I'm lying here in your arms
Oh, could it be forever
But time knows no mercy
The moment is already over


After the n-th embarrassing moment of the day, Rozemyne had urged Eglantine to go outside without her, so the lesson could start and she, being left alone, could make a hole in the floor and disappear into it.

But, obviously, noble society was too enamored with poison for someone to stay behind, alone, in a room others could use.

Eglantine had offered to leave her attendant with her, so she could take her time and go outside only when she was ready.

But, of course, it had to be the same attendant that had called out after hearing her scream.

So Rozemyne had decided to get out of the dressing room mere moments after Eglantine, hoping to find her way to the main door and make a hasty retreat, unbeknownst to anyone.

But, obviously, she was spotted the exact same moment she went out the door.

Her two angels -Charlotte and Lady Hannelore- started making their way toward her from the middle of the room. Rozemyne smiled at them -how could she not?- all the while wishing they had not heard her.

"Lady Rozemyne!" "Sister!" they spoke together, finishing in perfect sync, "I knew it was your voice!"

Of course. Of course they had heard her.

As her smile grew strained, Rozemyne hoped against hope that the door and the walls had muffled the sounds enough for them to be unable to make out her words.

"Was there some other misunderstanding with Lady Eglantine?" Hannelore asked.

And of course they had been able to understand every word...

"Attention, everyone!" Eglantine announced to all the presents that Aub Alexandria had offered to heal the participants of the bride-stealing ditter, making the few eyes that weren't already on her turn to look at Rozemyne.

Of course. Of. Freaking. Course. Why not put her in the spotlight right after everyone heard her scream about winter?

Even though Rozemyne's cheeks started to hurt as she forced a social smile on her face, her short stay at the whirling hall was pretty uneventful. After hearing Eglantine's announcement, Hannelore had immediately invited Rozemyne to a tea party right before the assembly, and then the young Aub left to allow the lesson to begin.

o

Once she returned to the dormitory, Rozemyne had Lieseleta and Gretia change her into her brewing clothes and, after joining Roderick and Laurentz in a meeting room, they took advantage of the time they had to try and sort some things, starting from the magic tool they had to give back to Hirschur.

"There was this in the time-stopping magic tool, Milady." Gretia said while holding out a honey jar. "I brought it to Ella, but she said it didn't come from our kitchen. What should I do with it?"

Rozemyne took the jar from her attendant's hands, a fond smile spreading on her face. It was the one she had taken from the kitchen of the Adalgisa palace, when young Ferdinand's stomach had started to rumble and they had to stop and search for something he could eat on the spot. The honey wasn't really the best suited food, but she had taken it all the same, even though she already had cookies waiting for them in the time-stopping magic tool.

Seeing his blissful face when she had fed the honey to him had healed her heart after all the things she had to witness in the Adalgisa palace. The things that had surrounded Ferdinand through all his childhood.

She remembered the noises they had heard near one of the princesses' rooms. Acts that should never be performed where children could hear or see, but the sounds -from the floors below- and the sight -from the garden- had become part of Ferdinand's everyday life.

Her thoughts went back to the captain of the guards, the man that they had seen during their escape and that had Ferdinand literally paralyzed with fear. That sick pervert that went and bragged -bragged!- about how he was going to enjoy sodomizing the child before killing him.

'Why did Ferdinand have to suffer so much?' With a distant look in her eyes, Rozemyne rubbed her thumb on the jar, like she had done many times with that sweet child's head.

"Milady?" Lieseleta's voice called her back to reality. "Is everything alright? We can get rid of that jar if it brings back bad memories..."

"No!" Rozemyne said, with more urgency than a honey jar would normally deserve. "The bad memories are... only collateral to it. Bring it to my chambers, Gretia, I will take it to my hidden room upon my return." she said, prompting the gray-haired girl to move out of the meeting room.

When Gretia opened the door, she found herself face to face with Matthias, whose presence was enough to alert Rozemyne. She stood up from her seat, quickly moving toward the knight.

"Matthias? Why are you here? Is there some other problem? Is Ferdinand in danger?" Rozemyne asked in an increasingly more worried voice.

The young man shook his head. "No, Milady, I was merely asked by Lord Justus to deliver this message directly to you. It's strictly confidential, he asked me to deliver it so it could avoid the usual checks." He passed a thick, closed envelope to his lady, who looked ready to tear it open to read it immediately. He placed his hand in front of it. "He said it's not urgent, but he stressed that you should read it in your hidden room."

