“Your Highness will no longer be able to smile.”

The magician’s voice was as soft as a lullaby.

“Your Highness will no longer be able to show anger. Boiling rage will burn your insides, or be channelled through a sword pointed towards your enemies.”

After pronouncing such irreversible declarations, he took his brush dipped in blood and began to draw lines on the cut-open chest of Bertram, a prince of the country.

With every brush stroke, the rock embedded in Bertram’s heart writhed. The bone of a dragon. From now on, this would be Bertram’s main artery.

Before closing up the chest, the magician said, in a slightly sad tone, “Your Highness will no longer be able to cry. When the corpse of His Majesty returns from the battlefield, even on the day of the funeral… you will not be able to shed a single tear.”

“That is fine. This is what will make me a strong warrior.”

Bertram was a young man of only sixteen years, yet his voice was firm. His strong will could be felt from his eyes, blue like the ocean, underneath his black hair.

It was because he had this will that he must be throwing his body into battle, but….

As the magician drew his final line, he spoke.

“The people want a strong leader, but they also fear an emotionless one. Your Highness may not be able to sit on the throne even after the war is over.”

“Even if I lead us into victory?”

“Yes. When tears do not fall from your eyes in front of His Majesty’s corpse, the people will call Your Highness a monster.”

Bertram could not understand what that meant.

But he was now unable to express even his doubts on his face.

With a bitter smile, grieving the prince’s fate—the magician stitched the prince’s chest closed.

Six years after the very day, the prince threw his body into the battlefield.

The war ended in defeat.

The country fell into ruin, and many of the youth could not return home.

Their living expenses conscripted to the nation, the people were simply sitting on their hands now.

In order to calm the chaos, Prince Sadle, brother to the previous king who died at war, rose to the throne in his place.

By doing so, they were ignoring the prince who had come of age during the war, but there was nobody who opposed the ascension of Prince Sadle.

On the surface, it was because he had acted as proxy to the king during the war and had done all the king’s duties.

In reality, it was because they did not want to serve a sword-crazy monster who had lost his emotions as their king.

The prince, Bertram, did not weep even at the funeral of the previous king. His blue eyes that did not know how to smile were as turbulent as the whirlpools of the winter sea.

Only when he was swinging his sword like a monster at the front lines did they feel any vitality from him.

He was a trigger that reminded the people of the war.

And so, Prince Sadle ends up deciding to separate his troublesome nephew from state affairs for a time being.

The Prince, who’d gained a long, long vacation overnight, thus chooses to….

***

Three years from that time.

In the vast countryside potato field, a stern voice of a woman rang out.

“Anything you want to say before you die!”

“What? Are you telling me to die just because I filched some potatoes?”

The two thieves raised their heads, dumbfounded.

But Anna, the farm manager, did not waver, and continued seriously.

“The potatoes from this field are for the resident villagers to eat. Therefore, by trying to steal potatoes, you tried to kill over a hundred residents.”

“What the? It’s just a few potat—gueh!”

Anna swung a pickaxe in the air.

Green eyes flashed between dishevelled blonde hair. This was a murderous temper that did not fit the cute and small image of a countryside lady.

“You looking down on the potatoes, or you looking down on me?”

'S- s- stop! Fine, we’ll give it back!”

The men hastily brought out dirty potatoes from their pockets. But the pickaxe did not back off.

In the end, they jumped up and down in their places to prove that their pockets were empty, then watched her carefully.

“You’re done now, right? Can, can we go now?”

“Not yet. Pay me back for the manure.”

“…… What?”

“You need to pay the price for digging up the potato field. So pay me back for the manure, or if you don’t have money, at least poop here before you go.”

At first, the men burst out laughing.

But Anna’s expression was serious, and the men were eventually unable to laugh.

‘This woman, she must be crazy.’

The price of hesitation was big.

Anna lifted the pickaxe again and pointed at the buckles on the men’s pants.

“Should I take it off for you?”

Of course, the men refused and ran off.

“Aaaaah! She, she’s crazy!”

“Don’t you ever come back, you b*stards! Next time, I’ll skin the leather off of you and use it as scarecrows!”

