Chapter 7
* * *
Early dawn. The Duke of Kreitan, his physician, and his butler gathered in the Duke’s office.
"What is it you have to say? I have to go submit the adoption papers, so make it quick."
"Your Grace, are you truly certain about this?"
"An adoption, all of a sudden. When I spoke to you about it before, you said you had no intention of adopting."
"I did."
"Then why?"
"Since I’ve adopted a child without any prior notice, my retainers will surely think I’ve lost my mind."
The butler did not deny it.
"Send out letters with a suitable explanation so that there is no unnecessary noise."
"The little guest cannot be the Lady who was lost."
At the butler’s insistence on pointing it out once more, the Duke’s hand faltered.
Even under the Duke’s frost-cold gaze, the butler continued to speak his mind.
"If the Lady were still alive, she would be a grown young lady by now. Not a child of merely four or five years."
The physician, who had been gauging the mood between the butler and the Duke of Kreitan, cautiously opened his mouth.
"However, she does truly resemble the Duchess. For a moment, I thought the Duchess herself was sitting there."
The butler had been thinking the same thing.
In fact, when he first saw the child stepping out of the carriage, he had thought the Duchess had returned from the dead.
There had been many swindlers who had come forward claiming to be the lost Lady.
But after exchanging only a few words, the Duke had summarily punished them for fraud or blasphemy.
Some had lost their lives, while others had been stripped of all their possessions and cast out.
The Duke had shown not a shred of mercy to those who impersonated his daughter.
That was why Lephonia’s sudden adoption was such an exceptional case.
The butler let out a sigh.
"If it is because the child resembles the Duchess that you are troubled, there are many other ways to handle this besides adoption."
"I know the two children are different. I am not so insane that I cannot distinguish between them."
"……."
"And I am not adopting her simply because she resembles Laila."
Laila. Just holding that name in his mouth made his heart feel as though it might stop from the sheer poignancy of it.
It was the name of the woman the Duke of Kreitan, a man called cold-blooded, had loved for the first and last time.
"It may look like a light decision, but my heart is not light. I have no intention of casting the child aside on a mere whim."
The Duke of Kreitan did not explain further. Or rather, there was nothing he could explain.
"I felt a certain power."
"Power, Your Grace?"
It was a power that only the Duke of Kreitan, who possessed Aura and was sensitive in all five senses, could feel if he focused intently.
Something like that existed within the child’s body.
That was why, the moment he met her, he had poured his Aura into her to verify it, but he had felt nothing.
Yet, there was something.
His Aura had clearly reacted and been drawn to a strange, indescribable power.
How on earth was he supposed to explain this feeling?
Lephonia.
He knew well enough that she was not the child born between him and Laila.
And yet, the moment he saw her, he thought, *She is my child.*
It was truly ridiculous, but he felt that if he let her go now, he would regret it forever.
His senses, sharpened after awakening his Aura, were telling him to love that child.
"It’s the first time I’ve felt this way since I fell in love with Laila at first sight."
"Pardon?"
"Perhaps I am just very weary."
His voice, laced with lament, muttered as if to himself.
Twenty years.
In truth, the Duke had been searching for his daughter, whom everyone claimed was dead, for twenty years.
The butler sighed and began his report.
"I will report the findings of the investigation into our little guest."
Even though her age did not match his lost daughter, she resembled the Duchess Laila too closely, so it had been necessary to investigate.
"There are a total of 60 people registered in the Empire under the name 'Lephonia.' It is estimated that there are 170 who are unregistered, and among them, there is no one who is five years old this year."
"None?"
"Yes. Thinking the little guest might have been mistaken about her age, I investigated children named 'Lephonia' between the ages of four and six. There is one six-year-old, but it was a boy."
The Duke of Kreitan stroked his chin.
"Is there a possibility that someone from Laila’s family gave birth to a child and abandoned her?"
"It has no relation to the Rowald Count family, the Duchess’s family."
