"Young Lady, I'm sure the Crown Prince will fall in love with you on the spot!" 

A room. Two women talking - different ages. The one who had just spoken was a maid, full of excitement and happiness, her first wrinkles showing as she smiled widely. The other girl was still a child. Eight years of age - Lyra Sandcastle, the beautiful girl standing in front of the maid, was still a kid on the outside but one could surely make a point that she was an adult mentally.

While her cute countenance surrounded by beautiful and long blonde hair that were curly towards the tips still looked like one of a kid and her big brown eyes, too big for her still small face, didn't help either, the appearance deceived many people to believe this girl wasn't one of the most talented people the Empire of Lalaria had ever had. But it was true - Lyra was born as a genius and had easily passed tests that were far beyond her age.

Plus, she was from a very famous and powerful noble house, the house of Sandcastle, one that was directly linked to the royal family. Those two characteristics made her the perfect fiancée for the Crown Prince of the Empire who'd be crowned Emperor in only eight years, being ten years old. As such, her family had made a deal with the royals and Lyra was accepted as the fiancée of Dzer Aerbach, the Crown Prince. Right on that day there was a ceremony prepared to celebrate a new generation of royals.

The young girl had been trained to be perfect for this exact day. Countless times she had replayed the possible outcomes of her upcoming encounter with Dzer Aerbach; an impressive amount of sentences were already set in stone in her mind, granting her the opportunity to answer to basically any doubt or question the Crown Prince might have with a certain tone. She was sure he would've enjoyed her presence.

Still, the young girl was extremely nervous.

"You don't have to worry too much, dear. You've pushed yourself to your limit preparing for today. Everything will just go as planned, but remember to have fun!" Those were the words that her personal maid had left for her while the two were heading to the carriage. Lyra thought of that answer to be far too romantic for the truth of relationships between nobles which were only ruled by profit but she could understand. A commoner's love was something much more exciting and passionate than this - the young noble remembered clearly that Alsala had said she experienced a love of that kind during her life, not that she cared much about what the life of the maid had been before serving her. But at the same time, Lyra was curious. She wanted her relationship with the Crown Prince to be like that.

"I totally will, Alsala. Thank you very much for the help you've given me throughout these busy days." The young heir to the Sandcastle family had a totally formal answer to the words that the maid had dedicated to her with affection, but at the same time she let her own excitement show.

"I'm so curious about what kind of person the Crown Prince is. That's justified, though." Lyra spoke to herself as her maid Alsala made her way back to the villa of the Sandcastle family. Her duty was done - the carriage had arrived just in front of the house and the young noble now had to go to the palace of the royal family. As she gracefully entered it, her thoughts were moving at fast speeds just like the carriage itself.

"My greetings, Salain Demar." 

"My greetings, Young Lady. You remember my name - that is already a privilege for a commoner like me. I hope to serve you well during this ride." As the driver of the carriage naturally responded with those words in a surprised tone, Lyra shrugged it off. It wasn't personal, after all - it was only normal for her to remember the name of her servants, as they remembered hers.

"Have you ever met the Crown Prince?" Lyra found herself asking to Salain, who shook his head. "Never. I've heard he's been kept in a private environment for how long he has lived. They don't want him to see the outside world... I can't speak any further than that." Those were the very careful words chosen by the rider. Of course, Lyra had to pretend she understood why he couldn't speak any longer - she actually couldn't ask him to keep the appearance but was suddenly very confused.

What the girl lacked was empathy - she was unable to understand others for the most part. While the outside world was so easy for the young genius to come to terms with, it wasn't the same for the feelings and thoughts of nobles and commoners alike. Still, because she was protected by an unbreakable facade of perfection, it wasn't something that anyone had ever realized or cared about. Her parents were only bothered by how business and politics were going and cared little about her, one of the reasons why she wasn't used to reading facial expressions. Maids didn't count - the girl had no drive to know them better.

What she really couldn't know was how this would've led to much darker, more serious consequences in the future. For now, though, the young noble was just a small child, living her dream to fulfill her parents' expectations and wishing of a passionate love in the future with Dzer Aerbach, a person she was fine with serving for the rest of her life.

Before long, the carriage stopped. It was a sign that it had arrived to the royal palace - Salain couldn't even leave the carriage at that point. He knew his belongings would be frisked if he had stepped just one foot outside, simply because he was a commoner.

"Have fun, Young Lady. I will be back in four hours. Send a message if you want me to arrive early." The rider said trying to be as formal as possible, to which the young noble lady just nodded. At that point, she was way more focused on the view that had been granted to her: the palace's beauty.

Even to Lyra's eyes, used to the outstanding beauty of her own palace, it felt gorgeous and ethereal. Bigger than anything she had ever seen and colored with white and golden colors that were easily seen even in the dark night. "Wow..." Inadvertedly, while admiring that place the noble girl almost forgot what she had arrived for.

