid of emotion, he said,

“If neither of us can dance, then there’s no point in dancing at the imperial banquet, is there?”

With clumsy dancing skills, they wouldn’t catch the emperor’s eye—they would only become the laughingstock of the ballroom.

“Then we just have to learn.”

“Learn? From other people?”

Practicing dancing alone together was already awkward enough, and now she wanted to display that disgraceful spectacle in front of others?

Reading the dissatisfaction on Bartholomew’s face, Lucy shook her head.

“We only need to follow the basic steps to the rhythm of this folk song.”

Lucy grinned brightly.

“And that much can be learned from a book.”

Clenching both fists with determination, she smiled.

“Let’s learn dancing together through books!”

* * *

Bartholomew visited Lucy’s room for dance practice.

After memorizing the basic steps from a book the previous day, they had decided to try practicing together starting today.

At first, Bartholomew had no idea how one could possibly learn dancing from a book, but once he actually tried it, the basic steps turned out to be simple enough.

There were designated steps for the man and the woman, and all they had to do was repeat them from the beginning of the music to the end.

‘This is easier than I expected.’

That was what Bartholomew thought.

Lucy, however, felt differently.

Of course, she had memorized all the basic steps too.

She definitely knew them all, but…

“Ah! I’m sorry!”

Lucy looked helplessly at Bartholomew’s foot, which she had stepped on for what felt like the hundredth time.

She knew the steps in her head, but her body refused to cooperate.

‘Is this because of my negative stats?’

Ding!
[Tip: Dance ability has absolutely nothing to do with stats.]

As though it had read her mind, the status window suddenly appeared.

The system window’s merciless confirmation only made Lucy feel more embarrassed.

What did it mean that Bartholomew, whose body obeyed him perfectly regardless of stats, was standing in front of her while she kept messing up at dancing—a skill completely unrelated to stats?

It simply meant Lucy was naturally terrible at dancing.

‘This is something I definitely didn’t expect.’

Scratching her cheek awkwardly, Lucy glanced at Bartholomew.

He had one hand covering his face while the other rested on his waist, letting out a small sigh.

At this rate, if she stepped on him any more, his feet might not survive until the imperial banquet.

Not only that—

Bartholomew might eventually decide he couldn’t tolerate this any longer and quit altogether.

“Let’s take it slowly.”

Removing his hand from his face, Bartholomew spoke.

“Let’s slow down the tempo and try again.”

“Young Duke Bartholomew…”

Lucy clasped both hands together and looked at him with deeply moved eyes.

“So you’ve decided not to give up on me.”

“I simply want to return to my room and rest as soon as possible.”

Bartholomew replied firmly.

Lucy steeled herself, determined to do better this time.

But the result was the same.

Whenever she managed to get past one difficult part, she would immediately stumble over another.

Driven into a corner, Lucy was forced to think of another solution.

“What if Young Duke Bartholomew leads me instead?”

Because Lucy had made so many mistakes, Bartholomew had naturally memorized her steps as well.

“And besides, even though we’re supposedly practicing dancing, we haven’t touched each other at all.”

Lucy pointed that out.

Because they had been awkwardly keeping their hands hovering in the air without properly touching, maybe that was what made it even more confusing.

“Won’t our arms and bodies naturally touch during the actual dance at the banquet anyway? So why can’t we practice that way too?”

Bartholomew found himself unable to argue.

Reluctantly, he nodded.

“Fine. Let’s try again.”

With a determined expression, Lucy placed one hand on Bartholomew’s shoulder.

She intertwined her other hand with his.

“What are you doing?”

Lucy gestured toward her waist.

Slowly, Bartholomew wrapped his arm around her waist.

As he naturally pulled her closer, their bodies pressed together.

‘Now this finally feels like proper dancing.’

Thinking maybe this time things would work out, Lucy smiled faintly and lifted her head.

At that moment, her eyes met Bartholomew’s as he looked down at her.