His answer echoed in the quiet room.

The expressions of everyone, including Velmar, turned even stranger as they looked at him. Ravian shifted uncomfortably under the weight of their gaze.

Standing beside him, Adrian broke the awkwardness with his bland tone.

"Is there anything else? If not, we would like to take our leave. We are in a hurry."

Velmar hesitated, briefly glancing at the folded pages still in Ravian’s hand.

"If you don’t mind, could I take a look at that page? Of course, you are free to refuse me if you wish."

Ravian paused. The pages were useless to him since their contents were already in the Library of Mnemosyne. Still, giving them away or not wasn’t a decision he could make on his own.

He turned to Adrian, and as if understanding what Ravian was trying to ask, Adrian replied with a light nod.

Ravian turned to Velmar and held out the folded pages.

"I don’t have any use for this, so you can simply keep it, good sir. May we take our leave now?"

With his attention now on the paper, Velmar gave him a light nod.

With that, they finally walked out of the shop.

***

The young servant turned his head and glanced at his master, Velmar, who sat behind the table with a lost look on his face. He was still holding the pages he had taken from that child.

It hadn’t been more than a few moments since those children left, but he hadn’t yet come to terms with the fact that everything that chestnut-haired boy had said in front of the crowd was nothing but a lie.

’Still, Master is a person who rarely loses his composure; what could cause him to become like this?’

After a bit of hesitation, the servant walked up to him.

"Master, is something troubling you? If so, I would be happy to help."

His master turned to him but didn’t reply. Instead, he offered him the pages his master had been holding.

"You should just see for yourself, it would be easier than explaining..."

The young servant took the pages.

’What could be here that...?’

But the servant’s head also went blank as he began reading through those pages.

’W-what the-?’

The number of pages stacked together was far higher than he had expected. Not only that, but the contents written on them...

"When I saw these pages in that child’s hand," his master suddenly spoke. "I had thought they contained an overall outline of their plan. Something like fooling the crowd outside and manipulating them through guilt. While it was impressive for a child to come up with something like that, I had thought that the plan had just somehow happened to work. I realise now how wrong I was."

His master let out a heavy sigh.

The young servant may have thought that his master was exaggerating if he hadn’t seen these pages. But he could now totally agree with those words.

Every word that the chestnut-haired child had spoken from start to finish was all written on these pages, including that entire story about the sister, line by line. But that wasn’t all, there was a lot more. There were various scenarios described in the pages, as well as step-by-step guides for each of those scenarios.

So no matter which direction the situation had developed, there was a method to control it and lead it to the desired outcome.

’This... this is no longer even planning...’

The pages now looked like webs woven together to ensure that the prey simply couldn’t escape once it entered.

Suddenly, the image of those two young boys flashed in the young servant’s mind. For one of them to have written it and the other to have memorized it all...

’...Those children—just what were they?’

***

Adrian walked forward, navigating through the mildly busy streets, and Ravian followed a single step behind him.

Their steps were somewhat hurried since the sun seemed only about an hour away from setting.

As they walked, neither of them spoke or tried starting a conversation. After spending so much time together, it was clear Adrian was not the talkative kind.

Ravian, on the other hand, had a lot to say. There was a question right at the tip of his tongue that he wanted to ask Adrian. He just... couldn’t find the courage to voice it.

The silence continued until they exited the district and were almost halfway to the Ravenshade mansion. But then, the hesitation simply couldn’t hold him back, and he finally opened his mouth.

"Adrian, I have something to ask you. Can I?"

Adrian replied without even turning around.

"You can. Also, it is better for you to simply ask the question without asking permission first. After all, how can I permit you to ask or not without knowing what the question even is?"

Ravian paused.

’...He has a point.’

He took a few breaths to gather his courage and opened his mouth hesitantly.

"That stone that hit my forehead, you were the one who threw it at me, weren’t you?"

Ravian had this strange feeling from the moment he saw that stone flying towards him. The timing felt too perfect. More than that, it felt abnormal. Although he was young and somewhat ignorant, Ravian had developed a sense for things. He could know the situation without understanding it.

And that sense was telling him that although people were angry, they weren’t angry enough to throw stones at a young child. More than that, Adrian had been too confident when he talked about not dodging stones thrown at him. It was as if Adrian had been almost certain that stones would be thrown at Ravian.

All these facts combined could mean only one thing...

Ravian gulped unconsciously as he waited for an answer.

Still walking, Adrian slowly turned his head, and their eyes met.

"Do you hate me now?"

Ravian stopped in his tracks the moment he heard Adrian’s reply.

In truth, he had been feeling rather anxious. In his mind, he was almost certain that Adrian was the one who threw that stone, so he had been imagining the ways Adrian would respond.

In one scenario, Adrian had lied. In another, Adrian had tried to justify himself. In a different one, Adrian had simply remained quiet.

But no matter which scenario, Ravian hated them all, for a reason he himself didn’t quite understand.

But Adrian’s reply shattered all the pre-made scenarios in his head. Not only did Adrian not try to defend himself, but his answer also suggested that he was well aware of what was going through Ravian’s mind.

Adrian already knew that Ravian had asked that question not to clear his doubts, but to evaluate him based on his response.

’Do I hate you? Hah, how could I?’

Adrian must’ve been well aware of the consequences his actions could bring, yet he chose to go through them. And when it was time for him to face the consequences, he didn’t back away at all.

How could Ravian still hate him?

After all, this quality was exactly why Ravian had been able to open up to him and genuinely wanted the two of them to remain friends.

Still locking eyes with him, Ravian curved his lips and flashed the smile he always did. Seeing it, Adrian turned away and started walking once again.

Ravian too started walking with him. But unlike before, when he followed one step behind, the two of them now walked side by side.

As if a weight had lifted off his chest, Ravian could now think about other, less important things. Still smiling, he turned to Adrian.

"We really did save that merchant’s shop, didn’t we? Although saying ’we’ did that might not be correct since I was only following what you had made me memorize—"

"No, you’re wrong."

Cutting him off bluntly, Adrian, too, turned and locked eyes with him once again.

"Although I did make you memorize those instructions, I had never expected you to perform so well while following them. Especially the last part. Even I had started having doubts for a moment while watching you; that was simply how genuine it all looked."

Ravian was somewhat taken aback after hearing such heavy praise. It was especially meaningful because the praise came from someone like Adrian, who was blunt and unimpressed most of the time.

It took a lot from Ravian to keep his smile from widening even further as he tried to react moderately.

"Oh, no need to exaggerate it all that much, I know it wasn’t that impressive, ha ha ha."

But as he glanced at Adrian’s reaction, Ravian saw him staring back expressionlessly.

He coughed a few times.

’Ugh, looks like I overreacted to the praise, in the end. I need to shift the topic quickly.’

But nothing came to his mind, resulting in an awkward silence as they walked side by side. But after a while, a question finally came to his mind, allowing him to break the awkwardness as he opened his mouth.

"So, now that it’s all over, are you going to explain things to me? Was that merchant really in the right, or did we just help whoever paid us?"