Celebrity Lady - Chapter 20

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

Celebrity Lady
Episode 20
Yet, no matter how uncertain my memory has become, there is one thing I can say with absolute certainty.
‘Why do I think of you that way?’
Leonard had never once thought of his only daughter as a disgrace to the family.
That day, inside the carriage returning home.
Even after thrashing the altar priest soundly, Leonard’s rage would not settle, and he clenched his jaw with rough, ragged breaths escaping at intervals.
Whenever his eyes fell on Rubetria, curled up beside him and forcing back tears with all her might, the barely-contained fury would surge again.
“Damn it all…….”
Yes, the person most shocked by it all could be no one but she herself. Her mind must have been tormented by a thousand thoughts.
Perhaps… she thought he was angry with her?
“Couldn’t you have just said one word that it was alright?”
Sadly, no matter how much I searched my memory, it wasn’t there. The recollection of telling his frightened, weeping daughter that everything was all right.
“Yes. That’s what I should have done.”
Leonard slowly lowered the arm covering his eyes and stared into the empty air with a bitter smile.
“……I’m truly the worst of fathers.”
* * *
The feelings I’d poured out onto Father left me strangely unsatisfied.
Not without reason. The sense of self I’d absorbed wholesale from Rubetria was not the sort to air grievances so openly; she would brood alone if wounded.
‘But Juliet Karenina is the type to speak her mind and live with it.’
With this clash of selves leaving me restless, I turned toward my room.
I’d climbed perhaps five steps toward the Second Floor when a shadow blocked my path, and I halted.
“……?”
When I looked up, there stood a face that lingered in my memory with painful clarity.
‘Cedric Lizer?’
My eyes widened in shock.
‘What’s he doing here in broad daylight?’
Cedric Lizer—the faithless scoundrel Rubetria had harbored a lifelong crush on.
Handsome enough, perhaps, but hardly to my taste; Rubetria’s crush stood before me with still-boyish features of barely sixteen.
“Rubetria.”
“Oh, Cedric. Hello.”
His neatly-swept chestnut hair and blue eyes were striking—the pretty-boy type, in a word.
And with that face, he’d spent years trifling with kind-hearted Rubetria.
‘This worthless bastard……. Just looking at him makes my blood boil.’
Thinking of the innocent, devoted Rubetria who’d wept over him, I felt tears prick my own eyes again.
* * *
It was Rubetria’s sixteenth birthday.
Which is to say, this was the actual event unfolding about six months from now.
At the twins’ instigation, a lavish party was held that day at the Diolus Duchy.
“You’re not going to eat? I even had a chef brought from far away just for you.”
There was no way such demons would ever celebrate a birthday out of genuine kindness…….
“Doesn’t look like you’re going to eat it.”
“What, Cedric? Hehe……. You said I’d eat anything if you asked?”
Suspicion never entered her mind—Rubetria was simply overjoyed that Cedric had come to celebrate her birthday too. Like a fool.
“So you’re not going to eat?”
“I… I… Cedric. Is… is this really something I can eat?”
Rubetria laughed awkwardly as she gazed at the food covering the table.
Fish mashed whole without being cleaned, leftover soup, hardened chunks of meat…….
As I recalled, it was scraps from roughly three days’ worth of meals at the Duchy. The sort usually collected and sent to the pig sties.
“Then what do you think this is?”
“B-but there’s so much else that’s delicious. Let’s eat those things instead…….”
Cedric hadn’t expected Rubetria’s refusal, and he looked around with a reddening face.
At that party were the twins and the group that ran with Cedric—that was all.
All of them were children of distinguished noble houses. Soon-to-be centers of high society, thoughtless heirs of immense wealth.
“What, you bragged so much and now this? How boring.”
“Right. So dull. We thought you’d eat anything without complaint, but I guess you won’t eat just anything, will you?”
Allon, the young marquis who served as ringleader of the bullies, and Pelcan, the young countess, tittered as they watched Rubetria’s increasingly pale face.
“…….”
Among all the faces gathered to celebrate her birthday, there was not a single genuine friend.
Watching the demons laughing and chattering around the table, Rubetria had to bite her lip hard to keep from crying.
“If you won’t eat, what does it make of me, having gone to all this trouble?”
Cedric, sitting beside her, gritted his teeth and whispered quietly.
What devastated her most was that the one person she’d trusted was orchestrating all of this.
