Shattered Innocence: Transmigrated Into a Novel as an Extra - Chapter 960

Chapter 960: Name and Identitiy (2)

Lucavion didn’t answer at once.

He stopped, the careless tilt of his shoulders evening out, his grin lingering but thinner now—less boyish, more deliberate. His eyes—black, steady—held hers across the table. The others kept eating, or pretending to, but the hum of conversation had thinned, the air sharp with attention.

At last, he exhaled softly through his nose.

“Certainly,” he said, voice even, though edged with something dry, “you are not the first person to ask this.”

Selphine’s brows rose a fraction. “Oh?”

Lucavion leaned back into his chair, his elbow propped lazily against the armrest, chin resting on his fist as though this were a game he could take or leave. “Mm. Though usually the ones who ask are older. More learned. Less…” His eyes flickered deliberately, slowly, across her immaculate posture, the polish in her uniform, before settling back on her face. “…little noble lady.”

Her mouth twitched—whether in irritation or amusement, even she couldn’t tell. “Little noble lady, is it? That almost sounded like a dismissal.”

“It isn’t,” Lucavion replied smoothly. “But it is a reminder.”

“Of what?”

“That the thing you know…” He gestured faintly, a lazy flick of his bread hand, scattering crumbs across the polished table. “…is not something most people stumble into from the books.”

Selphine’s brows arched, her tone cool but precise. “And what exactly do you mean by that? When did I ever say anything about books?”

Lucavion’s grin widened, soft laughter spilling past his lips—low, knowing, irritatingly unbothered. “To be frank… you didn’t.”

Selphine’s eyes narrowed.

“But,” he continued, tilting his head lazily, “you just did. Or rather—you answered me in a way that confirmed it all the same.”

A beat passed. Selphine felt the twist of annoyance coil hot and sharp beneath her ribs. Again. Played by this jester who smirked as though every word had been choreographed for his own amusement. She despised that edge of smugness, and yet—part of her couldn’t let go. Part of her wanted to win.

Her lips curved thin, sharp. “You’re enjoying yourself far too much.”

Lucavion leaned back further in his chair, his grin slipping into something smaller, smoother, though no less cutting. “Come on. I’m not that smart. But it isn’t that hard to see why you asked me this question out of the blue.”

Selphine’s jaw tightened. “Oh?”

He lifted his hand, slowly, deliberately, then tapped a finger against his lips.

“Lucavion.”

The name rolled off his tongue—soft, deliberate, stretched just slightly so it lingered between them.

“Doesn’t quite sound…” His grin curled again, sharper this time. “…how should I put it?” His eyes gleamed. “That Arcanissy, does it?”

The word landed with a deliberate weight, mocking in its playfulness. Around them, forks and knives clinked faintly, the conversation at the table buzzing quieter as though the others were leaning closer without meaning to.

Selphine felt the corner of her mouth twitch, the desire to smirk and scowl wrestling in equal measure.

Selphine’s lashes lowered, her smile perfectly composed, but behind it her thoughts hissed sharp.

‘Smug bastard. Playing circles with words like it makes him clever. I should freeze his grin to the plate and see if he laughs then.’

‘Little noble lady? Hah. Arrogant ass.’

Her fingers tightened briefly around the stem of her goblet before easing again. Polished, poised. Outwardly flawless.

Across from her, Lucavion’s grin widened—as if he’d heard it. As if he always did.

“You just thought of something rude.”

Her eyes narrowed a fraction. “…You’re imagining it.”

“Ahaha.” The laugh came quick, effortless, biting in its lightness. “Maybe I do.”

Selphine breathed slow through her nose, steadying her expression, smoothing the edge of her irritation into something colder, silkier. “What did you mean earlier?” she asked, voice soft but deliberate. “When you said it isn’t something most people stumble into from books?”

The table around them stilled again, faint but undeniable. The twins had stopped mid-bicker, Marian’s fork hung suspended near her mouth, and even Cedric’s steady eyes flicked between them like a pendulum.

Selphine leaned in slightly, her gaze unwavering. “Explain.”

Lucavion leaned back, his grin easing into something softer, though no less deliberate. He tapped one finger against his goblet, the sound dull against the blackwood table.

“Just recently,” he said, tone almost casual, “not long ago, someone asked me the same thing.”

Selphine’s brows rose slightly. “The same thing?”

“Mm.” His black eyes gleamed faintly under the chandelier light. “‘Are you from the west front?’ That was how they phrased it.”

He let the pause hang—long enough that the twins shifted, Marian tilted her head, and Elowyn’s hand tightened briefly around her glass.

