“Wow, it even has a father!”
Void carefully lifted the card, its edges trimmed in gold.
The mister’s expression as he watched—like he’d bitten into a bug—had been quite a sight to behold.
“If you like it that much, why didn’t you buy it sooner?”
I asked offhandedly, and Void turned his head.
“They only sell this in the capital for a set period. You can’t get it in the North.”
“You could’ve just written the Duke a letter asking him to buy it.”
“There’s no way I could say something like that….”
His pale cheeks flushed slightly.
“I said I’d become a great knight, so if I asked for something like this… I’d seem too much like a child… He’d be disappointed….”
He mumbled, so it was hard to make out.
“Huh?”
“Nothing!”
Void neatly stacked the cards and rose from his seat.
“Anyway, thanks for this. I’m not really the type to like these kinds of games, but.”
Liar.
“But if it’s from my little sibling, I have no choice but to accept!”
Void puffed out his chest and stood before me.
“Want something in return? Go on, tell me.”
“Hmm, I’d like some alone time right now.”
“Alone time? Of course I can give you that.”
Void put on a deliberately mature face and ruffled my hair.
“Then play this card game with me tomorrow.”
“If I say no….”
*Snap*—a sharp gaze turned back toward me.
Of course, it wasn’t threatening in the slightest, so I just laughed it off.
“I’ll play, I’ll play.”
At that moment, Void stared at me.
“But the way you laugh….”
“Huh?”
“You really look like… *that*.”
A strange gleam flickered through his innocent purple eyes.
“A girl…?”
I froze solid.
“Well, of course you’re not.”
What the hell is up with this brat’s intuition?
I was so flustered that I kicked him out right then and there.
* * *
The next morning.
I opened my eyes feeling refreshed. As if I had woken up after sleeping on a cloud.
“Huuuh. I slept so well.”
“So it would seem.”
“Ah, you startled me.”
Mister Leviathan was draped over the fancy room’s sofa like a pile of laundry.
“What are you doing there? Since morning.”
“It’s not morning, it’s afternoon.”
“Huh?”
Afternoon? I’d slept that long?!
I hurried to the window to check the sun.
“…….”
The sun was just now rising in the east.
“Ah, what the heck! Why are you lying!”
The mister snickered like some neighborhood idler.
He was dressed in a comfortable tunic. Of course, the face makes the fashion, but the fact that he still shone even dressed so sloppily…
‘As expected, it’s all about looks.’
I mindlessly tugged at my unsightly silver hair reflected in the mirror.
“What are you doing?”
“Nothing.”
“Put on your slippers. Your feet will get cold.”
“Yes, sir.”
I slipped my feet into the small slippers the mister casually held out.
The mister was juggling an apple, tossing it into the air and catching it.
“Aren’t you busy? Isn’t a Duke who just returned after a long time usually swamped?”
“Well… I am busy.”
*Swish*—his agile hand snatched the apple and placed it on the table. Purple pupils within sharp eyes fixed on me intently.
“You look fine.”
“……?”
I tilted my head, unable to understand what he meant.
With a light grunt, the mister rose and turned his back. At the momentum that made it seem he would disappear at any moment, I asked a bit urgently.
“Where are you going?”
“To work.”
“What about breakfast?”
“……? The chef will bring it, won’t he?”
“No, I meant your meal, Mister….”
The mister raised his eyebrows. A slightly troubled look flickered across his face.
“Ah, I’ll be buried in work for a while, so it’ll be hard to eat together.”
The dark circles under his eyes suggested he wasn’t lying about being busy.
“Just eat with Void. You don’t like that?”
“No, it’s not that.”
“Let’s eat together once I’m done being busy.”
“Okay.”
“Write down the names of anyone who bothers you.”
The mister grinned, basking in the morning sun.
It was a wicked smile closer to a villain’s than a hero’s.
“I’ll knock them silly until they bawl their eyes out.”
* * *
“My Lord.”
As the butler approached, Leviathan, who had been sauntering down the hallway, raised his eyes.
“Would you like to begin with inspecting the castle? Or shall we depart for the Regillus Mountain Range outpost first? You still need to see to the knights’ affairs, and the financial documents also require your review.”
Matters of the estate that had long gone untouched were flooding in.
“The documents first.”
After a moment’s thought, Leviathan chose to lock himself in his office.
The butler raised his eyebrows as if surprised.
“You always delegated reading the documents.”
“…….”
He did not answer.
He couldn’t easily say that Rubian weighed on his mind and he didn’t wish to leave. Those words felt unbefitting of him.
‘Was he all right last night?’
Leviathan had spent the night in Rubian’s bedroom.
