I Became A Thief Who Steals Overpowered Skills - Chapter 34

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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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Chapter 34. Bianca’s Sister

Clatter-clatter-clatter.

Inside the rattling carriage, Krash was flexing his recovered arm.

It seemed fine now. No real problems left.

He’d found a decent enough sword, so combat shouldn’t be an issue either.

‘Strong and stupid, that one.’

Krash cursed Merry under his breath and lifted his gaze.

Ahead, he could see Number 15—the coachman—leading the horses.

Krash was in a carriage.

A carriage made of bone, no less.

Snore-snore.

Beside him, Evelask was sleeping, snoring softly.

The carriage’s owner was none other than her.

As she kept trying to lean against him, Krash pushed her head away and looked out the window.

Since becoming a fugitive from the Empire.

Evelask had essentially no choice but to flee to another kingdom.

And so, after much deliberation, what she’d chosen was to follow Krash.

Krash had given her a good knock when she whined about how he had to take responsibility since he’d brought her along, and now he clicked his tongue in irritation.

Travel by carriage was convenient enough, but he had no real desire to keep her at his side.

‘Such a bother, this one.’

Krash, who knew well her habit of getting smug at the slightest concession, was just wondering where to abandon her when.

Suddenly the crow sleeping on his lap lifted its head sharply.

When Crimson Garden possessed other creatures, the crow would often sleep like this.

It seemed Crimson Garden had returned.

“It’s you.”
“I’m here.”

At Krash’s reply, Crimson Garden tilted its head.

The crow’s expression showed clear displeasure.

“Something’s come up.”
“What kind of something?”
“Your fiancée.”

Confusion flickered across Krash’s face.

His fiancée could only be Bianca.

“…Explain. In detail.”
“A man called Berkman has hidden himself in Hadenhartz.”

Krash’s body went rigid.

Berkman the butcher—a madman who’d committed massacres across the Empire and fled.

He’d known the man was hiding somewhere in Staron, but hearing Hadenhartz, Krash bolted upright from his seat.

“Bianca—”
“That’s the problem. It seems she entered the mountain where Berkman was hiding and has gone missing.”
“Evelask!”
“Huh—wha?!”

Krash grabbed Evelask’s sleeve and yanked her awake by force.

Evelask, who’d been sleeping with drool on her chin, jerked her head up in bewilderment, and Krash shouted at her.

“Turn the carriage toward Hadenhartz. Now!”

It was the first time in ages that Krash had raised his voice so forcefully since returning from the past.

＊ ＊ ＊

The day Bianca returned to Hadenhartz after finding the White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom at Krash’s request.

Bianca was treated poorly—as she’d come to expect.

The treatment was familiar.

She was a Cursed daughter.

The most worthless daughter in all of Hadenhartz.

Whispers from servants and maids were her daily bread.

Her title as youngest daughter of Hadenhartz was less a calling card than a poison to her.

‘It’s been a while.’

A condition she hadn’t felt at all during her time at Cheongsonggwan in Baldheim.

Now that she felt it again, Bianca realized how comfortable her life had been there.

The maid Eli and the steward Aliod never whispered about her behind her back.

They paid no mind to her Curse or anything else—they cared for her with utmost devotion.

‘Well, that makes sense.’

But Krash had received treatment worse than hers.

In Baldheim, it was insufficient talent rather than a Curse that had driven him into the abyss.

Bianca lifted her gaze toward the window.

Who would have thought she’d come to find Cheongsonggwan more comforting than home?

The ways of the world were truly inscrutable.

‘I want to go back soon.’

Somehow she found herself missing Krash.

Click-click—

Just then, the sound of footsteps echoed from ahead.

Those footsteps were familiar to her.

Because they belonged to the person in her family who despised her most.

Three years her senior, a woman who had just turned sixteen this year.

Jenika Hadenhartz.

She was none other than Bianca’s sister.

The moment she saw Bianca, her pale brows twisted in disgust.

It was the expression of someone encountering a sight they would rather unsee.

“Why did you come back?”

At once, her venomous words rang out.

Then Bianca finally understood why she had found Krash so much easier to be around.

