Of course, she had no intention of defending what Sierra had done, but perhaps because she was borrowing that body, she could understand the original Sierra’s feelings to some extent.

She must have thought she was born with a diamond spoon in her mouth that would never tarnish.

After all, she had been born as the daughter of Kepla, the foremost duke in the empire, and had early on secured her place as the mistress of Valdevern, a house of equal standing.

“Thank you for the compliment, my lady.”

Sierra placed both hands together above her navel and bowed to Countess Haylus.

“Oh my……”

Just as Sierra had intended, the corners of Countess Haylus’s lips began to tremble. The sight of her desperately holding back her delight in order to maintain her authority as a governess looked rather endearing.

“The new mistress of Valdevern is truly so well-mannered, and cu, cu……”

She probably wanted to say cute.

But she could not easily say what she wanted to say. Young as Sierra was, barely older than the countess’s own daughter, Sierra outranked Countess Haylus in terms of social standing.

“……Noble.”

Countess Haylus was quite a rational person. That much was evident from the fact that she swallowed the word cute.

“Thank you for thinking so well of me.”

Sierra bowed again with her hands folded at her navel and smiled to herself, hidden from Countess Haylus’s view.

Back then, every time Sierra looked in the mirror, she would clench and unclench her fists, not knowing what to do with herself.

Why?

Because young Sierra’s appearance was so unbearably cute and adorable.

‘It is one of the greatest advantages of being a villainess.’

If the typical female lead was the pure and lovable type, then villainesses were, without question, often strikingly beautiful.

The slightly upturned, cat-like eyes.

A single lash curling upward in each eye made Sierra’s cat-like face look even more haughtily charming.

And it was incredibly cute.

And what about those plump, chubby cheeks filled with baby fat?

They were so soft and squishy that the sensation of pinching and pulling them was something else entirely.

Of course, she could only pinch her cheeks occasionally. Since they were her own cheeks, the pain was also hers to bear.

“Then let us begin today’s lesson.”

Countess Haylus, having barely composed herself, continued.

“Do you remember what we learned in the previous lesson about the duties of a household’s mistress?”

“Of course. You said the mistress oversees all matters, large and small, within a noble household.”

Countess Haylus blinked rapidly.

What is going on with her vocabulary? Would a child of this age typically even know the meaning of words like oversees or matters large and small?

Countess Haylus, though astonished, soon brushed it off, assuming she must have used those words herself in the previous lesson.

“Very good. Then, though it may be a little early, I thought I would begin teaching you numbers today.”

Countess Haylus stole a glance at Sierra’s expression.

Contrary to what parents might hope, children of this age generally wanted to run outside and play. Just like the young lady of the Randel earldom, whose governess Countess Haylus also was.

That child would stick out her tongue and say numbers made her sick.

The young Duchess of Valdevern, on the other hand, simply blinked her eyes in an adorable way without showing any sign of displeasure.

It was still too early to make a hasty judgment. It might simply be that she had not yet reached the arithmetic stage and therefore had no fear of it.

Countess Haylus drew that conclusion and opened her mouth.

“The mistress must first be well acquainted with the wages of the estate’s servants and the overall general……”

Countess Haylus paused mid-sentence and stole a glance at Sierra.

When an unfamiliar word came up, children typically showed one of two reactions.

Tilting their head and asking what it meant.

This easily led to a game of twenty questions. To explain that word, Countess Haylus would have to use another word as an example, and to explain that example word, yet another……

In any case, a very tedious and laborious process would follow, and the lesson would end without having covered the day’s intended material.

The other reaction was pretending to understand in order not to appear ignorant.

The first case was troublesome enough, but this one was even more of a headache.

It was difficult to tell whether the child had truly understood, and if this pattern repeated itself, the child was likely to lose interest in learning.

There were various other reactions as well, but Countess Haylus had judged that Sierra would show the latter.

“……it is best to be thoroughly aware of the state of things.”

Countess Haylus continued speaking while keeping a close watch on Sierra’s expression.

But the child’s expression was far too calm.

‘Could it be that she is a new type I have yet to encounter?’

Countess Haylus tensed up and pressed on.

“That is why, even if it is a little difficult, arithmetic is absolutely essential. The moment servants sense that the mistress does not have a firm grasp of things, they will find a way to exploit that gap with uncanny precision.”

