Chapter 240
Chapter 240: Don't Cry, My Dearest
Leah's head was swimming. She sat in the Manor's Study, brow furrowed with distress.
She held a book in her hands, flipping through it back and forth.
But no matter how she looked at it, her mind simply could not settle.
What was this?
She had wanted to read to calm herself down—yet the more she read, the more that strange, jarring sense of disconnection rose within her mind.
When exactly had she developed the habit of reading in the first place?
Leah gave up entirely in the end. She closed the book, tossed it aside, and pressed her fingers to the bridge of her nose.
She lifted the teacup at her side and took a slow, measured sip.
A bitter taste rolled across her palate, followed by a faint, lingering sweetness that spread through her mouth.
Xiangyilan stood beside her in silence. Once Leah finished drinking, she attentively refilled the cup.
Leah glanced up at Xiangyilan, and found herself asking:
"Xiangyilan, if I recall correctly—you're a Mage?"
Xiangyilan gave a small bow and replied:
"My Lady Leah, I am still only a trainee Mage."
A trainee Mage—essentially a probationary candidate for full Mage status.
Leah naturally knew this.
So she gave a small nod.
"I wouldn't have expected a Demi-human with magical talent like yours to appear among your kind."
Of course, what surprised Leah even more was not Xiangyilan's magical talent.
It was the intelligence and composure she possessed—something distinctly unlike any other Demi-human.
Had Xiangyilan simply been born with it?
No. Of course not.
With others' reminders to guide her, Leah had already become keenly aware of a glaring gap in her own memory.
She was self-aware enough to understand that Xiangyilan could not have been someone she herself had cultivated.
A Demi-human this courteous, this gracefully composed, this willingly devoted to serving others as a Maidservant—it was virtually impossible for her to have trained someone like that.
The one who had cultivated Xiangyilan was someone else entirely.
But who?
She had posed many questions to Gwen, yet Leah still could not recover that missing stretch of memory that should have existed within her mind.
Even so, she had gathered a few leads.
First: someone from the Clavena Family was engaged to Gwen.
So the identity of this mysterious individual was almost certainly someone from the Clavena Family.
But the other party in the engagement couldn't possibly be her!
Leah traced through the mysterious person's relationship with Gwen, methodically eliminating possibilities—and eventually recalled something.
Gwen was the swordsmanship instructor of the Imperial Princess.
Her credentials alone were plainly insufficient—the Imperial Family would never have appointed Gwen as the Princess's instructor without good reason.
Only then did Leah realize: the person she had forgotten was certainly connected to the Imperial Family, and on no poor terms with them, either.
Leah was certain she needed to follow these leads and investigate further.
So she had asked Gwen, who was still staying in the Royal Capital, to look into it.
She trusted that Gwen would turn something up.
Just then, Leah noticed the crystal on the desk flickering.
She quickly took it in hand—but the voice that came through was not Gwen's.
It was someone else she knew quite well:
"Miss Leah."
Leon's voice sounded from within the crystal.
Leah wasn't sure.
What did she have to report at a time like this?
"I've remembered something. It may be able to help you."
Leah rallied her attention and immediately urged her along:
"Tell me—speak!"
On the other end, Leon stood atop the hill overlooking the mine, holding the communication crystal in her hand as it shimmered with light.
Her teal-gold hair swayed continuously in the breeze, her clothes stirring with it.
Leon stood at the summit of the mine hill, her expression cool and composed.
She gazed down at the workers below, digging away, and spoke in a measured tone:
"When the mine workers unearthed that mirror, I happened to be there."
At the time, Leon recalled, she had gone looking for Leah about something.
"But in that moment, I suddenly forgot you."
"It was only this morning that I remembered again."
Leah listened, a wave of dizziness washing over her.
Then, all at once, a thought struck her.
She leaned slightly forward, eyes fixed on the crystal before her:
"What day of the week is it today?"
"Miss Leah, today is Saturday."
The moment Leah heard the answer, she knew something was wrong.
Because she herself remembered receiving word from the mine workers and going to see that mirror in person.
But everything that came after—she had no memory of any of it.
All she knew was that when she came to, the mirror had already been placed inside the house.
That day had been Friday. Friday morning, to be precise.
She had lost an entire day's worth of memories—all of Friday.
Exactly as Leon had described.
Throughout that entire Friday, Leon had forgotten about her.
Now, this gap in Leah's memory and the experience Leon was describing were strikingly, uncannily similar.
Leah was immediately seized with agitation. She spoke into the crystal with barely contained excitement:
"Thank you, Leon!"
"Your lead has given me exactly what I needed!"
With that, she severed the connection between the crystals and turned to address Xiangyilan, who stood nearby:
"Go and notify Steward Helnersen at once—have him bring that mirror over."
Xiangyilan received the order, gave a small bow, and left the Study.
Before long, an elderly yet powerfully built Bear-man of imposing stature strode in.
Xiangyilan followed close behind.
In one of the Bear-man's great palms, his hand gripped the mirror's frame, carrying it into the room as though it were a tray—utterly compact in his grasp.
Helnersen set the mirror down before Leah and addressed her with respectful deference:
"Miss Leah, the mirror you requested."
The smooth surface of the mirror reflected Leah's face back at her.
She examined it up and down. The reflection of herself did the same.
"Hmm... it doesn't seem particularly special?"
