“…Lady, do you really not remember anything?”

“What… Did I do something rude?”

“Not at all. A physician will arrive soon…”

Before Cedric could finish, a robust elderly woman burst through the door.

“I heard it was urgent, thinking the young master’s little sister had another episode, but who is this lady nearly dead and drenched in blood?”

“Grandma, please calm down.”

The formidable presence of the grandmother put down her heavy bag of herbs with a thud.

“Calm down? Without even examining her, I can tell she’s near death.”

And she spoke bluntly to the grandson of the Grand Duke Renigrad.

“What is this?”

The grandmother quickly approached Arne and narrowed her eyes at the handprints on Arne’s neck. Her gaze turned stormy towards Cedric.

“Don’t tell me you did this atrocious act to this frail and precious lady? I must have raised you wrong!”

As Grandma looked around for something to grab, Cedric quickly moved the book aside. Arne swiftly caught Grandma’s sleeve.

“Ah, lady, you’re so tender-hearted. Tell me what he did? I’ll give him a piece of my mind!”

“There was a small misunderstanding. But now he has agreed to help me.”

Grandma stared into Arne’s reddened eyes and sighed softly. It was clearly the aftermath of a mana surge.

With a compassionate look, Grandma looked at Arne kindly.

“I’m Grandma Theresa. Just call me Grandma. My way of talking might be rough since I’ve followed the young master from the north to the capital, but I’m not a scary person.”

Her tone was markedly gentler than when he was addressing Cedric.

“May I see your mana core?”

“…Yes.”

Grandma Theresa’s gaze sharpened as she examined her mana core.

“This isn’t just a crack from a mana surge. Someone shattered it…”

Her gaze slowly returned to Cedric. Grabbing a book, Grandma Theresa smacked Cedric on the back.

“Come here right now. Cedric, how could you do that to someone who looks like they’d fall over if touched! You shattered her mana core?”

Arne couldn’t stand it and grabbed Grandma’s sleeve.

“It was also a misunderstanding…!”

“No misunderstanding excuses shattering a mana core! Had it cracked any further, you would have died! The mana core is life itself for you!”

“I’m not as bad as it seems. It will heal naturally; I’m fine.”

“You shouldn’t say you’re fine but that it hurts! Even as an outsider, it pains me to see. Do you know who the most difficult patients are? Those who are in pain but won’t say so. That’s how you worsen your condition.”

Arne awkwardly let go of the sleeve.

That’s how her illness developed and she was diagnosed with a terminal diagnosis. She had nothing to say. As Grandma Theresa remained unconvinced and picked up the book again, Arne quickly spoke up.

“It hurts, Grandma.”

Hearing Arne plead not to hit the man who nearly killed her, Grandma Theresa’s gaze wavered. With a short sigh, she put down the book she had picked up.

“The young master should think you’re alive today because of this lady.”

Cedric, who had been silently taking it all in without a word until now, opened his mouth.

“It’s clearly my fault that I accidentally broke her mana core, Grandma. That’s why I want to take responsibility and ask you to treat Lady Ronia until she gets better.”

“Again, again, trying to leave it to me. Just dealing with the young master’s sister who’s sick with Arin’s disease is overwhelming enough. Not to mention, my body doesn’t come cheap.”

“I will bear all the costs. You’re the only person I trust and can entrust her to, Grandma.”

“Again with that. Trying to coax me with such tender-hearted words.”

While Theresa and Cedric were bickering, Arne pricked up her ears at the mention of ‘the young master’s sister sick with Arin’s disease.’

‘Isn’t Arin’s disease a serious illness that’s almost incurable?’

The cure was discovered only after Cedric had died.

She remembered Benjamin, who came from the Freya orphanage and suffered from Arin’s disease, inventing the cure and becoming the talk of the newspapers.

‘How could I forget? He was my closest friend in the orphanage I was in. I wonder if Benjamin is still at the Freya orphanage.’

Awakened from her thoughts, Arne looked at Cedric.

Since his sister wasn’t there at their wedding, it means she died before that.

‘Does she have only about a year left? Or maybe even shorter.’

Realizing she was living on borrowed time just like herself, Arne bit her lip.

Seeing Arne’s expression harden, Cedric touched her forehead.

“You don’t have a fever right now. Don’t worry. I guarantee Grandma’s skills. You won’t be sick soon.”

“No, if you say it like that, how can I not treat her!”

“You’re going to do it anyway, Grandma.”

“Of course. How could I just leave such a small, frail, and sick lady alone!”

