They returned to the Silver Dragon Temple before dinner. As soon as they heard noises in the courtyard, Muen came running out on her short legs, eagerly attaching herself to her sister. They did this every week, and it never got old.
Rossweise had once explained that since most dragon clans had only one child, siblings who had each other cherished and relied on one another deeply.
A thought struck Leon. "Did you act like this with Isha when you were little?" he asked Rossweise. "It's hard to picture you begging your big sister for kisses."
Rossweise responded by kicking him.
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Back to the story.
Although Noah didn't get a specific rank in the composition contest, everyone understood that the true champion was still the champion—
The "Champion Beyond Ranking" was still the champion.
And this was acknowledged by the Headmaster herself! That was absolutely worth celebrating.
At the lavish dinner table, Muen read her sister's composition from start to finish several times.
Then, shaking her fluffy head, she pointed at the text and asked Noah, "Sister, why is the word 'sister' mentioned so few times? Why! Don't you love Muen anymore?"
Noah didn't answer directly. Instead, she handed her sister a chicken leg, stuffing it into Muen's mouth. "What do you think?"
Muen's taste buds, along with the part of her brain responsible for jealousy, were instantly conquered by the delicious flavor.
She put down the composition, nodded repeatedly, and mumbled with her mouth full, "Sister loves Muen! It's all in the chicken leg!"
Noah ruffled her sister's fluffy head, took back the composition, and set it aside. The rest of the dinner was enjoyed in high spirits.
After the meal, Noah took Muen back to their room. Muen, feeling stuffed from too many chicken legs, sprawled out on the bed in a starfish shape to slowly digest.
Meanwhile, Noah quietly retrieved her small wooden box from under the bed.
Looking at the faint layer of dust on it, she felt a pang of emotion. It seemed she hadn't added anything to it for a long time.
A child surrounded by love doesn't have the spare energy to try and prove they are loved.
Noah blew the dust off the box and opened it. Inside were still a piece of black metal shard, a name tag with her name on it, and a handmade, simple Rubik's Cube.
She rearranged the items to make space and then carefully placed her composition inside. Satisfied, she locked the wooden box and pushed it back under the bed.
As she stood up, she heard Muen groaning on the bed. "Sister… Muen's tummy hurts~"
"You lie down right after eating so much, of course it hurts."
Noah took her sister's hand. "Come on, let's go for a walk outside. A couple of laps, then we can come back."
Muen wriggled on the bed for a moment before sliding off, putting on her shoes, and following Noah hand-in-hand to the temple's backyard.
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Meanwhile, Leon and Rossweise were cleaning up after dinner. It was the usual routine: he scrubbed, she rinsed.
Leon sometimes thought that if he ever wrote an autobiography and someone asked how he endured his captivity under the Silver Dragon Queen, he'd say, "By washing dishes."
In prison, you had to sew. As a captive, you only had to wash dishes. In hindsight, captivity seemed more comfortable. Leon shook his head, stopping his wandering thoughts.
"Did you put away the pen Noah gave you?" Leon found a topic.
"Yeah. Why? Regretting it and want it back?" Rossweise teased.
Leon chuckled. "Am I as petty as you? Besides, you heard our daughter. She listened to her dad and gave the gift to her mom."
He leaned closer to Rossweise, repeating proudly, "She listened to her dad~"
Rossweise lifted her wet hand and flicked water droplets at Leon's face. He recoiled and wiped his face. "See? You can't admit you're petty."
Rossweise glanced at him. "Idiot. Get back to work."
"But speaking of gifts…" Leon counted the days. "Isn't next Tuesday your birthday?"
During their last date, they had met a fortune-teller.
In the first round, they discussed zodiac signs, and Rossweise had mentioned her birthday was October 25th.
Leon wasn't overly concerned about Rossweise's birthday at that moment.
He just wanted confirmation so that on her "birthday," when the whole Silver Dragon Temple was busy, he wouldn't be clueless, which would be bad for maintaining their "model family" image.
