“Oh.”
Loray opened the door at 7 o’clock in the morning and saw Sophia, who had woken up early and sat on the bed, and let out a slightly surprised voice.
“Didn’t you say you were a growing child?”
“I should listen to Loray, who insists on getting 9 hours of sleep.”
“Well done. This Loray is so proud.”
Sofia looked around her room out of the corner of her eye as Loray grinned mischievously and prepared her wash. She noticed a pile of presents next to the full-length mirror. However, it seems like there are more gifts than there should be.
“Loray, that…”
“Ah, the lord of the castle and the masters sent it. And they also have a gift prepared by them.”
It was the same as always, saying it was a gift prepared by the castle lord and servants. But something stuck that shouldn’t have stuck. Young masters? Since they started keeping their distance, they have not celebrated her birthdays even once. And above all, the amount of gifts was too much. There were fifteen boxes piled up, which would have originally been three or four.
“There are too many.”
As Sophia said this with a frown on her face, Loray said while rubbing his pale cheeks with a warm wet towel.
“It looks like you had a lot of things piled up.”
“…no way.”
“The masters always prepared gifts for the young lady.”
“…”
“They haven’t sent it for a while.”
“Why…”
Suddenly. In all her lives, they never sent gifts. She hadn’t done anything different in this life than the last, but why suddenly…
Lorey, who understood Sophia’s question as to why they did not send a gift, added:
“Those guys have a lot of thoughts. They have so many worries.”
“…”
“You’ve been in a lot of pain for a while, but you seem to be okay now.”
She was sick, so she didn’t meet them because she wanted to pass it on to her. There was no way she could believe such foolish words. Sofia of the past, who knew nothing and believed everything Loray said, would have believed it, but she was not the person she was now.
“Send back all the gifts.”
There was no such thing as a desire to receive it. Gifts from people who pretended not to know her. If she had lived to educate them, it would have been a welcome gift, but now that she had given it up, those gifts were not pleasant. Only now could she take a breath to live her own life. Of course, there have been times when Benjamin and Joshua have been kind to her because of her efforts. But in the end, everyone betrayed her.
Also, since she was afraid of being tied down by those things and being betrayed and being hated, it was better not to form a relationship from the beginning.
“…yes.”
Loray looked at the gift and Sofia with sad eyes before giving an answer. She used to wish for the day when Sofia would be with the others, but it was Sofia she had to respect the most.
* * *
While the servants looked at Sofia’s clothes, Loray packed up the gifts and left her room. She left the Castle of Laucentre, where Sophia was staying, and left the gifts with the servants at the Castle of Forn, where Joshua and Benjamin were staying. It wasn’t that difficult for her to get the gifts she had sent to Sophia through their hands back to Joshua and Benjamin.
“Why are you looking so disappointed? I told you it wouldn’t work.”
When Benjamin, who was holding a gift in his arms that had been returned with its unwrapped packaging, looked depressed, Joshua, who had been stealing cookies from Benjamin’s room and eating them, coldly shot him back.
“Even if it were me, I would feel bad if people that pretended not to know me for four years suddenly sent me gifts.”
“But you sent them too.”
“I knew they would come back. But I wanted to show you.”
Joshua, who was trying his best to appear calm as he munched on another cookie, continued.
“Sophia said she wanted to see all the presents piled up.”
“I still remember that.”
“I remember everything. How could I forget? It’s about Sophia.”
“That’s amazing.”
Even though he responded like that, it was Sophia’s wish that Benjamin did not forget either.
Benjamin opened the wrapping paper and checked the letter inside.
[Happy 8th birthday to you.]
A letter that looked a little faded due to age was left with just one simple sentence.
9th, 10th, 11th. Everything was the same.
The 12th…
“I wrote this at a bit of length because I thought she might read it.”
Words of congratulations, words of asking what she liked now, words of how she was doing. He wrote it formally because he knew he couldn’t send other gifts anyway, but he had decided to send this gift, so he wrote it at a bit of length. In the end, they had returned without even being able to get into that child’s hand.
Benjamin asked Joshua as he folded the letter with a regretful heart.
“Are you sleeping well?”
“You know things are okay these days. It’s the same thing, I can’t sleep without Rocha.”
Joshua let out a short, self-deprecating laugh and pointed to the alcohol on the nightstand next to Benjamin’s bed. The same alcohol, Rocha, was in Joshua’s room. It was very high in alcohol and sweet, so it was good for helping you fall into a deep sleep without thinking about anything.
