I Became the Male Lead’s Adopted Daughter

Though she’d gotten unexpected help from her birth mother, Leonia was still quite shaken by the shocking revelation about her origins.
She even forgot the reason she’d been trying to figure out why the Marquis of Pardus had shown up in the first place.

Her birth mother had gotten pregnant as a teenager?
She could now fully understand why Ferio had looked so genuinely disturbed earlier.
Even she was surprised by her own birth circumstances.

'In many ways, this is just… insane.'
As expected of the Black Beast of the North—he caused chaos in every direction.
Leonia closed her cherished book, Life Is All Pointless, the one she’d received back from Ferio.

Even if life really was pointless, she was in no state of mind to read such a book right now.
At least for today, she wanted to purify her spirit with the fairy tale book Ferio had bought for her.
'Then what kind of bastard was my father?'

She wasn’t curious, not really.
But she wanted to scream a mountain of curses at him—right to his face. What kind of deranged lunatic lures a clueless girl to run away and then gets her pregnant at such a young age?
She wanted to punch him after every question. No, she wanted to drive her fangs right through him.

The irresponsibility of the pregnancy wasn’t just Regina’s fault.
If anything, the blame belonged more to the reckless man who had sweet-talked a young girl and dumped his mess behind.
'I’ll bet my life on it—that bastard definitely ran.'

If he hadn’t, there was no way she would’ve ended up suffering through the hell of that orphanage.
“Young Lady, it’s time for lunch.”
“Okay!”

Internally, she was cursing the father she’d never even seen—comparing him to a leaky faucet dripping with irresponsibility—but she still took Connie’s hand and headed to the dining room with an innocent, cheerful face.
And she vowed—someday, when she met that biological father, she’d rip that useless faucet right out of the wall.
When she arrived at the dining room, Ferio was already waiting.
“Daddy!”

After not seeing him for a few days, Leonia dashed across the room and threw her arms around his long legs.
“Leo, I told you not to run.”
“Are you okay, Dad? Are you tired?”

“I’m dead tired.”
Ferio sat her down in the chair beside him.
In truth, his face was covered in exhaustion.

Leonia stretched her arm toward him, lips pouting. She wanted to pat him but her arms were too short to reach.
“Who made our daddy this tired!”
“You gonna go beat them up for me, Leo?”

“Yup! I’ll beat ‘em!”
Leonia threw a punch into the air—“Hiyah!”—as if showing him what she’d do.
That little exaggerated bravado of hers was almost enough to blow all of Ferio’s fatigue away.

While the two of them chatted, lunch was served.
Rosé pasta with seafood and a crunchy leafy salad topped with cheese—light dishes, chosen to not weigh down Ferio, who still had a lot of work left today.
“Wow, shrimp!”

“You like shrimp?”
“Almost as much as chicken.”
Just a single shrimp was enough to bring her that much joy.

Ferio, watching her fondly, offered the shrimp from his own plate and fed her himself.
The little beast cub, chewing with a happy hum, picked up a shrimp from her plate in turn and held it out.
“Daddy, say ‘aah’.”

Ferio, touched by his daughter now instinctively doing such sweet things without being asked, gladly opened his mouth and accepted it.
To be more precise—everything Leonia did was adorable and precious in his eyes.
'See, forced growth never works.'

Ever since he stopped worrying about how to foster her “childlike innocence,” Leonia had started acting more like a real child than ever.
Now that she could freely do what she enjoyed, her expression sparkled and her face lit up.
“A new private tutor will be coming.”

Satisfied by the change, Ferio delivered the news. Leonia, her lips smudged with tomato sauce, paused her meal.
“Ae ah-uh-oa?”
“Swallow everything in your mouth first.”

Following his instructions, Leonia quickly gulped everything down.
“A new private tutor?”
“That’s right.”

Ferio wiped the sauce from the corners of her mouth with a napkin as he spoke.
Originally, he’d planned to bring in someone other than Kerena for her etiquette training, but that person had repeatedly declined the offer due to personal reasons.
But this time, they had finally accepted.

“…I don’t want any woman who’s been involved with you, Dad.”
Recalling her previous experience, Leonia was immediately on guard.
“You don’t have to worry about that.”

This etiquette tutor was Ardea’s wife.
Her name was Hero Bosgruni.
“She’s the head of House Bosgruni, a count’s family.”

“Professor Ardea was a noble?”
She was even from one of the most deeply rooted noble families in the North.
Leonia remembered how Ardea had once drawn a firm line, calling Kerena’s family, House Mereoqa, an “immigrant noble house.”

She’d thought at the time that he seemed unusually snobbish—turned out, it was because he came from a core noble bloodline.
“Not anymore.”
“He’s not a noble? Why?”

“They’re currently separated.”
“…Dad, what exactly are you trying to do?”
Why would he insert a potential source of drama into their peaceful home?

“If you don’t want her, just say so.”
Leonia gave him a skeptical look.
At this point, she seriously suspected that Ferio was purposely hiring the most outlandish tutors he could find just to mess with her.

“What is this, new-age child abuse?”
“My own daughter’s stabbing me in the heart.”
“That’s my line.”

“Dad’s wounded.”
“No, I wounded you.”
Ferio looked every bit the type who’d leave someone hospitalized for eight weeks.

Ignoring Leonia’s sharp-tongued jabs, Ferio continued.
“And starting next week, you’ll have additional training once a week.”
It was about learning how to control the Black Beast’s fangs.