Rozemyne stared hard at the envelope, wanting to read it immediately, but knowing there was no time for it -especially if there was a chance it could have an emotional impact on her- she gave Gretia a feystone with her mana and instructed her to take the honey and the letter in her hidden room. She hoped that taking the envelope out of her sight, would also take it out of her mind.

She turned her attention back to Matthias. "Did Ferdinand wake up? There's... Is he well?" She had wanted to ask if there was any kind of lasting damage, but it wasn't an option with so many people around.

"He had yet to wake up when I was given the message from Lord Justus, although he said it could simply be lack of sleep from last night. He said there are no reasons to worry." When he had been summoned to receive the envelope, Matthias had been given a quick -and most likely not exhaustive- explanation of Lord Ferdinand's condition, but he had specifically asked one question, the one he knew his Lady would ask: if he was fine.

"I'm glad." Rozemyne exhaled a sigh of relief.

Matthias kneeled down and crossed his arms. "If Milady doesn't require anything from me, then I'll take my leave."

"Matthias, tell Justus that I expect a report on Ferdinand before dinner. If he wakes up, his health, if he works too much, if he starts brewing... everything. And tell Hartmut to select all the paperwork that needs Ferdinand's signature or mine. You will bring it to me tonight, together with Justus' report. Ferdinand is forbidden to work longer than one bell today. Is that clear?" Rozemyne said, her sudden barrage of demands surprising her retainers, although they didn't let it show.

"Yes, Milady. I will be back tonight, then." the knight said, before going away.

After Rozemyne assigned a few more tasks to her retainers, they loaded the magic tool on Lessy and went to the scholar building, landing on a balcony two floors above Hirschur's lab. Lieseleta and Gretia had to carry the tool down two relatively narrow flights of stairs and a long hall, but it was still better than going on foot from Alexandria's dormitory.

When they arrived at her door, Lieseleta called out to Hirschur and, for once, the Professor opened quickly. Still, Rozemyne was made to wait a little longer so that her attendant could make the laboratory fit for the presence of people.

"Lady Rozemyne..." Hirschur said, her eyes sparkling, "Sit, and tell me everything that happened from the moment you were called in the realm of the gods."

Rozemyne gave a difficult smile, knowing full well that keeping information from Hirschur was going to be an arduous battle. "I believe that can wait, Professor Hirschur. First, I'd like to return the time-stopping magic tool I borrowed from you." she gestured for the big box that her attendants had carried.

Hirschur eyed the tool, trying to remember when the loan could have possibly happened, but nothing came to mind. She had heard rumors about the Dunkelfelger's knights of Ferdinand's generation regaining some memories they all had lost... could something like that be at work here as well?

"I cannot remember ever lending it, you will have to refresh my memory... and please make sure to include details of what led to the loan." her face was practically begging 'Give me information!'

"I would expect you not to remember, Professor Hirschur, because I still have to borrow it."

"...Come again?" Hirschur was positively stunned, and so were also Rozemyne's retainers.

"We are facing the power of Dregarnuhr here, the goddess of time. I was sent back to a time when I still had to be born... It is really so strange that I would return something to you, Professor Hirschur, before borrowing it?" Rozemyne said, plastering a wise expression on her face. She was trying to lure the scholar into the awe-inspiring realm of time-paradoxes, all to steer the woman's thirst for knowledge away from her journey.

"Fascinating..." the woman said, a finger on her chin. "So, are you telling me that you are going to borrow again the tool you just brought back, and then you and the tool will return to a time already gone?" She was making an effort to wrap her mind on the concept, when she was struck by a realization. "Wait, does that mean that your journey isn't over yet?"

"It is over," Rozemyne replied, "but I will have to briefly meet with myself from a few days ago, and give her ...I mean, myself, the tool filled with food."

"If your only scope is to bring yourself food, couldn't you just use the tool you brought here? Wouldn't it be easier?" Hirschur asked, eager to understand how everything worked.

"I wonder... I'm pretty sure something strange would happen if I did that. Right now I'm borrowing a tool that has been in your possession for a certain amount of years, meaning that it existed in this world, that either you or someone else created it some time ago." Rozemyne started explaining, and Hirschur acknowledged her words with a nod.

