She is the Daughter of the Villainess in a Ridiculous Novel - Chapter 3

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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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I Am the Villainess’s Daughter in a Melodramatic Novel
Chapter 3
The drawing room where everyone had been waiting was the same one where the earlier commotion had taken place. I walked in wondering why it had to be this room again, and Melissa rose from her seat as if she’d been waiting for me, spreading her arms wide.
“Idel, my daughter!”
Her low voice, brimming with warmth, sounded remarkably tender.
‘All of it is a lie, though.’
I knew every gesture she put on was an act. Idel silently scoffed at her with cynicism and stepped forward.
Melissa might cherish her daughter as a tool, but she had never once loved her.
‘What mother in this world would place a Brainwashing Curse on a daughter she cherishes and have her do her dirty work?’
Look at her now. She’s stroking my cheek as if she’s missed her daughter these past few days, but her eyes are as cold as ever.
‘Like someone checking whether the bird she’s trained has been picked up by another hand while she was away.’
My younger sibling had actually acknowledged this point in a book report, after analyzing the original work.
[…Melissa’s treatment of Idel, who craved her mother’s love, was brilliantly vile, never once looking her way and using her purely as a tool. How do I put it? It’s like witnessing how far a person consumed by love and inferiority can go…]
I hadn’t realized it at the time, but seeing her behavior up close, with her constant awareness of the Duchess, I thought even ‘madwoman’ was an insufficient insult for Melissa.
‘I said I wouldn’t write out the Duchess’s lines after Melissa killed the Duke, since that would be a spoiler, but given the circumstances, I can guess.’
She was a woman who had gone mad with love and inferiority, who had tried to kill both the Duke she loved and her own younger sister. The words must have been shocking enough to turn the Duchess, who had barely survived, into a Black Transformation…
‘Well, she probably told her that she’d been adopted, or something like that.’
After all, my sibling had said, with the air of someone doing a favor, that Melissa had told the Duchess she wasn’t her real older sister.
‘Honestly, how many people does her precious emotion end up hurting? Does she think she’s the only one in the world?’
Idel, who had been silently tearing Melissa apart with her eyes, quickly composed her expression when Melissa’s gaze returned to her.
Melissa’s eyes swept over her body, from one corner to another. She seemed to be checking whether the curse she had placed was functioning properly.
Once she had finished her quick inspection, she locked eyes with her steadily.
In the moment she caught that persistent gaze beneath the bewitching smile, a single voice struck hard in her head.
[Idel. Hold me tight and whine that you missed me.]
Ah, damn it.
The instant Melissa’s voice echoed through her mind, her stiffened body began to move on its own.
As though someone had seized control of her body.
“Hmph, Mother, I missed you so much…”
“Oh, Idel…”
Still clinging to Melissa’s waist, Idel nuzzled her face against her stomach.
‘So this is the “Brainwashing Curse” I’d only seen in words, or rather, in text.’
They say imagination and experience are worlds apart, and now I understand why the ‘Idel’ of the original work couldn’t move an inch and was so thoroughly manipulated by Melissa.
If she’d been subjected to this from the age of seven until adulthood, it’s no surprise she ended up like that.
My body was no different from a puppet being toyed with by someone else’s hands.
‘So if I don’t take her side and am kind to the Ducal Household’s people, she was going to put this kind of brainwashing on me?’
Idel’s pride was wounded by the thoroughly unpleasant sensation, and she frowned.
Fortunately, it seemed she couldn’t seize complete control of everything. The harder Idel resisted, the more her fingertips trembled faintly.
Idel, who had placed breaking the curse at the very top of her plan, bit down hard on her lip before lifting her head. Somehow, it seemed to taste of blood.
‘I’ll break these shackles no matter what. And as quickly as possible.’
I couldn’t keep feeling this rotten over and over again.
Idel swiftly composed herself and slowly pulled away.
Melissa’s expression, now meeting hers again, looked quite pleased. It seemed she was satisfied that everything was moving exactly as she wished.
She pulled up the corners of her lips into a silent smile and placed her hand on Idel’s shoulder. Then, in a deliberately stern voice, she scolded her.
“Idel, I know you missed me, but that’s a breach of etiquette. Come now.”
She turned Idel’s body around and nudged her toward the Duke and Duchess, then patted her shoulder lightly.
“You should greet the Duke and Duchess. In private, they are your father and aunt. Tell them you’re sorry.”
“Ah…”
“…I’m sorry…”
Lowena didn’t miss the faint tremor in that voice, and she cautiously looked Idel over.
