When she — the candidate to be Duke Ranuncula’s second wife, Robinia, heard from Wolf that the number of dinner guests would increase, she said「Okay」. Appearing to be smiling, as she nodded.

With the excuse of practicing her cooking, she confined herself to the kitchen early. That was why, in the evening, she already called Wolf over to the kitchen.

Holding out a small saucer of soup, she offered Wolf a taste.

It was at that exact moment, that I rushed into the kitchen of the Ranuncula residence.

「Wolf!」

Calling out as loud as I could, Wolf’s head quickly turned my way.

「Lycoris, what’s wrong? Did something happen?」

Running all the way here as fast as possible, I voiced the word 「Doctor」 to Wolf .

「I don’t feel well, would you call the doctor for me? Please.」

Because I had sprinted all the way here, my breathing was suspicious, so Wolf panicked.

「Robinia, this girl is Lycoris. I’ll leave her in your care for a while.」

Only saying that much, hurried footsteps made their way out of the kitchen.

And so, I faced the woman who was standing still in front of the pot of soup.

Robinia was, from head to toe, a slender and fair-skinned woman. She looked younger than I imagined, it was hard to believe that she was already in her late thirties.

The aura she had looked like nothing but a fleeting innocence.

「Nice to meet you, my name is Lycoris Radiata.」

My voice was impatient, curt. From the beginning, I had no plans to make small talk with her. I only wanted to confirm one thing. If this was all a mistake on my part, then I will happily try all I can to make amends with her.

「Pardon my rudeness, but may I know whether you’ve tasted the soup?」

「…」

「If you haven’t, I would suggest you try it out first」

Bringing out a new saucer, and innocently adding a silver spoon as I said so… I then offered it to her. (1)

「Even me, when I try to cook, there are times that I would unbelievably fail at it. For example, accidentally putting sugar instead of salt. That’s why-」

「How did you find out?」

I wasn’t able to finish my sentence as she cut off my words with a flat tone. My face quickly turned white.

「I wonder how you found out. How strange.」

The woman’s eyes certainly reflected that of a killer.

Adding poison to her own cooking, and confidently making people eat it. In that matter, without defending herself on her attempt at murder by poisoning, I can’t think that her behaviour would indicate she’d try to escape.

She stared at the poisoned soup that she had made, looking like a child at a loss.

And then.

「…How mean. Now the soup has gone to waste.」

She murmured with a voice that sounded to be in deep sorrow. (2)

「… Even I, at first, thought I could be a good mother. But, you always had a displeased face, and you never once called me “Mother”.」

When she said 『You』, she looked in the direction of the doorway, where Wolf stood, with all color drained from his face.

「And then I realized, for the Duke and I to have a new life, I couldn’t stand having someone else in this house after all. With a clean slate, I wanted to build a wonderful family with the Prime Minister-sama. The second wife’s children, it’s common that they’ll get bullied by the first wife’s children. If I give birth to my cute baby, what could I do if you bullied that child? What’s more…」

She sent a resentful look towards Wolf.

Innocently muttering those blunt complaints to a child, seeing that sent a dreadful chill down my spine.

「That’s why, in order to kill the nuisance, I got this. I don’t know whether it was handy, but when I put the poison in my purse, the feeling I had was really dreadful」

She placed a small vial on top of the table with a clink. As expected, she really didn’t plan on hiding what she’d done.

Robinia was a psychopath. At least, I could only think of her as nothing but one.

At any rate, I had to pull Wolf away from this terrible woman.

Starting from the butler who looked like he was bringing in the medicated bath for me, people started coming into the kitchen.

Facing the perplexed bystanders,「I’m not the one at fault,」she continued on saying,「Because, I only did this so that I would be the only one the Duke would love.」

Moving my two trembling feet, I approached Wolf. I tried pulling Wolf away by the black clothes he was wearing, but he continued to devour Robinia with his eyes, dumbfounded. So at the very least, with my two hands, I blocked Wolf’s ears.

With that, his violet eyes turned to me. A distorted crying face of a child was reflected in his eyes. My face.

I was incredibly relieved that Wolf was okay, and dreadfully, dreadfully angry at Robinia.

At that time, I felt a lot of conflicting feelings. I was unable to bear the heavy feeling in my chest, and as a ten-year-old child, all I did was gulp uncontrollably, unable to do any reasonable action.

Soon after, I let out a loud wail as I cried my heart out.

Actually, when I thought about it, the person who should be crying right now was Wolf, but I only realized it later that night.

We left everything about the dinner to the Duke and my father after they returned. Meanwhile, we just sat down in Wolf’s room, cuddled together with the lights turned on. Although both my hands held the book open, not even once could the sound of the page being flipped be heard.

Only for today, even if the adults ask us to sleep alone or to turn off the lights, we won’t obey.

I closed the book with a plop, then turned to face Wolf.

「Go ahead and cry」was what I said.

「I’m fine」was what he returned.

Thinking that there was no way he could be fine, I pressed a wet towel to his face so he could cool his eyes.

However, Wolf quickly took it from my hands, pushing it back to my still swollen eyes.

「You’ve already cried this much. This is more than enough.」

Saying those illogical words, his gentle voice sounded like he was pampering me.

My eyes started to swell up once again, and the wet towel became even wetter.

I suddenly recalled the letter that Duke Ranuncula wrote.

Wolf has become mature. It might be just as the Duke said. I wonder if it’s because he’s becoming mature that he could overcome such a painful event. And with such an amazing speed.

「…At this rate, Wolf will surely end up becoming a woman hater.」

With my unexpected words, it seemed he thought it was a joke.

Laughing like it entertained him, he suddenly stood up and looked down at me.

「Because that’s all you’ve been thinking of, you’ve been sitting inside a man’s room in the middle of the night, crying defenselessly. You have to sense at least an ounce of danger, or else a man’s honor might get questioned.」

After he said it, with a jerk of his arm, thinking that he was pulling me up to my feet, Wolf instead lifted my body.

This posture is what you would call carrying a girl “princess style”.

With a blank look and my mouth wide open, looking like a fool, I was surprised. Although I was shocked about Wolf’s strength, but more than that…

「Could it be, Wolf – did you really grow taller than me?」

「… You didn’t believe me?」

「That’s not what I… but, it’s only been three months.」

「I’ve been struggling to become mature. Along with my body. And my mind, too.」

With him laughing embarrassedly, to me, he seemed mature enough – he looked strong.

Now it was clear to me.

He was really becoming mature.

And maybe.

He is becoming different from the one I knew in the game, a new『Wolfgang Eisenhut』was being formed.

Note:

(1) Silver reacts to some elements of poison.

(2) I’m guessing she tried to drink it. Crazy woman…

—

One more chapter to go before the end of this arc. How are you all feeling about this story? Happy? Sad?

At this point, I’m planning to translate the next arc as well. I’m reading through the new arc, but I’m a bit stuck… Anyone know of a flower term that sounds like Rankuratsu? Or any German name in particular?

At this moment, I’m using Rankgerüste(trellis/flowering fences in English). But it might not be the right name.