"Tonight I... the other me from a few days ago... will bring the tool to the past, keep it there for a few days, and then the tool and I will return to yesterday, so that I can give the tool back to you right now. Then the tool will continue to exist in this world, as if it just made a loop through time and came back..." She emphasized her words tracing an imaginary straight line in the air, a loop, and the continuation of the straight line.

Hirschur nodded again, her brain working hard to understand the girl's words.

"Let's imagine, instead, that I will not borrow the tool currently in your possession. The one I have appeared in this world yesterday, when I returned from my journey, then would disappear from the 'present' world tonight to return to the past, and then it will be taken back to yesterday..." This time she traced a circle in the air, repeating the motion over and over again.

"Can you see how it will be a problem? It would be a tool that nobody created and that only exists in a forever-repeating time loop." Rozemyne concluded with a smile. She was quite proud of how she had managed to explain something that she had struggled to understand whenever she had read science fiction novels that featured time travels and all the paradoxes that could occur.

Hirschur blinked a few times, trying to digest all the information. It made sense, and yet she felt like a true understanding was slipping through her fingers.

Rozemyne cut through her moment of reflection. "While you think about it, could you tell us where you keep your time-stopping magic tool, so Gretia and Lieseleta can exchange them?"

However, Hirschur hadn't heard her at all -the scientist in her too focused on finding out if what her student said could be true. "Would attaching a recording magic tool to the time stopping one, allow us to verify your claim, Lady Rozemyne?"

'Go figure... A mad scientist, just like her student...' the girl thought.

"Professor Hirschur, during my journey to the past, Ferdinand and I spent a few days without any other source of food than what was in the tool, the one that I'm going to borrow from you now. What if Dregarnuhr refuses to send back in time the one I was planning to return?" She let the question hang in the air, fully confident that the Professor's brain would fill in all the gaps.

Rozemyne herself wasn't sure if she was just being paranoid; she was now living in a world where magic was real, would a time paradox or two really cause a major disturbance? Most likely, even if the magic tool was stuck in a time loop, nothing bad would happen, but she was not going to take a chance. Not when Ferdinand's life was on the line.

"...I understand." Said Hirschur after an inner debate. She pointed to one of the desks, covered by piles of documents, long-forgotten tools, potions, food crumbles and who knew what else. "It's there."

Lieseleta, Gretia and all the other presents paled at the sight. How were they supposed to retrieve the time stopping magic tool under that mess? How long would it take to remove all the debris? Were they supposed to rearrange everything afterward?

"It's under it." Hirschur stood up, removing three identical wooden panels designed to look like drawers' front. "I had these installed after some clean freak threatened to suck my research with her cleaning tool..." she shot a glance at Lieseleta, who simply gave her a polite smile.

While Lieseleta and Gretia started to move the content of Hirschur's tool into the one they had brought back, Rozemyne had Roderick organize the ingredients she would need for her exam. She started weighting them under Hirschur attentive gaze.

"I understand you don't want to risk yours and Ferdinand's safety," the Professor started, "but this is a once in a lifetime opportunity, Lady Rozemyne. I'm sure there's some research that you can do during your journey to the past."

"I may agree with you that it is a very interesting topic, but I assure you, during the whole journey I never had any time to spare." Rozemyne started chopping the ingredients.

"Then how about something to record the duration of your journey? To know if the time you spent in the past is the same as the time that passed in the present."

"I'll be moving backward in time, not only to return to the past, but also because the 'me' that will receive the magic tool tonight will return to the present yesterday, one day before... How long one stays in the past has nothing to do with when one will return in the present."

"Then how about sending a message to my past self? For instance, what if I told myself the results of a research I did a few years later? Or maybe the results of that research that Gundolf managed to complete a few days before I did? That would make evident to everyone that you went back to the past!"

"Aren't you just trying to steal Professor Gundolf's results?" Rozemyne said with a knowing smile as she added the ingredients to the brewing pot.

"He already won that competition. By announcing his results before he did, we would be proving your presence in the past. It may be useful in case someone tries to deny it and use the delay in your exams to take the 'best of the year' title from you."

Rozemyne couldn't tell if Hirschur was being considerate or just trying to find an excuse to make her an accomplice research thief. "First, the results of any research important enough to make a lasting impression after twenty-some years will have a lot of data, and I wouldn't have time to communicate it all to your past self," she started to stir the pot.

