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The group ended up taking shelter in the orphanage.

After being caught up in trouble since morning, Alice, who had been devoted to making potions, fell asleep the moment she was laid on the bed.

After making sure the doors were properly locked and thanking the Sister who lent them the room, Sufi, Noche, and Filia gathered in a corner of the common room where the children usually hung out and took a breather.

“I still can’t forgive those guys, nya! They went and called us thieves just because we’re lycans¹, nya!”
“Yeah! Sufi and Alice both worked hard to help the injured too!”

What came out of their mouths was nothing but anger. They had held it back after being calmed by Sister and Langbert, but the flames of their anger were still burning strong.

From their perspective, they had acted out of goodwill; all the more reason why they found the townspeople who mocked the effort of their frail youngest member unforgivable. Even if it was all but an incited outrage, the abusive words the townspeople spat out wouldn’t just disappear.

Perhaps sensing their anger, or maybe out of consideration from Sister, the children kept their distance. Watching Sufi and Noche vent while keeping an eye on the other children, Filia, who had calmed down through the earlier exchanges, suddenly voiced a question that came to mind.

“You don’t do alchemy, Sufi?”

The time the group had spent together wasn’t long, but they had gone through hardships and worked together to get this far. Watching the twin sisters up close, there were things Filia naturally came to understand.

Their adoptive parent was an alchemist, and her younger sister Alice, though Filia didn’t know to what extent, could also practice alchemy to some degree. That was Filia’s understanding.

Seeing how much Sufi fussed over her younger sister, it wouldn’t be strange if she had learned alchemy together with her from their adoptive parent.

In fact, Sufi had knowledge of medicinal herbs and could follow alchemical discussions that were incomprehensible to Filia and Noche.

Just today, Sufi had fully supported Alice and even helped with making medicine. She clearly had both knowledge and skill, yet Filia had never seen Sufi try to practice alchemy herself.

She had remarkable talent, yet didn’t try to make use of it—that puzzled Filia.

“……Sufi won’t.”
“Huh?”

The question was meant to be casual, but Sufi answered in such a bad mood that both Noche and Filia were taken aback.

While the two stood there confused, Sufi’s expression stiffened as she looked down.

“Sufi… won’t do alchemy anymore.”
“I—I see…”

Because of her upbringing, Filia was good at reading the room. Her experience and intuition warned her not to ask any further.

Sensing clear rejection in Sufi’s expression, Filia dropped the subject. Noche also refrained from pushing further, her tail just swaying restlessly.

An awkward silence lingered between the three for a while.

■■■■■

—From the time she became aware of herself, Sufi displayed talent in many things. Not just average ability, but exceptional ones.

She could beat even adults in physical activities back in the village, and she had never lost a fight even against older boys.

With such talent, as one could tell from how she always competed with Noche, Sufi had an intensely competitive nature.

Precisely because of that, she never rested on her natural gifts and was able to polish the raw gem she was born with.

However, until she met Noche and Filia, the only child around her age was her younger sister, who was physically weak and could barely manage daily life without assistance.

Against a younger sister who was inferior to her in everything, that competitive nature had no place to manifest. Instead, Sufi cherished and devotedly supported her one and only sister.

It cannot be entirely denied that within that deep affection lay a sense of superiority born from her being a young genius. Even so, the fact that she cared deeply was beyond doubt.

Living like that, Sufi gradually turned protecting her frail sister into her own identity.

…and then. two years ago, when the two were about to turn five, *it happened*.

The truth was, it was Sufi who began learning alchemy first from their adoptive parent, the alchemist Wasel Haumass.

As expected, she displayed extraordinary talent in alchemy as well, impressing Wasel.

She absorbed both technique and knowledge like a sponge, and after beginning serious study at the age of five, she acquired enough skill and knowledge within just a few months to be recognized as Tier 0.

The path to becoming an alchemist is steep.

First, one must either become a direct disciple of the most knowledgeable person in the village, or gather at a private academy of a nearby school or a guild-run institution to study and aim to pass Tier 0.

On average, the age for passing the Tier 0 exam, an apprentice level, is around eleven to twelve. Reaching that level at just over five years old is nothing short of extraordinary talent.

The current record for the youngest Tier 0 certification is five years old. It was taken by a girl raised under elite training as the daughter of a renowned alchemist. By twelve, she obtained her official license, and she is now sixteen years old.

She is regarded as a prodigy who may one day reach the Tenth Tier, “Ars Magna.”

If Sufi had seriously pursued alchemy, then she would achieve a feat rivaling that genius, or perhaps even surpassing it.

In order to give his adopted twin daughters the strength to safely reach the Holy Kingdom, as well as having them inherit his research, Wasel then began to teach Sufi and Alice alchemy with even greater intensity.

Wasel Haumass was a genius in magical device development and a leading figure in magic tool miniaturization research, a mighty alchemist who had reached the Ninth Tier—and Sufi possessed the capacity to inherit the entirety of his life’s work.

Sufi herself, believing she would inherit the techniques of the man she regarded as her grandfather, devoted herself eagerly to alchemy.

Amid all that, it was some time after Sufi began learning alchemy that Alice developed an interest in it.

Alice was poor at physical activity, poor at studying. If something didn’t interest her, she couldn’t put her mind into it whatsoever—she would start gazing at the sky or the ground mid-conversation, wander off during lessons chasing clouds, and before anyone noticed, collapse somewhere.

Alice was that kind of girl—one who “had nothing, and could not have anything.”

In another setting, she would undoubtedly have been labeled a failure.

Her physical strength was so lacking it could be called fatal, following her older sister around frolicking in the forest was entirely out of the question for her. Alice would always watch her sister head out into the forest from the house window, feeling lonely.

That younger sister, however, found something that interested her, and became eager to study together with her older sister.