Clutching the cloth pouch from her bedside to her chest, Alicia stepped into the corridor. The Valton estate before dawn was silent. The stone floor was cold, and her bare toes protested against the biting chill. The scorched smell from the north wing still lingered faintly, and with each step, memories of last night brushed past her nostrils. The scent of ash. The smell of burnt wood. And the heat of Leon's palm transmitted through the cloth. She could still feel it at her fingertips. Alicia confirmed the fragment inside the pouch just once. Even in the dim light of night, the thick brushstrokes were legible—"Ash Ring Commerce Guild · Ledger Master Approved." This single sheet would change everything. Could change it. Had to change it. Her destination was her father Victor's study. Her knock on the door was unwavering. Three times, clear and distinct. "...Who is it?" Victor's voice came, thick with sleep. Alicia answered through the door. "It's Alicia, Father. There's something I need you to see right away." There was a pause. The rustle of fabric. The sound of a candle being lit. Then the door opened. Victor Valton stood with his salt-and-pepper hair slightly disheveled, his brow furrowed as he looked at his daughter. The fifty-two-year-old marquis had gentle features, but tonight he wore only the face of an aging father. That face tightened slightly as he read the seriousness in his daughter's eyes. "Come in," Victor said. The study was dim, lit only by the faint glow of dying embers in the fireplace. Alicia spread parchment across the desk and withdrew the fragment from the pouch. She brought the candelabra closer. Victor stood beside her, squinting through his aging eyes to read the characters. Alicia silently took up a quill pen. The transfer amounts to the ledger master, Galbert's personal share, the distribution ratio from Valton territory. The accounting knowledge from her previous life guided her fingers. Numbers lined up methodically across the parchment. Not emotion—only facts, stacking upon one another. Twelve years of embezzlement totals. Estimated transfers to the Ash Ring Commerce Guild. Funds flows that Galbert alone could not explain. Victor stopped mid-page. His hand holding the document trembled slightly. Trust in a longtime steward, anger at that trust betrayed, shame at his own blindness—all of it crossed paths on a single sheet of paper. Alicia understood this. "...I will conduct a formal interrogation at dawn," Victor said. That was all. His voice carried weight. The father everyone called indecisive did not waver tonight. --- When Alicia emerged from the study and returned to the corridor, a figure stood against the wall. Maria Valton—Leon's sister, nineteen years old—stood with her arms crossed, still in her nightclothes. She carried no lamp, yet in the thin darkness of the corridor, only her eyes shone with clarity. "I heard," Maria said quietly. Her voice was impossible to read. Was she accusing? Confirming? "You showed Father those numbers, didn't you? The previous Lady Valton could never have done such calculations," Maria continued. Maria's gaze held Alicia captive. This intelligent, devoted sister had always suspected something. From the beginning, she had found Alicia's sudden transformation after becoming the new lady of the house suspicious. "Did you get reincarnated or something?" Maria asked bluntly. Alicia paused for a beat. She could not lie. But she could not speak the truth either. Could not possibly—that a Japanese office worker had been reincarnated into another world. "I wanted to change. For this territory," Alicia answered. That was all. Not evasion, not a complete lie. The truth. Maria's brow moved. She was not satisfied. She was about to press further when footsteps sounded deeper in the corridor. It was Leon. His golden hair caught the candlelight with a faint shimmer. His pale blue eyes quickly read the situation. After a moment of silence, he moved to stand beside Alicia. Just that single motion. His body answered before words could. "I trust Alicia," Leon said. Maria looked at Leon. Then at Alicia. Then once more, she measured the distance between the two of them. Their shoulders were nearly touching. Maria exhaled softly. Reluctantly, she stepped back half a pace. But as she withdrew, she glanced toward Leon's ear and whispered low. "...Brother, your ears are red," Maria said. Leon answered immediately. "The corridor is cold," he said. His response came just slightly too fast. Alicia kept her gaze forward, suppressing the small twitch at the corner of her mouth. Maria's suspicion had not vanished. But tonight, she did not press further. --- The next morning. In the basement of the Valton estate, within a stone cell surrounded by cold walls, Feness Galbert waited. The fifty-two-year-old former steward kept his spine straight even in the dungeon. His graying black hair was not disheveled, and white gloves still adorned his hands. The pride of a man who had wielded power in this estate for thirty years seeped through the iron bars. Contempt gleamed in his cold green eyes. Leon stood formally as a knight. His sword at his side, his bearing carried not negotiation nor intimidation, but the quiet of procedure. A clerk stood nearby, quill at the ready. Alicia stood before the bars and unfolded the cloth. The fragment was placed on the stone floor. Galbert's eyes fell upon it. For just an instant, his expression froze. Only an instant. But Alicia saw it clearly. The moment when a man who had manipulated ledgers for thirty years was shaken by a single scrap of paper. Alicia spoke quietly. "The transfer ratios to the ledger master and