<Episode 12>
Even if I had once been branded a villainess, never had I been dismissed as an incompetent mage.
“Yes, I’m going to waste time—waste mana—quite spectacularly.”
I was ablaze with a determination no one had asked for.
Through the night.
The Sensory Amplification Spell.
An enhanced version of an older sensory spell—originally altered within my family to extract confessions from traitors and spies. Effective in the worst possible ways.
“AAAGH! S-Save me! Please—please, I’ll tell you everything… EVERYTHING!”
“I—I’ll confess it all…! Just stop…!”
As you can see, it worked far too well. Even the lightest prick of a needle felt like having one’s finger sliced off.
That was the very spell circle I was now drawing.
With a new twist—one that amplifies taste and smell only.
Fueled by pure stubbornness, I worked without rest.
By dawn, the magic circle—painted with my own mana as ink—glowed faintly in the air, radiant even against the newly risen sun.
I stood atop Winter Castle’s highest vantage point, the very rampart where the Grand Duke often walked in brooding silence.
“All done. Now I just need to charge it with mana—ugh.”
My mana circuits flared hot within my chest. Light dizziness swayed my vision.
Perhaps extending the spell to cover the entire castle was a bit ambitious.
I steadied my breath, lifted the spell circle high into the air, and closed my eyes.
Mana transmutation—alchemy—was interference, not creation. Far more complex than pure magic.
And because I obsessed over efficiency, I contorted the calculations even further to reduce consumption.
Meaning—yes. Headache.
“…Urgh.”
I felt my mana surge from my heart outward, felt the spell settle over the castle like a vast barrier.
Then—
A brief flash. A pulse like lightning.
Pop!
And when I opened my eyes, what stood before me was—
“Kyaaah!”
“You react as though you’ve witnessed something scandalous.”
The talking statue—no, the Grand Duke—had appeared. Soundless. Without warning. Like a ghost.
Expressionless as ever, he stared at me, haloed by pale morning light that made his already unfairly handsome face shine even brighter.
“Y-You startled me! Cough! Couldn’t you announce yourself?”
“Must I announce myself while walking through my own castle?”
“Haven’t we had this conversation before? Cough—fine. Your noble status is such a cheat, honestly.”
It was my fault for coming somewhere so high—perfect for viewing the whole spell.
Who knew he’d be out taking a morning stroll?
“Your spell formula is efficient to the point of excess.”
He glanced at the circle dissolving into the air, then stepped closer.
Lowering his head, silver lashes falling into his eyes.
The wind stirred.
His short, straight silver hair fluttered like scattered snow.
“A bad habit.”
“…What?”
What was he suddenly talking about?
I still couldn’t get used to his way of speaking.
And why is he so close—
Tap. The Grand Duke leaned forward and pressed his forehead to mine.
The touch was cold as ice—yet my skin flushed hot beneath it.
The contact happened so abruptly that my mind froze. Was this chills—or shock?
“You have depletion fever.”
“…”
“It must be chronic. You never take your own condition into account when casting.”
He spoke like a physician diagnosing an ailment.
He hadn’t touched me, yet somehow sensed my mana circuits—my chest tingled faintly as if dusted with frost.
I managed to speak after a long moment.
“D-Depletion what? I feel a little nauseous and drained, sure, but I’m fine.”
Truly, it was nothing serious.
When mana runs dry, the circuits overheat and mimic heatstroke. Rest fixes everything.
I’d experienced it since childhood. I knew my limits. I had never once run into real trouble.
“Depletion fever. Fix that habit.”
Why was he being so… strange? So unexpectedly admonishing?
I had received countless lessons and evaluations throughout my life, but never something like this.
Is this what a former Tower Master is like?
He shouldn’t have been able to sense magic at all anymore—only miasma—yet he read my circuits as if they were drawn on parchment.
Flustered, I snapped back out of stubborn pride.
“I know my own body quite well.”
“Clearly. As long as your body survives the abuse, that is what matters to you.”
“…It’s survived just fine. There’s never been a problem.”
Why did it sound like I was making excuses?
“Or perhaps you simply didn’t recognize that it was a problem.”
Why was he talking this much today?
“You should correct it.”
