At Ailien’s spirited answer, Marilyn smiled gently.
‘Lili’s treasure, which Mari went out of her way to hide when she could have just given it to me!’
‘Saying it like that makes me feel like I’ve become a truly terrible person, doesn’t it?’
‘Terrible person! Terrible person!’
‘You only say that because you don’t know what it means, I suppose?’
‘Hm?’
‘Yes, in a way, I am…….’
‘Huh?’
‘No, never mind. Anyway, that will help Lili.’
Ailien, too, seemed to have recalled the day Marilyn gave her the wand, for she gazed at it silently.
That was the day Marilyn first hinted to Ailien that she might leave this place.
Ailien had been rather shocked, but even so, she smiled brightly.
Marilyn was the hero who would save this world. She had something she had to do.
“But Lili is still a baby.”
She was weak because she was still a baby—but once she grew as much as Marilyn, she would become an incredibly powerful Zeronias.
Yet Ailien had no time. So she had to find the treasure and grow strong.
After sniffling once, loudly, Ailien swung the wand widely, filled with longing for Marilyn. It was an imitation of Marilyn’s stance.
That was when.
“Huh?”
The heart wand in Ailien’s hand pulsed like a beating heart. Then, with a shaaa, it burst into radiance. The light that began at the wand drew a map, and upon it a heart-shaped mark blinked and sparkled.
Soon an arrow was drawn on the map, extending onward as if seeking something out.
“Meow!”
“Squeak!”
“What!”
While Ailien stared blankly at the astonishing sight, Kiki and Didi each clung to her feet.
Kiki pushed Ailien with her nose, and Didi tugged at her with small front paws, whining. Under that feeble force, Ailien had no choice but to move her feet.
“You want Lili to follow that?”
“Meow!”
“Squeak!”
“That’s right, Lili’s treasure!”
Ailien’s eyes sparkled like transparent beads. The treasure hunt Marilyn had supposedly hidden was finally beginning.
Clutching the heart wand tightly, Ailien crossed the room to go in the direction it pointed. Didi and Kiki quickly chased after her.
And the moment she opened the door.
“Ouch!”
Ailien, who had buried her nose in the chest of someone standing there, raised her small hand to cover her nose. She had hit it so hard that tears pricked at her eyes.
What thoughtless person was loitering in front of Ailien’s room?
When Ailien glared with her large eyes and raised her head to check the identity.
“You—why are you here.”
She found herself eye to eye with Kaius, frozen cold.
“Tell me. Why are you here.”
She did not know why, but he looked extremely displeased.
Ailien stared at him blankly, then tilted her head.
“Why are you here.”
“Why is Kai here?”
“This is our house.”
Even as Kaius answered, he thought himself childish.
Born among the heroes who had led the Human-Demon War to victory, he had always grown up surrounded by tremendous expectations.
He had always tried to present a perfect image so as not to bring shame to his parents’ fame.
And yet, before this little brat, he could not even control his emotions—and he did not like that either.
“You said this is the sword’s house?”
“It’s my house too. I am his son.”
“Is that so? Kai’s dad said Lili could use this place, though?”
“Father did?”
Kaius’s gaze went past Ailien, behind her.
He, who had fallen into thought with his lips pressed firmly shut, looked at Ailien again.
“There seems to have been a mistake.”
“Huh?”
“This can’t be your room. I’ll speak to Father again, so pack your things.”
“But Lili likes it here!”
Ailien clenched her fists and stomped her foot with a thud. Kiki glared at Kaius, and Didi politely gathered her front paws. If she could speak human language, she looked ready to try persuading him.
Kaius’s gaze lingered long on Didi, then his brow furrowed again.
“What?”
“What!”
“You shouldn’t say ‘but’ at a time like that.”
“Why?”
“Why, you ask. This is about promises and rules.”
“Promises? Did Kai make one with Lili?”
Ailien thrust her pinky finger out at Kaius.
With a force that looked ready to poke his nostril, Kaius had no choice but to step back.
“Never mind, just move rooms.”
“Why should Lili do that? Kai isn’t even a butler. You’re just the sword’s son.”
“A butler…….”
