I’m The Male Lead’s Biological Daughter, But I Want To Live With The Second Male Lead! - Chapter 107

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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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Episode 107
“Still, not everyone has left. Six of them have remained by our side.”
But fearing their lives might be targeted again, she’d told the world they’d been wiped out entirely.
At Lillian’s words, Edward exhaled a shaky breath.
“That’s right. I’ll protect those children. No matter what happens, I will.”
Edward pulled Lillian close and repeated the vow several times over.
* * *
Unaware of the adults’ conversation, Mabel sat absorbed in the Book of Ozborne.
By the time she’d finished reading everything about the Subjugation Mark, the very thing she’d been curious about—
“What on earth! How can a book say something like that?”
Mabel bolted upright in exasperation.
She’d laboriously worked through all the difficult vocabulary, dictionary in hand.
And the conclusion was: “It varies each time, so it’s unknown.”
“If it varies each time, then the book should have written down exactly how it varied each time! You can’t just say ‘everyone remembers a different situation, so it can’t be pinned down to one answer’ and call it done! Can you?”
Growing more indignant the more she thought about it, Mabel crossed her arms and glared daggers at the book.
“And if the author didn’t know, they shouldn’t have written a table of contents at all! Why make a table of contents? Did they get paid by the word or something?”
Now Mabel was pointing accusingly at the book.
At her outburst, Winter, who’d been dozing beside her, flickered her eyes open.
[Mabel.]
[Read. Everything?]
“Yeah! But the conclusion was that they don’t know!”
Mabel huffed indignantly, insisting Winter listen to her.
As Mabel repeated herself, Winter yawned widely.
“Winter, are you even listening? Huh? Are you listening? Do you understand how disappointed I am?”
Mabel scratched the back of Winter’s neck insistently as she vented.
Winter simply yawned slowly again, as if none of it mattered.
After yawning three times in a row, Winter stretched out on the bed and floated words above herself.
[Summarize. Mabel’s words.]
[Varies. Person to person.]
[The end?]
“Yeah! That was it!”
So Mabel felt even more deflated now, despite having read the entire book.
‘I wanted to know what that incredibly bright light I saw back then was!’
As Mabel stamped her feet in frustration, Winter padded over to calm her.
[Show.]
[To me.]
Then Winter tapped the floor with her front paws.
What difference would it make if Winter saw it?
But Mabel found Winter so endearing that she simply showed her the book.
“Here. Don’t extend your claws. They’ll tear the pages.”
[See. With what. Me.]
“With a white lion’s eyes, obviously. Anyway, look. Right here. The conclusion really does end there, doesn’t it?”
Winter lowered her head to follow where Mabel pointed.
Winter’s small head moved back and forth as she read the passage for quite some time.
Then she placed a paw on a particular spot and looked up at Mabel.
[Find. Common point.]
“Hm?”
[Look. Here.]
Mabel brushed aside Winter’s paw and quickly read the section in question.
But the content was the same.
“Yeah, I know. That’s the conclusion. It varies person to person, so it’s unknown.”
[Foolish. Mabel?]
“What?”
Seriously?
Mabel scowled at Winter, who shook her head slowly.
[Want.]
[Partner.]
“Oh, right. Of course you need a partner you want in order to form a pair-bond. That’s obvious.”
Mabel pursed her lips and nodded.

