"Tuuli, are you sure you are alright?" Corinna said, looking at her young assistant with concern.
She'd taken on Tuuli as an apprentice shortly after her baptism, despite it being unusual for her to take on someone who hadn't even received the basic training at the guild. It was done as a favor to her older brother, though Tuuli's dedication to learning how to sew made it so that she quickly reached the levels that were expected of her as an apprentice at a workshop that dealt with nobles.
But it seemed that Tuuli was a little too dedicated to becoming a top seamstress, as she had come into work despite being very clearly sick. The girl's eyes were unfocused and she was panting slightly as she sat staring at the unfinished hair ornament in her hand.
"You're burning up." Corinna said with alarm as she put a hand to Tuuli's forehead, only to pull it away as it felt like she had been touching a hot pan.
"I'm… alright." Tuuli said, not convincing at all.
"No, you aren't." Corinna said, pushing her down. "You can't just push yourself like this. You need to rest."
"But I…"
"No buts. Now put that down and let's get you to bed. I'll send word to your mother and tell her you aren't feeling well." Corinna said.
"...Alright." Tuuli said, guilty that her fatigue was going to be causing problems for Corinna.
She'd been starting to feel worse and worse lately, especially as Winter approached.
She remembered how it had been for Myne, how her fevers would always flare up around Winter and gotten a lot worse. The thought was not a comfortable one, not when they were almost to the one year mark since Myne had passed away.
Even if she had left some kind of magic circle on the back of a mirror so that she could occasionally speak to them from beyond, it didn't change the fact that she was gone.
Tuuli missed her so much.
That thought was accompanied by a searing wave of heat inside of her body and Tuuli winced in pain. She really wasn't good to anyone like this. Which was strange, given how healthy she had always been. She'd never been sick a day in her life before, but after her baptism, she health just seemed to be getting worse and worse.
At Corinna's insistence, she put aside her work and climbed down from her chair, but she didn't get more than a few steps before she fell over.
"Tuuli!" Corinna shouted, rushing to check on the child as she lay gasping for breath on the ground. But she stopped as she noticed a sort of steam coming from around Tuuli's body and her usually golden eyes glowing a mixture of green and blue.
"Corinna… it hurts." Tuuli said, tears in her eyes.
"Get Benno, tell him it is an emergency!" Corinna told one of her assistants before turning to Tuuli. "Don't worry dear, it is all going to be okay."
Ferdinand looked over his stack of paperwork, finally completed for the day, despite it only being around lunch time.
Tohsaka had started to assist a little again, in order to free up some of his time for laying out the railroad tracks, and she appeared to have gained some kind of leverage over Sylvester's scholars and was blackmailing them into doing their own damn jobs, greatly reducing the workload.
It certainly made life a lot easier for him. He wondered if it was all going to go back to the way it was in the future.
The King had made his desire to adopt Tohsaka after her baptism known to the Archducal family of Ehrenfest, much to their shock and dismay. Save for Veronica, who was now trying to kiss the girl's ass more than ever, since she was going to marry the future King.
Ferdinand was left wondering what it was in Tohsaka's memories that would make the King order an Archduke to hand over his adopted daughter. Such things were very outside of the normal range of acceptable action, even if she was of royal blood.
"What are your thoughts in relation to your future adoption?" Ferdinand asked, glancing up at the girl.
"It is a pain, and I don't like having to leave so much of what I know behind, but at least they won't expect me to live in the royal castle. Apparently, I will be assigned to the royal villa at the academy after my adoption and until I come of age. I'm hoping that I can negotiate visitations with them so that I can maintain my businesses, and keeping Angelica as my retainer is not debatable. She WILL stay with me." Tohsaka replied, not so much as glancing up from her own work, a manuscript for a book on 'calculus'. "You must be planning a celebration for finally having me out of your hair for good, considering how much you hate me."
"...What makes you think I hate you?" Ferdinand asked. The girl blinked and looked up at him with a puzzled expression. "You might cause trouble wherever you go and never listen to instructions, but I don't hate you. You've done too much good for me to hate you."
