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Wasn’t Lucas something else at his last lesson?
At this rate he had probably collected around a hundred demerit stickers by now.
When I arrived in front of the lesson room door, I rose onto my tiptoes and peeked through the small window set into it.
Pop.
With only my eyes cresting the windowsill, I peered in—
Contrary to every expectation, Lucas was listening to the lesson with complete attentiveness.
“For last week’s assignment, you were asked to memorize the names of the successive heads of House Krost. Please recite them.”
“Yes! First head of House Krost, Amstrike. Second head, Risritan. Third head, Laon. Fourth head, Oriosha. Fifth head—”
Astonishingly, Lucas rattled them off without glancing at a single cheat sheet.
What’s gotten into him?!
I nearly fell over from the shock. But on reflection, Lucas had always shown real passion for anything related to House Krost.
Once he sets his mind to something, he does it properly.
He was a terrifying person when he wanted to be.
I was straining my tiptoes to the limit, watching him with quiet admiration, when—
“What are you doing?”
“Gyah!”
A blunt, unexpected question from right beside me startled me so badly that I stumbled and nearly twisted my ankle.
I turned. Knox was regarding me with a sharp, narrowed look.
“I was watching my brother’s lesson! What’s wrong with that?!”
Guilt flared in me despite myself—the trained reflex of a former spy, apparently still deeply embedded.
I hadn’t done anything wrong, and yet I squared my twin-tails and bristled at him defensively.
“Hmm. Did I look suspicious?”
“No, not suspicious, exactly—”
I straightened up and tried to recover some dignity before asking. Knox merely shrugged his shoulders.
“You looked a little bored, is all.”
“Pardon?”
“Bored. You’ve been wandering all over the place, haven’t you?”
Oh.
My twin-tails began to droop.
Now that he mentioned it—yes. Calypse was busy with his duties as duke. Kyle was busy training with the knightly order. Lucas was busy with his lessons as heir. And it wasn’t just them—Knox, Mai, and Brad were each occupied with their own work.
“…….”
I had only just realized it: I was the only one with nothing to do, idling about like a lady of leisure.
✦ ✦ ✦
And so, sometime later, in my bedroom—
“Om nom nom.”
Flop—
I lay sprawled across my bed in a starfish position, crunching through the cookies Mai had brought me.
“Come to think of it, lounging around wasn’t exactly my plan from the beginning, was it?”
In search of the origin point of my current lifestyle of leisure, I traced my way backward.
“Hmm…”
I sank into thought.
To start: when I had returned to Krost Duchy as a proper member of the household.
Delta, who had welcomed me back with open arms, had listened to everything that had happened in the capital—and immediately burst out wailing.
You must rest and recover. To have been kidnapped at such a young age—you must take time to heal, body and soul!
Delta had raged against Duke Foss, deeply worried that I had suffered serious psychological damage from the kidnapping and everything that followed. She had fed me carefully brewed medicinal tonics and brought me sweet candies every day to help me sleep.
Not bad, all told.
At first, doing nothing had made me uneasy. I had wanted to be doing something—anything.
But then—
Since the day I arrived in Aisha’s body, I honestly haven’t had a single proper day of rest.
With that thought as justification, I had used Delta’s urging as an excuse to cycle contentedly through eating, playing, and sleeping.
And since I had achieved the most important goal—escaping House Foss’s grip entirely—perhaps this was a genuine turning point. The moment to start working in earnest on the bucket list I had not yet fully completed.
…But…
If I was being honest, even I was starting to feel restless from all this idleness.
Duke Foss’s last words kept circling in my head.
If you knew who else was after you, you’d be shocked. It’s none other than Ar—
King Argen had cut him off before the name could be spoken—but Duke Foss had clearly been about to name him as Calypse’s next enemy.
Neither of them knew it, but we were already aware. After all, we knew that the creature-rage amplifier incident had been a joint operation between King Argen and Duke Foss. I had even witnessed the King using dark magic firsthand—which made me a crucial witness.
