A Runaway Villainess, Now Healing In An Enemy Country - Chapter 53

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

【Chapter 53】

A man with deep red eyes and a cool, dignified impression, dressed meticulously from neck to toe.

The quietly raging magical power was sharp.

Father, whom I was facing after several months, seemed both unchanged as always and perhaps more tired than I remembered.

Standing in a high place, he looked me over from head to toe and opened his mouth like this.

“Who were you with?”

“I was alone, as you can see.”

“You’re not asking me to believe that, are you?”

Can’t you trust me a little?

There might be some sense of unease, but since I moved using Jepi’s ability, no magical traces would remain. In other words, he couldn’t track him with magic.

‘Was he nearby?’

He must have pinpointed my location by catching the moment I released my magical power, so at most he wouldn’t have been more than fifty meters from the tower.

Of course, this would be an impossible feat for an ordinary mage. However, both I and Noah, and the Baltres family are particularly sensitive to the flow of magical power…

‘But why did he move so soon?’

It had been just over 30 minutes since I caused the commotion. I expected Father to move, but not now. It was too early.

“According to them, you suddenly disappeared before their eyes. It was a strange phenomenon as they couldn’t feel even a trace of magical power for it to be magic.”

“…”

“The one who was here… yes, the ones who were here also ‘moved’ using the same method as then. Lishie who disappeared must be there with them too.”

“Did those mages testify to that? Their skills were terrible, what would they know about advanced magic? The Magic Department’s standards have really dropped.”

I deliberately deflected the point.

Since they were guards assigned to the imperial event, they would naturally belong to the Magic Department, which meant they were mages under Father’s command.

It seemed they had reported more quickly than expected. Moreover, the process from Father personally moving to track me was so smooth…

Had he suspected I might appear?

But Chessier seemed completely unaware.

“Irene. Have you ever visited the manor?”

…Ah, so he checked the storage room in the meantime.

I thought it would be discovered quickly, but the Duke’s mansion that I observed through Mel had been quiet, so I thought it hadn’t happened yet. Surprisingly, the patrol guards I met that day were quite tight-lipped.

“There must be items you took with you then.”

He continued while pressing his brow.

“You always cause trouble. Since you appeared once, I expected you wouldn’t just let this matter pass either. I was right.”

“…You speak as if you know me very well.”

Outside the clock tower was still chaotic.

As I looked up at Father’s face after so long, my insides kept trying to become just as chaotic.

Rather, at that instant moment when I intuited his appearance, I should have grabbed Jepi and moved together.

No, I should have done that.

‘What exactly am I trying to confirm…’

“Why did you come looking for me? To arrest me?”

“…”

“Oh right. I heard the ridiculous story that you pleaded before His Majesty the Emperor not to kill me.”

“What’s ridiculous about it?”

“Then it’s not ridiculous? Father would never do something against the family’s interests for… just for me.”

“It’s true.”

The answer came too quickly and matter-of-factly as if he had been waiting, making me doubt my ears for a moment. It was an inevitable reaction.

It was hard to properly read his expression. It could have been because of the backlighting, or because the look in his eyes directed at me felt strangely unfamiliar.

I spat out the question stuck in my throat as if vomiting it.

“…What did you give up?”

“The right to rebuild the Mage Tower.”

At the monotonously delivered answer, my breath stopped with a thud.

What did he just say? That can’t be.

The Mage Tower was his lifelong goal and cherished wish. That reconstruction right was precisely why Baltres turned to the Imperial Faction and even became their dog.

Because a Mage Tower couldn’t be built in the Empire without the Emperor’s permission.

Rebuilding the Mage Tower with his own hands and creating a golden age of magic. His life could be said to be a chariot racing for that single purpose his entire life.

The ‘original work’ didn’t cover whether that cherished wish was fulfilled, but I know. If destruction had been delayed just a little longer, he would have achieved it in his lifetime.

That was the level of his obsession, and he had the ability to accomplish it.

But he gave it up for me? You did?

“…You’re lying.”

It doesn’t make sense.

It would be impossible unless the world turned upside down. At least in my world, that was the case.

However, he spoke with the unchanged appearance from my memories and a gaze I was seeing for the first time in my life, as if making a declaration.

