Anyway, she was a girl who didn't seem to know anything about misfortune. She was just a noble lady who had grown up nicely. It was not at the level where she would be reduced to the same situation as him just because they had one thing in common: they had drifted down the river.
'This time, she seems to have lost her grandfather to robbers while traveling.'
Even though this was near the capital, it was not uncommon to encounter armed robbers once you got off the main road. That misfortune seemed to have befallen the child.
'The parents must be looking for her with their eyes wide open by now!'
Even if a stranger saw her for a few minutes, her whole body would be filled with love and affection, so how could she feel?
Even though she had lost her grandfather this time, there would definitely be family members who would be desperately searching for her when she returned home. Dante stared at the girl with his arms crossed.
'I can just leave her here.'
His instincts whispered inside him. It was an extremely natural thing. He had done his duty by just saving her from the water. There was no reason to take any more responsibility for the little girl who was running a runny nose. However, if there was one problem, it was the sight that kept tugging at the corner of his heart.
The cheeks that had grown cold and then came back to life at his gesture, the eyes that had regained their light. If he had left that girl here, that light might have gone out very easily. It would have been the same if she had met even one trashy adult or even one worthless wild animal. Of course, even if that had happened, it would have had nothing to do with him...
"Huh."
Dante sighed again as he watched the girl who kept looking at him.
'It'll take two full days to get from here to the capital.'
He had planned to pretend to be missing for a day or two before returning to the castle anyway. If he had returned to the capital and left that girl at home during that time, it would have been roughly the right time. Who knows. If he had done one good deed like that before going on a mission, he might have had the luck of the handle breaking right before the barbarian's axe hit his head, once.
Dante was aware that he was thinking nonsense, but he was thinking nonsense. In order to stay up all night, distracting thoughts were essential.
'Dante, you must become the head of the household. So you must fulfill this mother's sorrow...!"
When Dante closed his eyes, his mother's feeble scream-like last words lingered in his ears. The sharp gaze she had as she glared at her young son, her only asset. It took a lot of idle thoughts to ignore them. For example, reminiscing about the training he received today or imagining beating up his stepbrother. Surrendering his mind to such things and spending the night over and over again was very familiar to him...
"Hey, if you can't sleep... shall I sing you a lullaby?"
An unexpected voice pierced his ear. Dante turned to the girl with slightly widened eyes.
A lullaby?
His crooked mouth tried to sneer, saying that he looked too big to listen to something that a runny-nosed child would listen to while held in his mother's arms.
"..."
The hand that was about to move the girl stopped because he suddenly wondered what it would feel like to hear something that he had never heard before, something that runny-nosed children would listen to before going to bed.
"Another song? Even if your eardrums can't burst, you still can put them to sleep? Like the devil."
Even so, his mouth muttered something strange.
"No, it's just a normal song. But my mother said that she can fall asleep just by listening to my song."
"..."
"Go over there and lie down. Please."
Dante was inwardly embarrassed when he found himself lying down quietly as the girl had told him.
Was he crazy?
No matter how frail she looked, what could he trust in someone he had only known for a few hours?
'It doesn't matter anyway. In front of a girl who looked like a handful, he could relax for a little while.
Now that he thought about it, how long had it been since he had had a proper night's sleep?
When he closed his eyes, his mother's last sorrowful face clung to his eyelids like a ghost. He couldn't even remember how long ago it had been since he had slept so deeply that he didn't even have dreams.
"A moonlit night, a starry night..."
The girl began to sing. Her sweet voice melted into his ears.
"Dancing and singing with fairies, following the moonlight to find a dream..."
The moment he closed his eyes, Dante was somehow certain. If he were to dream now, he would hear not his mother's will, but the singing voice of a strange girl. He probably wouldn't want to run away from that dream.
***
'Am I possessed?'
That was the first thought that came to Dante's mind the moment he opened his eyes. The bright, almost dazzling morning sunlight, the chirping of birds, his whole body feeling pleasantly drowsy. There were signs everywhere that he had fallen asleep without a care in the world. It was a perfect sleep, so much so that he would have believed that he had been hypnotized by a witch from a horror story.
Dante looked around with a somewhat bewildered feeling. What he saw was not a scary witch, but a girl huddled together and breathing colorfully.
"I'm going crazy."
Dante let out an incredulous laugh. Suddenly, he saw tears drying at the corners of the girl's eyes. Then he thought he heard her crying in her sleep,
"Grandpa, Mom."
"... Hey. Wake up."
Knock, knock.
A somewhat inconsiderate gesture woke the girl up. The girl opened her eyes and looked around with a blank face.
"Wake up, it's morning."
"Ah, ah..."
The girl blinked her eyes as if she was out of her mind, looking around. Every time she did, the girl's face changed. At first, it was doubt about the unfamiliar place, then fear, and finally despair that what she thought was a nightmare from last night was now reality. Her small body, which seemed to have no place to fall, was falling apart. Dante pretended not to notice and got up.
"Wake up. You have to move. It's quite a long way to the capital with your short legs."
I'll take you home, so just think about returning home where your remaining family is waiting for you.
Of course, such comforting words didn't even come out of his clumsy mouth.
***
The girl suffered a lot after that. The girl was made of sugar, spice, and all sorts of wonderful things. It was only natural that such a being would suffer greatly when thrown out of the warm greenhouse. Her small body was boiling so much that he worried that the body he was carrying would melt away at any moment. The more she did, the more a strange obsession sprouted in Dante's chest.
"Don't die."
"..."
"I saved you."
So you shouldn't die carelessly.
Dante kept whispering these words as he picked up the girl on his back.
"What's your name, brother?"
The girl kept talking nonsense, perhaps because she was so excited. Dante had to repeat his name about five times.
"Dante Heigenberg."
"Wow, your name is difficult...."
The girl had difficulty with his name every time. Dante kept walking while listening to the intonation of his name breaking in the girl's mouth. The journey that seemed endless came to an end, and finally, the island was in sight in the distance. It was only then that Dante asked her name for the first time.
"What is your name?"
"My name, Lili..."
"No, tell me your full name. You're a noblewoman. There must be a mansion named after your family. I have to throw you in front of it, so tell me your name."
"Lopez. Ariana... Lopez."
"...Ariana Lopez."
Dante pondered the name quietly. The pronunciation was smooth, and it felt like a name that belonged to her. It wasn't hard to find the Lopez mansion in the capital. It was night when they arrived at the mansion, which looked like a Princess from a fairy tale. Dante put Ariana down in front of the main gate and stepped back. It wouldn't be good for the public to know that she was entangled with the illegitimate child of a Duke whose succession system was tangled in dirty ways.
After a while, the door opened and a man who seemed to be the girl's father came out.
"Huh? What? Ah... Ariana?!"
The man, holding Ariana who was sleeping soundly, groaned.
"Ariana! Oh my God! How on earth did you get here?!"
He pulled Ariana towards him with a pale face and looked around hurriedly. It was as if he had seen a ghost. It was natural that the missing daughter was lying like a gift at the door.
"Master, what happened... Oh my, Miss Ariana!"
"What? What happened?"
"Oh my! The lady, the lady is back!"
Soon, the lights in the mansion turned bright as if it had never been dark. The mansion was soon filled with the voices of those surprised and thankful for the girl's return. Dante stayed in front of it for a moment and then turned away.
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