Seeing as how other children already were with their partners for the night, Lyra saw it fit to find Dzer Aerbach to hang out with him. Entering the palace with no hesitation, she was greeted by a view even more beautiful than the one she had seen outside of the palace. The first room she had access to was, in fact, covered with golden and purple bricks that felt very elegant and had two floors, one to dance and the other one to spectate and sit.

On top of the enormous room there was a spot that was superior in height to every other place, a balcony more than ten meters up the ground that was accessed by a room above the one Lyra was in. "So, that's where we'll be." Imagined naturally the noble girl, smiling at the thought.

But expectations aren't always fulfilled.

On another side of the room there was a young boy with golden-colored eyes, perfectly in tone with the gold color that kept being used in the Palace, his expression completely caught in the ongoing party. "I wonder where she is..." He said to himself, looking for the girl whose hand had been promised to him in marriage. He wasn't alone, he never was.

This was Dzer Aerbach, always followed by his closest friends, sons and daughters of the nobles the royal family had always been close to. On his right side there was Ashao Liyan, the son of the Emperor's Counselor, and Katrina Shira, his younger sister. The two had very similar features, such as the red hair and green eyes they shared - their ages weren't that far apart either, with Ashao having the same age as Dzer and Katrina just being one year younger. On the left side of the Crown Prince there were two other people: his own younger brother, Almerin Aerbach, with features very similar to his, yet two years younger and extremely short if compared to the already quite tall Dzer; there was also Herien Arnai, the successor of the most powerful noble family in the Empire - he was one year older than the Crown Prince but was usually a quiet person who didn't care too much about social life, which was why in this small and elite group the Prince himself was considered to be the main actor.

Because Lyra had never seen the Prince and assumed that he hadn't either, she gracefully moved easily through the nobles that were chatting and tried to recognize him. Because of just how much attention such a person received, it wasn't hard to do so and, just after a few seconds, the young girl locked her eyes with the boy.

"Are you..." The noble girl tried to ask, her voice leaving her as she could finally see the person she had prepared so long to meet, smiling happily which made the boy happy as well.

"The Crown Prince? That's me." The voice coming out from the royal was gentle and quiet, nothing like what it would become.

"I am... Lyra Sandcastle. My greetings, Your Highness."

Such an elegant and important greeting along with a bow made the Prince, who wasn't used to such a big show of manners, laugh.

"You're really pretty."

Immediately, the noble girl blushed a bit. Meanwhile the two were in their own world, talking to each other, the Prince's friends arrived.

"Who's she, Dzer?" 

"Hey, Almerin, this is Lyra Sandcastle. The girl I'll be marrying when we become adults." Proudly said the Crown Prince, smiling widely and getting the attention of everyone in the room towards him and the girl in front of him.

"I love this feeling." Just said Dzer as he noticed that, thinking this delight was caused by how beautiful Lyra was. He was wrong; he didn't realize that what he really loved was the attention. He was the Crown Prince, he felt like he was protagonist and it showed to everyone. Still a kid, to explain it easily.

"I'm so jealous." Just responded Almerin with a smile. He was obviously trained for such an occurrence because it didn't seem like he cared  even a little bit - he was far too young. 

"Big brother Dzer, can I talk to her just a little bit?" Asked Katrina, whose brother wasn't actually the Crown Prince, but everyone seemed to be used to the red-haired beauty treating Dzer like that; it was shown by how the latter just nodded and smiled, then said: "Of course. We'll wait for you all here."

The red-haired girl nodded and pointed at a place where nobody was sitting, as if she was telling Lyra to follow her. The latter just nodded and decided to do so, despite not knowing who this person was. That was also a possibility in her mind, after all. While the two were walking, Lyra also didn't notice how hard Katrina's hand was pressing on hers, as if she was angry. It wasn't that the noble girl was used to it, her head was just in the clouds as she was thinking about what previously happened and how she could've handled the situation better.

"Listen. To marry the Prince, you've got to pass a test." The red-haired girl told Lyra.

"How so? I've never heard of such a thing-" 

"Yeah, it's a new rule. I've studied for this test before, so I'll be the person giving you the questions right now, is that alright?" Katrina tried to make sense with what she was saying, but it didn't seem like the noble girl didn't trust her in the first place.

"I see... but now? Am I not meant to prepare?"

"Of course not. Are you saying you're not ready right now?"

In Katrina's mind, this was only a way to embarass the girl in front of her and make sure her Prince would stay without a partner. She had never heard about Lyra's reputation of a genius.

"No, no. Go ahead." The noble girl just sighed, hoping her general knowledge would be enough.

"Alright, hmm..."