"Oee...?" The newborn baby, wide-eyed, began to cry loudly as if startled by its surroundings.
"Oeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee...."
"!"
A middle-aged woman, her face marred by mysterious scars, smiled widely in pure happiness, her eyes glistening with tears as she heard the baby's cries echoing throughout the wooden house.
"Elara...!" Her voice choked with tears of joy. It was the first time she heard the sound of crying since the baby's birth.
"Oeee… Oeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee...."
The cries started to fill the simple wooden house, mingling with the wooden furniture.
"You're finally awake, dear."
The woman smiled as she gently moved her index finger towards the baby, and in an instant, a gentle, light green mist began to emanate from her entire body. The gentle mist slowly moved towards the baby's body, enveloping it like a soft and warm blanket to soothe and comfort the baby's fussiness.
"...?"
The baby, who had been crying loudly, seemed startled when she realized that a strange mist, soft and delicate like cotton candy, suddenly started swirling around her like a blanket.
As if realizing the unfamiliar and unknown power enveloping her, she began to cry even louder, as if conveying that she didn't want to be touched at all, rebelling like a baby who didn't want her diaper changed.
"Oeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee...! Oeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee...!!!!!!"
"Shhhh... Elara... It's okay...." The woman tried to calm the baby down, reassuring her to ease her fear.
"Oeee… Oe…."
Gradually, the baby's hysterical cries began to taper off.
"Oee... ungg..." Her wide-open slowly closed again in peace and comfort.
The effects of the gentle green mist she had applied were finally taking effect on the adorable baby.
The middle-aged woman gazed at the soft green mist for a moment, her eyes tired.
"It seems that from now on, I should stop using this power and resort to ordinary spirit magic." She murmured, sighing softly with a bitter smile. Her palm continued to pat the baby's back, lulling it into a deeper sleep
"The world wouldn't harm a child blessed by the Goddess, Elara." She whispered, adjusting the thick fur blanket that had become disheveled during the baby's little rebellion.
While still patting the baby's back, the woman turned her face towards the tightly shut window.
Snow was starting to fall, making the air even colder, threatening to freeze anyone to death. Fortunately, this simple wooden house was equipped with a basic fireplace that managed to warm them both.
"Now, let's see what the future holds...."
***
5 years later
"Lara?"
A small 5-year-old girl with shoulder-length brown hair responded, looking up from a thick and unexciting book titled, [The History of the Establishment of the Three Great Kingdoms Alliance]
She immediately stopped reading when her mother called her name. "Yes?"
"Could you please help me by getting some flour, dear? Our bakery is running out of stock."
Lara, or Elara, nodded her head and placed the thick, unfinished book on a wooden table.
"Of course, Mom. I'll be happy to help. I'll go to the store right away and get the flour for you."
Without further delay, Elara left her house and headed towards the general store. The only place in the small outskirts village of the Galatea territory where she had lived all her life that had a variety of items in stock.
"Ah, there's Lara! Why did you come down from the hill, kid?"
One of the town Guards greeted Elara as she emerged from the path leading up as if they were already familiar with each other and often exchanged greetings.
"Ah, hello, Sir! I came down to buy flour for baking bread." Elara replied politely, slightly bowing her head.
Another town Guard chimed in. "You're baking bread?! I love it when the wind carries the scent of your bread all the way here!"
Elara smiled upon hearing the comment from the middle-aged guard. "Sir, you should stop by to buy some bread after your patrol shift ends today!!"
"Absolutely!!"
"Take care. If carrying your groceries up the hill is too hard, you can always ask for our help."
The Guards who had initially greeted Elara smiled kindly, and Elara accepted the offer with a grateful smile before taking her leave. "Thank you!"
The atmosphere of the small village in the morning felt tranquil and peaceful, thanks to the villagers who were content with minding their own business without overly interfering in each other's affairs. This created a very comfortable living environment.
Despite the small population of less than two hundred people, the villagers recognized and interacted with each other easily, forming a close-knit community. While there were instances of exclusion and punishment for wrongdoings, the peaceful and harmonious atmosphere prevailed in this small, secluded village.
Luckily, Elara and her mother managed to maintain good relationships with everyone despite living somewhat distant from the main community, which meant they weren't bound by village rules too strictly.
Elara, who was busy thinking about so many things that didn't seem to fit in her tiny head, stopped walking after realizing she was out of the hill and had arrived in a village area that was already familiar to her.
She smiled widely, her big and cute eyes moving innocently as she spotted a rather large and bustling building, unlike the common structures found in most of the village.
"Welcome, oh, Lara, the clever girl!" The cheerful greeting from the store owner made Elara involuntarily smile.
