The past few months.
As if to prove the seasons they had walked through, each of the children had co into their own.
Like true protagonists of their story, they had steadily grown.
The pilot cast off his long-standing fears, and the fox reached the stars.
The drunkard overca his trauma, and the little prince reclaid his rose.
Each one took a step forward into their next chapter.
—I have to... be better.
—Enough to reclaim all that was lost.
The vain girl was no exception.
No—perhaps she was even more desperate than the rest.
Because she hadn’t been given much ti.
She constantly reminded herself she needed to grow stronger.
—Attribute alteration... is it?
The girl trained every single day.
Her own limitations were painfully clear.
When she hit a wall she couldn’t overco, Emilia clung to her magic all the more.
In particular, she began digging deep into a domain known as [Attribute Alteration].
Often considered the pinnacle of elental magic.
—My father mastered this as well.
—That’s how he earned his title as the greatest cryomancer on the continent.
—Honestly, I’m not confident... but—
The legacy her predecessor had built.
Emilia followed that honorable path in silence.
Of course, that path was never an easy one.
She stumbled often, was constantly frustrated.
It was only natural.
—I can’t grasp it at all.
—It’s like walking through fog at dawn. Everything is so unclear...
—Was this ever a level I was ant to reach?
Transformation of ice.
Going beyond the assigned elent to manifest sothing entirely different.
It was one of the most daunting challenges in a sorcerer’s life.
With ordinary talent, even an entire lifeti—or death—wasn’t enough to reach it.
Emilia, too, repeated cycles of deep frustration.
—What even is it?
—They tell you to “feel” it... but the explanation is vague.
—There aren’t even proper textbooks on the matter.
—If Father were alive, I could have asked him directly...
The girl failed again and again.
Equations that always ca out wrong.
Her notes grew thicker and thicker, ink blotting across her desk.
With each mounting failure, the villainess sank deeper into gloom.
Naturally, she began to yearn for the past.
—What... am I even...
Frost clung to her fingertips like a stain.
Lying there on a sheet of ice, the girl simply chewed on her helplessness.
Just as her persistence was about to turn into resignation—
—Do you need power?
—I believe I can assist you.
Suddenly.
A flash of inspiration crossed Emilia’s mind.
It was a mory.
A recollection from a certain day.
—Don’t be startled.
—As long as I’m here... you won’t be overwheld, Your Highness.
—All you have to do is take my hand.
The monster they faced in the abandoned laboratory.
The mont she handled it with Yuda’s help was still vivid.
—I’ll show you a new world... just for a mont.
—It’s temporary power.
The villainess had taken his hand like one possessed.
And then, she cut down a monster far beyond her strength.
Without a hint of hesitation.
With a beauty so clean and decisive it was almost divine.
She rembered the ecstasy of omnipotence.
The world beyond mastery that the snake had shown her.
‘Maybe...’
Could that be the clue?
The shadow that had veiled the frost.
The darkness that colored her mana black and radiant.
Using that fragnt of mory as her lead, Emilia plunged into a new line of research.
—Just like that ti... freely, without being bound by mana.
—As if lting into the dark.
She retraced the sensations of that fleeting mont.
It wasn’t all that difficult.
The mory was so sharp she could recall even the snowflake that danced through the air.
Once her direction was clear, the villainess poured everything she had into it.
And after countless failures—she did it.
"I told you."
Attribute alteration.
Her mana now mixed with [Frost] and [Darkness].
The villainess stood with dignified, elegant steps.
Fwwwoooosh—
Her hair fluttered with an eerie calm.
Perhaps it was the heavy shadow cast over her—
The once-blue strands were now clouded with a murky hue.
That touch of decay lent the winter a more haunting chill.
Her lips moved.
"I said... I ca to take back that na."
Her blue pupils flashed with light.
The atmosphere flipped in an instant.
It was sothing that should’ve been impossible.
The wall of talent had never allowed her to reach such a realm.
But that once-coincidental connection—now fate—had led her to a miracle.
Emilia opened her eyes, drunk on omnipotence.
The world was still, like a dawn filled with light.
‘So calm.’
The sensation she’d once felt.
And her unrelenting efforts to replicate it.
Her characteristic stubbornness had finally borne fruit.
In the villainess’s breath, shadow now lingered.
"Haa..."
She looked down at her own hand.
Her arm and the snowflakes resting on it were now completely pitch-black.
Like snow covering the edge of dusk.
Through the curling storm, the air twisted like a mirage.
It was a wholly changed presence.
‘Did I... succeed?’
A black winter.
Emilia’s frost magic was now fully infused with night.
An elent beyond mastery, brushing the far side of dinsional bounds.
Fine frost hovered faintly around her.
‘...Though it’s still unstable.’
Was it because the realm had been reached through sheer grit?
Its refinent was abysmal at best.
Compared to the legacy of the previous generation, she was barely replicating forty percent—if even that.
