Being Loved for the First Time Chapter 26

“Oh! Really? But we’re terribly curious about the young ladies’ adventure too.”

My sister’s personal maid spoke gently, trying to persuade her.

As expected of someone who was always by her side, she seemed to know exactly how to approach my sister.

Indeed, my sister’s eyes wavered for a moment.

But she quickly squeezed my hand tightly and shook her head with renewed determination.

“Nooo. Today Lara and Shasha have to explore all by ourselves.”

“Why? Are you going to search for treasure?”

This time, one of my sister’s guards spoke up.

My sister immediately placed a finger against her lips.

“Shhh!”

Then she announced that she had no intention of telling them.

“It’s a secret! What happens today is just our secret!”

“Oh… But if we don’t go along, we won’t be able to bring you your snacks.”

“Th-that…”

My sister’s maid tried tempting her again.

My sister, who had always been weak when it came to food, hesitated once more.

Nevertheless, she seemed to make another firm decision and shook her head resolutely.

“It’s okay! They said adventurers sometimes get hungry! Lara… Lara’s the big sister, so I can endure it.”

The expression on my sister’s face suggested that she was exercising an extraordinary amount of patience.

Everyone around us struggled to suppress their laughter.

Even I thought my sister looked ridiculously adorable at that moment.

Ah, I wanted to take out a camera and capture it.

‘It’s a shame I’m still pretending to be an ordinary baby at times like this.’

Childhood memories should be properly preserved, every single one of them.

‘Hmm. Perhaps I should summon a camera sometime soon and disguise it as something I can reasonably explain.’

If I made it look like one of the marbles I played with, most people probably wouldn’t notice.

Although Mikhail was still a concern.

‘He even recognized Choco.’

Because of that, I couldn’t freely summon Choco whenever Mikhail visited the mansion.

I could only see him briefly in the early morning or just before falling asleep.

Naturally, my puppy was sulking.

‘Whiiine! Choco wants to stay beside the Demon King all the time! Can’t you tell that young lord to go away? Demon King, you think Choco is the cutest, right? If you give Choco the order, I’ll make sure he can’t come near you anymore! Yip!’

Of course, I’d refused Choco’s enthusiastic suggestion.

No matter how irritating Mikhail was, he was my brother’s best friend and a child my parents had agreed to look after.

How could I do something like that?

Besides, Choco’s definition of “making sure he couldn’t come near me” was by no means a gentle method.

At least in this life, I had absolutely no desire to star in a tragedy, horror story, or blockbuster.

In any case, the maids and knights spent several more minutes trying to convince my sister.

But she was unexpectedly stubborn.

“Nooo! No matter what you say, the answer’s no!”

My sister turned her head away with an indignant huff.

Then she looked at me.

“Shasha likes it better when it’s just us two too, right?”

“U-uh-huh!”

There was such unusual force behind her question that I answered immediately.

Somehow, I felt she would be hurt if I said no.

“Then let’s go, Shasha!”

With those words, my sister put on the deer-shaped bag she’d prepared in advance and firmly took my hand.

The bag looked quite full.

Apparently, her maid had already packed some snacks inside.

As I held my sister’s hand and walked out of the room, a thought occurred to me.

My sister really had no idea.

Behind us, several presences began moving stealthily.

There was absolutely no chance of the two of us exploring this mansion completely alone.

I could only hope the group following us wouldn’t grow any larger.

And so I set out to explore the mansion with my sister.

For three days after deciding to rescue the lovely Princess Anastasia from the Demon King Mikhail, Laurencia had devoted considerable effort to preparing this adventure.

‘Lara’s the hero!’

Laurencia loved fairy tales in which brave heroes rescued princesses kidnapped by Demon Kings.

Of course, Laurencia had always wanted to be the princess herself—because the dresses in the illustrations were adorable.

But for Anastasia’s sake, she was more than willing to become the hero.

‘I can give Shasha anything! Because I’m the big sister!’

Her picture books said that wonderful older sisters shared things with their younger siblings and got along well with them.

Laurencia desperately wanted to become a wonderful older sister to Anastasia.

That way, Anastasia would like her even more.

‘I hope Shasha tells me Sister is amazing.’

Laurencia grinned happily as she gradually filled her favorite deer-shaped bag with cookies she’d requested from the head chef.

