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While most romance fantasy stories throw the main character into a sea of suitors, with charming male leads falling over themselves to win the protagonist\'s favor, there\'s always the gatekeeper. The stern, no-nonsense girl who stands firmly at the side of the heroine, acting as a buffer between her and the horde of admirers.

Sometimes a best friend, sometimes a rival, but always the same type: sharp, cold, and with a face that could freeze the sun.

Valeria was exactly that type.

I could almost picture her role in the story—standing off to the side while the main character (most likely a princess or some magical chosen one) dealt with the affections of five, maybe even six different male leads.

Every time one of them got too close, too friendly, Valeria would step in with that same icy glare, maybe a sharp word or two, reminding them that the protagonist wasn\'t so easily won over. She was like a human chastity belt for the romantic tension.

\'Blue-balling half the cast with a single look,\' I mused to myself, barely stifling a chuckle.

In these stories, the stern girl isn\'t just a protector—she\'s a litmus test. If a potential love interest could get past her walls, then maybe, just maybe, he was worthy of the protagonist. If not? Well, good luck to him.

The thing about these characters is that they almost always have an undercurrent of loyalty that runs deeper than their sharp exterior suggests. It\'s never just about being cold or stern for the sake of it; it\'s about devotion.

They\'re the ones who protect the heroine from the wrong sort of attention, who stand by her side through thick and thin, often sacrificing their own happiness for the sake of the greater good.

Valeria fit the stereotype perfectly. From the moment she\'d walked into the inn, her entire demeanor had screamed of someone who had devoted her life to something—or someone—far greater than herself.

Valeria Olarion—the moment I heard her name, it clicked. Of course, she fit the stereotype perfectly because she was the stereotype, at least in the world of Shattered Innocence.

I had almost forgotten…..Well, not that I had forgotten, but it is just that just reading some words describing someone\'s appearance and seeing them in real life does not always connect instantly.

While in the book, she was described as a knight with pink hair and violet eyes with a beautiful but stern face, the way I had imagined her as a reader was a little bit different from how she was looking now. And with the lack of illustrations, it took a little bit of time for me to realize who she was.

Valeria wasn\'t just any knight. She was a key character in the novel, one of the first real allies the protagonist, Elara, would make at the academy. Their relationship didn\'t begin smoothly, though. Valeria wasn\'t the type to warm up to anyone easily, least of all someone as free-spirited and rebellious as Elara.

At the beginning of the story, Valeria is introduced as the best friend of Elara\'s new roommate, a noble girl who is kind but unremarkable. It was through that connection that Valeria and Elara\'s paths crossed. Despite being in the same social circle, they were oil and water—Valeria\'s rigid sense of duty and discipline clashing with Elara\'s more carefree nature.

Valeria had been raised differently from the other girls at the academy. She was a product of the Olarion family, a line of knights whose history was drenched in honor and duty. From the moment she could walk, she held a sword. Her childhood wasn\'t filled with dolls or playdates like many of her peers.

Instead, it was filled with training grounds, the weight of steel in her hand, and endless lessons about duty, discipline, and the expectations of nobility.

In Valeria\'s world, noblesse oblige wasn\'t just a phrase—it was a way of life. She had been taught that her status as a noble wasn\'t a privilege to be enjoyed but a responsibility that came with burdens. She was expected to protect the weak, serve her house, and uphold the values of her family\'s legacy. And she did so with an almost terrifying devotion.

That was part of why she didn\'t get along with Elara at first. Elara\'s spontaneous, emotional approach to life and her refusal to be bound by the rules grated on Valeria\'s rigid upbringing. Where Elara saw freedom, Valeria saw recklessness.

Where Elara acted on instinct, Valeria would overanalyze every move, making sure it fit into the framework of honor and propriety that had been drilled into her since birth.

Their initial interactions were fraught with tension, especially during those early days at the academy. Valeria\'s formality and strict adherence to protocol made her seem distant, cold even. And to someone like Elara, that rather brought some not-liked memories, let\'s say.

But, of course, that was what made their eventual friendship so satisfying. Beneath Valeria\'s unyielding exterior was a sense of loyalty that ran so deep it bordered on self-sacrifice.

\'She was a character that I had liked quite a lot at that time.\'

Most of the male leads and their behaviors were always annoying to me as a reader, and seeing that Valeria was putting an end to such behaviors was indeed satisfying.

At the same time, her own acts and sometimes hypocritical way of thinking were also annoying. It was her flaws, and that is what makes a character.

