In her previous life, the girl had been the last remaining human in the world, and an S-rank hunter besides. And the great demon king who had caused the extinction of humanity was precisely the man standing in front of her.
Even if she was the only person left alive in that world, she was determined to complete the mission of destroying the demon king, because her family had all died at his hands. After an intense battle, she accidentally knocked the demon king's mask loose. Only then did she see his face clearly, and to her surprise, he turned out to be a former colleague of hers.
No matter how beautiful the memories between them had been, they could not outweigh the hatred of having her dearest kin murdered. So before the demon king could even speak, the girl raised the sword in her hand and brought it down. Accompanied by the sound of a system notification, she successfully completed the mission to destroy the demon king.
And at that very moment, her own body collapsed to the ground.
She wanted to summon the system to check her physical condition, but it kept showing an error message. After many attempts, the system finally responded again. A scan revealed that all the organs in her body were rapidly failing and could not recover on their own.
For her, this result was actually a kind of release instead. After all, living on alone was simply too painful. She could finally be reunited with her family. At this moment, the system suddenly began frantically asking whether she wanted to claim the mission completion reward. The girl was extremely annoyed by its incessant questioning. Out of curiosity, wondering what it could possibly do for someone on the verge of death, she tapped the accept button.
As a result, the system started reporting errors again, and she finally could no longer hold on and collapsed. At the final moment of her life, she heard the system notification once more.
Congratulations to the host for obtaining compensation authorization. As an extra reward for completing an SSS-rank mission, the host will retain the abilities of her previous life, and her magic level will be raised to S+.
You have got to be kidding me. She never expected that even in death she could not escape this damn system. And what did previous life mean?
Just as the girl was full of confusion, she suddenly jolted awake. The system's familiar notification sounded in her ears. Congratulations to the host on a successful reincarnation.
The girl fiddled with her tiny little hands. She had actually been reincarnated, but this body was far too small, wasn't it? Besides, wasn't she supposed to be the only living person left in that world? If that was the case, who was going to take care of her? She was so furious that she cursed at the system pop-up window. Why on earth did it have to make her reincarnate as a nursing infant?
But once she calmed down, she realized the environment here was far too clean and tidy. In her previous life, because of the demon king's descent, everything everywhere had been wrecked and ruined. So this definitely wasn't her original world. That meant other people existed here. She just needed to call them out.
So she immediately tried to cry out loudly for help, only to discover that she couldn't make any sound at all.
This was just too unlucky. Fortunately, at that moment, a woman finally came in. She gently picked her up into her arms.
"Your Highness, today is your naming ceremony. Are you nervous?"
Saying this, the woman carried her to the banquet hall. Seeing the room full of people, the woman looked especially nervous herself. "Don't be afraid, Your Highness. You are the princess."
When the girl heard this form of address, she immediately filled in a fairy tale plot in her mind, and she suddenly became full of anticipation for the future. But soon, the crowd's murmuring made her frustrated again. It turned out she was the rumored mute princess, and her development was particularly delayed. At this naming ceremony, if she couldn't make the sunstone shine, she might even be stripped of her status as princess.
This situation was really not optimistic.
At this moment, the woman lifted her up in front of a stone and had her place her hand on it. She said that this stone would glow when it encountered magic power. Half doubting, the girl reached out and touched it. The sunstone hanging in the air instantly burst into a dazzling light, and this signified that the girl possessed powerful magic within her.
A blond man approached, leading a group of priests.
"Everyone listen. The princess has already proven her royal blood. From this moment on, I bestow upon the princess the royal surname, Annatricia Rustum. This will be the princess's name."
The moment the girl saw the man, she became instantly excited. She immediately burst into tears and cried out, "Daddy!"
Strangely enough, the moment she saw her father, she suddenly found herself able to speak.
The king, hearing his daughter speak for the first time, was completely dumbfounded. He could only helplessly take the girl into his arms. Seeing the little one show a sweet smile the instant she saw him made his heart unconsciously soften as well. The girl's abnormal performance at the naming ceremony aroused the interest of the iceberg-like king.
And the reason she had become so emotional upon seeing the king was because he and her father from her previous life looked as if they had been cast from the very same mold.
It had been a full thirteen years since her father died in battle. The moment she saw the king, the longing she had suppressed could no longer be contained. Perhaps this was what the system had meant by a reward, allowing her in this life to reconnect with her family from her previous one.
To her surprise, it wasn't just her family from her past life. Even Uncle Yuming, who had no blood relation to her, appeared here as well. Uncle Yuming, as her father's comrade in arms, had more or less watched her grow up. He was essentially her second father. Back then, when her uncle and her father died in battle together, it broke the heart of her twelve-year-old self. Now, to see them both alive again, standing before her, was truly wonderful.
It was just that very soon, her father and her uncle went off together to handle government affairs. Back in the nursemaid's arms again, the girl felt a little reluctant, but being able to reunite with them once more still made her incomparably happy.
That said, because this body had not made a sound for so long, her pronunciation was particularly strange when she spoke. She still had to find a chance to properly practice speaking.
Just then, the nursemaid suddenly said excitedly, "Oh my, it's already time for the princess to eat. You have to wait here obediently for me."
And so the vast nursery was left with only her. The girl lay down and began to review everything that had happened today. The system window suddenly popped up.
Reward claiming completed.
But she didn't remember ever having claimed any reward. Just as she was about to tap the window to view the details, she discovered that her little hand simply couldn't reach a pop-up that high. So she decided to use a voice command to have the system open it. Who would have thought that because her articulation was so unclear, she tried several times and the system still kept saying the command was invalid.
She was so angry that she gave the system a spinning kick with her short little legs. This lousy system was targeting her on purpose, wasn't it?
At that moment, a voice suddenly sounded by her ear. "What are you doing?"
It startled the girl so much that she jolted. Lifting her eyes, she saw a face that looked strikingly similar to that of the king, her dad.