“How……?”

Lutis mumbled.

However, even if he asked, the hat had no words to offer.

How could it explain something that had been this way from the beginning?

Unable to bear the silence that followed, the child spoke to Lutis.

“Anyway, since it’s mine now, please open your hand, Dad.”

“……”

“Tsk!”

Slap!

Seeing that Lutis seemed unwilling to listen even after she had given him her locket, which was like a treasure to her, the child hit his arm.

Though it likely had little impact, Lutis purposely flinched his shoulder and slowly relaxed his hand.

When the child removed the handkerchief wrapped around Lutis’s hand, the contents inside became visible.

-This is…..

It was a piece of that vase which he had been shocked to find missing on the day he first woke up in this state.

Aeli drew in a sharp breath as she saw the white vase shard soaked with copious amounts of blood.

She had guessed it was something precious when she heard it was a cherished item, but she couldn’t believe he had actually been holding onto this sharp fragment.

It was hard to tell if this was foolish or just ignorant.

She wondered if she should consider him thorough for bringing a handkerchief, anticipating that there would be bleeding.

-If you were going to stop the bleeding anyway, why not bring an extra handkerchief? What is this?

“Ah……”

-……?

“……That’s not for stopping the bleeding, but to wrap the shard so it wouldn’t be visible.”

-……On purpose?

“When I went to the child’s room at night…… I thought she might be startled if she woke up to see me holding a sharp object over her bedside.”

-……

She immediately retracted her assessment of him being thorough.

It seemed it would have been less shocking to show the shard without drawing blood.

Even now, this wasn’t exactly an appropriate situation for a 5-year-old child to see.

Seeing the profuse bleeding, the raw cut in the flesh, and the treatment process…..

“……I’ll do it myself from now on. You can stop.”

Seemingly realizing this wasn’t right even to him, Lutis belatedly spoke to the child.

However, his wish was denied as the child refused to let go.

Lutis’s hand trembled slightly each time a shard was removed.

Even with the pendant around his neck, he looked anxious, as if Aeli might disappear from sight once he let go of the vase pieces.

“……All done here too!”

“……”

But the child continued the treatment, paying no mind.

Having done it once before, she even picked up speed when applying medicine and wrapping bandages on the opposite hand, finishing quickly.

Lutis looked down at his two clumsily bandaged hands before raising his head.

He had been looking dazed for a while now.

Slowly opening his mouth to mumble, Lutis looked at Aeli.

“I really…… can see you.”

Feeling somehow embarrassed by his words as he gazed at her with eyes that had regained a faint light, Aeli quietly averted her gaze.

The child nodded with a satisfied expression and said,

“Okay, now you do that, Dad.”

“……?”

Lutis looked down at the child at the sudden remark.

Then the child continued speaking.

“That thing, since you said you gave it to me, I’ll give you something too.”

“How did you-”

“Mari…… gave this to me as a birthday present three years ago…… She said you left it for me.”

“……”

“I don’t, need that anymore since I have Mom…… here instead.”

“……”

“……The person who needs it more should have it. Thank you for lending it to me.”

The child bowed her head.

Lutis looked down at the pendant the child had put around his neck, at a loss for words.

‘……I see.’

Aeli quietly watched the two from the side, learning of this fact she hadn’t known.

Of course, even after she died, these two would have continued living.

Whatever form it took, you both made your own efforts.

She had no desire to belittle that. Neither Lutis, who unhesitatingly gave the child his only portrait, nor the child, who cherished such a gift from Lutis.

Aeli lowered her gaze.

It was then that the child fidgeted with both hands and spoke up.

“Um……”

-Oh, yes?

“But, can you really see her?”

The child looked back and forth between Lutis and Aeli as she asked.

It was quite a late question to ask, considering she had already had a full conversation in front of Lutis.

Wondering what this meant, Aeli silently looked down at the child.

At that, the child’s cheeks flushed slightly as she stretched out both hands. She took hold of one of Aeli’s hands and one of Lutis’s.

The child glanced at her parents for a moment before speaking again.

“Then……”

-……

“……”

“Si-since it’s not morning yet because the sun hasn’t risen, can we sleep together?”

I really want to do this…… the child said.

At that, Aeli naturally recalled the paper she had received in the attic before.

[Say goodnight] [Give a kiss hello] [Hold hands while walking] [Eat a meal together] [Sleep in the same bed]

.

.

.

[Call them Mom and Dad]

There was definitely such an item.

