The news of Kisa and Seiard’s engagement shook the capital, no, the entire kingdom from the very next day after the charity banquet.

Kisa couldn’t hide her inner surprise when she saw the article about herself splashed across the front page of the newspaper. Although she had steeled herself, the scale of the repercussions far exceeded her expectations.

It was incomparable to Kisa’s recent broken engagement with Daniel.

While the broken engagement with Daniel was merely a common piece of gossip that piqued people’s interest for about three days before subsiding, the engagement with Seiard was like a bomb that would ignite public opinion for over a month.

This was partly due to the great prestige that the grand noble House of Hillan held in the Sorby Kingdom, and partly because Seiard’s very existence was so dramatic.

Born as the younger of twins, he was the unfortunate one who had to give up everything to his brother who came into the world just a moment earlier, and was confined, though not officially, to a monastery.

Of course, for the sake of the ducal family’s face, they would have transferred some assets to ensure he could live comfortably in the monastery and made various accommodations, but compared to the total assets owned by the Hillan family, it would have been almost nothing.

Moreover, the story that the family’s kindness was premised on Seiard staying in the designated monastery had spread quite openly in social circles.

‘Should this be called heartless, or thoroughly meticulous?’

In any case, from Seiard’s perspective, if he wanted to leave the monastery, he would have had to give up even the little he had.

That’s not all. Would those who so coldly excluded him from the family really have withdrawn their interest if he gave up what he had and left the monastery?

Moreover, as he was the only brother of the future head of the family, the moment he rejected the fate given to him, he was in a position to be easily misunderstood as targeting the family.

It was truly a dire situation. What could a young man who had been sent to a monastery before even reaching puberty and grown up isolated from society do in such a situation?

The unfortunate one of the Hillan ducal family, who had been a frequent topic of conversation from birth until the moment he was expelled, was thus forgotten.

Most people expected that Seiard Hillan would stay in the monastery until his death, and even after death, would be buried in the common cemetery next to the monastery.

Until four months ago, when Bisherck Hillan died in a fire accident, as if by a twist of fate.

The family’s lucky one and unlucky one had switched places overnight.

Bisherck was only engaged to the princess and unmarried without children, so Seiard was his primary heir.

The royal family must have been terribly upset. Bisherck and the princess were expected to marry within a year or two.

If Bisherck’s life had been just a little longer and he had died after marrying the princess, his property would have been inherited by the child they might have had, and the Hillan family would have been likely to fall entirely into the hands of the royal family.

From that perspective, time had sided with Seiard. So had the era.

I heard that several of Seiard’s collateral relatives opposed him succeeding as the head of the family, and some of them even filed lawsuits.

Of course, there was no way the trial would result in their victory.

While in the old days, influenced by the legend of twins, the younger of twins was not guaranteed any rights, the current inheritance law made no distinction between twins or whatever.

The problem was that people’s perceptions hadn’t caught up, but the outdated system bound by superstition had long been abolished.

It was a thousand blessings that Seiard wasn’t born several decades ago.

Anyway, after tying up the controversies related to inheritance, he succeeded to the title.

It was a natural result that public attention was focused on the new Duke of Hillan, who had an unusual background and made a clamorous start.

Moreover, he showed eccentric behavior such as choosing the opera house as the first public place to reveal himself and spending money like water.

While many were secretly expecting what surprising move he would show next, yesterday’s event broke out. The announcement of his engagement to Kisa.

‘It’s not unreasonable for the reaction to explode…’

According to what the servants of Vanspelt had told her, for the past few days, no matter where you went, be it the streets, markets, or restaurants, you could see people enthusiastically talking about the engagement of the two.

If even the commoners, who are relatively less interested in social affairs due to their busy lives, were like this, what about the nobles?

It was then. Knock, knock, knock, a cheerful knocking sound echoed in Kisa’s room.

“Come in.”

As permission was granted, the nanny entered the room with a basket in her arms.

“Miss! Another batch of letters has arrived!”

As she poured the contents of the basket onto the desk, new letters tumbled down on top of the already piled-up letters.

“Ah, I don’t know anymore.”

Kisa turned away from the mountain of letters with a disgusted face.

“Do they all just eat and write letters?”

As Kisa muttered a complaint to herself, the nanny patted her back as if to comfort her.

“Don’t be too upset. It’s proof that you’re engaged to such a great person.”

The nanny had been in such a good mood that she had been humming from time to time recently. The cause, of course, was Kisa’s engagement.