“……”

“This, in turn, provides an opportunity for the ducal household’s assets to be nibbled away little by little.”

When the explanation was finished, Sierra nodded as though she agreed.

Rather than forcing herself to pretend she understood something she did not, it seemed as though she had genuinely understood and agreed with what Countess Haylus had said.

“Shall I continue?”

“Yes.”

When all of the planned lessons had been completed, Countess Haylus thought to herself.

‘A, a genius!’

It was not without a sense of rashness to reach that conclusion based on just one day’s lesson.

But not only had she learned numbers, which alone had taken the young lady of the Randel earldom a full month, she had even progressed to addition and subtraction!

It seemed as easy as drinking hot soup lying down for Sierra.

‘What if I gave her a slightly more difficult problem?’

Countess Haylus felt a touch of ambition stir within her.

Gulp.

Would it be right to give further wings to the child’s brilliance? Or, considering how tired she must be from today’s lesson, would it be better to wrap things up here?

In that brief span of time, Countess Haylus turned over all manner of thoughts in her mind.

And it was just as she had finally reached a decision.

Without any warning, the study door flew open.

Young as she still was, Sierra was undeniably the mistress of Valdevern. And someone was flinging open the door to the room where she sat?

Countess Haylus, who had steeled herself and widened her eyes in indignation, soon narrowed them again.

It was because the person who had thrown open the door without knocking and come running into the study was none other than the master of this very estate, the Duke of Valdevern.

“……?”

The Duke of Valdevern, who was eight years old just like Sierra, walked slowly inside carrying a branch with a long green creature coiled around it.

And then he extended it toward the duchess.

“It’s a snake!”

“Kyaaah!”

Since she had been keeping a close eye on Ahin’s movements through the window all along, Sierra was not particularly startled.

But Countess Haylus let out a scream and fainted on the spot.

—

‘It was the kind of scream you would only expect to hear in a horror film……’

Sierra smiled bitterly as she recalled that moment.

“Ahin, honestly.”

Around that time, Ahin had acted as though he were afflicted with a disease that compelled him to torment Sierra.

And it was not only limited to that occasion. He had been enthusiastically tormenting Sierra right up until the moment he left for the battlefield.

“Ah……”

Sierra, who had been quietly reflecting on those days, suddenly realized something. That what was happening now was simply torment in another form.

Seeing Ahin changed after his return from the battlefield, she had at first wondered whether he had finally grown up.

As the commander, a single word from Ahin had been weighty enough to determine the life or death of dozens to hundreds of soldiers, so she had thought he must have grown inwardly under the weight of that heavy responsibility.

But thinking about it again, it seemed that was not the case.

Ahin’s torment had continued to evolve as the years went by.

So it seemed fair to say that his relentless pursuit of Sierra’s body day and night was simply his torment leveling up by one degree.

The moment she came to terms with reality, her mouth turned bitter.

“Tsk……”

Sierra clicked her tongue and shook her head.

The only comfort was the thought that the day she would finally be free from Ahin’s torment was not so far away.

Letting out a faint sigh, Sierra checked the time and rose from her seat.

“I should be heading over.”

If she made her way to the parlor now, the timing would be just right for Ahin and Claudia to come face to face.

—

At that same moment, Claudia was in the parlor receiving treatment from the healer.

“How do you feel?”

The healer withdrew his hands after channeling healing energy into Claudia’s body.

“It doesn’t…… hurt at all.”

Claudia couldn’t help but be astonished, her eyes going wide.

“It seems the treatment went well. Would you like to try moving your body?”

Following the healer’s suggestion, Claudia rose from her seat and repeated a sword-swinging motion several times.

Remarkably, the area that had been throbbing with pain had healed as cleanly as if it had been washed away.

Even seeing it clearly with her own eyes, she could hardly believe the healer’s mysterious skill.

‘To think the treatment would be finished so simply……’

She had already been finding it a strain to train alongside knights who had better physical builds than she did, and on top of that she had sustained an injury.

She had been worried about being cast out of the knights’ order for being useless, so this was truly a relief.

She was genuinely overjoyed, yet the image of her father lying ill in bed surfaced in her mind, and her throat tightened.