She reached out to touch it—but suddenly, she paused.
Turning back, she looked at Helnersen:
"Helnersen. What did you just call me?"
"Why didn't you address me as 'My Lady'?"
Helnersen gave a small bow:
"Miss Leah, the title of My Lady belongs to another."
Leah turned to face him fully, regarding him with undivided attention, and asked with quiet gravity:
"What exactly do you know?"
Helnersen kept his head lowered and replied with utmost deference:
"I apologize, Miss Leah."
"My ability is limited—this is all I know."
Leah rested one hand beneath her chin and began to think carefully.
Just then, the Bear-man's voice came again.
"However, I do still remember."
Helnersen looked at Leah, his deep, rumbling voice carrying across the room:
"I once brought all of you together."
"To build a snowman."
At that instant, Leah's head snapped up.
That was it!
She no longer spared a thought for the strange mirror, paid no heed to Xiangyilan standing to the side, stepped past Helnersen, and dashed out of the Study without a moment's hesitation.
In no time at all, she had run to the door of her own bedchamber.
The intense burst of exertion left her gasping for breath.
But Leah didn't care in the slightest. She threw the door open and rushed to the cabinet beside it:
"A magic lock? Good heavens—when on earth did I put this here??"
She had no patience to dwell on it. She extended her hand and began thinking through how the lock was meant to open.
But the instant her hand made contact with the cabinet, the magic lock seemed to recognize her of its own accord—and unlocked itself automatically.
Leah blinked, a flicker of puzzlement stirring in her heart.
But that was clearly a good thing.
She didn't let herself think on it further. She rummaged through the drawer, pushed aside the old, patched-together toys, and reached down to the very bottom.
And there, she pulled out a notebook—its pages yellowed with age.
A snowman. A snowman!
She had no patience for anything at the front of the notebook. The only word in her mind was 'snowman.'
At last, she found that page.
She read the contents, slowly and carefully.
"December 21st..."
"Today, it snowed—so heavily, so beautifully..."
Childlike handwriting, faintly touched with the innocence and whimsy of girlhood.
Finally, Leah read on to the later part.
She froze.
"I showed the snowman to Big Brother."
"To Big Brother... Big Brother?"
Who was Big Brother?
She slapped the diary down on the desk and, in something approaching a frenzy, tore through the earlier pages.
"November 6th..."
"November 7th..."
"November 8th..."
Big Brother. Big Brother.
Across all the memories recorded in this notebook, those 2 words appeared again and again.
Yet not a single entry in the diary stirred even a fragment of memory in Leah.
Desperate and frantic, she pressed on, trying to wrench from this thin little diary the answer she was searching for.
Even just a name would do.
Big Brother, Big Brother...
Who was he?
So Leah kept turning pages, kept searching—even as the yellowed, brittle paper tore beneath her fingers.
Why had she forgotten? Why?
A frantic, desperate sound was forced up from Leah's throat, edged with the trembling of tears barely held back.
Remember, Leah. Remember!
Following the diary's entries, she flipped to the later pages.
"December 23rd."
"He said he hates tears."
That's right. He hated tears.
In that moment, she had first learned to be strong—to stand on her own.
And so from that moment on, Leah had never once cried because of him.
Yet this time, the tears came anyway—urgent and unstoppable.
Drip. Drip.
Tears fell, dampening the yellowed pages of the diary.
Leah bowed her head helplessly, letting her hair fall forward to conceal her face.
At the same time, she read aloud those final words.
"I'm so useless..."
A breeze drifted in through the window, drifting softly across Leah's face, stirring the yellowed and fragile pages in a slow, gentle motion.
Carried by the wind, Leah noticed something.
One page of the diary had its corner folded down.
As though it had been done deliberately—to make sure she would see it.
She quickly turned to that page and read it carefully.
It was blank. There was nothing written on it at all.
But then, all at once, her eyes went wide.
At the top of the blank page, a simple smiling face had been drawn.
Yet it seemed to carry some kind of magic.
A name drifted slowly into her mind.
"Vik... tor...?"
A gust of wind poured in through the narrow window, rattling both panes of the casement with sharp, rapid clacks.
The curtains billowed upward. Leah's hair swirled in the surge of wind, tumbling into disarray.
But amidst the gale, it was as though a single, gentle breath of air passed through—brushing away, almost in passing, the tears at the corner of her eyes.
Leah blinked.
It was not the wind.
In that moment, she saw it.
A hand—warm to the touch—resting gently against her cheek.
A thumb, moving softly, wiping the glint of tears from the corner of her eye.
A black Coat swept and swirled in the storm of wind.
A man's steady voice began to reach Leah's ears, slowly and surely:
"I really don't like tears."
Leah stood motionless, staring at the man before her.
The Crow perched on his shoulder, head raised, its single eye carrying a distinctly haughty air.
Within the man's indifferent gaze, something gentler had crept in—quiet and unhurried, settled on Leah.
Feeling the warmth of his palm against her skin, Leah lifted her head, her eyes still wet.
The wind outside the window seemed to grow a little louder—yet it was no longer wild or unruly. Instead, it had turned mild and warm.
A soft current of air moved across her skin. Her hair rose gently in its tenderness.
The man's familiar voice, carried on the calm, steady breeze, slowly filled the air around her:
"So don't cry."
"My dearest."