“Lilygen?”
“Yes, it’s Lilygen. I’m going to transfer my magic to you now. It’s healing magic. Your body will feel a bit warm, but please accept my magic. I’m begging you.”
I focused the magic flowing through my body into my hands.
I had practiced for fifteen days in the carriage.
Little by little, Theobald’s pale face began to regain color. His once shallow breaths grew steady, and warmth returned to his cold skin.
My uncle watched with bated breath, and when Theobald showed signs of recovery, tears streamed down his face.
“Theobald!!” As soon as I released his hand, my uncle rushed to embrace him tightly.
“...Father…!!”
A long sigh of relief escaped me as I felt the success of the healing.
The room was filled with butlers and attendants, all watching in awe as Theobald, whom even renowned healers couldn’t cure, began to recover. Some were so overwhelmed with emotion that they, like my uncle, wept.
Magic is truly incredible. In the novel, Theobald dies, but since I’m not even a background character in the capital, it shouldn’t affect the story. There’s no way this could trigger a butterfly effect, where some small action leads to a chain of events causing major occurrences, right?
By the time I ran away, the story had already diverged, like throwing a pebble into a calm pond and creating ripples.
Ten years later in the novel, my own life is far more important to me than my half-sister’s, and Theobald’s life matters more to me than the heroine’s.
Great people from the past have said things like “navigate wisely” or “when a wall falls sideways, it becomes a bridge.” So there’s no point in worrying about the unpredictable nature of chaos theory, right?
From that day onward, Theobald’s recovery was rapid, and he steadily regained his health. All was well.
As for me, I sat on a wooden crate in the central square of the town, surrounded by the knights my uncle had assigned to protect me, saying, “Yes. The fee is 1,000 lirins.”
“Are you sure 1,000 lirins is enough?” someone asked.
“Of course! I’m seven years old. What would I do with 10,000 or 100,000 lirins? 1,000 is plenty.”
I healed even the most severely injured and ill people, making me a nuisance to other healers and apothecaries. So, I only worked in the square sporadically. Once a week, I’d suddenly show up like a terrorist, quickly heal people, and disappear. People said it was a stroke of luck to encounter me.
During the week, I worked as the healing mage for the knights. My daily schedule included studies in the morning, work in the afternoon, and free time in the evening. I was busy every day.
Not wanting to reveal that I remembered a past life, I told my uncle I had a prophetic dream.
“Uncle, I dreamed of a monster outbreak. It was terrifying,” I said, trembling, and asked him to investigate the cursed forest.
In a world with magic, prophetic dreams were far more believable than past-life memories. My acting—trembling with fear—was so convincing that my uncle immediately sent soldiers to investigate the cursed forest.
Since I was highly respected for my ability to heal even the most severe injuries, the soldiers trusted my “prophetic dream” without a second thought.
“Oh, Lilygen. Your dream was accurate. The outbreak is occurring in multiple places in the cursed forest. If it had grown into one large event, the entire frontier might have been destroyed. We managed to detect it early, and the knights were able to stop it before it became a large-scale disaster. I’m sorry, but the injured will return tomorrow. Can I count on you for their treatment?”
“Yes, leave it to me, Uncle. After all, I am the knights’ dedicated healer. Shall I also join the front lines?”
“I appreciate the offer, but you’re still a child. We’ll leave the front lines to the adult healers.”
“Thank you, Lilygen. You’re our family’s lucky star. Ever since you came, only good things have been happening,” my uncle said, lifting me up and spinning me around with a joyous laugh. At that moment, a fully recovered Theobald joined in.
“Father, that’s not fair! Let me hold cute Lilygen too!”
Theobald reached out, and I was passed into his arms, where he hugged me tightly.
“Cute, cute Lilygen.”
Recently, Theobald had become more and more unrestrained, as if his rationality had loosened. Despite being a beautiful boy who looked like an archangel, he was in full-blown rampage mode, constantly repeating “cute Lilygen” hundreds or even thousands of times each day. To rein him in, my uncle decided to arrange an engagement between Theobald and me.
“This is the best decision of my life. We’ll make sure Lilygen is the happiest in this house,” my uncle said, fully satisfied. He had regretted his twin sister’s unhappy marriage and wished he had opposed it, even if it meant going against my father.
Though I thought it was a bit early, I understood that noble engagements were decided by the head of the family. In some cases, children were engaged as infants. It wasn’t unusual for a noble girl to be betrothed at the age of seven.
Marriage would happen after I came of age, so we’d have time to slowly nurture our love.
My uncle gave me the rare privilege of pursuing a marriage based on mutual love, something that was hard to achieve for nobles.
After our engagement was settled, Theobald’s way of calling me “cute Lilygen” began to shift.
From “cute cousin Lilygen” to “cute fiancée Lilygen.”
And eventually, “cute future wife Lilygen.”