After the two scrambling men disappeared from sight, Anna picked the potatoes up and came down to the field.

It had already been three years since the war had ended in defeat.

The taxes were still heavy, those who had lost their hands or feet had lost their jobs, and many villages were still struggling with the lack of manpower.

Due to that, Anna usually turned a blind eye to petty thieves. She sometimes entrusted them with a few chores and pressed vegetables into their hands as compensation.

But no matter how you looked at it, the men who had come just now had not been simple petty thieves.

‘Those things, they definitely came to our village to find treasure.’

After the war. In the disorderly world, all kinds of peculiar rumours spread about.

They said that a prince addicted to blood was going around to kill citizens, or that missing soldiers had actually been eaten by the enemy, so on and so forth.

The treasure supposedly buried in this village’s public farm was one of those very rumours.

‘It’s a treasure of a field because it farms well, but that must have been reported falsely. You have to be a fool to believe it.’

What should I do if someone digs up the field again next time, kick their butts and bury them into the ground? So they can be manure themselves?

Thinking up these joyful imaginations, Anna went down to the village, but……

Soon, an unpleasant scene spread out before her eyes.

Young people from the village were threatening a seated man… and in front of Anna’s restaurant, at that!

Anna rushed to them and yanked on the sleeve of the young villager's who’d lifted his fist.

“Why are you fighting in front of our restaurant!”

“Oh, Anna. This clearly suspicious guy was sitting at the front of your restaurant and won’t get up. And when we ask, he only says weird stuff!”

“And so you bring up a fist? Step out for a second! If he’s our customer, let me see him for a bit.”

Still huffing, as if they had not shaken off the excitement yet, they drew back.

And when the threatened man’s silhouette appeared—

Anna momentarily understood what they were feeling.

                                                If he sauntered around with his build, they could only have seen him as a bear searching for honey.’

The man was incredibly large. Crouched down as he was, he still looked like a boulder that had been rolled here. His dark fur cloak on his shoulders only added to his imposing figure.

But the uneasiness lasted only a moment.

When the man lifted his head, Anna looked at his face and became speechless.

Underneath his manly forehead, his deep eyes were of a blue, like someone had poured the winter lake into them. Dust and dirt were heaped on top of his black hair, which was just long enough to cover his ears slightly.

But what caught Anna’s eyes was his sharp jaw…. Or, actually, the sunken cheeks that made his jaw look even sharper.

Pity filled Anna’s eyes.

The people nearby, too, sensed the change in Anna.

‘No.’

‘Anna’s about to pick up a person and fatten them again……’

As everyone expected. Anna grabbed the uninvited man’s sleeve.

“You there!”

“……. Yes?”

A dignified but raspy, very, very dry voice.

Every time he spoke, it felt like sand would be falling from his mouth.

All the young villagers took one step back. Only Anna squatted in front of the man and looked at him.

“You were so parched, you couldn’t even speak. Come to my restaurant. I’ll give you food.”

“I don’t need a meal. What I need is—”

“It’s free! Just eat! I happen to have a potato I found on the way here, see? If nobody eats it for me, then I need to throw it away!”

Anna brought out the potato the thieves had attempted to take earlier and shook it.

Had he let himself be tricked by this transparent nonsense?

Whatever the reason might be, the man, who had been expressionless even when he was being threatened by the villagers, followed Anna into the restaurant.

As he stood up and headed to the restaurant, the shoulders of the villagers unconsciously tensed.

They’d already expected his frame to be huge from when he’d been seated, but—

Set upright, this man’s height was a head taller than most of the young men. Which meant, he was two heads taller than Anna.

And his shoulders—they were so large that, if they propped him up against a door frame, he could be used as the door instead.

On the other hand, Anna was feeling a different emotion rather than pressure.

‘I wonder how much I’d need to feed him so that he looks pleasantly plump.’

It seemed like a few potatoes would not be enough to solve this.

After seating the man in the restaurant, Anna pulled out other ingredients from the kitchen. She cut the bacon a finger’s width, brought out some cheese, and took out some unsavoury wine on the side.

Once a full meal was set, the man reached out his hand without a word of thanks.

