A Rare Plant from Fontaine
Neuvillette!
He was sitting in the royal box, too?!
Just who on earth was he?
Conan's head was so full of questions that he'd completely lost interest in the match.
Then something occurred to him, and he tugged on Ran's sleeve.
Ran was in the middle of comforting Kogoro, who was still moping over how embarrassingly rowdy he'd been at the banquet. Feeling the pull at her sleeve, she turned around and looked at Conan with concern. "What's wrong, Conan? Is something the matter?"
"Big sister Ran, who's that white-haired mister over there?" Conan pitched his voice up into an adorable squeak. "Did you and Uncle meet him at the banquet the other day?"
Ran glanced in the direction he was pointing, then nodded in recognition. "Oh, you mean Mr. Neuvillette. Yes, he was at the banquet that day. But if you want details, you'd better ask Dad — the two of them seemed to hit it off pretty well that night."
She grabbed Kogoro's arm and shook it. "Isn't that right, Dad?"
Yanked back to reality by his daughter, Kogoro replayed a few details from that evening in his mind and answered with a confident curl of his lips. "Indeed. Chatting with him was quite pleasant."
Then he muttered under his breath, "Except for that part where I got thrown over his shoulder..."
"So, Uncle, do you know what his position is?" Conan pressed his advantage, pressing on. "And isn't there a friend with him, someone called Furina? What does she do?"
Battered by the barrage of questions, Kogoro gave Conan's head an irritated bop. "Honestly, where do you get all this curiosity!"
He grumbled a complaint, but didn't think much of it, and gave a simple account of what he knew.
"Neuvillette and Furina are both from Fontaine. I have no idea what their exact positions are, but Neuvillette is apparently some kind of government official. They were invited over by Lady Diana to enjoy a bit of sightseeing in London, so don't go bothering them — the last thing we need is for you to cause trouble for Lady Diana."
With that, Kogoro delivered his final warning to Conan.
"I actually know who Miss Furina is," Ran chimed in, tapping at her phone before holding it up for everyone to see, the screen facing them. "She mentioned it a little while we were chatting, and I got curious and searched for her online — she popped right up.
"And it looks like she's practically a household name back in Fontaine."
So Neuvillette and Furina were both famous figures in their home country. Which meant the similar characters in the *Cocoon* game must have been modeled after them by *Noah's Ark*.
Conan mulled it over for a while, arrived at that conclusion for the time being, and let the matter drop, turning his full attention back to the match.
The match itself held little suspense. The opponent was simply no match for Miss Glas, and before long, the bout ended in Glas's victory.
Though it was a shame they wouldn't get to see Lyney and Lynette's magic show the following day, Ran made a point of saying her farewells to the twins in person before they left.
"What's this?" Kogoro stared in bewilderment as Ran returned from her goodbye visit empty-handed in one moment and cradling a bouquet of dried flowers the next. Then a thought struck him, and his voice went tight with alarm. "Don't tell me some punk gave you these?"
Didn't that brat from the Kudou family leave London ages ago? Don't tell me he came back?!
Conan's eyes locked onto Ran as well, his heart tightening — after all, he had no idea whether Shinichi had sent flowers or not.
If it wasn't him, then it had to be some other oblivious interloper.
"No, no." Ran held the bouquet out to Kogoro. "Dad, these are from Lyney."
"Lyney?" Kogoro and Conan exchanged a glance.
*Damn it all,* Conan fumed inwardly. *How did I miss this when we met him before? He was harboring feelings this whole time!*
Just as expected, the Teyvat Syndicate's people had ulterior motives. From now on, he really ought to keep Ran away from them.
Kogoro, for his part, grumbled with a scowl on his face. "Hmph. Why would that guy suddenly give you flowers..."
"Dad, your imagination is running away with you." Ran explained with a laugh. "I mentioned that the bouquet in their room was really unusual, so he gave it to me.
"According to Lyney, these are called Rainbow Roses. They only grow in his country, and they can't be preserved for very long — so he found a way to dry them into keepsakes, which means they can be enjoyed for ages even abroad."
"Is that so, now." Learning that Lyney had no designs on his daughter put Kogoro in a gracious enough mood to actually admire the flowers Ran handed him.
He had to admit — these Rainbow Roses really were lovely.
"A blue-violet flower this unusual is pretty rare. Even the leaves are blue." It was the first time Kogoro had ever laid eyes on such a strange plant.
Even Conan, once reassured that the flowers hadn't come from a love rival, couldn't resist his own curiosity and leaned in for a closer look. "Yeah, Rainbow Roses... from the name, you'd guess they grow by the water..."