Chapter 3: The Beginning Of Attachment Doll

A stark silence enveloped the campsite.

The only sounds audible were the whistling night wind and the gurgling of crimson blood flowing from the limp form in her arms.

The child who had been moving just moments ago was growing cold, hardened by the night air and wind.

“—-!!”

“Med–kit–hurry!!!”

The momentarily quiet campsite erupted into chaotic movement, as if war had broken out.

The arm supporting Sia, keeping her from falling to the ground, trembled.

The knights were shouting something, but she couldn’t hear them at all. Her entire being was focused solely on the cold child in her arms.

It was a mystery.

‘Why?’

‘Was there poison in the stew?’

She considered it but dismissed the thought.

Her knights would not betray their chivalry with such petty tricks.

‘Then what reason could there be for suddenly coughing and vomiting blood?’

‘Did the stew not agree with her?’

‘But who vomits blood just because they dislike the taste?’

‘Does such a person even exist?’

She couldn’t figure out the reason for vomiting blood.

Question after question tangled in her mind, confusing her thoughts.

She usually preferred simple thinking, but now, only complex thoughts filled her head.

First, she clamped down on the mouth from which blood continued to flow.

Her hand was already soaked in Sia’s blood.

Her own clothes were also red.

However, Sia’s clothes were redder, so she didn’t even notice her own.

Her thoughts flowed slowly.

The child was already cold.

‘Is she dead?’

The uncontrollably trembling arm felt strange.

Why was it doing this? She had no way of knowing herself.

Thump-thump. Thump-thump.

The heart she thought didn’t beat was now pounding faster than ever before.

Her vision blurred.

It wasn’t because of tears.

Her eyes had long since dried up, becoming a desert.

It wasn’t dizziness either.

Her brain was currently spinning faster than usual.

A haziness that felt painful not just to Sia, but to herself as well.

Yes.

Helplessness and frustration continuously blocked her thoughts.

She knew nothing of medicine, and couldn’t treat Sia immediately, the nearby village was already burned down, and everyone with her was a knight—

“Lady Lilac!!”

A loud voice calling her name made her head slowly turn to the right.

There stood Edwyn, holding a glass bottle filled with blue liquid.

“That’s…”

A Recovery Potion.

A potion made by alchemists imitating Holy Water, an essential item for adventurers, was held in his hand.

Her hand moved before her mind could.

She uncorked the potion Edwyn held, threw the cap to the ground, and immediately poured the open potion’s contents into Sia’s mouth.

More potion spilled than went down Sia’s throat, but she had no time to care and kept pouring.

Why did she want to save this child?

Why was she worried about this child, unlike any other?

How did the emotion of anger arise when she saw the cold body and thought her dead?

She didn’t know.

However.

She felt she knew one thing.

She wanted to save Sia, whom she had met for the first time today, spending less than half a day together.

She had known.

-‘She looks like she’ll die soon.’-

It was mere curiosity.

The girl remaining after suppressing the village fire didn’t want to die.

-‘Save, me.’-

That cracked voice speaking those words was the root cause.

She, Lilac, should have left Sia there.

If she had abandoned Sia.

She wouldn’t have had to feel this urgency and these various emotions.

Emotions were a luxury for her.

Raised as her parents’ doll, she often felt like she wasn’t even human.

But when she met Sia.

The emotions lost in childhood sprouted like seedlings in a dead field.

Because of Sia, she felt the emotions of a ‘human’ for the first time in a long while.

Although Sia herself had dead eyes from the start, those eyes resembled her own so much that a sense of kinship inadvertently brushed past her.

“Live.”

Perhaps that’s why she didn’t want to let her go?

She had seen many people similar to herself in this world, but Sia was somehow different.

As if reminding her of her past self.

Of course, she was two years older than Sia.

Treating her like a child was amusing, but well, given her height, it didn’t seem to matter if she treated her like one.

They had only known each other for a few hours, but those few hours felt like the best time in recent years. Though she hadn’t realized it herself.

Was her wish for Sia to live conveyed?

Or was it simply a delusion?

Slightly, the blood stopped flowing from her mouth, and the cold body returned to being slightly warm.

Feeling the emotion of tension for the first time, she carefully placed her hand on Sia’s chest.

What she felt was flesh, and beyond it, the faint pulse of a weakly beating heart.

Detecting that, the tension that had sharpened her senses eased, and beads of sweat that formed on her forehead trickled down her cheek.

Without the potion, Sia would have died.

Her intuition told her so.

She roughly wiped the dripping sweat with her sleeve.

The sleeve was heavily stained with Sia’s blood, leaving a streak of blood on her forehead. Everyone except Lilac saw the bloodstain drawn on her face, resembling something out of a horror movie.

She was already difficult to approach normally, but now it became even harder.

Lilac hugged the slightly stabilized Sia into her arms.

The smell of blood emanated strongly from both of them, but she didn’t care.

Sia’s blood scent was somehow, somehow… not bad.

Startle!

‘What was I just thinking?’

‘No matter how eroded my emotions are, finding the smell of human blood pleasant?’

It seemed she herself was very tired.

Yet, she didn’t release the embraced Sia.

She just wanted to stay like this.

