When Emilia drowsily woke, she found herself in the carriage and assumed they had already made it back to the manor. Cardan told her they were actually headed to the plaza for a stroll, and that if she felt too tired, he would take her straight home instead.
Hearing that they were going out, Emilia was overjoyed. The instant her feet touched the street, she took off like a gust of wind, turning back to yell at Cardan to hurry up. Why was he so slow?
Emilia accidentally crashed into someone walking the opposite way, and they both tumbled to the ground. Startled, Emilia looked up to see a strikingly handsome boy with golden hair. Before she could even react, he had already dashed off.
Elvin rushed over to help her up. Behind her, Cardan watched the boy's retreating figure, lost in some private thought.
Cardan told her to give him her hand. Emilia held it out, and he remarked that holding her hand like this felt just like walking a dog.
Emilia fumed. "Wow, Papa, way to go, comparing your own daughter to a dog. That's infuriating. Who calls their own daughter a dog?"
Before Cardan could even explain, she had already grabbed his hand and dragged him off. Elvin tried to clarify that what the Duke actually meant was that the young lady was as adorable as a puppy.
Emilia refused to hear it, insisting he had clearly said dog, not puppy, which left both men second-guessing themselves. She sighed, utterly exasperated at having such a slow-witted father. She decided to forgive him just this once. He ought to be grateful to have such an adorable daughter. Then, laughing, she took his hand and pulled him toward the plaza.
Passing by a shop, Emilia was drawn in by the striking colors of a macken plant on display, completely different from the one back home. Without a word, Cardan immediately pulled her into the shop, even though Emilia had not said a thing about wanting to buy it.
Seeing the three of them, the shopkeeper simply gave a lukewarm response, assuming they were just passing browsers. When Emilia said she wanted to look at the macken, the man laughed and said that even if she sold off her entire household's food supply for a year, she still could not afford it.
"I spent a fortune to acquire this one, and it still refuses to dance for me. Little girl, better not touch it. You can't afford it anyway."
The shopkeeper kept complaining, completely oblivious to the black smoke practically pouring off Cardan standing behind her.
A while later, the three of them walked out of the shop with the macken in hand. Cardan, irritated, told Elvin to go replace every single employee at that store.
Emilia sighed. Why had it not responded at all when she greeted it? Had it withered up and died?
Cardan took the plant and handed it to Elvin, then asked if she wanted to go anywhere else. Emilia smiled and took his hand, saying she just wanted to walk around, remembering that the last time he had fired an entire shop's staff, and that would be a disaster all over again.
The streets were now busy with preparations for the harvest festival, a festival filled with memories of Cardan and Rainer, since the very day they had first started courting had been during that same harvest festival.
Glancing over at Cardan, she suddenly felt an inexplicable ache of sympathy for him. Noticing her staring, Cardan bent down and brushed back a strand of hair the wind had blown across Emilia's face, saying, "If you hold my hand tightly enough today, I'll bring you along when the harvest festival comes."
Emilia smiled and promised she would never let go of his hand.
Back home that evening, Sue scolded her irritably for sneaking off to play alone, asking where she had been hiding all this time. Before Emilia could even explain, she simply held Doe up in front of it. But Doe gave no response at all, leaving both of them worried.
Emilia assumed it was thirsty and was about to fetch some water when it suddenly burst into loud sobs, explaining that it had been trapped inside this flower while traveling north.
Emilia could not understand why everything always seemed to happen up north. Even the bolum, the monster Cardan had to hunt down every single year, came from the north too.
Speaking of these monsters, they had first appeared some three hundred years ago. Only by fusing mana and divine power together could one hope to destroy them. But one day, Cardan and Rainer had discovered the bolum wielding weapons, which meant they had surely evolved.
When she read a certain word aloud from the book, both Sue and Doe instantly recognized it as the phrase come find me in their own language.
Emilia smiled. In that case, they just needed to find the author. Simple as that. But the book did not list an author's name anywhere. Looks like she would have to ask her tutor after all.
She had named the pink macken flower Doe and the yellow one Sue.
The next day brought another new day at the mage tower. Tatau taught her how to manifest mana visibly, the very thing that always appeared behind Cardan whenever he lost his temper. If she could learn to do that too, wouldn't that be incredibly cool?
After the lesson, Emilia happily ran over to Elvin, bragging about how fun today's lesson had been. She had even managed to surprise herself.
As the two of them walked along, a woman standing nearby smiled and called out, "Emilia."
It turned out to be one of the empress's personal attendants. Empress Mogi wanted to see her.
Emilia startled. Could this be the invitation Mogi had mentioned before?
Elvin spoke up to decline, explaining that the young lady already had prior engagements.
The attendant replied coldly, "I know that once her lessons at the tower finish, the young lady always heads straight back to the manor. Surely the young lady wouldn't want to commit an act of disrespect by refusing her majesty's invitation."
Hearing that, Emilia reluctantly agreed to go with her. The empress could not do anything to her anyway. After reassuring Elvin, she climbed into the carriage headed for the empress's palace.