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Chapter 29
“What is your favorite season, Your Grace?”
Eloyce asked, her eyes sparkling. Alex stifled a laugh at her face, which seemed to be pondering all sorts of things.
“Well, I’m not sure.”
“Don’t say you don’t know, tell me! What season do you like? It’s important!”
Alex couldn’t take his eyes off the child’s face, which kept changing expressions.
‘Just what is she hiding in that little head.’
To Alex, who had lived in a world filled with humans hiding dark intentions and pretending to be noble, the child’s innocent attitude felt very fresh. Clearly, she was hiding something just like them, so why couldn’t he look away?
“I like all four seasons.”
At his answer, the child pouted her lips, as if something was unsatisfactory. But he was utterly sincere. When he saw the snow described as sparkling like sugar, it reminded him of her silver hair. Also, the tree leaves glowing green, soaked in sunlight, were like her warm eyes.
The pure white snow, the grass, and the leaves—things that were once trivial felt incredibly special now.
Winter with its falling snow. Spring filled with green leaves. Summer and autumn too would be made special by this child.
“Huh? That won’t do, you have to pick just one.”
“If I had to pick just one…?”
Suddenly, he remembered the time he visited the village disguised in a common knight’s attire. A girl, shivering in the cold, snowy weather in thin, worn-out clothes, holding out a flower. Looking at that flower, he had thought. He wanted to place not a common wildflower, but an Adellen flower, in her hand.
“Winter… yes, winter.”
“Eh? You’re just like me! I like winter the most too.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes! It’s when I first met you, Your Grace.”
‘Every year when winter comes, I should fill the child’s arms with Adellen flowers.’
Alex looked forward to the image of Eloyce holding an armful of Adellen flowers. Trivial things became special, and meaningless days became something to look forward to. Because they would be filled with scenes of this child smiling brightly at him.
“It seems like we’ve come quite far, but I don’t see Cailyn.”
Where in the world is he? Eloyce turned her head here and there in the garden. Then, a patch of grass swaying with a regular rhythm caught her eye.
“Cailyn!”
Eloyce, who had jumped down from Alex’s arms, ran straight over. As she got closer to the grass, she could see Cailyn training, slicing through the air with a wooden sword.
“You’re late?”
As Cailyn lowered his wooden sword and greeted them, Eloyce grumbled at him.
“Don’t just change locations on your own. The garden is so huge it took time to find you.”
“Alright, next time I’ll leave a note so you know where I am.”
“Let’s just go back to the training grounds. It’s closer to both the office and the residence, isn’t it?”
The place where the three of them first started gathering was the training grounds. It was because Eloyce had tagged along after hearing that Alex helped Cailyn with his sword training every dawn. That had continued naturally. Although one day, the location changed to the garden due to Cailyn’s insistence.
“No way, what if you collapse again at the training grounds?”
Cailyn firmly pointed out the incident from not long after she had fainted and woken up.
‘Was changing it to the garden because of that time?’
Eloyce looked at Cailyn with disbelieving eyes.
“You’re bringing up something from so long ago? That was because I overexerted myself so soon after waking up!”
“Even so, you could collapse there, so no.”
“Don’t make me out to be some weird person who collapses every time I go to the training grounds.”
Alex, who had been watching the bickering children, spoke.
“If you’re worried I might find it burdensome, you don’t need to be concerned.”
“But……”
Eloyce trailed off worriedly, knowing that his workload had increased lately and he wasn’t resting properly.
“I’m an adult, and the office isn’t that far from there.”
“Okay.”
Eloyce nodded at Alex’s playful words as he ruffled her hair.
‘Since he says it’s okay, I guess we have no choice but…’
Eloyce shot a glance at Cailyn. For some reason, she felt like she had lost to his strange logic that she collapses every time she goes to the training grounds.
“Right. You might not know because you’re still small, but it’s really close to the office.”
Cailyn, who had grown noticeably lately, shrugged his shoulders and said.