Rubetria was kind and timid, but not foolish—she understood perfectly well that Cedric viewed her as little more than a plaything.
And yet…….
“I’m… I’m not hungry. I’ll eat later.”
“Hey!”
“Guffaw!”
“Look at Lord Cedric’s confidence!”
“You said she wouldn’t eat it, right? Since I was the only one who got it right, all the money’s mine!”
“No, this bet’s invalid!”
“Hehehehe……!”
Among the mocking laughter of his friends, Cedric trembled with wounded pride.
“Nasty little wretch…….”
“I… I’m sorry.”
“If you’re sorry, then eat! It’s not like it’ll kill you!”
“B-but…….”
“It won’t kill you to eat it!”
Bullied into compliance, the frightened Rubetria picked up the Spoon by instinct.
“Miss!”
It was about then that Rebecca, the maid who’d been watching, bravely stepped in.
“Rebecca?”
The moment Rebecca snatched the Spoon from Rubetria’s hand, silence fell over the table.
In the presence of young aristocrats whose arrogance far exceeded their years, Rebecca stood trembling yet courageous.
“I… I’ll go to the kitchen and bring something truly delicious. There’s plenty of prepared food.”
“…….”
“…….”
A terrible silence. It was broken by a sigh from Lillia, who sat at the end of the table.
“Sigh…….”
At her bored gesture, the waiting maids roughly seized Rebecca’s arms.
“L-let go!”
“Drag her away. The nerve of a servant getting above herself.”
“R-Rebecca!”
“Miss!”
Startled, Rubetria tried to rise and follow Rebecca.
“Sit down.”
Cedric’s angry voice stopped her short.
“Don’t you see you’ve ruined the mood? We all came here to celebrate your birthday—is this how you repay us?”
“…….”
Rubetria could only watch Rebecca’s retreating form, tears finally welling in her eyes.
Her mind swam with a thousand thoughts.
‘Why is Cedric treating me this way? Why is he so eager to make me suffer? Does he like Lillia? Is he trying to impress her?’
The prince-like Cedric who’d captured Rubetria’s heart at first sight when she was eight was nowhere to be found.
Yet the feelings that had accumulated so carefully over the years were a terrifying thing, and Rubetria could never harden her heart against him.
“This is so tedious. I think I’ll go sleep in my room.”
When Lillia rose with a sullen expression, Ricky came over and seated Rubetria, pressing the Spoon into her hand.
“You idiot. Our princess is upset. Eat, quickly.”
“N… no. Don’t do this.”
“No?”
I should have just gotten up and left right then.
“Rubetria, are you going alone to the Debutante Ball this time?”
Cedric’s suddenly softened voice caught her once more.
“Huh? Wha…?”
“You never asked me to go with you, so I thought you’d already found another partner. But you haven’t, have you?”
“I… I….”
With an expression grown gentle, Cedric smiled softly, resting his chin slightly on his hand.
“I’ll go with you.”
“……Really?”
“Of course. Who else would you go with but me?”
“…….”
“Rubetria, this is just a game. Wouldn’t it be boring if we just congratulated each other normally? Don’t you see how much fun everyone else is having?”
Cedric gestured to the children tittering around them.
In the end, after a moment’s hesitation, Rubetria reached for the Spoon with trembling hands.
“Heh. So you’re really going to eat it?”
“Wait! This young lady, I bet one million Marks on this!”
“Hehe, be quiet!”
It wasn’t that she needed a Debutante Ball partner so desperately.
By then, learned cruelty had already become routine, and much of Rubetria’s will to escape that life had withered away.
She only wanted that nightmarish moment to end quickly.
“Guffaw!”
“My goodness! She really ate it!”
“Ahh, that’s hilarious!”
In the end, the fishy, putrid taste of fish guts and pork fat scraps she put in her mouth was every bit as revolting as her imagination had conjured.
* * *
“Ugh.”
For a moment I felt the taste of garbage in my mouth and involuntarily gagged.
Cedric standing before me looked puzzled.
‘Go to hell, you scum.’
Part of me wanted nothing more than to rush to the kitchen, grab the leftovers, and cram them down his throat.
‘Pity it hasn’t happened yet. If I get angry now, I’ll look insane.’
Exercising enormous restraint, I managed to hold myself in check, gritted my teeth, and stepped aside, avoiding his gaze.
As I moved to continue up the stairs,
‘What?’
Cedric blocked my path again.
It’s only natural to avoid filth. As I stepped to the other side,
Our steps crossed again.
I was so exasperated that I jerked my head up with frustration—only to find Cedric looking far more irritated than I was.
“You’re in the way.”
“What?”
“In the way, I said. Why do you keep doing this? If you have something to say, spit it out and get lost.”
“……?”
Is this man insane?
He seemed to think I’d deliberately positioned myself in front of him.

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