But Winter’s frustration only deepened.
[Sincerely.]
[Sincerely!]
“Yeah, I must’ve shared it with someone I genuinely wanted. A Pair-bond, remember? Don’t you know what a Pair-bond is?”
Mabel’s innocent question nearly sent Winter into apoplexy.
In exasperation, Winter bounded up and down on the plush bed.
Then he planted his front paws on Mabel’s thigh, straightened his body, and pressed the matter.
[Mabel.]
[Wanted.]
[Me.]
[Sincerely.]
[In the cave?]
“Huh? What are you talking about? Why would I have wanted you from our very first meeting…?”
Then, like a bolt of lightning, understanding struck Mabel’s mind.
“Oh!!!”
“Huff…”
As Mabel’s eyes widened, Winter exhaled heavily.
“That’s it—the Subjugation Mark couldn’t be established until the conditions of a Pair-bond were met first!”
A Pair-bond couldn’t form simply because one side desperately desired it.
But Winter had said he recognized what Mabel was the moment he saw her—a Fantastical Species.
And though he knew that drinking her blood and establishing the Subjugation Mark would bind him to her in servitude, he’d done it anyway.
That could only mean Winter had genuinely wanted her, even then.
But what of Mabel?
“So there it is—I never had any real feelings for you!”
“Cough.”
Mabel’s cheerful words made Winter choke.
Mabel laughed and patted Winter’s back as he coughed, giggling away.
“See? That’s probably why I’m not a Seer—because I have no feelings for you at all!”
But with this final blow delivered, Winter found himself utterly defeated.
Collapsing sideways onto the bed, Winter’s eyes grew dim.
[A will.]
[Mabel will kill. Me.]
“Hey, don’t be silly now—”
Mabel shook Winter, telling him to stop playing around.
But Winter genuinely wanted to lose consciousness.
He was already anxious that he alone seemed to harbor feelings for Mabel, and now this final confirmation…
[A will.]
[Mabel will kill. Me.]
[With words.]
Plip.
A clear tear gathered at Winter’s closed eye and fell.
“Aw, really now—why are you crying? Is it because of that yawn from earlier?”
Mabel gently wiped his eye, but Winter felt no comfort at all.
As Mabel scratched Winter’s belly trying to cheer him up, Kellic appeared at Mabel’s Room.
“Mabel—how about we hold a banquet to celebrate Aselt’s engagement being called off?”
“Oh, really? I’d love that!”
With Empress Consort Lillian and Zigmund now serving as her legitimate guardians, the Empress could no longer force the Crown Prince’s engagement upon Mabel as she pleased.
Even thinking it over again, it was a satisfying outcome, and Mabel’s face broke into a radiant smile.
Since they were holding a banquet anyway, wouldn’t it be better to go to the Capital rather than hold it at Duke’s Castle?
Lost in these happy thoughts, Mabel jumped to her feet.
“Let’s go tell Father right away!”
“Kyaaaow!”
And in that instant, Winter suddenly lunged toward Mabel.
“Oh, you scared me!”
Mabel leaped from her seat, eyes wide with surprise.
Kellic, who had been reaching for Mabel’s hand, was equally startled.
Winter, his body pressed low to the ground, snarled fiercely at Mabel.
The sharp, repeated cries sounded distinctly angry.
With his whiskers bristling, Winter contorted his muzzle in apparent fury as he bore down on her.
[An engagement?!]
With whom?!
He was actually cheating on her—it was absolutely unforgivable!
‘Oh no!’
Mabel belatedly realized she’d never told Winter about the betrothal.
It hadn’t been intentional.
There simply hadn’t been the opportunity, nor any reason to.
“Calm down, Winter! No, it wasn’t like that!”
But now that Winter had found out everything, Mabel had to make her case.
“He forced the whole thing on me!”
“Roooaaarrr!!!”
When Winter’s suspicions still wouldn’t ease, Mabel grabbed onto Kellic.
“Right, Kellic? I didn’t want the betrothal anyway, did I?”
“Huh? U-uh, y-yes, that’s right. Mabel never wanted to be betrothed!”
Kellic, who’d been watching from across the river so to speak, jumped in alarm and quickly backed her up.
“Eek!”
Winter had released a sliver of aura and fixed him with a piercing glare.
“I didn’t want her betrothed to that bastard either. He was the Crown Prince, after all!”
“……huh?”
The Crown Prince?
Winter’s aggressive momentum faltered.
Kellic seized the opening and spoke up quickly.
“Yeah, the Crown Prince! You know, the Crown Prince? He takes after his mother and treats Beastmen like dirt, so you really think I’d hand Mabel over to someone like that?”
Kellic pushed past his instinctive dread of the aura and exhaled sharply.
His affection for Mabel outweighed even the primal reverence he felt toward a Fantastical Species.
“Not a chance. And it’s not just me—if Mabel had been forced into that betrothal, then the Duke and Aselt would’ve stormed the Imperial Palace.”
In fact, Aselt was genuinely plotting to turn the Crown Prince into stone.
With him trying to slip out of Duke’s Castle every other day, the servants had no choice but to keep a close eye on him.
It got to the point where Zigmund made chasing Aselt down his daily routine.
If they’d failed to stop him then…
Mabel shuddered at the dreadful thought.
It was truly fortunate that such a thing had never come to pass.

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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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