But the moment Erica scattered feed on the opposite side of the yard, the chickens’ eyes changed. All four of them seemed to completely forget about their eggs as they rushed out of the coop in a flurry.

While the chickens pecked at the feed, Eric snuck into the coop quietly.

“This one I’ll boil, and this one I’ll fry in the shape of a daisy……”

The child carefully picked up each egg one by one, afraid of breaking them by holding too tightly, and handed them to his mother while singing. When he pointed to the last one, he asked:

“Can’t we let this one become a chick?”

“That one can’t become a chick.”

“Why?”

“Because we don’t have a rooster.”

“Why?”

“Well, the rooster might fight with the hens, and it would be difficult to manage if we kept having chicks.”

“Why?”

“……”

She wanted to confiscate his “why.”

“Let’s talk about that while eating breakfast. Quickly finish collecting that one too……”

Crack.

“Oh? Oh!”

“…What accident have you caused now?”

“Hehe.”

The child grinned broadly and lifted one foot. The yolk and white stuck to the sole of his shoe stretched like gum.

“Oh my.”

“Mom, this egg doesn’t taste good.”

“That’s because you can’t taste it now.”

This little troublemaker. Who did he take after?

“……”

Anyway, with this child, life was never boring.

* * *

After breakfast, she took Eric out. Their destination was the dense forest outside the city walls.

‘I need to save on material costs.’

She decided to gather herbs herself instead of buying them from an herb merchant. Moreover, since it was autumn, she could earn enough for food expenses by picking and selling mushrooms.

‘Maybe I’ll get lucky and find some rare mushrooms.’

Since the shallow parts of the forest would have been picked clean by countless people already, she went deep into the forest. The ground was covered with lush ferns and moss, all green, while the canopy above was filled with autumn foliage, all yellow and red.

Luckily, she found a mushroom colony that no one had touched. While she was excitedly gathering edible and medicinal mushrooms, the child picked up a mushroom she had discarded and asked:

“Mom, why can’t we eat this mushroom?”

“Because it’s poisonous.”

“What happens if it’s poisonous?”

“Then you might feel pain and die with a scream.”

“Really?”

“Yes, so throw it away quickly.”

“But what happens when you die?”

“Um… when you die, you’re reborn in another world.”

“Really?”

“Yes, so if you want to live with Mom for a very long time, don’t eat that mushroom and throw it away.”

Eric, who had wanted to play with the umbrella-shaped mushroom because he liked its appearance, threw it away without hesitation when told that he should discard it if he wanted to live with his mother for a long time.

“But how do you know what happens when you die?”

Because I’ve died before. Erica had decided to be a mother who answered everything honestly and straightforwardly, but this was the one thing she decided not to be honest about.

“Mom doesn’t know. Someone told me before.”

“Who?”

“Um… an old woman from the village where Mom used to live?”

“How did that old woman know?”

Now she wanted to confiscate the question marks.

It seemed like he had nothing to do in this forest and was bored, so he just followed his mother around, bombarding her with questions.

“Eric, could you gather some acorns that have fallen around here?”

“Yes!”

He quieted down when given a mission, but only for a moment…

“But Mom.”

“Yes?”

She answered diligently despite feeling annoyed. Perhaps Erica was actually enjoying it without realizing.

“Why does that mountain have white hair like the old lady upstairs? Is it old?”

When she looked up, she could see the snow-capped mountain range in the distance between the trees and rocks. That mountain range, standing tall like a barrier on the horizon, was the one she should have crossed before Eric was born but ultimately couldn’t.

That’s why she ended up settling in this random city instead of the port city that had been her destination.

Thanks to whom.

‘I wonder what happened to that guy who blocked my path.’

Thud.

‘He’s probably living well on his own.’

Thud.

‘Why should I care?’

Thud.

Snap!

“Ah!”

While digging the ground with a small hoe, she accidentally snapped the root of an herb.

“Sigh……”

Erica threw the broken herb into her basket and shouted:

“Eric, don’t go too far!”

A mother naturally has eyes in the back of her head. Throughout her herb gathering, Erica kept her ears tuned to the child’s presence, and whenever she sensed him moving too far away, she called out.

Truly, grace and parenting could not coexist.

Eric was busy moving around, pushing through ferns as tall as himself.

Was he still collecting acorns?

But when the child returned shortly after, what he held out as a gift wasn’t acorns but colorful flowers.

“These are the flowers you like, right?”

At that moment, the face of a seven-year-old boy overlapped with Eric’s face, and a similar voice was heard along with Eric’s:

“These are the flowers you like, right, Erica?”

This child resembled his father too much.

The way he held out flowers with eyes asking for praise was so identical to her father when he was young that a sigh almost escaped Erica’s lips before praise.

‘He only looks like him.’

Erica swallowed her sigh, offered praise, and hugged her son. Then she fervently wished:

‘Don’t take after him in other ways, my son.’

Don’t inherit the playboy genes, and especially don’t inherit the weak constitution.

Parenting principle number two: Raise him not to become like his father.

She planned to thoroughly educate him on morality from a young age. Though it was still too early for anti-playboy education since the child had no interest in the opposite s*x yet.

She seemed to be doing well in raising him to be strong unlike his father. Eric was actually a healthy baby but was born after a full term, which had caused Erica quite a struggle.

Given that he had hardly ever been sick, it seemed there was no need to worry about him taking after his father’s health, though.

Erica accepted the flowers and patted the child’s plump bottom.

“Go play. But don’t go far.”

“Okay!”

Eric didn’t keep his promise.

While following an ant he encountered at a tree trunk, he found himself beyond the dense fern forest and on a secluded forest path before he knew it.

Of course, Eric didn’t realize this.

“Wow! So this is your home.”

The ant disappeared into a hole under a rock. While he was mesmerized, staring at the entrance to the ant colony, he heard footsteps from the path.

“Mom, why do ants……”

Eric’s words stopped abruptly as the owner of the footsteps halted right in front of him. The pair of shoes before his eyes were much too small to be his mother’s.

‘That’s not Mom.’

Eric looked up, embarrassed for calling a stranger “Mom.” Standing before Eric was a girl about his age. The girl looked just as surprised as he was.

The girl looked up and down the path, blinked her puzzled green eyes, and asked Eric:

“Did Dad shrink?”