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Chapter 8
“Dad!”
“Lowell.”
As I let go of his hand and ran toward him, Dad easily lifted me into his arms.
“…It’s not the time for me and your brother to be fighting,” Werner muttered, but I didn’t really think it was important.
“Good morning! Did you sleep well?”
“Yes. It looks like our little princess slept well too.”
“…Can you tell my eyes are puffy?”
“…No.”
His answer came a beat late, slightly awkward.
My dad—who was once said to have shaken the hearts of all the women of the Empire with his looks, abilities, and personality—was still not a perfect person.
“Dad… you’re really bad at lying. So just don’t even try to say empty compliments.”
“…Cough.”
I narrowed my eyes at him, and Dad cleared his throat.
After a lively breakfast prepared with great care by Chef Huey, dessert came out: the fruit pudding Kizef had mentioned.
“Wow!”
The pudding, filled with fresh and sweet fruit, was one of my favorite desserts.
“Pudding is the best…”
“It’s not better than chocolate cake, but pudding is good too.”
Werner and I each finished three and five plates of pudding and leaned back with full stomachs, patting our bellies in the same posture.
Dad and Kizef, who didn’t have strong preferences about food like us, stared at the eight empty plates with slightly stunned faces.
“…She really takes after Yunis in that way.”
“Mother could easily eat several plates of dessert at once.”
Dad nodded slowly.
“Come to think of it, it’s a little strange that you don’t like sweets.”
“Why?”
I asked, curious.
Dad answered lightly.
“Yunis ate the most desserts when she was pregnant with Kizef.”
“…That’s not really true. I remember she always had snacks during her pregnancy with Lowell too.”
“Hm, I remember that too. There were always snacks in her dress pockets. I was surprised, but she said they were all for Lowell.”
Kizef, who had the clearest memory among the three siblings, objected to Dad’s words, and Werner agreed.
I listened with interest.
I remembered everything after I was born, but I didn’t know anything about when I was still in the womb.
“Of course, she also ate a lot when she had Werner and Roweina…”
“Did she?”
“But when she had Kizef, she tried to eat sweets for all three meals.”
“Wow… even I can’t do that.”
“…She really did that every day?”
“She would have, if we hadn’t stopped her.”
At that, not only me but even Kizef and Werner opened their mouths in shock.
Then Werner slowly looked at Kizef.
“Hey, hyung.”
His tone was strangely excited, and Kizef’s expression turned stiff.
Werner’s intuition was correct.
“Hyung, you actually like sweets, don’t you? You just pretend you don’t because it doesn’t fit your image, right? Right?”
“……”
“I knew it. With our genes, there’s no way you don’t like sweets.”
“……”
“Well, the ‘Silver Wolf of the Snowfield’ doesn’t really fit sweets anyway.”
At that muttered nickname, Kizef finally twitched.
I couldn’t help but look at Werner.
When our eyes met, Werner grinned.
“I met Joshua yesterday and heard it. His brother goes to the academy with Kizef hyung. Apparently, hyung’s nickname at the academy is the Silver Wolf of the Snowfield.”
“Silver…”
“Silver Wolf of the Snowfield.”
“Snow… silver…”
I couldn’t finish speaking and lowered my head, but I couldn’t hold back my laughter.
Kizef’s cold gaze slowly turned toward Werner, but Werner, still proud of landing a hit on his brother, didn’t notice.
And the final blow came from Dad.
“So you’ve been living at the academy with a nickname like that?”
“…”
“Try smiling more, Kizef.”
At that moment, Kizef stood up with a cold smile.
“…Brother, why are you coming this way?”
Werner finally sensed danger.
“Wait, are you mad? Because I told them your nickname? Seriously?”
He tried to get up, but Kizef was faster.
“Brother!”
Kizef grabbed Werner by the back of his collar very easily and smiled softly at me.
All the killing intent from earlier had vanished, leaving his usual gentle face.
“…Ahaha.”
I gave an awkward laugh.
“Lowell, I’ll come get you for your walk later.”
Ignoring Werner’s screams behind him, I nodded.
Kizef smiled back and turned away.
As he walked off, a faint killing intent seemed to rise again from his back.
“Aaagh! Brother! I’m sorry! I was wrong!”
“Lower your voice. I told you not to shout anywhere.”
“You’re trying to kill me—how am I supposed to stay quiet?! Ahh!”
Werner’s cries faded into the distance.
“…Dad. We don’t know our oldest brother’s nickname. Okay?”
“…Alright.”
Until the noise completely died down, Dad drank coffee while I sipped sweet fruit tea.
In the third-floor head office filled with elegant, refined furniture, a soft scent of coffee lingered.
A man sat behind the desk by the window, his shirt slightly unbuttoned.
“Ubbph! Mmgh!”
From outside the window, a strange noise broke the silence.
Calips’ hands, flipping through documents, stopped.
His enhanced senses, far beyond ordinary humans, clearly picked up the sound from the garden.
And he immediately recognized the voices as his children.
“Ah, seriously, hyuunng! Let me go!”
“I keep telling you, Werner, your mouth is the problem.”
“…That’s true.”
“Leh! (Roweina!)”
Werner, hit by a silence spell, Kizef holding a magical device, and Roweina watching them with a smile.
Calips’ lips softened slightly.
There was only one reason those three would be in the garden.
‘They must have come out for Lowell’s walk.’
Roweina didn’t have formal lessons yet, so she spent her days freely, but she never skipped her daily walk. Today, her companions seemed to be her two brothers.
Click.
Calips put down his documents and stood up, walking toward the window.
There, he saw Werner with his mouth sealed by magic, Roweina standing in front of him, and Kizef slightly behind, the one who cast the spell.
“…Roweina is scolding him again.”
With her hands on her hips, Roweina was speaking firmly.
“Little brother really needs to be more careful with his words. Look, he already promised big brother he wouldn’t do it again…”
“Mmmph… I was wrong…”
“You better not just be saying it. Doing it on purpose is worse.”
“Mmgh…”
Werner obediently answered under her scolding.
Calips chuckled.
For a boy much taller than others to be scolded by a small pink-haired girl was a common sight in the Valentine ducal house.
Most of the time, disciplining others with words was Roweina’s job—just before her seventh birthday.
‘She really takes after Yunis.’
The way she stood with hands on her hips, the way she raised her eyebrows—it reminded him of Yunis.
“Calips. I told you not to undress carelessly outside.”
“…It was hot.”
“Too hot?”
“There were only knights there.”
“It was the training ground of the Imperial Palace. There were people passing by.”
“…Did you see?”
“I heard it. Honestly, I don’t understand why so many people are so interested in my married husband’s body…”
“Well, fine. I’ll just walk around with three buttons undone and lift my skirt this much too. All my friends are girls anyway, so what’s the problem—”
“I was wrong. I won’t do it again.”
“Only saying it?”
“…I promise.”
The image of Yunis with her hands on her hips, scolding him, came back clearly.
After that day, Calips always dressed properly in public.
Yunis was someone who meant what she said, and Calips knew he wouldn’t be able to ignore it.
He would likely feel something deeper—darker and more intense than simple jealousy.
As a result, many people were disappointed, but Calips did not consider the disappointment of strangers a factor at all.
