Beast Gacha System: All Mine-Chapter 253: Rotten Snowflower

The Dawnoro’s estate, the Winter’s Keep, sat like a beast curled for sleep, its dark stone walls absorbing what little light the northern sky offered.

Inside, the keep hummed with quiet life. Fires crackled in every hearth... servants moved through corridors, their breath visible in the chill of unheated passages... the smell of pine and smoke and something cooking.

A rich, meaty stew, wafted from the kitchens below.

Upstairs, in a small chamber near the family quarters, candles flickered against the darkness. A girl sat by her window, watching the snow fall.

Sienna’s face was blank.

Not quite the blankness of peace, more so certainty. She was absolutely certain that the world was about to shift in her favor.

She was sure, in the next semester, the last semester of the senior year for Arkai, Cecilia Araceli would be gone. Whatever her father had planned, whatever pressure he was applying, it would work. It always worked.

She could sense that her father had been more engaged with the Athenaeum than usual these past days. The lord of the house didn’t trouble himself with academic institutions without reason.

And she had heard from her mother’s maids that the lord’s aide had been pressuring the Athenaeum about something.

Sienna knew it must be about Cecilia.

Knock, knock.

She turned from the window, her face smoothing into something more presentable. "Yes?"

The door opened, and her mother’s face appeared. She was warmly smiling, relieved.

"Sienna, honey." Ines stepped inside, her eyes soft with the particular tenderness she always reserved for her daughter. "Your father has an unexpected downtime for dinner tonight. He’s even calling your brother home." She paused, letting the news land. "Let’s have dinner together."

"Really?"

Sienna’s smile bloomed.

It was the first genuine expression of joy she had worn in days. But now her father was calling them together. Her brother was coming home. Dinner.

Ines watched her daughter’s joy return and felt something ease in her chest. These days, Sienna had been so sad, so withdrawn, wanting only to be left alone with her thoughts.

Ines could feel that her daughter was expecting something from her husband. She was waiting for him to fix and remove whatever was plaguing her mind.

Perhaps tonight, that would happen.

"Yes." Ines smiled, warm and encouraging. "It’s time to have a talk with your father if you want something. Please don’t make your father worry anymore, alright?"

Sienna nodded eagerly and made a beeline for her walk-in closet. "I’ll wear a nice dress tonight."

Not to mention, her brother was home too?

Some thoughts flickered through her mind as she pushed open the closet doors. After what had happened at the cemetery, Sienna was still unsure how she would face Arkai again.

But she knew.

She knew Arkai loved her more than anyone else in this world.

He had promised, after all.

Sienna’s eyes swept over her dress collection. Row after row of beautiful garments, each one chosen or made specially for her. But one dress caught her attention, pulling her gaze like a magnet.

A dainty white dress, lined with soft fur at the cuffs and collar. And at its breast, embroidered in delicate grey thread, a pigeon.

She had made quite a few versions of this dress over the years. Each one bigger, more fitted, as she grew from child to young woman. But the pigeon embroidery was always the same one she wore after that day.

Because that day was the start of it all.

"Mother." Sienna’s voice was soft, distant, her fingers tracing the embroidered bird. "Do you remember the day I got lost in the northern winter alone?"

Ines smiled behind her, the memory warm despite its terror. "Yes. Of course I remember. It was the scariest day of my life."

But to Sienna, it was the best day of her life.

Sienna had been angry, those first few days after being brought into the keep as August’s new step-daughter.

Ines came from a poor noble family. Respectable blood, but no wealth to speak of. But she had married well the first time. Trion Bjornson, a very wealthy nobleman of the north. Twice her age, but kind and handsome, and never married before.

Trion was Sienna’s biological father. But Sienna knew nothing of him. He had died when she was only three years old, leaving behind a fortune and a wife who had never learned to manage it.

After his death, Ines had sworn her daughter would never know poverty, and the shame and the desperation she had grown up with. Thanks to Trion’s fortune, she could afford a luxurious life for herself and her child.

And she never said no to Sienna. Ever.

So when she married August in the fifth year of her widowhood... when the Dawnoro family’s teachings and discipline were suddenly applied to eight-year-old Sienna, the girl couldn’t cope.

She couldn’t just play anymore, she had to study. She couldn’t have everything she wanted, she had to earn it. She couldn’t boss the servants around, she had to have manners.

It was too much.

So she ran away.

In the freezing northern winter, eight-year-old Sienna slipped out into the night. Quiet as a mouse, small as a shadow, she disappeared when no one was looking.

No child, especially not one sheltered from birth, could survive the northern winter alone.

She got lost immediately. The landscape all looked the same. It was only white and white and more white, endless and featureless. She couldn’t find her way back to her old home. Couldn’t find anything at all.

Hours passed. The cold seeped into her bones. Her limbs grew heavy, then numb. Her skin turned blue.

She found shelter under a fallen old tree, its trunk forming a small cave against the snow. She huddled there, alone, shivering and dying. No animals in sight. No rescue appeared. Just the wind, and the cold, and the endless white.

Until ten-year-old Arkai Dawnoro found her.

He was tall. Even at only ten years old, Arkai Dawnoro stood above most children his age, with the kind of presence that made adults pause and take notice.

He could already ride a massive battle stallion anywhere he pleased, handling the beast with the ease of a seasoned warrior. His Force Magic was said to be the strongest anyone had seen in hundreds of years. He was a prodigy, a phenomenon, the kind of child legends were built around.

When Sienna and her mother first arrived at Winter’s Keep, they hadn’t seen Arkai yet. He had already been away at the Athenaeum’s Elementary Program, a special track for the most gifted young mages, those whose potential was too great to wait for standard schooling.

At the time, Sienna had only known that the Athenaeum was for elites. For mages with immense talent and the wealthiest of families. Her mother had promised to send her there when she turned twelve, if she studied hard enough, if she proved herself worthy.

But this boy had been there since he was six?

That was another level entirely. Another realm of talent and wealth and destiny.

So when Sienna first heard about Arkai Dawnoro, she knew immediately what her future held. Endless comparison. Endless falling short. She was the step-child, the interloper, the daughter of the woman who had married into a dead wife’s place. And this boy, this heir, would surely hate her for it.

She was convinced of it.

That day, huddled under the fallen tree, blue with cold and half-dead from exposure, was the first time she ever saw him.

Arkai Dawnoro.

Her step-brother.

He sat atop a massive warhorse, its breath steaming in the frozen air, its dark coat stark against the snow. The boy himself was wrapped in furs, his face partially hidden by a hood, but she could see enough.

Cold. Stern. Magnificent. Like a fairytale prince carved from the northern ice itself.

Then he jumped down.

The movement was fluid, effortless, a boy who had been riding since he could walk, who had never known fear of heights or falls. His boots crunched in the snow as he landed, and he strode toward her hiding place without hesitation.

He crouched down, pushing aside the fallen branches, and looked at her.

"Found you."

He smiled.

Ah.

So... a face as cold as a black glacier, when smiling, could look that handsome?