Published: February 1, 2026
“Gilbert…! With that face, you’re Gilbert! And with that thug attitude, Gilbert! Ahahaha!”
“You’re laughing too hard, Eleven, fuh. Gill, fufufu, so the thing you were embarrassed about was that?”
“Pff-haha! Seriously? You were that against it ‘cause you were embarrassed! How much more can you get! Gilbert? Gilbert is embarrassed? Ahahahahaha!”
“He looked like he hated it to the utmost, but really he was embarrassed to the utmost. Well, being embarrassed and hating something are kind of similar but… ngh.”
Whether to cover up his laughter or to calm himself down, Lizel cleared his throat. Gill glared down at him with clear displeasure.
Just as he’d imagined. These two would absolutely laugh. They’d laugh with all they had, without a shred of mockery in it. Just laugh.
Of course, he also thought it was a pain in all kinds of ways, but if you asked what he hated most, it would be that once he met the man and his real name was known, it would be a huge hit with them. To borrow Lizel’s way of putting it, he was embarrassed.
“Come to think of it, when I showed your portrait at my place you made a hugely disgusted face too, but that was embarrassment, huh. You’ve got some cute sides after all!”
“Yeah, he was embarrassed from the bottom of his heart.”
“Shut it.”
“Big Brother is super shy…! With that face! With that face!!”
“If you don’t shut up I’ll rip that hair clean off.”
At the intimidation that leaked out, Eleven’s laughter stopped dead. His shoulders, however, were trembling slightly.
The only fortunate thing was that there were few people here. Rei’s friends had decided they didn’t want to get dragged into this and moved to another room, so the only ones present now were Lizel’s group, Rei, and the man in question.
In the now-quiet hall, the man who had frozen at the sudden outburst of laughter looked at Gill, somewhat overwhelmed.
But Gill didn’t return his gaze. He shot a dubious look at Eleven, who was still holding back laughter, as if to say that if he laughed again he really would rip his hair out.
He didn’t need to get this embarrassed over it, and yet the alias really was far too straightforward. Thinking that, Lizel looked to Rei.
“Viscount, I’m sorry, but could you introduce him to us?”
“Ah, my apologies. He is the heir of the marquess family that oversees the knights here in Parteda, currently serving as division commander and deputy head of the knight order, Lord Oldor. Lord Oldor, these three are the adventurers I invited to the party this time.”
“…Three?”
Oldor looked down at them with a dubious expression. Lizel responded with a pleasant smile.
He was a man who would likely inherit the house in the future, and yet Lizel’s impression of him was that his bearing lacked composure for that.
He was calm, but perhaps lacked confidence or felt pressed. Naturally, there would be pressure as the heir, but he didn’t seem dissatisfied with his education itself, which appeared proper enough.
In that case, the cause was obvious. All sorts of emotions could be read in the gaze he had been directing at Gill for a while now.
Just as he thought, Lizel looked back at Gill. No—there was only one thing that had been unexpected.
“Gill, you were the youngest in your family? You look after people well, so that’s actually kind of surprising.”
“I barely ever had anything to do with ‘em. Don’t have older or younger, not really.”
“Huh? What? What are you talking about? Also, youngest…!”
Unable to follow the conversation, Eleven asked while his laughter started up again. At this point everything was a trigger for him.
He was promptly silenced when Gill grabbed a handful of his snake-like supple hair. If Gill said he’d do it, he meant it.
“When did you figure it out?”
“Pretty early on. I always thought you were someone who’d received a proper education. It shows in your conduct and in the little details.”
“Ah, so that’s why you said Big Brother didn’t need any etiquette lessons. Now that you mention it, he acts rough but there’s this weird refinement to him… so that means, Big Brother is this guy’s—”