Chapter 49: The Virgin Snow

It had snowed through the entirety of the night. It was the very first snowfall of the year.

When I opened my eyes that morning, a quiet shock rippled through my chest. The world visible through the narrow seam of the heavy drapes was completely, seamlessly blanketed in pure white. Even the massive glass panes—which had been heavily treated with specialized thermal sorcery to prevent the biting winter drafts from penetrating the interior—were entirely obscured by a thick, velvety layer of condensation and intricate frost patternings.

“Wow……”

Having awakened significantly earlier than my usual baseline today, I carefully slid the velvet curtains aside, maneuvering myself toward the window sill entirely unassisted to quietly observe the transformed exterior. I ultimately chose to refrain from pressing my palms flat against the glass to secure a closer look; I didn’t want to risk leaving an unsightly cluster of handprints across the pristine transparency. The snow that had fallen overnight must have consisted of massive, dense flakes, for the ground was completely buried under drifts so deep the geography was entirely unrecognizable. From the gray expanse of the sky, a quiet, steady flurry continued to drift downward.

Though my private chambers occupied the second floor—a station elevated significantly higher than standard architecture due to the immense, cavernous ceiling of the ground level—the upper branches of the courtyard trees were directly level with my window. Even those bare, skeletal limbs were thickly pillowed with heavy snow, their fragile tips bowing under the sheer physical weight of the winter load.

The absolute sum of the world had surrendered to the white. The landscape appeared profoundly, almost clinically pristine. The aggressive, ostentatious color palette of the imperial palace had been entirely swallowed up, offering a welcome relief to my aching eyes. Because this marked the absolute first time I had ever witnessed a clean winter landscape from the perimeter of my room, a deep, childlike curiosity anchored me to the glass, keeping my eyes fixed on the falling flakes.

After spending an extended window absorbed in the view, my sensory dampeners picked up the distinct vibration of approaching footsteps navigating the corridor. I quickly slid back into the bed, pulling the thick duvets over my chest to conceal my early activity.

A polite, rhythmic sequence of knocks resonated against the wood, followed immediately by the familiar, measured voice of the attendant tasked with waking me every morning.

“Lord Ian, I am entering the chamber.”

Ordinarily, a solitary servant would cross the threshold to manage my morning routine and assist with my physical elevation, but the auditory feedback from the floorboards explicitly indicated two distinct pairs of boots. I held my breath, closing my eyes to project the illusion of deep sleep while waiting for them to close the distance to my bedside.

“Ian.”

The distinct, metallic scratch of a chair legs dragging across the carpet cut through the quiet. The individual who had settled into the seat reached out, his fingers incredibly gentle as he systematically brushed the stray locks of hair away from my forehead to coax me awake. It was Claire. Hearing that low, resonant baritone vibrating through my room at such an early hour was a profound absurdity.

The structural schedule of the imperial orders initiated at an incredibly unforgiving hour. During the deep winter cycles when the sun delayed its ascent, the knights would commence their conditioning maneuvers in absolute darkness, maintaining a relentless, unbroken training rhythm until the noon bells rang. As the Supreme Knight Commander overseeing the absolute entirety of the twelve imperial orders, Claire was theoretically anchored to those training grounds. It was logistically impossible for him to be occupying space by my pillow at this hour.

Surprised by the reality of his presence, I forced my eyes open, his name slipping past my teeth before my intellect could filter it.

“Claire……?”

Though I had been fully conscious for a considerable period, the lack of verbal activity had left my vocal cords severely parched, causing the syllables to break into a harsh, raspy register. That structural cracking, combined with my unvarnished confusion, made my voice sound intensely, pathetically startled even to my own ears.

“Good morning,” he responded softly.

In stark contrast to my own disheveled state—clad in loose nightshirts with my hair thoroughly ruined by the pillows—Claire stood before me in a state of clinical perfection. While he hadn’t donned the heavily ornamented formal dress uniform from our previous encounter, he was fully outfitted in his standard tactical training leathers. The ensemble lent him the distinct, terrifying aura of a perfectly trained, apex predator. The uniform was meticulously engineered from a flexible, high-density navy blue textile designed to maximize kinetic fluidness, with polished leather reinforcement plates bolted across his shoulders and vital joints to absorb impact.