The butler said firmly.
"As you know, the Rowald Count family, the Duchess’s family, has long since seen its line cut off due to an unfortunate accident. The only ones left from that family are—"
"Only my wife’s father."
"Yes. Only Count Rowald. Even if we assume he took a mistress and fathered a child… he would likely never let such a child out of his sight."
The Duke of Kreitan tapped his desk.
"Is Count Rowald doing well?"
"Yes. Though he still does not even turn his head in the direction of the Duke."
"I am the sinner who caused him to lose his beloved daughter and granddaughter. It is a blessing enough that he meets with Habel and Pretes."
"Yes. I also checked the house where the little guest stayed. The owner is a man, but he rarely visits and seems to have no connection to her."
The Duke fell silent, as if deep in thought.
"The little guest is so incredibly tidy that there is absolutely no trace of her having lived anywhere."
Could a person live without leaving any trace at all? It was an absurd story.
"So, she has no connection to our family, then."
Then what was this feeling?
The image of the five-year-old child, who was fearless yet so composed, came to mind.
"So many things happened in just one day yesterday. But do you know what that child asked me?"
The butler closed his mouth at the Duke’s self-deprecating mutter.
"She asked if I had any regrets. She showed no signs of anxiety, and she didn't seem curious, as if it were someone else's business."
Even while she was being incredibly cautious, as if she had done something wrong, when she was caught scraping up cake cream.
"It seems the Lady has a tendency to be indifferent toward her own affairs. …Hmm, perhaps it is a defense mechanism."
The physician raised his hand and spoke up.
"She didn't cry and remained calm even when I was looking at her wounds. Your sons would have cried at five years old if they saw blood."
The butler, listening to the physician, seemed to remember something and opened his lips.
"When the maids were bathing the Lady, they said she had scars all over her body."
"She must have been living outside on her own, so that is to be expected. Children get hurt often without even realizing it."
At the physician’s added explanation, the butler nodded and continued.
"The problem is her reaction. They said she had no particular reaction even when they told her it must have hurt, as if she were talking about someone else’s injury."
"She lived alone outside, so it couldn't have been a good environment for a five-year-old to survive in."
The physician smiled bitterly.
The Duke recalled Lephonia reading and checking the adoption papers when he handed them to her.
"Come to think of it, she seems to be able to read even though she is only five."
"She likely didn't learn it separately. In many cases, children pick it up naturally just to survive on their own."
The Duke of Kreitan stepped out, as if heading to the Imperial Palace. The butler followed, finishing his report.
"It is said that the young Lord Villemont will soon inherit the Dukedom. You must attend the Imperial Palace, so you will need to have your uniform refitted."
The Villemont Duchy was a prestigious family of swordsmanship in the Empire. As a family that had produced the strongest knights in the Empire for generations, they boasted military power comparable to the Kreitan Duchy.
"Ah. That arrogant greenhorn."
Currently, due to certain circumstances, only the young heir and his grandmother, the Dowager Duchess Villemont, remained to carry on the family line.
The heir, the young Lord, was nine years old this year, and it was known that the Dowager Duchess Villemont had declared herself the Duke’s representative because he was too young to inherit the title.
"He is the one who will officially inherit the Dukedom, so 'greenhorn' and 'brat' are forbidden."
"The Dowager Duchess Villemont wouldn't have given up her position so easily."
"Yes. They say he is the youngest Duke in the history of the Empire. After the succession ceremony at the Imperial Palace, they plan to hold a separate celebration party at the mansion later, so please keep that in mind."
"Leave the childcare to someone else. I am busy enough taking care of another child right now."
The Duke of Kreitan left for the Imperial Palace without further delay.
* * *
The very next day after Lephonia approved the adoption papers.
The Duke of Kreitan submitted the documents to the Imperial family without a moment’s hesitation. It was said he even went at dawn and badgered them to process it quickly.
The Imperial family approved it, and Lephonia officially became the Lady of Kreitan.
