Chapter 36
Infinite Love
"Where did you pick up this child?"
"......"
She hadn't expected him to ask so directly.
He didn't seem to think for a moment that it could be Lucia's child.
"I've practically raised you for years, do you think I wouldn't know a lie?"
"She is my child."
As he said, he had been her teacher since she was old enough to learn the sword, so her expectation that he would at least ask indirectly was off the mark.
But that didn't mean she was going to tell the truth.
They stared at each other in silence for a while.
However, unlike Lucia's stiff face, Helbert's expression as he looked at her seemed quite intrigued.
"You, who never had any attachments in your life, are being so stubborn. Does your father know you have a child?"
"I don't have a father."
"That hasn't changed either. Tsk, tsk."
At her sharp hostility, he leaned back on the sofa, displeased, with his arms crossed.
"Black hair, you say?"
"Yes, because she's my daughter."
"Does she use Divine Power too?"
"Yes, my daughter...!"
At Lucia's cracking facade, Helbert sighed deeply and said,
"The Master of the Magic Tower was furious the other day. It seems someone stole some books from the Magic Tower. They were all about Divine Power and Control Stones."
"......"
Heath.
Only those with magic power can enter the Magic Tower, and Heath was the only one capable of boldly robbing such a tower.
Looking at his indifferent face, it seemed he had already guessed everything.
The Commander-in-Chief of the Empire, if he knew about the existence of the Saintess in his position, the least he should do is inform the Emperor.
And if the Emperor, upon learning this, ordered the child to be taken to the temple? Or forcibly took her away?
'As long as I'm alive, I can't let that happen.'
Seeing Lucia's cold eyes, wary of him for the first time, Helbert frowned and bit his lip tightly.
Then,
-Thwack!!
"Ugh!"
Lucia groaned at the sudden attack on the top of her head.
"Why are you glaring like that! I didn't raise you that way! Becoming a naughty liar!"
"......"
Helbert shouted, seemingly angry.
It was the first time she had ever seen him, who was always playful and relaxed, shout like this.
"Do you know how worried I've been while keeping my mouth shut about this situation? Black Crystals aren't easy to come by, so I can't even come to see you in an emergency!"
"......"
He seemed to have a lot pent up, and strangely, he looked a little scared despite his outburst.
The first Sword Master of the continent, and the most outstanding swordsman besides the current Lucia, Helbert.
He was the sword instructor of the Cluer Marquess family, and also her godfather who recognized and nurtured her innate talent.
Lucia, who had taken her hand off the top of her head, uttered the words she had been suspecting at his unfamiliar appearance.
"...Were you worried?"
"Hah! Worried about what! It's just that I can't imagine it! You, a sword idiot, being so proactive, I can't imagine how big of a deal this will be!"
Clearly, he had mentioned worrying with his own mouth, but he turned his face away and changed his words.
He seemed very sulky.
But as the awkward silence that followed ended, he eventually revealed his true feelings, as parents always lose to their children.
"...Lucia. Promise me. I trust you, but you must tell me before anything happens. Do you understand?"
He finished speaking in a sulky tone and didn't seem to want to pry any further.
In fact, Helbert's heart ached at the news of her maternity leave.
He, who prided himself on knowing Lucia better than anyone else in the world, never even considered that Lucia had fallen in love, met a man, and had a child.
He just thought that her five years of lonely training must have been so lonely that she kept a child by her side. Like he once did.
But Heath, who moved only for Lucia, the books of the Magic Tower, the traces of intrusion into the hidden room. And the disappearance of the Control Stone.
Lucia's black-haired child, who suddenly appeared, was at the center of all of those things.
The temple's hidden room was the only place where information shared between the temple and the state was kept under mutual surveillance.
Knowing the location of such a room, and boldly stealing the Control Stone.
Everything was a question, but he decided not to say anything.
Because Lucia was a precious disciple and daughter to him, who had no family.
Waiting for her to reach out to him when she needed help, as always, he would just let her know that he knew.
'Lucia.'
Hearing her childhood nickname after a long time, Lucia briefly recalled old memories.
The coming-of-age ceremony, the day she was called a monster.
The reason she was able to withstand that shock was because he had sincerely persuaded her for a long time.
Her godfather, friend, and teacher Helbert, who had given her unconditional love even though he was not her father.
Perhaps his infinite love was the starting point that created Lucia's desire to save Nia.
*
The first floor of the inn tavern in the evening.
Leon is looking at the display case that fills one side of the wall.
He had seen off the Commander-in-Chief, and after staying in their respective rooms until the evening, when Monsters were likely to appear, they had come down.
Waiting for Lucia to come down, Leon, who had pulled his hood down deeper to hide his face, fiddled with a few items.
'......If I buy this, it should be enough. Why do they want souvenirs from a business trip with Lucia-nim......'
Marien and Jaina of the White Wizard Division's administrative department were almost in tears and in the mood to throw a party when they heard that he was going on a business trip with Lucia.
And as they had excitedly searched for and told him, this inn sold many things, such as local specialties, handmade soaps, bath bombs, and souvenirs from the days when Hengken Village was thriving.
Leon, who didn't have many close friends, couldn't refuse their request to borrow his son, so he ended up picking out a few items.
They were the rose-scented bath bomb that Ren, the son of this house, had boasted about, and cookies with unique tree patterns.
'Does it mean something?'
He picked it up and examined it because the pattern was quite elaborate, and the name written on the cookie box caught his eye.
'Lovers of the Lake?'
-Thud.
"......!"
Leon was startled when someone poked him in the side.
He was already in a corner on purpose because problems always arose when he revealed his face, so he was even more surprised than usual.
