ICMMF | Chapter 9

Episode 9

“Shall I have them bring out more dessert?”

Emmet had dinner with Miss Lucy.

Perhaps because she was small, or maybe it was a habit. The child didn’t eat much, which made him worried.

At least she finished the pickled peaches that came out as dessert.

The apple tart, which the chef had proudly prepared, had only been scratched a few times with a fork.

Perhaps her appetite was like his master’s. Duke Arden also liked peaches but rarely touched apples.

“No, I’m full.”

Emmet looked at Lucy with a hint of disappointment as she put down her fork, signaling she was done.

“If you’re curious about anything, you can ask.”

“Oh.”

Emmet awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck, having been caught with the true reason for the meal.

But since the young lady had opened the conversation, he didn’t need to hesitate.

“Do you know the name of the village you lived in?”

“Hmm, it wasn’t a village. It was Flavi Mountain. I think it was about a day’s distance from the nearest village?”

Lucy answered while recalling the village from her mother’s memories.

She’d have to reread those memories to know the village’s name.

Since the name hadn’t mattered to her, she hadn’t looked into it closely.

Her mother was usually gone for a day or two when she went to the village, so it must have been quite far.

There might have been a closer village.

In her memories, there were occasionally unfamiliar villages.

But Lucy had never left the mountain, so she had no way of explaining.

Before the age of four, she had lived in a small inn in the countryside, but she had never heard the name of that place either.

Her early childhood memories weren’t important, so she hadn’t read them thoroughly.

“Then how did you live?”

“From what Mom planted. Sweet potatoes, potatoes, cabbages—things like that. There were a lot of fruits too.”

There was plenty to eat in the mountain if you just looked around a bit.

As long as it wasn’t the dead of winter, she had never worried about food.

She had forest friends who would show her paths and sometimes bring food directly.

“Ah.”

Emmet let out a small sigh.

The child, who was smaller and thinner than others her age, spoke as if she lacked for nothing, making it hard for him to suppress his pity.

With no one to compare herself to, she wouldn’t have known she had grown up with so little.

Unaware of Emmet’s feelings, Lucy cheerfully chattered away with a bright face.

“Oh, meat was hard to get. I eat a lot of it here, though.”

Saying this with a giggle, Lucy had eaten a palm-sized piece of beef again today.

Though there was abundance now, she hadn’t been able to eat her forest friends back then.

Ah, there was another friend who once surprised her by catching a forest friend.

That friend, who had also mistaken her for a forest spirit, came into the forest covered in blood.

She had treated him and fed him, but later he had brought back a forest friend, startling her so badly.

She cried so hard that, flustered, he let the creature go.

“Can you wake Lady Aicel?”

As Emmet asked his next question, Lucy focused again.

But it was a question that naturally made her tilt her head.

Was this something worth asking?

Doctor Dermot, and now Emmet too.

They both acted like her mother’s sleeping illness was a huge issue.

Even now, Emmet looked at her seriously, as if waiting for an answer.

Lucy replied briefly, as if it were nothing serious.

“Yes.”

Through his glasses, Emmet’s eyes widened. Lucy mirrored him, her eyes growing wide as well.

She wasn’t lying, but he looked at her suspiciously.

“Anytime.”

Lucy firmly added.

Feeling strangely parched by Emmet’s serious expression, Lucy took a sip of water. He still didn’t move, blinking silently.

Had he asked everything he was curious about?

Just as Lucy was about to rise from her seat, Emmet quickly spoke.

“Are you serious?”

“Yes. I could wake her even now.”

Hearing her definitive answer, Emmet rubbed his frozen, tense face with both hands. The sigh that slipped out between his palms was heavy with heat.

Now he could understand the child’s behavior.

It wasn’t that she was ignorant of the sleeping illness when she asked for the Vapour disease to be treated first.

He had vaguely suspected that maybe—just maybe—the child could wake someone from the sleeping illness.

Even though it didn’t make sense, it would explain her informed behavior.

But to think she truly could cure it.

He didn’t ask the foolish question of how it was possible.

The child had surely woken her sleeping mother many times before.

Perhaps it was a power even she didn’t fully understand.

