The Snow Leopard Baby of the Black Leopard Family

“Where is the child? Where is she?”

The Duke of Evalt jumped out of the carriage in an uncharacteristic hurry, forgetting all propriety in his urgency.

Alpheus Evalt Asterian.

A man who always maintained decorum, the Duke couldn’t care less about such things at this moment.

He had been scheduled to dine with the Emperor that evening, but upon hearing the news from Parden, he canceled it without hesitation.

After all, his granddaughter—whom he had believed dead—was alive. How could he leisurely sit down to dinner?

Fortunately, the Emperor, being Alpheus’s close friend, readily understood and excused him.

The Duke turned to a maid and said urgently, “Take me to her at once—or no, fetch Karsus first.”

At his gesture, a maid hurried off to summon Karsus.

The Duke, unable to bring himself to even remove his jacket or retreat to his study, waited in the central hall, pacing impatiently.

Before long, he spotted Karsus approaching from a distance.

His son’s face, which he hadn’t seen in some time, seemed to have regained a bit of color. Without waiting for Karsus to greet him, the Duke immediately asked, “So where is the child? Is it true? Are we certain she is Lena’s child?”

“She’s resting in Olivia’s old room. I’ve already requested a paternity test, but I’m almost certain, Father. The child is a Snow Leopard with golden eyes.”

Karsus gestured toward his own eyes.

“Like those of a Black Leopard.”

At this, the Duke let out a sigh of relief.

“I must see her at once.”

“She’s asleep right now. It’s best if you only take a quick look,” Karsus said firmly.

The Duke nodded in agreement. Together with Karsus and Parden, he made his way to Olivia’s old room, where the child was resting.

Karsus carefully opened the door to the room. Thankfully, the child was still fast asleep.

“Just a quick look,” Karsus reminded.

“I heard you the first time,” the Duke muttered, stepping inside.

The sight before him took his breath away.

A little girl with snowy white curls was sleeping soundly in the center of the bed.

Cautiously, the Duke stepped closer. Karsus and Parden stayed behind in the hallway, not wanting to disturb the child.

It was his first time meeting his granddaughter.

A granddaughter he hadn’t even known existed.

A surge of indescribable emotion welled up in the Duke’s chest, and he felt his eyes sting with unshed tears.

He reached out a wrinkled hand toward the girl’s face but hesitated and withdrew it.

Instead, he whispered softly, “...My dear.”

His voice broke, and he couldn’t bring himself to say anything more.

Worried that she might be cold, he carefully pulled the blanket up to her chin before retreating from the room.

Outside, Karsus and Parden were waiting for him.

“Well? What do you think...?” Parden asked, his voice trembling.

“What kind of question is that? Didn’t you see her earlier?”

“I did, but I didn’t get a proper look. I was in such a rush to report the news. How is the young miss? Is she well?”

The Duke waved him off impatiently.

“I don’t know. I only saw her briefly. But, Karsus, what’s the story here?”

At this, the Duke finally turned to Karsus for an explanation. Karsus, who had been staring at Tiel’s sleeping face through the slightly open door, straightened and began to speak.

“It seems the Nestians were hiding her. Since she’s Lena’s child... they probably didn’t want to give her up.”

Karsus relayed everything Ian had told him, leaving nothing out.

By the time Karsus finished, the Duke’s face had turned red with anger.

“That wretched Chender! That scoundrel! I’ll kill him myself!”

“Quiet, Father. You’ll wake the child,” Karsus said, raising a finger to his lips.

The Duke immediately fell silent, glancing nervously at the door.

Karsus pushed the door closed and said, “It would be better to continue this conversation elsewhere.”

The Duke, Karsus, and Parden moved to the Duke’s study.

But there was one thing they didn’t know.

Someone else had overheard their conversation.

***

"You useless thing! You are the shame of the Nestians!"

The harsh voice of her grandfather, Chender, echoed like a buzzing noise in Tiel’s ears.

In her dream, she saw Chender, Rowen, and the other servants, their faces appearing and disappearing like dust scattering in the wind.

Tiel was watching herself being scolded by her grandfather in the dream.

No matter how hard she tried, her abilities refused to manifest, and she was punished for it.

She saw Rowen taunting her with his rudimentary but functional ice abilities.

Her mother had been a powerful ice manipulator—strong enough to be considered the next head of the Nestian family.

And yet, Tiel had been told that because she had "devoured" her mother in childbirth, she should possess even greater abilities.

“Then why...”

Tiel, staring at her empty palms that couldn’t conjure even a hint of ice, always thought to herself:

Why don’t I have abilities?

If she had abilities, she too might have been loved.

She might have been...

Just like when she looked through the glass window at her grandfather, Rowen, and Cornelia moving away from her, Tiel found herself staring at her reflection.

