Siod’s plan to boost Larisa’s confidence and alleviate her anxiety hit a snag from the start.

‘The more praise given, the more counterproductive it becomes.’

Parenting was not easy. The more Larisa was praised, the more she craved praise.

It was noticeable how her eyes sparkled at each of Siod’s evaluations, and she visibly sulked when not praised.

Finally, at the end of the evening lesson, Siod went to Guinevere with weary eyes.

“Vera, lend me that parenting book you were reading.”

“No. I haven’t memorized it all yet.”

Does it need to be memorized…?

“Come on, let me take a look. I’ll just read it here.”

“Then read quietly.”

Guinevere nodded towards a corner and began to focus on her research. In the direction she indicated was an armchair and table with a thick book placed on it.

“Is this it? Dr. O’Hara’s bestseller ‘Modern Parenting’?”

Instead of grumbling at the unresponsive Guinevere, Siod quietly opened the book. As he carefully examined the table of contents, a subtitle caught his eye.

‘What to do with our praise-hungry child?’

Siod read that section as if entranced.

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

When Larisa was praised with “Our Lara, you worked hard?”, she would reply “And?” with an expectant expression, staring at him intently.

She was a child who demanded an accurate assessment of results. It was useless to try to gloss over it. If he did, she seemed to judge for herself that she hadn’t done well enough to be praised.

“The child is too much of a perfectionist.”

“Lara?”

Guinevere turned to look at him.

“Yes. It’s heartbreaking how she repeats endlessly until I praise her. I can’t just keep praising her…”

“If being a tutor is too burdensome, say so. I’ll find someone else.”

“That’s not it…”

Siod, who was about to protest, sighed. Since he hadn’t been there when William was young, he wasn’t in a position to tell Guinevere to pay more attention to parenting now.

“I just wondered how to teach her. She might burn out too early if she pushes herself too hard, right?”

Guinevere frowned, pondered for a moment, then spoke.

“My master.”

“Huh?”

“To learn anything from my master, I had to pass a test.”

It was the first time Guinevere had talked about her past.

“You had a master?”

“When I was young.”

Guinevere was known to have become a magician through self-study after acquiring a magic book by chance. Siod rested his chin on his hand and listened to her story.

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

“And then?”

“It was a dog raised by the mercenary group, so I volunteered to feed it every day and secretly fed it onions.”

Siod was at a loss for words.

“It didn’t die from just once. Anyway, if I wanted to learn something, I had to keep making deals. The desire to learn… I think that was my motivation.”

So this was a story Guinevere had brought up to give him advice. Siod asked with wavering eyes.

“Um, how old were you then?”

“The first test? Let’s see, maybe 7 years old.”

Heartless from age 7. Should he be amazed at such an unusual childhood? Siod asked with a forced smile.

“Weren’t you scared?”

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

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

“I was beaten by the mercenary leader.”

“Ah, I thought you meant your heart hurt from killing the dog.”

Guinevere chuckled.

“I was too hungry to be heartbroken over something like that.”

“…”

“I was hungry enough to steal even dog food.”

After being beaten by the mercenary leader just short of death, Guinevere went to find her master. And she boldly demanded to be taught magic.

‘If you don’t teach me magic, I’ll tell them grandfather told me to kill the dog!’

However, the master was actually a fraud pretending to be a magician, and just an ordinary alchemist with no talent for magic.

In the end, she did become a magician by stealing the magic book he cherished.

Still, Guinevere considered him her master. While constantly making deals to learn something from him, she learned about life, not magic.

“Anyway, how about giving her a test? If there’s an appropriate evaluation tool, Larisa will know her level and feel at ease.”

“You were thinking about it?”

“Larisa’s problem? Of course. I made a vow, didn’t I?”

Siod was touched.

‘This doesn’t seem like something I should be touched by, but why am I?’

Siod clutched his pounding heart and thought.

‘Is this what it’s like? When someone usually indifferent does something nice once, you fall hard…?’

He was already too far gone to escape.

*

Taking Guinevere’s advice, Siod spent the entire week making etiquette and culture test papers for Larisa.

It wasn’t easy to create test papers matching the level of noble children of the same age.

First of all, since the education of noble children is usually done quietly one-on-one within each family, it wasn’t easy to average out their level, and there were big differences between families.