And it was a power that brought genuine relief.

Only now did Emmet feel he could face his master again.

It had been a diagnosis he couldn’t even write down in a formal letter.

Now, Emmet wished for his master to return as soon as possible.

“But not now. She’ll be in a lot of pain because of the Vapour disease.”

Even with the ointment.

Lucy firmly declined, stating it was absolutely not okay.

Seeing the determined look in the child’s eyes, Emmet broke into a smile.

Then he shook his head, saying that wasn’t what he meant.

Miss Lucy’s words had only reinforced his certainty.

The child possessed a power that no one else in the world could match.

Now he no longer needed to worry about Lady Aicel’s future.

Nor did he have to struggle with how to explain the sleeping illness to Miss Lucy.

That had been a needless worry anyway.

Whew. With a sigh of relief and joy, Emmet looked steadily at the child.

“No one must know that you can do such a thing.”

Not until the master returned. Not even the family’s doctor was an exception.

A secret that leaked from a small place could reach the empire.

Realizing he had uncovered a secret too heavy to bear, Emmet’s heart thudded belatedly.

He even felt sorry to his master for being the first to know.

“Not even the doctor?”

“No. No one. Not even Amelia, not Melody.”

Emmet rose from his seat and approached Lucy.

He had dismissed the servants for the dinner conversation.

Yet he checked the surroundings again. Then he spoke in a low voice.

“You have a special ability, Miss. So special, others would be shocked if they found out.”

That is…? Lucy pursed her lips and tilted her head.

She had never thought of herself as special.

If anything, her other ability was the unusual one. She debated whether or not to mention it.

Emmet was certainly a good person.

He hadn’t appeared often in her mother’s memories, but he had never belittled or mistreated her.

He had always been polite and treated her with respect as the Duke’s fiancée.
Her mother had trusted him. Perhaps even more than the Duke.

As Lucy pondered, Emmet continued.

“I’m afraid others might covet your ability. So please, grant me this favor. I beg you.”

“Can’t Grandpa Steward do it?”

“No. Not just me—no one else can. As far as I know, you’re the only one.”

As he held both her shoulders and pleaded, Lucy couldn’t just answer lightly with an “okay.”

It didn’t hurt, but the weight of his hands made her shoulders feel heavy.

Only then did the power she had thought insignificant seem truly great.

Indeed, without it, she wouldn’t have been able to wake her mother.

“Then… I have something to tell you.”

“Yes.”

Emmet took his hands off her shoulders.

Perhaps he had gained a bit of trust in her. He was grateful she came to him first.

“I can see other people’s memories.”

“…What?”

That resolve to listen seriously to whatever the young lady said, grateful for her approach, shattered in an instant.

Emmet stared at Lucy in disbelief, wondering if he’d heard wrong.

“That my mom was close with Amelia and Melody, that she was afraid of Grand Madam, and that she trusted Grandpa Steward—all of that, I saw in her memories.”

“…”

“That this is my father’s house, too.”

“Ah…”

Faced with a heavy secret, Emmet was at a loss for words.

But now he understood everything that had happened.

She hadn’t heard it from Lady Aicel.

That’s why she had acted so familiar, why she had known so much.

Even though she’d grown up in the mountains, she’d adapted easily to this place.

Now he understood how she had found her way here alone.

There were some people in the world with extraordinary powers.

In faraway lands, there were the priests of temples. Nearby, there was his master.

Maybe because she was the daughter of Lady Aicel, who had healing powers, and the peerless Grand Sword Master himself.

Emmet, faced with Lucy who had an unheard-of power, could only stare in silence.

With eyes full of astonishment, gratitude, and awe.

She really was like his master. Even that calm face, despite possessing such an incredible power.

“I’m truly glad. Thank you so much for coming, even now.”

If not for that power, she wouldn’t have made it here.

He was grateful she had come to this place.

Lady Aicel’s memories surely contained others, but she had chosen this place.

He didn’t ask why she came only now.

Back then, he hadn’t even guessed that Lady Aicel would leave, so he had no right to blame anyone.

Lucy gave no response.

Was coming here really something to be thankful for?