"Well, I'd argue that aberrant crayfishes aren't that deadly but maybe they are to you? Rontress says not everyone is as strong as us."

  "Ahaha... You're right, I am pretty weak compared to the two of you." Thomala deflated, like the thought of having two children being stronger than him somehow managed to hurt him physically.

  "Yes."

  "Ifira, stop scaring my dad and taste this."

  "Okay."

  There's two of them now. By the Light there are now two of them. How is that even possible?! And in neighboring settlements no less? Is there something in the swamp's water that made kids into uncontrollable geniuses or something? None of this made sense.

  And somehow, having two makes it so that it's harder for her to feel jealous? She honestly didn't get it, but seeing the two of them act like children— playing, tasting stuff, and just generally doing random things that take up their attention in a given moment. — made it easier to accept Rontress' and Ifira's innate genius.

  Laself has always assumed that Rontress' was more mature for her age, but seeing her sister-in-law having fun like this made her realize that it only seemed that way because Rontress worked.

  Rontress is a prodigy, so it's only natural that anything she does is exceptional, possibly even better than an adult's. That competency gave others a false sense of maturity.

  "Hey, have you ever seen Rontress like this?" She sat down next to her boyfriend. "Have you?"

  "No? If you're asking if Rontress has ever had friends or anyone outside our family that she got close to then the answer is nope, my little sister has always been alone." Howaph continued to weave baskets together as he explained. "She did talk to adults, though. I think the reason why Rontress never had friends her age is because no one can keep up with her."

  "I can see that happening." Laself silently watched the two girls giggle when a drop of caramel fell to the floor. "Guess she finally found someone she can relate to? Ifira doesn't seem like a bad girl."

  Wasn't Rontress scared of her back then? Laself wondered why, there's nothing wrong with Ifira as far as she can tell, she's just a normal child who probably felt lonely in her giant mansion, hence why she went out of her way to get Rontress to become friends with her.

  How Ifira came up with a plan to attack their store, get the guards to take Rontress to a prison, and then confronting her when she's walking back alone just got summarized in Laself's mind as: genius children doing their thing.

  Strange how she's become desensitized to their whole thing, usually people would be shocked when they learn that a little girl is capable of planning so well.

  First they'd ask what kind of class that child has, and if the class doesn't fall in line with their genius expectations, they'd say something like the child isn't actually a genius and that she's lying.

  Genius huh? Laself would never think the two girls are geniuses with what they're doing now.

  "I swear it tastes good!"

  "No!" Ifira spreads her hands in a vain attempt to push the spook Rontress is holding away. "It's disgusting goop!"

  "It's not!" Rontress giggled, a rare sound. "This is sweet( I promise!"

  "You're lying!"

  "No! I swear on my life! This isn't like fish eyes where they taste bad—"

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  "You don't like fish eyes?" Ifira's panic suddenly died down and she just looked at Rontress, her expression then morphs into one of confused amusement. "How?! They're so juicy and tasty!"

  "Ugh, you too?" A reflexive gag came out of Rontress as she put the spoon away and frowned. "Fish eyes are NOT food, why is everyone trying to make me think they taste good when they obviously don't?"

  "They do, though?"

  Not a single one of them is backing down, Laself felt amused as their bickering quickly became a relentless back and forth with no child willing to back down.

  "Okay then, how about we feed each other?" Rontress must have gotten tired because she decided to go for a compromise. "You feed me the fish eyes, and I feed you the herbal sauce?"

  "Mhmm! Deal!" Ifira stood up, her head turned from left to right, eyes scanning the room until they stopped on Laself. "You, bring me fish."

  "Okay." Laself felt that the way Ifira addressed was a bit rude but Rontress did explain that's just how she is, and Laself could understand of course, she knew that Ifira is a noble and that they're usually rude to the common folk.

  "Here." Would Miss Atterson hate her once she realized that Laself picked a fresh jar of brined fish?

  "Okay, here!"

  And there's not even a thank you, Ifira just went back to arguing with Rontress immediately. Nobles really do have a weird sense of chivalry, if they have any that is.

  "Right, so, say ahh..."

  "You as weahhh—"

  Two separate spoons entered different mouths at the same time, the hands that held them started quivering, and their balance frayed with each passing moment.

  "Look at their faces." She heard Howaph say, she followed suit and laughed out loud.

  Both girls had a look of pure disgust, Rontress' cheeks were puffed out while Ifira's pallor turned green, the two of them had red eyes on the verge of crying and yet none gave their counterpart relief by pulling back their hands.

  "Guess they both have things they don't like." Laself giggled, she didn't know Rontress had an aversion to fish eyes, she just assumed the girl ate them as a snack instead of a meal. "Why does Rontress hate fish eyes anyway?"

  "No idea, she's always been like that."

  "Hmmm, so it's just personal preference?" Laself caught her boyfriend nodding in the corner of her eye. "That's interesting, I never expected her to be like this."

  "She doesn't have a refined taste, just a weird hate for fish eyes, and hey look, the two of them are done testing each other."

  "With bad dishes?" Laself couldn't hold back the amused smile her lips are curving into. "How does that work?"

  "I don't know, but it probably makes sense for them." Her boyfriend replied, still giving Laself no answers to her question. "If you ask me though? I think it's interesting how the two of them are susceptible to the taste of food. After everything I've seen Rontress do and how she described Ifira, I assumed the only thing that would make them happy would be dragons."

  "Apparently not?" Laself chuckled, it is a strange discrepancy between their personal power and true selves.

  "Apparently not." Howaph lightly laughed alongside her.

  "You know what? I am done with this kind of food." Ifira suddenly declared, she shot a challenging stare at Rontress."You want to make your tongue dance?"

  "Sure? I guess?" Rontress is the kind of kid to not back down from a challenge so it's expected she'd agree like this. "What do you want to do? Are you cooking for me?"

  "What? No, I'd have our chefs cook a meal for us, come, wasting time talking is counter productive and will only slow us down."

  "Okay, fine." Rontress got up and followed her new friend out of their house.

  "Did that girl just insult our cooking?" Atterson sounded shocked, why? That was a noble.

  "I suppose so, yes." Laself confirmed, making her in-law sigh.

  "Rontress is moving up in the world."

  "Yes." At that, Laself can only agree.

  "You think we can hire workers to help us as well?" Thomala suggested, only to then get shot down by his wife.

  "The house is too small, how about you figure out a way to make us live in a mansion before you do that?"

  "Yeah... You're right."

  As silence came down on them and everyone went back to focusing on what they are working on, Laself can't help but let her mind wander to the future. It shouldn't be impossible for her to live in an actual mansion by this point right? With Rontress by her side and the responsibility of leading Flotol coming to their family, it's only a matter of time before she lives in a giant house.

  Her eyes go over to her boyfriend, Howaph would want a family wouldn't he? Should they have children before they move to a new house or after? Can she even control something like that?

  Wait, of course she can, she can just keep herself chaste until the new house! But would Howaph want that?

  Her boyfriend flinched when she hugged him, to him, this must have been out of the blue. Then what would he think of what she's about to say?

  "Hey."

  "Yeah?"

  "When do you want to have children?"

  Howaph's hands froze, then he slowly turned his head to look at her. "I don't know, when do you want them?"

  She pinched his arm, making him flinch, "I was asking you, what made you think I somehow had an answer to that?"