“Cute Lilygen, here’s a fairy’s bed,” Theobald said, bringing me a delicately glowing flower from the cursed forest, known as a fairy’s bed.
“Cute Lilygen, here’s some light snow,” he said, using magic to preserve the soft, fleeting snowflakes that had fallen in early spring.
“Cute Lilygen, here’s a present,” he said, always bringing back souvenirs after his inspections around the territory.
Theobald loved me deeply, with all his heart, through his actions and words.
Every day, he would gently take my hand, and we would stroll through the garden, in the morning when the flowers bloomed, and in the evening when the moon rose.
We would sit side by side, watching the falling rain and snow, like two little birds.
Gradually, I, too, came to love Theobald, not as my cousin, but as a man. By then, nine years had passed since I came to the frontier, and I had already told Theobald about my previous life, wanting to keep no secrets between us.
“Yes, say ‘ah’,” Theobald said, as I sat on his lap in the gazebo in the mansion’s garden. Gently, he tapped my lips with a silver spoon, and I obediently opened my mouth.
Theobald loved feeding me.
At first, it embarrassed me, but since he’d been doing it since childhood, I had grown used to it.
Though my uncle stepped aside whenever Theobald was around, he would sometimes dash over to me with pudding when Theobald was away.
“My sister and I used to feed each other,” he would say, smiling warmly. My uncle often told me stories about my mother, sharing those sparkling memories from the depths of his heart.
“We were twins, but we didn’t look alike. My sister was so skillful with her hands, while I was quite clumsy,” he would say with a nostalgic smile, his eyes always soft with fondness.
Despite having lost his wife and sister, my uncle never showed his loneliness, pouring all his love and care into Theobald and me.
“Theobald, you know I told you before that I’ve been reincarnated. I don’t want to be reincarnated again,” I said, gazing at him.
Beside the gazebo, the soothing sound of the fountain surrounded us, a pleasant melody in the air.
“Why not?” he asked.
“Because you wouldn’t be there. It would be too lonely,” I said softly.
Theobald gasped, and the next moment, I was wrapped in a tight embrace. I could feel his heart racing.
The clear blue of Theobald’s eyes darkened, like the depths of a deep ocean. His eyes always shifted with his emotions, and now they sparkled with intensity and sincerity.
“Ah! I’ll never leave you alone. I’ll find you, my dear Lilygen, no matter what. That’s why I’m studying magic,” he declared.
Magic really is wonderful. I felt reassured.
If Theobald, a genius, said it was certain, then there was nothing for me to worry about.
For nine years, I had been loved by Theobald and cherished by my uncle, and I enjoyed my life in the frontier. There had been a few incidents because of my healing magic, but Theobald, my uncle, and the people of the frontier had always protected me.
Still, I had one more concern.
“Theobald, next year, the novel’s story will begin. I’m worried we might get dragged into it,” I said, lowering my lashes.
Theobald responded with a beautiful smile.
“That’s already been taken care of. My father ruined the count’s household, and the so-called heroine was sent to the temple as a saint-in-training so she wouldn’t get caught up in love and romance.”
So that’s why…
The temple had been so insistent about making me a saint, but suddenly stopped. It was because my uncle had given the temple the heroine, who had outstanding talent in healing magic?
I vaguely remembered that in the novel, the heroine had been about to be sold by her parents before being rescued by a young duke. She had awakened her healing magic when the duke was injured, and after that...
“She was grateful, you know. She was about to be sold by her parents, so now she’s seriously training as a saint-in-training, living a pure life at the temple. As for the duke, well, he got drunk one night, got involved with his fiancée, and they married earlier than expected. He’s now a devoted husband and a doting father of one,” Theobald chuckled.
“As for the count’s family? Even if they were once rolling in wealth, with two foolish women squandering it all, they’re no match for my father.”
My uncle…
He had been like molten lava, quietly seething but not erupting, waiting for the right moment.
Thanks to him…
The story had ended before it even began.
My uncle had been the delicate butterfly that caused the whirlwind.
“Are you concerned about the former count’s family?” Theobald asked.
I shook my head slowly.
“They’ve long since ceased to matter. My family now is just you and Uncle. Besides, it’s not uncommon for nobles to fall due to political schemes,” I said.
Thanks to my uncle,
I was able to escape both the fallen count’s family and my role as a mere background character in the novel.
A butterfly, fluttering gently, caught my eye—perhaps drawn to the water of the fountain, or to the flowers in the garden. Its delicate wings flapped like petals. Noticing my gaze, Theobald, too, looked at the butterfly.
“Such a beautiful butterfly. Hey, let’s invite Uncle to tomorrow’s tea party,” I suggested.
“Yes, and we should also start discussing the wedding plans. Let’s have a meeting, the three of us,” Theobald replied.
We smiled at each other.
I had never been abused.
The novel’s plot never even began.
In the novel, the saint lived happily, loved and revered.
But in my story, it will be that I lived happily, deeply loved by Theobald.
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