She apologized and quietly tilted her teacup, looking away.

She clearly looked like someone who had no intention of continuing the conversation.

“……Ah.”

It was then that he realized he had been silent for quite a long time.

“Why do you say it’s a gift?”

“Pardon?”

Among the thousands of questions swirling in his head, this was the first to reach his tongue.

“Ah, as a gift… it’s too shabby, I suppose.”

Serena said.

She understood the question, but the answer that came out was baseless.

“……?”

“Still, I thought it was what you wanted most. Well, certainly, someone like me couldn’t be a gift to Your Grace.”

There was something strange about Serena.

Irdin Lavernia only now realized this point.

And he also realized a fact he didn’t want to acknowledge.

‘She didn’t throw away a letter after all.’

The fact that Serena Lavernia wouldn’t have thrown away a single sheet of paper while writing the letter.

He had that feeling.

There was simply no emotion at all. There was no affection to begin with.

‘……She wasn’t like this before, I think.’

Even when she came to throw tantrums and cause a scene, she still consistently called him father.

Though her eyes showed annoyance, she wasn’t a child with such dry eyes.

Those eyes……

‘…They’re similar to the old days.’

They closely resembled the child when she was much younger, before the accident happened.

But it feels even more desolate than back then. It’s very similar to when she matured too early back then.

Thinking this, Irdin Lavernia unconsciously rubbed his face.

“Is there anything else you’d like to discuss?”

Serena asked after emptying her teacup completely.

‘I need to go and develop samples too.’

I really don’t know why I’m here.

Serena racked her brain to see if she had forgotten anything.

No matter how much she thought, there was nothing.

Serena put effort into not letting her fatigue show on her face.

Appearing rude seemed like a great way to further reduce her already negative score.

‘I can’t afford to reduce my score any more and increase hostility.’

He had the power and authority to drive Serena to ruin.

‘Manage your expression, manage your expression.’

Fortunately, after thinking about it a few times, Serena was able to maintain a calm expression again.

Expression management was one of her specialties.

“I’ve arranged with His Majesty… to withdraw your removal from the family register. If you just agree, I’ll go right away and……”

“Why would you withdraw that?!”

Serena’s eyes widened and she ended up raising her voice.

How did you manage to get that, and now you’re saying you’ll withdraw it!

‘Is this, by any chance, the original plot forcing its way through or something?’

Serena thought with her eyes wide open.

A forced plot to somehow involve Serena in the death of the Marchioness?

Or is it just my bad luck?

“…Why withdraw it, you ask, because it was a misunderstanding, of course……”

“I don’t need to borrow money, it’s fine.”

Serena turned pale at the thought that one of the three nightmares that drove the original ‘Serena Lavernia’ to hell might not fall.

“I apologize for presumptuously calling it a gift.”

“……No.”

“I won’t ever come near the Lavernia mansion again.”

“…Serena, that’s not what I……”

“If you wish, I’ll leave the empire or the capital. I can even write a statement promising never to appear again.”

Irdin Lavernia easily noticed that Serena was desperate.

The child was more desperate now than at any other point in their conversation.

“……Do you hate it that much?”

“Of course!”

Serena answered emphatically.

“……”

At those words, Marquis Lavernia was hurt.

He felt something welling up inside him, but he couldn’t open his mouth.

If he did, he felt it would burst out uncontrollably.

Of course, for Serena, she simply didn’t want to be entangled in such matters and have her life threatened.

“I see.”

Serena nodded once more at Marquis Lavernia’s words.

“Do you dislike the Lavernia mansion?”

Hearing that somewhat subdued voice, Serena hesitated for a moment.

She did have some sense of tact.

Although this was just Serena’s own thought.

Anyway, she wasn’t so dull as to not notice the sudden change in atmosphere.

“I neither liked nor disliked it.”

After pondering for a moment, Serena gave a somewhat honest answer.

“Because… I had neither good nor bad memories.”

“……”

To Serena, the mansion was just a house.

A place that provided food, a place to sleep, clothes, and blood relatives.

Good memories?

Not particularly.

Bad memories then?

None of those either.

It was the same in her previous life.

Was she unhappy before becoming Kim Chul-soo’s slave, born in South Korea and raised as an orphan?

Not particularly.

She had always been somewhat indifferent to everything.

This doesn’t work?

Can’t be helped.

That doesn’t work either?

Nothing to be done.

You don’t want to be friends with me?

Well, that’s a bit disappointing, but what can we do.

To summarize, that’s the kind of feeling she had lived with.

In her first life, there were too many things that didn’t work out. There were too many things she couldn’t have and too many things she had to share.

But it’s not like she had the great motivation or passion to fight and obtain those things like other kids.

Because watching from the side, those kids usually all got scolded and cried.

Even when she’s living as Kim Chul-soo slave, it was a miserable life, but she felt it couldn’t be helped.

She said she wanted to quit.

Of course, the answer came back that it wasn’t possible.

Even while she thought that she hated it, her body became ‘Well, can’t be helped.’

As time passes like that….

‘A fine talent like me is going to be completed.’

Recalling her somewhat gloomy past, Serena decided to affirm herself particularly.

“None, you say……”

“Yes, I can’t think of any, do you have something, Your Grace?”

Serena asked, leaning back on the backrest with a slightly more comfortable look.

Because she noticed that the other party wasn’t trying to torment her or get angry.

“……”

At Serena’s question, Marquis Lavernia’s lips couldn’t even move.

Memories with Nocturne?

If studying together, teaching what he didn’t know, giving him hints for his heir lessons, helping with sword practice, learning strategies, going on territory inspections together and buying something to eat could be called memories, then yes, those could be called memories.

Memories with Serena?

“……”

He thought hard, but nothing came to mind.

Serena was a quiet child.

At least, he knew she was very mature from a very young age. To the point where he wished she would act more childish.

‘Although she became too immature after that.’

What kind of change of heart made her so different now?

Irdin Lavernia wondered.

But no answer came.

Because Irdin Lavernia knew nothing about either Serena Lavernia or Serena Kelahinum.

She was a child who never wanted anything.

A child who didn’t speak of pain even when she fell.

A child who would come and ask how to treat a wound only when it was festering and oozing pus.

Even then, she would just ask for the method and quietly disappear, diligently treating it alone with a first aid kit.

Even before the accident, she didn’t say anything about the monastery and left only a letter, causing a big incident that made his heart drop.

After she got sick, she became unruly, made demands, and stubbornly insisted on things she wanted, giving him a headache, but he thought she was seeking compensation for her childhood.

Whatever happened, the child who seemed to have returned to that time…

She seemed to have no lingering attachment or affection.

It’s to the point where he feels grateful for the long letter she wrote saying she would leave for the monastery.

That’s how much the child’s letter speaking of eternal farewell was, at best, plain and at worst, indifferent.

‘Was I really that inattentive?’

She was a child who made it impossible to pay attention to.

If he were to make excuses, he could say that.

His wife was sickly. Her body was very weak, so there was hardly any time they could spend together.

Yet unlike Nocturne who sought attention, Serena would sometimes sit quietly by her side, and when his tired wife fell asleep, she would cover her with the disheveled blanket and quietly leave the room.

That’s the kind of child she was.

“Din, sometimes… I’m scared that Serena has become too much of an adult because of me. She’s not an adult yet, she doesn’t even know how to walk properly, can’t even climb stairs properly, but it’s like she’s crawling up by herself, pretending to be an adult.”

Suddenly, Irdin Lavernia recalled what his wife had said long ago.

His expression twisted slightly.