‘Right! This is it…!’
A slightly open door.
Yuri secretly peered through the gap, her body trembling with excitement.
Yesterday, she was so disappointed watching Aslan Vermont mediate between the two.
What she wanted to see was Charlotte and Julia awkwardly clash and naturally reconcile—not just the formal ending of the fight with a single word from Aslan saying “reconcile!”
She thought she would never get to see the natural reconciliation between Charlotte and Julia again.
But after running ten laps around the field and coming back, an exciting scene was unfolding inside the room.
‘If you combine cute things with cute things, it becomes infinitely cute… Heeheehee…’
As expected, Charlotte!
Yuri had predicted this from the moment Charlotte invaded Julia’s bed due to her bad sleeping habits.
Even beyond her expectations, the distance between them was so close that Yuri felt her heart pounding wildly.
Charlotte and Julia were so close, almost touching.
Just a slight movement and their bodies would collide.
This was a scene that must be etched into her mind.
Yuri drooled and, not blinking once, stared intently at the inside of the room.
“Even if we do argue, it’s okay. I’ll approach you again and again. So, don’t worry.”
“Th, that is… So… It seems like Charlotte is always the first to approach or ease the atmosphere… I just want to gather the courage to do this…”
Wait, is Julia saying this!?
Yuri’s eyes trembled in shock.
Julia, who was introverted and timid, said something like that!?
Isn’t this basically a confession!?
Ah! It’s so sweet!
This is truly unbearable!
Yuri wiped the drool from her chin at that moment.
“Ughh! What should I do!? Isn’t Julia just too cute!?”
“Ugh… I… I can’t breathe, Charlotte…”
“Ah. Sorry.”
Wow. They’re hugging like that?
At Charlotte’s sudden move, Yuri’s brain came to a complete halt.
Unable to handle such a huge stimulus, her brain stopped working.
As a result of the overload, her nosebleed erupted.
“Haah…”
“…?”
“…?”
Just when Yuri was swallowing, surprised by the sudden nosebleed.
A loud sigh echoed, like she was about to pass out.
Adding to the chaos, Yuri’s hand moved forward, and the door swung open wide.
In an instant, Charlotte and Julia’s gazes turned toward her.
Ah. She made a sound.
“Ah.”
“Mm?”
“Huh?”
In that moment, Yuri realized that a nosebleed wasn’t the most important thing.
She had no mask.
In her carelessness, she had come here without wearing it!!!
“Ah, hey? Yuri…?”
“…!?”
She just called me Yuri, right?
She didn’t call me by mistake, did she?
Yuri quickly turned her back and tried to hide her face.
But, stupidly, she stood frozen, and the time she exposed her face was more than three seconds, so there was no way they wouldn’t have noticed.
Ah, am I really that stupid?
I had quietly infiltrated the Vermont estate, planning to remain anonymous and uncover Aslan Vermont’s true face.
But after being intoxicated by the sight of Charlotte and Julia playfully hugging and rolling around, my true identity was exposed on the second day.
A disastrous consequence brought about by a moment of carelessness.
Regret came flooding in, but it was already too late.
‘What should I do? Should I just insist it’s not me?’
There were plenty of choices.
She could escape right now.
She could deny being Yuri.
She could make up some ridiculous excuse, like saying this was an experiment to test reactions by showing her friend’s face.
But would that even matter?
Wasn’t it just a futile attempt to cover up the truth?
If she insisted she wasn’t Yuri, Charlotte and Julia would probably pretend not to notice her identity.
They were such kind-hearted people that they would likely do that.
But would that really be beneficial?
‘I should just tell the truth…’
Yuri made up her mind and closed her eyes tightly.
The reason she had hidden her identity from Charlotte and Julia until now was to prevent Aslan Vermont from finding out about their relationship, to completely eliminate the possibility of him discovering it.
But now it was too late.
Even if Charlotte and Julia pretended not to know her, if they made it obvious, Aslan Vermont would find out anyway.
Since this has happened, I might as well just reveal it to Charlotte and Julia.
I’ve held it in for so long.
I’ve been suppressing my desire to chat with Julia and play around with Charlotte.
I’ve been watching them from so close, and now it’s time to reveal everything.
Yuri gathered her courage and turned around.
“J-Julia! What do you do if you call someone by the wrong name?”
“Ah? Ahh! Right! It was Yuria, not Yuri. Yeah, yeah, Yuria.”
“I’m actually Yuri…!”
“…”
“…”
While Charlotte and Julia awkwardly pretended not to notice, Yuri came out, and for a moment, silence filled the room.
