The oldest brother of the four Leadon siblings, Yohia, had been taking care of the work he’d brought home in his parents’ study. His younger sister, Sharla, was paying him a visit, so she became his conversation partner as he took a break.
They’d always gotten along. However, there were limits. Yohia’s nature made it so he was standoffish to everyone, and Sharla had an avid independent spirit. As a result, he had few memories of his sister coming over like she was now, just to hang out because she had nothing to do.
As for why she frequently showed up these days, that was probably because...
She’s probably lonely too since Zen’s gone, Yohia’s analysis had concluded.
In that case, well, Sharla was a mother of two, so he felt she could just spend more time with her kids, but Zen was different, he supposed. She probably had an unnamed desire that could only be fulfilled by talking with her siblings.
Sharla rudely parked her shapely butt on the edge of Yohia’s desk as he had his work spread across it. “Can you believe it, Yohia? After he sent back that assassin of the Vajra Temple, now he’s exposed a prefectural governor’s treason and has sent him to the imperial capital too. Oh, I don’t know if Zen wants to act like he’s a big shot or a normal guy! You feel the same way, right?”
Even now, she talked about Zen every time she opened her mouth. No, she might’ve just wanted to talk about him with someone that badly.
“No matter where Zen goes or what he does, he’ll always get the job done. I am surprised that he exposed Baron’s scheme and prevented it right away, though.” Yohia, who considered himself an indifferent person, humored his sister’s feelings. Or it might be that he couldn’t help wanting to talk to someone else about Zen too. However, Yohia was an even bigger workaholic than Zen, so talking about his little brother always went in a pragmatic direction. “I think it was the right call to shelter the imperial princess in Cylin. And sending Zen there too was like killing two birds with one stone. It’s all thanks to your keen insight.”
“It was just a guess.” Sharla frowned. She wasn’t looking for flattery since she wasn’t terribly attached to him the way she used to be.
However, that hadn’t been his intention at all. “It’s already been around seven years since you first identified Baron as a threat. You said they might attack the empire soon.”
“That’s just the hunch I got after reading over so many reports from the Imperial Guard. I couldn’t explain my reasoning, and nobody but you would have believed me like that, so it’s nothing to brag about.”
His younger sister had always had a strangely sharp intuition. On top of that, she had the brains to verbalize and turn that intuition of hers into theories whenever possible. However, for times she couldn’t, she also was daring and pragmatic enough to move based off of those hunches.
While Yohia didn’t believe that his thinking skills necessarily paled in comparison, when you took intuition into account, there were times he felt useless, wondering whose brain the empire actually needed.
So Yohia said, “Boast as much as you want, Sharla. After seven years, you’ve proven in the end just how crafty Baron’s territorial treachery toward the empire is.”
“Thanks to our youngest brother!” Sharla freely smacked Yohia’s shoulder as if to say she was way prouder of Zen than herself and that she wanted to share this delight.
Then she poked his forehead. “And if you’re going to talk about bragging rights, I think you have that right too. You were the one who heard out my uncertain anxieties and suggested we move Zen to the Baron Ambassador Bureau. You were also the one who proposed sending Her Highness Elysia to Cylin with him. Those strategies both paid off and led to Stoga’s arrest today. Oh, your planning and conceptual abilities are so admirable! I wouldn’t have been able to make it happen by myself. I would’ve just fretted endlessly about the risks,” she praised him. She must have been in particularly good spirits today.
Yohia had had no idea she looked at him that way. We greedily yearn for something we don’t have. Or maybe our family is stable thanks to how we complement each other. Yohia, who seldom smiled, couldn’t help a bitter quirk of his lips.
However, he said, “I want Zen to remain in Cylin as a preventative measure against Baron.”
“Yeah. He suits being worked to the bone like a donkey.”
The two siblings could make fun of Zen because they loved their brother. No matter how strategic they were, there were limits to how much they could keep Baron, far from the imperial capital as it was, and its schemes in check. It was reassuring to have Zen there in their stead.