Several years ago, at the Warm Home Orphanage, on an afternoon so bright it almost felt excessive—
Nicole was younger then, and her pink twin-tails were a little rougher and less neatly kept.
Having once again been caught red-handed after causing some "highly creative" trouble, she was now wearing a miserable expression as she unwillingly swept the courtyard with a broom nearly as tall as she was.
"N-Nicole big sis…"
A faint little voice came from behind her.
Nicole turned around and saw tiny Xiao Luo sneaking over like a cautious kitten. Carefully, she pulled out two roasted sweet potatoes from her arms, still warm.
"For you… The headmistress punished you, so you didn't get lunch, right…"
Nicole had found Xiao Luo by a street corner a few years earlier. Back then, the girl had been so cold she could barely speak.
After coming here, Xiao Luo became Nicole's little shadow, and the two of them grew very close.
As for Nicole herself, even earlier than that—after the fall of Old Eridu—she had lost her memory, lost everything, and had been brought back from a street corner by Headmistress Demara.
Naturally, the "crime" of secretly eating roasted sweet potatoes did not escape the headmistress's notice. At some point, Headmistress Demara had already arrived in the back courtyard. Nicole instantly switched into her usual cheeky grin and hurried to beg for mercy first.
"Heeaaadmistress~ I know I was wrong! I seriously won't do it again next time, so please let me off this once!"
Unexpectedly, the headmistress did not lecture her as usual. She only sighed softly and looked at Nicole with a complicated expression.
After gently patting Xiao Luo's head, she said in a warm voice, "Xiao Luo, go play with the others for a while first."
Then she looked at Nicole.
"You. Come to my room."
The room carried a faint herbal scent. Only the two of them were inside.
Nicole felt a little uneasy, but still forced a smile onto her face.
The headmistress sat down in an old wicker chair, but before she could speak, a violent fit of coughing suddenly seized her. She bent over, her face instantly turning pale.
The smile vanished from Nicole's face at once.
She rushed forward in a panic, clumsily but urgently supporting the headmistress, patting her back gently, then dashing off to pour her a cup of warm water.
Only after a long while did the headmistress recover, her breathing gradually calming again.
Looking at Nicole's face, still full of lingering worry, she did not scold her for her earlier mischief. Instead, she asked softly:
"Why… did you refuse that family last time? I had a very hard time persuading them. Their conditions… were really quite good."
Nicole pressed her lips together and stubbornly turned her head away.
"I don't want to leave the orphanage. If I go, who's going to take care of you? Who's going to take care of Xiao Luo and the others?"
In truth, most of the children who had arrived at the orphanage around the same time as Nicole had already been adopted and begun new lives.
Only Nicole had stubbornly remained, using every method she could think of to "drive off" one potential adoptive family after another.
The headmistress looked at her, her eyes full of helplessness, but even more of aching tenderness.
"Nicole… you should think a little more about yourself. You're always this reckless, and you spend money with no sense of restraint. In the future… how are you going to live carefully? How are you going to build a proper life?"
"Who says I won't?!" Nicole snapped back at once like a cat whose tail had been stepped on. She whipped her head around, voice rising as if she were making some grand declaration.
"I'm definitely going to make a ton of money someday! I'll buy whatever I want! I'll build an even bigger orphanage too! I'll bring you there, and Xiao Luo and everyone else too!"
Sunlight shone through the window, scattering warm patches of light across the somewhat worn floorboards.
The old woman and the young girl—two people with no blood relation—bickered back and forth inside that humble room.
What filled the air was not blame, but something hard to describe, something almost like family: warmth, attachment, a bond that ran deep.
The headmistress watched Nicole puffing her cheeks in indignation, and in the end only shook her head. A nearly imperceptible smile tugged at her lips, carrying both fondness and worry, as she murmured softly:
"Silly child…"
A timid knock at the door interrupted the warmth in the room.
"Headmistress… there are guests outside."
