Born As The Daughter of a Lowly Concubine - Chapter 93

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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 Concubine of Low Rank.
Chapter 93
For the past few years, I’ve been endlessly nursing the hope that my everyday life might finally ease up a little.
But it was always nothing more than a grand delusion on my part.
My friend from the previous life—whose face I could barely recall now—used to say something to me.
That brothers, as a species, must have certainly made enemies of their younger sisters in some previous incarnation.
Of course, being without a brother myself, I insisted that younger brothers were the true enemies, and friends who actually had male siblings one by one joined in the pointless debate—declaring brothers more useless, no wait, younger brothers more useless.
At least younger siblings are cute, right? Well, that ends once they’re no longer infants.
At least brothers give you pocket money, right? What sort of mythical creature or folk legend are you even talking about? I’m just grateful he doesn’t steal my allowance. And so on.
Listing out the sad evidence cases we’d each experienced, we arrived at the bitter conclusion that male siblings—whether older or younger—were pretty useless in life, and then we just went out to eat chicken together in peace, which, come to think of it now, was a rather fond memory…….
That chicken place really was delicious.
Just thinking about it now has me craving chicken.
Marinate the chicken, coat it in flour, bread it, and fry it once more?
In any case, even now being reborn and thinking it over, my friend’s words back then weren’t wrong at all.
“Why did you call me for this…….”
“Your judgment is reliable.”
Now it had been five years since the Queen Dowager’s Royal Passing.
The End of Mourning Period was long finished, and banquets could be held again.
And this year, at the age of twenty-two, the Crown Prince was holding Court Banquets within the palace. Quite frequently, in fact.
If I put it this way, someone might ask whether it was reckless extravagance, but that’s not it at all.
Royal banquets were also a tool for strengthening royal authority.
Not that I fully understand the why of it all.
In a Confucian nation like Joseon, correcting the Rites and Music and hosting banquets centered on the king was a means of elevating the king’s status.
It was a method that Crown Prince Hyomyeong, son of King Sunjo, had employed.
Moreover, a banquet of a scale that no ordinary noble family could manage inevitably drew a line between the commoner and the royal house, thereby establishing the authority of the realm.
Truth be told, the royal authority wasn’t weak, but the Crown Prince’s unmarried status was the one convenient attack vector.
The mourning period was over. So in this situation, installing a Crown Princess should come first—yet the Crown Prince chose to strengthen royal authority instead of taking a Crown Princess.
I mean, wouldn’t installing a Crown Princess and producing an heir stabilize his power more?
But the Crown Prince was being extremely cautious about taking a Crown Princess.
Of course, there was no other grand prince or prince who could threaten his position now, his legitimacy was unquestionable, his learning was acknowledged by all to be superior, and moreover, his record as Crown Prince assisting in state affairs had accumulated—so he was already the de facto power of the next generation in both name and reality.
So it made sense that his Crown Princess consort would be coveted by many now.
One might wonder how there could still be unmarried maidens, but the Three-Year Mourning periods happened to overlap so unluckily sometimes that cases of delays did occur, though rarely.
Yet now this shifted atmosphere seemed to fuel the Crown Prince’s distrust of people.
‘Now that everyone comes asking for the Crown Princess selection and tries to push their own daughters into the seat, it’s no wonder he’s displeased.’
When things were hard, everyone ignored me, and now they pretend to be close—who would like that?
Even if he couldn’t show distaste, he wouldn’t want to keep them near.
So it seemed his thinking was to just solidify his own power first so no one could make a peep, and then choose a Crown Princess or not as he saw fit.
Of course, from my perspective it looks like the unconscious wisdom of a male lead tidying up his surroundings before meeting the heroine, but setting aside my romance-fantasy self, speaking honestly as a Historical Drama enthusiast and current Princess, it’s absurd and just a headache that the Crown Prince won’t take a Crown Princess at his age…….
Am I serious……?
Yes, well, he’s the male lead anyway. As for me, an extra, I know nothing. The protagonists will sort it out themselves.
Besides, even the king says nothing, so it feels a bit odd for me to complain so much.
But why on earth…….
“Why do you keep piling work on me? Why?!”
My forlorn cry—having been dragged to Gyujanggak to work from time to time—echoed futilely through the space.
But no one here understood this injustice of mine.
“Hahaha. And yet it cannot be denied that Your Highness possesses exceptional talent for arranging banquets.”
“The idea of creating that small Artificial Stream and floating lanterns on it was truly splendid, Your Highness.”
These young officials of Gyujanggak—who had passed their civil service exams at a young age, risen swiftly, caught the Crown Prince’s eye, and been posted here—possessed the pragmatic mindset that if their own workload decreased, what was a bit more work for a princess anyway?
“Could you not deny it?”
“How could we deny the truth!”
You were originally Bureau of Rites officials! You should deny it!
Coming to deliver snacks and casually throwing in a few words here and there—my mouth truly was the source of disaster, inviting all this labor upon me.
Yet the Crown Prince nodded approvingly at his officials’ insincere sincerity.
“That’s right, that’s right.”
“Ugh, deny it!”
“My, my. Our Si-a looks tired. Shall your brother carry you?”
“No, I don’t need it!”
Shriek!!
Given that we were both speaking in shortened forms even in an informal setting, it was clear we truly were not in our right minds.
Worn down by sleep deprivation, I launched my most devastating attack on the Crown Prince.
