The Harvest Mouse Exits the Fairytale Together with Cinderella

"Tchik!"
"Ah!"

Elodie jumped at the sudden voice.
Clutching her wildly pounding heart, she whipped her head around. But before she could locate the source, the voice seeped into her mind once more.
[How old are you?]

The fire spoke.
Yes, the fire inside the stove.
And now it was not only offering unsolicited advice but also interrogating her about her age.

[I asked how old you are.]
"Five."
[Baby, come back in ten years.]

The flames stirred.
A great flare erupted, its size growing in an instant.
Even if fire tried to take on a muscular form, it would still just be hotter, not stronger.

Elodie instinctively took a step back from the searing heat, and before she could react, the fire casually tossed the entire beaker into its body.
"What—why did you eat that?!"
[You couldn’t use it anyway. You need to melt the ingredients separately. Tossing them all together just turns them into a useless mess. Medicine requires precision, you know.]

"…Really?"
[Of course. The direction and number of times you stir can determine the final result.]
Now that she thought about it, the book had mentioned something about that.

Elodie groaned and squinted at the text again.
"So, you know how to make everything written in here?"
[I could make them blindfolded. No, probably with my feet, too.]
Wait—feet?

So it could, like, walk around too?
"You're pretty competent, huh?"
Elodie smirked, a scheming glint in her eyes.

[No need to state the obvious.]
"But what are you? How can fire talk?"
[I am Inferno, the Spirit of Fire. By divine decree, I have always existed in this place.]

The fire spirit crossed its arms—if fire could cross its arms—and puffed up proudly.
"Then you can help me, right?"
No, forget can—he had to help her.

"I'm the heir of the Ratson lineage, you know?"
Inferno sighed as he gazed at the tiny harvest mouse dashing around the temple like it was some grand playground.
[Aren’t you leaving?]

"Nope."
[You’re Maximilian’s daughter, right? If you were lucky enough to break the curse, you should be nestled safely in your parents' arms, playing with toys until you’re actually old enough to be here. What’s your problem?]
What’s my problem?

If she simply went along with the flow of fate, she might lose her family all over again.
Forever.
Elodie glared at the spirit, who was very openly showing his reluctance to deal with a child.

"Do you even know that the Ratson family is about to collapse?"
[How would a five-year-old know that?]
The flames flickered in apparent surprise.

[Don’t tell me Maximilian actually asked you to break the family’s curse?]
His voice carried certainty—it was impossible for Maximilian to have done such a thing.
"No. I just figured it out on my own."

[Maximilian really is terrible at lying…]
Inferno let out a deep sigh, sending a puff of black smoke curling into the air.
[In any case, there’s nothing a five-year-old can do about it. Let go of this pointless sense of duty.]

"If the Ratson family collapses, won’t that be a problem for you, too? This place will become abandoned."
[Not at all. The Temple of Healing is a space created by the gods. It is merely permitted to the Ratson lineage for now. Even if the Ratsons are wiped out, another family will inherit the right to it.]
"Another family…"

The Basilisk family.
Would they be the ones to take over this place after the Ratsons disappeared?
Elodie bit her lip.

She hugged her father’s book tightly, as if to shield it from the future.
"Then… would the next High Priest be able to read all these books?"
[Of course. Entering this space means they’ve been acknowledged by the gods.]

"But all of these books were written by the Ratson ancestors!"
[You think they just wrote them? Every book here was developed and recorded by them. They left these behind to guide their descendants, to save more lives and bring good into the world.]
The fire spirit grumbled and added,

[Do you have any idea how much hell—er, how much fire-hell—I went through assisting those High Priests?]
[I have been here since before the first book was ever placed on these shelves.]
Hearing that made something twist inside her.

A slow-burning frustration built in her chest.
Because she knew.
She knew that when the Basilisk family took over, they would trample over the Ratson legacy and claim its achievements as their own.

She had heard it with her own ears in the future—
"Beastfolk worship a venomous snake as their High Priest? I thought they'd destroy themselves, but turns out, they excel at healing because they can handle poisons."
"I heard. The guy’s been on a roll. They say he performs miracles every day, claiming he’s the reincarnation of the first High Priest, Raphael."

"Tch. I thought divine blessings had vanished after the last High Priest disappeared without a trace. But now, some monster just shows up out of nowhere."
"At the end of the day, he’s just an exceptional doctor. Meanwhile, we have the bloodline of Valkyrisen—the war hero who led us to victory."
The reincarnation of Raphael.

Daily displays of miraculous power.
And all of that—
It had come from this very temple, where the blood, sweat, and legacy of the Ratson family remained.

[Little one, the Ratson family has no future. Stop clinging to meaningless things and find another way to survive.]
Inferno, the spirit who claimed to exist by divine will, spoke with a finality that could have shattered the heart of any ordinary five-year-old.
But Elodie was not an ordinary five-year-old.

She met his gaze with unwavering, pitch-black eyes—clear, determined, unshaken.
"You're just okay with this?"
The question came out of nowhere.

"You’ve always existed here, right? We’re at the 23rd generation now, so maybe nearly a thousand years have passed. And you’re fine with the Ratsons just disappearing?"
[…Why wouldn’t I be?]
"You said you remember when the first book was placed here."

It wasn’t just memory.
Inferno had witnessed it all firsthand.
From the first Lord Raphael to the 23rd Lord Maximilian.

For centuries, he had known nothing but the Ratson family.
Even if it was simply the result of his divine duty.
He had never once considered another lineage taking their place.

And yet.
[It’s the way of the world. Everything that begins must also come to an end.]
A flame, bound to one place, had no choice but to accept the passage of time.

Inferno’s words were harsh, but his voice carried a warmth that betrayed them.
Elodie caught that hesitation.
She could feel it.

"If the Ratson family had simply declined over time and lost their influence, I wouldn’t have interfered. But this isn’t that."
Her voice was quiet, but firm.
"My bloodline, my people—they're on the brink of extinction because of someone else’s deliberate, malicious scheme. And you expect me to do nothing?"

[…Are you really five?]
"I am."
[You don’t sound like it.]

There was no point in pretending to be a helpless child against a spirit who wanted her gone.
Elodie made no attempt to hide her true self.
"I’m going to learn every single thing written in these books."

Inferno scoffed, amused.
[Maximilian himself didn’t master even a fraction of them. His talent was mediocre to begin with—and turning into a rat in his prime certainly didn’t help.]
"……."

[And you, his daughter, think you can? What are you, Raphael reborn?]
Not reincarnated. But time had been turned back.
Elodie narrowed her eyes.

Even if her father lacked natural talent, so what?
To her, he was never insignificant.
Because he was the only one who had left behind a foundation—something for his daughter to hold onto, even in his absence.

And the spirit, who had watched over him all this time, should have known that better than anyone.
"You keep calling my father ‘Maxi.’"
She smirked.

"As if it’s second nature."
The fire crackled sharply, as if it had been caught off guard.