Born As The Daughter of a Lowly Concubine - Chapter 37

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Born the daughter of a concubine of the lowest rank.
Chapter 37
“Won’t you get out of here?”
As the child shrieked and swung his arm, the crow flapped its wings, trying to flee.
Flap-flap.
“Ugh, what!”
But the crow attempting its escape seemed caught on something, flapping uselessly instead…….
“Ha!”
I had instinctively shut my eyes, but as the commotion around me suddenly ceased, I cracked them open quietly.
The crow that had been diving at my head just moments before now rested securely in the child’s hands.
“Are you all right? This thing has no fear. Attacking a person like that. I think it got greedy seeing the shimmer of your hair ornament.”
“Oh. Yes, thank you.”
Normally I’m surrounded by attendants, so the crow wouldn’t have dared approach, but alone like this, I must have seemed easy prey.
Still, children are small, and anything that sparkles is tempting.
“There’s a string caught on the crow’s foot. It looks like that’s what stopped it from getting away. Is it a necklace?”
“Oh.”
Ting—
Too distracted to notice before, the Jade Ring dragged out from under my clothes by the string struck against something and chimed clearly.
“Good thing we caught it. I nearly lost it.”
“Is it important?”
“Yes.”
It was the last thing Seong Won gave me before he left that day.
Since then, I’ve never taken it off.
“Keep hold of it while I untangle this.”
“Such an insolent bird.”
I tried to work the knot free from the crow’s talon, but it began resisting again.
Caw—
“Ow.”
“Be careful!”
With its wings pinned, it was now trying to peck at me with its beak instead.
To undo the knot, I’d need to bring my face close, and if I got hurt, the crows in the area might be slaughtered en masse at someone’s furious command.
“There’s no helping it. Let’s cut the string with a blade.”
“You carry a knife?”
“Just a trinket ornament.”
One might think a Silver Ornamental Knife as a trinket for an eight-year-old was rather dangerous, but it turned out to be surprisingly useful, so the child kept it on hand. Mainly for cutting bread and such.
‘The Silver Ornamental Knife’s original purpose was practically a utility blade anyway.’
I cut the appropriate length of string from around the crow’s leg, retied the knot, and tucked the ring safely back into my clothes, at which point the child finally released the bird.
Caw—
The child shrieked threateningly at the crow as it cawed back at us.
“Don’t you dare come back here. If you do, I’ll give you a real thrashing.”
“Ha ha. If a whole flock comes, it’ll be us who’s in trouble.”
If it comes again next time, I’ll have to call someone and threaten it with an arrow to drive it away.
We’ll see about that.
As I turned my head away with that thought, I felt something soft against my lips and only then realized.
That I was cradled in this child’s arms, and that I had just inadvertently kissed the boy’s cheek.
‘What in the world…….’
The child’s eyes went wide as he registered what happened, and he quickly drew away from me in flustered embarrassment.
He must have held me awkwardly while shielding me from the crow earlier.
‘It’s hardly a big deal to give a little kiss to a child.’
I checked to see if the child had any scratches on his arms while offering my thanks, watching him hesitate over something.
“Thank you for helping. You’re not hurt?”
“Just a little. Only scratches.”
The child laughed sheepishly and drew back slightly. Oh? Was he bashful?
The way his gaze wandered and his fingers toyed with his cheek suggested this had been quite the startling incident for him.
‘Though they say even kindergarteners have crushes these days.’
Children are maturing faster, and it seems children of this era are no different.
“Well, there’s a scratch with bleeding.”
“This is nothing serious.”
It won’t show if covered by a sleeve.
“Serious or not, it still needs to be disinfected.”
“Sterilization?”
I led the child to where water was running and washed away the wound, then pulled out a handkerchief and bound it around the injured area.
It was a shame we had no disinfectant, but at least washing it clean with water would help considerably.
“When you’re injured, wash it with clean water and apply medicine. If you don’t have medicine, wrap it with clean cloth so nothing touches it. Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
He was obedient—quite endearing, actually.
Now that I thought about it, what was this child? Crows were surprisingly large and strong around children, but when I saw him grappling with the fluttering bird earlier, he hadn’t looked strained at all.
“Are you from a Military Official Class family?”
“Hmm? Yes. My father is a Jeoldosa now, but our family originally came from the Civil Official Class.”
The title Jeoldosa referred to either the rank-two Military Commander or the rank-three Naval Commander.
He’d said his father was at the Northern Military Camp, so it seemed he was a Military Commander after all.
If this child’s father held the rank of Jeoldosa, that meant the boy came from a rather prestigious family.
‘It makes sense if he came to the palace to pay respects to the Queen.’
“Then you don’t study martial arts?”
“I learn Archery and horseback riding and such… but everyone tells me to study harder.”
“That makes sense.”
Whether Military Official Class or Civil Official Class, among the yangban this was a nation where horsemanship and archery were considered refinements.
To get ahead in the world, you had to pass the Greater Examination and begin as a civil official anyway.
‘A Jeoldosa family, and he said he came with his older sister to the Central Palace. Could it be…?’
“Are you a Crown Princess candidate…?”
The Central Palace had definitely mentioned looking at Crown Princess candidates from Military Official Class families.
“What?”
“Little one, you said you came with your older sister, right?”
“Again with ‘little one’?”
“Anyway. How old is your sister?”
“Um, she’s fourteen… Why?”
The Crown Prince was fourteen now too, so the age worked out. If they moved things forward now and held the wedding ceremony around fifteen, making her Crown Princess would be ideal timing.
‘Wait. Could she be the Female Lead?’
