You Say This Child Isn't Yours!? - Chapter 4

It was during the height of the village’s May festival. The villagers could barely contain their excitement at the unexpected guest’s appearance.

“Wow! You’ve become a completely different person!”

Though there were countless tables in the village square decorated with ribbons and cloth-adorned birch trees, all the young villagers were crowded around one table.

“Where have you been all this time?”

A young woman sitting next to Roderick asked, leaning closer to him with her chin propped in her hands. Roderick took a sip of beer without looking at her and answered curtly.

“In the royal capital.”

“Does everyone in the royal capital speak as elegantly as you, Roderick?”

Erica, who was sitting on Roderick’s other side – or rather, who ended up there because Roderick had followed and sat next to her – suddenly realized.

‘Come to think of it, earlier he…’

“I apologize for my rudeness.”

Country men don’t use such refined speech. The old Roderick didn’t either. Back then, he would have just said “Ah, sorry!”

“Ah… do I speak that way? I must have picked it up from the people I live with.”

“It sounds nice. Like a prince.”

The village girls seemed already enchanted by Roderick’s sophisticated and elegant city speech, hanging on his every word with dreamy expressions.

‘What’s with that? His way of speaking isn’t that different from mine, but they called me stuck-up.’

Habits from her previous life as an heiress would occasionally slip out in this life too. And without fail, it would lead to mockery.

“Yes, yes, Your Royal Highness. When will the prince come to save you from this lowly village crawling with commoners?”

It was irritating to see those same girls who used to mock her now squealing “How wonderful!” at him.

“What do you do for a living there?”

A young man who had been standing with his arms crossed asked Roderick in a blunt, rough tone.

“Mercenary.”

“Wow! How cool!”

The women’s response to his brief answer was explosive. The man who had asked the question looked down disapprovingly at the excited women and muttered.

“Becoming a mercenary isn’t that difficult.”

“So you’re just passing through on your way to find your next job?”

Another young man cut in. It was a question that assumed – or rather hoped – that he wouldn’t stay in this village permanently.

“No, I kept thinking about this place…”

Roderick’s eyes briefly flickered toward Erica, who was picking at the food on her plate, before returning straight ahead.

“I just came to visit, but I have to return to the capital in ten days. I can’t be away from my post for too long.”

“Where do you work?”

“Who do you work with?”

“Winterborn.”

“Whaaaat?!”

Now even the men had an explosive reaction.

Winterborn.

Now synonymous with the kingdom’s guardians, but once another name for terror throughout the kingdom – the half-human, half-divine clan.

They were descendants of divine beings who used ice magic, but as their blood mixed with humans, their powers weakened. Finally, about a thousand years ago, they were defeated by the royal family.

The king of that time made a contract with them.

In exchange for not exterminating them, they would use their powers only for the royal family.

Thus their ice magic was sealed, and only those with royal permission could use that power – now called ‘aura’ – through tools, specifically swords.

That’s how the divine descendants became watchdogs for the human king.

“But you live in the capital instead of the borderlands?”

The current Winterborn were margraves, responsible for defending the borderlands where monsters and enemy invasions were frequent.

“I’m part of the Margrave family’s palace guard in the capital.”

“Wow, amazing!”

“Did you hear? Roderick works at the palace.”

“That’s impossible. You can’t use aura.”

Though tinged with jealousy, it wasn’t wrong to point out that aura was an ability only Winterborn descendants possessed. Erica was also curious about how this worked.

“There are regular soldiers in the guard too. They can’t fill the ranks with just those bloodlines.”

“So it wasn’t just a rumor that some of them can’t use aura anymore because their blood is too diluted.”

“Have you seen the Winterborn descendants?”

“What are they like? Are they cool?”

Their chattering was suddenly interrupted by the sound of wheels rolling and clattering. Soon, a cart carrying a wolf’s carcass appeared and stopped in front of the table where the young people were gathered.

“Hey there.”

Erica’s father, who was pulling the cart, poked his head through the crowd and called out to Roderick.

“Should I leave this in front of your cabin?”

“No, sir. This beast tried to make your precious daughter its lunch, so please dispose of it as you see fit.”

Father’s face lit up at the offer of a free wolf. He was the only one looking pleased.

Among the peers who were staring at the cleanly bisected wolf with shocked expressions, one Miss murmured in an admiring voice.

“How did he cut something so big in one stroke?”

“Hmph, that’s nothing special.”

…muttered a man who had a crush on that Miss.

There was no way anyone would believe it wasn’t a big deal to take down a calf-sized wolf with just an old axe. The women, as if they’d been holding back until now, showered him with admiration.

“That’s amazing.”

“I wish I could have seen that wonderful moment.”

“I should have gone to tend the sheep today.”

“Erica, stop eating and tell us what it was like.”

Annoyed, Erica picked up her beer mug and responded halfheartedly.

“I had my eyes closed, so I didn’t see.”

It wasn’t a lie, considering she had been about to become wolf food.

“Did you kiss?”

The moment one of the girls suddenly asked, both Erica and Roderick’s eyes widened simultaneously as they were raising their beer mugs.

“Isn’t it proper to kiss your hero who saved you?”

“……”

“……”

“Kiss! Kiiiiss!”

Four hands immediately covered that girl’s mouth. Both men and women rushed to stop their tactless friend.

“But how did the wolf end up trying to eat a person?”

“Uncle Hans got a wolf pelt after it almost got his sheep.”

They started talking among themselves as if trying to dispel the awkward atmosphere. As Erica was pretending nothing had happened and raising her beer mug again, Roderick turned his head toward her and whispered in a low voice.

“I don’t need a thank-you kiss.”

“Then…”

Erica started to ask something that had suddenly popped into her mind but caught herself.

‘What was I thinking? Am I crazy?’

Fortunately, Roderick, who couldn’t have known what she was thinking, steered the conversation in a different direction.

“I was just repaying a debt.”

“A debt?”

“You saved me before, remember?”

It was too trivial to deserve such a grand label as ‘saving.’ Of course, that was just Erica’s opinion – Roderick’s memory was different.

***

“Want to play with us?”

“Yes.”

“Then fill these five apple baskets for us. Then we’ll play with you.”

“Okay!”

When they were young, the village children would make Roderick, who wanted to be part of their group, do their chores. Since he was an outsider’s child with no one to take his side, the village children had no reservations, and Roderick, who was innocent and obedient back then, was easily taken advantage of.

Then one day…

“My ball! Father bought it for me from the city.”

A boy’s leather ball fell into an isolated well. The well was deep and had stagnant water at the bottom.

No matter how precious a leather ball might be, no one would want to go in willingly. The children told Roderick, who was hovering around wanting to play with them, to go into the deep well and retrieve the ball.