She wasn’t sure whether to cry at finally being able to do such a simple thing after several years, or to smile at being able to do what the child wanted, even if only as a ghost.

It was hard to get her bearings.

Instead, Aeli nodded with a bright smile.

-If that’s what Adi wants, Mom is happy with it.

You probably don’t remember, but we used to sleep together like this quite often, Aeli said.

To be precise, it would be more accurate to say they slept together almost every day rather than quite often.

At Aeli’s affirmation, the child’s head turned toward Lutis.

It wasn’t that Lutis and the child had never slept together, but that had been when the child forcibly squeezed in, not something Lutis did voluntarily.

Lutis gave a small, stiff nod to the clear eyes gazing up at him with a strange expectation.

“Hehe……”

At that, the child smiled happily and flopped backwards. Since they were already on the bed where Lutis’s hands had been treated, it didn’t matter.

“Then, when it’s time…… let’s have a snack together later. I want to read a picture book together too…… Oh, and I want to go out to play. And……”

The child mumbled on.

Her voice continued uninterrupted until she unknowingly drifted off to sleep.

[This is the timeline separator]

When the child woke up well past noon that day, the first thing she did was check both sides.

Aeli, being a ghost, didn’t need to sleep and had been awake the whole time, while Lutis was sound asleep with his eyes closed.

“Mo-!”

-Shh. Adi, Dad’s still sleeping, so should we sleep a little longer?

“Oh…… Okay.”

Shh. The child put a finger to her lips, mimicking Aeli, and nodded.

She had a big smile on her face, clearly in a good mood as soon as she woke up.

After telling the child to go wash up first, when it was just the two of them left with the sleeping Lutis.

Aeli clicked her tongue softly as she looked at Lutis with dark circles under his eyes.

Lutis hadn’t been asleep from the beginning. He had gazed at the sleeping child for a while, exchanged some conversation with Aeli, and at some point his eyes had closed.

They had been talking while Aeli floated her body as if lying on the bed, looking up at the ceiling.

[So the lack of contact with Mason was due to that damn…… I mean, the communication orb issue. The war…… I’ve already heard about that, so never mind.] [……Yeah.] [They tried to kill the child to aim for the position of second wife? Did you find out who sent those people?] [I do…… know. But, why……] [Why do you think I’m asking? That servant working in the main library now, he was injured trying to protect Adi then, right? Don’t you know to return favors twice over and grudges tenfold? You need to pay them back.] [……They’re probably already, gone.] [……Huh?] [……] [……Are you sleeping? Like this?]

Of all things, to cut off there.

When no response came, she turned her head to check and found him asleep. It was quite remarkable, considering he used to be unable to fall asleep at all without medication.

And so, Aeli studied Lutis’s sleeping face just as he had done with the child earlier, before turning her gaze away.

It was after the child came out from washing up.

Some time passed, Lutis woke up, and after they finished eating, when the afternoon sunlight had moved a bit lower from its position at the crown of the head.

“Snack!”

“……Alright.”

“I, want to eat pudding.”

“That takes too long to make right away. If there’s something you want to eat, I’ll have someone go buy it.”

“……Then I’ll eat that tomorrow. Today, um……”

“……”

“……What does Dad like?”

Finding it difficult to choose again after being unable to have the snack she had in mind, the child passed the choice to Lutis.

Lutis seemed to consider for a moment before saying something to a maid and instructing her to prepare it.

And so the prepared snack was, as expected yet unexpectedly, chocolate cake.

‘Oh…..’

Aeli let out a small exclamation when news came that preparations were complete not long after they had started their walk in the garden. The snack must have been prepared in advance, as it came very quickly.

Lutis quietly gazed down at the child who sat down with a bright expression and began digging into the cake. He raised his hand.

It was to wipe off the cream smeared around the child’s mouth.

“Ah.”

“Does it suit your taste?”

“Yes. It’s delicious.”

The child smiling with rosy cheeks, seemingly in an especially good mood today, and Lutis with a somewhat softened demeanor.

As she had guessed from looking at the sky yesterday, the weather was very nice.

Aeli smiled faintly at the peaceful scene they were enjoying.

Perhaps because they knew she was there, Lutis had instructed for three chairs to be prepared and dismissed everyone around, allowing them to converse comfortably.

Taking the opportunity, Aeli voiced the question she had been holding onto all this time.

-Come to think of it, I haven’t seen you returning from the battlefield or going to work at the imperial palace. Did you get a long vacation?

“……”

-Lutis?

“……That-”

Lutis hesitated before opening his mouth.

“……I quit.”

……What?