‘It’s true that I’m sick, but I’m not small and frail.’

Seeing Grandma standing with the distinctive physique of a Northerner, she decided not to voice that thought.

Having been thin from not eating properly since childhood, Arne was indeed on the smaller side.

“My goodness, you’re all bones. First of all, the lady is severely malnourished. You must eat well.”

“I’ll have a banquet prepared right away.”

“Of course. Let’s see.”

Grandma Theresa examined Arne’s mana core and looked at her pensively.

“Lady, why did you do this?”

The kindly wrinkled brow furrowed with worry.

“Knowing you could die, why did you push yourself so hard? You are now in a dual-core state. Dual cores are not formed unless it’s right before death.”

“What does that mean?”

“Normally, other people’s mana and other kinds of mana don’t mix, but when you’re on the verge of death, you accept other people’s mana as your own in order to stay alive. Seeing Lord Cedric’s spirit mana inside your core suggests you were close to death and became a dual-core due to Lord Cedric’s healing.”

Grandma Theresa’s warm yet reproachful gaze turned towards Arne. Her thick, wrinkled hands held Arne’s small and thin hands. Arne felt a surge of emotion for some reason.

“A mage’s mana core is a vessel for holding mana. If the mana core is broken to this extent, even recovering one’s own mana would leak out and lead to death. You are alive now because Lord Cedric’s spirit mana has barely kept your mana core filled and you breathing. Why did you do this?”

Theresa’s question wasn’t really a question. It was a lament seeing a child who had no choice but to make such a decision.

“The crack in your mana core is severe, so recovery will be quite slow. There’s no answer but to wait for a mana core injury to heal, so in the meantime, you’ll have to endure by receiving spirit mana from the young master.”

Theresa’s gaze lingered on the hands that Arne and Cedric were holding.

“So that’s why you were holding hands like that. Contact is indeed the easiest way to transfer mana.”

“……”

Arne felt her face heat up for some reason. Does this mean they have to keep holding hands like this? She awkwardly lifted her head feeling her hand unnaturally hot.

Cedric was about to say something but closed his mouth when his eyes met Arne’s. He was reminded of last night’s events, though she didn’t remember them.

Grandma Theresa glanced at Cedric’s flushed neck before quickly selecting and preparing herbs.

“Young master should also call that mage friend of yours to extract some mana. It might not be enough but it will help. It will take some time to refine the mana into a potion though.”

Theresa selected a bundle of herbs that would help Arne recover her strength. Selindefirin was a rare stamina restorative in the North but common in the capital.

Arne murmured,

“Selindefirin helps alleviate Arin’s disease. It should allow her to live for at least a few more years.”

At that moment, Cedric and Theresa’s gazes met. Cedric and Theresa had tried every treatment possible to cure the incurable disease of his sister with Arin’s disease.

There was nothing Cedric wouldn’t give if there was anything that could cure her. Cedric asked, pulling on Arne’s tightly held hand.

“What did you just say?”

“Selindefirin can alleviate Arin’s disease. It can’t completely cure it, though.”

Benjamin from the Freya orphanage, who had contracted Arin’s disease, had his condition alleviated by eating this herb.

Arin’s disease was a very rare incurable disease, so there was no available medication, let alone research on it.

Naturally, war orphans couldn’t afford medication or even see a doctor, so they had no choice but to eat common Selindefirin as a vitality recovery agent.

Arne remembered because she personally dug up and gave Selindefirin to Benjamin, who had Arin’s disease.

But after Arne was adopted by the Ronia ducal family, she couldn’t see him anymore.

“Eating crushed Selindefirin also stopped hemoptysis¹coughing up blood from some part of the lungs (respiratory tract). If you stop eating it midway, the disease will flare up again, but at least it slows down the progression of the disease.”

“How do you know that, miss? Arin’s disease is such a rare disease that even people in the empire would hardly know.”

Theresa’s eyes widened. Rare emotion cracked Cedric’s usually composed face.

Arne knew what that emotion was. It was a desperate and earnest wish.

The desperation of not wanting a loved one to die, and the hope that they might live.

So Arne decided to speak honestly. Normally, she wouldn’t have brought up her orphanage days.

“I was adopted from the Freya orphanage before I became Lady Ronia. I had a friend at the orphanage who had Arin’s disease.”

Theresa blinked at Arne’s confession.

She couldn’t have imagined that such a ladylike miss was an orphan.

But Cedric didn’t seem too surprised, like he already knew.