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Chapter 23
“Young Master Bartholomew.”
A temple attendant came looking for Bartholomew early in the morning.
Bartholomew looked at him with obvious annoyance written across his face.
The attendant hesitated before holding something out to him.
It was an envelope.
“A letter has arrived for you, Young Master.”
Even while seeing it with his own eyes, Bartholomew could hardly believe it.
Whether he was staying at the temple or at the duke’s estate, not once had a letter ever been addressed to him.
Who in the world sent this?
Bartholomew accepted the letter and dismissed the attendant.
Left alone, he opened the envelope and unfolded the paper inside.
Immediately, his brows furrowed.
There were no words written on the page.
Instead, it was covered with crude drawings, like something from a child’s picture diary.
Bartholomew narrowed his eyes as he examined it.
A treasure map?
Something resembling a map had been drawn, with an X marking a certain spot.
For a moment, Bartholomew wondered if the letter had been delivered to the wrong person, but then he spotted the crookedly written name at the bottom.
“Lucy.”
It was a letter from Lucy.
Come to think of it, Lucy was the only person who would ever send him a letter.
The corners of Bartholomew’s lips lifted faintly.
He recalled Lucy saying they should meet again before he left the temple.
He had thought she was merely being polite, but apparently she had meant it.
Bartholomew had assumed that once Lucy returned to her normal life, she would quickly forget someone like him.
That was why he had expected nothing.
Yet somehow, knowing that Lucy remembered him well enough to send a letter made his chest feel strangely ticklish.
But why send drawings instead of words?
Of course, Lucy had resorted to pictures because of her stat-related limitations, but there was no way Bartholomew could know that.
So he began seriously deciphering the letter.
After studying it for quite some time, he figured out that it pointed to the riverside near the annex where Lucy was staying.
Is she asking me to come there?
Bartholomew tilted his head.
What does she want?
He found himself genuinely curious.
Lucy’s words resurfaced in his mind—how she had said she needed him.
That it had to be him.
Did something happen again where she needs my help?
Because of attending the imperial banquet last time, Bartholomew had incurred Duke Faraday’s wrath.
The duke had extended the amount of time Bartholomew was required to stay at the temple.
It was a kind of punishment, knowing full well that Bartholomew found the temple even more suffocating than the estate.
If he got involved with Lucy again and trouble arose, Duke Faraday might very well lock him up in the estate altogether.
Bartholomew’s mind told him to ignore Lucy’s letter.
But his heart disagreed.
He wanted to accept Lucy’s invitation.
A powerful urge to leave the temple welled up inside him.
Why?
Was it simply rebellion against Duke Faraday?
To think that a rebellious spirit he had never once felt in seventeen years would suddenly appear now.
No way.
Was it because he wanted to see Lucy?
Bartholomew let out a dry laugh.
Impossible.
Why would he want to see Lucy?
She was troublesome and bothersome.
She always smiled brightly at him and acted overly familiar whenever she saw him.
And Bartholomew…
Do I dislike that?
Not exactly.
It’s just…
He pressed a hand against the left side of his chest.
Bartholomew had always felt as though a heavy stone rested there.
Breathing was difficult, and his body constantly felt drained.
This pain had accompanied him for a very long time.
None of the medicines from the temple had worked.
When the chest pain became unbearable, only powerful emergency medicine could suppress it.
But whenever he was with Lucy, the pain seemed to ease.
Ah.
Bartholomew realized something.
Cerberus.
Whenever he touched Cerberus, the pain subsided immediately.
Right. I’m going to see Cerberus.
Thinking that, Bartholomew stared quietly at the letter.
His eyes traced over Lucy’s name written in the corner.
Bartholomew went to see Lucy.
The knight guarding the gate of the annex beside the imperial palace blocked his path.
Bartholomew explained that he had come as Lucy’s guest.
“Ah, Young Master Bartholomew.”
The guard’s wariness immediately disappeared.
“Princess Lucy has ordered that Young Master Bartholomew is always permitted entry.”
After sending the letter, Lucy had gone directly to speak with the gate guard.
“Listen carefully. Bartholomew is my friend.”
“Pardon?”
“He’s always welcome.”
