Everyone Was Obsessed With Me After I Became the Youngest Princess Favourite - Chapter 13

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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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‘Why is a four-year-old speaking so eloquently and intelligently?’
I harbored serious suspicions that Diana, like me, had regressed into childhood, yet her innocent expression revealed not the slightest hint of deception.
“Once a day, then. …I see.”
Duke Elrad’s eyes darkened as he absorbed the vivid account of his only daughter’s suffering, and a dangerous edge crept into his voice.
“Hiccup!”
As I sat watching him in tense silence, I thoughtlessly began to hiccup.
Fortunately, Duke Elrad quickly shed that lethal aura and extended a glass of water toward me.
His kindness caught me off guard, but I gratefully accepted it with a murmured “Thank you,” and hastily brought the glass to my lips.
The water worked wonders—my hiccups ceased almost immediately.
But that was when something peculiar began to unfold.
The Duke started persistently pushing food dishes toward me.
At first, I thought it was merely my imagination, but it wasn’t.
Belatedly wondering if he meant for me to serve Diana, I carefully speared a morsel with my fork and offered it to her, but the child shook her head.
“Dana eat more!”
And she proudly patted her protruding belly.
Eventually, reading the room, I began placing the food piled before me into my mouth, bite by bite.
It had been barely a week since I returned to the past, yet the realization that I would never starve again filled me with a joy that transcended mere sustenance.
With a newfound sense of peace, I began eating, though I soon set down my fork.
At that, Duke Elrad—who had remained seated at the table with Diana even after finishing his own meal—raised his eyebrows.
“You’re finished already?”
“Yes.”
“There’s no need to hold back. This place isn’t that wretched… well, in any case, you may eat as much as you wish.”
“I’m quite full, thank you.”
“Hmm.”
Despite my earnest response, the Duke’s expression remained visibly displeased.
He had said there was no need to be cautious, yet his face was precisely the sort that made it impossible for someone in my position not to worry.
However, I had never been a heavy eater to begin with, and after such a prolonged fast, my appetite simply wouldn’t cooperate.
Just as I was seriously contemplating whether I should force myself to eat more, salvation arrived.
In the form of my idol.
* * *
“You’re leaving already?”
When Bianca Mareta, who had seemed quite content with the prospect of enjoying a feast at the Duke’s Castle, suddenly announced her intention to return to the Grand Duchy, the Duke asked in a bewildered tone.
Bianca Mareta forced a smile, her expression troubled.
“Just moments ago, His Highness the Grand Duke contacted me through the communication device, and it seems His Highness has heard news of you.”
“News concerning Diana?”
“Yes. I informed him immediately that the young lady had been found, but….”
“He didn’t believe you.”
Without needing to witness how events would unfold, the Duke’s expression turned bitter with understanding.
“It seems His Highness will only be reassured if I go and tell him in person.”
“I had intended to properly reward you upon your arrival at the Duke’s Castle, but it cannot be helped. Your assistance has been invaluable. Please convey my renewed gratitude to His Highness the Grand Duke for sending you such a distance.”
The Duke regarded Bianca Mareta in silence as she bowed her head, then subtly turned his gaze away.
He caught sight of a child pretending indifference while straining to listen to their conversation, ears practically perked.
Following the direction of the child’s gaze—brimming with admiration and longing—he found Bianca Mareta at its end.
It appeared the Countess had thoroughly captured the child’s heart in mere moments.
The Duke observed with curiosity how Lia could not tear her eyes from her.
When she had exposed the Orphanage Director, she had seemed clever and resolute, yet afterward she had conducted herself timidly, constantly gauging the mood around her.
Her emaciated frame made her appear far younger than her years, yet her expression seemed unnaturally mature.
‘And yet now….’
Beneath her haphazardly cut bangs, her eyes sparkled with unmistakable childlike wonder.
He had discerned that she possessed mana, but outwardly she was utterly unremarkable.
And yet once she had caught his attention, his gaze kept returning to her inexplicably.
It seemed Bianca Mareta experienced the same pull.
“Lia.”
At the sound of her name properly spoken for the first time since it had been revealed, Lia startled, her eyes widening.
Bianca Mareta, who had knelt before her and leveled their gazes, asked gently.
“Do you remember what I told you upstairs?”
“Yes.”
Lia nodded quickly.
Before descending to the first floor, Bianca Mareta had revealed her identity and explained to Lia that she possessed mana and had nearly lost control at the Orphanage.
“And you remember what I said—that using mana without proper training, especially when your body is in such poor condition, could be dangerous?”
As Lia nodded once more, Bianca Mareta gently stroked her head as though pleased with her.
Just as Lia’s eyes began to glisten with emotion, Bianca Mareta asked.