“If you want to play with babies so badly, why don’t you just have a niece or nephew of your own!”
A niece or nephew! A niece or nephew to see!
“Ha-ha, so the baby keeps wanting to see other babies, does he? Ga-i will be coming to collect Si-a soon enough and tell her to stop working the Princess so hard, so you should go to bed today, shouldn’t you?”
By now, the Crown Prince’s evasion skills had reached maximum level. After years of rolling through the position, he’d honed only one ability: letting unpleasant words slide past without landing.
“Ah, why won’t you get married!”
“Ha-ha-ha. I don’t understand why Si-a is so eager to marry off her brother so quickly. There’s a younger sister who says she doesn’t want to marry at all and would rather live with her brother.”
“What? Who said something so strange? Even if dirt got in my eyes, that nonsense would never come out of them! You said you don’t read novels—where did you see something weird?”
Or could it be that her marriage prospects are just so terrible she doesn’t want to marry at all and would rather stay home?
Just then, a young civil official who had been checking the order of proceedings quietly lifted his head.
“I have heard rumors that such novels have become fashionable recently, sire…”
You read those things?
Grasping the hidden meaning behind those words, the Crown Prince winced and scrambled to explain himself.
“No, I merely repeated something I heard from Muyeong-gun.”
“Muyeong-gun? Song An’s brother would speak of such things?”
Muyeong-gun was the son of Hwacheon-gun and the brother of Song An. He’d become famous for grabbing a man by the collar when he watched his sister’s intended bridegroom walk into a pleasure house.
Given that the man had a reputation for quiet and gentle conduct, there were rumors that he hadn’t simply seen the man enter the pleasure house, but that something unspeakable must have transpired.
‘According to him, he made a mistake in his anger and went into seclusion for a time.’
And having narrowly avoided an embarrassing misunderstanding, the Crown Prince’s arrow of blame turned toward his more defenseless retainers.
“But why do all of you seem to take only the Princess’s side?”
The Crown Prince turned to regard his loyal attendants, but they all averted their eyes and bowed their heads as if attending to their work.
“In this matter alone, we ourselves find we cannot help but take the Princess’s side, sire.”
“I have lived in vain…”
These days it seemed his retainers actually enjoyed this sort of back-and-forth nonsense with him.
How had someone who seemed destined to grow up so prickly and sharp-tongued turned out this way? Of course, he was still just as sensitive and difficult as ever, but toward those who entered his circle, he showed a certain leniency.
The excessive workload he carried must have played a role in shaping him this way.
And among that excessive workload was the court banquet he had brought upon himself.
Perhaps from rolling along together so long, the young bureaucrats who had become the Crown Prince’s retainers followed along with whatever he did, their eyes hollow.
My presence here is certainly a strange sight too, but none of them seemed to have the mind to make an issue of it.
Strictly speaking, an unmarried Princess of marriageable age should not encounter young retainers like this, but because my outward appearance was so young that marriage was difficult anyway, no one pressed me about meeting people.
As a result, I was trapped here, suffering through it all.
Let me out! I’m going to leave the palace!
“Now, before you go, first confirm the order of the courtesans who will perform at this banquet. And we’re adding new songs this time, aren’t we?”
“Ugh…”
A sweatshop, a sweatshop organization…!
This sort of thing carried meaning as well—it was a way of conveying the people’s lives to the king—so folk songs were always included at the end.
This wasn’t a procedure I added; it was already here…
Since the king only stayed within the palace walls, there was naturally no way for him to know about the people’s lives, so institutions like this one were always included. Whether it served any real purpose was another matter.
Among those performing at this court banquet was Maehyang.
I’d heard beforehand what song she would sing, and it was already in a modern style.
She’d somehow discovered several songs I used to sing at Siyeongwon and started composing similar ones on her own, and honestly… she was remarkably talented.
‘The only complaint I have is that the lyrics mention wanting to ride the Amusement Rides at Siyeongwon.’
But as I said before, popular songs always reflected the spirit of the times.
Besides, Siyeongwon had been created by the Princess, so there was no problem with it being performed at the banquet. Unfortunately.
***
And shortly after, when the king heard Maehyang sing at the banquet, he even let out a chuckle at the lyrics. Naturally, he already knew that I had created the Amusement Rides.
I heard rumors that my creations had lately become something of a neighborhood landmark.
Well, I suppose they are rather unusual structures when you look at them, but how did things end up this way?
For what it’s worth, those Amusement Rides are inspected every month by specialists to ensure safety before people ride them.
And at the Crown Prince’s request, I even built a Carousel in the Capital City—this one was made with considerable expense and decorated quite lavishly.
It looks as though it was made for passersby to admire, but actually the purpose was something else entirely.
It was made for foreign envoys to see when they made their Official Visits.
‘What is he… trying to show off?’
In any case, now that the banquet had concluded without incident, there would be no further banquets to speak of for some time.
‘Now I can finally rest. The cleanup isn’t my responsibility anyway.’
But the very next day, for some inexplicable reason, I found myself in the Palace of the Middle Palace.
“Matters concerning the Inner Palace are something the Princess surely understands well. Now that the Princess is sixteen, it would be fitting to have her take on the task of assisting me in managing the Court Ladies.”
The moment I heard those words, I doubted my own ears.
I’m sorry? What about my work-life balance?

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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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