His rich, auburn hair had been cleanly swept back without a formal parting, leaving the straight, aristocratic lines of his forehead and the sharp bridge of his nose completely exposed. My mind involuntarily flashed back to our days on the front lines, where the chaotic dirt of battle rendered hair pomade a useless luxury; Claire had habitually secured his stray locks with cheap, metal snap pins before charging into the vanguard. The memory brought a faint, internal smile to my lips.

“What brings the Knight Commander here at this hour……?” I inquired, my voice still carrying the heavy, thick quality of sleep.

“Ian, it snowed continuously through the night,” Claire answered, his response completely disconnected from the logical architecture of my question.

I instinctively opened my mouth to eagerly declare that I was already intimately aware of the weather, but caught myself at the absolute last second, choosing instead to offer a slow, carefully neutral nod. A bright, immensely refreshing smile broke across Claire’s features, and he reached out once more, smoothing his hand over my crown as if ensuring every hair was perfectly aligned.

“The flakes are still descending, albeit gently now. This is the very first snow of the year.”

The heavy, calloused texture of his palm lightly brushed against the tips of my eyelashes, causing me to reflexively squint one eye. I stared up at him blankly. And? While the arrival of the first snowfall was admittedly an event of minor cultural significance, it was hardly a monumental piece of state intelligence that warranted a direct, personal visit from the highest military official in the empire. Claire, however, clearly wasn’t finished delivering his proposal.

“I have completely cleared the First Training Grounds. Have you ever personally visited that sector?”

“Yes,” I murmured, my mind drifting. “Before the continental war initiated, I used to frequent that space to practice my forms.”

The First Training Grounds were an institution I knew intimately well. It stood as the solitary combat arena constructed within the interior defensive walls of the imperial palace, serving as the exclusive domain for the elite First Knight Order—the vanguard unit that doubled as the Emperor’s personal Sovereign Guard.

“Because the snow arrived, I systematically redirected all morning training maneuvers to the auxiliary arenas. The grounds are entirely vacant; the surface remains a pristine, unbroken sheet of white without a single footprint. If you are amenable to preparing yourself, would you care to accompany me out there?”

Claire extended the invitation with an expression that looked remarkably, uncharacteristically boyish.

The mental image of that vast, entirely undisturbed white arena instantly triggered a sudden surge of genuine excitement within my chest. Driven by the uncharacteristic spark of joy, I violently bolted upright—only for a massive, terrifying wave of postural vertigo to slam into my brain, forcing my frame to collapse heavily back onto the mattress. Because I was actively prohibiting my internal circuits from manipulating mana to stabilize my physical baseline, these mundane, everyday movements frequently resulted in pathetic physical failures. I pressed the heel of my palm against my throbbing forehead, letting out a low, involuntary groan of discomfort. Claire’s features immediately contorted with intense anxiety; he brought both of his massive hands up to frame my skull, his thumbs executing slow, incredibly gentle circular strokes across my temples to soothe the pressure.

I weathered the spinning sensation for a moment, gradually reclaiming my focus before opening my eyes. Claire slowly retracted his hands, a soft, knowing smile playing on his lips as he looked down at me.

“Does the prospect truly delight you to such an extent?”

The immense, flawlessly sculpted architecture of his physique remained completely unhidden by the heavy layers of his winter uniform. Claire didn’t merely possess broad shoulders; his back, his chest, and the entire circumference of his torso were developed to a degree that seemed to defy standard human dimensions. His forearms and thighs were thick cords of dense muscle, and though his fingers were long and remarkably well-formed, they carried a heavy, powerful thickness. He looked entirely like a creature explicitly engineered by the gods for the singular purpose of wielding a blade. Claire was a fascinating study in contradictions. When he swung a sword with that mathematically perfect, lethal balance, he resembled a terrifying demon from the underworld; yet, the moment a genuine smile broke across his face, that ferocity dissolved instantly, leaving behind the pure innocence of a youth.

