Chapter 278 – I Also Heard it From my Father (2/2)

“Thank you.”

“Uh…” Although her attitude eased up, she was still cold and hard to approach. Higgins was set back again, but it stimulated his competitive desires as he bravely extended his hand, “Then, Miss Elena, would you like to have a dance with me?”

“No.” Elena gave a clean answer.

“Un, okay, then please take my hand, we… wait, w-what did you just say?” Higgins opened his eyes in disbelief and couldn’t believe what he just heard. The hand he extended was frozen in midair and he didn’t know what to do with it.

This foolish woman actually rejected him without even thinking about it? Was she joking?

“Hey, do you know who he is? He’s Higgins, the son of the lord of Soma City!” His companions thought that she was poorly informed and didn’t recognize Higgins, and quickly came to support him.

Soma City was a large city to the south of Winterless City, and as the eldest son of the city’s lord, he was naturally pampered. Because of his status there were countless women that wanted to curry favor with him and he enjoyed his lifestyle of changing women like changing clothes, and it wasn’t the first time he was fooling around with other people’s women.

But this time, he suffered.

“Soma City? Oh, I think I remember.”

“Hmph, since you know, then stop being unappreciative! A mere maid, you should be thankful that Master Higgins would invite you for a dance, and you dare refuse?”

“Leonard, please don’t say that, you’ll scare this beautiful lady.”

He once again raised his hand and invited her to dance.

“Elena, don’t overthink it, I just want to dance with you. Even if you don’t know how to dance, I’ll slowly teach you, so don’t worry and come.”

Higgins words could be said to be extremely practiced, stopping the other’s excuses while expressing his goodwill, so that the other party had no reason to refuse.

But Elena wasn’t a normal women, those words were useless towards her.

“No.”

A single word that came softly out of Elena’s mouth changed the complexion of everyone there as the atmosphere froze.

“Hey! You foolish woman, your master is just a commoner, but Higgins is a…”

“The son of Soma City’s lord, right? If I remember correctly, twenty years ago, Soma City was attacked by demonic beasts. Civilians were killed and injured while nobles and soldiers barely were, do you remember that incident?”

“Uh… I think I have, what about it?” The companions didn’t understand why Elena was bringing up ancient history and glanced at Higgins, and noticed he had a terrible complexion.

“Master Higgins, is it? You weren’t born then, but you should know what happened, right?”

“I, I… I don’t know…” Higgins stammered.

“I think I know! The demon army that attacked Soma City was too powerful, so the lord retreated to preserve strength. Then he attacked a week later to reclaim the city.” One of his companions rushed to answer first.

“Hehe, so that’s how you humans are telling it…” Elena gently chuckled while muttering to herself, “If I remember correctly, the so-called demon army was nothing but a few lost sixth-level demonic beasts. The lord was a coward and mistook it for an attack and immediately ran from the city abandoning the people which caused that tragedy… Higgins, your father should have told you, right?”

“I, I…”

“What? Higgins, that happened!? Why didn’t I know?”

Without waiting for Higgins to respond, his companions lost their cool, ignoring his deathly pale complexion and asked him nonstop.

Hearing that, Higgins got a headache.

When his father was young and initially appointed as the lord, he was scared of the sudden demonic beast attack, although he did his best to make up for his mistake and covered up the truth, that incident caused him a lifetime of shame.

Even for Higgins, that incident was a secret he found out when his father was drunk, so how did this maid know about it?

This woman, who was she?

“Elena… h-how did you know? Could it be… you’re from Soma City!?”

If the truth got out, his household would be ruined! His father’s position wouldn’t be safe anymore either!

“No, I’m not. Like you, I also heard it from my father.”

“Hah? Your father?”

Higgins almost choked on his saliva.