No one in this world is flawless, and seeing someone change is always inspirational.

But that was still a long way off from where we were now. In Shattered Innocence, Valeria is introduced to the academy arc after Elara has already started her journey.

Right now….

Right now, Valeria is most likely far from the character I\'d come to appreciate in Shattered Innocence. The development she would undergo, the subtle softening that would bring out her loyalty and the depth of her character—none of that had happened yet. She was still in the earliest stages of her arc, before she learned to temper that unyielding discipline with a bit of compassion.

The Valeria in front of me wasn\'t the nuanced, loyal friend I remembered from the story. No, this version of her was still rough around the edges. She was the embodiment of the rigid knight, the sword of justice that hadn\'t yet learned how to bend without breaking. Her world was built on rules, on tradition, and on the certainty that she was doing the right thing.

In a way, she was still the product of her upbringing, molded by the Olarion family\'s strict codes of conduct and sense of noblesse oblige. Her actions were always based on what she believed to be right, but that came with its own set of problems.

For Valeria, "right" often meant "by the book," and if someone didn\'t fit into her carefully defined boxes of honor and decorum, well… they were a problem to be dealt with, not a person to be understood.

And that was who she was right now: someone who saw the world in black and white, with little room for anything in between.

\'She\'s still at the stage where everything is cut and dry for her,\' I thought, watching her lead the way with that same stiff, disciplined stride. Right or wrong, honorable or dishonorable, duty or failure. There wasn\'t much gray in Valeria\'s world yet. She hadn\'t been tested in the way she would be later in the story, when those rigid rules of hers would start to clash with reality.

I had been so caught up in my thoughts, mentally dissecting Valeria\'s character, that I barely noticed we had been walking for a while. The rhythmic clinking of her armor and the sound of our footsteps on the cobblestone streets had become a background hum, blending into the noise of the city around us. It wasn\'t until she came to an abrupt stop that I snapped back to the present.

Blinking, I looked up to find Valeria standing just ahead, her back still straight, but her stance tense. Her violet eyes locked onto mine, and for a moment, I could see the clear annoyance in her gaze. She was sizing me up, as if trying to decide if I was worth the trouble.

Her lips pressed into a thin line, and I could almost hear the deep breath she released, her irritation palpable. She looked me over, her expression sharp, as if there was something about my entire appearance that grated on her.

"Are you really the one who dealt with the bandit Korvan and his men?" she asked, her tone clipped and skeptical, as if the very idea of me doing such a thing was beyond belief.

I wasn\'t surprised by her question. After all, from her point of view, I probably didn\'t fit the image of a hero—or even a mercenary capable of handling a seasoned bandit like Korvan. To her, I must have looked like some laid-back fool who thought too much and took nothing seriously.

I met her gaze evenly and nodded, keeping my expression calm. "That\'s right," I said, not bothering to elaborate. The truth was enough.

Her eyes narrowed, clearly unsatisfied with my simple answer. She seemed to be waiting for more, perhaps a justification or some explanation that made sense in her rigid worldview. But I offered none, just a small, knowing smile that I knew would probably annoy her further.

"You dealt with Korvan," she repeated, almost as if testing the words in her mouth. "And his entire group?"

I nodded again, my tone light. "That\'s right."

For a moment, her gaze darkened, her frustration with me—and probably this entire situation—bubbling just beneath the surface. She clearly didn\'t like what she was hearing, but I wasn\'t sure if it was because she didn\'t believe me or because she did.

Her posture stiffened even more, and her hand hovered dangerously close to the hilt of her sword. It wasn\'t a threat, not yet, anyway, but it was a reminder. A reminder of who she was, what she stood for, and the fact that she wasn\'t easily impressed.

"I find that hard to believe," she said finally, her tone dripping with skepticism. "You don\'t exactly look like someone who could take down a group like that."

"Why are we repeating the same thing over and over again?"

Valeria\'s eyes flicked up to meet mine, locking onto me with a cold, calculating stare. She didn\'t flinch, didn\'t waver, just nodded her head once, sharply.

"You\'re right," she said, her voice quieter now, but no less firm. "We are repeating the same thing."

For a moment, I thought that was the end of it, that maybe we\'d move on from this tiresome back-and-forth. But instead, her gaze shifted downward, locking onto the hilt of the estoc at my side. A faint glint of determination sparked in her violet eyes, and I knew exactly where this was going before she even said it.

"I\'ll see for myself."