“Even things like this don’t have to be the same.”
He had distracting dreams and couldn’t sleep well. He resorted to alcohol to force himself to sleep. The face alone was the same. Benjamin shrugged his shoulders as if he was fed up with how useless most of his life was.
He walked up to the nightstand, grabbed the bottle, filled the empty glass with Rocha, and handed it to Joshua.
“A drink?”
“No, I want to drink it while I sleep. Serita told me not to drink more than two drinks a day.”
“How much do you drink on a regular basis to make him say that?”
Serita was a doctor who did not often criticize. It was surprising that she said the same thing, “Drink in moderation.” Benjamin asked in a voice full of her laughter. In response, Joshua rubbed the back of his neck as if embarrassed and opened his mouth.
“Two bottles… How much did you drink? Rosha is so delicious.”
Seeing Benjamin’s eyes looking at him like that, Joshua smiled and kept muttering that he couldn’t help it. The night was beautiful, his head was dizzy, and the alcohol was delicious, but if he couldn’t get enough of one or two drinks, was he human?
“I really can’t help it. It’s a habit. I couldn’t sleep if I didn’t drink more than two bottles.”
“Well, you don’t get drunk easily.”
“Right. You might be able to sleep well with just one drink, but not me.”
Fortunately, even before Serita warned him, he almost stopped tossing and turning at night.
If his condition had been so bad that his abstinence from drinking had expired, he would have been up for days on end begging Serita to please give him a drink. Benjamin smiled bitterly and brought the glass he had originally intended to give to Joshua closer to his mouth. A satisfying sweet taste along with a sweet scent passed down my throat. He drank a glass of this last night too. Oh, come to think of it.
“How did Sophia know about that spire?”
“I’m curious about that too. I don’t think Loray would have told her.”
Last night, while he was drinking his usual glass of Rocha, he saw Sophia heading towards the spire with a lantern in her hand. The spire was close to Forn Castle where they were, so the road leading to the spire was clearly visible from the room. He purposely stayed in the room with the best view of the spire, and more than anything, I couldn’t ignore the lantern light.
He could see someone walking down the road where nothing could be seen because of the light, and the extremely small figure from behind belonged to someone they couldn’t have known. Benjamin, who found Sophia through the window, found Joshua just downstairs, and Joshua, who also saw Sophia in his room, went to look for Benjamin upstairs and ran into him at the middle staircase.
‘Sophia, did you see her too?’
‘Uh. Since you saw her, you go and get the lantern. I just light a candle using the candle in the hallway.’
Following Joshua’s words, Benjamin prepared a lantern and headed to the spire with him. Since the area around the spire was a forest, he had no idea what wild animals might be living there. Because of that, a hunting competition was held every year at the Olavi Festival, and without fear, the young one went there alone. At first, he didn’t know that Sophia’s destination was the spire. Sophia would not have known of the existence of the spire itself. But the child stopped in front of the steeple and placed a flower in front of it.
Blue rose. The same flowers as the ones they brought in the morning. Sophia shouldn’t have known. The truth about Chase’s death, the existence of the spire, and the meaning of putting that flower down on the spire.
But the kid knew everything.
‘She said she was sorry. What on earth did Sophia do to apologize like that?’
‘Turn off the lantern and be quiet, Josh. We’ll get caught.’
‘Benji, I don’t know what happened to this situation. Why does Sophia know everything that happened that day and is apologizing?’
‘Josh, calm down first…’
‘What did Sophia do…?!’
The bushes they were hiding in shook greatly due to the gestures that grew along with the intensified emotions, and at the same time, Sophia, who felt the presence of others, turned her head towards them. Benjamin quickly covered Joshua’s mouth and examined the situation. He thought about making a cat noise, but luckily the wind blew at just the right time.
There was an order from his father forbidding him from meeting Sophia, and he couldn’t show himself in this situation, so from then on he desperately hid, covering Joshua’s mouth.
‘…I wish I could die.’
With those last words, Sophia left the spire. It was surprising and unknown enough that she knew things she shouldn’t know, but what stayed in his mind more than anything was those words.
—————————————————————
Translator Note:
Hello there! This is RJR. I hope you liked it <3
If you like my work please support me with Ko-fi or Patreon. Next post will be released on May, 18.
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