As I watched, I felt my mood lifting, but Hadel’s face only grew more contorted. As if holding back tears, he mumbled with his lips, then pulled me into his arms and buried his face in my shoulder.

“I have no one but you.”

I patted the back of his neck with both hands and replied.

“Yes, I’m the only ferret in the world this clever.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“What? Then what did you mean?”

Perhaps due to the intense flames he had produced, Hadel’s body was warmer than usual. Through our touching skin, I thought I could feel the thump-thump of his heartbeat. His heart, having depleted its mana, must have been busy creating new flames.

‘Back in the forest when we first met, he was lonely because he didn’t know he could deplete his mana like this.’

Now that he knew he could release the mana built up in his heart, would he no longer fear mana overload as before?

‘Then I won’t need to absorb his mana to lighten his burden.’

That was a somewhat bittersweet thought. As I was thinking this, slowly patting Hadel’s back,

Hadel whispered in a low voice.

“Stay by my side.”

“……”

It felt as if the intense flames had spread to my heart as well.

In the end, the evacuation order for the residents of the Northern Fortress turned out to be a false alarm. Before the subordinates could lead the people to flee, a pillar of fire shot up into the sky, and they realized that all the ice monsters had disappeared.

The subordinates sincerely praised Hadel. Some even burst into tears upon seeing Hadel, whom they thought they would never meet again.

“That was amazing, Your Highness.”

“I was truly surprised as well. It felt like the seasons changed in an instant with that intense heat.”

“The monsters won’t be able to approach for a while now.”

Yes, yes. Our Hadel did something incredible. I listened to their praises with a satisfied expression.

“Um, but…”

Just then, their gazes turned towards me.

“Who is this person?”

Ugh.

‘Ah, this is why I said I wanted to hide.’

I wore an awkward expression as I tightened Hadel’s cloak around me.

Honestly, after kissing Hadel to help him and demonstrating how to explode the flames, I thought I would turn back into a ferret. Since all the mana I received would be depleted.

‘But it’s strange. My heart is pounding as if it’s become normal.’

However, I couldn’t turn back into a ferret. And that’s when the aftermath became a problem. I couldn’t just appear in front of people with a ta-da, after all.

As I was saying I would hide outside the fortress until I could turn back into a ferret, Hadel pulled me along. Saying I couldn’t hide forever.

‘To be honest, I don’t know when I’ll become human again, and I can’t keep escaping to the study by stepping on the window sill.’

It made sense to reveal my existence to some extent, as Hadel said. But faced with curious eyes, I kept shrinking back.

‘Hadel, do something about this.’

I turned to Hadel with troubled eyes. Hadel, who had given me his cloak and was now in simple attire, answered in his characteristic dry tone.

“She is my guest.”

No, isn’t it too suspicious to say she’s a guest when a woman suddenly appears?

‘Maybe I should have spoken up myself.’

I don’t want to be suspected and driven out like this. I furrowed my brow. The expressions of the subordinates, who like me found Hadel’s explanation unfriendly, became peculiar. The funny thing was that it wasn’t as negative a feeling as I had thought.

“She seems to be a young lady?”

“Since her gender is female, she must be a young lady, right?”

“For His Highness to make a joke…”

Was that a joke? It wasn’t funny at all.

“Is she really a guest?”

“Yes.”

“But we’ve never seen her before.”

“Because I haven’t introduced her.”

Hadel continued to give short answers to his subordinates’ questions. Finally, when I opened my mouth, frustrated,

“Um…”

I was going to say something like I’ll just leave.

Suddenly, the cloak I was wearing fell to the floor with a thud. My long hair shortened, and the people looked gigantic like giants.

From my mouth, which was about to explain my situation, only familiar cries came out.

“Kyu kyu kyu.”

I had turned back into a ferret!

The faces of those who witnessed my transformation right before their eyes turned pale.

“…A ferret?”

Oh no, why did I have to turn back into a ferret now!

Embarrassed, I climbed up Hadel’s leg and hid inside his shirt. One of the subordinates watching this scene rubbed his eyes with his sleeve and asked,

“I must be sick. Did I just see a pretty young lady turn into a ferret?”

“That’s right.”

Instead of denying or equivocating, Hadel answered with nothing but the truth.

“Her name is Marian.”

“What?!”

Naturally, his brief explanations were too short for them to understand the situation.

The reason I’ve been trying to hide my human form all this time is because I was afraid people would dismiss me as an evil monster.

