His guardianship promise wasn’t limited to her academy years. Since no specific duration had been mentioned, he remained her guardian even now.

But if she was going to act this way, why had she asked him to be her guardian back then?

He knew that despite her royal background, she had a surprisingly minimal attachment to material things. She didn’t desire wealth or seek honor.

But couldn’t she at least use what was available to her?

Why go to such extremes?

Aira, pretending not to notice his complicated gaze, bowed politely.

“I’ll thank you properly later for today. Thank you for your help.”

“…”

Without waiting for his response, she turned away almost like she was escaping and stood before a door marked 102 on the first floor.

Incredibly, the building seemed to have neither a garden nor a lobby. The door, opening directly from the street, clearly led straight into a room, judging by the awkward placement of the windows.

This made security terrible. In Jens’s eyes, this was no place for a young woman to stay alone. He took a step closer to call out to her again.

“…?”

Then he saw it too. The letter inserted in the doorknob that she was eyeing suspiciously.

The envelope format looked familiar. It was an official government envelope, the kind typically used for bills.

As he stepped back to a respectful distance, Aira pulled out the letter.

Though she might have simply torn it open, Aira produced a small knife from somewhere so quickly he hadn’t even noticed, and neatly sliced the envelope.

Jens gave a hollow laugh.

But as Aira read the letter, her eyes trembled and then widened.

“…Ensign?”

In the darkness, her pupils were already dilated, but now they darkened further to an almost frightening degree.

“That…”

The hand holding the letter trembled slightly.

But Jens’s attention was drawn not to the letter or its contents but to the small knife she still held in her other hand.

The sharp edge of the blade reflected the dim streetlight like flowing oil in her trembling hand.

“…Don’t do it.”

Without knowing exactly what he was trying to prevent, Jens grabbed her hand holding the knife and spoke.

The commanding tone that came out unconsciously startled even himself, but Aira looked up with a somewhat composed face and managed something like a smile.

“Do what?”

“Whatever it is, don’t do it. Just…”

Jens struggled with what to say, then forced out words he knew were based on flimsy logic.

“You’ve saddled me with this guardian role. So I’m interfering as your guardian. Ask for help.”

“Help…?”

“Yes. You’re a ward of the Will family, and my ward. So tell me. I’ll help you.”

Jens’s lips moved, appearing ready to say more, but he closed his eyes, opened them again, swallowed what he had originally intended to say, and said something else.

“I can’t force you unless you ask.”

“…”

Aira looked at a loss for words.

Though not a muscle moved on her face as she stared at him blankly, the streetlight must have changed somehow because she almost looked like she was crying.

Jens tried to find words to persuade this stubborn young woman.

Whatever the problem was, she clearly faced a situation she couldn’t resolve alone.

Her eyes alone told him she was drowning.

Just as he was about to say something more, Aira’s expression changed.

“Ugh!”

Finding strength from somewhere, Aira wrapped her arms around Jens’s waist and threw herself in the opposite direction of the entrance.

BOOM!

A massive explosion erupted from the room where Aira had been staying, powerful enough to shatter the gradually dawning morning.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

It wasn’t just a single bomb, as explosions continued in succession. The quantity of explosives seemed designed to prevent escape from anywhere in the room.

The entrance door they had been standing in front of was blown away. Had they remained there, they would have been caught in the blast.

“This is insane…”

“They probably detonated it now, thinking I wouldn’t enter the room yet and would still be at the doorway.”

Aira’s pitiful expression had vanished, replaced by a sharp look.

She roughly stuffed the letter she had been reading into her pocket and stood up.

She extended her hand to Jens, but he quickly got up on his own. Then he grabbed her hand and ran toward the opposite side of the building.

“Wait! We need to catch the culprit!”

“What are you trying to do!”

“But they’ll keep coming after us.”

“Be quiet. Are you some professional assassin? If we get to the main road…”

As Jens oriented himself, he spotted a shadow flickering between the bluish sky that was gradually brightening. Aira saw it too.

But unlike him who wanted to change direction, Aira charged toward the shadow.

THWACK.

Jens couldn’t tell what she did. After exchanging a few moves with the knife-wielding shadow, she instantly kicked off the alley wall while still wearing her long skirt. In the process, she drove the knife she had used to cut the envelope into the shadow’s neck.

