Calisto, who had been gazing out the window for a moment, suddenly came to himself and looked toward Ailien. The child was busily looking all around the inside of the carriage. Just as he was about to say something, wondering if she felt uneasy, that was the moment.
“Is this the sword’s house?”
“What?”
“Hmm, it’s a bit small…….”
The carriage Calisto and Ailien were riding in now was one the knights had procured with great effort. It could not compare to the carriage owned by the Ruventain Grand Ducal House, but even so, it was quite excellent.
“This is a carriage.”
“A carriage?”
Ailien tilted her head, then opened her eyes wide as if she had realized something.
“Lili knows too!”
“You know?”
“The theory is sufficient. While the horse runs itself to death, the people just laze about inside, right?”
It was quite a brilliant answer, and yet it was baffling. Calisto pressed a hand to his forehead.
“It’s not like that anymore. Marilyn Zeronias and other mages invented portals, greatly reducing travel distances. And so the horses wouldn’t be overworked, they even placed magic on the horseshoes…….”
“Mari is amazing!”
Ailien clapped her hands. Thoroughly excited, the child hummed a tune and gazed out the window. Then she marveled greatly, saying the scenery was changing in a flash.
She truly was a child worth watching.
The carriage sped along and arrived at Ruventain Castle. Ailien, who had been marveling all this while, marveled even more greatly.
“It’s like a princess’s castle!”
It resembled the castles from the storybooks Marilyn had read to her. The castle, with its pure white walls as if holding the first snow of winter, shone brightly with a silvery radiance.
It looked like a mysterious fantasy floating above the clouds. At the castle’s highest tower, a lapis lazuli roof soared toward the sky. Whenever the sunlight touched it, the dazzling radiance seemed to reach even the village below the castle. The entire castle was like a crown holding starlight for a princess.
As if the castle were greeting her, welcoming her, Ailien smiled brightly and waved toward it.
* * *
In the place called the heart of the empire, a man was reading a report.
“The Ruventain Grand Duke brought a child from Hayana Forest?”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
The Emperor took his eyes off the report and looked out the window.
“He kept submitting reports about the possibility of demons appearing……. It seems he has a great deal of time on his hands.”
He set down the report with a somewhat irritable touch.
“Give the Ruventain Grand Duke more work. Move up the northern patrol schedule, and add an inspection of the eastern border as well.”
“Even the eastern border?”
“What can one do?”
The Emperor smiled. He, called the water lily of the Tamne Empire, possessed a pure and delicate beauty.
“Heroes should be busy.”
But he was a man whose depths were as unknowable as his beauty.
The Emperor’s aide had no choice but to nod and turn away.
* * *
“It seems His Grace will arrive soon.”
Kaius, who had been holed up in the library reading, rose from his seat at the butler’s words. Both his father and mother had left the castle, so he had been a little lonely, and this was very welcome news.
Kaius, who had poked his head out the window to check, had a question mark appear over his head.
“What is that carriage? It doesn’t look like one from the Grand Ducal House. And didn’t Father leave riding Blanc?”
Blanc was the Ruventain Grand Duke’s prized horse and partner. Even on battlefields where demons ran rampant, he never shied and galloped through the enemy lines alongside Calisto.
“Could he be coming with Zeronias?”
“With Zeronias?”
Kaius’s eyes sparkled. Though he had been very young, he remembered Marilyn’s warm touch and gentle gaze.
The reason he could remember was that every year on his birthday, Kaius dreamed of Marilyn Zeronias appearing before him.
In the dream, she would stroke his hair for a long while. Even without any meaningful conversation, he was happy. It felt like entrusting his whole body to soft clouds.
It was Kaius’s own secret, one he did not even tell his parents.
But now Zeronias was really returning.
Before the butler could say anything, Kaius dashed down in a single breath.
There were so many things he wanted to say when they met.
But the person who actually stepped out of the carriage with his father was.
“My, so you’re Kai? You’re much bigger than I heard!”
