It turns out that my little sister was my daughter all along.

...

Eugh~ As expected, just saying it makes me feel weird.

Putting the weirdness of our family situation aside..... What the hell are these abilities?!

There's that dubious skill, «Seduction» that lets me know that Aphrodite is behind Aki's– or Ronnie's, reincarnation!

Ugh... The return of my anger induced headache is near.

There's the addition of another questionable passive skill:

«Blessings of the War God (SS)»

Increases the Speed of growth for all physical stats.

I suppose that could only be good for her when it comes up to protecting herself, but........ This "War God"... It couldn't be who I think it is right? That muscly, trouble seeking, delinquent onii-san on Olympus... We didn't piss off another major god, right?

My small hope was drop kicked into next year by the other two unfamiliar skills:

«Bloodlust(E)»

Increase attack strength by 5% after every attack sustained when health falls below 50%.

«Endure(B)»

Prevents any attack sustained from an enemy up to 20 levels higher depleting more than 25% of Hp at a time.

'These only apply to when she's getting beaten up!!!!!' I shrieked internally.

This was definitely the work of Aphrodite's delinquent boyfriend who loves to pick fights! I don't need an Oracle to tell me that a lot of fights will probably thrown her way along with these... "blessings". I almost instantaneously decided that Ronnie absolutely must learn to fight immediately!

The person in question raised a despaired shout of "Eh?!" at this declaration, but I ignored it in favor of adjusting all my plans to not only avoid getting myself in trouble with my cursed face, but also keep my daughter from getting killed in some fight.

Sigh.

Yet another item to the long list of things to get done, along with finding a suitable tutor and reading materials to finally get a move on with my magic training now that there's no middleman between me and the household funds.

I'd already dispatched some people to search through father's old connections for a teacher.

In the meantime, it was about time I took a look around my fief (yes mine fufufu) and inspect the extent of the damage that Verne inflicted on it. I received word from someone I sent out earlier that the section of the fief that was previously the Onyx Barony had seen hard years since Verne's rule, but it was still infinitely better than the original Verne lands. I planned to see it for myself. I needed to see exactly what needs to be fixed and what just needed a little prodding.

I wasn't going as myself, though. Lord knows what would happen if I was just walking around with this cur– blessing on my appearance. I already attract annoying people like flies, and I still can't fight yet. I can't walk around surrounded by bodyguards either. That would just be broadcasting the fact that I'm a noble, and given how the people in this fief were treated previously, they might withdraw and ruin my chance to get a true, unobscured view into their lives and areas that need improvement.

Therefore, the next day, I found myself in the estate's side courtyard decked out in the old dusty clothes of a regular village boy. A light layer of soot and dust on my skin to hide the curse glo– err... radiance, and a ragged, dull brown wig atop my head.

I was going incognito.

Of course, I would have some of my lower ranked and therefore street savvy guards tailing me from a distance, but otherwise, I was unprotected. It would certainly be dangerous, but sitting around speculating and having others describe it all while peering down from a high horse is the downfall of most nobles in this world when it comes to properly addressing problems in their feif. They hardly know the place that they govern, only knowing to bleed it dry with taxes.

I wasn't going to make this mistake. I didn't plan on going incognito every time I needed to do inspections though, I had to raise my image in the people's eyes after all. It would do no good operating under the quiet forever. Propaganda is vital.

I would have to wait until their living conditions are no longer plummeting first, and their fear and wariness of nobles decreases. At that point I plan to take full advantage of the fact that I'm a child to lessen that wariness.

For now, though, a disguise would have to be used to get close enough.

The servants seemed to be silently disapproving, too loyal to complain about my choice, but not happy. At. All.

I wasn't going to pay any attention to the head guard peaking from that doorway while biting his handkerchief like a scorned woman. Nope! Didn't see it. Didn't happen.

Now if only I could also ignore the six-year-old girl attached to my hip like a leech whining and pleading endlessly.

"Pleeeeeaaaaaaaassssse!!!" Wailed Ronnie sticking to me like a second skin. "Please please take me with you, big brother!! I'll be good I promise!!"

"No." I refused flatly.

"Whhhyyyyyyyyyyy?!!!"

"Now, Young Mistress," Maddie chided, trying in vain to pry the little frilly koala off me, "the Master is not going out to play. He has very serious business to attend to. It's dangerous!" That last part sounded kind of bitter...

"I known that!" Ronnie whined before becoming serious and giving me a very determined look, showing me the mature expression that had no place on her round little face. "I'm not a baby." Her voice was level this time.

"..." I sighed. I suppose I can't treat her like a seven-year-old after all. She's still Chiaki. "Very well."

""""Young Master!?!!"""" The servants raised their voices in shock.

THUD!

Oh dear. It would appear that my head guard has fainted. Maybe he's anaemic. He should really take better care of himself.

"Young Master, are you sure?" Maddie asked frantically.

I nodded sharply. They could only swallow their protests for now.

I myself am a reincarnated person, and I don't fancy being treated like a child. Chiaki's temperament has always been similar to my own in the end, that's why she was cursed like me. Of course, she wouldn't stand for being kept in the dark. Practice what you preach and all that... It also didn't hurt to start early on disillusioning her.

I'd informed her on the situation with our reincarnation and the "blessings", but I needed to make sure she understood the gravity of the situation, that this was no fairy-tale, she could and would die a second time, and dangers lurk in this world just as bad as our old one. She hadn't yet regained her memories until the whole situation with Verne's untimely demise blew over, so her mature mindset had yet to go back over the more dubious things "Veronica" had seen, few as those were.

Veronica gave a whoop of joy, and a few minutes later she was dressed similarly to me, her skin smeared with grime, her glossy black hair covered by a ragged, brown wig and her, elaborate, frilly dress replaced by a worn, washed out, simple one. She was beaming at me wile clutching my hand.

