Just as Melphis had asked me to think about him all day, he occupied my mind the entire day.

I couldn’t help it.

How could I think of anything else after discovering the possibility that Melphis might be a dragon?

I desperately wanted to summon him right away and ask if my deduction was correct.

But it was impossible because I didn’t know where he was staying or how to contact him.

The only thing I could do was wait for him to come while staying put at home.

In the meantime, I recalled the suspicious things about him one by one, starting from the day I first met Melphis.

The quality of his transformation magic was so high that it felt unreal.

His magical prowess that allowed him to freely use high-level magic like teleportation.

I hadn’t noticed before, but now that I think about it, many things suggested that he was a dragon.

‘How did I not know this until now?’

I knew I was dense and slow-witted, but this seemed to be too much.

‘I want to meet Melphis quickly.’

Who would have thought I would miss Melphis this much, someone who was nothing more than a troublemaker when I was kidnapping and confining the handsome man?

Indeed, you never know how things will turn out in life.

Unable to stop thinking about his true identity, I ended up staying awake all night.

Even as fatigue crept in and I yawned, my only concern was when he would arrive.

Thinking that he might have arrived by now, I opened the front door and checked outside for no reason.

Contrary to my expectations, there was no sign of the Melphis I had been waiting for. The only thing greeting me was the newspaper I had subscribed to.

I picked up the newspaper, went back inside, and sat on a chair again.

I kept waiting for Melphis, tapping my feet, and then sighed. Time seemed to pass too slowly.

Thinking that focusing my mind elsewhere might help, I unfolded the newspaper I was holding.

And as I wanted, I was able to stop thinking about him. It was because of the shocking headline that caught my eye.

Last night, a massive fire broke out in a grain warehouse in the Heavens Territory!

I must be seeing things because I’m sleepy, right? I hastily rubbed my eyes and looked at the newspaper again.

As expected, nothing changed.

“No…”

The reason for my bewilderment was simple. It wasn’t time for this incident to happen yet.

The grain warehouse in the Heavens Territory stored the largest amount of grain in the empire.

It was no exaggeration to say that the warehouse played a significant role in the empire, as there was a saying that all the wheat in winter came from the Heavens warehouse.

But a fire had broken out in that very warehouse, which was supposed to be responsible for the upcoming winter.

Reading the newspaper article carefully, it said that several warehouses had burned down without a trace, leaving only ashes.

‘I knew something like this would happen someday. That’s why I tried to prepare in advance.’

However, it had happened much earlier than expected.

The timing should have been winter.

In the original story, during the war with the demons, the food storage burned down, and the war reached its climax.

As such, the burning of the grain warehouse was supposed to happen much later in the original story.

‘It means that Siegfried’s actions are deviating from the original story.’

In fact, I had guessed that he would eventually make a move and show a different pattern of behavior from the original story.

I was a huge variable that didn’t exist in the original story.

Moreover, Siegfried regarded me as the Apostle of God. It was natural for him to act differently from his original plans.

However, this was different from what I had anticipated.

And from now on, he would likely engage in more and more bizarre acts that surpassed my imagination.

If I truly had the ability to foresee the future like the Apostle of God, I could have prevented this. Unfortunately, I didn’t possess such power.

The original story I knew was already shattered, so it was unlikely to be of much help.

It was nearly impossible to know in advance and prevent any abnormal behavior Siegfried might engage in from now on.

‘I can’t delay any longer. I need to find the holy sword as soon as possible.’

The holy sword, the only key to putting an end to Siegfried.

Until now, I had been hesitating because I couldn’t find the dragon, but…

‘If Melphis is indeed a dragon, I can obtain the holy sword. Because I can go to the Dragon Realm.’

Of course, it would be useless if Melphis refused to help… I thought I would have to persuade him somehow.

‘For now, let’s wait patiently.’

With that thought, a few hours passed.

Finally, someone knocked on the door.

I hurriedly ran to the entrance and opened the door.

Fortunately, the visitor was Melphis, whom I had been eagerly waiting for.

“Vivian, are you sick? You don’t look well.”

I was dumbfounded by his tone of concern.

‘It’s because of you that I couldn’t sleep a wink last night!’

I grumbled at Melphis, who reached out to examine my face closely.