Leonia, who had just been grumbling about the tutor situation, immediately lit up with curiosity. This was something she liked.
“It was unstable, but Leo—you did bare your fangs, remember. So now you’re going to learn how to reveal them properly and how to use them. Along with physical training.”
This translation is the intellectual property of .

“Ugh, I hate physical training…”
Leonia, a certified homebody, already found the idea of regular workouts exhausting.
“You’re going to be my successor someday, so you need to start learning bit by bit,”

Ferio nagged, telling her not to slack off.
“…Dad, are you seriously planning to make me your successor?”
Leonia was still stunned by Ferio’s unwavering decision to name her as his heir.

He had mentioned something similar before.
Back then, Leonia hadn’t fully opened her heart to this world yet, so she’d let it slide. But now things were different.
Now that she had decided to live as part of Ferio’s family, she had to give real thought to the matter of succession.

Still, it didn’t quite feel real yet.
And realistically, she doubted if it was even possible.
Even though they were technically related by blood now, Leonia was still a child from a collateral line—and publicly, an illegitimate one.

“Didn’t I tell you this already?”
Ferio looked completely confused as to why she was still asking this.
“I considered all that before I even adopted you.”

“See, this is why I said you live life recklessly.”
“If you really don’t want to do it, I’ll consider other options. I’m still young—I could get married, after all. But even then, you’re still my daughter, and nothing changes the fact that you’re the first in line to inherit House Voreoti.”
Then, as if to seal the deal, Ferio pulled out an empty threat that didn’t match his heart: if she brought this up again, he’d sew her mouth shut.

In truth, it wasn’t so much a threat as it was a magical chant that reassured her completely.
“…Hmph.”
Leonia turned her head sharply.

“Well, fine. I guess I’ll give it a shot.”
The small, round ear peeking out beneath her black hair was bright red.
Ferio only smiled quietly.

Embarrassed, Leonia quickly covered her face with both hands.
Then, calming herself, she let out an awkward cough and straightened up in her seat.
After the meal, Leonia insisted on escorting Ferio to his office.

“Dad.”
“Yeah?”
They walked side by side, her hands tightly clasped together, when Leonia asked:

“Why are Professor Ardea and his wife separated?”
After all, this woman was coming in as her tutor—it seemed necessary to know at least a bit of their situation, whether to mediate or read the mood or do something else.
Ferio shrugged, like it was no big deal.

“Back when he was still head of his house, Ardea decided to leave the North to study in the capital right after they got married—he left his wife and kid behind. So his wife, now the Countess of Bosgruni, ended up inheriting the house and the title so she could feed the family.”
Then he gently reached out and closed Leonia’s jaw, which had dropped in shock.
***

'…Dad really is something else.'
Leonia found herself impressed by Ferio’s audacity—he had managed to bring a separated couple together under one roof.
They say no one is perfect, and Ferio was living proof of that.

He was just too indifferent to other people’s circumstances.
The clearest example was Kerena, formerly the Countess of Tedros and now the daughter of House Mereoqa.
Even though he’d known how Kerena felt about him, he still brought her in to be his daughter’s etiquette tutor—simply because she was competent.

And today.
As expected—
“D-Dear!”

“Ardea, you bastard…!”
Leonia stared with a vacant expression at the elderly couple now engaged in what could only be called a brawl.
Well—brawl was a generous term. It was really just Countess Hero Bosgruni one-sidedly beating her husband.

The old professor, who had spent a lifetime buried in books, was no match for a noblewoman who had survived the harsh storms of the North.
Yet still, those punches kept flying.
'How did it come to this…?'

Leonia thought back to just a few minutes earlier.
‘I am Countess Hero Bosgruni.’
The woman who arrived at the estate had her light brown hair neatly tied up. Her back was straight, shoulders firm, and a sharp pince-nez rested on the bridge of her wrinkled nose, giving her a stern impression.

But once they spoke, Leonia discovered the Countess was as kind and gentle as their housekeeper Kara.
She had even expressed concern over what Leonia had endured under Kerena’s teaching and shared a carefully planned curriculum for etiquette lessons.
At that point, Leonia had understood why Ferio had chosen her. Countess Bosgruni was a perfect tutor.

‘I look forward to learning from you, ma’am.’
‘And I look forward to teaching you.’
She’d even said it was a pleasure to meet such a good student after so long.

Then, while moving to the classroom—
‘Young Lady, about that question you asked before…’
One of the current live-in tutors ran into the newly arrived one.

And that was [N O V E L I G H T] the start of hell.
***
“You should’ve at least shown your face when you came back to the North!”

“So you could beat me up again?!”
“Obviously! Just thinking about all the trouble you caused me—!”
“N-Not the knees, darling!”

“They’re fair game!”
This brutally intense fight between a couple who nearly divorced—but somehow never did—dragged Leonia back into this nightmare.
Why was it that every etiquette tutor she got turned out to be so combative? She felt like applauding the North’s unparalleled passion for battle.

Right then, a chair soared through the air in a graceful arc.
That was the final straw. Leonia shook her head and quietly left the room.
Just as she stepped out, the last thing she saw was the couple grabbing each other by the collars, shaking and shoving like it was a tournament match.

“Young Lady!”
Meleis rushed to her side the moment she emerged from the chaos.
“Are you alright?”

She’d been worried the young lady might’ve been frightened by the racket—but thankfully, Leonia showed no sign of distress.
Meleis had momentarily forgotten that her young lady was no ordinary child.
“Meleis.”

“Yes, Young Lady?”
“In the North, does ‘etiquette’ mean fistfighting?”