After arriving at the castle and handling only the most urgent matters, it was already dawn before he knew it. When he quietly went to check, he saw a sleeping face breathing heavily.
‘I knew he was quick to adapt, but... ’
Leviathan swallowed a laugh internally.
A child who could sleep well anywhere. He wasn’t picky about food and didn’t throw tantrums.
He did seem to like baths, but… he wouldn’t beg for one if the situation didn’t allow it.
Rubian had slept well last night.
That fact gave Leviathan a certain sense of stability.
Throughout the journey from the capital to the duchy, the child had been unable to sleep.
“Don’t… go that way….”
“You can’t… go there….”
Seeing him toss and turn, drenched in cold sweat, Leviathan had been beside himself with worry over whatever nightmare he was having.
He had looked so pitiful that even the stiff knights led by Leon had fretted through the night.
‘Just what nightmare is he wandering through?’
Leviathan’s eyes darkened.
Rubian didn’t seem to realize he was having nightmares.
Because in the morning, he would wake up smiling and toddle around as usual.
He didn’t know if that was a good thing or a bad thing.
However, seeing Rubian like that weighed heavily on Leviathan’s heart.
‘Is he continuously dreaming about when the village was attacked?’
But the words he mumbled occasionally had a strange quality to them.
“If only I… a little more….”
“I’ll go… I….”
Just what had been the child’s business in that village?
Leviathan’s brow furrowed deeply.
‘He said he was a healer’s child.’
Rubian was reluctant to talk about his past. Worried he might touch upon the child’s pain, Leviathan was cautious.
‘Should I wait… until Rosetta returns?’
He was, from the start, an incredibly rough and clumsy man.
He couldn’t fathom what Rubian saw in him.
‘And with Void, we’re still… ’
He let out a sigh.
It hadn’t been long since he had started making eye contact and conversing with Void. It was closer to Leviathan being drawn in by Void’s peculiar friendliness.
Even that was still awkward, truth be told. It was even worse with the eldest in the south.
‘Difficult.’
He didn’t know where to begin.
“Ah, Your Grace. A letter has arrived from Lady Rosetta.”
“Rose?”
Leviathan took the letter.
It was the reply, belatedly arrived, to the question he had sent from the capital asking if he could bring Rubian in.
The affirmation was so simple it was almost laughable.
After losing the child in her womb in a carriage accident, Rose had begun actively taking care of children with nowhere to go.
Since they couldn’t adopt every child, they had started with small sponsorships.
Eventually, they met Liam and Void. Both were children Rose had proactively taken in.
Leviathan had neither greatly opposed nor supported it, merely watching in silence.
So for such a man to suddenly declare he would bring Rubian home…
She must have had all sorts of questions.
‘She means to ask when she returns.’
Understanding his wife’s intention, he smirked.
“Hm?”
There was a postscript hidden beneath his fingers.
A caution palpable even in the handwriting. Leviathan’s gaze sank heavily.
He had buried the dead child with his own hands.
How hard it had rained that day, how cold the tiny thing in his hands had been. He remembered everything as if it were yesterday.
“…Ah.”
His mood sank into the mire. The surrounding air began to churn ominously.
This… wasn’t good.
He struggled to calm himself.
Shaking his head roughly, he deliberately erased the thought.
“When does Rose return?”
“They say it will take about a month.”
“Very well.”
He resumed walking.
He walked down the hallway, bathed in the sunlight streaming through the large windows.
He recalled Rubian’s face, smooth and soft as he had just woken up.
The way he had tugged at his silver hair as if dissatisfied with it came vividly to mind, bringing a smile.
‘That temper of his, honestly.’
The estate staff had been chattering all day about Rubian’s shimmering hair.
How lovely and mysterious it was. Whisper, whisper.
Leviathan thought the child’s blue eyes were the prettiest, but… well. His hair was rather beautiful, too.
‘Saying a boy is beautiful, or pretty… ’
Adjectives he had rarely used his entire life slipped out unconsciously when he thought of Rubian. That brought another smile…
He stopped dead.
“Is something the matter, My Lord?”
The butler asked, looking at Leviathan who had suddenly halted.
He was seized by a strange sense of dissonance.
*“It’s not morning, it’s afternoon.”*
*“Huh?”*
It had been a thoughtless prank.
*“Ah, what the heck! Why are you lying!”*
Instead of looking at a clock, Rubian had dashed to the window.
As if doing so was second nature.
The sight of him reading the direction of the sun or moon to gauge the time looked all too familiar.
‘Like a soldier roaming the battlefield… ’
In that instant, it felt as though an unknowable tidal wave was crashing over him.