"...If I didn't know you better, I'd think you were actually being genuine." Tohsaka said, turning back to her work. "Hopefully the King will give up on the idea of having me marry one of his sons though, because I am honestly not interested."
"You know, it is an honor to be chosen to be the wife of the next King." Ferdinand replied.
"Then you marry the guy." Tohsaka replied. "I'm not that kind of girl, so if they want my hand in marriage, they will need to get it the old fashion way."
"By having the largest political backing, a matching mana capacity and undermining all of their rivals?"
"...Are you really that romantically dead inside or are you just doing a bit?" Tohsaka said flatly.
"Then, what do you look for in a potential marriage partner?" Ferdinand asked, not really caring that people were listening. With Tohsaka having gained the favor of the Veronica Faction, the danger of being slightly open was gone.
As far as all of the political factions were concerned, Tohsaka could do whatever she wanted until she left to join the Royal Family. Her having fawn memories of Ehrenfest and continuing to assist them was all that mattered.
She should start stabbing people at random in broad daylight and none of them would say a word.
Her power, and her awareness of it, was actually terrifying.
"Well, if I was allowed to choose, I would say someone like Angelica." Tohsaka said with a sly smile.
"Ah… Like me?" Angelica said, startled out of her daze from her position by the door, where she was guarding in order to avoid doing any actual work.
Ferdinand was equally confused, as regardless of her extreme loyalty, with the girl willing to point her sword even at Ferdinand or Sylvester in order to defend her lady, Angelica was an idiot.
"I like people who pursue their dreams with a single-minded passion, even if everyone tells them it is stupid. There is a beauty to it that is hard to put into words. Also, they need to support my goals as well, the way that Angelica does, with us helping each other. Being attractive is also a plus." Tohsaka said with a nod of her head. "Yes. Angelica would be my ideal husband."
"Oh. Thank you." Angelica said with her usual bright smile.
"...You're both idiots." Ferdinand said with a sigh.
Moment's later, Nicola burst into the room, getting grabbed by Angelica because of her suddenness before being released upon seeing who it was.
"L…Lady… Lady Tohsaka. There is an emergency." Nicola said, panting for breath before Benno arrived at the door right behind her, not dressed in the usual outfit he would put on when he was about to meet with nobles. Even his normal clothes looked shabby, and had sweat stains, despite the cold weather.
"Tuuli." Benno said, the singular word causing Rin's eyes to change from alert to panicked.
"What? What is it!?" Rin demanded, her behavior confusing Ferdinand.
"She collapsed at the shop. She's very sick." Benno said, his eyes darting around the room as he said it.
Rin didn't wait to listen to any more.
She ran and jumped through Ferdinand's window, smashing it open and started to run in the direction of the lower city, leaving a stunned Ferdinand behind as Angelica jumped out the window after her, soon followed by a confused Brigitte and the pair of shapeshifting Feybeasts.
Ferdinand looked at his destroyed window and then turned to stare at Benno and the surprised Gray Priests. "Who is Tuuli?"
Myne didn't care that busting through the High Priest's window instead of using the hall like a normal person only saved her something like ten seconds. Nor did she care about the confused shouts of the commoners below her as she jumped from building to building in broad daylight. Nor that people would be able to see straight up her apprentice priestess robes, which normally only went past the knees.
The only thing on her mind was Tuuli.
Benno wouldn't have rushed to the Temple the way he did, ignoring all protocol if it wasn't something serious, and considering the high quality potions she had left with him, she could barely think of an illness or condition that would demand such a reaction.
The Gilberta Company was a high end store, only a few blocks away from the noble district, and Myne made it to the front door in just ten fully reinforced leaps, kicking off the air with mana bursts in order to increase her speed to the max.
Mark nearly fell on his ass as she landed right in front of him, pushing past him and running into the shop, Angelica hot on her heels.
She dashed up the first two floors, breaking a wooden board as she went due to using too much force in her step, and made it to the third floor, where Corinna's workshop was.