“I couldn’t sleep at all last night, you know? I was thinking about someone.”

“What, are you talking about me?”

“Who else would it be?”

Suddenly, a peculiar glint flashed across Melphis’s face as he cupped my cheeks with both hands.

It seemed like he was twitching the corners of his mouth, but it was a truly ambiguous expression that I couldn’t quite decipher.

“…I-I see. I’m honored.”

“What honor? Anyway, come in quickly. I have a lot to ask you.”

Melphis stiffly walked inside.

In the meantime, I brought the tea I had boiled in advance and poured it into a cup for him.

“Thank you, I’ll drink it well.”

As he took a sip from the teacup, I immediately brought up the main topic.

“Are you perhaps a dragon?”

Cough. Melphis covered his mouth and coughed as if he choked on something.

“What, are you okay?”

I hurriedly tried to go to his side and pat his back, but he waved his hand to refuse.

I had no choice but to wait patiently for his condition to improve.

After finally calming down, he wiped the small tears gathered in the corners of his eyes with his sleeve and spoke.

“A dragon? What are you talking about all of a sudden?”

His face was filled with a deep sense of bewilderment.

Melphis found it difficult to grasp the situation.

A dragon? Well, he was indeed a dragon. But why did that question suddenly pop up?

‘What happened while I was away that led her to that conclusion?’

Yesterday, when he took Vivian to the forest near Schmidt’s villa, he had a specific intention.

It was to let her realize that he was the same person as the wizard who had saved her in the past.

Melphis suddenly recalled an event from over a decade ago.

Although he now freely roamed the human world and traveled, Melphis hadn’t always lived this way from the beginning.

Dragons generally stayed in their own world unless there was a special reason.

They didn’t feel the need to come to the human world where there were no fellow dragons.

Melphis was no exception.

The reason he came to the human world ten years ago, despite having only stayed in the Dragon Realm, was solely due to the Dragon Lord’s order.

On that day, Melphis went to the habitat of magical beasts to check if demons had opened a portal to the human world, as ordered by the Dragon Lord.

As the Dragon Lord had predicted, the portal was open.

‘It seems the demons are trying to invade the human world again.’

It was a situation akin to a disaster for humans. However, the misfortune of other races wasn’t an important issue to him.

Melphis checked the portal one last time without much interest.

Having completed his mission, all that remained was to return to the Dragon Realm and report this.

But at that very moment when he was about to return, the cry of a magical beast caught his attention.

Strangely, curiosity arose even though he would have ignored it under normal circumstances.

Following the sound, what he saw was a growling magical beast and a trembling young human.

The human, who looked weak at a glance, was in stark contrast to the threatening magical beast.

If left alone, that human would have become a snack for the magical beast.

The human child seemed to know this too, as they were terrified.

‘How unfortunate.’

That was the end of Melphis’s impression of the scene. He turned around and tried to go his way again.

It was at that moment when he turned his foot. The unexpected action shown by the human momentarily captured his interest.

The small human must have inwardly sensed that there was no hope for them.

However, for some reason, they managed to stand on their weakened legs.

The child picked up a branch that looked completely devoid of attack power and aimed it at the magical beast.

Even on the verge of death, they tried to resist somehow.

The meaningless resistance of the clear underdog didn’t stop.

And that sight felt refreshing to the noble dragon who couldn’t imagine being threatened by another creature.

Was that the reason? He felt like being capricious.

Melphis easily disposed of the magical beast and saved the child.

Looking at the child expressing gratitude with an innocent face, he thought,

‘Come to think of it, humans keep pets, don’t they? Should I try raising this human too?’

He wanted to observe what other curious antics they would display by his side.

“Human child, do you want to follow me? Seeing you wandering alone in a place like this, it seems you don’t have a guardian, right? I’ll take good care of you, let’s go together.”

It was a proposal made with such intentions, but unfortunately, it was immediately rejected.

Anyway, having learned that humans were also surprisingly interesting creatures, he began to travel the human world.

Whenever he encountered a human that piqued his interest, he would stay nearby and thoroughly observe them.

It was when nine years had passed in human world time as he wandered around pretending to be a wandering wizard.

That’s when Melphis met that human child again.