‘Krash and I were the same.’

It was a kinship of suffering.

The treatment Krash received from his brothers mirrored her own precisely.

In Jenika’s eyes, Bianca was a child born by killing their mother.

Yet here was this girl, shackled by a Curse that robbed even sorrow from her soul, who stared back at Jenika with that infuriating blankness no matter how much resentment and rage the latter accumulated against her.

So Jenika despised her.

This creature who did not understand emotion—so inhuman that Jenika even doubted whether she was human at all—had planted in her the very thought that perhaps she was not born of their mother but rather born as a curse itself.

And now she had returned.

Naturally, Jenika had no intention of letting it slide.

“Ah, I see. That worthless wretch from Baldheim cast you out, didn’t he? Well, who could accept someone as unpleasant as you?”

Jenika unleashed her barbs as she always did.

But then Bianca, who had never answered her venom before, turned to face her for the first time.

“I’m not a spare.”

The words she spoke were entirely unexpected.

“What?”
“Krash isn’t a spare. And he’ll be back soon.”

Jenika looked at her with an expression that asked what nonsense she was spouting.

But Bianca remained as expressionless as always.

That fact only irritated Jenika further.

“Fine, then go now! There’s no place here for someone like you!”
“I can’t leave yet.”

Hearing her outburst, Bianca shook her head.

“I’ll leave once I find the White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom.”
“White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom? Why would you be looking for that?”

Jenika stared at her in bewilderment.

That mushroom, used to draw heat into the body, was a natural ingredient of a precious elixir—consuming even a single bite would fill one’s body with heat for an entire month.

Why would she be seeking such a thing?

After a moment’s thought, Jenika grasped the truth.

“So… the spare needs it?”

For some reason, Bianca was helping the youngest of Baldheim’s household.

She had no idea what the White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom was for, but everything Bianca did rubbed her the wrong way.

“Well, search all you like.”

With that, she snorted derisively and spun on her heel.

The malicious smile playing at her lips was something the emotionless Bianca could not quite comprehend.

And so Bianca set about searching everywhere for the White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom that Krash had requested.

But no matter how hard she searched, she could not purchase it.

The reason was simple.

First, the White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom itself was so rare that few people harvested it.

Second was none other than Jenika’s interference.

Unlike Bianca, Jenika would lead Hadenhartz directly alongside her eldest brother.

Her influence within Hadenhartz was, without question, the strongest.

For that reason, she had instructed the merchants never to sell the White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom to Bianca.

It was a thoroughly malicious act.

“I apologize. Bianca, we have no remaining stock of the White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom.”

So it was Bianca who blinked, realizing that even the last merchant house had turned up empty.

The two attendants who had followed her watched her with awkward expressions, gauging her mood.

The two attendants knew exactly what Jenika had done.

This was because Jenika had stationed them beside Bianca specifically to report on her every move.

“There’s nothing here either, then.”

Bianca found herself in an equally difficult position.

She had meant to bring the White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom to Krash, but now it looked like she would arrive empty-handed.

By the time she returned to the mansion, she had sunk into contemplation.

‘I think Jenika deliberately got in the way.’

It had been a mistake to tell her about the White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom.

She had done so thinking Jenika would actually help her find it so she could leave quickly—but clearly, Jenika despised her far more than she’d realized.

‘Then again.’

Bianca began searching through Hadenhartz’s books.

After pulling out several volumes and learning what she could about the White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom, she soon nodded to herself.

Hadenhartz was the oldest noble house in the north.

As such, the distribution regions of the White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom were described in considerable detail.

It was possible that the merchant house had deliberately withheld the exact location from them to maintain prices—after all, if the merchants knew precisely where to find it, the mushroom’s value would plummet.

‘I can probably find it faster than I thought.’

With that belief, Bianca swiftly packed her clothes and supplies.

If no one around her would help, she would manage on her own.

It was a judgment as foolish and childish as they come.

However little emotional range she displayed, however mature for her years—she was thirteen years old.

Her reasoning had taken the path of least resistance.

‘I’ll find it quickly and be back before anyone notices.’