“…”
“If you don’t wish to regret it later.”
His gaze felt as though it reached deep inside me, prying open ribs and looking straight at my heart.
And in that unreadable expression—I saw regret.
Before I realized it, I blurted,
“Is that from experience?”
Instead of answering the impertinent question, he offered knowledge fit for a former Tower Master.
“Repeated depletion fever wears down the circuits.”
“…That’s new. A relic of knowledge from a century ago?”
“It was rare even in the old Tower.”
Perhaps it was the exhaustion. Perhaps the fever. Perhaps staying up all night.
Whatever it was, fatigue surged all at once like a bursting dam.
“Haaaam… Fine, I’ll be careful…”
I muttered something I didn’t mean, nodding drowsily.
I didn’t feel like arguing anymore. Not because I’d lost on logic or knowledge—certainly not.
After a brief pause—
“Go sleep, Irenne Valtres.”
He dismissed me.
“There you go again… How long are you going to call me by a discarded house name…”
The lord of the castle ignored the guest’s complaint.
“Unless you wish to faint outright.”
“Ugh, fine. Enjoy your solitude…”
With my work finished anyway, I was planning to sleep. Half-blind with fatigue, I stumbled away.
Miraculously reached my room. Collapsed on the bed. And through fading consciousness—
“Holy—! Thought she was a ghost. Why’s she sleeping on the carpet?”
“Is Irenne dead?”
“Irenne! You can’t die yet!”
Loud idiots. All three of them.
Irenne was not dead.
She had simply collapsed two steps from her room and used the carpet as a blanket.
But her face had been so pale, her breathing so faint, that it was an easy mistake.
The maid—who had been searching for her since dawn—and the two men who had been idling about discovered her and carried her to bed.
Decreased consciousness… symptoms of hypothermia for sure!
Most of their senses had long degraded, so while they could not feel temperature properly, they knew in theory that the castle was cold.
Thus, Allie made a grim, logical diagnosis and steeled herself.
“Forgive me. If Irenne dies, His Grace will sleep again—Bellmeier will have no future.”
Her gentle attempt to slap Irenne awake was stopped by Nishe.
“Are you insane? If you hit her, she really will die.”
“Ah.”
“And she’s just sleeping.”
“Ah.”
Allie and Zephy voiced their epiphanies in perfect unison.
Watching the two—more like siblings than actual siblings—Nishe sighed.
“She does look half-dead. Probably burned through her mana doing something stupid.”
“How would you know, mutt?”
“Use your brain. His Grace used to be like that all the time.”
“Oh.”
As expected of the Black Sea Knight Order’s sole remaining intellect—wisdom glittered between his words.
If Nishe ever learned that Irenne lumped him in with the resident idiots, he would be deeply offended.
Captain of Bellmeier’s foremost knight order—called the Black Sea.
A title of honor. He possessed both skill and intellect. In short: an elite.
Not that it matters. There are only two members left.
The rest had died—war, time, and attrition. The order was now barely a proper order.
Allie, too, held a peculiar place—technically a knight, but spending 360 days a year posing as a maid.
The assassin-turned-disguised-servant pulled the blanket up to Irenne’s chin.
“We should add more firewood.”
Her movements were like an undertaker tending a corpse.
She only meant to warm the room, but the sight was unsettling.
“Hey. Is that right?”
“Irenne must be cold.”
“That’s not the point. Ugh, forget it.”
“Where are you going? Bring firewood while you’re at it.”
“Make the idiot do it. Idiocy is contagious.”
Leaving the bickering fools behind, Nishe stepped out.
A guest room unused for decades had become the most lived-in corner of the castle.
And not just that.
Since Irenne’s arrival, Winter Castle had changed.
Brighter. Cleaner. Warmer. Louder.
And—
“H-Hiii!”
On his way to the dining hall, Nishe nearly collided with Coco—who flinched as though seeing a ghost.
“What, did you spot a specter?”
“N-No! I’m sorry!”
“What are you apologizing for? Don’t make it a habit.”
“Y-Yes… I’m sorry for being sorry…”
He stared down at her bowed head, irritation simmering.
It wasn’t that he disliked Coco.
It wasn’t that he hated having people in the castle.