Ah. So this is when it comes out?
Charlotte and Julia, embarrassed, scratched the back of their heads.
They began pretending to be surprised, glancing at each other.
“Wow! Waaah! So Yuria was actually Yuri?”
“I… I really didn’t know… I’m so surprised… I hadn’t heard from Yuri, and then to see her show up like this… Wow…”
“…Are you really sure you didn’t know?”
“…?”
“…?”
Under Yuri’s suspicious gaze, Charlotte and Julia’s eyes drifted away.
They had the look of people who weren’t being honest.
Yuri was once again shocked, her mouth hanging open.
“Wait. So you’ve known it was me all along? Since when…?”
“Hmm? When did we know…? Oh, right! The day Yuri showed up wearing a mask! We figured it out when we were heading north!”
“Then you found out as soon as I disguised myself…!”
“Not immediately. Actually, that evening, when you briefly took off your mask, I peeked and saw it…”
“Just a few hours apart…!!!”
So what have I been doing all this time!?
I’ve been wearing a mask, distorting my voice, acting aloof, and making a fuss in front of kids who already knew my identity!?
Yuri sank down in disbelief.
“Hah… Ahahaha… Ughuhuh… Ahhahahaha…”
“…?”
Yuri suddenly burst into laughter, and Charlotte and Julia were left bewildered.
Has she completely lost it?
With a clear nosebleed still on her face, Yuri was laughing like crazy, and they couldn’t help but feel concerned.
“Yuri, are you okay? Your efforts weren’t in vain, you know…!”
“No, no… It’s just so funny. Ah, it was so simple. I just needed a tiny bit of courage to take one step forward. If I had done that, I could’ve skipped all the heartache and faced you guys sooner… I couldn’t summon that small amount of courage, and now here I am. And if I hadn’t made the mistake of forgetting my mask today, I would’ve been doing this foolishness for even longer.”
Wiping away a tear, Yuri chuckled to herself.
What was I so afraid of all this time?
Charlotte and Julia had already figured it out.
Why was I desperately trying to hide it?
But that feeling of regret and self-doubt lasted only a moment.
Yuri felt a far greater sense of freedom, and her tight chest felt like it was finally opening up.
Now, I don’t have to wear that uncomfortable mask anymore.
I don’t have to pretend not to know Charlotte and Julia.
I don’t have to suppress my desire to jump into the sweet moments between Charlotte and Julia.
As those thoughts started to surface, Yuri felt overwhelmed with emotion, her chest swelling with joy.
‘Charlotte and Julia knew from the beginning. And even though they knew, they didn’t reveal it to Aslan Vermont, so I’ll be fine from now on.’
In the end, the sense of danger that hiding my identity from Aslan was impossible if Charlotte and Julia found out was proven to be an illusion.
It didn’t matter.
It was fine to reveal it.
It was a bit unfortunate that I didn’t know this from the start, but now that I do, I’m just happy that I no longer have to suffer the hardship of hiding my identity in front of my friends.
“Ah. That feels so freeing! But why did you act like you didn’t know it was me even though you did?”
“Oh, well…”
“We thought there was a serious reason why you were sneaking around like this!”
“Yeah. We thought there was some important reason we shouldn’t know your identity…”
“Ah. There’s no such reason…”
Yuri slapped her forehead and laughed again.
They thought I had some deep reason for doing this.
But in reality, I was just doing something foolish.
Now that everything was revealed, she felt an overwhelming sense of emptiness and exhaustion.
“We should’ve had the courage to show we noticed… ”
“Still, it’s so good to see you like this again! It’s been so long since the three of us got together like this!”
“Yuri, how have you been? I’m so curious!”
“Well, I…”
Yuri grabbed Julia’s hand,
and with Charlotte crossing her arms, she began to recount what had happened over the past time.
With the determination to reunite with them, she went to the Imperial Magic Academy, bearing a sense of anger.
There, she met valuable connections and was specially admitted.
Through those connections, she managed to join Vermont Security, among other things…
Yuri spoke of everything she had been through, the things she couldn’t tell anyone, even the tough experiences she couldn’t share with Mr. Black.
The only people she could talk to so openly were Charlotte and Julia.
As Yuri’s long story was nearing its end, Charlotte and Julia exchanged glances, both of them thinking the same thing.
‘Mr. Black… he’s really suspicious…’
The mysterious benefactor, the “Mr. Black” who kept showing up in Yuri’s story…
No matter how they looked at it, something seemed off.
Could he be some kind of shadowy figure trying to use Yuri…?
