Episode 8
As Elysia left, a heavy silence once again settled around Eden.
The cold sensation he had felt in his muddled state now enveloped his whole body with a clear mind.
Eden hated the emptiness and silence he had felt in that hazy consciousness.
It was the same even after his mind cleared up.
In fact, the silence felt even more vivid with his sharpened senses, amplifying his fear.
With no memory to dwell on and no thoughts to sink into, Eden simply breathed and blinked.
Unable to do anything, and with nothing he wanted to do, this situation terrified him.
‘What should I do?’
He just wanted to wait.
To wait for the sun to go down, for Elysia to appear again and fill this void around him.
And so Eden sat still, waiting for time to pass.
How many hours had passed?
‘Bed. Blanket. Fireplace. Painting.’
Eventually, he spent time muttering the names of the furniture in the room.
These were the only bits of knowledge Eden had.
‘Elysia.’
From time to time, he would mutter Elysia’s name.
‘Elysia Partin. But she said she didn’t like being called Partin.’
He repeatedly recalled the conversations he had with her.
‘Elysia. Elysia.’
Aside from that, there was nothing else Eden could do here.
Originally, Elysia’s schedule was fixed—an overwhelming number of classes and nauseating amounts of work.
It was her daily routine to deal with it all, every single day of the week.
During her set breaks or on rare occasions when time unexpectedly freed up, Elysia would always spend it with Ariel.
But with Eden’s sudden arrival, Elysia’s daily life had been thrown slightly off track.
Of course, since it was a choice she made herself, she didn’t find it bothersome or troublesome.
Still, the fatigue was unavoidable.
Just by looking at Elysia’s face as she forcefully set down her pen with a loud clack, one could tell how tired she was.
To meet Eden, she had to cram in the studying she should have finished by lunchtime during the early morning and now, again, at night.
The time before dinner with Ariel was her only break of the day.
Elysia, pressing her tired eyes with the hand still holding her pen, stood up.
It was time to have dinner with Ariel.
“Ariel. Even if you don’t like it, try eating one or two pieces.”
Ariel was soon to enter adolescence. So Elysia tried to remind herself to cut down on the nagging.
But seeing Ariel sneakily picking out broccoli while glancing at her nervously, Elysia’s nagging came out of habit.
“…It tastes bad…”
Though she had stopped poking with her fork, Ariel clearly had no intention of putting it in her mouth as she grumbled sullenly.
“Since you hated it so much, I asked the chef to make it taste as bland as possible.”
“……”
“Just try one bite. If you still don’t like it, I’ll eat it.”
In this household, even among family, giving someone food you had already touched or eaten was considered improper etiquette. Even without being taught in etiquette classes, everyone accepted it as common sense for hygiene reasons.
However, Elysia often ate the food Ariel left behind. To her, Ariel’s leftovers were never food waste.
“Ugh! It’s disgusting!”
Ariel, who had put the broccoli in her mouth after Elysia’s persuasion, grimaced and flinched dramatically.
What should she even do with this child?
Seeing Ariel cover her mouth with her small hands and insist that she didn’t want to eat it, Elysia sighed and slid her plate over.
It meant Ariel could pick out the broccoli onto her plate.
Ariel, as if waiting for that, promptly transferred the broccoli to Elysia’s plate.
“If the chef had seen that, he would’ve been really hurt, you know?”
The chef had been subtly trying to fix Ariel’s picky eating habits, so he would definitely take it personally.
To Elysia, it seemed like a battle of pride.
“But it doesn’t suit my taste.”
“Hmm…”
Elysia quietly listened to Ariel’s cute little protest and then suddenly called over the nearest maid.
The maid flinched as she was unexpectedly addressed and approached Elysia with hesitation.
‘Surely she’s not going to order me to punish the chef?’
The maid was already imagining the worst.
“Tell the chef—”
With her soft cheeks stiffened, Elysia’s expression was unusually stern for a child.
‘F-fire him starting today…?’
If she had simply ordered to bring the chef, that would’ve been one thing. But asking another servant to go and tell him not to come in from tomorrow? That was too cruel.
“—to slice the fruit into bite-sized pieces.”
“…Excuse me?”
Elysia was usually expressionless when speaking to servants.
