"What's wrong, Eblana? You look troubled."
The voice by her ear came so suddenly that it cut straight through the girl's thoughts. It startled her so badly that her whole body jolted, even her little tail snapping stiff behind her.
In the kitchen, seeing how badly he had startled her, Zuo Jian could only look helpless.
Judging from experience, after spending this much time together, little Eblana ought to be lifting her head about now, glaring at him with wide eyes, then launching into a caustic tirade about why he had interrupted her train of thought.
And yet, as Zuo Jian shut his eyes and prepared himself for whatever vicious words his "good daughter" was about to hurl at him, he realized that today's Eblana was… strangely quiet.
"It's… nothing. I was distracted just now. Sorry."
...?
Something was off.
Not just a little off—nine parts out of ten, something was seriously wrong.
Zuo Jian turned and looked at the girl who usually wore a mocking expression as naturally as breathing. But today she seemed unusually restrained. Even her usual sharp-tongued sarcasm had disappeared without a trace. In its place was only a soft, timid little dragon girl who looked sweet and delicate enough to make anyone want to pinch her cheeks.
He turned again and looked toward the other side.
Wait, wasn't Loughshinny helping him in the kitchen right now?
So this Eblana couldn't possibly be the younger sister pretending to be her.
Realizing something about the girl's behavior was far too abnormal, Zuo Jian hurriedly set down the kitchen knife in his hand. Then he crouched seriously in front of Eblana and, in a tone more suited to checking on a patient, asked,
"What's wrong, Eblana? Are you feeling unwell somewhere?"
"No…"
"Then is something bothering you? Tell me about it…"
"No."
The girl pressed her lips together and lowered her head. Her neatly combed bangs drooped with gravity and covered her eyes, making it impossible to tell what she was thinking.
But Zuo Jian seemed deeply concerned about her state of mind and kept pressing gently.
"Then what is it? Do you not like today's lunch? If you really hate it, I can change the menu. I remember you mentioned liking a certain dish before. I can go buy fresh ingredients right now."
As he spoke, he reached to untie the apron around his waist, clearly preparing to head out.
But in the very next instant, Eblana suddenly shouted,
"Enough!!!"
The girl jerked her head up and glared at him, eyes wide with fury.
"Eblana…"
Zuo Jian was startled by the violent burst of emotion. He froze for a moment, but then still reached out, wanting to touch her.
"Don't touch me!"
She stepped back half a pace and slapped his hand away.
"Why do you have to care about this and care about that?! Why are you so absurdly good to us for no reason at all?! Who do you think you are?! How can you treat two girls who barged into your life out of nowhere like you're actually their real father?!"
"Do you think the way you keep acting like some selfless saint is noble? Do you think it's supposed to move me?!"
"I'm telling you right now—it won't!"
"I… I…"
Eblana's voice seemed to catch for a moment. Then she took a deep breath, and when she spoke again, her tone was utterly resolute.
"The kind of person I hate most… is someone like you. A self-righteous do-gooder who goes around acting on his own."
The moment she finished, she turned and ran out, leaving Zuo Jian standing there alone.
"Ebl… ana…"
He seemed to want to say something else, but her words had lodged themselves in his throat. Even his hand was still suspended in midair.
"Zuo Jian…"
Loughshinny looked at his back and seemed to sense the heaviness in the air.
She didn't understand how things had ended up like this. Ever since her sister had gone out with her and overheard something strange, Eblana had been acting oddly. And in all the years before, Loughshinny had never once seen her sister lose control like that.
And the things she had said… they had obviously hurt Zuo Jian very deeply.
Thinking that, Loughshinny stepped forward, wanting to comfort him somehow.
But to her surprise, when he spoke again, there was a trace of openness in his voice.
Zuo Jian turned around. The momentary dejection in his eyes lasted only a few seconds before it was replaced with a helpless expression.
He scratched the back of his head, smiled at Loughshinny—who was just about to say something comforting—and said,
"Wow… I really didn't expect Eblana's words to be that sharp today. But honestly, it's not impossible to understand. Every kid goes through a phase like this. Mm-hm, I was pretty much the same."
"You start thinking the whole world is dark. You think everyone's out to get you. Oh, right—and you start believing there's some mysterious power hidden inside you. What was that term again?"
"Oh, right. Adolescence syndrome. Or maybe rebellious phase plus middle-school chuunibyou?"