The child, with red hair just like her sister’s, stood with her head bowed, trembling slightly.
Was that all? The small hands gripping her skirt tightly had gone pale.
She was a child who hadn’t been able to spare so much as a glance since their first meeting, given the shocking truth she had been told.
And inwardly, she had even blamed the child’s very existence.
‘But seeing her in person like this…’
The one she had blamed was merely a child, far too young for such a burden.
The moment she saw the child, who seemed tense in this unfamiliar situation, a faint sense of guilt stirred in the Duchess’s heart.
She had behaved shamefully as an adult.
‘Silvia, the Head Maid, said the child often looked down on the maids and acted as she pleased. She also said the child’s emotions swung wildly and that she was highly sensitive.’
Silvia wasn’t one to make things up, so there must have been some truth to it, but now that I see the child with my own eyes, I don’t think I can simply blame her outright.
Especially since I kept her alone all this time, separated from her sister, which is exactly why.
By the time Lowena was looking at Idel with bitterness and guilt pooling in her eyes, Idel was doing everything she could to keep from getting emotional.
The truth was, she wasn’t trembling from nerves. It was Melissa’s words, so outrageously makjang, that had her shaking.
‘Father and aunt, in a private sense? Can those two words even go together?’
Her opinion of her, which had already been at rock bottom, now sank straight through the floor.
‘Blinded by love. Is it normal to say you had some kind of thing with your brother-in-law in front of a child who knows nothing?’
And on top of that, a bald-faced lie.
Well, someone who knew shame and common sense wouldn’t have done something like this in the first place. This is exactly why people say the characters in makjang novels are hopeless.
Just as Idel was cursing Melissa with a heavy dose of prejudice, a gentle touch brushed against her cheek.
“Idel, would you mind lifting your head and letting me see your face?”
At the soft voice, Idel’s body stiffened.
She had forgotten for a moment while busy cursing Melissa, but the person before her was, in many ways, someone she had to keep her guard up around.
‘Get a grip. Melissa is right here too. I can’t let my guard down.’
Idel’s eyes cautiously settled on the duchess.
The duchess was smiling faintly, completely unaware of what lay ahead for her.
Beneath her pale brown hair, which fell softly, her gaunt face caught the eye.
‘…She’s probably pretending to be fine in front of the child, but she must have had a hard time.’
Well, of course. Her husband’s illegitimate child suddenly showing up, and it turns out she’s her own sister’s daughter. Honestly, I’d bet she wouldn’t be surprised if she went black-hearted right then and there.
Idel, feeling both human pity and tension as she looked at the duchess, pressed her lips tightly together.
‘Wouldn’t it be better to find a way to see each other less? A boarding school or something like that.’
That way, she could at least recall the painful memories a little less often. Besides, if she were holed up in a boarding school, she could avoid Melissa’s eyes, and Melissa couldn’t throw as many tantrums.
‘Of course, that’s a pretty unlikely idea.’
There was no way Melissa would just sit back and watch me drift away from the Ducal Household.
‘Is there no way out of this?’
Just then, Lowena bent her knees to meet the child’s eyes. Seeing Idel’s brow furrow in thought, she seemed to mistake it for wariness toward her.
“Lowena.”
Despite the duke’s brief attempt to stop her, saying she didn’t need to go this far, she didn’t budge.
When it came to forming a bond, it was the grown-up’s job to reach out first, not the child’s.
“Idel, we haven’t properly met yet, have we? I’m Lowena Clementine. Like your sister said, for now, I’m… well, your aunt.”
“…Hello, um, ma’am.”
Seeing the child roll her eyes but still refuse to say the word “aunt,” a bitter smile lingered on Lowena’s lips for a moment.
“…Yes, hello, Idel. The reason I called you here today is that I want to tell you we’re going to become a family from now on. From now on, you won’t be Idel Lopez, you’ll be Idel Clementine. Hmm, it means you’ll live as my and your father’s daughter, just like Jeiana.”
So that’s what this was about.
Resolving to keep her wits about her, Idel gulped as she was thinking.
Just as when she had first embraced Melissa, an unpleasant voice lodged itself in Idel’s head once again.
[Idel, the duchess is asking why she’s my mother. The duke is my father, but she isn’t my mother. She’s snapping at me, asking how a duchess who isn’t even a mother can become family.]
Idel’s hand, clenched tight into a fist, trembled.
‘So, now you’re telling me to throw my first impression straight into the trash myself?’
Ya…
Ya, you trash!

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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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