“And that person,” Lucavion continued at last, voice curling smooth as silk over steel, “was certainly not someone who would spend their days drowning in books.” His grin twitched, sharp as a knife’s edge. “They excelled, instead, at reading people. At connecting. At drawing meaning from what isn’t written at all.”

Selphine’s gaze narrowed, not with doubt but with that careful, measuring interest she reserved for puzzles.

“In a way,” Lucavion went on, “knowledge doesn’t come solely from the words penned by scholars or sages. The world itself—” he gestured lazily at the table, the hall, the air around them, “—is a page. And if you have eyes to see it, ears to catch it, you’ll find everything there to be learned.”

Selphine sighed, low, controlled, and entirely deliberate. The corners of her mouth curved the faintest degree upward. “You speak in riddles.”

Aurelian chuckled under his breath from further down the table. “You should be used to that by now, Selphine. You do it yourself often enough.”

“Yes,” she said smoothly, “but not like this.” Her eyes stayed fixed on Lucavion, steady as blades. “You take it to a level that borders on parody.”

Lucavion smirked, teeth glinting. “And yet,” he murmured, “you’re still listening.”

Selphine’s exhale sharpened into the shape of a laugh, though her eyes never softened. ‘Oh, dear First Flame, no wonder everyone finds him exhausting. He twists every word into a mirror, makes you chase after your own thoughts until you’re tangled.’ Her fingers traced idly along the rim of her goblet. ‘But it’s… not dull. It’s fresh. Annoying as hell. But fresh.’

Her head tilted slightly, lips curling with controlled amusement. “So,” she said, slow and pointed, “you met some sort of trader, then? And they asked you this question as well?”

Lucavion’s grin stretched thinner, sharper. For once, he didn’t immediately deflect. He simply held her gaze.

“…..You’re on the right track.”

Lucavion swirled the wine in his goblet once before setting it down with a soft clink. His grin was still there—light, careless—but the words that followed edged with something heavier.

“As for your question,” he said, tone deceptively easy, “just because I have a name that sounds a bit Lorian, doesn’t mean I need to be from Lorian. Does it?”

Selphine’s eyes narrowed, one brow rising in that deliberate, measured arc of hers. “It certainly doesn’t. But why would your parents give you a Lorian name if you weren’t?”

Lucavion shrugged, almost lazily. “I don’t certainly know that. Maybe they had… other things in mind.” His hand flicked once, dismissive, as though the subject were a stray ash he refused to pick up.

Selphine leaned forward just slightly, her lips curving into that sharp half-smile she wore whenever she’d decided patience was no longer worthwhile. “You’re stalling.”

The grin on Lucavion’s face twitched wider, but it didn’t reach his eyes.

“Whatever,” Selphine said, her voice cutting clean through the tension in the air. “Just answer me. Are you from the Lorian Empire or not?”

The table hushed around them, the laughter and clinking silverware fading into a strange, taut stillness. Even Marian’s chatter fell quiet. Elowyn’s fork slowed against her plate, her hand tightening around it.

Lucavion didn’t answer. Not at once. He met Selphine’s stare across the table—black eyes locked against the cool edge of her own—and for the first time, the grin slipped.

Silence stretched.

Then at last, his voice came low, calm, precise.

“If you’re asking where I was born…” His gaze didn’t waver. “Then you would be right. I was born in the Lorian Empire.”

A ripple moved through the table, subtle but unmistakable—Aurelian’s brows lifting, Mireilla’s fingers pausing against her glass, even Quen and Valen straightening from their usual half-slouch.

But Lucavion wasn’t finished.

His grin was gone now. His face had cooled into something sharper, the air around him taut enough to draw a breath from more than one throat.

“However…” His voice dropped colder, the humor stripped clean away. “…if you’re asking if I am Lorian?”

He leaned back into his chair, shadows flickering sharp across his jaw beneath the chandelier light.

“Then no. I am not.”

The words settled heavy over the table, cutting the air like a blade.

The silence that followed pressed down like frost. Forks hovered above plates. Cups lingered mid-air. No one quite breathed, as if the weight of his tone demanded stillness.

Lucavion didn’t look away from Selphine. His black eyes—flat, unreadable—held hers across the long table with the same ease as if no one else were there at all. The grin was gone, stripped clean from his mouth, leaving behind only the bare shape of someone who chose when to wear his masks.

At last, he shifted, slow and deliberate, leaning back into his chair once more. His hand curled around the stem of his goblet, lifting it halfway to his lips before pausing.

“That,” he said, voice low, precise, final—like the slam of a door only half-heard, “should be your answer.”