**Winter in the North always came earlier than anywhere else.**
Though it was only the first month of the year, dense snow had already smothered the forest, turning the world into a frozen expanse of white. The creaking of carriage wheels echoed through the emptiness before finally halting in front of an ancient mansion—one that still stood tall amidst the skeletal trees, even as its foundations had long been picked clean by scavengers.
The Rosavell Mansion possessed the tragic beauty of a ruin that refused to collapse.
The heavy oaken door groaned open, its sound like the whispers of the past.
Inside the high stone hall—cold as an abandoned chapel—the sole owner waited.
She stood motionless in the flickering candlelight, surrounded by faded carpets and Antique and luxury furniture.
**Irene Vestel Rosavell.**
A woman of twenty-nine, her beauty had not faded but transformed—no longer that of a young girl, but something legendary.
Her skin was pale as fresh snow, her jet-black hair bound high in the style of the old nobility, making her resemble a statue of some forgotten saint. A long ivory dress, its puffed sleeves trimmed with delicate silver lace, clung to her tall, graceful frame like frost on a winter pine. Her only adornment was a silver brooch pinned above her heart: the faint shape of an *arzaria*—the Rosavell family's flower. And her eyes… silver, deep, and still as a frozen sea, yet holding something that refused to die.
The visitor's leather boots announced his arrival before he appeared in the doorway. The young man was tall, draped in a deep red velvet robe embroidered with gold, trimmed in white fox fur, and crowned with a goatskin hat. He inclined his head slightly—a gesture polite enough, but not humble.
*"Lady Rosavell,"* he said, his voice soft yet sharp.
*"I apologize for disturbing you in the heart of winter… but old debts do not hibernate with the season."*
Irene gestured to the long table between them. *"I never intended to avoid repayment. I simply expected your bank to speak a different tongue than the tax collectors."*
Fredrick chuckled and laid a document bound in red string upon the oak. *"We have an official language—it's written here."*
He unfolded the parchment, revealing a figure that seemed to carve blood into her name:
**52,000 gold.**
*Note: Full payment due within seven days of this second notice.*
Irene's silver eyes traced the numbers before she replied, calm as the grave:
*"The magic herb fields still yield profit. I can pay two thousand gold per year. In twenty-six years, the debt will be settled."*
Fredrick smiled—the kind of smile that made one wish to set the whole table aflame.
*"A pity the bank is not a charity, and I do not possess a century's patience."*
He paced the room, slender fingers trailing over a crooked frame. *"A genuine Brauveld? It might fetch a price… if the colors weren't so dull."* Next, he examined a bronze table carved with dragons. *"Exquisite craftsmanship. From an era when your family still believed itself immortal, no doubt."*
Irene did not rise to his bait. *"Do you intend to appraise every item in this hall?"* Her voice was ice, but not without dignity.
*"Merely offering assistance,"* Fredrick replied, his smile laced with false warmth. *"If the gold does not appear in seven days, the bank will seize all assets for auction—including this mansion."*
He paused before an old family portrait, then turned, his gaze lingering on her body with deliberate insolence.
*"Though the princess may stay, of course."* A pause. Then, crudely: *"You're still a virgin, aren't you?"*