“Our Ollia wouldn’t do this to me…”
Delight, who had tried to pounce on me just like in his childhood, quickly backed down after my light reprimand.
He exaggeratedly slumped his shoulders as if feeling wronged.
Seeing that, I was dumbfounded.
“Huh? What are you talking about?”
Who did what to you?
Noticing my reaction, Delight seemed to feel a sense of unease and paused.
Then, as he slowly processed it—
“Now that I think about it…!”
Realizing the truth a little too late, he mumbled in shock.
“No wonder it felt familiar and I didn’t resist. I’ve been hit and tormented so much since childhood that I didn’t even realize it was odd.”
Oh no.
Looks like he caught on that I had been smacking his face and chest without hesitation.
“Is it just kicks? I remember being pinched… and I think you even smacked the back of my head?!”
Delight’s expression changed by the second.
I anxiously waited to see what he would say next.
Then, he glared at me.
Ugh.
It was all true, so I had no excuse.
But come on—
When I was his teacher, this was just an everyday occurrence!
“What? You got a problem?”
I stared him down confidently.
“Uh, uhh…?”
Why do you suddenly look so pitiful?
“And after all that, you still smiled at me so sweetly!”
Delight’s voice grew louder, clearly feeling more and more wronged.
“You even called me ‘Dad’…”
His eyes drooped, and his lips jutted out in a full pout.
“Back then, I was so touched that I even wrote in my journal for the first time in ages.”
His emotions were steadily rising.
“You toyed with me…”
“What?! I just went along with what made you happy!”
“So you weren’t sincere? That’s why you stopped calling me Dad? Back then, I thought you didn’t accept me as your father, and I…”
Delight, who had been pouring out his sorrow, suddenly trailed off.
Then, the corners of his mouth twisted mischievously. His narrowed eyes looked annoyingly sly, and his lips curled in a way that felt ominous.
“But in the end, you did call me Dad.”
Ugh. This guy. I knew this would happen.
He was just whining a second ago, and now he’s all smug!
But—
I’ve called him ‘Dad’ for so long that I can’t even deny it.
“Yeah. And every time I called you that, you looked so happy. The moment I said ‘Dad,’ you’d immediately…”
I hesitated.
“…kiss my face.”
The more we talked, the more embarrassment flooded in.
“Ahem.”
“Cough.”
“……”
“……”
People should always be prepared for moments of regret in their past, yet I had gotten so careless that I let my guard down.
I awkwardly cleared my throat and turned my gaze away.
At that moment, Delight, who had been desperately avoiding eye contact just like me, spoke up first.
“What should I call you from now on?”
Now that my true identity was revealed, this was something we needed to address.
“You have two names now.”
“……”
“Violyana and Sherina. Which one will you choose?”
“Which one is more comfortable for you?”
I turned the question back to Delight.
I was willing to go with whatever made it easier for him.
“I don’t mind either way. Whether it’s Teacher or Ollia, to me, you’re both.”
Delight shrugged casually as he spoke.
“Just choose the name you like more.”
Which name did I like more?
The name Sherina belonged to the Archmage, an untouchable figure of immense power and influence. In times like these, that name alone carried enough weight to pressure those around me.
Meanwhile, Violyana was a name Delight had given me.
And I…
Even before I had finished thinking, my lips moved on their own.
“Violyana.”
Right now, that felt like my real name.
And it carried a special meaning.
Violyana.
When Delight first gave me that name—
I immediately knew what it meant.
It happened long ago, not long after Delight was officially accepted as my disciple.
“Teacher, what’s your name?”
Delight had been curious about my name.
At that time, he had no idea that I was the Archmage, Sherina.
Hearing that question, I hesitated.
I didn’t want to tell him my name.
The name Sherina was synonymous with the title of Archmage.
The more famous I became, the more the entire continent treated the name Sherina as a proper noun, unique and unmatched.
Naturally, no one else ever used that name.
So, when I abandoned my title as the Archmage, I discarded that name as well.
That’s why I didn’t tell him.