And even then, it was unstable, making it difficult to control its pacing.
However—
‘It’s enough.’
It was enough to overco the traitor before her eyes.
The girl flicked her finger lightly.
Chaeng—!
Fragnts snapped off her fingertip.
Her uncle’s surprise attack was blocked all too easily.
His spell shattered into a spray of broken shards.
‘My body feels light.’
As if she were being carried on the wind.
Like a veil hung on a window, black fluttered with noble grace.
"Urgh, guh!"
"Uncle."
"How... How could soone like you use attribute alteration...!"
"Were you always this insignificant?"
Thud—!
Her clenched fist landed squarely against the man’s guard.
The impact sent her uncle staggering backward.
Dragged across the floor for quite a stretch, he still wore a look of shock.
He hadn’t expected his niece to cross that threshold.
Emilia raised her fingers, pointing.
"There are so many grievances I want to ask you about, but..."
"You dare... you wretched little brat!"
"I won’t drag it out."
It wasn’t out of rcy.
Even maintaining this form was pushing her limits.
The world she had forcibly stepped into was trying to cast her out.
Her consciousness could slip away at any mont.
So she intended to end it in one blow.
"O harsh winter..."
She murmured the incantation softly.
In its wake, pitch-black snowflakes brushed the walls.
What fell upon the corridor was dawn—or perhaps winter itself.
The thick chill pressed down on the atmosphere.
—Emilia-style Cryomancy Secret Technique—
‘Hoarfrost’
The girl poured in everything she had.
Mana gathered into a single point.
Originally, the spell would conjure ten thousand spears of ice.
But through her research and growth, it had beco sothing entirely different.
Now, only one spear took shape before her.
Ssshh—
Frost compressed so smoothly it was gentle.
The ten thousand that had once scattered now converged into a single point.
On top of that, thick shadow solidified the gathering snowflakes.
Power compressed to the brink created waves of mirage.
It was a beautiful sight.
"...Now, please let us go."
A blue-tinted moon rising in the night sky.
Its glow did not waver even slightly.
***
"Now, please let us go."
A voice echoing with chill.
Deron was no longer calm.
An unexpected developnt. A cornered position.
He clenched his fists, blue eyes trembling.
‘Damn it...!’
No way.
That inferior niece of his had crossed the wall.
The snowflakes fluttering around her were dazzlingly beautiful.
Cold sweat ran down his spine.
—Deron, please rember this.
—I’ve always been on your side.
A voice from the past brushed against his ear.
His idiot of a brother.
The silhouette of the girl shimred like the ghost of that mory.
Deron clenched his teeth against the chill running down his back.
Forcing away the pressure weighing on his shoulders.
‘That thing... is dangerous.’
His mind spun rapidly.
He assessed the situation.
After confirming the spell being cast, he imdiately launched a counter.
Deron knew the weakness of that technique.
‘Hoarfrost... requires casting ti.’
About a three-second delay.
That ant now was the most vulnerable mont.
He would cut down that detestable throat in a single stroke.
With that calculation in mind, Deron launched forward with a stomp.
In an instant, he was «N.o.v.e.l.i.g.h.t» right in front of the girl.
Thwak—!
"Die!"
He swung the blade he’d readied.
A flash of light in the blink of an eye.
And in that brief mont when their eyes t—
"Pft."
"...?"
Suddenly, Emilia’s lips curled upward.
Her eyes arched like she’d caught him in a trap.
Sothing was wrong.
His instincts scread.
Ssssh—
Her blue eyes weren’t fixed on him—they were looking just past his shoulder.
It was only a subtle glance, but he didn’t miss it.
And then her lips parted.
As if sending a signal to soone.
"Now, Ruska!"
The cry struck his ear.
Ruska.
A na he hadn’t anticipated in the slightest.
That sudden foreignness pierced Deron’s thoughts.
The girl’s earlier reactions, her smile, her strange gaze—all of it clicked together.
The accumulated data produced a single conclusion.
‘A feint—!’
Screeech—!
Deron twisted his blade’s path, deploying a defensive formation behind him.
Quick thinking. Clean, seamless defense.
A perfect response.
But—
"...?"
There was no one behind him.
Only the mocking blackness of night.
Deron realized.
"You fell for it, traitor."
That he’d been deceived.
He looked around belatedly, but Emilia had already completed the cast.
Her eyes glowed with clarity, boring straight into Deron’s heart.
The tip of her conjured spear shimred with rapture.
And the reaper of winter declared:
"We’ve been toyed with long enough."
Of the one who had lost his pride.
Of the one who stood at the threshold of his end.
"This is the end."
The next mont.
A flash swallowed the world in brilliance.
The mirage shattered like starlight.
And then—
"...Guh."
When the light faded.
Deron’s abdon had been pierced clean through.
His arms and legs were already frozen stiff.
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