Chapter 13

Lia returned to Rafaella after hearing the stories the maids had shared.  

As always, she diligently taught her daughter the basics of education that day.  

The intelligent Rafaella had followed along with the lessons remarkably well throughout the winter.  

To exaggerate a little, it felt as though she learned ten things when taught just one.  

‘She’s so smart, just like her parents.’  

Just as a satisfied smile formed on Lia’s face, Johann entered Rafaella’s room.  

Lia, who had been slightly worried that her husband might break his promise, greeted him with relief.  

However, as unfortunate as it was, while he might have been adequate as Duke Blumhart, he was utterly failing as a father.  

Unlike when he was simply Hart, as Duke Blumhart, he was completely stiff and unable to do anything in front of his daughter, aside from sitting rigidly.  

‘Oh dear, this won’t do.’  

Lia, who had intended to simply observe and let them spend time together, decided to step in as an example.  

“Do you know what Raffy likes the most, Your Grace?”  

If she didn’t consciously remind herself to speak formally to her husband, she found herself slipping into informal speech.  

‘I almost made the mistake of speaking informally again, out of habit from when we used to be less formal.’  

Perhaps it was because she hadn’t seen him often throughout the winter, but she still wasn’t used to addressing her husband with formality.  

“…How would I know that?”  

“It’s the wooden doll she’s holding right now. Its name is ‘Tosooni,’ and she loves it so much that she even sleeps with it at night.”  

“Tosooni? A rabbit? I was wondering what kind of animal it was.”  

At those words, Rafaella, who had been playing alone, glared at Johann and hid the wooden doll behind her back.  

Lia turned her head to suppress her laughter.  

“…What’s so funny?”  

“Haha, I’m sorry. That wooden doll was made by you—no, I mean, by yourself, Your Grace.”  

“…Me? I made that wooden rabbit doll?”  

“Yes, you spent a long time deciding what to give Raffy as her first gift, and eventually, you learned how to make it from Raul, a friend from the village where I used to live.”  

“When I lost my memory, I must have been half out of my mind.”  

He let out a hollow laugh. The idea of him learning to carve something like a wooden doll seemed absurd.  

“It wasn’t that; it was just that your love for your daughter was so immense.”  

“……”  

He still couldn’t believe that he had made a wooden doll as a gift for his daughter.  

“Anyway, Raffy loves playing with Tosooni.”  

“…So, you’re saying I should play with her and the doll?”  

“Yes, that’s right.”  

Nodding as if he understood, Johann approached Rafaella, who was playing with Tosooni.  

However, less than five minutes into playing dolls with his daughter, Rafaella stood up.  

“Mom, I want to play with you instead!”  

Unable to tolerate her father’s clumsy doll-playing, Rafaella fled to her mother.  

‘Hmm, perhaps playing with dolls is too difficult for such a rigid man.’  

After some thought, Lia took out a Jenga set from the box containing Rafaella’s toys.  

“…Jenga?”  

“Yes, it’s one of Raffy’s favorite games these days.”  

Since Johann had played Jenga occasionally as a child, he felt more comfortable playing this game.  

Because Rafaella felt uneasy playing alone with him, the three of them—Lia, Johann, and Rafaella—started playing Jenga together.  

The problem was that Johann didn’t hold back at all, and after a few games, Rafaella became upset.  

“…I don’t want to play anymore.”  

“Raffy, why don’t you want to play?”  

“…Dad keeps winning, so it’s no fun.”  

“That’s because Dad is really good at this….”  

“He’s not my dad! My dad wouldn’t do this!”  

Although Lia tried to comfort her, the upset Rafaella grabbed Tosooni and retreated to her bedroom.  

After Rafaella left, Johann, feeling bewildered, set down the wooden block he had been holding.  

“As a noble, one must accept defeat gracefully and think about the next move. Acting like that won’t do.”  

“…In the past, Your Grace, you would win only once or twice out of five games and lose the rest on purpose.”  

“Me? The past me certainly seemed to have done many things to spoil the child.”  

Grinding her teeth, Lia suppressed her anger at his attitude of not reflecting on how he had upset their daughter on the very first day of playing together.  

“Raffy still hasn’t fully accepted you as her father. Did you really have to keep winning?”  

“Sigh, I don’t know how to play with children. It’s not that I intentionally tried to win….”  

“Then learn how to play with children from now on.”  

“What? Learn that? How?”  

“If you can’t do something, you study it.”  

“……”  

Johann felt annoyed at the idea of having to study how to play with children, but seeing Lia, who seemed even more irritated, he kept his mouth shut.  

He had thought that the cursed contract could be handled half-heartedly, but the woman before him made that impossible.  

