Siod’s plan to boost Larisa’s confidence and alleviate her anxiety faced challenges right from the beginning.

“The more you praise, the more counterproductive it becomes.”

Parenting was not easy. The more Larisa received praise, the more she desired it. She beamed with excitement at each of Siod’s evaluations, and if she didn’t receive praise, she noticeably sulked.

Eventually, on the evening after finishing the class, Siod approached Grenavier with determined eyes.

“Vera, lend me a hand with the parenting you’ve been doing.”

“No. I haven’t memorized everything yet.”

Do I have to memorize all that…?

“Stop saying that and let me take a look. I’ll just read quietly from here.”

“Then read quietly.”

Grenavier pointed to a corner, focusing on her own research. In the direction Grenavier indicated, there was a comfortable chair and a table, with a thick book lying on it.

“Is this it? Dr. Ohara’s ‘Modern Parenting,’ the bestseller?”

Without waiting for Grenavier’s response, Siod murmured to himself while quietly flipping through the book. As he examined the table of contents, there was a noticeable subtitle.

‘How to deal with our child thirsty for praise?’

Siod read that section as if captivated.

“Praise the process rather than the result? Acknowledge the effort? Easier said than done…”

When Siod praised Larisa, saying, ‘Well done, our Lara, you worked hard, right?’ she looked at him expectantly, asking, ‘So what?’ with a hopeful expression.
She was a child who demanded accurate evaluations of the results. Even if you tried to skip over it discreetly, it was futile. It seemed like she judged herself as not doing well enough if she didn’t receive praise.

“The kid is too much of a perfectionist.”

“Lara?”

Grenavier turned to him.

“Yeah. If I don’t praise her, she keeps repeating until she gets praised to the point where it’s pitiful. I can’t keep praising her forever…”

“If being a home tutor is burdensome, let me know. I can find someone else.”

“It’s not that…”

Siod, who was about to argue, sighed. He couldn’t put Grenavier in a position to worry about childcare, especially since he wasn’t there when William was young.

“I just tried to think about how to teach her. If we push too hard, she might get tired early, you know?”

Grenavier furrowed her brows and pondered for a moment before speaking.

“My mentor.”

“Huh?”

“To learn something from my mentor, I had to pass a test.”

It was the first time Grenavier talked about her past.

“You had a mentor?”

“When I was young.”

Grenavier was known to have acquired magic skills through self-study after obtaining a magic book by chance. Siod rested his chin on his hand, listening to her story.

“The first test was to kill a noisy dog that disturbed my mentor’s sleep. If I could solve that problem, he said he would teach me magic.”

“So?”
“It was a dog I raised in the mercenary group, and since he volunteered to feed it every day, I secretly fed it onions.”

Siod lost his words.

“It didn’t die the first time. Anyway, if you wanted to learn something, you had to keep making deals. The desire for learning… It seemed to be my motivation.”

So, this was a story Grenavier brought up to offer advice to him. Siod asked with a hesitant look in his eyes.

“Oh, um. How old were you then?”

“The first test? Well, I think it was around 7.”

So, she was unyielding even at the age of 7. Should he be amazed at her extraordinary childhood? Siod forced a smile and asked.

“Weren’t you scared?”

“Not at all. Rather than scared… It hurt.”

Surprised by the unexpected answer, Siod looked at her, and Grenavier replied with an expressionless face.

“I was hit by the mercenary leader.”

“Oh, I thought you were sad because you killed a dog again.”

Grenavier chuckled.

“I was too hungry to be sad about something like that.”

“…”

“I was hungry enough to snatch dog food.”

After getting beaten to a point where she wouldn’t die by the mercenary leader, Grenavier sought out her mentor. And boldly demanded to be taught magic.

“If you don’t teach me magic, Grandpa told me to kill the dog!”

However, her mentor turned out to be a fraud pretending to be a magician, and he was just an ordinary alchemist with no talent in magic.

In the end, she stole a magical book from him and became a magician, even if it meant using her last resort.
Nevertheless, Grenavier considered him as her mentor. During the constant dealings to learn something from him, she learned not magic but life itself.

“Anyway, how about trying an exam? If there’s an appropriate evaluation tool, it will be reassuring for Larisa to know her own level.”

“Were you thinking about it?”

“Larisa’s problem? Of course. I swore, didn’t I?”

Siod was touched.

“I don’t think this should be a touching moment for me, but why am I touched?”

Siod held his pounding heart and pondered.

“Is this how it works? Being indifferent, and then if someone does something good for you once, you become affecti
Siod lifted Larisa in his arms and said, “And the teacher wants to see Lara on Saturdays too.”

“I don’t want to see him.”