The woman’s pink eyes turned toward the orb.

A heavy atmosphere hung in the room. Jerome thought Evan might draw his sword depending on the woman’s answer—or rather, the color of the orb.

“I……”

After hesitating, the woman parted her lips.

“I really don’t remember anything. I’m sorry.”

The orb turned blue again at the woman’s tearful response.

Looking at the unmistakably clear blue color, Jerome heaved a deep sigh.

“……I see.”

Evan picked up the orb and tossed it to Jerome.

Jerome hurriedly caught it, afraid his treasure might break, and bristled, but Evan didn’t bat an eye and merely gestured for him to follow.

Jerome followed Evan outside and firmly closed the door.

Then, whispering in a very small voice, he poured out his concerns.

“Don’t tell me what she asked for was…… the spirit stone?”

When Jerome pointed to the necklace that would be hanging around Evan’s neck, Evan nodded.

“So you saved her to ask how she knows about its existence?”

Seeing his master nod expressionlessly once more, Jerome clutched his chest.

“Why save her just to ask that! You should have left her to die! What if the family secret is revealed! And if that woman reports us……”

“She also had a nice scent.”

Evan muttered with his arms crossed, not even pretending to listen to his servant’s words.

Jerome could only gape, unable to make a sound.

What did I just hear?

All this time, I thought my master was a rational and cold person.

Was he actually a sentimental fool?

“What? What smelled nice?”

“I said that woman had a somehow nice scent. It felt familiar too.”

“……”

“As if I’ve met her somewhere before.”

Evan recalled the last words the woman had uttered as she was dying in the snowstorm.

“Gi-give me… the spirit… st-stone.”

Insolent woman.

How dare she bluntly ask for someone else’s family heirloom?

As Jerome said, he should have drawn his sword and killed her on the spot.

“Pl-please……”

The trembling woman had then dropped her head into the snow, and Evan had briefly contemplated while watching her golden hair flutter.

Killing her would be clean.

But…….

“Your Highness?”

While Evan was reconsidering his first encounter with the woman, Jerome, trembling for a different reason, finally exclaimed in disbelief.

“What familiar scent? She’s clearly a commoner beggar. What if that flower beggar is a dangerous person targeting the spirit stone!”

“Then I’ll kill her at that time.”

Evan remained calm this time too, and Jerome was completely at a loss for words.

He felt frustrated that Evan seemed too careless, even if the woman appeared frail.

“For now, we can’t throw an amnesiac patient with nowhere to go out into this snowstorm. Thanks to your toy orb.”

“Ugh, just because someone tells the truth doesn’t mean we have to be considerate!”

“Anyway, clean up one of the guest rooms, move her there, and tell her to stay until she remembers something. Don’t you feel sorry for her?”

“I don’t feel sorry at all. Not one bit.”

“Hmm. Really?”

Evan looked with interest at the orb in Jerome’s hand as it turned bright red.

⁕⁕⁕

“Um, th-thank you. I’ll return home as soon as I remember where it is.”

The woman, who had emerged fresh from a bath, looked at Jerome with an even more radiant face.

She even bowed politely.

‘One shining thing in this castle is enough……’

Jerome frowned while thinking of Evan, but the woman, unaware of his thoughts, flinched in surprise and quickly clasped her hands together.

“Wh-while I’m staying here, please let me handle cleaning or laundry! And I absolutely, absolutely won’t be a burden, Sir Jerome!”

An abandoned puppy trying hard not to be thrown out.

That was exactly how she looked.

‘Ugh.’

Jerome, weak to pitiful and shiny things, turned away and answered.

“Drop the ‘sir.’ It makes me uncomfortable.”

“What?”

“Just call me Jerome, casually.”

“Oh, yes! Jerome!”

“Tell me your name when you remember it.”

“Yes!”

The woman nodded with a brightened expression.

When she smiled brightly, she seemed to radiate even more.

‘What a smile that makes people completely defenseless.’

While trying to maintain his aloofness, the woman clenched her fists and asked.

“Then what should I do first?”

“You’re not even fully recovered, how can you do house—huh? Your leg is healed?”

Jerome, who had been responding indifferently, noticed that the wound on her ankle had faded.

“Oh, yes! I guess the injury wasn’t as serious as it seemed.”

The woman smiled as if relieved, but Jerome tilted his head.

‘What’s this? As far as I know, the winter spirit stone doesn’t have healing abilities. It can boost energy to some extent, but……’

But Jerome soon dismissed it as unimportant.

Come to think of it, the medicine he had applied to her was supposedly a new panacea.

The magic shop owner had boasted about its incredible effectiveness, and it seems he was right.

In that case, maybe he could work her hard.

Jerome gave her several sets of plain everyday clothes and a maid uniform that had belonged to a runaway maid, and the woman chose to wear the maid uniform.

Her choice suggested she understood her position well.

The clothes seemed slightly large but not uncomfortable enough to hinder her daily activities.

However, from an observer’s perspective, there was something unsettling.

The woman’s appearance was so naturally splendid that wearing a maid uniform created a sense of imbalance.

A straight nose on her small face, large round pink eyes.

Her skin was as white as Evan’s, with cheeks and lips tinged with the color of freshly bloomed roses.

If Evan’s silver hair sparkled like clean snow reflecting sunlight, this woman’s golden hair shone softly and warmly like sunshine pouring onto that snow.

Watching her, Jerome shook his head and pointed to a desk.

“I think I’ve been too brief with someone who can’t even remember their own name.”

The woman approached the desk at Jerome’s gesture.

“You don’t even know where you are now. Even if I tell you it’s Baltion Castle, you have no background knowledge of what kind of place it is or where it’s located. Right?”

The woman nodded embarrassedly.

“I was going to start with cleaning, but that won’t work. Sit down at this desk.”

Jerome pulled out a chair and seated the woman.

His hand unrolled a scroll of paper.

Swoosh.

A large map appeared before the woman’s eyes.

“Look here. See this huge continent?”

“Yes.”

“This is the Land of God, said to have been created by Amasi, the God of Light, along with four spirits who each govern spring, summer, autumn, and winter.”

“Land of…… God?”

Jerome explained patiently as if teaching a newborn baby.

The legend of the Land of God was a story known even to children throughout the Empire.

“This large Empire occupying most of this land is called Amazenta. It’s beautiful and abundant thanks to the protection of the four seasonal spirits.”

The woman nodded with interest.

Since she truly knew nothing, she was accepting whatever she was told.

But Jerome’s hand, which had been circling the Amazenta Empire, suddenly moved to the edge.

“But we’re now at the northern end of the Empire. Here, this periphery. See?”

“Shadow Forest?”

“No, next to it. Baltion territory.”

“Oh, yes. Found it.”

The woman seemed excited by her small discovery and clapped her hands together.

“We’re here now. In this barren land that’s the only place in the Empire where it’s winter every day.”

“Oh, yes……”

The woman scratched her cheek with a surprised expression.

To think this cold place was also part of the Land of God.

“This place, with just a few small villages at the foot of the mountain, doesn’t get much attention except for its ice mine. Both geographically and climatically.”

“I see.”

“This was the hometown of the ancestors of the noble Baltion family, but after the fourth head of the family acquired land and a mansion in the capital, this castle wasn’t used much. His Highness Evan is now the 11th head, so this castle is several hundred years old.”