Four faces looked up in shock as Myne tossed the door open, Corinna, one of her older assistants, and Myne's own mama and papa.
"Lady Tohsaka!?" Corinna said in surprise, having seen Myne before as a noble, being the one Myne had commissioned her clothes from, though she didn't know her true identity.
But Myne just ignored her as she looked past the group and at the young girl with green hair who was painfully gasping for breath on the bench, unprocessed mana rolling off of her body.
"The Devouring? By why? Why does Tuuli have the…" Myne said, her heart falling as she sees her sister being consumed by the poisonous mana.
With the start of Winter just days away, the world's mana was at its most toxic, and without the knowledge of how to refine it, or the skill or tools to expel it, Tuuli was suffering greatly.
'Get a hold of yourself.' Rin shouted internally, kicking herself for letting herself lose control.
A magus does not panic.
Collecting her emotions, she pushed the others aside to get to Tuuli and checked on her physical condition.
It was bad.
While Rin's mana was mostly a balance of all of the elements, leading to a certain level of stability, Tuuli's appeared to have been keyed into the fire attribute, making the burning even hotter, despite having drastically less mana.
There were already signs of serious internal damage.
"I need to drain her of her excess mana." Rin said, before realizing that she didn't have any magic tools to passively drain mana. Despite them being common among the nobility.
They were too wasteful for her tastes, and so the tools she used required her to actively feed her mana into them, instead of it being passively drained. They were also keyed into her mana signature in particular, so that she could access and use the stored mana more efficiently in the future.
But she needed to drain Tuuli's mana right away.
So she tilted the girl's head back, opened her mouth, and kissed her on the lips, sticking her tongue into her sister's mouth and absorbing the mana through her saliva.
"W…What are you doing?" Gunther shouted in shock, but stopped as Tuuli stopped struggling and started to relax.
"That should be enough for now." Rin said as she broke the kiss and wiped the drool from her chin. She then raised her hands and magic circles formed. "I'm going to heal the damage caused to her body already. So please be quiet so I can concentrate."
Minutes later, and Tuuli's mana was stable, the damage to her insides by the fire attributed mana was repaired.
"...Myne?" Tuuli said, opening her eyes but only able to see Rin's silhouette over her.
"Shush, it's alright. You've been through an ordeal, but it is over now." Rin said, a hand to Tuuli's cheek. "Just rest and regain your strength."
"...Thank you." Tuuli said before closing her eyes and sleeping easy.
"Thank you. Thank you so much." Effa said, tears in her eyes as she hugged what she believed was her last living child.
"You're welcome." Rin said, though her mind was still spinning, wondering how this could have happened. Tuuli hadn't had active magic circuits before. She shouldn't have developed the Devouring. So how did she? "I'll need to prepare a magic tool to help keep her condition under control. Please visit the Temple in three days to pick it up."
Rin then turned to see her guard knights and her familiar staring at her, Angelica with a look of confusion, Brigitte with admiration, and Taiga with curiosity, seemingly wanting to give both her and Tuuli a hug too.
"Come on. We need to return to the Temple." Rin said before pausing. "And Brigitte. It should go without saying, but not a word of what you saw today to anyone."
"Of course, Milady." Brigitte said, saluting as she did so.
For Tuuli's safety, Rin couldn't let a single word of this get out to anyone.
"Husband, what is this I hear about you planning on adopting a child?" Trauerqual's first wife asked him as she and his second wife cornered him in the days leading up to the start of Winter. They were alone, without even their normal servants around to listen in on the conversation.
Meaning the pair were probably about to dig into him.
"It is just that. There is a girl who is of royal blood, who I plan on adopting into our family." Trauerqual replied.
"...Husband, why though?" His second wife asked, less accusing than the first. "From what we have been told, the girl was adopted into an Archducal Family. There are laws in place that are meant to prevent the Sovereignty from forcing Duchies to give up their Archducal Candidates. What you have done, it could cause a great deal of unrest."