A little girl with a slightly odd way of speaking, and grubby.
“What is this?”
Kaius, disappointed that it was not the person he had been waiting for, asked flatly. Ailien sniffled, and as if that would not do, rubbed her nose roughly with the back of her hand. It was only natural that Kaius’s brow furrowed.
Her blonde hair was similar to his father’s and his own, but a little lighter. Her small face and exceptionally large eyes sparkled as if holding light, and they were so blue they seemed cute, but her wide, goofy smile looked a little foolish.
For Kaius, who detested dirty things and stupid people, it could only be the worst first impression.
Just then, a cat and a flying squirrel, just as grubby, stuck close to the child’s side. They stood majestically as if guarding the child, and at the sight, Kaius flinched for a moment.
“She is called Ailien.”
“Ailien?”
“Ailien Zeronias!”
“What?”
“Just call me Lili.”
At Ailien’s behavior of casually attaching Marilyn’s great title to herself, Kaius grew even more displeased.
“She will be staying with us from now on, so please look after her.”
“What? Why?”
“Understood.”
At Calisto’s request, Kaius asked back, and Ailien readily agreed. When the answer came from an unexpected direction, both Calisto and Kaius turned to look at her, and Ailien shrugged.
“Just trust Lili. I’ll pour all my attention onto Kai. Kai is still a baby and needs lots of help.”
“……What is she, really?”
At Kaius’s question, Calisto had nothing to say either and simply felt frustrated.
Fortunately, the butler who had followed behind Kaius appeared and broke the silence.
“Welcome, Your Grace!”
“Ah, Peril. You’ve worked hard all this time.”
“Your Grace has suffered far more. And this child is……?”
“Her name is Ailien, and she will be staying at our castle from now on. She is a child Marilyn Zeronias specially entrusted to us, so please take good care of her.”
“By Zeronias?”
Peril’s face brightened. Marilyn Zeronias was the hero of the continent. Many artists sang songs about Marilyn Zeronias, wrote poems, painted pictures, and carved sculptures.
To think there was something he could do for Marilyn! Peril bent down to meet Ailien’s eyes.
“Hello, little one. I am Peril Tosen. I am the butler who manages Ruventain Castle.”
“Bu-tler? Lili do that too?”
“What? You do not need to, little one.”
“Why? Lili wants to do it too! Lili thinks she can do it too?”
“You do not need to, but…….”
At Ailien’s innocent insistence, Peril looked to Calisto as if asking for help, but he was pretending not to notice and had turned his gaze away.
Sorry, but he had suffered enough from Ailien on the way here.
Meanwhile, Kaius was frozen cold.
A child Marilyn Zeronias specially entrusted?
‘But Grandmother’s jewel is me?’
Kaius’s small but firm fists began to tremble.
“Kai, your face is ugly.”
“You should ask why my expression is so bad.”
Calisto, who had perfectly guessed what Ailien wanted to say, quickly corrected her phrasing. The child nodded as if she understood, then her small lips wriggled.
“Kai, your face is not good.”
So she only learns half of what she is taught.
Kaius, having lost even the will to answer, looked down at Ailien silently for a moment, then slowly raised his head and looked at Calisto.
“I am relieved to see you have returned safely. May I be excused now?”
“Yes. You worked hard protecting the house alone.”
When Calisto praised him with a gentle stroke of his head, Kaius’s cheeks flushed red. Being praised by the person he wanted to resemble more than anyone in the world was always a joy.
“Upsy, upsy.”
Just then, hearing a grunting sound, he looked down to see Ailien rising on her tiptoes and waving her hands.
‘Is she saying she wants to pat my head too?’
The more he looked, the more absurd this child was. Calling him a baby out of nowhere, saying he was commendable. Kaius gave her a short, annoyed glance, then bowed to Calisto and disappeared back to where he had come from.
Calisto, looking down at Ailien’s small head as she watched Kaius go, scratched his forehead.
What if she had been hurt……
