"Tia, what would you like to have as a birthday present?"
My father asked me when I was watching the servants take out the breakfast bowls.
As a result of a very careful search last night, I was able to find out that I was still seven years old and had about a month left on my eighth birthday.
"A teddy bear! A very big teddy bear, I want to have it!"
I shouted out loud, picking a gift that a seven-year-old child would want.
"But don't you hate dolls?"
"Ah ...."
I messed up.
Since I was a child, I wasn't happy with dolls whether they resemble humans or animals.
I felt like they were alive and moving at night.
I said that I wanted to have a huge teddy bear.
My father looked at me as if it was a little strange, and sweat was flowing behind my back.
"Now, when I think about it. I think dolls are not good."
"Then what would you like to buy?"
"Hmm... ."
I had nothing to remember.
What I want as a gift is a villa in a quiet place or a manor where you can live with money for life?
But I can't ask for something like that.
I must tell him to buy me a suitable book or something like that.
As I was about to say something, my father clapped his hands as if he just had a good idea.
"Okay! How about a horse, Tia?"
"What do you mean?"
"If you take a foal about one-year-old and mount and raise it from now on, it will be a great horse by the time you are an adult."
"What...."
I couldn't answer for a moment and blink my eyes.
Horses are expensive.
They were an important asset that could measure the size of the owner's or the owning group's property depending on how many horses they had.
The ransom of a horse was something, but more importantly was the cost of maintenance.
If you weren't going to feed them and get rid of the excrement, you'd have to hire someone to do the job for you, and you also needed a stable.
Not to mention the vast land you had to have for the horses to run freely.
Even the average noble family would buys horses for their children, but it was a perfect gift for the 18th birthday of adulthood.
"When I was about your age, I received my first horse as a birthday present."
But this is Lombardy.
Such general economic standards were not used.
He is usually a very modest and gentle person, so I sometimes forget it, but my father is also a member of the Lombardy family.
With that thought, I stared at my father.
"Huh? Why are you looking at me like that, Tia?"
"It's nothing. But Dad, I think a foal is not a good idea."
I didn't really want to learn horse riding, so I came up with an excuse to refuse.
"You do not want it?"
"It is only one-year-old, but it has to be separated from its mother already. It will be very sad."
"Tia."
Oh my.
The moment I spoke, I realized I had made a mistake.
It was because my father's eyes, looking at me, became moist in an instant.
"You don't like being separated from your mother...."
I forgot for a moment.
The fact that my mother died as soon as she gave birth to me.
It was obvious that my father misunderstood and that I was identifying myself with the foal.
"Oh, Dad. So that's...!"
I tried to fix it later, but it was late.
My father, who looked at me with tearful eyes, hugged me and said.
"This dad was short minded . Let's bring that mother horse alone."
"I'm okay... Yeah?"
What have I heard now?
"As you said, it seems too cruel to separate a foal that is only one year old from its mother. So, if we buy the mother horse as well, they will be able to live happily without being separated."
That's right.
Foals are expensive, but mares that can give birth are even more expensive.
But my father, son of Lulak Lombardy, couldn't have that in mind.
I nodded in a half-given state.
"How can our Tia have such a good heart?"
My father stroked my hair as if I were the most lovely girl he has ever seen. and then hugged me tightly again.
Okay.
"You can learn horseback riding, well."
My father said to me, snarling like a fat cat.
"Shall I not go to the library today, but read a book in the parlor?"
Unlike my cousins who had nannies and spend most of the day with them, I didn't have a nanny.
Small things such as washing or changing clothes were solved by borrowing the hands of the maids, and then, my father took over everything else.
In a way, I was sticking to my father like a scab from the moment I wake up to the moment I fall asleep again.
This was possible because my father and I were close. There were only two members in our family after all. Yet the main reason why such a simple routine was practically possible was that my father was unemployed.
"I have to write a book today."
He was an interested and well-educated person in many aspects, from arts to economics, but he did not use them in practice.
