Twelve years. That was the time Ellarish had spent living in the shadow of her sister, Arisa, the 5th-ranked Saint of the Temple.
In the frigid study of the Mast family, a five-year-old Ellarish sat motionless on a chair far too large for her. Surrounding her were thick, ancient grimoires, their contents as dry and cold as ice. Every day, she was forced to memorize half a book. Failure to do so would bring down the cold stares of the servants and the crushing disappointment of her parents—a sentence she had to endure time and time again.
The sobs of a five-year-old girl were swallowed whole by the howling wind outside the walls of the Mast estate.
Only in the fleeting moments when Arisa returned home did Ellarish's world gain any color. Those were the times her sister would take her hands, teaching her how to season a dish, whispering that the fire in the kitchen could be as warm as any magic. In those moments, Ellarish was not the "heir to the Ice Arts," but merely a seven-year-old child, allowed to exist.
But then, that peace collapsed.
During a routine mana training session, the pain struck. It was not mere exhaustion; it felt as though something fundamental—the very essence that defined her—was shattering within her chest. She collapsed, her world blurring into the frantic, panicked shouts of her tutor.
When she finally regained consciousness, hidden behind a partially opened door, the doctor's words struck like a blade, piercing the vanity of the Mast family: "Mana blockage. Her core has completely closed. She... she has almost zero chance of ever becoming a mage again."
A heavy, suffocating silence followed. Then, the Duke's scoff—the father she had spent her life trying to please—rang out, sharp and venomous: "Ha... A useless daughter."
Ellarish lay in the darkness of her room, her small hands clutching the bedsheets until her knuckles turned white. The sting of his words didn't hurt as much as the realization that hit her: her worth in this house had been tied entirely to a mana core that had now withered into nothingness.
From that day on, the Mast estate remained as majestic as ever, but Ellarish had become a ghost in her own home. The servants, once bowing in reverence, now brushed past her with eyes filled with equal parts pity and disdain. Her favorite meals no longer graced the table, and her tailor-made dresses vanished one by one.
She was still a young lady, but a "broken" one.
Ellarish realized a bitter truth: her existence was defined solely by magical prowess. Without it, she was not a person; she was merely a burden to be endured for the sake of appearances.
In the sleepless nights that followed, no longer burdened by magic lessons, she wandered the estate. She discovered a new skill: the power of silence.
The biting wind shrieked as Ellarish spurred her horse, galloping toward the city. To her, this wasn't an escape; it was a flight from the gilded cage known as the Mast family. But freedom was short-lived. The familiar agony returned, sharper than a thousand needles, tearing through her chest and turning the world into a spinning vortex. She collapsed.
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In her delirium, she felt a sturdy, unexpected warmth replace the cold, unforgiving earth.
When she awoke, the scent of the room left her stunned. It wasn't the expensive incense or the eternal frost of the Mast estate, but the smell of old books, damp wood, and something profoundly, unexplainably warm. A man in a brown vest sat nearby, composed as if he had been waiting for her for an eternity.
When he placed his hand upon her back, Ellarish felt a scorching energy, a stark contrast to the icy magic she had always known. Glowing runes, jagged like lightning, etched themselves onto her skin—painful, yet liberating.
"Your mana is blocked, isn't it?"
As he pressed firmly against her spine, the world exploded into white light. Instead of the hollow void, she felt mana surging through her veins once more.
But what was the cost? Ellarish watched in horror as the man collapsed, his breathing ragged, blood staining the wooden floorboards.
"Why... why did you do it?"
His voice was a mere rasp, a flickering candle in the dark, yet his eyes remained filled with grace: "I possess the power to absorb suffering... I have saved hundreds of children like you... and now... it is your turn."
"No! If you do this, you won't be able to use your own mana! You'll die!" Ellarish screamed, her small, trembling hands reaching for him, desperate to hold onto the final embers of his warmth.
He only smiled, a look of profound relief, as if he had finally shed a weight he had carried for a lifetime. His hand trembled as he rested it upon her head—the final touch before it fell lifeless to the floor.
"Live for yourself... never for anyone else..."
The room fell into an absolute, suffocating silence. A savior, a nameless hero, was gone, leaving Ellarish with a heart in tatters and a mana core reborn. As she gazed at the fallen man, she realized that from this moment forward, her life no longer belonged to her parents, nor to the Mast family.
She owed him a life. And she swore that his sacrifice would not be in vain.
Ellarish walked through the heart of the city, but the bustling noise hit her ears like distant, meaningless static. To her eyes, the world had lost its vibrant hues, reduced to a bleak, haunting landscape of black, white, and gray.
She clutched the neckerchief—the only thing he had left behind. It still held a lingering warmth, a reminder of the sacrifice she now carried.
Within her veins, two mana currents—the frigid frost of the Mast lineage and the healing warmth of the stranger—clashed and merged. It was no longer pure; it had become something else entirely—a potent, regenerative energy. A form of "Ice Magic" that had never existed in the history of the Mast clan.
Suddenly, she stopped before a dark alleyway.
A group of figures in grey cloaks—scouts from the Mast family—were silently scouring the streets. Their voices drifted to her: "Lady Arisa has commanded it. Whether she is found dead or alive, we must find her before dawn."
Ellarish pressed herself against the cold wall, her breath held tight. Had this been the Ellarish of yesterday, she would have been trembling, sobbing in terror. But now, as she looked at her hands, she saw faint blue mana flickering along her fingertips.
She felt no fear. The "uselessness" her father had labeled her with was now her greatest camouflage. None of them would ever suspect that the girl they deemed "blocked" stood right before them, brimming with a power they couldn't comprehend.
Ellarish clenched her fist. Her eyes held not the gaze of a child, but the cold focus of a predator.
You want me back? Then prepare yourselves to face the thing you threw away.
She retreated deeper into the shadows, her scarf fluttering in the bitter winter wind. The chapter closed, but the hunt—and the journey of the "useless" girl—had only just begun.