Realizing that it was in his best interest to say what she wanted to hear, even if insincerely, he reluctantly opened his mouth.  

“…Fine. I’ll study it.”  

“…Then, I’ll go and comfort Raffy now.”  

Lia sighed heavily, her heart heavy, and headed to the bedroom to console her daughter.  

Johann, on the other hand, left Rafaella’s room, feeling uneasy after making his daughter cry.  

The first playtime meant to bring Johann and Rafaella closer ended without any progress.  

***

Lia soothed the sulking Rafaella, sang her a lullaby, and put her to sleep.  

Although she had thought it wouldn’t be easy from the start, she hadn’t expected it to end with the child feeling upset rather than awkward.  

While Johann would surely find it challenging, Lia also realized that bringing Johann and Rafaella closer wouldn’t be simple.  

‘He must truly and sincerely play with Rafaella next time.’  

Am I expecting too much from a great noble rather than an ordinary man?  

But there was no choice but to expect it.  

A mere father-daughter relationship fulfilling only noble obligations would never be enough to change the future awaiting Rafaella.  

Even if it was hard for everyone, Johann and Rafaella ultimately had to become a father and daughter who treated each other with love rather than obligation.  

‘…Because I won’t be able to stay by Rafaella’s side forever.’  

Lia sighed and gazed at the snake emblem near Rafaella’s neck as she slept.  

The goddess’s emblem seemed to warn her not to neglect her duties.  

She hoped the emblem on her daughter’s neck would disappear as soon as possible.  

Only then could she die peacefully without worrying about the future.  

‘Rafaella, I will make him love you again.’  

So don’t worry about anything and stay just as you are.  

The only thing I wish for is your happiness, Rafaella.  

After carefully tucking Rafaella’s blanket, Lia rose from the bed.  

In the darkness, she tiptoed toward the adjacent room where she kept her belongings.  

She was looking for the potion notebook she had written with her grandmother.  

That morning, something the maids had said in the servants’ hall had come to mind.  

“After the late Duke passed away, the Duchess Dowager and Lady Penelope visited the villa near the duchy the following summer.”  

“The Duchess Dowager had been feeling down ever since the late Duke passed away, so Lady Penelope took her to the villa for a change of pace.”  

“A villa?”  

“Yes, there’s a massive lake between Eisner’s northern territory and Blumhart’s territory. It’s famous for its beauty, so many nobles have summer villas there.”  

“But something must have happened at the lake because they returned earlier than planned. And Lady Penelope’s finger had a blackened, festering wound that caused her to grow weaker day by day.”  

“It was as though her body was losing moisture….”  

“Renowned healing mages from the Empire came to treat her, but none of their treatments worked.”  

“…That’s why His Grace the Duke requested help from His Majesty the Emperor and even summoned the Imperial Mage, but they couldn’t cure Lady Penelope either.”  

“I heard it’s a newly discovered disease, and there’s no cure yet.”  

“She used to be so lively, but now she doesn’t even leave her room on the fourth floor.”  

The year after Johann had been found unconscious, a child from the village had grown gravely ill after playing near a nearby valley.  

The child had been bitten by a strange fish they had never seen before while playing with friends in the valley, and their body began to dry up.  

Frightened, the parents carried the child to Lia for help.  

Like her grandmother, who had treated the villagers with various potions, Lia was skilled at making potions.  

When she first examined the child, Lia was puzzled by the symptoms she had never heard her grandmother mention.  

The wound was oddly shaped, the tongue had turned a bluish-black color, and the child suffered from severe thirst—far too extreme for a mere fish bite.  

‘It was too much to be caused by an ordinary fish.’  

She thought the child’s condition resembled knights who had been wounded by monsters, as her grandmother had described.  

Though it wasn’t an exact match, making her unsure.  

‘Typically, injuries caused by monsters turn the entire body bluish-black, but in this case, only the tongue was affected. The thirst wasn’t usually this severe either.’  

Initially, Lia made a potion used to treat those poisoned by monsters.  

However, the potion failed to cure the child, and Lia spent nearly a year poring over her grandmother’s notebook and old books to create a healing potion.  

‘Ironically, the key ingredient for the potion didn’t come from the notebook or books but from near the cabin.’  

After much effort, the potion finally cured the child.  

While she would need to examine Johann’s younger sister directly to be certain, if it was the same illness, Lia might be able to cure Penelope.  

‘But could I really cure her, when even the Empire’s most renowned healing mages and potion makers couldn’t?’  

It was possible that Penelope’s illness was different from the one Lia knew.  

If that were the case, she hesitated to speak up, fearing she might disappoint them again.