“Magicians are naturally drawn to magical power by instinct. The greater and more powerful the magic, the more they lose their senses.”

Hilda muttered with a deep sigh.

“Because of that, His Grace once buried me in a potato field thinking I was in love with Lady Bas…”

***

Long ago, when Ferik wasn’t yet the Grand Duke.

During this time, Astrid was traveling across every wasteland on the continent researching ‘the correlation between water magic and rainfall.’ When she arrived at Basilinte, a territory notorious for its wastelands, she began what would become a peculiar almost-romance with Ferik.

Since Ferik considered unproductive interactions worthless, and Astrid was, like most magicians, singularly obsessed with her research, their conversations revolved around practical matters such as ‘constructive measures for wasteland improvement.’

As a result, throughout their year of almost-romance, no one recognized their relationship for what it was.

Even Astrid herself didn’t know.

Meanwhile, Hilda, a candidate for head maid of Basilinte who had such weak magical power that she never knew she had magical qualities her whole life, unconsciously followed Astrid around.

Watching this, Ferik one day silently buried Hilda in a potato field, and there, Hilda awakened her magical powers.

When Astrid took the awakened Hilda as a temporary apprentice and learned what had happened, she grabbed Ferik by the hair, and they fought for about three days.

Though no one knows exactly what happened during those three days, Astrid and Ferik acknowledged each other as lovers.

And instead of disposing of Hilda, Ferik arranged her marriage.

Even though he knew that the attraction to magical power had nothing to do with romantic feelings, Ferik’s persistence in finding someone matching Hilda’s ideal type and even arranging their marriage sometimes gave Hilda chills.

It made her wonder if he really was emotionless.

Of course, seeing him remain expressionless even in front of Astrid made it seem like he truly was emotionless…

“The Grand Duke gets angry when I’m not around, but he doesn’t know why he’s angry. Isn’t that pitiful? To not be able to feel your own emotions?”

Hilda recalled Astrid’s words as she looked down at the prince’s bed.

“Surely after the curse is lifted, he’ll regret treating me like this. Just because he can’t feel emotions doesn’t mean they don’t exist.”

Just because they can’t feel them doesn’t mean they don’t exist.

Looking at the young masters lying on either side of the still-unconscious prince, Hilda thought that perhaps Astrid’s words might be right.

The Second Young Master clinging to the prince like a newborn duckling following its mother duck was one thing.

But the actions of the First Young Master, who had limped down here at dawn today, were extremely irrational.

Honestly, Hilda was surprised when she answered the knock on the prince’s door at dawn to find Chamuka leaning against it, drenched in cold sweat.

His eyes were unfocused, feverish from what must have been severe leg wounds. Though she tried to take him back to his room seeing his clearly unsound state, she failed when he rolled into the room.

Eventually, Chamuka collapsed while tightly gripping the prince’s sleeve, and Hilda finally gave up trying to move him and informed the upper floor of Chamuka’s presence there.

It had been like this ever since.

Three children, all out of their minds, lying huddled together on the bed, groaning.

Hilda watched the prince who was moaning in discomfort, presumably because of the young masters clinging to both sides.

There was nothing she could do since even if she separated them, they would quickly reattach themselves.

It’s not like she could tell a child with the mental age of zero to move away since they wouldn’t understand, and she couldn’t ask a severely injured patient who couldn’t even walk properly to move…

That’s when it happened.

“Head Maid!”

The quiet atmosphere of the room, filled only with the prince’s groaning, was broken by a maid’s hurried cry.

The maid spoke to Hilda in an urgent tone.

“His Grace has awakened!”

Hilda jumped to her feet.

When she hesitated briefly before rushing out of the room, the girl who was supposedly the prince’s personal maid gestured for her to go ahead.

Soon the room returned to silence after people rushed out.

In that silence, the prince slowly opened his eyes.

***

It hurt.

When heat reaches its extreme, you barely feel the heat itself. It just hurts terribly, and paradoxically feels cold.

Like the sensation of fingertips slowly being ground away while frozen and stinging.

It was pain she had already experienced during the great fire at the Borba troupe.

But that didn’t make it hurt any less. No, knowing exactly what kind of pain it was made it even more frightening and painful.

The flames that started from her right hand had burned Leticia as if they would never end. To the point where she thought she might not survive this time.

But once again, Leticia survived.

“Ah…”

That was Leticia’s first thought as she opened her eyes.

Instinctively, she raised her right hand to look at it. Though it trembled faintly, it was clean without even a small burn mark.

While Leticia was blankly staring at her hand, she suddenly turned her head at the uncomfortable weight she felt on her left shoulder.

A child who appeared to be about five years old, with sparkling silver hair, was sleeping with their cheek resting on her shoulder. It was a child she had never seen before.

“Who…”

Her mouth must have been dry, as she started coughing as soon as she tried to speak.

Leticia gently pushed the child off her shoulder and sat up. Just doing that made her head spin momentarily and her whole body ache.

“It hurts…”

“Have some water, Your Highness.”

She took and drank from the cup offered before her. The lukewarm water running down her throat helped clear her mind.

“Thank you, Aina.”

“It’s nothing. This is my job. I am always Your Highness’s faithful maid.”

Setting aside the affected tone, Leticia was returning the empty cup with a sour expression at the extremely artificial words when she felt her sleeve being pulled and looked to the side.

“…What? Why is Lord Chamuka here?”

Leticia was startled to find Chamuka buried in the bed, tightly gripping her right sleeve.

To which Aina replied nonchalantly:

“Perhaps he came to visit the sick?”

“It seems like I should be the one visiting him.”

Though his lips were pale, his cheeks were flushed with fever. His hair was stuck to his forehead with cold sweat, and his breathing was hot.

Leticia placed her hand on Chamuka’s forehead and was surprised by the heat.

“We should call a physician. His fever is severe.”

“It’s alright. Until just now, the physician was here constantly. He’s taken medicine, and the fever should break soon. The physician said he would suffer from occasional fevers until the thigh wound heals completely.”

At Aina’s calm words, Leticia hurriedly pulled down the blanket to check Chamuka’s wound.

She let out a sigh of relief upon seeing the clean white bandage firmly wrapped around his thigh. It didn’t seem like the wound had reopened and caused the fever.

“Why isn’t the physician here now?”

“Well, when news came that His Grace, who had been found trapped under the tower, had awakened, all the physicians rushed there?”

“Is His Grace alright?!”

She raised her voice for a moment but then looked around worriedly in case she had woken Chamuka.

Leticia slowly removed her hand from Chamuka’s forehead, filled with concern.

About whether His Grace and the Grand Duchess, who had been caught in the tower’s collapse together, were safe and unharmed.

“Since I haven’t heard anything about their lives being in danger, wouldn’t they be fine? I’m more curious about why Your Highness was found in that tower with the Young Master.”

“I told you not to call him Young Master.”

In response to her reflexive words, Aina shook her head slowly.

“Even so, I can’t possibly address His Grace’s son by his name. You’re the one who’s cherished enough to be allowed to use his name, not me.”

“The name isn’t meant like that…”

At that moment, Chamuka grabbed Leticia’s hand as she was withdrawing it from his forehead.

Leticia stopped her argument with Aina and turned to Chamuka.

His tightly closed eyelids trembled slightly.