He neither smiled nor frowned as he put the food into his mouth. Rather than eating, he was placing the food in. Anna wondered if she was treating him to some lumps of clay.

That bacon over there was thick and hard, so it should definitely feel good when you crunched and swallowed them, that feeling you get when you swallow soft and chewy and toasty hot pork fat…!

But the man barely even chewed before his meal ended.

He opened his mouth with a much more stabilized voice than before.

“Hello. My name is Bertram.”

“Wow, that’s a cool name. I’m Anna Wirth! I manage this village’s public farm, and I’m the owner of this restaurant! Was your meal alright?”

“Yes. They were good nutrients.”

Anna failed at controlling her expression.

‘What is this guy saying? I feed him ‘til he’s full, and he can’t even say that it was good?’

Even as Anna’s chin wrinkled like a walnut right in front of him, the man called Bertram peacefully searched his bag for a piece of paper and thrusted it towards her.

A dirty, tattered piece of paper. There even seemed to be blood on that, too.

Not wanting to touch it, Anna read the written words with hazy eyes.

“A rental of the aforementioned product for an indefinite period…. Reimbursement to be made after the war…. Is this a promissory note?”

*Promissory note: also known as an IOU, it’s basically a legal acknowledgement of debt that you promise to give back.

“Yes. Ordinarily, we would have to fill out specific paper forms, but at the time the forms weren’t available, and we had to use leftover paper. However, it still is legally binding.”

Binding or not, the paper was just full of complicated language using technical terms, and the name of the borrower was not even written.

However, the name of the one who’d lent out the item was clear.

Hans Wirst.

Anna’s father’s name.

“Hans Wirst? This person, he’s my father!”

“So I’ve come correctly. Where might he be?”

“That’s…. He passed away a few years back. I’ll receive it on his behalf! What item was it?”

Anna attempted to appear especially cheerful in order to avoid a sombre mood.

But even at the reveal of Hans’s death, Bertram wasn’t flustered, nor did he say the commonly offered words of ‘my condolences’.

‘What kind of wacko is this guy?’

Anna was taken aback, but she was soon to meet an even more absurd situation.

“The item to be returned has been lost.”

“……excuse me?”

“For that reason, I was going to ask the worth of that item to Mr. Hans Wirst personally and pay him back that way. It’s something that looks like this, do you know what it is?”

Bertram drew a picture on the back of the paper.

The shape that was as big as a fist, as two green horns sprouting out of it, was….

“An onion?”

“It’s not an onion. Mr. Hans Wirst said it was a special bulb prepared for his farm. Do you also not know of it, Miss Anna?”

“…… It seems I don’t. I don’t think it’s something we need, though.”

Getting a plant that you didn’t know about would be nothing more than a headache.

Anna shook her head.

“You don’t need to pay us back. Please don’t be burdened and….”

“I cannot.”

“Huh?”

“I plan to pay my debt no matter what.”

Saying such a phrase with an expressionless face and a voice without undulations, the pressure was incredible. Even Anna flinched, though she regularly smacked the backs of horse-sized young men without a thought.

“Um, it’s not really something we need, and…. J-just, have some food and go on your way!”

“Do I appear to be incapable of repaying the debt.”

“That’s not what I meant!”

“If not, please tell me the price you want. I will meet the price that you imagine.”

“……does it look like I’m trying to negotiate with you?”

The fear was only for a while. Anna slowly began to feel annoyed.

But Bertram did not notice this. No, he in fact brought up even more insulting words.

“Your intentions are irrelevant. Please call a price, so I can repay my debt. I will also consider substituting the price for any goods or any other way you want.”

“Goodness gracious, you’re so dreadfully sorry that I don’t know what to do!”

“Please don’t feel burdened.”

That single phrase vaporized all of Anna’s patience.

In the end, the rage that had built all the way up to Anna’s throat consolidated into one shout.

“Then pay me back with your body!”

T/N: Please don’t tell me I’m not the only one who laughed at ‘manly forehead’ up there, lol

                                         Anna Wirth’s heart was unnecessarily large.

