Upon hearing that, Isabella bowed her head to check the state of her dress. Indeed, a deep pink strap was sticking out beside the deeply cut pure white organdy dress. It was Isabella’s ‘bra’ fixing strap.

“Oh my!”

Isabella’s face turned bright red. Julia de Baldezar was someone Isabella treated as a close friend, so they had shared a few secret stories. Among them was the story of the ‘bra’.

She had suggested trying it once because some great stuff had come from the Moor Empire. Julia had dismissed it with a snort, but Camellia had promised to purchase it with cheers.

In the end, she didn’t take a picture. Isabella thought that she had become closer to Julia at that time.

‘I trusted her, and this… She stabbed me in the back?!’

As Isabella’s face turned red, Julia de Baldezar left the powder room where the girls had gathered without looking back.

Upon this, several girls looked at each other, got up from their seats, and followed Julia out of the powder room. The number of girls who left was four or five, which was not half, but more than a third.

“Yoyou, traitors…!”

Isabella’s anger pierced the sky.

Lady Camellia de Castilione looked around nervously, and the remaining girls began to insult Ariadne and the ones who left even louder in order to suppress their anxiety.

Julia de Baldezar, who had left her seat, headed for the central banquet hall. There was Ariadne, who was surrounded by middleaged ladies and having a conversation.

Julia approached Ariadne and offered a straightforward greeting.

“I’m Julia, the eldest daughter of Duke Baldezar.”

“Lady Julia…!”

Taken aback by the sudden greeting from an unexpected person, Ariadne reciprocated the greeting.

“I’ve heard a lot about you.”

Julia glanced at the powder room where Isabella’s group was gathered and murmured to herself.

‘Well, there were no nutritious stories.’

The lady of Baldezar just said what she wanted to say.

“I hope we can get along well. I look forward to it.”

Ariadne didn’t have many female friends in her previous life.

Because she had climbed to a very high position too quickly, and because she didn’t behave very well, she had no one around her except for jealous people and those who tried to take advantage of her.

So, she was really happy when a peer girl friend like Julia, who had nothing to gain from her, approached her first.

“I’ve also heard a lot about the reputation of Lady Baldezar. I’m honored to meet you.”

Gladly greeting Julia de Baldezar and shaking hands with her, Ariadne hesitated for a moment and then added one more sentence.

“Thank you for your kindness.”

It could be a ridiculous modesty that means ‘thank you for greeting me’, but she knew what it meant for those girls, who were friends of Isabella, to criticize her right now.

Several young ladies who had followed Julia from the powder room surrounded Ariadne and continued to chatter in unison.

Julia, who had greeted them, casually tossed out an invitation as if it was nothing special.

“Oh, it’s not confirmed yet, but we’re thinking of having a tea party at our house next week. It’s nothing big, just a few close friends gathering. Would you be able to grace us with your presence?”

A light of joy, perhaps more radiant than when she received her father’s approval or when men approached her, shone on Ariadne’s face.

Being invited to a girls’ tea party was a first in her life! And it was not just receiving an invitation to a confirmed tea party, but being asked from the planning stage if she would come. It felt as though she had made real friends.

Ariadne smiled brightly.

“Of course, Lady Baldesar. I will be looking forward to it.”

From that point on, Ariadne’s debutante ball went as smoothly as could be.

Count Cesare, who had shared the first waltz with Ariadne as the King’s envoy, excused himself early, regretfully mentioning an important appointment he had prearranged.

However, Prince Alfonso stayed until late afternoon, attending to all his engagements before bidding farewell to Ariadne.

Alfonso seemed to have an intuition. He held onto Ariadne, reminding her that they might not be able to meet for a while, and earnestly asked her to take care of herself and await his letter.

After seeing off Alfonso, who couldn’t help but show his regret, a long day finally ended.

Then it was time to balance the books for the debutante ball. Ariadne returned 12 ducats out of the 150 allocated by Cardinal de Mare to her father.

“Did you really have this much left?”

Cardinal de Mare could not hide his surprise. This was the first time in 22 years, since he started providing for his wife Lucrezia in 1100, that some of the living expenses he had given someone had been returned to him.

“You must have been short, weren’t you?”

Cardinal de Mare had thought that if she was frugal, 300 ducats, and if she prepared lavishly, 500 ducats would be necessary. He had only given Ariadne half of what he considered an adequate budget, which was 150 ducats.

Yet she had saved money! As he had been supporting his extravagant wife and children, this was simply amazing.

The secret was in her daring omissions. What Ariadne had omitted in preparing for this debutante ball was not just the ‘storytelling tapestry’.

Ariadne, who had driven the kitchen staff crazy by not deciding on the menu until just before the ball, asked the kitchen staff a week before the event to check the farms she listed and see if there was any overproduction that couldn’t be controlled, and to buy the ingredients there.

“Wait, you want me to go and check the ingredients without even deciding on the menu?”

Despite the instruction that defied common sense, the kitchen staff faithfully checked all the places and came back.

When they went around the farms, most of them refused to supply in large quantities outside of their regular customers at the last minute, but one farm that was raising black pigs was eager to sell their stock at a very low price because a contract was cancelled at the last minute.

“Miss, did you know?”

When Sancho, surprised and with wide eyes, asked Ariadne after completing the contract at the farm, Ariadne responded as always.

“How could I have known in advance whether or not a contract at a pig farm would be cancelled, even if I came from the future.”

It was just a very common occurrence. Ariadne, who had been managing the domestic affairs of the Etruscan Royal Palace for nine years, was an expert in this type of purchasing method.

While it couldn’t be applied to gigantic events like state functions that sweep up all the products of a region, it was quite effective when organizing midscale events.

Ariadne’s methods of controlling various event expenses were endless. Ariadne, who had neatly sorted out her accounts, handed over the doubleentry bookkeeping to Cardinal de Mare.

“Yes, Father. It was possible because I was frugal. Here is the detailed account.”

Cardinal de Mare’s eyes widened once again when his young daughter, who had been raised only inside the house, to be exact, on the farm of the Bergamo estate, presented him with the doubleentry bookkeeping that was currently all the rage among the merchants of the Porto Republic.

It was doubleentry bookkeeping that he had recently learned to read due to an absolute shock.

“Where did you learn this again?”

“I saw a book I found in Father’s library―”

His daughter was undoubtedly a genius. Cardinal de Mare, flipping through the ledger, confirmed that the calculations were exact.

Even the loss that would have been incurred by cutting down the white poplar shrubs of the Bergamo estate was recorded in the ledger. He shook his head and called out to the maid next to him.

“Bring Lady Lucrezia to this room immediately.”