Chapter 1: The Lost Daughter
The children at Rowan House always gathered whenever visitors arrived.
Whether the visitors came to deliver donations or volunteer, the children welcomed them warmly, just as they welcomed the families who came hoping to adopt a child.
Today was no different. Tiny feet hurried toward the front yard, except for little Mina, who ran in the opposite direction from her brothers and sisters.
She searched every room on the first floor before rushing upstairs. Her footsteps stopped in front of a window overlooking the barn behind the orphanage.
"Shani!" she shouted after spotting a long silver-haired girl doing something in front of one of the cows.
Mina frowned when Shani ignored her. She quickly ran back downstairs and headed for the backyard.
"Shani! Hurry up and come to the front! Don’t you want to be adopted?" Mina scolded her like a little mother.
Without turning around, Shani replied, "I’m eighteen this year, Mina. No one’s going to adopt me."
Mina immediately shook her head. "You’re the prettiest girl in this orphanage. Of course someone will adopt you! Anyone who passes you by must not have a brain..."
She paused for a second before awkwardly correcting herself. "I mean... our brothers and sisters who got adopted are wonderful too. But this time, I’m sure you’ll finally get your chance."
Shani chuckled. She could tell little Mina was trying her best to encourage her, but she was such a kind-hearted girl that she couldn’t bring herself to insult anyone.
Then again, every child at Rowan House had been raised that way by Cedric Rowan.
"Stop laughing and let’s go already!" Mina stepped forward just as Shani turned around.
The sight nearly made the little girl fall backward. "Is... is that cow dung?!" Mina shrieked.
"Hehe." Shani giggled. Her face and arms were smeared with fresh cow dung.
"Don’t laugh like that!" Mina stared at her in horror, afraid the disgusting stuff would end up in Shani’s mouth.
Before Mina could recover from the shock, Shani did something even more unbelievable.
She scooped up another handful of cow dung and rubbed it into her long silver hair. Within seconds, her beautiful silver hair turned into a messy brownish-green disaster.
Mina had grown up feeding cows and cleaning their manure, but what Shani was doing was far beyond normal. She nearly threw up just watching it.
"Done. Let’s go." Shani straightened her back and spoke confidently, looking completely satisfied with her masterpiece.
It took Mina several moments to recover from the shock. By then, Shani was already walking ahead.
"Hey! If you show up looking like that..."
Mina continued complaining behind her, but Shani never hesitated for even a second. She had absolutely no intention of being adopted.
Besides, she already knew the people arriving today weren’t here to adopt anyone. They had come to find their missing blood relative.
Shani knew exactly what was going to happen. She knew everything.
Because she had already lived through it once before.
In this second life, after being given the chance to be reborn, she refused to repeat the mistakes she had made in her first.
Baby Shani had been found near the border by a group of villagers, who brought her to Rowan House.
With the help of several orphans who were only eight to ten years old at the time, Cedric Rowan raised the abandoned baby.
When Shani turned five, Cedric took her to have the Beast Energy within her body measured.
Beast Energy was the most important power every beastman possessed. A beastman’s talent, strength, and even lifespan were all determined by it.
Unfortunately, Shani’s Beast Energy measured only twenty. F Rank. The lowest rank possible.
For a beastman, that was devastating. Not only did it mean they were weak, but an F Rank beastman could only live for twenty years.
Cedric comforted little Shani, telling her that once she found her partner, her lifespan would surely increase.
Shani wasn’t discouraged in the slightest.
Not because she believed Cedric’s words. Even after finding a partner, she would still remain F Rank unless she obtained a special liquid capable of accelerating Beast Energy growth.
The problem was that the liquid was unbelievably expensive. In fact, its price exceeded the amount Cedric spent caring for every child in the orphanage for an entire year.
The reason Shani remained optimistic was something else entirely.
The moment her Beast Energy was measured, a mysterious system appeared before her. Cashback 500% System.
Just as its name suggested, whenever Shani gave someone a gift, she would receive a 500% cashback reward.
The system offered more than just cashback. It also contained a Cashback Shop, where various items were sold.
One of them was a potion that instantly increased Beast Energy by fifty points at a surprisingly affordable price.
She only needed to buy two bottles to advance to E Rank and extend her lifespan by another twenty years.
The biggest problem came when young Shani realized that Cashback 500% didn’t work on everyone.
She gave gifts and money to the children at the orphanage, to Cedric, and even to strangers she met on the street. None of them triggered the cashback.
In her first life, Shani spent eighteen years without ever discovering who could activate the system.
Until that day arrived. The very same day as today.
A woman dressed in luxurious clothing arrived at Rowan House with a butler, searching for the missing child of the first son of the House of Ashbourne.
The moment the butler saw Shani’s silver hair and crimson eyes, he immediately knew she was the one they had been searching for.
The House of Ashbourne was known throughout the kingdom as the Silver House, thanks to the silver-haired bloodline that gave every descendant an elegant and distinguished appearance.
As for Shani’s crimson eyes, they were the unmistakable trait of the Crimson Eagle gene, the exact trait passed down to the firstborn son’s wife.
To be absolutely certain, the woman personally examined the birthmark on Shani’s body. It matched the missing baby’s exactly.
That very day, Shani left Rowan House and traveled to Aurelis, the capital of the Kingdom of Argenor.
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