“Kai doesn’t know, does he. A butler, you see, when there’s an empty position, they—what was it—hmm—they’re appointed through proper procedure. Does Kai have the qualifications to be a butler?”
“I have no reason to become a butler.”
“Hm, I’m sure you don’t.”
Ailien nodded as if she understood everything and smiled.
Kaius’s fists, meanwhile, were trembling.
Kaius was the heir of the Ruventain Grand Ducal House and was receiving an enormous education.
Qualifications to be a butler, of all things. It was absurd, and yet his pride was stung for no reason.
“Listen well. I, Kaius Ruventain, do not need to become a butler.”
“Understood, baby-baby.”
“Hey, you!”
“Baby-baby, you must learn. That not everything in this world can go the way you want…….”
At the tone that was exactly like his grandmother’s, Kaius lost his will to retort in an instant.
“Don’t worry too much. No matter how much baby-baby clings, I’ll be off in a flash.”
Ailien’s expression as she said that looked a little sad.
“But baby-baby, Lili is a bit busy right now and has no spare moment to play……. Would it be all right if we finished talking later?”
Before Kaius could even answer, Ailien had vanished to the end of the corridor.
Kiki chased after her diligently, and Didi, on Ailien’s shoulder, kept looking back as if concerned about Kaius, sending him a pitiful look.
Left alone in the corridor, Kaius could not hide his bewilderment and muttered.
“What kind of creature is that?”
* * *
“Baby-baby seems to have a bit of a selfish personality!”
Ailien said to Didi as she ran along the light coming from the heart wand.
Didi chattered busily, as if doing her best to sympathize.
“It’s a good thing Lili knows the theory of handling baby-babies very well. If she didn’t, she would have gotten angry.”
Her pale pink lips pouted. Frankly, Ailien did not like Kaius either.
Marilyn had clearly said Kaius was a kind and sparkling baby.
“It seems he sparkles so much that Mari’s eyes went blind.”
Ailien nodded, thinking that made sense.
“Anyway, how far do I have to follow this?”
She had thought the castle was enormous when she saw it from the carriage, but it was far more monstrously large than she had imagined.
The light pointing to where Marilyn’s treasure was located continued on without end.
“Meow!”
When Ailien slowed down, Kiki pressed her forehead into her insistently.
“Kiki, you’re making it so Lili can’t live.”
“Meow.”
“What!”
“Meow!”
“All right, all right, I got it.”
At Kiki’s fierce look, Ailien flinched and hurried her steps again.
“Hello!”
Running pitter-patter down the corridor, Ailien passed countless people.
‘People must greet others properly. Greetings are, you see, first impressions.’
‘Does Mari greet people properly too?’
‘Lili, I am Zeronias. I am not in a position where I need to go out of my way to greet anyone.’
‘But didn’t you just say people must greet others properly? Then Mari must make a bad impression on the lower folk, right? When they see you, they must go, “Ugh, she’s here again without even greeting anyone.”‘
‘You shouldn’t call them the lower folk. All right, I understand. That was too stuffy a way of thinking. From now on, Mari will greet people properly too.’
‘I think that’s a very good attitude.’
Recalling the lesson she had given Marilyn, Ailien waved her hand at every single person she passed.
Of course, she had been so startled by the sudden intruder that she might not have greeted Calisto when she first saw him, but still.
“Hello, hello!”
At Ailien’s bright greetings, the servants’ eyes went wide.
Among them, two maids stopped in their tracks.
“Who is that?”
“She must be the child Peril mentioned. They say His Grace brought back the child Lady Zeronias raised.”
“Goodness. Lady Zeronias?”
At the words that she was a child personally raised by that Zeronias, the new maid turned her head once more.
Something like a golden ball of fur was running along busily.
It was only a small child and a single cat running, and yet it was quite a lively sight.
“It’s not a sight you see often in the Grand Ducal House.”
“Isn’t it the first time, actually?”
At the new maid’s question, the older woman smiled and turned her head.
Her name was Kora, and she was the head maid of the Ruventain Grand Ducal House.
“It’s not the first time. This place was once a place where a child was raised, after all.”
“But…….”
The new maid’s words trailed off, as if she simply could not imagine it.
Kora laughed heartily, as if she understood her feelings.
