The next morning, Anima was awoken by lively chatter. He turned toward the voices and opened his eyes to see Myuke and Marie excitedly jumping up and down at the windowsill.
“Myukey, look! Iss white!”
“Sure is! Wow, look! It’s even snowy over there!”
“Ah! There too!”
“Whoooa! The whole world’s white!”
“Ehehehe!”
The two were not-so-quietly enjoying the snow-covered spectacle. Curious, Anima silently got out of the bed, snuck up behind them, and looked out the window. The snowfield was slightly illuminated by a dim light. It may have been dim because of the clouds, but since Luina was still sleeping, Anima figured it must’ve been really early in the morning.
“You girls are up early,” Anima whispered, being careful not to wake Luina.
“Ah, did we wake you up?”
“Don’t worry about it. You do have to be quiet, though. Mommy’s still sleeping.”
Myuke nodded, and Marie covered her mouth with her hands in response to Anima’s gentle warning.
“I can quiet,” she whispered.
“Thank you, my big girl.”
He stroked her still-disheveled hair, much to her enjoyment. Then, as if she’d just remembered something, she turned right back toward the window and pointed outside.
“Daddy, look! Lossa snow!”
“Hmm, let me see... Wow, you’re right!”
The vegetable field was draped in a white blanket, with the cabbages looking like they were wearing little hats. The nearby forest had also gotten a complete makeover; the once-bare branches were covered in snow, and the ground foliage was nowhere to be seen. In a single night, the scenery they knew had been changed completely, resembling something from a different world. It made perfect sense that the girls—especially Marie, who had never seen snow before—would be excited.
“I’m happy to see that it survived overnight.”
“I wanna play!” Marie chirped, fidgeting from the excitement. She was so ready to rush outside at a moment’s notice that the call to do so was likely the only thing that would get her to pry her eyes away from the window.
Snow was nothing new to Anima, but to the four-year-old girl, it must have been a brand-new world to explore. He must’ve experienced his first snowfall with the same excitement over a hundred years ago. It was an early hour, but there was no way to put Marie back to bed with the winter wonderland waiting for her outside, so Anima decided to instead dress her up.
“You need to have breakfast before heading out. Would anyone like to help me make it?”
“Meee! I bring water!”
“You’ve gotten very good at bringing glasses of water to the table. Do you want to help us too, Myuke?”
“’Course I do, but I’ll need to borrow Luina’s stone.”
Luina was in charge of cooking for the family, with Anima and Myuke always there to help her out and even take up the cooking itself every once a while. Unfortunately, however, they each only knew how to make a single dish, so with the main task almost always in Luina’s hands, she kept the ring that housed the fire lizard stone on her finger at all times. It pained him to wake his slumbering wife, but they needed the stone if they wanted to actually make anything.
“Luina, can I borrow the magic stone?”
“The magic stone?”
Her long eyelashes shook as she slowly opened her eyes at Anima’s whisper. She had been the first to rise for as long as he could remember, but she’d taken a liking to spending more time in bed since getting pregnant.
“We want to cook something.”
“It’s that late already? Give me a little bit; I’ll be downstairs soon.”
“Go back to sleep, Mommy. We’ll take care of breakfast.”
“I can do breakfast! I’m big girl now!”
“Just give it to ’em so you can stay in bed and snuggle me, m’kay?” Bram sleepily proposed before letting out a big yawn.
“What’re you saying?” Myuke responded with a sigh. “You’re coming down to help too.”
“But it’s cold, m’kay?”
“Get used to it now and it’ll be much easier to go outside.”
“Brum, Brum! Get up!”
“Haah... I can’t say no to you, Marie, m’kay?” Bram reluctantly climbed out from under the blankets, got out of bed, and immediately hugged Anima. “Daddy’s warm. I wanna walk like this, m’kay?”
“Jeez, just how much do you hate the cold? Don’t you think it’ll be hard for Daddy to walk like that?”
“I don’t mind. I can walk perfectly fine with a little readjustment.” Anima picked up Bram, who comfortably rested her head on his shoulder. He then turned his attention back to Luina. “We’ll call you when breakfast’s ready.”
“Make sure to keep your stomach warm!”
They said goodbye to Luina and made their way down the stairs. Once they got to the dining room, Bram climbed down from Anima’s arms and stopped in front of the cold fireplace.
“We can still use this wood. Myuke, do your thing, m’kay?”
Myuke nodded, then stopped for a moment. She had only ever used the stone a handful of times, so she must have been worried that something could go wrong.
“Maybe we should get some water ready. Just in case.”
“There’s no need; you did it perfectly last time. You’re great at handling magic stones, so just go for it, m’kay?”
Bram’s words of encouragement seemed to have worked. Myuke cleared her throat, then got ready to use the magic stone.
Every time a monster was killed, it left behind a crystal. Channeling mana into that crystal would call forth that monster’s powers, albeit at the cost of a minor physical alteration in the form of temporarily inheriting one of the monster’s characteristics. In the case of the fire lizard stone, that characteristic was its tail. Anima had noticed that neither of the girls enjoyed that part of using the stone, as both Myuke and Luina became incredibly self-conscious after lighting fires. Regardless, Myuke did as she was asked, then proudly turned toward Bram.
“No need to thank me.”
“Awesome! You’re the best, m’kay?!”
Bram hurriedly warmed her hands in front of the flame, letting out a comfortable moan as she did. While the room was still cold, the warmth of the fireplace from up close was enough to give her a moment’s bliss.