The vivid brightness in his eyes intensified as they crinkled into a soft smile, radiating a brilliant, blinding energy. I stared up into those wide, clear eyes, a sudden, cold sense of displacement washing over me. A profound, hollow realization settled into my gut: I was an entity permanently incapable of projecting that brand of pure, unadulterated joy. Claire was taking me to that immaculate, untouched snowscape with the implicit expectation that I would mirror his lighthearted smile, but lamentably, my internal architecture was entirely too ruined to fulfill that desire.

The abrupt spike of happiness evaporated as quickly as it had arrived, plunging me into a profound, heavy melancholy. Though I had maintained a perfectly serene exterior, the reality was that ever since I had formally accepted Felix’s hidden proposition, my internal emotions had been fluctuating violently multiple times a day. Each time the pendulum swung, I was simultaneously crushed under a suffocating weight of self-loathing and immense guilt. I was actively walking toward the altar to pay the absolute price for my past transgressions, yet the fact that my internal consciousness experienced such a violent, instinctual revulsion toward my own demise made me feel utterly sickening. Whenever the discomfort flared, my emotional regulatory systems failed entirely.

Sensing the sudden, drastic drop in my internal energy, the smile instantly vanished from Claire’s face, replaced by an expression of deep, hovering concern.

“Do you…… do you not wish to go? Or is there perhaps an issue with your condition?”

I offered a slow shake of my head. Then, utilizing the exact mechanical process I had perfected over a lifetime, I systematically eradicated my thoughts and flattened my emotions. If I did not actively look away from the rot, existence became entirely unendurable. The moment the veil of numbness dropped over my mind, the superficial anticipation for the snow flowed back into the vacuum.

It had been an incredibly long time since my eyes had processed genuine, clean snow. Though the winter elements during the war had technically been generated by the Goddess’s authority, the ambient energy had been so thoroughly saturated with demonic miasma that for the past decade, every snowflake that drifted from the sky carried a distinct, contaminated gray tint. Given those bleak, apocalyptic circumstances, the simple act of observing a clean snowfall felt like a memory lifted from a completely different lifetime. The last time I had ever witnessed pure, white snow was during my infancy at the orphanage—a period that felt thousands of years removed from my current reality.

My current existence was anchored to a strict, non-negotiable expiration date, but within this brief, artificial window of safety, I possessed a small measure of autonomy. Surely, I could permit myself to enjoy a single, inconsequential morning. Comforting myself with that pathetic rationalization, I reached both of my arms upward toward Claire’s form.

“No. I want to go. It sounds wonderful.”

Claire immediately rose from his chair, bending his massive frame over the edge of the mattress. I naturally looped my arms around the thick column of his neck. Locking his powerful arms around my back to support my spine, he slowly, effortlessly elevated my upper body. Both he and I were acutely aware that my physical frame was entirely capable of executing this basic movement without assistance, yet this was a small, silent piece of indulgence I permitted myself to claim. Fortunately, Claire accepted the silent plea with absolute grace, ensuring my dignity remained completely intact.

Perceiving that my internal cloud had lifted, the warm, serene smile returned to Claire’s features. I looked up at him as he began methodically arranging the plush pillows behind my back to support my posture.

“Shall we depart the absolute moment breakfast concluded?” I asked.

“If that is your desire,” he murmured.

Though I had already conducted my secret medical inspection of the courtyard through the drapes prior to his arrival, Claire—wholly ignorant of my early awakening—strode across the floor to pull the curtains completely open, before carefully transferring my frame into the wheelchair so I could comfortably observe the outside world. While the secondary view didn’t trigger the same raw, aesthetic shock as my initial look, I meticulously monitored Claire’s expressions, exerting a conscious effort to perform the role of an excited invalid for his benefit.

Leaning my face close to the thick glass pane, I executed the exact action I had denied myself earlier, pressing my palm flat against the cool surface as I stared down at the drifts. Predictably, the clear glass was instantly marred by a dense cluster of my own handprints. Finding a strange, hollow amusement in the result, I intentionally shifted my hand across the surface, systematically stamping my palm over every patch of frost until the view was thoroughly obscured by my markings. Though my skin—which was already chronically cold due

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