the approval records remain. This is not embezzlement by you alone. Regular transfers to the Ash Ring Commerce Guild—the shadow distribution network spanning the five southern territories—can be proven by this fragment," Alicia said. Galbert pressed his lips into a thin line. "If you provide the names of your accomplices, the Valton house can offer the possibility of reduced sentencing negotiations," Alicia continued. Silence stretched on. The stone walls pressed back the cold air. Galbert's white-gloved fingers moved slightly on his knees. He was calculating. Whether an escape route existed. How much this young lady knew. After a long silence, his mouth opened. "...Baron Folke," Galbert said. In that instant, something pounded fiercely in Alicia's chest. Baron Folke—the elderly nobleman on the aristocratic council who had been pressuring Leon. The man who had threatened to vote against the restoration ruling until yesterday. That man was the ledger master of the Ash Ring Commerce Guild—Felgrand. "Baron Folke himself approved as the ledger master," Galbert said. His voice was low and flat. No anger, no regret. Just facts emerging as words. That very flatness emphasized his coldness. Leon, standing beside her, did not move his expression. He signaled the clerk with his eyes to record it. His voice was quiet, proceeding through the procedure as part of his duty. But Leon's right hand, beneath the sword hilt, was clenched so tightly it had gone white. Only Alicia saw it. That fist, gripped until bloodless. Baron Folke had tried to destroy Alicia, Leon's sister-in-law. That meant he had been slowly strangling the entire Valton house, strangling Leon himself. That man's name was now being carved into the clerk's quill in this stone room. The confession was complete. --- Morning light streamed into the great hall. Marquis Victor Valton stood at the front, holding the decision document. Alicia stood before him in formal dress. "I hereby formally appoint Alicia Valton as Financial Advisor to Valton territory," Victor declared. The pen ran across the parchment. A signature. Sealing wax. Alicia bit her lip. She had not meant to cry. This was not a moment for showing emotion. But the back of her eyes burned intensely. She thought of that night in her previous life when no one had acknowledged her. The accounting office filled with overtime, the keyboard she had struck alone beneath fluorescent lights. These numbers are correct, but no one is watching—she had spent those hours thinking exactly that. Now, here, that time had taken form. Financial Advisor. A position with a name. The right to move under her own name. She exhaled slowly, deeply. --- After the great hall dispersed, Leon called Alicia to his office. The room on the east side of the second floor, surrounded by mountains of documents. Outside the window, the town of Trone reflected the light of the Minol River. The fireplace burned warmer than candlelight, dyeing the interior in orange. Leon stood directly before Alicia. His golden hair swayed softly in the light. His pale blue eyes held her gaze steadily. His expression was calm as always, but today it carried the look of someone making a choice. His right hand extended toward her. A large palm opened toward Alicia. A knight's hand, marked by labor, the hand that had plunged into ash with her that night—the hand that had rested on her cold fingers that evening without a word. For a beat, Alicia could not move. The memory of that night when she had retrieved the fragment returned. The night she had wept while searching the bottom of the pouch. The night Leon had simply sat beside her without speaking, resting his hand on hers. Slowly, Alicia's hand moved. She grasped Leon's palm in return. It was warm. The same temperature as last night. No—today it was warmer, seeping in gradually. His broad palm enveloped her hand completely, and for a beat, he pressed gently. Several seconds passed with only their breathing audible. The firewood crackled softly. Leon was the first to release his hand. He cleared his throat once and lowered his gaze to the stack of documents. "I want to work through the plans for territorial reconstruction with you again. As financial advisor, I'd like to hear your thoughts," Leon said. His words were practical, flat. But the tips of his ears had taken on the color of the firelight. Alicia answered. "Of course," she said. Her voice cracked slightly. Heat rose in her cheeks. It was the fireplace, she told herself. It had to be the fireplace. Absolutely. The air in the room was beginning to settle into quiet peace—when it happened. The copy of the confession the clerk had recorded still lay at the edge of the desk. When Alicia's gaze fell upon it, Galbert's voice from the dungeon returned to her ears. After finishing his confession, as he turned to leave the bars, Galbert had spoken just one more thing. "The ledger master is much closer than you imagine. Do not think it ends with Baron Folke," Galbert had said. That was all. His cold green eyes had been smiling at the very end. Alicia remembered the difference in temperature between when he spoke Baron Folke's name—with resignation—and when he delivered that final statement, with a thin smile. There was someone above Baron Folke. The Ash Ring Commerce Guild—Felgrand—its true core remained untouched. The firelight flickered. The orange glow danced across the wall. Alicia gazed at that light and felt something cold slowly opening in her chest. One battle had ended. But beyond that ending, a deeper darkness waited with its mouth open. The memory of a warm palm and Galbert's final smile coexisted quietly within Alicia.