We looked like a regular pair of urchins......

Perfect.

We set off on horseback to one of the villages relatively farther away from the main town because I needed to see the absolutely worst conditions, so we would start with the rural setting first.

After dismounting in the forest a short walk away from the village, Veronica and I continued forward with our tails following at a distance just far enough to keep us in sight but not close enough to make it seem we were being followed.

Like this we stepped into a village in disguise for the first time......

........

'What the fuck is this!?!!!!!' Is what I screamed in my heart at seeing the conditions in the small village with barely more than a couple hundred people.

There were walking skeletons everywhere!

The trend in this place seemed to be stick thin limbs in worn brown rags, more hole than cloth, dry straw like hair, sunken eyes and jutting cheekbones topped off by a dead soulless look in the eyes.

This was the picture of desolation. Even our disguises, ragged as they were, stood out glamorously against this piss poor backdrop.

There were but a few straw and mud huts with equally ragged curtains or straw lattices for doors and windows. They slept in the same room as the livestock that were just as malnourished as the residents here. The fields– if you would be so kind as to refer to them as such, were small stretches of dry, unploughed earth filled with small rocks. It was especially bare looking now that it was approaching the beginning of spring and nothing was planted yet.

"This...." I was at a loss for words. Not to mention Ronnie whose face was doing its best impression of a sickly pale coconut.

Was it really this bad? Was this how it's always been under the rule of Richard Verne?

Steadily the evidence piled up and my stomach roiled queasily. By the time we'd gone through three more villages and the main town, my fists were clenched so hard my nails were biting into the skin of my palm.

My indifferent mask lasted all the way until we were back to the mansion where I promptly washed my face; ordered a large portion of those gaudy looking, cheaply made vases I'd had tossed into storage be dug up and brought to one of the empty drawing rooms and dismissed everyone but Veronica from the entire wing before letting loose every bit of the burning rage in the pit of my stomach.

"–COMING DOWN AROUND OUR GODDAMN EARS!!!"

SMASH!!!

"–PEOPLE STARVING BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD WHILE THAT SWINE DID WHATEVER HE WANTS WITH THEIR BOYS!!!! FILTHY FUCKING–"

SMASH!!!

"AM I EXPECTED TO BUILD THIS HELLHOLE UP FROM THE GROUND IN THIS THRICE. FUCKING. CURSED. BODY!?!!!!!!!"

SMASH!!!!!!!

I watched as another hideous vase exploded into shards on the already torn, shredded surface of one of the last remaining portraits of Richard Verne.

My breath was ragged and stung my raw throat as I stood before a veritable sea of porcelain and glass shards.

"........"

I, Yukimura Michi come Kaoru Onyx, am no human rights activist. I'm no hero, nor am I a paragon of justice by no stretch of the imagination. I'm just not absolute scum.

How long was that swine living in opulence while the people out there literally wasted away looking like any old wraith straight from Hades? Despite the conditions these people lived in and their pitiful harvests, I know for a fact that he taxed the living daylight out of them. What kind of sickness does it take to reduce a human to the kind of creature that was Richard Verne, huh?

This... dried out husk of a fief is in my hands now. I'm expected to turn this wasteland into somewhere liveable! This... This...

........

Is this my next trial? Am I supposed to be beaten down by that man from beyond the grave? Is that sadistic goddess laughing at me right this minute?

"...... Fu... Hahahaha." I couldn't help but let out a humorless chuckle that turned into a cold laugh as the corners of my mouth lifted into a dark smile.

"Mama..."

I looked towards Ronnie's who was curled up in a plush chair behind me with her arms around her knees and a distant look in her eyes. She was still so pale, and the size of the chair made her curled up figure look so small. She struggled to find her words.

"It makes me feel sick Mama." She gripped her legs tighter to her chest. "There's something we can do... right?" She was looking at me so hopefully.

I smiled widely, "Of course."

Her eyes widened. I walked over and cupped her little face in my own small hands.

"Sweet girl, you and I aren't going to let some small obstacles like these bring us down are we?"

She shook her head slowly but firmly.

"Do you forget that we come from a world with thousands of years of experience under its belt? What are these little agricultural problems in the face of that?"

Suddenly, sparks returned to those two previously dark pools of wine red, and her figure quickly uncurled. She jumped to her feet; her entire face flushed with excited agitation. "You mean..."

"Wouldn't it be a joke for us to come from a world as advanced as ours and quake before these primitive problems?" I said, brushing back the stray strands of my blood red hair. I could see her vibrating with excitement now.

"Ox ploughs?" She whispered.

"Water wheels," I replied nodding.

"Wheelbarrows?"

"Mulching," I replied.

"Channels?" She was bouncing on her toes by now.

"Crop rotation," I smirked.

"Mama, we have to start now!!"

'There's that energy I'm used to'

"Calm down, sweet girl," I chuckled rubbing her cute little head. "We have all the experiences of our ancestors behind us as well as our rather ill gotten wealth. You and I are no horticulturists, but we can at least fix this dump up a bit with what we know. The only problem is how to implement it."

She nodded her head so fast it seemed it was going to fall off.

"Now!" I clapped my hands together. "Let's have this," I gestured at the shattered vases and the mess of canvas and wooden frame that remained of Richard Verne, "cleaned up by the staff, and then we can put our heads together and try to remember how to build a waterwheel, shall we?"

Ronnie all but dragged me to my study. There she scurried to gather rolls of paper and dump them onto the desk.

So, I've been given a lost cause fief?

Hmph! I don't care if she'd dumped me into a desert!

I, Kaoru Onyx, refuse to go down without a hell of a fight!!