He seemed to have let it go under the assumption that I was still too young, and had been too frightened at the time to remember. But a man rotten enough to do what he had done would certainly come after Father again before long.
“The problem is that right now there’s no evidence to use against King Argen.”
Argen had already shifted all blame onto Duke Foss. As much as it frustrated me, there was nothing I could do about it now.
“So that’s why I’m sitting here doing nothing. Hmm. No—I need to be doing something, as a proper daughter of House Krost.”
Thud.
As if in reply, the round little belly that had been growing steadily rounder from all the cookies I’d been eating popped out at me.
Ah. So this is the Korean sensibility—the one that survived even reincarnation. The guilt of resting.
I turned my head with a glazed expression and stared out the window at the falling snow.
Always feeling guilty when I’m not doing something. I should be kinder to myself.
With a mental note to start moving tomorrow, I let out a tremendous yawn—
—and the drifting snow caught my eye.
Snow falling from the sky. When the temperature dropped far enough, snow became ice—
“……!”
A flash of lightning struck through my mind.
“That’s it—ice!”
It was such an obvious thing that I couldn’t believe I hadn’t thought of it until now. Or rather—I had completely forgotten about it.
“If I’m Father’s real daughter, I should be an Ice Affinity user!”
I have something to do now.
I shoved my slightly protruding little belly back behind my waistband and sprang upright.
If it’s in Father’s bloodline, it should be possible for me too.
If I had an Affinity, I could hold my own against King Argen. Even if I were kidnapped by adults again, I wouldn’t have to be helpless!
“…But how do you actually do it?”
The problem was that I had no idea.
From watching Calypse and Lucas, it seemed as though the ability manifested at birth and was used instinctively. The original story had suggested the same.
“Hmm…”
I thought about it, then—snap.
I raised my palm toward the empty air. Bore down hard with my whole body. Scrunched my face in concentration.
“Ngh—!”
Come on. Ice crystals blossoming above my palm, maybe? Something?
“NnnnGH—!”
An icicle erupting from the floor with a dramatic crack—?!
Nothing happened.
Right, then.
“I’ll have to ask Father!”
Bang—
“Father! Your golden seed has finished its rest and is ready to grow!”
I tore through the corridor and flung open the study door.
Turning my most bright-eyed, expectant gaze on Calypse—
“Oh? Sure. Grow as much as you like.”
Father, who had been working quietly, delivered his blessing and returned immediately to his documents.
So everyone else is living productively while I’m the only slacker. Outrageous.
I trotted over to him and placed my hands on his knee.
“Father! What about me?”
“What about you?”
“The Ice Affinity! If I’m your real daughter, shouldn’t I be an Ice Affinity user too?”
Calypse paused, and then looked at me with newly rounded eyes.
“…You know, you’re right.”
From the look on his face, he hadn’t given it a single thought either.
There had simply been too much going on since my return, I supposed. Apparently for everyone except me.
“Now this sounds like a conversation worth joining. May I, Your Grace?”
Knox, who had been working at the side desk, interjected.
I immediately raised a sharp hand-chop and replied.
“No. Affinity users only.”
“What ban? Knox, come over and think about this with me. Why hasn’t this child’s Affinity manifested?”
“Hmph.”
Father ruffled my head roughly by way of response to my joke, then tilted his chin to summon Knox over.
Knox had already pushed his monocle up and was setting it to gleaming white as he spoke.
“Let’s think through this theoretically. Members of House Krost, in order to condition their bodies to generating ice, are placed in an ice vault created by the Ice Affinity shortly after birth. They spend several months there, acclimating to the Affinity.”
“That’s right.”
“But Lady Aisha’s exceptional circumstances meant she never underwent that process. In my personal estimation—her body may simply not yet be accustomed to the temperatures required to produce ice. That could be why Affinity manifestation has been difficult.”
I stared at Knox, horrified.
“Does that mean I’ll never have an Affinity at all?”