“You’re still a Baltres, and my daughter.”

“…”

“We’re family. I judged it to be my duty as a father to cover for my lacking daughter’s faults.”

It was so absurd that a hollow laugh escaped through my teeth.

Daughter, family – these were words I never dreamed I would hear in a situation like this.

“Stop this and bring Lishie back, Irene. It’s not too late yet. You should be satisfied after causing such a commotion.”

…Who decided that.

“Who decided we’re family?”

Because we share blood? If that was the reason, you should have treated me as your child from the beginning. You always looked at me like a machine part or a troublesome burden.

“Don’t be ridiculous. I am, now I am…”

I’m not the ten-year-old child who tried hard to get a single word of praise, nor the duke’s daughter who devoted herself to the family.

My family. My family is somewhere else.

Somewhere else…

“Winter Castle will become your family.”

…In Belmayer.

“We want to be on your side.”

Because Winter Castle has now become my home.

I think of them as family, of that place as home. It was such a natural flow of thought that I couldn’t easily guess when it had started.

And so I realize anew.

‘Ah, my heart…’

I’ve given it to someone again. I wanted to leave it as an empty house, but I ended up letting people in.

This made the meaning of asking them to propose again next year pointless. All the wariness and suspicion until now was also futile.

It was no longer a matter of whether I could trust Belmayer, them, or Davuer.

Regardless of that trust, I want to care for them. I want to understand their lives.

I want to be by their side.

Even if the day comes when I regret something going wrong, at least for this moment, it didn’t matter at all. So.

“I won’t be returning, Duke.”

“…Irene Baltres.”

“What makes you think I’d return? What can you do for me, Duke? Live quietly while barely clinging to life?”

My label doesn’t disappear easily. Criminal, villainess, the target of everyone’s hatred, fear, and slander.

I might end up on the execution platform someday when the numbers don’t add up, and even if not, as long as I’m in the Empire, my life would be no different from exile.

Most of all, I’m sick of it now.

“Devoting myself to the family until death like that? But I probably won’t be that valuable anymore. I’m no good for marriage arrangements either…”

“That’s not true, Irene. You are.”

“‘Because you’re my daughter’? Since when exactly!”

A scream-like sound came from my throat.

“When did you ever treat me that way?”

The reason young me had no choice but to love Emma the nanny as a mother was because in that cold, vast manor, she was the only one who was kind.

Father was always the stern Duke to me.

He could be a superior who gave orders or reprimands, but he could never be a father who praised or disciplined.

I thought Father was naturally such a cold-natured person even toward his children. But that wasn’t true.

The despair I felt when I discovered that he would pat Noaren’s head and smile at him, that he would scold rather than reprimand—

Even when young me was kidnapped and returned, he offered no comfort and only scolded me, saying he had ‘trusted the nanny too much.’

From then on, I stopped hoping for his affection. I understood that no matter how hard I tried, I could never have it.

So I became obsessed with things I could obtain through effort.

“Please say that my value as a mage is higher than you thought in the Duke’s eyes. Instead of such nonsensical words like daughter or family.”

“…”

“…Even if some psychological change occurred in the Duke and I suddenly became a daughter.”

“…”

“It’s too late.”

The expression of the Duke standing high above, staring down at me blankly, was still unreadable. Perhaps I didn’t want to read it.

I calmed my emotions and spoke again.

“I won’t go back.”

Irene Baltres would die today, and without being pursued by anyone, I would enjoy the same daily life as before.

For now, that was enough.

“Because I can’t be happy there.”

As soon as I finished speaking, I suddenly sent a magic bullet to strike the clock tower’s bell. Immediately, a thunderous sound pierced my eardrums sharply.

CLANG—!

“What now…!”

“Duke. As my last advice as a Baltres, just excommunicate me now.”

“Irene!”

He drew up his magic power and descended toward me.

Though that fierce magic power stung my skin like a storm and made my hair flutter, I didn’t budge a single step.

“Because I have no intention of stopping after coming this far.”

This bell sound was a signal Jepi and I shared.

The first time was notification of the operation’s start. A long, heavy strike meant signal to finish the operation. A short, fierce strike meant—

Whoosh!

“Am I not late?”

“…Perfect timing.”

An urgent signal to come get me immediately.

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————