How to Replace Your Dad - Chapter 54
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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How to Replace Your Dad
Chapter 54
“No. I’ll meet her.”
“Who knows what that woman will do. She fed poison to your mother, so she might throw acid at you.”
At the mention of acid, Father’s eyebrows twitched.
I shook my head.
“She won’t be able to. She’s someone who can’t do anything in front of others.”
It was the same at the Andres Estate.
After Stella entered the manor, Emma often came to the Andres Estate under the pretext of meeting Stella.
Mother said to such Emma.
“I won’t stop you from meeting Stella. But you must meet outside the manor, out of sight.”
“Ah, I suppose that would be best. I’m grateful to you, my lady, just for allowing me to meet Stella…”
Emma shed tears like chicken droppings and promised to do so.
Then she went back and immediately took medicine.
Saying she had no reason to live since she only seemed to interfere with her daughter’s life.
‘I wonder what kind of suicide attempt it is to swallow about ten fever reducers.’
Stella was in an uproar.
Rather than lose her mother, she packed her bags immediately, saying she wouldn’t live at Andres.
Would the people who dearly loved Stella just stand by?
They knew that Mother’s weakness was me.
When they grabbed me and caused all sorts of commotion, Mother had no choice but to back down.
That’s how Emma came and went from Andres as if it were her own home.
“I want to meet her.”
When I was firm, the Irregulars reluctantly backed down.
I told the butler to let Emma in and headed to the reception room.
After some time, I heard a knock.
The butler had brought Emma.
“So this is where you’re living.”
Emma was dressed luxuriously, befitting a noblewoman from a high noble family.
She wore a dress with delicate patterns embroidered in gold thread, draped a white fox fur shawl, and wore a hat with a large brim on her head.
Emma took off her hat, sat across from me, and smiled leisurely.
“Have you been well.”
“Yes.”
“Still as rude as ever.”
“Are you someone I should show courtesy to?”
It was a remark pointing out her position as merely the mistress of my biological father, who was of maid origin.
Emma’s expression crumpled.
But she soon smiled again and said.
“Seeing how sharp your tongue has become, you must have heard news of our Stella.”
“So?”
“You don’t know how proud he was of Stella. Seeing that made me so moved that I even felt grateful to your mother.”
Mother?
Why is Mother being mentioned here?
When I narrowed my brow as if asking what she meant, Emma’s eyes curved pleasantly.
“Oh my, your mother didn’t tell you until the end? It was your mother who arranged for me to meet him.”
“…What are you talking about?”
“You see, your mother and I were milk sisters.”
“…What?”
“Through that connection, your mother hired me as a worker when she established the Paul Guild. I was able to enter Andres because your mother pulled strings for me.”
Even as a child, I thought it was strange.
How was Emma able to work at the Andres Estate?
And as a nurse maid taking care of my young brother, no less.
High noble families hire talented people with academy graduation certificates.
But Emma had never received proper education, let alone graduated from an academy.
“Your mother and I were as close as real sisters when we were young. Your mother saved me from being sold, and I was the only support for your mother who had no family.”
“…”
“But now we’ve both given birth to children by the same man, and those children have become real sisters – how ironic life is.”
“…”
“I understand why your mother tried so hard to bury our past. She wouldn’t have wanted to see her daughter’s face like this. As a woman, it must have hurt her pride that she lacked charm and lost her husband to me.”
Emma was smiling brightly while saying such things.
As if she found it amusing that I was gripping my skirt tightly.
“So there are times when I pity you mother and daughter—”
“Are you proud of being an ungrateful beast?”
“What?”
“Are you happy that stealing the husband of someone who helped you is your life’s greatest achievement?”
Emma’s expression hardened.
She glared at me fiercely, then soon burst into hollow laughter.
“You’re just like your mother. Do you want to protect your pride that badly?”
“What Mother tried to protect wasn’t pride.”
Until now, the mother I thought of was a strong person.
Someone who wasn’t afraid to face problems head-on when they arose.
A cheerful and bright person.
Someone who smiled saying that scars were like medals for enduring pain.
But now I understand.
‘Mother wasn’t a strong person, but someone who had to be strong.’
To protect me.
“It was me. She didn’t want me to waste my life seeking revenge for Mother.”
“…No matter how much you act superior, in the end you mother and daughter lost to us mother and daughter and were driven out…”
“But I found out in the end!”
When I shouted fiercely, Emma flinched and looked at me.
I looked straight at Emma and said.
“You’re dead.”
“What can someone like you…”
“Throw this woman out!”
