Child Rearing Journal of the Strongest Wiseman～About My Daughter Being the Cutest in the World( Saikyou Kenja no Kosodate Nikki ～Uchi no Musume ga Sekaiichi Kawaii Ken ni Tsuite～) - Chapter 17

As we finished our tea and put away the dishes, Chloe immediately inquired.

“By the way, Aruji-sama, how shall I address you and Fiona in this school?”

I’ll explain it. It was a good opportunity so I called Fiona over too and had her sit on the sofa facing me.

The blonde-haired child and silver-haired girl sitting close together made quite a painting, but I didn’t let that distract me from explaining to them.

“Let’s see, first of all, did you properly let Fiona know that we’re infiltrating this country and this school under false identities?”

I glance at the blonde girl, and she nods her head energetically.

“You may call Otou-san “Otou-san”, but you may not tell anyone that Otou-san is from the Empire and that Otou-san used to live in a big mansion in Louwen, okay.”

That’s why it’s “shhh” to other people.

And she put her index finger to her lips.

“Exactly. You remembered well, Fiona. Well done.”

When I praise her, Fiona goes “ehehe” in happiness.

“In short, I should treat Kite-sama as one of the teachers of this school and Fiona-sama as her daughter, correct?”

Chloe confirms.

“That’s right. My Shisou has made all the arrangements, and this dormitory is for families. If Shisou forgot to make those arrangements, I would have been thrown into the bachelor’s dormitory by now, and Fiona would have been taken to the girls’ dormitory.”

“Um, what do you mean?”

“The Leangrad School of Magic is essentially a boarding school. It’s not just this principality that’s recruiting people from all over the world. Well, some parents build mansions near the school because they want to spoil their sons and daughters, but basically 70% of the students live in dormitories.”

“I see! Fiona-sama is getting special treatment.”

“You’re right. We should be thanking Shisou.”

“Un, I’ll write a thank-you letter to obaue-sama later!”

Fiona said cheerfully.

Chloe also agrees with her.

“Chloe needs to express her gratitude, too. It would break Chloe’s heart to think of us being separated and Chloe wouldn’t know which side to follow if it comes to that. It would be a tearing experience for Chloe.”

“Indeed, such a future was possible. By the way, Chloe. If the two of us were separated, who would you go with?”

I asked that as a prank, but I suppose that was a bad idea.

“Eh?” Chloe looked at me for a moment, and stared at my face.

Then her expression froze, and she became speechless and stopped thinking.

She literally turned into a doll.

She doesn’t move a muscle.

I thought to myself, “I messed up”, and stripped her back and fiddled with her circuits.

Watching her, Fiona asks me.

“What’s happening to her? Otou-san, is Chloe broken?”

She looks at me with concern, but I deny it.

“This is how Chloe is structured. If her mind is overloaded, a safety device will kick in and shut her down completely. It’s called freezing. It’s common in mechanical dolls. There’s no need to worry.”

“Oh, okay. Thank goodness~.”

My daughter is literally puffing out her chest with relief.

I explained to her as I worked on it.

“Without this safeguard, Chloe would go into thermal overload and get so hot that you couldn’t touch her.”

“Like, steamy?”

“Well, maybe if it’s raining. Like, Pushu~.”

“I’d like to see that.”

“Well, you’ll have to ask her next time. Anyway, mechanical dolls are surprisingly delicate.”

With that, I closed the opening in her back and placed the maid’s dress back on.

Now all I have to do is put in some magic power and she will activate.

“By the way, this safety device was invented by me, and I also applied for a patent from the Magic Society. I used the money to buy the mansion”

Once I said that, I put my hand on her back and poured some magic power into her.

Chloe rebooted in a minute and twelve seconds.

Her eyes glowed with a mysterious light, and a log of ancient magical letters began to flow.

It was too fast for me to read the meaning of the letters, but I remembered the first line of letters that flowed.

「ＨＥＬＬＯ　ＷＯＲＬＤ」

That’s it. It was the magic language I had programmed.

