For a fraction of a second, it really did appear as if nothing wrong was about to happen, and the whole bad feeling Melinda had was just one big overreaction on her part.
But then...
"HURGH…!"
"Young Lord!?"
Magnus Em'raldio spat out the egg white as his body arched when he dry-heaved, unable to control his own body's rejection of the food. This caused most of the girls to cry out in shock and horror while the spoon the blue-haired man dropped bounced on the floor, signaling trouble.
Three girls acted a bit differently from the rest.
Lidia stared at Magnus in disbelief, only to look down at her partially eaten egg and then move her gaze full of disbelief at Bjorki.
Bjorki had lowered her head, staring at her own knees while biting her lips.
And lastly, Melinda…
*thunk*
She stood up from her seat, knocking over the chair, and left the room before anyone could call after her.
"What is the meaning of this?! If I cannot eat it, it can't be Basilisk…! WHOSE IDEA WAS IT TO SERVE KOBOLD EGGS!?"
Magnus spat to the side, raring in disgust and fury, staring at all girls except his sister.
"I-I wanted to pull a prank on Young Lady Fenrioette…"
"ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND? WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE!"
Lidia gulped down her saliva and admitted, instantly getting shouted at by the blue-haired man.
"YOUR HIGHNESS!"
"What is it?"
While Lidia's eyes filled with tears, Natalie called out, standing up and smacking hands against the round table, getting Magnus's reluctant attention.
"Lidia admitted her wrongdoing and apologized to Young Lady Fenrioette! She advised your younger sister to get Basilisk eggs because they look similar to Kobold eggs. Nothing more. It was your sister who checked everything, including the ordered products! She even boasted about it to Young Lady Fenrioette!"
"...huh…? What nonsense are you…?"
Natalie stood bravely in defense of her friend, staring up at the towering blue-haired man who furrowed his brows about to scoff.
"...Bjorki…?"
Only to tense up and see that his younger sister would not dare to look back at him.
"Bjorki, what are you doing? Are they blackmailing you? Why aren't you refuting such baseless accusations? Are you ashamed that you didn't manage to stop it even though you said that you've seen through all of it?"
"!!!"
Ignoring everyone else, Magnus asked his younger sister, showing such outrageous bias that none of the girls present could find the right words to address it.
"...without this girl and you, no one would be able to tell the difference…"
"...!"
Bjorki muttered spitefully, shocking not only her brother but even the other girls.
"Explain yourself. I promise not to get mad."
Magnus demanded but also quickly assured his younger sister.
"...I paid for everything from my own pocket… Basilisk eggs were expensive. I found Kobold eggs for less than a quarter of the price… the taste was supposed to be only slightly different… I saved up so much..."
The blue-haired girl mumbled under her breath while adamantly refusing even to face her older brother.
"If even a word of what happened here will get out, the consequences you all will suffer will be beyond anything you can imagine."
"!!!"
And then, her older brother spoke up, but not with a scolding or even advice, but a threat…
…a threat towards everyone else besides the culprit…
"We're going."
"..."
Then, Magnus grabbed his sister's shoulder and pulled her up, taking her out of the room without any additional explanation, clearly deciding that what he already said would suffice for the final word.
"..."
For a while, the room stayed silent, and the silence extended not only to the female students, but to the staff hired for the tea party.
"...is it just me, or are the royal siblings actually the way we all assumed Young Lady Fenrioette was…?"
Natalie was the first to move and speak, sitting down and voicing her distaste about the situation.
"That… that girl fed us all Kobold eggs…"
Lidia gulped down her saliva and trembled.
"What's the problem with that, actually? Aren't we already using humanoid monsters for parts anyway…?"
One of the other girls looked at her shaken classmate and asked with a clueless expression.
"..."
Lidia pulled out a handkerchief and pressed it to her mouth. Unable to speak while fighting a wave of nausea, she limited herself only to glaring at the girl bewildered girl.
—------
After leaving the tea party, Melinda rushed back to her room the fastest she could without the system reading her movement as a charge.
With each step, her heart grew warier as the panic settled in.
Her chin trembled uncontrollably, and the tears started streaming down her face even before she reached out and opened the door.
She didn't even bother to close the door properly, hastily moving to the bed, dropping to her knees, and pulling out a bundle of blankets from underneath it.
"...."
Biting her lips and holding her breath to stop herself from sniffling, she unwrapped the bundle and saw…
…the intact brownish egg, the size of an ostrich one, rested in the nest of gold…
"You're safe…!"
The wave of relief washed over Melindal, but the next moment, the memory of so many cooked Kobold eggs shattered it, and the gold-haired girl's shoulders shook as she began to sob her heart out.
"Blessed… Heal…"
Trembling, she cried out the incantation of the spell that basked the whole room in a warm golden glow.
Without changing out of her dress, without even putting down her hair, after only making sure to lock her door, Melinda crawled into her bed holding the egg to her chest and curled up into a ball draping the blanket over herself.
She didn't call for Zane or anyone else.
She didn't want to be seen in such a pitiful state, for the first time facing a situation when something she cared about was already lost and there was nothing she could do even with all of her power.
She simply cried, letting it all out while clinging to the Kobold's egg.