The servants of Vanspelt learned about their young mistress’s engagement the day after Count Habertz’s charity banquet.

“Oh, oh, oh, Miss! This article in the newspaper! Is this true? Are you really getting engaged to that Duke Hillan?”

The nanny, who had come running with the morning newspaper with her mouth wide open at the crack of dawn, pressed Kisa. And when Kisa answered that it was true, she jumped up and down with joy.

“Oh my! Why did you tell me this important news only now! Anyway, it’s a joyous occasion! Congratulations, Miss!”

The nanny, who had been lamenting until just the day before about where they could find a groom like Daniel, praised Seiard as if she had turned her palm over.

“It says here that he fell for you at first sight at the opera house. Well, how beautiful our Miss is. Oh my, did he really come to the Count himself and earnestly ask to marry you? How romantic!”

“Yeah, well, something like that.”

“Wait a minute. That means he came to our mansion… Oh my goodness! Was the handsome gentleman who came several times the Duke?”

The nanny, who had only heard about it from other servants and hadn’t seen Seiard directly, couldn’t hide her disappointment as she rummaged through the newspaper for a long time.

After the engagement announcement, the newspapers were decorated day after day with bits of information that Seiard had leaked little by little.

Naturally, of course, it wasn’t the plain truth, but information that had been edited or even newly created by his hand.

Seiard, who fell in love at first sight with Kisa by chance at the opera house, finally received permission to marry after passionate courtship.

This fictional story, which had also been presented to Count Vanspelt before, was transmitted to many people through newspapers and became the truth as it was repeatedly discussed.

Ah, needless to say, the timing of Seiard’s first visit to the Vanspelt mansion was changed. To after the broken engagement with Daniel.

To a journalist’s sharp question about whether it was related to the two’s broken engagement, Seiard shamelessly answered like this, they say.

That although he felt intense love the moment he first saw Kisa, he tried to give up because she already had a fiancé. So when she coincidentally broke off her engagement, he felt like cheering.

To be frank, it seemed that almost no one believed those words at face value. Especially those who had doubted Kisa’s broken engagement from the beginning, knowing Count Vanspelt’s tendencies.

Although they couldn’t speak out openly due to lack of evidence, it seemed everyone thought Duke Hillan was the culprit behind the broken engagement.

Paradoxically, as the perception that he had stolen someone else’s fiancée grew, the public’s reaction towards Kisa became more favorable.

In fact, in the early days when only the fact that the two would soon be engaged was known, there were quite a few people who quietly criticized Kisa.

The reason was that she dared to snatch away someone who was to be engaged to the precious youngest princess.

Fortunately or unfortunately, such reactions quickly subsided as more information was released.

After all, if the great Duke of Hillan wanted it and it was beneficial to the family, how could a mere count’s daughter resist?

In some quarters, there were also quibbles that Kisa might have seduced him first, but Seiard had shown such a profligate behavior so far that suspicion fell more on him than on Kisa, who had lived quietly.

Kisa wondered if he might have shown such an unfitting image all this time in anticipation of this situation.

If that was really the case, it was grateful, but not something she could just be grateful for.

She felt concerned that Seiard was being criticized by people who didn’t even know him well.

He was really a good person.

But then, with a knock, Richard, the Count’s secretary, visited Kisa’s room.

“Excuse me. Someone has come wanting to meet you, Miss.”

Seeing his subtle expression, Kisa tilted her head.

“Is it Duke Hillan?”

“It’s not the Duke.”

If not, then there’s no one special who should be coming? Due to the many people wanting to visit with the purpose of digging up information about the two’s engagement, Vanspelt had decided not to receive most guests for the time being.

Richard, who sighed deeply, scratched his head.

“To be honest, I was very hesitant about whether I should inform you about this person’s visit. But with the Count away from the mansion on other business, it didn’t seem right to handle it on my own…”

“Just who is this guest that you’re like this?”

“Well, it’s…”

Hearing his next words, Kisa couldn’t help but stiffen her expression.

Then, after being lost in thought for a moment, she answered that she would meet this surprising visitor.

A little later, Kisa faced a woman in the mansion’s reception room.

“What business do you have here? Your name was… Hazel, correct?”

To Kisa’s question, Hazel Turdy, the owner of the Willow Teahouse and Daniel’s woman, opened her mouth.

With a desperately pleading face.

“Please, Lady Vanspelt.”

“Please reconcile with Daniel.”