Chapter 09

“Ahh, the air is wonderful!”

Upon arriving at the entrance to the Pedrica Mountains, I spread both arms wide and inhaled deeply.

The air was so cold and biting that it stung my lungs, but the scent of trees and earth mingled within it, making my heart flutter once again.

Whoosh, inhale, whoosh, inhale.

After breathing in the familiar forest scent several times, I finally took in the sight of the enormous snow-covered mountains of Pedrica.

“Wow…”

This was incredible.

A vast expanse of pure white snow stretched endlessly, filling my entire field of vision.

Brilliant snow clung to each overlapping mountain ridge, and whenever the wind swept past, powdery snow rose from the ridgelines and scattered through the air.

Just thinking about climbing over frozen ground again after so long made the corners of my mouth curl upward.

‘Hehe.’

Contrary to the knights’ and the Grand Duke’s worries, I reached the entrance to the mountains without the slightest difficulty.

My breathing wasn’t even labored, and my legs and shoulders actually felt lighter.

‘As expected, people are meant to live with their feet on the earth.’

With my heart light and excited, I started walking deeper into the mountains.

The two knights who had rushed ahead when the Grand Duke appeared were already nowhere to be seen.

But there was no particular reason to worry.

A very clear path lay before my feet, one that the Grand Duke’s knights had painstakingly cleared.

No matter how harsh and merciless the northern mountains were said to be, this was a place the Grand Duke’s knights climbed and descended all the time for training.

Perhaps because of that, the paths they used were unmistakably marked by human hands.

“What a shame.”

I clicked my tongue, disappointed.

‘Herbs and rare poisonous plants don’t grow in places that have been trampled by people like this.’

On top of that, it seemed the two knights who had gone ahead had cleared away the snow that had accumulated overnight even while carrying out their punishment.

And it wasn’t just snow.

They had even pulled out every sharp rock jutting from the frozen ground and every stubborn weed they came across, tossing them to the side of the path.

As if telling me to be careful and follow behind them.

‘No matter how much they dislike me, knights are still knights.’

The faces of the two men came vaguely to mind—their worried expressions when they had been concerned for me before I climbed the mountain.

I let out a small laugh.

They were blunt and rough, but I could clearly feel the quiet consideration characteristic of northern knights buried beneath it all.

Following the path the knights had so kindly prepared for me, I began properly climbing the mountain.

I liked the feel of the solid ground beneath my feet.

Even the chill seeping up through my soles despite the cleared snow felt wonderful.

After more than two weeks without climbing a mountain, it felt as though my body had finally returned home.

The winter mountains of the south were nowhere near as fierce as these, but rather than frightening me, the thought of the poisonous plants that must be growing amid such harsh conditions only made me more excited.

Huff, gasp, gasp—

How long had I been climbing?

Naturally, I could no longer sense the presence of the knights who had run ahead while carrying full combat gear.

Perhaps I might encounter them when they reached the summit and came back down, but there was no way I could catch up with them.

I stopped walking.

‘At this rate, there’s no point in climbing the mountain.’

It wasn’t as though I had boldly volunteered to share their punishment just so I could follow this neatly cleared hiking trail.

I stood where I was and slowly surveyed my surroundings.

Outside the path the knights had cleared, snow was still piled high enough to sink well above my knees.

Bare branches and strange, blackened weeds that had died from the cold jutted grotesquely from those grave-like mounds of snow.

To anyone else, it would have looked like nothing more than the bleak scenery of a dead winter mountain.

But to my eyes, it looked completely different.

My mouth watered.

‘How many medicinal herbs and poisonous plants could be hiding beneath that snow?’

I swallowed hard and slipped my hand beneath my cloak.

Then I pulled out the gardening gloves and hand hoe I had hidden around my waist.

A few days ago, on the day I had been cleaning the windows on the outer wall.

I had been watching Celine searching for a four-leaf clover beneath the ladder when I happened to find the gloves and hoe.

It seemed a gardener had left them behind while tending the flowerbeds, and I had quietly taken them.

They were small and worn, but sturdy enough to break through frozen ground.

I gripped the handle of the hoe tightly and abruptly turned away, as though I had no attachment whatsoever to the safe, cleared trail.

Toward a place untouched by human footsteps.

Toward that perfect, unexplored territory where rare medicinal herbs and deadly poisonous plants seemed certain to be growing everywhere.

For a moment, my bet with the Grand Duke came to mind.

‘It doesn’t matter if I lose the bet anyway.’

The truth was, I had never intended to win the bet in the first place.

Varkan was following the princess from a distance.

At the same time, he simply could not understand her bizarre behavior.

Of course, trying to understand someone who was not in their right mind was unreasonable in itself, but being mentally unstable and possessing that absurd level of physical stamina were entirely different matters.