So no, she wasn’t angry about anything now either.
After the meal, Elysia found herself in a bit of trouble thanks to her cute little sister who was following her.
Instead of going back to her room, Ariel was trailing right behind her.
Worried that Ariel might follow her all the way, Elysia finally spoke up.
“Ariel?”
“Yeah?”
Why are you following me?
Elysia didn’t say it aloud, because she had a pretty good idea why Ariel was following her.
“Didn’t you want to eat dessert with me?”
You wanted to play with me, right?
Seeing Ariel’s clear eyes brimming with expectation, Elysia averted her gaze.
On the days when she asked the chef for something to snack on, it was usually because she planned to spend time with Ariel.
So of course Ariel assumed Elysia wanted to hang out with her and followed her.
It was Elysia’s fault for not telling her in advance.
“Ah… today’s not like that…”
Since Eden had arrived, Elysia had already turned down several of Ariel’s requests. Saying no again was incredibly difficult.
As she hesitated, lips moving but no words coming out, she suddenly remembered Eden in the annex, likely still alone and hungry.
A flash of guilt crossed Elysia’s face as she steeled her resolve.
“Sorry, Ariel. Let’s have dessert next time, okay? I have something I need to do today.”
Bringing up work again as an excuse, Ariel’s eyebrows drooped visibly.
As if asking for Elysia to notice her disappointment, Ariel openly showed how upset she was.
Elysia, of course, noticed—and with a nervous smile, she tried to comfort Ariel with a gentle tone.
But Ariel, already deeply hurt, pouted and spoke bluntly.
“You’ve been ignoring me a lot lately.”
“…Huh?”
Elysia, who had been trying her best to soothe her sister, immediately went silent.
She too had felt that she’d been spending less time with Ariel lately, so she couldn’t even deny it.
Seeing Elysia frozen and unable to come up with a response, Ariel quickly shook her head and took her words back.
“No, it’s okay… I know you’re busy…”
Even the embarrassed scratching of her cheek was enough to prick Elysia’s conscience.
And it didn’t stop there—Ariel gave a small, bitter smile and turned away.
“Then… will you have lunch with me tomorrow?”
“…Yeah. I promise.”
Anyone else watching might have laughed at how serious the atmosphere was over something so trivial.
But for Elysia and Ariel, this was a very important moment.
Elysia nodded earnestly at Ariel’s turned back, even though she knew she couldn’t see her.
‘I’m sorry. We’re doing this just to survive.’
Clutching the fruit basket tightly in both hands, Elysia muttered inwardly.
She thought she was doing her best not to let Ariel feel lonely.
Maybe she overestimated her efforts.
Elysia pitied Ariel, who had lost her mother early.
Even more so because she knew the original story.
A father blinded by Meldion’s legacy who abandoned the child he refused to take responsibility for, and a sister who constantly bullied her like she wanted to destroy her.
If Elysia hadn’t become “Elysia,” Ariel might have lived her life wearing that gloomy expression from the original story until the end.
Even so, Ariel had begged for their sins to be forgiven when the family collapsed.
Even at Elysia’s execution, she had screamed for her sister’s life to be spared.
She was a pitiful, kind child.
Fortunately, Ariel wasn’t desperately trying to be acknowledged by the Duke of Partin as she did in the original.
In fact, she hated him as much as Elysia did—that was the first change Elysia had made to the story.
Because of that, Elysia had believed she was giving Ariel enough love.
Although Eden’s arrival had cut into her time and Ariel ended up feeling neglected… there was no helping it.
Elysia only had one body, after all.
“You really came, my lady?”
Seeing Elysia holding a fruit basket late at night, Lizbeth whispered in admiration.
In the quiet of night, even a small voice seemed loud.
At her surprised tone, Elysia simply nodded with a composed expression, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
“He’s not asleep already, is he?”
It looked like night, but it wasn’t too late yet.
Even so, considering Eden’s age and the boredom of the annex, he might’ve fallen asleep already.
“Who knows.”
Lizbeth, who had no idea of Eden’s sleep schedule, gave a vague answer.
Her gaze remained fixed on the fruit basket in Elysia’s hands.
Lizbeth’s brow slowly furrowed.