In the end, Siod gave up on finding an appropriate level of education and sneaked into the imperial palace to steal the etiquette education guidelines for the royal family.

And the weekend came.

Saturday was William’s lesson day, but Siod brought William along to visit Larisa.

“Me too?”

“Yes, Lara, you’d be lonely if you were alone, right?”

“I’m not lonely though?”

“No, you will be lonely.”

Siod said as he picked Larisa up.

“And the teacher wants to see Lara on Saturdays too.”

“I don’t want to see you though.”

“Ah, really…?”

Siod was embarrassed but tried to smile.

“William wants to see Lara too. Right? Hm?”

Siod urged William to answer. William was flustered, then nodded slightly.

“See? Lara, just play next to us. Okay?”

Larisa nodded reluctantly. This was all a ploy to make Larisa rest, even forcibly, but Larisa was no ordinary child.

“Now, so the duties of a lord are…”

Siod, who had been explaining for a while, noticed Larisa listening intently and closed his mouth.

“Professor?”

“Ah, no. Sorry. I was just lost in thought for a moment.”

Both children were staring intently at him. It was good to have passion for learning, but.

“By the way, Lara, aren’t you reading a book?”

“No. It’s boring.”

“But listening to the lesson is fun?”

“Yes.”

“Do you want to become a lord or something?”

“No. But you never know.”

She was an ambitious 7-year-old. There were many words that would be difficult for a 7-year-old to hear and understand.

But Larisa was still a young child after all. As the difficult lesson continued, soon wheezing sounds could be heard.

Siod laid Larisa, who had fallen asleep leaning on the sofa, down straight. William, who had been watching, pondered and said.

“I don’t understand why she’s working so hard at these lessons when she says she doesn’t want to be a noble.”

“Lara said that? That she doesn’t want to be a noble?”

“Yes. She said she wants to be rich, but doesn’t want to be a noble.”

“I wonder why she said that? She seems to be working harder than anyone right now…”

William hesitated for a moment before answering.

“I think she’s worried that mother might make her marry me.”

“…”

“So, she’s been pushing herself like this ever since I said I’d become a duke. We were originally planning to run away together… Hey, don’t look at me like that.”

William covered his face with both hands.

“No, I’m just surprised. You were going to run away?”

“In the past. Not anymore.”

“That’s a relief.”

“Anyway, it seems Lara wanted to go back to where she used to live when she grows up, but since I gave up on running away and said I’d become a duke, I think she’s worried she might have to forcibly become a duchess too.”

William quickly poured out his thoughts and then let out a long sigh. After rubbing his face, he looked at Siod nervously and asked.

“Is there any chance you could become Lara’s adoptive father?”

This time it was Siod’s turn to be flustered.

‘I, I want to be a father-in-law though?’

“I’m sorry. It was an unreasonable request since you’re still single.”

William had just said it out of frustration.

“If someone could become Lara’s real family, she wouldn’t have to be so anxious like this… Shouldn’t we look for a place that could adopt Lara?”

Siod stared at the worried William for a moment, then said quietly.

“William.”

“Yes?”

“This is not something for you to worry about.”

Siod looked straight at William’s surprised expression and said quietly.

“You’re still a student, and Guinevere is Larisa’s guardian. The duty and responsibility to raise Larisa well lies with Guinevere. You don’t have to worry about such things.”

“But…”

“And it would be difficult for Larisa to adapt to a new place at this point.”

His gaze fell on the sleeping Larisa.

“Guinevere is trying too. It might seem to you that she’s only focused on magic research every day… but actually, she’s doing that research for you kids. I can’t explain in detail, but this time she’s desperately trying to protect you.”

“How do you know, Professor?”

“William. It was Guinevere who persuaded me to stay close to you. If it weren’t for her, I wouldn’t have paid this much attention to you.”

Siod looked at the speechless William and smirked.

“By the way, isn’t your worry excessive for someone you think of as a sister?”

“…Do you think I’m a pervert? I’m worrying because I really think of her as a sister!”

“Okay, okay.”

Siod nodded outwardly, but inwardly he thought, sister my foot.

It seemed that memories remained in William’s subconscious. Otherwise, it didn’t make sense to be so attached to a child he’d met less than a year ago.