Is knowledge the type of thing that should end up like that?
Sometimes, when there is a department that he is really interested in, he organizes his knowledge and makes it into a book, just like that.
Of course, there was no revenue being generated there.
The finished books would be placed on a bookshelf in my father's study and left alone.
Nevertheless, my father has the money to buy mother horses and baby horses at the same time on his seven-year-old daughter's birthday.
After all, Lombardy is the best.
Right after confirming my father was focus on his work while drawing something, I opened my book and sat down a little away.
Of course, I was just pretending to read, my real purpose was something else.
"Let's organize your thoughts."
It was to point out what to do in the future.
It would be best to organize it by writing it down on a piece of paper, but there was a risk that someone would read it.
Being stuck with my father all day is annoying at times like this.
Pretending to be reading, I turned over the bookshelf and picked the first thing I should do.
"You have to capture your grandfather's heart."
If my grandfather had known my abilities a few years earlier before he died...
I lamented it, but I was sure that alone would have not changed the future of the family.
Even if he had known them a few years earlier, it would have been already too late.
What would have changed if the succession structure had already been hardened by the eldest son, Viese, and an illegitimate granddaughter, not even recognized as the third son's successor, shows superiority in the situation in which his son, Belsach, becomes an adult.
There were three mountains I had to cross to compete with them.
I was a seven-year-old daughter of a powerless third son.
So, from now on, I should show my talents to my grandfather on every opportunity I get.
I had to solidify my position and win my grandfather's absolute support.
"But I don't have to rely solely on the power of my family's wealth just because it's a family affair."
There should be no choice of means and methods.
So what I came up with was the Second Prince.
Someone outside the family and who will strengthen my position within the family.
Even after becoming the Lord, it is the Second Prince who can empower me.
Of course, I will also help him a lot until he becomes a Crown Prince.
No Emperor will reject Lombardy if trust has been built since childhood and if we helped him become Crown Prince.
We can be good friends.
"Oh, it turns out that it was around this time."
I looked out the window as it started to rain.
The Second Prince, Perez's mother, dies one day during the rainy season this year.
I was told that despite the birth of the Emperor's son, she died without receiving proper treatment under the pressure of the empress.
Perez, who was poisoned by, became the Crown Prince, and when the Empress lay down on the bed, he returned the poison.
It was ordered not to allow lawmakers to enter the palace.
Instead of a wandering Prince, he was a Prince who had taken power, and Astana, the First Prince who was supposed to be his mother's shield, was pushed to the fringes, so there was nothing to stop him.
How long he will struggle from being a Prince in a back room where no one looking for him to become a Crown Prince?
It cannot be done without being poisoned.
Perhaps by now, Perez, who is thin without his mother, is spending day by day alone.
I feel like I want to go and comfort him, but I can't go.
It was a rule made by my grandfather.
Lombardy's children cannot leave the mansion at will before their 11th birthday.
However, limited access was possible with the state's permission, to prevent crimes against the descendants of young Lombardy.
"So be patient."
I didn't mean to let go of my hands until I was 11 years old.
But now was the time to focus on the work inside the family.
The next thing is to create an opportunity to go to the Imperial Palace.
After organizing my thoughts, I turned over the book again and tried to recall my memories.
"What happened to Lombardy around this time?"
If you take on the work of the family for several years, you learn the history of that family even though you hate it.
In my case, although I wanted to study harder.
The year I turned eight.
Apparently there must have been quite a big deal in Lombardy.
It was then.
I heard a strangely familiar voice with a low knock sound in my ears, groaning with my head wrapped around.
"Gallahan, are you there."
When did I hear this voice?
"Who are you?"
Tilting his head, my father opened the door to the parlor.
And I was amazed at the face that looked through the open door.
After becoming the top of Lombardy, and after my grandfather died, he went out of the house like me and formed the Pellet Company, and in just two years, he developed it into the top 5 Lambrew Empire.
Clerivan Pellet was stepping into our parlor.