Born As The Daughter of a Lowly Concubine - Chapter 66

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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 as the daughter of a lowborn concubine.
Episode 66
“Why did you come in hurt like this? What happened?”
“Eh? Eh? How did I… end up here?”
The child flinched at the sight of me, shrinking back as if to hide the wound.
Of course, there was no hiding it now.
The formal speech still sat awkwardly on her tongue, but her eyes betrayed a warmth she couldn’t quite conceal beneath the confusion.
“What do you mean how did you get here? This is a place I’ve prepared.”
“Ah, yes. Of course you did……”
The children who’d never seen me before exchanged curious glances at our exchange, though that hardly seemed important now.
“Come here. Why are you so badly hurt?”
“It’s nothing, really……”
The child clamped her lips shut like a clam, but another one standing nearby decided to tattle.
“It’s not nothing—she got caught by some strange guy and got hurt.”
“Hey, keep your mouth shut.”
My threatening glare sent the tattler shrinking back, scrambling away into the inner room.
More precisely, she was caught by a mild-faced couple on the way in and dragged off to bathe without a chance to resist.
The other children too trudged toward the washing area with faces half-resigned, which meant my rules were being followed well enough, and I felt a quiet satisfaction at that.
In any case, that was beside the point. I turned back to the wounded child and pressed for answers.
“You won’t tell me who hit you?”
“Yangban bastards, what else.”
A different child answered from behind a bear-like man’s broad shoulders, peeking her head out just enough to speak.
The man, who looked as though he’d taken the children up into the mountains and back, bowed his head to me, and I awkwardly returned the greeting.
“So you are the young lady who employs us. A pleasure to meet you. I am Mauri, and I’ve been caring for the children here on Seong’s introduction.”
“Employs… that sounds strange. Good to meet you. Do you happen to know what happened to the children?”
The bear-like man spoke with cautious politeness despite his imposing frame.
I’d heard that the Chae-tam-in working here knew about my identity, while their spouses, if they were ordinary people, did not—but which category did this man fall into?
His build was solid enough, but such a striking appearance wouldn’t be ideal for someone doing this kind of work.
“I was gathering firewood and mushrooms with the children when those yangban began making a commotion over in the valley.”
The children took up the story.
“There were beautiful ladies dressed in fancy clothes.”
“They smelled delicious, and they drank wine and danced and sang.”
It was scattered talk, but I got the picture.
‘So autumn outings have begun again in earnest.’
Now that I thought about it, if Gyeongeongun truly had received poison, then this year’s Jungyangjeol Festival would be out of the question for everyone. There was no point in drawing the Daebee’s ire for nothing.
Last year, I’d heard the concubines at least got to slip outside quietly for some air. Of course, I couldn’t go myself—my health was too frail, they said, and exposure to the elements would harm me.
‘I’ll move out of the palace when I come of age, but the concubines have so few chances to leave at all. It’s a shame.’
And here I was, already slipping out in secret myself.
The children’s account continued.
“We were watching from a distance, but they told us to stop spoiling their mood and chased us away, so we ran. But then they got the fun out of chasing us, and we asked them to stop, but they just hit us.”
“Hit you? Those people hit you?”
“Not directly—their servants did.”
The child I was examining, pouring water over her wounds, answered with a trembling voice and a wince.
But another child quickly added,
“And there was this one guy who seemed to think it was funny that we’d run in fear. He kept chasing us on purpose, and we fell while running from him and got hurt like this.”
“Hey!”
“Why lie about it? That guy—uh, that yangban—he was acting like he was waiting for us to come the whole time.”
The child had started to curse but caught sight of my expression and caught herself. Though I suppose I’m more royalty than yangban, but in any case, cursing at bastards like that hardly mattered to me.
“You see him often around the streets? Is he following you?”
The children who had washed came out and began methodically rinsing and trimming the herbs they’d brought.
“Is this how you do it?”
“That’s right. Well done.”
The older children had resigned themselves and begun their housework with practiced ease.
But the others were delighted at my attention and came rushing forward to air their grievances.
“It wasn’t even the first time. He keeps chasing and tormenting us in the mountains.”
“Even though you hadn’t done anything?”
“No!”
As the children cried out indignantly, their voices rose in a furious chorus that made my ears ring.
The injured child even lost patience with them.
“Shut it! Go work, you damn brats!”
“No fighting here, so no shouting either!”
“But those bastards……!”
The children had grown quite accustomed to the rules.
I’d need to verify the facts, but I couldn’t help sighing.
Come to think of it, even during the spring festival last time, most of those who claimed spots early on the City Wall were yangban. I’d heard the yuseang floated boats on the Han River to play.
But the spring festival only comes once a year, and the playing happens at night—why do these scholars do nothing but play every single day instead of studying?
It was the mindset of a curmudgeon, but I couldn’t help it.
Scholars in the Joseon era are, in essence, yuseang preparing for the state exams.
In modern terms…… they’re civil service exam candidates. And mostly long-term ones at that.
Whether their families had money or not, the yangban would drain their family fortunes and spend their entire lives as a collective of perennial test-takers—it was frankly impossible not to worry about it.
Now imagine that these collective long-term test-takers go out to public places with women, drinking and playing, harassing neighborhood children. Think about it.
It’s even more ridiculous.
But what if those bastards aren’t test-takers but officials? Civil servants???