Although she just met her, it felt like finding her missing half.

The tension that had frozen the campsite thawed again.

The knights seemed to think their master had handled things well.

Why they thought so was evident just by looking at Lilac’s expression. Like a cat that had claimed its toy. That seemed to be exactly the expression she wore.

With the eased atmosphere, the knights moved quickly, washing away the blood on the ground with water and cleaning the table where Lilac and Sia sat.

If the blood wasn’t cleaned quickly, wild animals or monsters might be drawn to it.

Of course, even if they were drawn, it wouldn’t matter.

These were hailed as the Empire’s finest knight order.

Even a small contingent of these knights could annihilate a small kingdom.

Truly the Empire’s elite knight order.

However, as the Ducal family’s knight order, even the Imperial family had to tread carefully around them.

As the situation somewhat calmed down, the relaxed atmosphere matured, and the campsite became bustling again.

Lilac didn’t particularly restrain it either.

She showed some consideration for the knights who couldn’t even eat because of her.

Now that things had calmed down, Edwyn, who had been standing in the same spot since earlier, spoke carefully.

However, the reply he received was.

“Mind your own business.”

It was a chillingly cold remark.

Edwyn immediately shut his mouth, bowed his head, and headed towards the table where the knights were.

Lilac currently wanted to monopolize this time.

She didn’t want Edwyn breaking this mood.

Just holding Sia and looking up at the night sky felt peaceful.

It just… felt that way.

About 5 minutes passed like that.

Lilac looked down at the small creature stirring in her arms.

The small creature, meaning the girl Sia, looked around here and there with eyes that wouldn’t open properly.

As if trying to grasp what had happened.

After looking around for a moment, she raised her hand and pushed Sia’s forehead towards her own chest.

Seeing the top of Sia’s head reach her nose, she removed her hand.

Sia, still unaware of the situation, just stared at Lilac’s hand that had pushed her.

Sia, who had been watching, seemed to come to her senses, startled, and turned her head back. Though due to her stiff neck, only her eyes were visible from that angle.

“Um, what happened?”

Perhaps due to the potion’s effect, her voice was less raspy than when they talked earlier, but it still wasn’t pleasant to hear.

Unless you were Lilac.

“Nothing happened.”

The bewildered Sia looked at her own clothes and Lilac’s clothes and was horrified.

The word ‘horror’ settled into her dead eyes, which looked just like her own.

That sight was strangely amusing, causing the corners of her lips to twitch upwards slightly before settling back down.

“Blood, I spilled so much blood. Eh?”

She tried to cover the panicked Sia’s mouth with her blood-caked hand but withdrew it.

No matter what, she didn’t want to dirty that face with a blood-stained hand.

‘Wait, isn’t it Sia’s own blood anyway, so does it matter?’

Lilac lacked common sense in many ways.

The potion was like that too.

She hadn’t even considered potions, thinking them inferior items only adventurers bought, lesser than Holy Water.
She thought she should always carry Holy Water from now on.

Carrying potions was a thought already dismissed from her mind.

‘Isn’t it enough to just carry a large amount of Holy Water?’

Truly simple thought processes.

Anyway, it seemed she should wash her hands before touching Sia.

She thought it was unsanitary.

She spoke to a nearby knight and used a whole canteen of fresh water just to wash her hands.

There couldn’t be a greater luxury than this.

Using water meant for survival just to wash hands.

An action difficult to perform if not for the title of ‘Lady’.

She flicked her washed hands dry and covered Sia’s mouth.

“Oomph!”

Seeing her startled face again as she tilted her head back brought a strange sense of satisfaction.

Until now, she had been the doll, but somehow… should she say a doll obtained a doll?

Ah.

She wanted to consider herself human now, not a doll.

Sia is the doll, and she is human.

Thinking like that didn’t feel bad.

She was in a position to get whatever she wanted.

She didn’t need to care about anyone’s opinion.

Not even the Emperor, or currently, the Duke and Duchess, scared her.

Because she, known as the Empire’s Magic Sword Master, and her knight order were here.

The knights weren’t exactly the Ducal family’s people, but the Lady’s people.

If she put her mind to it. Anytime, anywhere, she could stage a revolution. Though she had no ambition for power, so she hadn’t attempted it.

However, to ‘have’ Sia, it seemed worth considering.

If a Lady takes in a commoner, social perception would worsen.

To change such perceptions, the Imperial family-.

“Mmph!!”

“Don’t talk. Do you want to strain your throat and see blood again?”

“……”

She spoke to Sia, who was quietly protesting as if frustrated.

At that, Sia flinched and went limp.

Knowing it was useless to defy her.

It was quick surrender.

Lilac reorganized the thoughts interrupted by Sia.

If she took Sia to the Ducal estate, the family would cause an uproar.

Then things might go wrong, and the Duke and Duchess might ask the Imperial family for help. If the Imperial family also pressured her like that. The fate of the Empire would be.

“That would be the end of it.”

“?”

Sia, who had gone limp in her arms, lifted her head.

Because Sia’s head was near her chest.

Like lounging on a sofa.

At that sight, she lightly stroked Sia’s hair.

Today, for the first time.

Not even half a day.

This commoner girl felt like she had found her missing half.