"I knew it, you must like her."
It was the landlady, her eyes smiling strangely like crescent moons.
"It's for the woman you came with, right? That's why you're drawn to things like this!"
Her calloused hand pointed to a poster full of product advertisements.
The article on the poster read,
[The Legend of the Lake. Even the notoriously ugly Baron Danalan found love thanks to the lake......!]
"......The Legend of the Lake?"
As he read a passage from the article, the few women in the tavern suddenly approached and started saying a word each.
"It's true! This inn wasn't always like this."
"That's right. Originally, there were many shiny insect shells clustered like stones in the forest near here, and the legend is that if you carve the name of the person you like on the stone and throw it into the lake, you will find love."
"When we were young, couples would go into the forest to find them and end up having children, hahaha!"
The gathered women were excited to talk to the young man they hadn't seen in a long time.
Looking at the conversations the women were having with the landlady, they seemed to be old friends rather than just customers of this place.
"Sigh, that's why there used to be so many tourist couples because of that, so we set it up like this, but now we can't get them because of the Black Contamination."
"......Ah, is that so."
As Leon mumbled, unable to take his eyes off the article, the landlady said with a pitiful face.
"Why don't you confess? She's a bit aloof, but she doesn't seem like she'd be stuck up."
Confess.
At the landlady's meddling, the shock of that day came back to him again, and he staggered.
"Oh my, the man is so timid! He looks perfectly fine."
Starting with her words, the surrounding women began to scan Leon one by one.
He was covering his whole body with a robe, but he couldn't hide his masculine lines, and the sparkling silver hair and smooth jawline visible through the hood were unusual.
And among them, one woman found something and arbitrarily rolled up Leon's sleeve.
"Oh my! Look at this arm. The tendons......!!"
"That's right, that's right! My goodness. He's a man, but what's with this fair skin, is it natural?"
"Oh my, his back is firm too~! He's covering it all up with clothes, but if it's this much......! Aigoo!"
Seeing the tendons revealed on his rolled-up sleeve, the hands of the women poured out like a flood and moved busily.
They began to touch his firm arms, shoulders, and broad back without hesitation.
Leon, who was unfamiliar with the women who were getting so close without any distance, unlike the people of the Imperial Palace who usually kept a certain distance even when there were crowds, was very embarrassed.
Of course, he knew that they didn't have bad intentions and he could have retreated enough, but his body froze for a moment.
And his vision went dark, and he began to feel nauseous.
It wasn't a normal reaction.
Just as his limbs were frozen and his wide hood was about to be pulled off by their hands,
-Whoosh!
Someone grabbed the hood that was about to be pulled off and pulled it down hard under his chin.
"Are you out of your mind?"
Because of that, Leon's face was wrapped in the hood and he couldn't see anything, but he was sure who the owner of that stiff voice was.
Her resolute words, which she had secretly whispered while pulling him down to her height, meant, did he want to have his identity revealed here?
Even if it was a remote place, rumors were bound to spread greatly if his unusual appearance, which was already uncommon with his black-haired companion, and even more famous with his silver hair and Golden eyes, was revealed.
But Leon, whose vision had only recently cleared from the dark,
Without the time to think about such things, he buried his face in the small shoulder in front of him with a dazed head.
Then, the cool scent that hadn't changed at all from that day entered his breath.
.
.
.
"My goodness! To think that the descendant of the Ruins Marquess family has grown up so wonderfully. It's just amazing!"
"He looks just like the Prime Minister in his younger days. They were always fighting back then!"
"That's right. Especially this silver hair......"
Young Leon felt nauseous.
Was it because of the terrible scent on the hands in front of him, the flattering words of the women, or the strangely greedy eyes?
'It still hasn't gotten better......!'
It wasn't just the women in front of him, but he couldn't figure out why he felt nauseous every time people touched him.
The doctor said that the cause was an incident that happened six years ago, during a few days that he couldn't remember no matter how hard he tried.
But this kind of illness wasn't very inconvenient for young Leon, who didn't like dealing with people in the first place.
However, what made that deleted memory feel so big was that he hadn't been able to see his mother for six years because she was disappointed in him after that.
He was 17 years old now.
So the reason why he had bothered to come to this coming-of-age ceremony, which was a year late, was because he had hoped to see his mother since it was a gathering of all the nobles.
But before he could even see the hem of his mother's skirt, he felt a surge of nausea.
Young Leon quickly turned around to leave the party.
In the end, Leon stopped deep in the garden.
As expected, he hadn't eaten anything in case this happened, so he was just gagging, but now he was more frustrated than anything else.
"At this rate......I won't be able to see my mother."
"How long has it been since you last saw her?"
"......5 years."
Young Leon answered absentmindedly and was startled.
He quickly covered his mouth and turned his head.
There was a black-haired girl wearing a dress with ugly wine stains on it, as white as the light shining down.
The girl, with cold blue eyes and unusually expressionless, said indifferently.
"Really? I win. It's been 16 years since I last saw my father."
16 years? Today is the coming-of-age ceremony commemorating her 16th birthday.
That meant she had never seen him in her entire life.
'......Adoption? Or, for some reason......?'
The shock was brief, and Leon looked at the girl's dress and finally realized what he had done.
"I, I'm so sorry!! To make such a stain at such an important meeting......! I'll send the dress back somehow!"
Compared to himself, the young Leon felt even more sorry for the unimaginable pain of not having seen him in her entire life.
"......It's okay. I don't think I'll be able to see him in the future anyway."
The girl's face was expressionless, but the boy saw a distant loneliness in her pretty eyes that moved slowly only once.