"Good morning. I'd like to buy some bread flour, Aunt Seth." Elara said as she approached Aunt Seth, addressing the store owner respectfully.
"In the usual amount, right?"
"Yes." Elara nodded.
Seth also nodded with satisfaction, pleased with the polite demeanor of a young child like Elara. Such politeness was rare, even more so in a small and secluded village like theirs.
Seth patted Elara's head, messing up her neatly brown hair.
"You can head back now. I'll have Uncle Denver deliver it to your bakery!"
Elara nodded, ignoring her tousled hair, and quickly bid farewell with polite words. "Thank you, Aunt. I'll head back now."
"Take care!"
"Ung!" Elara smiled warmly, turned around, and walked out of the store without pausing or glancing back at the people around her.
But whispers began to circulate among the people present in the store.
"She truly doesn't look like a 5-year-old child."
"Indeed, her composed and polite demeanor is quite unusual and strange."
"I wonder if the rumors are true... that she's a child of illegitimate nobility...?"
Elara, overhearing the whispers, continued to walk past them with an expression that pretended not to hear, as if she was undisturbed by their words.
"Haaa...." She eventually managed to exit the store, feeling a sense of relief wash over her.
<"She truly doesn't look like a 5-year-old child.">
She replayed the words in her mind as if they were etched there.
"Of course, that's true. If I count my age from my previous life, I'm already in my 30s." She murmured, shaking her head unconsciously.
When she first realized that this was her second life, Elara, still a baby, couldn't help but cry and wail incessantly whenever she was hungry, sleepy, or needed a diaper change.
But upon realizing that this wasn't the same world, but a different world similar to what she often read about in novels during her leisure time, she screamed in endless delight.
"EUREKA! THE GODDESS OF LUCK HAS FINALLY SMILED UPON ME! I'M IN ANOTHER WORLD! IT FEELS LIKE I'VE WON THE LOTTERY!"
That's what Elara always cheered with joy in her heart every time she opened and closed her eyes during these infant stages of her second life.
However, she had to retract the phrase "like winning the lottery".
Because she was merely born as an ordinary person, living in a small village on the outskirts.
Of course, it still felt like winning the lottery when she managed to live in a different world with memories of her previous life still vivid in her mind.
Nevertheless, Elara couldn't believe that she had successfully navigated through the challenging and demanding days of infancy and had reached the age of 5.
"I managed to grow up healthy, sniff."
"Good morning, Lara. Is El Family Bakery open?" One of the villagers who occasionally visited her bakery greeted her warmly.
Her reverie was interrupted, and Elara quickly nodded with sparkling eyes.
"It's open! Feel free to come and buy freshly baked bread straight out of the oven!"
"Wow, I'll come during lunch break!"
"Looking forward to it!" Elara beamed with a wide smile, having secured another customer.
Thanks to that, she decided to return to her home and help her mother with baking bread once again. The simple wooden house stood atop a hill.
A carved smile adorned her cute face as she spotted a large wooden sign affixed to her house, visible from a distance due to its size and attention-grabbing writing.
[El Family Bakery]
Elara and her mother had a brief dispute and days of silence because of the argument over what name would be suitable for the bakery. Her mother insisted on 'Lara's Bakery', but Elara stubbornly resisted, wanting a more commonplace name without her name mentioned.
In the end, Elara gave in to her mother's request and suggested a more generic name for the bakery.
'But...Does this name look ordinary?' She wondered, feeling a strange pang of embarrassment once again, though thankfully, it was far less overwhelming than the initial embarrassment she had felt when first customers began enthusiastically mentioning the bakery's name.
Elara shook her head and decided to keep walking, realizing that she had only ascended a third of the slope of the hill she was currently on.
Despite the repeated climbs up the not-so-high hill, there was no sign of exhaustion on her face. Youthfulness truly was a refreshing thing!
With a joyful skip in her step, Elara ran towards the house, humming a tune.
'It's finally here!' Elara shouted happily in her heart as her house came into view.
Elara entered the simple wooden house that had been divided into two parts to accommodate the bakery.
The wooden house, which initially looked like a tiny shack, had been expanded to a moderate size, creating spacious rooms for selling bread and also a kitchen.
Inside the not-so-large bakery, the inviting aroma of freshly baked bread welcomed her. She saw shelves filled with various types of bread, ranging from crispy croissants to soft wheat bread. Meanwhile, in the kitchen at the back of the bakery, there was a considerable noise, undoubtedly originating from her mother.
"Lara's back!"
Her mother, a middle-aged woman with a face marked by peculiar scars on her right cheek and left eye, greeted Elara with a warm smile as she stood by the door kitchen.
"Welcome back my Lara! Where's the bread flour?"