Chapter 550:
The Bear Finds That Someone Figures Out She Likes Bears
AFTER WE GOT OUT of the bath, Noa and I headed back to the room where we were staying. As we went our separate ways, I was worried about the look I’d seen on Seleiyu’s face, but I couldn’t bring myself to say anything.
“I didn’t expect her to mention what happened at the academy festival.”
“I was surprised you didn’t even react when Lord Lutum’s name was mentioned,” Noa said.
“I remembered that he was the knight captain, but his name didn’t really ring any bells.”
I’d only heard his name at the festival. Also, I hadn’t seen him since, so why would I remember his name anyway? It had already been deleted from my memory.
“Still, I didn’t think that Seleiyu would be aware of what happened back then.”
“Even with the gag order, it makes sense that word would spread that Lord Lutum dueled and was defeated by a student. Nobles have quite the grapevine when it comes to things like that.”
Right. If a knight captain who was also a noble lost to a student in a match, it’d be a popular topic for gossip.
“Oh, thanks for not telling Seleiyu it was me.”
“His Majesty was the one who issued the gag order, but Mother also warned me not to speak about it. I’m sure you don’t want others to know too. Isn’t that why you didn’t tell him your real name?”
“My real name? What do you mean?” I tilted my head to the side quizzically.
“You introduced yourself back then as Youna, didn’t you?” Noa asked.
Youna...?
The memories were starting to come back to me. I clapped my bear puppet hands together when I realized it. His Majesty had asked me my name, and I hadn’t wanted anyone to know, so I’d just elongated my name into You-na.
“Oh! Right, I kind of remember saying that. You have a good memory, Noa.”
I’d forgotten all about it.
“You just forget things too often, Yuna. I can’t believe you would forget Lord Lutum’s name after everything that happened.”
Uh. Not many people would remember the name of someone they’ve only met once, would they? Especially when I had no interest in him at all. It’s the same as not bothering to learn the names of the students in your class that you don’t care about. I couldn’t see any difference.
I felt guilty about it, but I’d only recently memorized the Fochrosé name too. I remembered how Cliff had told me off when he realized I’d never bothered learning it.
Since I was still toasty from the bath, I opened the window. It felt so nice to cool off a little bit. While we were relaxing, Seleiyu came to visit our room.
“Dinner is ready, so please make your way to the dining room.”
“I’ll just wait here as you eat, then,” I said.
“Whatever do you mean? You need to come too, Yuna.”
“But it’ll be with your family, won’t it? It’s not like I can eat with you and Noa when you’re nobles and I’m just Noa’s guard.”
Or wait, did she want me to stand behind Noa during the meal? You sometimes saw retainers standing guard at the end of the room that in manga and stuff.
“I will introduce you as Noa and Shia’s friend instead of as a guard, so you should be fine. And I believe I told you that I would like to host you both. You’re included in that as well, Yuna.”
Seleiyu offered me her hand.
“Let’s go, Yuna,” Noa said as she grabbed my hand.
I couldn’t turn them down, so I let them lead me out.
“Just so you know, I don’t know any proper dining etiquette.”
Honestly, I didn’t want to eat dinner with a noble family, but I couldn’t ignore Seleiyu’s hospitality.
“That should be fine, as long as you enjoy the food. Father isn’t particularly picky about these things. I think he’ll be happy to have dinner with such sweet kids.”
Would he really be that happy to have his dinner table full of kids?
We finished dinner and arrived back at the room.
“Yuna, the food was so very good,” Noa said.
“I was a little nervous…”
To skip straight to the end, Seleiyu’s dad was nice enough. He asked us about Shia, Cliff, and Ellelaura every once in a while, but I think that the meal went well overall. Seleiyu’s brother was there with us too. He was just a little older than Noa. He seemed surprised to see us eating with them, but he still greeted us cheerfully.
I hadn’t seen any sign of their mother, though. Maybe she was working at the castle like Ellelaura did. If Seleiyu’s mom did work in the castle, she might know about me in my bear suit, so I needed to be careful.
“It’s a little early, but should we get ready for bed soon?”
“Yes.”
Noa pulled her pajamas out of her item bag and started changing. She had a cute nightdress with white frills on it. Something like that would never look good on me.
“Are you going to change too, Yuna?”
By that, she meant whether I was going to change into that thing, didn’t she... Well, we were just going to sleep, anyway. It wasn’t like I’d be going out to see anyone after this, and I could just get changed again early in the morning.
I pulled my white bear onesie from my bear storage and got changed. I definitely felt a lot more at home in my bear clothes. As I realized I felt that way, it also occurred to me that that meant these clothes were definitely cursed.
“You look best like this, Yuna.”
“Noa, that’s not a compliment, just so you know.”
I looked at myself. I was fully dressed up as a white bear. All the commotion that day had tired me out, so I figured I’d use the white bear outfit to recharge.
“Ah, but I was trying to praise you. Maybe I’ll sleep in my bear outfit too,” Noa said as she unfurled some clothes from her item bag.