Deftly avoiding the blood spurting from the neck, Aira crouched with the bloodied knife and growled.

She turned her body, ready to chase after other shadows who, realizing their operation had failed, were fleeing.

Jens quickly grabbed her wrist.

“The sun is rising. Let’s get away from here first.”

“…But!”

“They probably saw my face too. We’re in this together now. Come with me.”

Jens was about to pull her along when his gaze fell on the fallen shadow figure.

The man, dressed entirely in black with even his nose covered, wore clothing that wrapped high around his neck.

Jens tore off a black cloth emblem attached to the inside of the man’s collar.

“Let’s go. We can examine it later.”

He ran with Aira toward the main road.

* * *

“Young master, what kind of state is this?!”

“Shh. Your voice is too loud. Is grandfather still sleeping?”

“He went to the club and didn’t return until after 3 AM. But this…”

Just moments ago, giving her no time to protest, Jens had taken Aira’s hand and quickly hailed a rental carriage on the main road.

Aira had insisted they should separate since she would be the target, but Jens adamantly refused to let her go, arguing that splitting up would be more dangerous.

Thus, they ultimately arrived at Armeria House, the Will family mansion.

Aira, who had only written this address on letters a few times, examined the mansion with fresh eyes.

Though called a mansion, this place had once been a palace where the Grand Duke of the Livro royal family, who had established roots in Oculer land, had lived.

While the main palace where the king, queen, and direct bloodline had lived was now appropriated by the Republic and turned into a museum, this palace had come into the possession of the Will family, who were distant descendants of the Livro royal line.

With an enormous inheritance tax, of course.

Thus named Armeria House, this mansion was immense in scale.

Hundreds of rooms, a garden rivaling a decent national park in size. Befitting a palace of the Livro royal family who loved bathing, there were dozens of bath chambers, three large banquet halls, dozens of smaller halls, a music hall, an art gallery, and even a fairly large museum.

Above all, this mansion was rumored to house a library with far more volumes than the National Oculer University.

Of course, since the Will family hadn’t opened it to the public, these remained merely rumors.

The heir to all this mansion’s splendor had nonchalantly entered with a woman wearing even more shabby and dirty clothes than his own wrinkled, dust-covered attire.

At dawn, as employees prepared for their daily routines, it was natural that they all emerged to witness this sight.

Aira hung her head low, embarrassed to be treading on this historic mansion with her dirty feet.

Jens, firmly holding her arm to prevent her escape, rubbed his eyes and spoke to the first maid who appeared.

“I’m tired from staying up all night. I’ll explain to my grandfather later, but for now, please prepare a room for this lady.”

“Yes. But…”

The maid with reddish-black hair braided to the side spoke with a twirling smile.

“Which room should I prepare? Perle? Ambre?”

Jens, who had been talking to the maid, turned around to look at her.

Startled by his sudden gaze, Aira blinked. The dawn light was filtering into the mansion’s hall, and Jens’s eyes reflecting that light looked as hard as diamonds.

His claim of being tired from staying up all night seemed completely false.

“Amethyst.”

The maid looked at Jens with surprise.

Aira tilted her head.

Amethyst? Ah, eye color.

What a one-dimensional way of assigning rooms.

“For now, just sleep without thinking about anything. You only regained consciousness a short while ago after fainting. Laura, send word to Dr. Modewa. Have her ready to examine our guest when she wakes.”

“No! I’m fine. If you tell me a time, I’ll come back later…”

Jens scrunched his face.

“Your miserable room just got blown to pieces. Where do you plan to stay? Want to start over with getting rejected by hotels?”

“But…”

“If you’re that uncomfortable, think of it as witness protection for a crime I almost fell victim to. If you understand, go rest. We’ll talk later.”

“…”

Aira bit her lip hard. He was right.

Fortunately, she habitually carried important documents including her ID, but any other belongings would likely have been destroyed in the explosion, and she still had nowhere to go.

But was it really okay to impose on him?

“Young master, you need to let go so the lady can come with me.”

“Huh?”

—

T/N: I need more scenes of Jens making a fool out of himself. The pet sardine. Sleeping on the floor with what couldn’t have been a comfortable pose. Losing the ability to speak after seeing Aira in the flower cart. Being amazed by her combat skills (you literally put her in military school, you buffoon!)