If she was truly the Princess of Delmar, who had supposedly grown up like a hothouse flower, then merely reaching the entrance to the mountains while being battered by the fierce northern winds should have left her gasping for breath.

Yes, considering her personality, one might assume that she had endured everything through sheer stubbornness and somehow made it to the entrance.

But once the princess began climbing the mountain, she was excited the entire time.

Literally.

She was as exhilarated as a puppy stepping onto snow for the first time, yet as nimble as a fox racing through a snow-covered mountain as though it were its own territory.

Her steps were light, and her breathing was remarkably steady.

Was that even possible?

As Varkan watched the princess, who was clearly not normal, he found himself wondering exactly why she was not normal.

He had been quietly following behind her for quite some time now.

They had already reached the middle of the mountain.

Varkan narrowed his eyes.

‘She has extraordinary stamina.’

He suddenly remembered Hendrick’s report about how she had performed her duties as a maid without ever seeming to tire.

At the time, he had merely interpreted it as meaning that she was surprisingly capable for such a frail princess.

But seeing her now, that clearly wasn’t the case.

That level of stamina simply should not have been possible from such a delicate frame.

Varkan looked up toward the summit.

‘The others who went ahead must already have reached the top and be on their way back down.’

Surveying the flow of the mountain, Varkan resumed following behind the princess.

That was when—

The princess, who had been moving steadily along the path, suddenly stopped.

Then she slipped a hand beneath her cloak and began rummaging around before pulling something out.

Varkan’s brow furrowed slightly.

‘…A hoe?’

It was an object that looked completely out of place in her small, pale hand.

‘Where on earth did she get that this time…?’

Haah.

Varkan pressed a hand against his throbbing forehead and sighed.

Before the sigh had even ended, the princess glanced around and abruptly stepped off the path the knights had cleared, changing direction.

Following behind her, Varkan thought,

‘So it’s finally starting.’

Yes, he had thought it strange that she had been climbing the mountain so quietly.

He silently followed her.

If anything dangerous happened, he decided, he would use it as an excuse to take her back down the mountain.

He wanted nothing more than to snatch the hoe from her hand right then and drag her back to the Grand Duke’s residence.

But then—

Whack! Whack-whack! Whack-whack-whack!

“…”

The princess began rapidly clearing away the snow piled beneath a dead tree.

‘What on earth is that…?’

Then—

Thud, thud, thud!

She began striking the frozen earth with the hoe.

Varkan was rendered speechless.

A woman who looked perfectly normal and beautiful was hacking away at the rock-hard frozen ground like a beast, using a hoe that looked more like a weapon.

It was the sort of sight that would have sent chills down the spines of the other knights or servants if they had witnessed it.

But Varkan found himself perplexed for an entirely different reason.

‘…She’s skilled.’

The ground had frozen and thawed hundreds, perhaps thousands, of times.

Digging through it with a tiny hoe—and doing so with nothing but the strength of those slender little hands—could not possibly have been easy.

Yet the princess chipped away at the soil, changing the angle of her strikes again and again.

Her movements were strangely practiced.

After digging into the ground for quite some time, the princess placed something into a pouch she had prepared in advance, then moved to another spot.

She dug again.

And again.

Then, smiling brightly as though she had gained the entire world, she carefully swept what she had found into her pouch.

Watching her like that suddenly brought an old memory to Varkan’s mind.

His mother, who had lost her mind after being abandoned by his biological father.

Not everyone was the same, of course, but people who lost their reason after suffering severe trauma often developed an obsessive fixation on something.

Varkan’s own mother had been like that.

Every morning, she would go to the winter seashore wearing only thin clothes and gather small, useless pebbles.

Without even realizing that her fingertips were turning black from frostbite, she would treasure those worthless stones as though they were jewels, filling boxes and pouches with them.

Perhaps the princess, too, had suffered some terrible loss for some reason and had become so obsessed with meaningless stones or weeds.

The princess’s back as she moved away, blowing warm breaths over her dirt-covered fingertips—

For some reason, it overlapped with the final image he had of his mother.

The corners of Varkan’s eyes softened slightly.

Feeling a strange, desolate ache settle somewhere in his chest, Varkan continued silently following the princess’s bizarre behavior for quite some time.

Then the princess began climbing a steep slope.

Varkan’s brow creased faintly.

‘That’s dangerous.’

The direction the princess had excitedly run toward was a steep area of the Pedrica Mountains infamous for its unstable ground.

Covered in snow, it might look like flat terrain, but beyond it lay a dizzying area that ended in a thousand-foot precipice.

‘It’s time to take her back down.’

Varkan decided he had given her more than enough time.

He was just about to step toward her when—

“Wow!”

With a sudden, short cry of amazement, the princess abruptly disappeared from his sight, seeming to plunge straight down into the empty space below.

“……!”

Startled, Varkan instinctively sprinted forward.