Contrary to his resolution, the proposal written on the blank page was quite tempting, like a blank check.

A wish—of course, he had something very clear he wanted from her, but the range of wishes the lady mentioned would likely fall short of that.

“My wish is for the young lady to remain quietly in place.”

Sion spoke words he didn’t mean while naturally taking her hands and neatly folding them on her lap.

[It’s to commemorate you becoming my first friend in Ponten. A rare opportunity, don’t you think?]

When he didn’t easily give in, Agate quickly added more.

‘I know it’s a rare opportunity.’

He wanted to immediately draft a contract clarifying the scope of wishes and establishing firm conditions, but he bit his tongue and endured.

Outwardly, Sion remained unmoved. Seeing that persuasion wasn’t working, Agate’s hands became busy again.

[If you take me to the lake today, I’ll grant you any wish.]

As if she wouldn’t look at him like a bug if he asked for ten gold ingots as his wish. Should he educate her as a butler that such careless promises shouldn’t be made?

While Sion was caught in the struggle between reason and instinct, unable to give an easy answer, the lady seemed to firmly misinterpret his hesitation as unwavering refusal.

She tore the paper neatly in half and began scribbling something on the cleanly torn piece.

[I, Agate Irone, hereby grant one chest of gold ingots to the bearer of this signature.]

After firmly signing below the sentence, Agate raised her eyebrows as if to say “Is this enough?” and handed the makeshift check to Sion.

For months he had schemed to seduce her, with no progress and no clear solution in sight. Yet now gold had rolled in on the vine. So sudden it was almost deflating.

For someone whose life had never flowed easily, this was the first stroke of luck he had ever encountered. If she truly gave him the gold, what did a mere lake matter? Sion’s heart pounded like a hammer, his reason approaching its limit.

“Miss……”

Before he knew it, Sion’s expression had grown serious, and Agate placed the invaluable piece of paper in his hand.

Then on the remaining half of the blank paper, she added the final touch that completed this absurd transaction.

[A foreigner would need substantial funds to settle in Bladen.]

What she had wanted to say was longer and warmer than this. She hadn’t offered such wealth simply because she wanted to visit the lake.

Both her promise of gold and her offer were sincere, not made in a fit of anger.

Was she naive, thoughtful, or both?

‘Even so, to someone she barely knows… No, I suppose for the Irone lady, this amount of wealth isn’t particularly significant.’

A chest of gold ingots—an amount a kind-hearted grand noble could spend without hesitation, but enough to change the life of someone like Sion who had climbed up from the bottom.

His hand holding the paper unconsciously tightened. Now, entirely of his own will rather than external pressure, he kept the certificate close.

He decided to think of it as a kind of insurance. It wouldn’t matter if he made no other gains during his hiding in Ponten. With this alone, the gold ingots would naturally follow when he completed his contract as a butler and casually mentioned changing jobs.

‘If I can just hold out until early winter next year…’

If he accepted this condition, from now on it was just a matter of time.

While his mind automatically rearranged future plans, his collar was pulled again. For a very brief moment, he had completely forgotten the lady’s existence.

“Miss, I’m deeply moved that you think of me this way. To even concern yourself with my settlement…”

The deal was struck. Since it was a profitable transaction for Sion, he had to seal it before Agate changed her mind, pretending to give in reluctantly.

“Since you’re so adamant, I have no choice. Very well. Risking my position, I’ll escort you to the lake today.”

Finally yielding to capital, Sion bowed neatly at the waist and promised. He carefully folded the piece of paper as if it were a real blank check and tucked it into his br*ast pocket.

The key now was to persuade the servants to hurry with picnic preparations before Adollo returned. Since the lake was just a stone’s throw away, there shouldn’t be much opposition.

And as expected:

“The weather is so nice, we should bring a parasol. The young lady’s skin is delicate.”

“It’s been so long since we prepared for a picnic, I’m not sure what to pack. Sandwiches? I made apple juice recently—should we bring that too?”

Far from opposing, they all seemed excited, as if they had been waiting for this. The previously dull Irone villa instantly became lively with the humming of people who seemed to have sprouted wings.

Indeed, with the mistress of the house in her condition all this time, even simple outings had been out of the question. Sion fully understood their joy, like horses freed from a stifling pen to roam open pastures.

“The forest path is too narrow for a carriage…”

“It’s close enough to walk!”

Kanna cheerfully interjected. Meanwhile, her hands were busy braiding Agate’s golden hair into two plaits.

“That’s fine for us, but what if the young lady’s health suffers?”

When head maid Molly chided her, Kanna pouted. Lorraine, another maid who had been listening quietly, clapped her hands as if struck by a good idea.

“Oh my, what about that! The bicycle!”

“Ah, the old bicycle the chief butler sometimes rides?”

‘Bicycle?’

Standing apart from the servants who were more enthusiastic than himself, Sion raised one eyebrow. Of course, having experienced all sorts of hardships since childhood, Sion had ridden bicycles plenty when delivering newspapers.

‘I haven’t seen one at the mansion. I suppose it must be stashed away in some storage room.’

Until this point, he hadn’t cared how they would get there—by riding or rolling. He also couldn’t understand why they were putting so much effort into preparing Agate for a trip to a lake just a stone’s throw away, with the same tiresome people they saw every day.

“We can send the young lady by bicycle!”

“That’s a good idea. Who knows how to ride a bicycle?”

As one irresponsible question floated into the air, the previously noisy room became quiet for the first time. Simultaneously, all eyes in the room converged on one spot, as if by agreement.

‘Surely not…’

The face of Sion, who had consistently maintained a third-party stance, suddenly stiffened. He made eye contact with each person looking at him. The answer to why everyone had fallen silent and was staring at him was already clear.

It seemed he was the only one who could—or rather, had ever—ridden a bicycle here.

He briefly considered lying about never having ridden a bicycle, but that conflict was incinerated when his gaze met those brown eyes.

He felt a crisis—if he lied, she might take back the precious promissory note he had carefully tucked away.

It certainly wasn’t because he was swayed by the lady’s desperate gaze. How could one read desperation in that dry face?

“…The right person is here. I’ll escort the young lady.”

When Sion, once again hiding behind his mask of kindness, voluntarily took on the role of driver, everyone was quick to praise him, saying there was no one better than the butler.

‘D*mn, I only rode as a snot-nosed kid. I can barely remember how to hold the handlebars.’

Since his main mode of transportation had been carriages since he grew up, he remained uneasy even after answering.

Of course, he would still be safer than the maids who had already moved on to discussing how many bottles of juice to pack in the picnic basket. Safer in the crisis of tumbling onto the dirt with the young lady while taking her by bicycle.

After looking around at them once more, Sion shook his head and gave up. A bicycle was nothing—if he refreshed his memory quickly, he could manage somehow. If that failed, he could simply carry the lady on his back.

Since the lady was so slender, he quietly estimated that he could probably lift her with one arm as he looked down at her.

“All done, Miss!”

“Oh my, Lady Agate. How well braided hair suits you!”

“If you walked through central Ponten right now, everyone would stare with their mouths open!”

When Kanna finished styling her hair and applied a touch of rouge to her lips, the maids gathered around, not holding back their enthusiasm.

Of course, it wasn’t flattery but sincere admiration, mixed with the doting of those who thought of the lady as their daughter.

“How does she look to you, Butler?”

Kanna, whose mood had improved from having her handiwork praised, drew Sion in. She seemed to want his compliments too.