The protagonist of “The Crown Prince’s Beloved” had a similar background, I thought.
I reached back into the novel’s settings, which I hadn’t recalled while so distracted. I didn’t have perfect knowledge of every detail from the past, but I remembered the Female Lead’s background in relative detail.
Thanks to that, I’d also thought of the most reliable way to confirm whether this child’s older sister was the Female Lead.
“Come with me for a moment.”
“What? Where?”
I grabbed the child’s hand and began running toward my destination.
***
Usually, people who realize they’ve transmigrated into a book try hard to record the original work they remember.
But for me, that was quite difficult.
For one thing, I started as a newborn, and it took far too many years to grow to an age where I could hold paper and brush and scribble without it being suspicious.
‘Imagine a two or three-year-old picking up a brush and writing characters she never learned. She’d be called a child prodigy.’
Beyond that, with the motor development of my hands, writing properly with a brush—not even a pencil—was far too difficult a task for me.
As a result, my memory of the original novel was now a jumbled mix with the drama adaptation.
To be honest, I couldn’t even keep straight what belonged to which setting, or which world’s logic I was actually in right now.
‘That’s right. In the drama script, the Female Lead definitely had a younger brother.’
The Female Lead, realizing her accompanying brother had gotten lost in the palace, searched for him and met the Male Lead—that was their first encounter.
Since the drama moved from the perspective of the Female Lead, the real protagonist, it began from her childhood.
If I’d actually watched the historical drama as visual media, it might have stayed in my memory better. What a shame.
Thinking that, I was running toward the Eastern Palace when I spotted a familiar back of a head and stopped cold.
The child running after me crashed into my back, his face turning confused.
“What? Why? Are we here?”
“Be quiet for a moment.”
“…?”
I covered the child’s mouth and quietly pulled him back into the shadows. Though bewildered, he obediently followed my lead. From running, his body heat was warm against me.
Peering out from behind a pillar, I saw a handsome pair locked in a shy eye contact against a backdrop of pink petals dancing in the breeze.
Just as you’d expect of the Male and Female Leads, they were creating a storybook moment for their first meeting.
‘This looks like a scene straight out of a historical drama.’
Well, I suppose it was much the same thing.
To witness a scene from a historical drama I’d never seen in my past life—that wasn’t so bad.
‘Even though I’ve warped the original quite a bit, it seems the main thread still can’t escape its course.’
Whether that was good or bad, at least the two of them had met. That much was positive.
Glancing toward the back of where the Crown Prince stood, I spotted the eunuch Song, who always followed the Crown Prince, crouched behind a building in a posture much like mine.
Our eyes met, and in that instant, we both raised our index fingers to our lips and nodded in agreement.
Then we turned our full attention to the Crown Prince’s romantic affairs.
‘Wow, what is this? They fall for each other at first sight? In the original script, the Male Lead had that “no woman has ever treated me this way” vibe, which was kind of funny, but can our boy pull that off?’
I’d worried that he’d become too much like real flesh and blood for me to watch their love story without some detachment, but it turned out to be far more captivating than I expected.
I’m savoring this moment.
I wish I had popcorn, but there’s none to be had here.
As a consolation, I fished out the Castella I’d started earlier and brought along, popped a piece into my mouth, then handed another piece to the Female Lead’s Brother (presumed) who stood bewildered behind me.
“Eat this and stay quiet.”
“……Okay.”
Nice—he listens well. Really, there’s nothing children respond to better than food.
I crouched behind the building and pricked up my ears, catching the two of them speak in hushed, distant voices.
“I do not wish to become a Crown Princess.”
“Why would that be? The Crown Princess is destined to become the nation’s mother.”
Ah, I think there’s a scene like this in the original work.
“I have something I wish to accomplish. But if I were to become a Crown Princess, that dream would become impossible to achieve.”
“May I ask what that is?”
As the Crown Prince posed his question, a breeze swept through once more, and petals scattered gracefully in a shower of blossoms.
‘Is that the protagonist’s blessing?’
Whether I was thinking idle thoughts or not, I heard the Female Lead’s composed voice drift over.
“I wish to become a Physician. I would study the Medical Arts and save lives. Will you forbid me from doing so simply because I am a woman?”
Oh, right. That’s who she was.
Born the daughter of a yangban family, she could have risen to become a Crown Princess, but instead she spoke of wanting to become a Physician to save lives—a dream born from the loss of her mother, who had left this world far too early for want of proper treatment.
In this age, the gender divide meant that women often could not receive proper care for ailments specific to them. Skilled Female Physicians certainly existed, but they were so few that finding one was nearly impossible.
‘She was that spirited girl, boldly pointing out that even yangban-born male physicians existed, so why should she not become one herself.’
Still young, the Female Lead had been gathering Medical Texts within her reach, committing them to memory, and studying medicinal herbs on her own.
She’d hoped to find a master to teach her the Medical Arts, but finding a physician eccentric enough to take a yangban daughter as his disciple proved impossible. On top of that, with her mother gone and her father away on a distant provincial post, she had to care for her younger brother.
To such a girl, the Male Lead had delivered some line like “I find you all the more lovely for it—your boldness, your fearlessness. Will you not become my Crown Princess?” or something to that effect.
‘Hmm. Actually, our boy doesn’t seem the type to say something like that.’
Moreover, the Crown Prince had been using formal speech from the very beginning.
“……No, there is no fault in what you say. If a yangban woman were to become a Physician, then women from respectable families could far more easily receive treatment from a physician. You are clearly a capable person—it will surely be possible.”
What?

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