On the day she’d decided to carry out her little sister’s rescue mission, she was surprised to discover that her deer bag was stuffed full.

‘Maybe the fairies helped me because Lara loves her little sister so much!’

That had to be it.

After all, heroes in fairy tales often received special gifts from wonderful fairy godmothers.

‘As expected, Lara has to rescue Shasha!’

In reality, her personal maid had prepared everything for Laurencia, who had been singing about going on an adventure for three days.

Laurencia had also spent her precious nap time scouting the places inside the mansion that she intended to explore.

‘Our Shasha is still a baby, so her legs will hurt if she walks too long.’

Her sister was still so very small that whenever Laurencia took one step, Anastasia had to take one and a half quick little steps to keep up.

Laurencia still remembered an incident several months earlier when she’d caused Anastasia to fall because she hadn’t realized how small her little sister was.

‘Lara… Lara didn’t do it on purpose…’

When Anastasia fell forward, Laurencia had been so startled that she’d immediately tried to explain herself.

Neither Father nor Mother had scolded her.

‘We know that, my daughter. But Anastasia is still a baby, so she’s small. You need to walk a little more slowly. Our second daughter can do that, can’t she?’

Laurencia had never forgotten Mother’s words.

Ever since that day, whenever she held her little sister’s hand while walking, she moved very, very slowly.

She didn’t want Anastasia to fall with a bang again.

‘Shasha scraped her knee that day, but she didn’t even cry.’

Her sweet younger sister had actually approached the frightened Laurencia and gently patted her shoulder.

She hadn’t looked hurt.

She hadn’t cried.

‘Lara wasn’t a wonderful big sister that day…’

That had made Laurencia terribly sad.

Even while her adorable little sister was patting her comfortingly, she’d felt so upset that she’d burst into tears.

In any case, she couldn’t allow Anastasia to see her behaving like an inadequate big sister again.

That was why Laurencia had carefully questioned the maids and knights and even drawn her own map for the adventure.

Although her lines weren’t as straight as Brother Damian’s, Laurencia was confident that it was a pretty good map.

The first place my sister took me while holding my hand was Father’s office.

“Young ladies, what brings you here?”

The elderly butler asked with a kindly expression.

“We came to see Daddy! Shasha’s never seen Daddy working before. Can we come in?”

My sister spoke hesitantly, looking slightly uncertain.

But before the butler could answer, the office door swung wide open.

“My babies! Did you come because you missed Daddy?”

“Uh-huh! I brought Shasha with me!”

“Oh my, my beautiful daughters! Come here.”

Huh?

I’m sure the office was overflowing with murderous intent until just before that door opened.

But now Father’s face was covered with a delighted grin.

However, the moment we stepped into the office, I realized that the murderous intent I’d sensed earlier had been completely real.

‘Those poor aides…’

The aides working beside Father had dark circles under their eyes, and their faces were deathly pale.

They’d clearly gone several nights without proper sleep, failed to resolve some problem, and received a severe scolding from Father.

“W-welcome, young ladies.”

“Would you like some delicious cookies? We also have the flower tea the second young lady likes.”

The aides stared at my sister and me as though we were their saviors.

Father held one of us in each arm, then glanced toward his aides as though they were getting in the way.

“Have the butler bring the tea.”

“Understood, Your Grace.”

“Return in two hours to report.”

“Yes, Your Grace!”

The aides answered with their shoulders held perfectly straight.

But the relief written across their faces made it obvious that my sister and I had arrived at an excellent time.

“Now then, my daughters, what brings you here?”

“Well, you knooow, Daddy looks the coolest when he’s working!”

“Our Laurencia thinks Daddy looks coolest when he’s working?”

“Uh-huh! And, and when you swing your sword around all whoosh, whoosh!”

“Shall we go to the training grounds?”

Father spoke as though he would happily demonstrate as much as she wanted.

But my sister abruptly looked dejected and shook her head.

“No!”

“Why? You said Daddy looks cool when he swings his sword, so I thought I’d show you.”

“Because Lara and Shasha are exploring the mansion today!”

“Exploring the mansion?”

“Uh-huh!”

My sister explained firmly, as though absolutely determined that we couldn’t go to the training grounds.

“So we can’t go outside the mansion! We’re exploring here!”

Come to think of it, isn’t Mikhail at the training grounds right now?

No wonder my sister was being so serious.

I hope Father figures that out too.