Rossweise's mind stirred. It was true, next Tuesday was the anniversary of her birth. However, it wasn't her "birthday" in the celebratory sense. The way dragons observed birthdays was different from humans.
With their long lifespans, celebrating every year would mean hundreds or even thousands of celebrations in a lifetime, which would become tedious.
So, before adulthood, dragons celebrated once a year. After reaching adulthood, they celebrated once every ten years.
It was worth noting that dragon adulthood wasn't at eighteen like humans, but at twenty.
A twenty-year-old dragon possessed sufficient physical strength, logical thinking, and magical mastery, fully prepared for their long life.
Rossweise calculated quickly. Next Tuesday, she would be two hundred and eighteen years old. Her next "birthday" was in two years.
She glanced at Leon and decided not to tell him about the once-a-decade rule. She wanted to… mess with him a little.
"Yeah, it's my birthday. So what? Are you going to give me a gift?" Rossweise asked.
"I'll gift you a journey of a thousand miles. How about that?" Leon replied.
"Hmph, you dog of a man. If you're not giving a gift, then don't bring it up." Rossweise pouted.
Leon shrugged, unfazed. Since when did captives have to give birthday gifts to their captors?
"But since you're not giving a gift… you should at least make some other gesture, right?" Rossweise pressed.
Leon blinked. "What… kind of gesture?"
Rossweise pretended to think, then had a sudden idea. "You can… be in charge of my birthday celebration this year."
Leon was taken aback, pointing at himself. "Huh? Me?"
Rossweise nodded.
"With so many people in the Silver Dragon Temple, and you being the Queen, surely a line of people will be waiting to celebrate for you. Do you really need me to organize it?" he resisted.
This refusal showed that organizing a birthday party would make him feel troubled and uncomfortable.
Good. As long as he was uncomfortable, she was comfortable. That was the Silver Dragon Queen's logic.
"Why not?" Rossweise set down the plate she was holding, put her hands on her hips, and turned to face Leon. "Last year on my birthday, you were still in a coma. The children were too young, always crying for you to wake up. The birthday was completely joyless. Now that you're awake this year, shouldn't you make it up to us?"
"Hey, you—"
Rossweise cut off Leon's protest, speaking confidently, "And, to put it nicely, as the model husband of the family, isn't it normal to handle your wife's birthday? Don't you want people to think our relationship is harmonious?"
"…"
Leon was speechless. But he thought about her words and caught a key phrase—'to put it nicely'.
So he asked curiously, "And if we put it not so nicely?"
Rossweise replied without hesitation, "Not so nicely? As a captive, what right do you have to negotiate? You'll do whatever I tell you to do."
There it was. That hit the spot.
Leon finally understood why her previous words sounded so uncharacteristically pitiful. This last sentence was the familiar tone, the familiar captive-master dynamic.
Seeing Leon's reaction, Rossweise felt quite satisfied.
After a moment of silence, Leon sighed and nodded. "Alright. I'll make it up to you."
If Rossweise hadn't mentioned the daughters earlier, Leon might not have agreed so readily. But since she had brought them up, he couldn't ignore their feelings.
Noah had just written in her composition about how genuine her parents' love was, believing they were a loving couple.
How could Leon disappoint his daughter?
But!
Not disappointing his daughter was one thing. Obediently listening to Rossweise and organizing a birthday party for her was another matter entirely.
He looked at her and asked, "So, I'll arrange a human-style birthday for you. I'm pretty good at those."
Rossweise shrugged. "Sure, it's up to you. But if you can't satisfy me in the end… you'll have to think of something else to make it up to me. Understood?"
Leon chuckled and raised his hand. "I promise you'll be satisfied."
Rossweise glanced at the offered hand. Without much hesitation, she reached out and clasped it, their palms meeting to seal the agreement.
And so, the deal was struck.