The rumor that the Duke had adopted a child spread quickly, and everyone was curious about her identity.
"…Good."
Lephonia, the protagonist of those rumors, was currently waking up, feeling the warm sunlight.
The morning sun, streaming through the small window beside the bed, had woken her up without fail again today.
A bed as soft as lying on a cloud, a fluffy blanket made of high-end fabric that only came through trade, and even a pillow that didn't make her neck ache.
Lephonia was currently experiencing a perfect sense of peace that she had never once felt in her life.
Of course, that didn't mean it was entirely peaceful.
*Where on earth is the heirloom?*
Even amidst a busy daily life of having dresses and shoes fitted and being held by several physicians to check her health, Lephonia wandered through every corner of the mansion.
This body, with its weak stamina, tired easily, so it took her several days just to roam the mansion.
Lephonia was now quite accustomed to eating with the Duke and touring the mansion with her assigned maid.
When lunchtime came, the Duke, who knew where he had been hiding, would pop out again to eat with her, and they would tour the mansion some more.
Then, when evening came, the Duke would rush out again to eat with her, as if he had become a meal fairy.
That wasn't all.
"Ponia."
"Yes."
"…Ponia."
"Yes?"
"Ha, Ponia."
"Yes!"
Days where he called her for no reason like this were increasing!
Every time she answered the Duke of Kreitan’s call, the maids standing behind would clutch their hearts and pretend to faint.
"My Lady, your pronunciation when you answer is so cute."
"The way you nod so earnestly is also perfect."
"How are you so good at answering? My Lady, could you be a genius?"
…This place is truly strange.
"Ha. Ponia."
Meanwhile, that Duke of Kreitan, who kept calling her with a satisfied expression, was the worst of them all.
"……."
"Why aren't you answering? You have to say 'Yes' cutely again."
The conversation always ended with Lephonia, whose temper was rising, glaring at him.
Because she had been abandoned in April, the director of the orphanage had called Lephonia by comparing her name to a fruit that could be eaten in April.
She hated that, so Lephonia had named herself.
Easy to memorize, easy to call.
Of course, there was no one to call her by it.
Even after meeting the Pope, she had been called the first daughter.
It felt strange to have that name called out here and there.
Since she couldn't explore the mansion until late at night, she washed up and went to bed early, as befitted a five-year-old.
"Then, have a good dream, my Lady."
After reading two fairy tale books and even singing a lullaby, the maid finally left the bedroom only after Lephonia had fallen asleep.
*Click.*
Lephonia, who had been pretending to sleep, opened her eyes.
"Ha. It feels like the whole day passed just by eating."
Lephonia patted her full stomach.
Still, by walking around diligently today, she had finally completed the floor plan of the mansion's main building in her head.
It wasn't perfect, but by calculating the shape of the outer walls and hallways, she had even deduced the secret passages connecting each floor.
However, no matter how much she looked, there was no place where the heirloom could be hidden.
'Could it be that the heirloom is hidden somewhere other than inside the main mansion?'
It was known that the heirloom of the Kreitan family was managed directly by the family head and hidden deep within the mansion.
Of course, it was said that the family head was the only one who knew what it actually was.
'A safe place that no one can steal from. A place that can be managed and checked frequently.'
In other words, it meant it had to be inside the main mansion.
"Hmm."
Lephonia recalculated to see if she had missed anything.
*Clatter!*
Just then, the terrace window rattled from the wind blowing outside. Lephonia turned her head toward the sound.
"Huh?"
She saw a shadow beyond the terrace window.
'What is that?'
Frowning, Lephonia slowly approached the terrace and opened the door.
*Whoosh!*
As soon as she opened the door, a strong wind blew as if it had been waiting. Lephonia's silver hair, shimmering in the moonlight, fluttered in the wind.
Startled, Lephonia couldn't even scream and squeezed her eyes shut. At the same time, a young boy's voice drifted down from above her head.
"You're alive."
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