And so, fearless and alone, she set out into the mountains.

When Jenika learned of her actions, her expression turned to disbelief.

“Is this girl mad? Does she think Hadenhartz’s mountains are some kind of joke?”

She was at a loss for words.

True, anyone born in Hadenhartz grows accustomed to mountains and snow.

But Hadenhartz’s peaks were no easy terrain for a thirteen-year-old child to wander alone.

Moreover, the White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom grew only in the deepest reaches of the mountains.

It was not a place she could reach alone.

If things continued as they were, she would almost certainly get lost.

“Sigh.”

Jenika exhaled a long, weary breath.

She couldn’t fathom why someone who had ever shown interest in anything beyond reading books was now exerting herself to this degree.

Yet even if she despised Bianca, it would be equally troublesome for Jenika if she perished out there.

She was Baldheim’s betrothed.

If she died and the engagement with Baldheim fell through, it would be a serious matter.

“Tch. I’ll go fetch her. Attach a few knights to me.”
“Yes, understood.”

In the end, she rose to retrieve Bianca.

All the while thinking of her as an annoying younger sister.

＊ ＊ ＊

The mountains of Hadenhartz—the Local Mountain Range.

Bianca tread across the snow-blanketed slopes.

‘This works nicely.’

Bianca glanced down at the shoes on her feet and nodded to herself.

They were artifacts that allowed easy passage across snow, which made travel comfortable.

Bianca tightened her pack and resumed her journey deeper into the mountains.

She intended to find the White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom before nightfall.

“Hey!”

In that instant, she heard a sharp cry.

When Bianca turned, Jenika stood there with two knights beside her.

She looked exhausted from the pursuit, breathing out a long sigh.

It was because Bianca, despite her short stature, had moved faster than expected.

As a result, Jenika was forced to catch her breath heavily and wipe the sweat from her brow despite the winter chill.

“Are you insane? There’s no White Snow Hot Yang Mushroom, so you just waltz into the mountains to search for it yourself?”

She pressed Bianca with exasperation.

But the one who was truly taken aback was Bianca.

“I told you not to sell them.”

Bianca had ventured into the mountains only because Jenika had blocked the distribution of White Snow Hot Yang Mushrooms.

The mushrooms were already scarce enough in circulation.

Now that Jenika had cut off the supply, there was nowhere left in Hadenhartz to obtain them.

So she’d come searching herself—and yet why was Jenika upset about that?

“What, you thought I came all the way out here because I like you? If you died lost in these mountains, Baldheim and Hadenhartz would lose their alliance!”

Only then did Bianca understand.

In Hadenhartz’s eyes, she was indeed a figure of importance.

A token of trade between two houses.

That much, Bianca hadn’t thought through until now.

“Come on. I’ll give you what you want and send you back straightaway.”

Hearing that, Bianca turned to follow.

If she could just have the White Snow Hot Yang Mushrooms, she saw no need to take unnecessary risks.

But there was one thing she wanted to ask.

“Why did you come yourself?”
“What?”

Jenika’s expression turned blank.

Her ragged breathing and torn clothing from the climb suggested she’d come in quite a hurry.

Searching for Bianca could have been handled by forming a search party of knights accustomed to mountain terrain.

So there was no reason for her to climb the mountain herself.

“I told you—I came looking for you because of family obligations.”
“But you’re not the type to worry so much about family affairs. You could have just sent a search party.”

Even positioned as she was in Hadenhartz, Jenika remained the second child.

In a house where male interests dominated, the eldest son could reasonably concern himself with family matters.

Had her eldest brother come searching for her, Bianca wouldn’t have found it strange.

But it was Jenika, the second.

That she, who had seemed to hate Bianca so much, would come in person—that struck Bianca as odd.

It was precisely the sort of inconsistency that someone without feelings might latch onto.

Caught in exactly that contradiction, Jenika’s lips twitched.

Then her face twisted into an expression of anger.

“What do you want me to do about it? It’s my heart, after all.”

Yet for all her defiant words, something deep within Jenika’s chest twisted sharply, as though a blade had found its mark.

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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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