"Second, if you told yourself the results of a research and made them public, then they would no longer be Professor Gundolf's results, so we would not be able to prove anything. Besides, if the results were already known, neither one of you two would have any reason to carry out the research anymore... and then there would be no results at all." Rozemyne continued, a part of her proud at how easily such arguments were coming to her, another part wondering if she had said anything seriously wrong.

"Why there would be no results? They exist, already..." Hirschur interrupted her, her curiosity growing with each word the girl in front of her said.

"They exist now, because someone carried on that research in the past. But what if there had been no one to do it?"

"...There would be no results..." Hirschur repeated, mulling the thing over in fear that her understanding would vanish as soon as she thought about something else.

Rozemyne nodded, adding a time-saving magic circle to her brew, and went on to state the most important argument of them all. "Third, Dregarnuhr sent me to the past to fix the cuts in Ferdinand's thread, all so that Ventuhite wouldn't have to undo the cloth she had already woven and that she seemed to really like. She has already refused me the changes I wanted to make, I do not want to risk angering her." She let out that the change she had proposed would have impacted the history of the last twenty years.

"I see..." Finally, that last argument seemed to be effective in making Hirschur drop the experiment she had wanted to carry out. "You said 'twenty-some' years... That would be around Ferdinand's baptism, am I right?" Was Lady Rozemyne the one responsible for Ferdinand's sudden appearance in Ehrenfest?

The girl in question said nothing, realizing the blunder she had committed just by saying a single number, and busied herself adding a second time-saving magic circle to the pot in front of herself.

Hirschur nodded in understanding. "I won't ask about it again, I've known Ferdinand long enough not to prod about his past. But do tell me, Lady Rozemyne, were you involved in the Ternisbefallen incident that happened during Ferdinand's fifth year?"

Rozemyne debated for a moment whether to admit it or not, ultimately deciding that, if she was asking, she had to be somewhat familiar with the events already. "Seems you got your memories back as well... I'm surprised though, Dregarnuhr said nobody but Ferdinand's group and the Dunkelfelger's knights had any awareness of the incident."

"Indeed, it seems they were the only ones to know that anything had happened at all, even though they couldn't remember the events. Ferdinand and I did some investigations afterward, that's how I know it was a Ternisbefallen." Hirschur recounted. "I've heard second-hand stories from Rauffen, but if there isn't anything that needs to be kept secret, may I ask you what actually happened?"

Rozemyne paused for a moment, but then decided it was pointless to try to keep the silence, as the Dunkelfelger knights had probably told the story to their acquaintances all over Yurgenschmidt, so she started telling the story.

Dregarnuhr had made her reappear in the past at the gazebo, and from there she had to reach the Dunkelfelger's gathering spot, where the beast was rampaging. She had reached the site of the incident exactly in time to see the Ternisbefallen bite right through Ferdinand's chest.

"I thought I had failed before even starting my mission..." she admitted in a whisper.

However, Ferdinand's mana, combined with the desperate attacks from Eckhart and Heisshitze, had made the beast suddenly grow a few meters, but also open its jaws just long enough for the unconscious boy to start free falling. Rozemyne had moved quickly to catch him with Lessy -momentarily deprived of its roof- and take him far away from the beast.

"At that point all the knights started chasing after me, calling me a kidnapper..." Rozemyne laughed, never interrupting her brewing, "but they trusted me pretty quickly after I let Justus inside my Pandabus and told the others to lure away the beast without attacking it."

She had then used her ring to stabilize Ferdinand's condition. Fluthrane's staff would have done a better job, but it would have also attracted the monster's attention. Leaving Justus to continue the healing, Rozemyne had reached the knights and granted them the god of darkness' blessing, using the god of darkness' cape to suck the mana out of the Ternisbefallen and help the knights in their hunt.

When they were about halfway through the subjugation, she heard Ferdinand cough. He was still unconscious and, despite Justus' healing, his breathing had grown quite labored, undoubtedly thanks to the corrosive nature of the beast's saliva. She returned her focus on Ferdinand, performing a healing ritual exclusively for him -much to Justus' astonishment.

The boy regained consciousness, but the wounds on his chest were still purplish and not completely closed. He was clearly in pain, and that only worsened with his vehement attempts to send Rozemyne away or to curse Justus, who heeded her request to go retrieve his master's jureve, in case her healing would not be enough.