That was the best Lucy could manage after diligently raising her intelligence stat.
Still, the guard had understood her perfectly.
“Please, go right in.”
The guard opened the gate.
As Bartholomew stepped inside, he mulled over the guard’s words.
While heading toward the riverside, he wondered what exactly this swelling feeling in his chest was.
Whenever he was around Lucy, he felt strangely important.
Normally, he had always believed himself to be someone whose existence nobody in the world would even notice.
But every bit of special treatment Lucy gave him made him feel acknowledged.
Why did a simple statement—that he could come see her anytime—make him this excited?
Shaking his head, Bartholomew quickened his pace.
At last, he arrived at the place marked in Lucy’s letter, and he doubted his own eyes.
A grassy field bathed in sunlight.
Lucy’s pure white dress fluttered gently in the warm breeze.
Her hair and skin gleamed brightly under the sun.
Her neat profile and long eyelashes.
The books stacked neatly beside her.
She looked like a painting.
And that picturesque Lucy was…
“Got one!”
Fishing.
Bartholomew felt as though he were experiencing cognitive dissonance.
Lucy always managed to bewilder him, but he had never imagined she would be fishing.
Even someone as inexperienced in socializing as he was knew that noble young ladies generally did not fish.
Why in the world is she fishing…?
Bartholomew looked around.
Apparently this was not her first time, because the nearby fishermen clapped and congratulated Lucy.
Then Lucy spotted him.
“Young Master Bartholomew!”
Lucy greeted him with a radiant smile.
Climbing down from the rock she stood on, she ran over to him.
“So you got my letter!”
Bartholomew instinctively wanted to ask why she was fishing, but instead cleared his throat.
“Why did you call for me?”
“Because I missed you, obviously.”
Bartholomew’s eyes widened slightly.
“Didn’t you miss me too, Young Master Bartholomew?”
“…I did miss you.”
Lucy had asked teasingly, but when Bartholomew answered honestly, her eyes rounded in surprise.
After watching her startled face for a moment, Bartholomew turned his gaze away.
His eyes landed on Cerberus beside Lucy’s feet.
“Cerberus.”
Bartholomew added.
Ah, so that’s it.
Lucy smiled awkwardly.
“Cerberus missed you a lot too, Young Master Bartholomew.”
Naturally, that was a lie.
As if proving it, Cerberus bared his fangs and growled at Bartholomew.
Unbothered, Bartholomew bent down and stroked Cerberus’s head.
Yes. This peace.
As he petted Cerberus, Bartholomew became convinced that it truly was Cerberus he had wanted to see.
A sense of calm washed over him.
The stone pressing against his chest vanished, and he could breathe freely again.
Bartholomew had once wondered whether petting animals produced this effect in general, so he had tried petting the rabbits raised behind the temple.
The rabbits had docilely accepted his touch, but they had never soothed his body and mind the way Cerberus did.
Only Cerberus can do this.
Especially now that he could no longer take his emergency medicine.
If he could pet Cerberus every day, perhaps he would not need the medicine at all.
Grrr.
As Cerberus growled, Lucy moved to stop him.
Then her eyes widened.
Even while growling, Cerberus’s tail was wagging back and forth.
Doesn’t he dislike Bartholomew?
Lucy could not understand Cerberus.
Cerberus followed Lucy faithfully, but he did not automatically show hostility toward everyone else.
He would even flop onto his back and show his belly to the servants in the annex.
Considering how he had been wary of the fishermen, Lucy had thought he simply disliked strangers. If that were true, though, he should have lowered his guard around Bartholomew, whom Lucy treated warmly.
Yet every time Cerberus saw Bartholomew, he growled.
But judging by that wagging tail, he clearly did not hate him either.
Why exactly is Cerberus acting like this?
Shouldn’t a guardian beast have some dignity?
That’s right. Cerberus had originally been the guardian beast Lucy’s mother brought with her when she married into the empire.
Which made him an essential existence in the progression of the game.
Though in Lucy’s eyes right now, Cerberus looked no different from a moody puppy.
Could there be some special reason for this?
Lucy tilted her head.
But no matter how much she thought about it, she could not figure out the answer.