Civil servants…… who skip work, drink and play outside, and chase around children to harass them?
‘I’ve heard rumors that those who skip work without permission don’t show up even if beaten, but it might be true.’
Since passing the exams is difficult, there were quite a few said to play hooky out of some need for compensation.
If you quickly fired the absentees, vacancies would open up fast, but they didn’t do that. It made no sense.
Those who cared for the children, having hidden this from adults until now, were even more upset hearing it for the first time.
“Whose sons would do such a thing? I won’t stand for it!!”
“If you won’t stand for it, what will you do about the yangban.”
The children stopped the adults with resigned faces and calm words, but I thought I understood the reason for their reaction.
‘Right, these people were former Chae-tam-in.’
Skilled in martial arts, having conducted dangerous infiltrations and intelligence work…….
Those yangban ought to be careful on the night roads, I suspect.
Even if legal sanctions were impossible, people like this could break a leg or two in the dark without much difficulty.
At the harsh implication, everyone looked to me for my reaction, so I pretended not to hear and played a game of blocking ears with the small child who’d been playing beside me.
Once the atmosphere had settled somewhat, I called over those who’d been angry just moments before and asked them something.
“Speaking of which, what would you think about teaching the children some martial arts?”
“Pardon? I’m not sure I understand.”
These people were being coy again, feigning ignorance.
“In this harsh world, it’s good to learn some self-defense.”
“Self-defense……?”
Perhaps the term didn’t exist in this era. But my suggestion seemed to sit well with them, for they fell silent in thought.
“You can’t injure yangban without courting disaster, but they should be able to run away. If they’re facing servants, they could even fight back.”
“Hmm…….”
“And talent can hide anywhere—you never know where it might appear. Oh, that’s right, this works out perfectly. Soon a teacher will come to teach you all your letters. Learn reading and writing, and learn how to protect yourselves too.”
“Huh?”
The children gasped at what sounded like a bolt from the blue, and a few even dropped the pot lids they’d been holding.
I paid them no mind and finished what I had to say.
“Anyway, come winter it’ll be hard to find food, so it’s perfect timing for concentrated lessons.”
“Why should we learn stuff like that?”
I hadn’t expected them all to welcome it, so there were indeed children who resisted.
“Do you remember the seal you left when you came in here?”
“There was nothing strange in it.”
“Do you remember what it said?”
As I tilted my head, the small, injured leader nodded with confidence.
“Yes.”
Then, surprisingly, he rattled off all the conditions I’d set down.
Ga-i, who’d been frowning beside me the whole time, looked a little startled hearing it too.
“You remember that, but you forgot the part about learning without complaint whatever’s taught here. Hmm?”
“Well, we thought you’d only teach us how to start fires and gather wild herbs.”
“That’s important too, of course. But if you want to avoid getting beaten, you’ll need to learn other things as well.”
“What other things?”
“That yangban aren’t allowed to hit you freely, even though you’re yangmin.”
These children were beggars, but strictly speaking they weren’t low-born, and even if they were, there was no law saying they could be mistreated.
“But there’s no reason to think they’d listen to such talk.”
“Then we’ll make them listen. And you know yangban slaves can beat you because they have a yangban backing them, right?”
“…… We don’t have anyone backing us.”
“How do you know who bought this house?”
“Oh…… Si-a…… said she bought it for us.”
The children hesitantly brought up the title of princess.
Oh. Not just princess, but to hear them call her “Your Highness”—it’s rather refreshing, isn’t it?
“That’s right. So if anyone tries to harm you from now on, tell them you’ll report it to me.”
“Really? Will Your Highness punish them?”
“This house belongs to me, and since you all live here and work here, you could say you’re under my protection.”
I’m not truly their owner in any strict sense, but in these matters, a claim made with confidence carries the day.
Word had spread throughout the Capital City that I was the mistress of this place and that I cared for the children from my own purse—practically everyone knew it by now.
‘Actually, now that I think about it, that’s not wrong at all.’
If I treated this place as an orphanage or school, then I was much like its director or headmaster, and as such I had both the right and duty to protect these children.
Others might assume I’d simply accumulated servants in an unconventional way.
“But I need you to know that I cannot simply take your word for things—you’ll need proper evidence.”
“How do we do that?”
“You can learn to read and write, and then submit a petition to me about your grievances.”
“A petition?”
“Yes. A letter, in other words—you would write down how you were wronged, how those bad people hurt you, and send it to me.”
“You’d send it to Your Highness for us?”
“That’s right.”
Nothing in this world motivates quite like grievance and injustice.
I gently goaded the children into burning with a thirst for learning.
‘These children don’t know that I’m only eight years old myself.’
But in a time like this, if someone belonged to the royal family or held a position of authority, people naturally assumed they must be something special and grand—and I doubted they’d change their minds even if they found out.
The little child who’d been playing with me all this while clenched their small fist with fierce determination.
“I’m going to learn to write so I can… I can write about how unfair it was!”
“That’s the spirit.”
My, how quickly you’ve learned the word “unfair.”
I turned to the other children and asked them a question.
“And do you remember the faces of the ones who bullied you? Find out who they are.”
“……W-why……?”
“I need to look into them.”
I didn’t know if those men were officials or not, but anyone with conduct as wretched as theirs rarely had a clean record in anything else.
‘If they want to play, then let them play—why not.’

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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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