In fact, she secretly loved it. Even though it was highly embarrassing if he did it out in public in front of the knights or Cassius, right now she just happily looped her small arms around his neck and held on tight.
Adrian planted a loud, exaggerated kiss on her cheek.
"Do you want to stay back here where it’s safe while Papa goes to the war?"
Aria immediately shook her head rapidly against his shoulder.
"No. I’m coming with you."
Adrian just chuckled softly, knowing that this was exactly the stubborn answer he was going to get.
"Okay then. If you really want to come and protect your old man, then who am I to stop you?"
He adjusted his grip and just started walking down the hallway and back up the stone stairs toward the main mansion floor.
As they got closer to the main doors where the servants were cleaning, Aria suddenly wiggled a little.
"Papa, put me down," she said cutely. Her voice was small and slightly panicked.
Adrian stopped on the stairs and looked at her. He could clearly see that there was a slight blush spreading rapidly across her pale cheeks.
He just stared at her for a few seconds.
"Hmm?" he hummed playfully, a teasing grin spreading across his face. "Are you embarrassed about being carried by your father? Huh?"
Aria just looked away at the stone wall and quickly shook her head.
"No."
She paused for a second.
"Maybe."
She pouted slightly.
"I’m seven years old now, Papa. What are the people going to think if they see the young lady of the territory being carried like a toddler?"
She pursed her lips in a very serious manner that only made her look even cuter.
Adrian just threw his head back and chuckled loudly.
"Well, they’re just gonna think that you’re Papa’s big baby!"
And with that, he immediately sped up and started lightly running up the rest of the stairs toward the main floor.
Aria panicked. She immediately grabbed his ears and pulled on them playfully.
"No, no, no! Please put me down, Papa! Please!"
Adrian just kept walking.
"No! No way I am putting you down. I’m gonna make sure that everyone in Oresfall knows that you are my big baby."
Aria’s face just went completely red like a tomato.
She desperately didn’t want to use any magic against him to get free. The one promise she had firmly made to herself in this new life was to never intentionally harm Adrian or forcefully use magic against him.
But this man was just being way too infuriating right now. He was completely forcing her hand at this point.
She thought about it for a second, and as the main door got closer and closer, she decided to use a completely different, non-magical weapon.
She pouted, gave Adrian a sharp side-eye, and looked away.
"If you carry me outside in front of everyone... I won’t talk to you!" she threatened loudly. She paused for dramatic effect before screaming, "For a whole year!"
And exactly like she had expected, Adrian immediately stopped dead in his tracks.
He turned his head to look at her with an incredibly shocked face.
All of the playful glow on his face, all the teasing happiness, everything just reversed instantly. He looked genuinely, deeply hurt by what she just said.
He didn’t say a word. He just immediately and gently put her back down onto the stone steps.
But just seeing that single, drastic change in his happy expression was like a brutal physical stab directly to Aria’s heart.
She never intended to actually make him feel sad. She never did.
In fact, she absolutely loved it when he carried her up the stairs. She loved it when he picked her up and walked around the mansion with her. The core reason was pretty simple and deeply tragic. She had always desperately craved this exact kind of affection in her past life.
She had seen how her biological mother and her stepfather had warmly carried their kids around. She had seen how they hugged her step-siblings with bright smiles. But they had always refused to do the exact same thing with her.
In fact, even in this current life, before the transmigration, her mother had almost never picked her up willingly. And based on the gossips that she had heard when she was younger, even the milk that she drank as a baby was strictly from a hired nursing maid instead of her own mother.
That was the exact kind of cold, isolating treatment she had gotten since the day she was born.
And Adrian was the one single person who, miraculously, in this timeline decided to boldly take her with him instead of ruthlessly rejecting her at the divorce court like he was supposed to.
And that single, act of taking her in as his own child instead of rejecting her, had completely changed the course of her entire tragic life.
Because of him, she finally got to experience the true bliss of being a normal child. The advantages were insanely good. She could just act cute, throw a minor tantrum, and get almost everything she ever wanted, as long as she did it right and wasn’t being too much of an entitled idiot about it.
And Adrian always happily fulfilled her needs and wants without question.
Anytime she wanted to eat something, he would either happily make it in the kitchen or take her out to the best places. Anytime she wanted to wear something fancy, he would immediately take her out to buy whatever she wanted.
He had never, not once, let her feel like she got less love than anyone else.
It was something that even the actual royal princesses at the Imperial Palace wouldn’t have the luxury of experiencing. And yet, she did. All of those royals had the money to buy whatever they wanted for the most part, but their father, the Emperor, was never actually emotionally available for them.