The Arranged Suitor Was the Kidnapper

Laria blinked slowly.

Not on the guest list?

“What are you talking about!”

Before Laria could respond, Rodit protested loudly:

“Look carefully with your eyes wide open!”

As Rodit shouted, the momentarily flustered butler adjusted his glasses.

As if he would be hit if he said there was no invitation, the butler exclaimed, ‘Ah!’ and spoke again.

“I apologize. There was a mistake.”

He awkwardly mumbled an excuse about not seeing the name because it was at the very end of the list.

‘Well, it’s because I suddenly decided to attend.’

She had decided to attend at the last minute, so the message probably hadn’t been conveyed properly.

“Then I will guide you.”

Before following the butler, Laria turned to Rodit and spoke.

“I have a favor to ask.”

“Anything, just tell me!” Rodit’s eyes sparkled.

Laria took out a pre-written letter from her bag and handed it to him.

“Can you send this to Grand Duke Krassium? Right now.”

“…To Grand Duke Krassium?”

Upon hearing his apprehensive response, Laria nodded in confirmation.

“You’re the only one I can trust with this letter.”

Upon hearing this, an elated Rodit nodded vigorously:

“I’ll be back soon!”

Laria, smiling slightly, soon followed the butler into the garden.

After a short walk, the butler stopped and gestured.

“You can go straight this way.”

It was odd that he wasn’t guiding her all the way, but the path seemed straightforward, so Laria nodded.

The butler left, and Laria walked in the direction he had indicated.

Fading red roses filled her surroundings. They were planted so densely, from a distance it looked like a massive bed.

With plenty of time left, Laria, wandering through the garden, felt something was amiss.

It seemed she was walking in circles.

The moment she realized this, her surroundings wavered as if she were seeing a mirage.

‘Did they use illusion magic?’

It was her first time seeing an illusion created by someone else.

Curious, Laria observed her surroundings.

Lifeless roses and a perfectly still garden with no breeze.

The better an illusion resembles reality, the higher its quality, but this one seemed just like looking at a painting due to the caster’s crude technique.

Laria then realized.

‘I have to pass this test to enter.’

Given that it was a meeting of sorcerers, an initiation test seemed plausible.

Excitedly, Laria reached out her hand.

She tore through the clumsy magic, pouring her own power into the gaps.

Suddenly, as if shattering a puzzle, the illusion fragmented.

“Cough!”

A severe cough echoed.

Laria instinctively turned towards the sound. There, a man was coughing, while others looked on in shock, their tea cups in hand.

‘Everyone’s already here?’

She regretted not coming out earlier and mentally clicked her tongue.

The people, previously gazing at Laria with surprised faces, began murmuring.

“What happened? We thought you’d be stuck in the illusion for a while.”

“You look completely fine.”

“Wasn’t the illusion defective?”

The coughing man shook his head.

“It wasn’t defective, that woman broke the spell.”

He spoke with a pale face, as if facing something fearsome, but no one believed him.

To break another’s spell, one must be much more skilled than the caster. But it was unlikely that Laria Rohan, who had manifested as a sorcerer only recently, had such skill.

The man covered his mouth with a sickly expression.

The others looked at him with disdain. It was clear that he would be excluded from future meetings.

As they murmured, Laria carefully observed their faces.

‘I don’t recognize any of them.’

Since she hadn’t participated in the fox clan meetings, all the faces were unfamiliar.

The only face she kind of recognized…

Laria’s gaze landed on a woman sitting at a higher seat. The blazing red hair and sunset-like ruby eyes clearly identified her lineage.

She was Sienna Hashir, the only daughter of the Marquis Hashir, belonging to the red fox clan.

While she had only seen her a long time ago, she had grown without changing, making her instantly recognizable.

Sienna’s eyes met Laria’s.

For a moment, Sienna’s gaze narrowed.

The two sorcerers’ eyes locked.

However, their eye contact didn’t last long.

“Lady Laria Rohan?”

Laria turned her head towards the one calling her.

The woman who took the seat next to Sienna smiled brightly.

“You came early. Would you like to sit down for now?”

Laria approached the round table, looking for an empty seat.

However, there was no vacant chair in sight.

“Oh dear, it seems we’re short on chairs. What should we do?”

Her eyes blinked as if she was in a dilemma.

The butler’s half-hearted guidance and the general inadequacy made the gathering seem lacking.

However, the lack of preparation was the fault of the organizer.

Since it was her first time attending such a gathering, Laria decided it might be best not to comment and just let it pass.

Smiling, Laria replied:

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll find a place to sit.”

She opened her bag and took out a seed.

Upon throwing it on the ground, the seed quickly began to grow. A thick branch wound up to form a chair-like shape, and the other fox-people looked in astonishment.

Laria calmly sat on the chair made of tree branches.

The surroundings quieted for a moment, and Laria blinked her eyes.

The woman who had spoken to Laria smirked.

“I heard you manifested as a sorcerer. Seems the rumors weren’t false?”

The tone was undeniably sarcastic.

“Showing off with such a trivial spell.”

“Enough.”

With a loud snap of her fan, Sienna sternly looked at the woman.

“Lunel, I told you not to bother the weak.”

“…I’m sorry, Lady Sienna.”

The woman called Lunel quickly lowered her head.

Sienna glanced at Laria and then waved her fan.

Roses grew from behind her, covering the chair Sienna was sitting on.

Now having the most splendid chair of all, Sienna smiled and said:

“It seems we can also apply magic like this. Thanks for the idea.”

“Besides being skilled, you’re humble too.”

As Lunel flattered her, Sienna gracefully waved her hand away.

“This is a basic spell. Everyone does it.”

Sienna gave a knowing look to Laria.

“Right, Lady Rohan?”

Laria tilted her head at the obvious statement. Such magic is so easy; one could do it even in their sleep.

“Yes, the ritual is simple.”

She thought she had responded kindly, but Sienna’s expression turned strange. She seemed about to say something but then turned away.

As everyone gathered, they began to converse while sipping tea.

They seriously discussed the future of the fox clan as if they were representatives.

Initially, Laria found the conversation interesting, but soon she could only laugh.

The fox clan was superior to other clans, they said, and they should fill the imperial bureaucracy with fox people…

She felt an intense tribal superiority.

During the conversation, they occasionally sought Sienna’s opinion. Sienna would answer adequately, and her response was considered the final word. And complimenting Sienna in the process was a given.

Laria tried to join the conversation a few times but was consistently ignored.

It was as if she was invisible.

‘Did I make a mistake?’

She reflected on her actions.

Realizing when she noticed people whispering and mocking her-

‘I’m being ostracized!’

With this belated realization, she could only chuckle sarcastically.

She thought too positively of the situation.

‘Using that illusion earlier wasn’t a welcome gesture.’

Now everything made sense.

She had never been shunned like this before, so she didn’t notice.

Not wanting to forcibly join the conversation, she decided to leave when it seemed right. Her main goal was to meet Zenox after all.

“If only we had the fox orb, we wouldn’t have to worry about all this.”

Laria lifted her head as she overheard the conversation.

The others agreed with the man’s statement.

“Indeed, if we had the fox orb, we wouldn’t need to worry about what other clans think.”

The fox orb was a treasure passed down through generations of the fox clan. Whoever possessed this orb, filled with mystical power, could perform all sorts of magic.

The most powerful figure in fox tribe history was also known to have possessed this orb.

“If we had the orb, the golden age of the fox clan would return.”

“It disappeared so long ago. Where could it be now?”

Hearing the talk of the fox orb, Laria felt thirsty and took a sip of her tea.

She knew the whereabouts of that treasure.

It was right inside her.