And she desperately wished:

“I want to be loved too.”

To be loved, she needed strong abilities.

If she had powerful abilities, everyone would finally love her...

Suddenly, she felt a large, ominous hand reaching toward her face.

It was terrifying, as though it would strangle her at any moment.

In that instant, Tiel gasped awake.

Her eyes snapped open, and a strange ceiling came into view. Realizing she wasn’t in the Nestian estate but the Asterian estate, she felt a wave of relief.

“...Why haven’t they thrown me out yet?”

She had tried her best to behave and not be a burden, but she had eaten too much cake and even vomited.

Yet the maid had bathed her, dressed her in pajamas, and laid her on a bed.

“...Will they not throw me out?”

Tiel stared at the two small bells hanging from her chest as she pondered.

It was then that she heard faint voices conversing through the slightly ajar door.

Curious, she got up and tiptoed toward the door.

Peeking through the crack, she saw Karsus, an older man she didn’t recognize, and the butler, Parden, standing in the hallway.

At that moment, the older man, brimming with anger, exclaimed,

"...I should kill that bastard immediately!"

Gasp!

Tiel’s eyes widened in shock, and she staggered backward.

Kill?

It must have been about her.

The way Karsus had glanced toward her room confirmed it.

Her body trembling uncontrollably, Tiel hid behind the door. Thankfully, Karsus shut the door and left the hallway.

“...Kill me?”

It was true after all. The Asterians must truly despise her.

The servants were only kind because they didn’t know what kind of child she was.

Chender’s words echoed in her mind: no one would ever like her.

Her thoughts spiraled, and all she could hear was the word "kill" echoing over and over.

“I-I need to run away.”

She had come to the Asterians to survive, but she couldn’t stay and be killed.

Biting her nails anxiously, Tiel opened the door slightly and spun in place.

In an instant, her small body transformed into that of a baby Snow Leopard. The trembling little cub peeked into the hallway.

Fortunately, no one was there.

It happened to be the time when the guards were changing shifts.

The cub slipped out of the room.

It didn’t take long for Ria to discover that Tiel was missing.

“The young miss is gone!”

Ria’s panicked scream echoed through the estate. Guards lit torches and began searching every corner of the vast mansion.

Darkness had fallen while Tiel slept, but now the estate was as bright as day from the flood of torchlight.

Karsus, the Duke of Evalt, Parden, and Ria also carried torches, joining the search.

“Young Miss!”

“Miss Tiel, can you hear me?”

“Where are you, young miss?”

“Tiel!”

Despite the number of people mobilized, the search was difficult due to the size of the Asterian estate.

The Duke extended his hand. Flames roared to life in his palm, and several small salamanders materialized, dropping to the ground.

“Find the child. She’s a Snow Leopard with white hair and golden eyes.”

At his command, the salamanders scattered throughout the estate.

“Where are you, my dear?”

Karsus released his own salamanders, which glowed a slightly yellower hue than the Duke’s.

“Where could she have gone...?”

He couldn’t fathom where the child, frail and injured, would have gone.

It wasn’t possible that someone had taken her—only those within the Asterian household knew of her existence.

Then—

[Found her. Basement.]

[The child. Crying.]

[Comfort. Basement. White-haired child.]

The salamanders all relayed the same message. Without pausing to inform the others, Karsus sprinted toward the basement.

The Asterian estate’s basement was massive and maze-like, even the servants frequently lost their way.

How had the child ended up there?

Following the salamanders’ lead, Karsus navigated the labyrinthine basement, his mind consumed with worry.

Finally—

“...My dear.”

In the darkest, most secluded corner of the basement, where even torchlight barely reached, he saw a small figure sitting alone.

The little girl, sobbing softly, turned her head at his voice.

Her cheeks were streaked with dried tears, and the sight of her broke Karsus’s heart.

“My dear, come here,” Karsus said gently.

But the child only stared blankly at him.

“My dear... ah.”

It was then that Karsus noticed something was wrong.

The child wasn’t in her right mind.

Perhaps it was the darkness, or perhaps it was the fear, but she murmured to herself as if in a daze.

“G-Grandfather...? I-I can’t manifest abilities. I don’t have any abilities...”

Her lifeless eyes and muttered words made Karsus clench his jaw in anger at the Nestians.

He knelt and opened his arms toward her.

“Come here, my dear.”

“But, Grandfather...”

The girl hesitated, clutching her palms together as she stammered.

“I-I don’t have abilities, but this... appeared.”

In her trembling hands, a bright light flickered, shifting shapes—a fish, a leopard, a gust of wind—before growing ominously large, as if it would consume her.

Karsus’s eyes widened in shock.

“This is...!”

The radiant light filled the room, as if it would devour everything in its path.

It was Tiel’s first manifestation of her abilities.