“Then, would you like to come with me?”
“Countess Bianca Mareta, what are you saying?”
“Exactly what I mean. I would like to take you with me. Of course… only if you wish it.”
As the Duke pressed further, Bianca Mareta clarified more precisely.
Lia’s eyes trembled as though battered by turbulent waves.
She had not misheard.
‘Come with you? With me? Truly?’
In her previous life, Lia had always yearned for a place where she could rest at ease, and for someone who needed her.
That Bianca Mareta herself—of all people—would speak such words to her left her so astonished her heart scarcely seemed to beat.
While Lia remained bewildered, the Duke furrowed his brow and spoke.
“I cannot fathom why you would suddenly say such a thing, but there is no need for concern. The House of Elrad has no shortage of mages skilled in handling mana.”
“But…!”
“Surely you do not intend to spirit away an Imperial subject to the Grand Duchy without just cause.”
The Duke’s words were not wrong, and Bianca Mareta bit her lip.
All the children of Tessar Orphanage had come under the Duke’s jurisdiction, and Lia in particular had been taken directly under his care, leaving no room for Bianca Mareta to intervene.
Yet her heart found no peace.
Though she could not fully understand it herself, she sensed that if she returned to Bellus leaving Lia behind, regret would haunt her.
“Lia, tell me yourself. What is it that you wish to do?”
When Bianca Mareta refused to yield and turned the choice back to Lia, the Duke clicked his tongue in exasperation.
Then, as if unwilling to accept defeat, he turned to Lia and asked.
“Well then, answer me. Diana follows you so devotedly—will you go with Count Mareta?”
“Your Grace, isn’t that rather underhanded?”
Bianca Mareta clenched her teeth as she glanced at Diana, who clung tightly to her arm as if terrified Lia might leave.
Yet there remained one glimmer of hope—the child’s reaction.
Though Diana’s eyes were wide with disbelief, her cheeks flushed a rosy pink and her gaze sparkled with unmistakable joy. Anyone could see she was delighted.
In truth, I trembled with happiness.
Bianca Mareta, who had made such an offer to me, and Diana, clinging to my arm as though we could never be parted, gazing up at me with those luminous eyes.
‘There are people who want me.’
Perhaps Bianca Mareta had made the proposal out of concern for my mana’s runaway potential, but even so, everything felt like a dream.
As I hesitated, my lips moving soundlessly, the Duke waited for my answer with an inexplicably anxious expression.
“I will….”
At last, my lips parted.
* * *
In the carriage carrying only myself and the sleeping Diana, I gazed at the moon visible through the window.
Once we crossed the mountain range, we would soon reach the Elrad Duchy.
In the end, I chose to go with Diana.
I felt a sense of responsibility to quickly restore Jack’s position, which had been displaced because of me.
But more than anything, just before my lips opened.
“No! If big sister goes, I’ll die!”
Diana suddenly began to wail—and that was the decisive reason.
It seemed she had grown quite attached in such a short time.
The fact that I couldn’t bear to leave the weeping child clinging to me spoke volumes.
Of course, it would be a lie to say I had no regrets.
At some point, Bianca Mareta would enter seclusion, and I had no idea when I would see her again. I had wanted to feel more of her kindness.
‘I had wanted to witness her abilities firsthand as well.’
Yet, possessing even fragmentary knowledge of the future, I knew it was better to remain in the Empire.
There was something I had learned with brutal clarity in my previous life.
If you are useless, you cannot survive, and sympathy merely alleviates hunger for a moment—it is never salvation.
‘Though the Guild took me in through Master’s whim….’
Had I not possessed mana, or had I not constantly strived to prove my worth, could I have ever become a true Guild member?
I do not believe so.
“But I am exhausted now.”
I was utterly sick of fretting, afraid of abandonment, desperate for recognition.
And what had come of my efforts, even unto death?
Terenthium was my homeland and my home.
Master, who took me in when I lay collapsed on the street. The officers who taught me so much when I could not fit in with my comrades.
I had genuinely thought of them as family and wanted to be acknowledged as a true member.
But what returned was betrayal.
‘Of course, I’d like to believe Master and the executives knew nothing of this….’
Jade had served Master far longer than I had, and he was the most powerful figure of authority after the executives themselves.
Given Terenthium’s inherent culture of loyalty, it was difficult to accept that Jade would have acted so independently.
“…Ah, what’s the use of dwelling on it? It’s already a closed chapter.”
I laughed hollowly and shook my head.
I had no desire to repeat the patterns of my past life.
‘This time, I won’t be bound to anyone else, struggling and grasping for survival.’
In this life, I wanted to stand confidently on my own, wielding the abilities I possessed and the knowledge of what was to come.

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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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