Still smiling, Zuo Jian patted Loughshinny gently on the head.
"It's okay. Everyone goes through it. I can understand how Eblana feels."
Then, as though nothing had happened, he retied the apron he had just undone, picked up the kitchen knife again, and resumed working with the ingredients in front of him.
"Zuo Jian…"
Loughshinny could tell that a sadness had hung in the air just moments ago, but she had no idea how to comfort him. Looking at the way he acted as though nothing was wrong, she suddenly felt utterly powerless.
In the end, all she could do was help him in the kitchen.
Realizing that, she said nothing more and simply lowered her head, going back to helping him prepare the food.
If… if only she could be as strong as her sister… no, if… if she could be even stronger than her sister…
Then maybe… maybe she would be able to help him.
The young red dragon stared blankly at the ingredients she had just lifted from the water, as though slipping into some kind of daze.
Gray sat in the room before her with a faintly bewildered expression.
Her gaze moved over the signs that the place had just been cleaned, over the old but spotless furniture arranged all around it.
From the wardrobe to the desk, everything a room ought to have was present.
Simple, but not shabby.
This was a room Zuo Jian had cleared out for her temporarily. The rest of the furnishings had been scavenged from other unused rooms, carefully cleaned, and brought in piece by piece.
Before leaving, he had even joked with a grin that he couldn't very well make a patient keep sleeping in a sickbed forever.
"A comfortable environment can help slow the progression of illness too."
Now she lay back on the bed. The freshly laid bedding was astonishingly soft, with a faint clean fragrance lingering on it, the kind that almost made one want to sink into it and never leave.
For a moment, Gray felt dazed.
She had dreamed of a scene like this before.
When had that been?
Oh. Right.
She remembered now.
It had been not long after she first became a mercenary, back when she was still green. Because of a few jobs, she had been marked by stronger mercenaries.
She had fled and hidden, fled and hidden, until finally she ran out of strength and took shelter in a ruin.
Beneath her then had been stone slabs slick with moss—cold, damp, hard, and streaked with mud.
When night fell, she had stared up at the sky above the land, at the twin moons ringed by countless stars, and thought:
If only I hadn't been born in Kazdel.
If only she hadn't grown up there, but somewhere else—Yan, Victoria, or any country she'd never even seen, anywhere at all far from that cursed place crawling with desperate killers.
If that had been the case, then she would sleep in the softest bed imaginable—the kind you could sink your whole body into. Every meal would be clean white bread, with a bowl of steaming hot meat soup beside it.
And, and—
Everything would be prepared for her in advance. Someone would even remind her when it was time to eat—
Knock, knock, knock.
At that moment, a dull knock sounded at the door.
"Ms. Gray?"
"Lunch is ready. Come downstairs and eat. Or would you like me to bring it up?"
Gray fell silent for a moment.
The scene she had once imagined as nothing more than fantasy had somehow appeared right in front of her.
And yet… she didn't seem to feel the joy she had imagined she would.
Moving her lips slightly, she answered softly,
"No need to trouble yourself. I'll be right down."
"Alright. Please come quickly, then. The food won't taste as good if it gets cold."
After saying that, Zuo Jian seemed to move to another door and knock there too, though he apparently received no response.
As for Gray, she rolled over, preparing to get up—only to feel something hard pressing against her back.
She knew exactly what it was.
The woman sat up and slowly drew two bloodstained daggers from where they had been hidden against the back of her clothes.
The blades turned in her hands, flashing coldly, reflecting her own eyes back at her.
"Leave… my old life behind?"
Gray murmured to herself.
Then, after a moment of silence, she opened the wardrobe and placed the two sharp daggers inside.
As though she had come to some sort of decision, she shut the wardrobe doors firmly.
The mission could wait.
Her condition was terrible right now, and listening to that man's advice as a doctor was not necessarily a bad idea.
With that thought, she opened the door and headed downstairs.
Oh, right.
If she remembered correctly, when she had once lain in those freezing ruins dreaming about a better future, there had actually been a sequel to that fantasy—
The sequel was that she had been lucky that night. The mercenaries hunting her never found her.
And afterward, using the terrain and her Originium Arts, she had slipped through the dark and driven her blades one by one into the throats beneath those snarling, unwilling faces.
That was how she won the right to keep living.
....
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