"The girl is worth it." Trauerqual replied simply.
"How? How could a child be worth the risk of upsetting the other Duchies during a time like this?" His first wife asked with a serious expression.
"Because she is no ordinary child. On top of having more mana than I do while not even yet baptized, she possesses memories of entirely different people. When I looked through her memories, I found the combined knowledge of nearly a dozen different nobles, each of which could rival the greatest minds our Kingdom has to offer." Trauerqual told his wives, earning looks of shock.
"How is that possible? I've never heard of such a thing." His second wife asked.
"I have. It is exactly how my second brother described inheriting the Grutrissheit. Gaining knowledge and memories of nobles and royals long dead." Trauerqual said, looking up at the ceiling.
"Are you telling me that she is in possession of the Grutrissheit!?" His first wife shouted in wide-eyed shock.
"No. At least, I don't believe so. But regardless, her knowledge could help to stabilize the Country. She definitely has the skills necessary to uncover the mysteries behind the magic tools that we have lost control over and the forgotten rituals of the past. She's already uncovered a few within the last few months already, and according to our spies the industries she has introduced into Ehrenfest will likely make it one of the wealthiest Duchies in the years to come and her public displays of magic surpass those of our Academy Graduates, despite not having a Schtappe." Trauerqual explained simply. "In Ehrenfest, she is already hailed as a genius and a saint, and she hasn't even been baptized. In the future, the entire country would likely be fighting over her, if we do not claim ownership of her now."
"...I see. So that is the reason you are willing to toss aside tradition for the girl." His second wife said, nodding her head in understanding. "How are you going to explain this to Klassenberg?"
"I am not intending to make Tohsaka Queen, just have her close to the Royal Family." Trauerqual said, swallowing down the words he really wanted to say.
Klassenberg had been his strongest supporter during the war, which had earned them the position as the highest rank Duchy, but in all honesty, the Zent was furious with them, he just hid it well.
They had taken advantage of his anger and depression following the kidnapping and death of his beloved daughter in order to start the Purge and killed thousands of nobles in his name, far more than had even died during the war itself. They held the most blame for the awful position the Kingdom was in now.
His sisters, his cousins, his nieces and nephew, old friends who had just spoken out against the senseless killing, scholars and those who had sworn their lives to serve only the Goddess of Wisdom. So many died.
Had their deaths really been necessary to prevent more fighting?
Now, Klassenberg was attempting to cement their position at the top ranked Duchy through Trauerqual's last living niece, who was adopted by the previous Aub Klassenberg, who was her grandfather. They wanted her to marry the next Zent, and given her abundance of mana, her royal blood and her political backing, she was an obvious choice.
They disgusted him, but in the end, producing high mana children required a mother with tons of mana, and the girl would one day have more mana than Trauerqual did.
Though even in that regard, Tohsaka was still a more ideal choice, regardless of her commoner roots.
Who knows. Maybe a miracle will happen and Tohsaka would agree to become the next Queen. Trauerqual would like nothing more than to be able to rub that in Klassenberg's face.
While Eglantine herself is only moderately self-absorbed, Klassenberg is one of the more evil factions in canon. They don't give a shit how many people they kill as long as they keep the seat as Top Duchy.
Granted, Eglantine has her own villainess arc, declaring that while she claimed she wanted peace, what she really wants is the absolute authority needed to enforce it. Her dumbshit simp husband just going 'yes ma'am' instead of trying to reason with her.
One of the differences from canon is that Rin holds no personal interest in Ehrenfest.
To her Ehrenfest is just a place she happens to be in. There is no reason for her to prioritize it over the rest of the Kingdom, like how Rozemyne does in canon. So all of the work that Rozemyne put into giving Ehrenfest advantages over other Duchies, Rin doesn't really see the point. Whether you are ranked first or last is just politics, and has little importants to her, compared to whether or not people live or die.
She's also not in conflict with the Veronica Faction, because while they are self-interested, paranoid and vengeful individuals, they have no reason to be in conflict with her.
Not yet anyways.