Even the adult Aria from the novel deeply respected her teacher and Serena had acted as a genuine mother figure to her in her own way.

Because of his knowledge about the novel, Adrian knew Serena had the raw potential to be an amazing mother. Or a stepmom, in this case.

But there was a massive problem.

The Serena right now completely different person from the character in the book. The novel version only turned into a cold, ruthless mage after surviving a horrific civil war that slaughtered her entire bloodline. That specific, brutal trauma gave her a way to relate to Aria.

But right now? Adrian had prevented that civil war. He had offered to fix her mana veins, so he did not really know if the sheltered, shy Serena of this timeline could connect with Aria in the exact same way.

Then he thought about Claire.

He thought back to all the time he had spent watching her execute her duties. She had always been there and she had always stood firmly by his side through every single crisis. 𝓯𝙧𝙚𝒆𝙬𝙚𝒃𝙣𝙤𝒗𝓮𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

And when it came to Aria, Claire was actually the very first person to step up. She was the one who walked right up to him and demanded to take Aria under her wing for physical knight training. Claire saw the massive potential in the little girl and actively wanted to nurture it.

Adrian compared the two women in his head.

Serena knew exactly where her social boundaries were. She never did anything extra apart from studying her magic books.

Claire did a phenomenal job of keeping a protective eye on Aria. Adrian had seen it happen multiple times in the past. Claire repeatedly kept glancing down at Aria to check on her, and she also kept repeatedly glancing up at Adrian. She did it constantly for both of them.

And while Adrian definitely noticed her constant glances, he completely misunderstood the actual context behind them.

Yes, Claire looked at Aria constantly because Aria was the young daughter of the Lord who hired her. And yes, she looked at Adrian constantly for the exact same protective reason. She was a knight, and she wanted to make sure there was absolutely no hidden danger creeping up on them in the crowded market.

But there was another massive reason for her constant staring.

She was just genuinely, deeply interested in Adrian as a man. But even But Claire did not even realize the actual depth of her own crush. glancing at him felt like a completely natural instinct to her at this point.

And she didn’t even notice this habit.

Adrian let out a long sigh. He rubbed his face and fell back onto the bed. He was way too tired to even bother taking his clothes off.

In the hallway, Claire gave Serena a polite nod and walked into her own room.

She looked completely calm and normal as she walked through the door, but the exact second the door was shut and the lock slid into place, her serious and strict persona instantly vanished.

She immediately shifted into a super giddy, blushing girly mode.

She started happily hopping in place on the wooden floorboards. She practically jumped towards the bed and thanks to her being a C rank Knight, one jump was enough.

She landed directly on the soft mattress and shoved her face deep into the pillow just to muffle her high pitched squeal. Then she just rolled around in the blankets for an entire minute while kicking her feet wildly in the air.

She finally flipped over on her back.

Staring up at the dark wooden ceiling, she slowly raised her right arm and just stared her open palm.

That was the exact hand she used to grab Adrian’s hand. She had just grabbed him and boldly pulled him all around the busy market and she had done it multiple times throughout the day.

She honestly could not even believe herself. She had no idea where she had suddenly pulled the sheer courage out of herself to actually do something that bold to a high ranking Baron.

And she did not regret a single second of it. At least not yet.

Because just holding his hand sent a weird, flutter straight to the bottom of her stomach. She felt so ridiculously happy that her brain could not even form the right words or thoughts to explain it.

She was basically acting like a hormonal teenager dealing with their very first massive crush.

She just tilted her head against the sheets and kept staring at her palm. She slowly let her hand drop to rest against the soft mattress.

’I need to control this.’ Claire thought desperately to herself. ’I cannot cross the boundary between a Lord and his knight. But I just cannot help it... I really cannot help it. Ugh... screw that notebook and screw Serena...’

She lifted her free hand and lightly slapped her own cheeks.

"Just go to sleep." Claire whispered to the empty room. "You have more work to do tomorrow."

She forcefully locked her face back into her usual stoic knight glare.

But even after she closed her eyes shut to sleep, she just could not shake away that warm, fluttering feeling twisting up her stomach.

Just down the hall, Serena was having a completely different night.

She closed her door shut and just stood frozen in the dark for a long time. She eventually dragged her feet over to the mattress and sat down on the edge.

Tapping the storage ring on her finger, she pulled out the massive book Adrian gave her along with her own tiny journal.

Instead of opening the big book, she opened the smaller, thinner journal first. She turned a few pages until she found the specific page covered in scratched out sentences.

She looked down at the single line that was not scratched out, The line that mentioned the dual mana cultivation method.

She stared at the words for an entire minute in silence and then she took out a quill from her spatial ring. She pressed the tip against the paper and violently scratched the entire sentence out.