The moment I shouted, the door burst open.
But the person who appeared wasn’t the face I expected.
“I was wondering when you’d call. …Young Lady.”
“Filth was flowing from her mouth. Auntie.”
Yuise and Antonio looked at Emma with fierce eyes.
* * *
Emma, startled by the Elite Irregulars’ intimidating presence, ran away with her tail between her legs.
Emma, who had run out of Duke Esgaroth’s Second Residence, panted and glared toward the door.
“Still acting so defiant.”
Just like her mother.
But that attitude won’t last long.
It seems she was lucky enough to gain recognition at Esgaroth, but once they learn that child has fallen out of the Saint’s favor, the situation will change instantly.
Emma, seated in the carriage, said.
“Let’s go.”
She had to witness her daughter’s most glorious moment with her own eyes.
At today’s verification ceremony, Stella would rise to a position higher than anyone else.
The carriage departed soon after.
The destination was the Imperial Palace.
No one dared to stop the carriage bearing the crest of Andres.
As they passed through the palace gates and entered the carriage waiting area, Stella greeted her mother with a bright face.
“Mother!”
“My goodness, Stella…!”
Emma looked at Stella with a moved expression.
Dressed in white ceremonial robes with a himation woven from golden thread, Stella looked like a god from mythology.
“Beautiful. So very beautiful.”
“Please hurry. Father and Grandmother are in the assembly hall.”
Stella smiled brightly as she led her to the verification ceremony hall.
In the hall were the Emperor and Pope, the heads of the Seven Families, senior priests, and nobles selected by lottery.
The Marquise, who had been exchanging greetings with the nobles, frowned when she saw Emma.
She whispered to Count Andres.
“How did that thing come to the verification hall?”
“Stella earnestly requested it, they say.”
A tearful plea to share this honor with her mother.
The verification ceremony was merely a formality. Stella was already as good as confirmed as a Saint.
The Temple, which had been waiting for a Saint all along, could hardly refuse her request.
Emma quickly approached upon spotting the two.
“What a beautiful day, Mother.”
“What on earth are you wearing…”
The gaudy ornaments hanging all over her looked utterly vulgar.
The Marquise turned her head away with an expression of annoyance.
Soon the verification ceremony began.
The verification method was purifying an egg contaminated with ancient poison.
It was an egg that even the first Pope at the founding of the nation could not cleanse and had to seal away.
The contamination was so powerful that black forms writhed even outside the cage containing the egg.
The cage was placed before Stella.
The Pope extended his hand with a smiling face.
“Begin the purification.”
Everyone in the audience focused on Stella as she reached toward the cage.
“Do you think she can resolve the contamination?”
“She’s only recently awakened, so how could she completely resolve such terrible poison? Even partial purification would be an excellent result.”
Emma watched Stella on the dais with an excited expression.
‘Ah, finally.’
Finally, her daughter would become a Saint.
Stella’s fingertips touched the cage.
Light that seemed like fireflies gathered at her fair, delicate fingertips.
Soon they became undulating curves that wrapped around the cage.
“Ooh…!”
“Waah…!”
Gasps of admiration flowed from among the nobles.
It was tremendous mana.
Pure, powerful mana that could be felt even from a distance.
That mana penetrated into the cage.
It was then that the sound was heard.
Thump.
A sound like a dull crash, or perhaps like a drum beating.
The sound continued intermittently.
Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.
The youngest man among the heads of the Seven Families muttered.
“Doesn’t it sound like a heartbeat…?”
Then someone murmured.
“That can’t be. Who could have such tremendous beating…”
A noble who had been tilting his head with a strange expression suddenly looked at the cage in shock.
The cage.
It was the cage.
This beating was coming from the cage.
The thoughts of those who realized this began to connect.
‘What exactly is that egg being purified?’
The Pope was the first to find the answer.
The Pope, seated in the chair prepared closest to the dais, hardened his expression.
The Pope shot to his feet.
“Stop! Senior priests, gather and seal the cage!”
What?
Just as the nobles were widening their eyes wondering what was happening, the senior priests rushed frantically toward the dais.
But it was too late.
Crash!
The cage shattered completely and it had emerged.
[Graaah…!]
Stella was thrown against the wall as the cage broke apart.
“Ugh…”
She groaned and barely managed to lift her head.
It was a giant bird, completely blackened as if it had rolled through mud.
A bird?
No, that was a monster.
A beak that split open in a cross shape.
Teeth filling the inside of the beak.
Talons sharp as spears, and red eyes flashing with madness.