I thought it would be an appropriate word for a mechanical doll girl to see for the first time, so I chose it, but was it suitable?

I wanted to take the opportunity to ask her, but before I could, she looked around curiously.

She turns her pale eyes to me and asks.

“Aruji-sama, is it possible that Chloe was freezing?”

” I guess so. I’ve rebooted your system.”

“Thank you very much. By the way, why was Chloe freezing up?”

“Don’t worry about it. It’s just a load of random access to your thought process. It happens all the time.”

I give Fiona a glance.

My daughter put her finger on her mouth again and said, “Okay. Shhh, right?”

“I see. That’s all right then.”

If you ask her the same tricky question again, she’ll freeze and lose all memory of the previous and subsequent events. Again, even mechanical dolls are more delicate than you might think.

Taking care of the girl, who looked as fragile as she looked, I began to casually continue our conversations as if nothing had happened.

“Well, thanks to Shishō’s arrangement, we father and daughter and our mechanical maid can now live in the same house. It’s a wonderful thing.”

“This is something I really appreciate. Now Chloe can stay together like this.”

Chloe said that and looked around.

“However, the only slight disappointment is that it is not as big as Aruji-sama and Seymour-sama’s mansion. This means the cleaning will be over in no time.”

“Well, I mean, it’s a staff dormitory of the school. Even so, this one is quite nice, isn’t it?”

Indeed, the mansion we used to reside in had twenty rooms.

Shishō’s mansion, where we had been staying a few weeks ago, was twice that size.

With that in mind, this humble house would be a walk in the park for the maid-clothed broom wielding Chloe’s.

However, as always, I don’t feel any concern.

In fact, it would be better to have a house of this size so that I can have more time to spend with my daughter.

This staff dormitory is a two-story building. There are about five rooms.

Each room was a reasonable size so that I could hear my daughter’s breath in every room. T/N : Kite…

On the first floor, there is a large living room with a table set up.

While Chloe was in the kitchen baking pastries, I was there teaching my daughter her studies.

Such a scene came to my mind.

Upon mentioning it to her Chloe smiles.

“It’s a lovely vision of the future.”

And….

“I’ll put up with the small space then”, Chloe joked, anyway, this place will be our new home from today.

The Leangrad School of Magic is a 9-year-system school.

Of course, if your grades were poor, you could be expelled earlier than that, but if your grades were excellent, you could graduate in as little as three years.

I don’t mean to make Fiona feel rushed at all, but if all goes according to plan, she will be staying in this staff dormitory for more than three years.

Now then, I wonder what kind of memories I will be able to leave behind in this small house.

I greeted the house with these thoughts in my mind.

“I don’t know how many years I’ll be here, but I’ll be counting on you.”

And――.

My daughter followed suit and bowed her head.

“I look forward to living with you, Ouchi-san.”

Would the spirits of this house bless us with this?

With this thought in mind, I began to unpack.

The furniture was already in place. It was already furnished. There was no need to buy anything new.

That’s why the main task of moving would be to sort out our clothes.

Let’s leave that to Chloe, shall we? She’s a professional maid. She’s good at this kind of work, or rather, if an amateur were to interfere, it would only result in chaos.

I display the books on the bookshelf in my study, including the magic books and old books that I got from my Shishō. Some of them were newly purchased in the capital.

The bookshelf is soon filled to the brim.

At this rate, I’ll have to call a carpenter or order a furniture maker to build a bookcase tomorrow.

Chloe peeked over to see what was going on.

“Please don’t make the floor collapse again.”

Just one word of warning. In a dismissive tone.

“I know. This is not a research tool, it’s a tool to gain the knowledge I need as a teacher.”

“This is a rental house, you know. If the floor falls out, we have to pay for it. We also have to pay for Fiona-sama’s school fees. Please don’t splurge like you have in the past.”

“I understand.”

But, neither the one who promised nor the one who made me promise was confident.

In the end, six months later, his study and even his bedroom were overflowing with books, but that’s another story.

For now, though, he was just a father excited about his new life with his daughter.