“Indeed, Cailyn, it seems you’ve grown a lot taller since you started learning the sword.”
At Alex’s response, Cailyn’s eyes widened.
“Have I really grown a lot? Ah, that’s right! I practiced everything you taught me!”
Feeling confident from Alex’s words, Cailyn raised his wooden sword to show him.
“You seem quite confident? Then, shall we do a simple test to see how proficient you’ve become?”
At the child’s proud display with the wooden sword, Alex raised the corners of his mouth.
“Huh? Th-that……”
Caught off guard by the sudden disaster of a ‘test’, Cailyn racked his brain to find a way out.
“You said you were good? The knights were all making a fuss about how talented you are?”
Eloyce chattered playfully, circling around him.
“……”
“A once-in-a-century genius! That’s what they said.”
Eloyze lowered her voice dramatically, imitating exactly what the knights had said. Her tone was clearly teasing, making Cailyn shoot her a sharp look.
“You… I’m going to tell Cain to move your test date earlier.”
“No!”
At Cailyn’s counterattack, Eloyze’s face paled.
“Don’t fight… let’s get along well, shall we?”
Seeing the conversation getting increasingly heated, Alex cautiously tried to mediate. He then promptly knelt down to be at the children’s eye level. His posture was the standard one you might find in a parenting book. The children looked at Alex’s action with puzzled eyes.
“Were we fighting?”
Eloyze asked, blinking, then turned her head towards Cailyn. As she looked at him as if to say, ‘Were we fighting?’, Cailyn let out a sigh.
“We’re not fighting.”
Seeing the obvious worry in Alex’s eyes, Cailyn answered more firmly on purpose. How could what just happened look like that?
“Really? You’re not fighting? That’s a relief……”
Even after double-checking, Alex’s worry didn’t easily subside, and he shook his head thoughtfully.
‘What should I do in this situation… Ah, yes! The book said to consider the children’s thoughts and feelings when speaking!’
Alex recalled the parenting book he read yesterday. Remembering the underlined sentence, he rummaged through his pocket and pulled out some chocolate. Good thing he had kept some chocolate, which most children supposedly like the most.
“You like chocolate, right? Let’s reconcile… no, let’s get along well.”
Alex, who was about to say ‘reconcile’, quickly corrected himself. No matter how he looked at it, it seemed like they were fighting, but his own thoughts weren’t important. What’s important are the children’s thoughts and feelings. If the children don’t want it, he should respect that.
“Well……”
Eloyze opened her mouth with a dazed expression. But before her words could even be heard, Cailyn shouted vehemently.
“Ugh, I’m not a child! First of all, I’m not like Eloyze either, there’s no way chocolate would make me feel better!”
‘Not like Eloyze either?’
Unable to let Cailyn’s comment slide, Eloyze frowned.
“What did you say? Why bring me into this! You like it too, we even stole that whiskey chocolate together!”
After shouting at Cailyn, Eloyze flinched.
‘What are you doing, mentioning the whiskey chocolate in front of His Grace!’
Eloyze glanced cautiously at Alex. Fortunately, Alex, who was muttering ‘Was the book wrong?’, didn’t seem to have heard.
“I only did that to play with you, of course. Things like chocolate are just too sweet, it just makes my mouth tingle, and as for alcohol, back in the Imperial Palace, I stole some with Rian… well, something like that.”
As if he hadn’t learned from Eloyze’s slip-up a moment ago, Cailyn made the same mistake and also glanced cautiously at Alex.
‘What, does he really dislike chocolate? Then it just makes me look even younger!’
Although she was two years younger than Cailyn, in this situation that had turned into a battle of pride, that was no longer important.
“Besides, everyone in the mansion knows your mood improves whenever there’s chocolate, right?”
“Th-that can’t be……”
For a moment, a conversation with the butler vaguely came to Eloyze’s mind, and she couldn’t strongly deny it, trailing off her words.