The visitors were finely dressed and carried themselves with unmistakable elegance. On their chests was the emblem of the Melopede family—a thorned rose entwined around the staff of medicine.
Their purpose in coming was very clear:
they were looking for a suitable adopted daughter for the younger generation of the family.
"Our generation lacks daughters," said the lead envoy in a flat tone, as though stating a business matter. "If we wish to climb higher on the ladder of power, marriage alliances are a necessary step. However, the truly prestigious families do not deign to marry their daughters beneath them. Therefore, we require a 'daughter'—a piece to use in securing ties with houses of even higher standing."
Their gazes swept over every child in the orphanage like precisely calibrated instruments.
In the end, they stopped on Nicole.
She was the right age, and she was beautiful.
She was the only suitable choice here.
"Come with us, and the family will provide you with the finest education. We will raise you into a true lady," the envoy promised her, his voice carrying a seductive certainty that brooked no refusal. "In the future, you are destined to become a wife admired by all in a great and wealthy house."
Headmistress Demara forced herself upright and shielded Nicole behind her.
She had long heard of the Melopede family's reputation—monopolizing medicine, driving prices higher and higher, leaving countless poor families staring helplessly at life-saving drugs they could never afford.
This was no good home.
She was just about to refuse them as tactfully as possible, when a heart-rending coughing fit struck her all at once.
Pain blackened her vision, and her body crumpled limply to the floor.
"Headmistress!"
Amid the chaos, the Melopede family's people swiftly arranged to have her taken to the hospital—not entirely out of kindness, but more to avoid trouble.
Nicole followed closely behind them. Before leaving, she only had time to hurriedly tell the terrified Xiao Luo:
"Take care of everyone!"
At the hospital, the scent of disinfectant was cold and biting.
The doctor's diagnosis came down like a final sentence:
"Late-stage cancer. At present, the only thing that can prolong her life is a special medication. But as for the price…"
He did not finish.
But the weight of that silence alone was enough to crush the entire orphanage.
At that very moment, the Melopede envoy, like a hunter who had already been waiting for this exact instant, spoke up with perfect timing. His voice rang out clearly in the silent corridor:
"It seems fate has arranged a transaction for us."
"The medicine that can extend her life is produced by the Melopede family."
"Miss Nicole, as long as you agree to be adopted into the family, and agree to fulfill your future duties as our 'daughter'…"
"Then the medication Headmistress Demara needs will be supplied free of charge, in unlimited quantity. Furthermore, all of her future medical expenses will be fully covered by the Melopede family."
With elegant composure, he stepped forward and extended his hand toward Nicole.
The gesture did not feel like an offer of hope.
It felt more like the asking price for a soul.
"So," he said, "what is your answer?"
Nicole stood frozen in place, feeling as though all the blood in her body had turned cold.
She stared at that hand—the hand that represented the turning point of her fate.
Then, through the small glass window in the hospital room door, she looked at the headmistress lying pale and peaceful in bed.
That person who had always tolerated her, taught her, and given her warmth…
That home she had sworn to protect…
On one side was a future in which she would lose her freedom and become nothing more than a chess piece to be moved at others' will.
On the other was the headmistress's only chance to live.
Time crept forward in the silence.
Every second felt like a knife slicing into her resolve.
In the end, all her struggle, all her stubbornness, meant nothing before the brutal scales of reality.
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
When she opened them again, something that had once shone in them seemed to have gone dark.
Slowly, almost numbly, she placed her cool, trembling hand into the one waiting for it.
"…I agree."
Join here to read ahead.
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Crossover Anime Multiverse: The Demon Hunter of an Unnatural World 70
From Junkman to Wasteland 60
Weekly Refresh of Overpowered 31
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Honkai: Is This Still the Prev 42
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From Demon Slayer to Grand Ass 55
The Way the Umamusume Look at 42
Uma Musume, but My Cheat Power 40
Naruto: Weaving the Future, Be 36
Zenless Zone Zero, but Kamen R 30
Multiverse Crossover: The Perf 26
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