"After Justus left, I realized I needed Ferdinand to take off his feystone armor, if I wanted to cast washen on his wounds and remove the beast's saliva. I asked him to do it, as a knight he was surely able to do it alone, but he kept refusing..." In reality, he had kept calling her a 'shameless woman', but she didn't need to include that in her story.

"In the end I had to wrestle it out of him. He was incredibly strong for someone that badly injured, but at some point he suddenly agreed to remove his clothes, as long as I stopped straddling him... the Ternisbefallen must have hurt his pelvis as well. Luckily he could walk without issues after the healing." She said, noticing that it was almost time to give a shape to the manablade she was brewing.

When she raised her eyes to look at Hirschur, the woman was gaping at her. Unbeknownst to her, her retainers were gaping as well.

"Lady Rozemyne... did you just say you wrestled Ferdinand into taking off his clothes? And straddled him? That Ferdinand?"

"He was being pointlessly stubborn! I understand properness, but in a life or death situation one should first focus on surviving, and only after that on being proper!"

Everybody's face was practically screaming 'No, you don't understand properness!' in such a dramatic way that Rozemyne stopped to question if she had actually done something she shouldn't have.

It was then that something poked back at her memory. 'Poking' being quite the apt word.

As she had straddled him, she had felt something poking between her legs. Back then she had just imagined it was a part of the feystone armor... but there was no part that could poke her there!

It couldn't be! It was impossible that the Ferdinand she had just met would react like that to her!

The sensations from back then and from the night before mixed together with the sight she had witnessed that morning, giving her a crystal-clear tridimensional image in her head.

"Lady Rozemyne, it's a crucial moment, focus on your brewing." Hirschur's voice called her back to reality.

She took a quick glance at her pot. Something was starting to take form inside it, and it looked like it was rubbing itself against the mixing stick as Rozemyne moved it in the pot.

A manablade should not 'rub itself' on anything!

The thing was growing in size, but it was much larger and less pointy than a manablade should be. The scabbard had a dark red color, and there was even a small hole on its mushroom-like top!

'No, no, no... this can't be happening...'

Rozemyne started to panic, trying to think of a way to reverse the shaping of the brewing once it had started, but whether she knew one or not, it refused to come back to her at the moment, and that thing that was not a manablade was now as long as her hand.

Hirschur leaned over, staring at the thing with rapt curiosity.

'I need to make it disappear... I need to destroy evidence... How? Just how?!'

She had a flash then, of when she had first tried to make her highbeast.

'Right, I literally need to destroy it!'

She concentrated hard, imagining an exploding balloon, and before long that thing that was not a manablade went up in the air in thousands of pieces, even accompanied by a loud banging noise.

Both Laurentz and the shumils rushed to protect their Lady, but now that the evidence had been destroyed, Rozemyne felt suddenly safe, and raised a hand, telling her guards to return to their posts.

"Lady Rozemyne..." Hirschur started, "I've been teaching for almost thirty years now, and never in my career I've seen a tool explode during its brewing..." It was hard to tell if she was angry, curious, amused or bothered. Probably a mix of all. She brushed the shards of magic tool off of her clothes.

Rozemyne took it as a cue for a hasty retreat. "I'm sorry! I must be much more fatigued than I thought!" She said out loud as she quickly cast washen on the table and on herself to remove all the debris, then she stood up and all but ran to the door, forcing her retainers to do the same, "Keep the leftover ingredients as an apology!" was the last thing that she said before she went out of the door.

Inside the laboratory, Hirschur could do nothing more than stare at the door and blink, bemoaning the loss of that most unusual manablade.


I made a mistake in the previous chapter, including Matthias in the retainers Rozemyne has in Royal Academy in her fifth year. At this point, Matthias already graduated, so I edited the (luckily few) paragraphs where he appeared.

There's an ideal continuation of this chapter in another fic, "Professor Hirschur's new pet"

Many thanks to Krymzim for beta-reading the chapter

The (translated) verses are from
"Zeit", Rammstein, Zeit (2022)
The original lyrics:
Ich liege hier in deinen Armen
Ach, könnt es doch für immer sein
Doch die Zeit kennt kein Erbarmen
Schon ist der Moment vorbei

The memories Rozemyne has about child Ferdinand are based on "Precious".

The memories about the Ternisbefallen hunt are not based on any other fic.