“Your Majesty!”
“Your Holiness!”
Soldiers and knights urgently protected the Emperor and Pope.
The Emperor shouted at the Pope.
“You prepared a monster’s egg for the verification ceremony?!”
“It’s not a monster. It’s a sacred beast. A White Crane!”
“Then what is that appearance!”
“The egg was awakened without being purified. The sacred beast was born stained with contamination!”
What?
The nobles were horrified.
She couldn’t purify it?
Then she’s not a Saint?
‘No, more than that…!’
The contaminated sacred beast continued to grow in size.
It had grown large enough to destroy the Holy Tower and the Chamber of Blessings.
Knights and senior priests stood in its way, but it was futile.
The knights’ swords and spears melted away as if they had touched lava, and the senior priests’ divine power was also negated by the chilling cries.
“Reinforcements! Send reinforcements quickly!”
“Aaaaah─!”
The Holy Tower became a scene of chaos in an instant.
The nobles screamed in terror and rushed toward the exit.
The corrupted White Crane flew toward the Emperor.
Just as the White Crane’s talons were about to reach the Emperor.
Clang─!
A sharp scraping sound rang out.
Thud.
The White Crane’s severed foot rolled across the floor.
“…!”
“…!!”
The startled crowd simultaneously looked toward one place.
Three men who had rushed in front of the Emperor.
A blonde man so beautiful his gender was unclear.
A red-haired man who had leaped onto the corrupted White Crane.
And that black-haired man guarding the Emperor’s front was….
“Aslan.”
Marquis Esgaroth called his name.
Aslan quietly gazed at the corrupted White Crane while gripping his sword.
His fierce aura was enough to make the beast identify him as an enemy.
[Kyaaaak─!]
The White Crane shrieked sharply and charged straight at Aslan.
Clang─!
But it collided with Aslan’s barrier.
Just as its beak began to burn, Antonio, who had mounted the corrupted White Crane, violently drove his sword into its neck.
With a thud, the White Crane crashed down.
When Yuise spread his hand, something like a net made of strange characters covered the corrupted White Crane.
[Grrrr! Kraaa─!]
The corrupted White Crane’s resistance was tremendous.
Not only was the building being destroyed by its wing beats, but people closest to the corrupted White Crane began having their blood vessels burst.
“Ahhh…!”
“Grrr….”
People collapsed while covering their ears.
But nothing could stop Aslan.
He charged straight at the corrupted White Crane and struck down at its neck.
Crack.
With a chilling sound of bones and joints breaking, the White Crane’s neck snapped with a thud.
“Is… is it over?”
Thinking it was finally resolved, people began to move.
But they froze in place.
The cross-section of the corrupted White Crane’s neck was writhing, and a head was already regenerating.
“Aah… aaaah…!”
Terrified people began pushing themselves away with their palms against the ground.
Cold sweat poured down Yuise’s temples.
“It’s useless to hold it any longer.”
At that moment, a girl appeared.
Even as the corrupted White Crane cried mercilessly, the girl strode boldly across the assembly hall.
“…Huh?”
The heads of the Seven Families, the clerics, and other nobles all looked at the girl.
Emma muttered.
“Yu… Yustea?”
Yes, that girl.
Her light-colored hair fluttered in the rough wind that entered through the collapsed outer wall.
Her eyes held a noble heterochromatic glow.
One of the nobles shouted.
“N-no! If you approach the White Crane…!”
Then the girl said.
“It’s okay. It’s weakened enough.”
The girl’s hand touched the White Crane.
Whooooom….
With a strange vibration, golden light gathered at her fingertips.
“Calm down.”
From where her hand touched, chunks of corruption fell off like pus, drip by drip.
The hideous body began to return to normal.
And what was revealed were pure white feathers.
“Release it, Yuise.”
When Yustea spoke, Yuise asked in a monotone voice.
“Will you be alright?”
“Yes.”
The spell was withdrawn from Yuise’s hand.
And the freed White Crane….
[Kiiik….]
Rubbed its eyes against Yustea’s hand.
“…!”
“…!!”
“…?!”
People gasped in amazement.
Their mouths hung open, unable to make a sound.
The first to speak were the senior priests.
“Your Holiness….”
“Your Holiness, this is….”
The Pope stared frantically at one place.
At that girl who was stroking the White Crane freed from corruption.
In the quiet assembly, the Pope shouted.
“The Saint has appeared─!”
It was the moment when Yustea Andres. No, Yustea Esgaroth Quaron earned the title of Saint.
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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