Over and over again after the war ended, she picked up straggling, wounded soldiers, gave them work at the public farm, and fed them. Once their bodies recovered, she went the extra mile to figure out their ways back home. Among them, some settled into their village.

But that was something she’d done just after the war, when they had been lacking workers.

If she picked up another person, then some people were bound to narrow their eyes at her.

Just like how Dieter, Anna’s childhood friend, was doing now.

“Anna! I heard you picked up a guy! Do you have no fear? You’re driving me crazy—if you keep doing this then, you know, the guy who’ll become your husband will dislike it!”

As may be expected, the restaurant entrance did not respond to him.

A passer-by saw Dieter babbling at the door by himself, sighing as he went on his way.

Regardless, Dieter practised yet again.

“……would I be going too far if I mention the husband part already? Okay, I’m going to change it to just ‘somebody.’”

Dieter took a deep breath.

As soon as he went in, he’d shout this to Anna confidently. In anticipation of when he would propose to her one day!

Only after he practised three more times or so, Dieter pushed open the door with hands wet with cold sweat. At that moment, he happened to see Anna serving. Dieter stiffened his neck and shouted.

“Anna! I heard you brought another beggar back? How many times have you picked them up just because they're pitiful and……”

He spoke up until exactly that point before he became speechless.

Since they’d said ‘Anna picked up a beggar again,’ he’d thought it would be some super skinny person.

Instead, this thing that looked like an alpha male wolf was licking a soup bowl in the corner of the restaurant.

Dieter stammered.

“A-Anna…. Is it, safe here?”

At that question, the male wolf…… No, the dangerous-looking man lifted his head.

It seemed he’d mistaken him for a wolf thanks to his dark blue fur cloak, but the deep blue eyes behind strands of his black hair were just as threatening.

When Dieter stammered, Anna turned her head.

“What, Dieter. You come to pick a fight?”

“I, I came because I had some time.”

“Then now that you’re here, say hi to our restaurant’s worker. Mr. Bertram, please introduce yourself as well.”

Anna ran to the huge man, then took hold of that chin on his head and turned it towards Dieter. Was she handling a dog?!

Eyes like ice swivelled towards Dieter.

Dieter opened his mouth, shaking like a leaf.

“Hello. I’m Dieter. Son of the tailor. Anna’s childhood friend.”

“Hello. My name is Bertram. I am repaying my debt that I have to Mr. Hans. I am cutting onions. Furthermore, I am not close to Miss Anna.”

His voice was super nice.

Enough, in fact, that he only belatedly realized the overall randomness of the sentences he’d just said.

“…… Bertram? I’ve heard that name before.”

“I have also heard of the name Dieter many times before. It seems I have met seven people up until now.”

“That’s because Dieter is a common name! And a debt you have to old man Hans? He had a fortune he could lend out to others?”

Anna struck Dieter’s head with a smack

“Hey, he definitely could! We even have a promissory note, you know! Right, Mr. Bertram?”

Bertram nodded his head.

“Yes. As it is a debt that cannot be repaid materially, I am paying her back with my body, as Miss Anna has wished.”

Hearing the words ‘paying back with his body,’ Dieter’s eyes shook. Anna pulled at Dieter’s cheek.

“Don’t take it weirdly. I’m just giving him chores for the restaurant here and there. Like trimming the onions.”

“Onions? Why onions?”

“I tried giving him other tasks, but he was best at that. Speaking of which, Dieter, want to eat some onion soup before you go?”

Thinking perhaps that his time for self-introduction was over, Bertram drank up his second bowl. The onions heaved.

His hunger dropping rapidly, Dieter replied.

“Do you have anything else?”

“I have pickled onion sandwich, onion omelet, and onion steak without meat.”

Much too late, Dieter realized that the smell of onions was radiating in the restaurant.

“Are there only onion dishes?”

“Yeah! You know, I entrusted Mr. Bertram with chopping onions, and he didn’t spill a single tear while he was cutting a whole sack of onions. And he even rubbed his eyes! I was so amazed by that, I ended up asking him to chop up all two sacks of onions, and…. It just kind of became like this.”

“You sure got amazed at something weird!”