But then—
“I figured out Teacher’s name!”
One day, out of nowhere, Delight excitedly shouted—
“It’s Olliana, isn’t it?!”
“What?”
“Or… is it Violyana?”
He looked so confident yet tilted his head in uncertainty.
It didn’t take long to understand how he came up with that name.
A long time ago, I had ripped up an envelope with my real name written on it and tossed it away.
Apparently, he had secretly picked up the pieces, rearranged them, and tried to guess my name.
“Teacher scribbled over some letters, so I got confused in a few spots. But it’s pretty close, right?”
That scribbling was meant to erase my name before discarding it.
I could’ve just used magic to erase the letters completely, but I didn’t think it was necessary.
Who would’ve thought he’d secretly take the scraps and try to deduce my name from them?
It was absurd, but not bad.
“Yeah. You got it right. You actually figured out my name.”
For a while, I lived under the name Delight had created for me.
Not that it made much of a difference—Delight always called me “Teacher” anyway, so the name rarely came up.
But I never forgot it.
Recalling those days, I gave a small nod.
“Yeah. Violyana still feels right.”
“I knew it!”
Delight’s eyebrow twitched in excitement, unable to hide his joy.
“See? I really have a talent for naming people!”
He puffed up with pride, looking as if he had won a great victory just because I chose the name he had given me. Seeing his reaction made me smile.
“I bet no other disciple has ever named their teacher before.”
Delight smirked, clearly pleased with himself.
“That just proves how unique and extraordinary I am as a disciple. Which means, Teacher, you’re incredibly lucky to have me!”
“That’s true. I really do have an amazing disciple.”
And I meant it.
Delight was truly a special disciple to me.
More than that—he was family.
And that made it all the more difficult.
That was the real reason I had kept my identity a secret for so long.
“Of course, it’s embarrassing! But more than that…”
When Hiel asked why I was avoiding Delight, I finally voiced what I had been keeping to myself.
It wasn’t just embarrassment.
It wasn’t just shame.
Although those were definitely huge hurdles to overcome—
More than anything…
“How will Delight react when he finds out that I was actually Sherina all along?”
That was what worried me the most.
“He cherished and adored Ollia so much.”
I had grown up showered in the love of a father—Delight, who had become my “dad.”
Even though I retained all my memories from my past life, I had still been born anew as a child who needed care and affection.
And all of Delight’s love had been fully absorbed by that young, vulnerable me.
That’s why it mattered so much.
That’s why I was afraid of what would happen next.
“The moment I return as Sherina, the daughter Delight has loved until now—Violyana—will disappear.”
No matter how much Delight missed his teacher, that person had died a long time ago.
A figure of the past.
Someone who, in the end, was meant to be forgotten.
But Violyana was the present.
And she was also the future.
Now that he knew the truth, there was no way he could go back to seeing me solely as his daughter.
“It feels like I’m taking that person away from him, and I don’t like it.”
If I admitted that I was the Archmage Sherina—
Then I would no longer be the same Violyana I had been before.
“Delight missed his teacher. He dedicated years to avenging you.”
“Did he?”
“Now that he knows you’ve returned, he’ll definitely be happy.”
Hiel told me I was worrying over nothing.
“But…”
That didn’t ease my mind.
I knew exactly what Delight had done in his quest for revenge after my death.
I knew how deeply he had grieved for me.
So, I didn’t think he would resent me upon learning the truth.
But—
Even if he didn’t say it out loud, he might still feel a sense of loss.
And that thought weighed heavily on my heart.
When he finally learned the truth, he had been angry, hurt, and heartbroken. But in the end, he smiled at me as if nothing had happened.
At this rate, things between us would settle into an acceptable resolution.
But—
‘Is this really okay?’
Acceptable. Reasonable. Good enough.
That wasn’t what I wanted with Delight.
I couldn’t hold back anymore.
“Delight.”
“Yes?”
“Now that you know I was your teacher all along… Are you disappointed?”
In the end, I asked the question.
The one question that could shatter everything between us.
