Zoemi turned around and look at girl a bit more carefully.

She had short brown hair and green eyes, which would be a dead giveaway of her being a commoner even if Zoemi would somehow miss that she doesn’t have a unique shadow on her own.

Her face looked a bit familiar, but the black-haired boy couldn’t link it to any of his memories…

…maybe it was one of the children that were kept by Edung and Boren in the slums of the capital all those years ago…?

No – that one was definitely impossible – Zoemi wasn’t a name that anyone knew him by back then simply because that name was given to him only after he got adopted by Mizoe.

”Pardon me, miss, but… do we know each other…?”

The black-haired boy furrowed his brows and asked in confusion – in the first place, the back alley wasn’t lightened up by any of the streetlamps and the only light source were the stars and the moon – which wasn’t a problem for Zoemi but certainly should be a problem for a commoner – but the girl recognized him regardless…

”Ah…! I… My name is Re… Ririe…! Ririe – I am a maid in the Banemor’s mansion – sir… lord Reo had told me about you…!”

The girl seemed to get extremely embarrassed and was stumbling over her own words, cowering more and more while stealing glances at whatever she could make out of the black-haired boy’s face in the darkness.

”…”

At first, Zoemi furrowed his brows and leaned back in confusion, fully expecting the girl to be trying to lure him into a trap…

”Sir… Lord – um, sir Benevirau rushed to the capital because you said that it is your destination, but sir Reo had stayed behind because he thought that you may actually return! He knew that you wouldn’t just leave him like that!”

The servant girl clenched her fists, getting a bit confused over how she should address the young-looking butler, but then she became all bouncy as she spoke with excitement…

…all bouncy…

”Wait – so he is in the mansion after all? And not because Benevirau had imprisoned him?”

Zoemi did his best not to look at anything other than Ririe’s face and asked cautiously.

”Imprisoned?! No! Not at all! Sir Zoemi – there has been a huge misunderstanding! Sir Benevirau isn’t a bad person! He made the carmelized apples so bitter because he got extremely nostalgic about the young lady Learen, who could never grasp a proper timing…!”

”…yeah, of course, that’s what he would say…”

Ririe took a step towards Zoemi and looked up to him with a pleading expression, but the black-haired boy looked away and sighed with a bitter face.

”Sir Zoemi…! No, I swear, it’s not like that! After you left he made ice sculptures of you and your parents and showed me… lord Reo… I mean, he showed us how he recognized you! You really are similar to them! If you had seen how sir Benevirau behaved after you disappeared, you would not doubt him either!”

The magicless girl pleaded and clung onto the boy’s arm as if to prevent him from vanishing again.

”I…”

|Dear heavens, she isn’t wearing any…!|

Zoemi opened his mouth but then a sudden realization struck him down like a lightning, causing words to get stuck in his throat.

”Ekhem… Miss Ririe. I understand that you put a lot of faith in Benevirau – but he had a lot of time to master the art of acting – are you really sure that what you witnessed wasn’t a masterful performance on his part?”

”…”

Still, it wasn’t as if he couldn’t control himself, so after clearing his throat he asked, looking seriously into the big innocent green eyes of the brown-haired magicless girl, causing her to make a pitiful expression.

”Is it okay for you to take me to Reo? I want to return with him to the capital – although that might not be the greatest idea with Benevirau going there too…”

With the silence from the girl, Zoemi ended up tilting his head and asking.

”…I… I will take you to lord Reo… but the sculptures are still in the dining room, would

you

at least take a look at them before you two leave…?”

|…! She’ either well aware about what’s she’s doing or extremely clueless about her own body…!|

Ririe ended up grabbing onto Zoemi’s hand so much that some other parts of her ended up pressing against the boy’s body, making him breathe out to keep calm.

”That depends on Reo’s reaction – I do not know you, miss Ririe, and I will not take your opinion over my friend’s.”

”Of course! Thank you, sir Zoemi!”

Zoemi ended up shrugging his shoulders and declared while looking the girl in the eyes, expecting to see any sign of annoyance flashing through, but instead, they lighted up with happiness, and the content girl ended up unintentionally rubbing herself against the black-haired boy even more.

The two of them walked back onto the main street and Zoemi was about to tell Ririe that it was okay not to stick to him that hard as no matter how hard she tries to hold him down, he would simply teleport with her – but then he noticed that her being so close wasn’t exactly meant as an attempt to persuade him to go with her.

”Eyy! Another one, lass!”

”No way – you get even half a glass more and you will piss yourself and your wife would nag me tomorrow!”

”…!”

Each time they heard the voices of the people enjoying themselves, Ririe would flinch and tighten her grip on Zoemi’s hand.

Although she was trying to appear as if the drunken guy from before trying to force himself on her didn’t affect her all that much, it was obvious that she was still afraid to some degree, so the black-haired boy just kept quiet as if he didn’t notice a thing.

”What were you even doing in that alley alone? Did that guy drag you there? Should I have not let him go?”

”…eh…? Ah…!”

Zoemi asked glancing down at the worried girl, making her flinch and look up at him in confusion before her eyes widened and she turned away blushing.

”N-no… I… I was running some last-minute chores and was using the alley as a shortcut… I was the one who walked on at him actually… And it seems that he misunderstood my intention…”

The brown-haired girl moved her left hand and patted the apron of her maid dress, pointing at the exposed pocket, before hurriedly grabbing onto the black-haired boy’s hand.

”…”

Zoemi furrowed his brows looking at it and immediately sent out a hair-like shadow towards the alley.

…the girl wore the apron inside out, and the alley was a dead end with only one way to access it – that being from the main street…

The girl was lying.

”…”

Zoemi furrowed his brows – inside apron’s exposed pockets, the girl seemed to store mana crystals, multiple green mana crystals.

If she was getting paid well enough to afford that many of them, Benevirau was certainly not holding back with the money…

The black-haired boy didn’t say anything but also ended up deciding that he certainly wasn’t going to deactivate his enchantments around her, that’s for sure.