I dropped onto my bed and looked down at Cassio, who Mirabel said had finished her lessons.
Since Mirabel was currently with Miraculum and Lancerial, their tutor, Cassio had been dropped off to me.
I wanted to start spending more time with her, but while she could speak.
She always seemed far more eager to simply watch, her eyes sharp and unblinking as though cataloging everything around her.
"Daddy!" Cassio exclaimed, reaching up toward me. "Give me more power!"
Huh? That was the first thing she had ever truly asked for.
A power-hungry two-and-a-half-year-old, I thought, though the more I looked at her, the less the term "child" seemed to apply.
Time was still slippery, hard to measure properly, but even so, her words carried a weight that startled me.
"Power, you say? Well, little death, you've already stolen something from me."
It was true. "Little Death" was the name I had chosen for her, because she had inherited, no, taken, my attribute of death.
Or rather, she held it innately.
If she grew as I suspected, she would not just wield death. She would become it.
It made me happy that she wasn't weak, but it also unnerved me how strong she already was.
Her mind was frighteningly quick, her instincts sharper than most adults I'd known.
She might grow up to be like me: lazy in temperament, yet overwhelmingly powerful.
My eyes convulsed as I watched her existence subtly rewrite itself, gaining yet more strength.
[Title Obtained: Lazy Little Death.]
My jaw nearly dropped.
[Nicholas had given her a new title, one that made it impossible to die if she did not care to live.]
Cassio clapped her hands, grinning as though she had just been handed a toy. "Thank you, Daddy!"
What a terribly powerful baby. I couldn't imagine even a Saint giving her much trouble.
I reached out and patted her head. "Hmm, do you think Daddy is strong?"
She placed a finger to her bottom lip and thought carefully, her eyes narrowing with a focus I had seen only in war-hardened strategists.
"Not stronger than Mommy. So weak!"
What! That was a terrible bar to set. I would have to clear that from her terrible little mind sooner rather than later.
"Hey, comparing me to her isn't fair. Maybe use a different metric?"
She tilted her head, confused for a moment, then smiled and clapped again. "You're weak compared to Mira!"
I'm beginning to think she can't sense my true power. After all, there's no way I could lose to a baby.
I mean, it's absurd, even for someone who believes in the absurd.
"Hey, how strong do you think I am?" I asked, picking her up.
As I set her down on my lap, she patted my legs like she was inspecting me. "Flimsy, fragile. Don't worry, I'll protect you!"
She then clung to my side, as if comforting me.
Maybe I needed it, because my newfound confidence just diminished under the weight of her words.
With only her tiny voice she had defeated me.
I fell back onto the bed and lifted her into the air.
"Don't be too mean. I'm a man with feelings. Even more so, I'm also very not fragile."
She giggled as I lifted her up and down. "Mommy said you were sick, and you slept for a long time."
Is that why she thought I was weak?
I grit my teeth, and in the next moment, as I brought her down, we appeared in the sky, high above the kingdom.
I let go, and she began laughing as we fell.
"Can a weak person do this?" I turned to the sun.
As she tumbled, I moved beneath her and sent a small orb of darkness toward it. In a flash, the world turned to night.
Her eyes widened, linked to all the stars in the sky as the light slowly came back.
She rolled over in midair and pushed my cheeks together. "How do I do that?"
Blacking out the sun wasn't a particularly amazing accomplishment, even for the me who had just resurrected.
But to a child who had only seen the inside of a castle, it was a miracle.
We flickered back to the room and dropped onto the bed.
At the same time, she jumped up.
Standing on my chest, she began swirling mana in her palms, a mix of black and red that pulsed with raw potential.
"Daddy! Give me your knowledge!"
This girl, this tiny tyrant, was power hungry, but not blindly so.
She had a mind like a knife, already mastering concepts before I could even teach them.
[Nicholas thought of giving her another title.]
I didn't, not yet. I simply thought it would be a good title, maybe the best.
[Title Obtained: Tyrant of Death and Darkness.]
It made me pause. Why did it say "obtained" if it was referring to Cassio?
Perhaps because she was technically an extension of me. Or maybe, just maybe, her True Self already existed.
[Nicholas's tongue might have diminished the true grandness of something of the sort.]
Was it calling me dumb in a nice way?
[The title her father granted so easily gave her full control over death and darkness.]
Ignoring the annoying little commentary, I watched as Cassio, a byproduct of the title, immediately began to master the craft.
She created a sphere of darkness with perfect control.
This sphere, potent and condensed, fell onto my face. Though it was powerful, I didn't dodge.
Instead, when it hit me, I forced out blood and made a bruise at a speed she surely couldn't see.
Just to keep her from realizing how far she had already surpassed what should even be possible, I forced a bruise onto my face.
"A genius, my little girl is," I murmured softly. "Say, do you want me to teach you something else?"
She nodded happily, sitting down and crossing her legs in perfect imitation of a meditating sage. In a way, my goal was already achieved.
I thought maybe this would be enough.
But as I absentmindedly explained how mana worked, its currents, its flow, its infinite potential, I couldn't help but feel a rising anger.
My little girl and my little boy would have to live in a world where I was destined to die.
However, I had decided. I wanted to live.
I wanted to live forever, with them, and with Mirabel and Nicole.
I wanted to be happy. I wanted to deserve my happiness, even if the world rejected it.
How much effort would it take?
[Nicholas asked this question and realized he already had an answer.]
I chuckled softly as Cassio began warping mana with a precision that would humble ancient archmages.
She molded time like clay, folding space as if it were paper.
In her small palms, she created a tiny cube.
She then expanded its layers and dimensions, bending the rules of magic with the instinct of someone who had been born knowing them.
She was, in a way, my catalyst. As were Mirabel and Miraculum.
They would be the things that bound me to this world, the anchors that kept me from slipping into apathy.
[At that moment, Nicholas thought of the false world below him, how small and fragile it was, and yet how peacefully blissful it appeared.]
Cassio finished her work by dissipating the now impossibly complex structure in her palms.
Then, pressing both her tiny hands onto my eyes, she spoke with a voice trembling with sincerity.
"Daddy, I want to grow up big and strong so you never have to fight again. Mommy cried when you were fighting."
I could feel myself holding back tears as she continued.
"I never want Mommy or you to cry!"
[Nicholas gazed at Heaven and made a silent vow inside his head. He would reach its gates and slaughter those who might threaten these words.]