In fact, 100 years ago when I was fighting against different species, there were monsters like me pretending to be human. Of course, it wasn’t difficult to find them out because they couldn’t mimic humans perfectly.

‘If I was unlucky, even Hadel could have been expelled along with me, accused of being bewitched by a monster.’

But many things have changed in 100 years. Such monsters no longer appeared in the kingdom, and instead of considering me a monster, people said this:

A beautiful young lady cursed to turn into a ferret!

‘A curse, what a comfortable excuse.’

Sitting on Hadel’s office desk, munching on grapes that are hard to come by in the North, I thought leisurely.

The fact that I was actually human spread quickly within the Northern Fortress. At first, watching the rumors spread, I thought:

‘Everyone will avoid me now.’

Isn’t it normal to want to avoid someone cursed?

But the people of the North were tougher than I expected. Far from being bothered by the curse, they became even more interested.

‘That’s why even these grapes, like a luxury item, are being brought up.’

I hadn’t even seen grapes during my entire stay here. Well, I’m happy as long as they’re delicious.

Hadel’s aides looked at me with sparkling eyes. The aide who wrote in place of Hadel clapped his hands together and said,

“Ah, then those documents written in elegant handwriting were also written by the ferret young lady?”

“Yes.”

Hadel nodded proudly as if he had written them himself. I pouted my lips.

‘Ferret young lady. Even that nickname is funny.’

From Mr. Ferret to Kyu Kyu, and now back to ferret young lady. It was amusing how the honorifics and terms of address went back and forth. An aide watching me munch on grapes with curious eyes nodded.

“I thought it wasn’t an ordinary ferret. Even so, a ferret eating bread?”

“I thought the tail color was unique too.”

“I thought it was clever, but I never imagined it was human…”

I tried my best to act like an ordinary ferret, but was I unable to hide my extraordinariness? As I shrugged my shoulders at their ‘I knew it’ reactions,

One person asked a sharp question.

“But how do you turn into a human?”

Ugh.

At the unfavorable question, I unconsciously turned to look at Hadel.

‘You’re not going to tell them, are you?’

It’s too complicated. That I’m originally a fire attribute so I can absorb your mana, and that’s how I can turn human…

Making my anxious thoughts pointless, Hadel’s answer was concise.

“She turns human when I kiss her.”

“The prince’s kiss!”

“That’s right! The royal way to break a curse is the prince’s kiss!”

What? What are you all saying? Isn’t it the opposite?

‘Isn’t it usually the princess’s kiss that breaks the curse on the prince?’

I wore a sour expression. For some reason, everyone was very excited about the fact that the key to breaking my curse was Hadel’s kiss.

They spoke to me with sparkling eyes.

“What’s your favorite food, young lady!”

“Don’t you know? It’s cake, cake.”

“Don’t be silly. Our ferret young lady likes chocolate the most.”

“Why are you arguing? Quickly tell the kitchen to bake a chocolate cake!”

Watching their pathetic argument, I ended up giving a thumbs up to the chocolate cake that appeared at the end.

‘Genius idea!’

Delicious plus delicious is obviously more delicious. Why didn’t I think of this?

‘Chocolate cake! I want to eat it.’

The sweetness of fruit is good too, but I really love the artificial sweetness made by adding lots of sugar.

As I was licking my lips, another person cautiously addressed me.

“Shouldn’t we give her a separate room? Staying in the same room as His Highness like now…”

“You fool! No. Living in an unfamiliar place would be more bewildering. Stay close by His Highness’s side.”

“That’s right. We should prepare separate spaces for her in His Highness’s study and office as well.”

The man who had cautiously expressed his opinion had his mouth covered and was dragged away. Looking at them, who seemed generally excited, I furrowed my brow.

‘Why are they all so happy?’

Did they make some kind of bet without me knowing?

The change in the aides’ attitudes was quite fresh to me, but it didn’t shock me as much as this person’s change.

A middle-aged man in a crisp black suit without a wrinkle, well-trimmed mustache, and sparkling monocle asked me in a polite tone.

“Ferret young lady, how are you feeling today?”

It was the butler who used to bully me.

‘No, butler! Even you?’

As I gaped at him in shock, the butler retorted with a reddened face.

“D-don’t look at me with that expression. If I had known you were human, I wouldn’t have bullied you like that.”

“Kyu.”

Strong to the weak and weak to the strong, what a despicable person.