Sister-in-law of the Heroine in a Childcare Novel - Chapter 24

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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 24

True, the contract with the Castrain family does nag at me a little, but then again.
The Gloria’s Banner has already fallen into their hands anyway.
Once I’m gone and Elaine is gone, the shameless princes will surely try to lay hands on Bibi, but the Castrain Ducal House will handle that themselves.
“I’m fine. And soon Raymond will be too.”
There. If I die, there’s no need to force an annulment. If only I’d known things would come to this, I wouldn’t have wasted time worrying about the future.
I blinked my fading eyes and smiled. My vision blurred.
So sleepy. I’m not even sure if the words are coming out right. If I close my eyes, it feels like everything will just end.
A thought struck me suddenly.
Is there any reason to keep my eyes open here? There isn’t, is there?
Elaine will finally be truly free. Raymond and the Castrain family, bound as they were to an unwanted bride, will find peace.
Adrian might regret it a little—though our alliance was so shallow to begin with, I doubt he’ll grieve deeply.
I see.
A kind of resignation, like rest itself, spread like mist through my chest. My heart felt frozen.
Perhaps it would have been better for everyone if Titania had never been born.
I was not ignorant of this.
From the moment I regained my memories in this world, from the instant I first lifted my eyelids, I knew.
That Princess Titania was a being who could never be welcomed anywhere.
The memories of those I loved and was loved by were only fragments of a past life.
“…That’s not true.”
I snapped to attention at an unfamiliar sensation.
Bibi’s grip on my hand was fierce, as if she would never let go.
Her blue eyes blazed with determination as they met mine.
“I’m not okay! I can’t repay my life’s debt to you—I can’t just let you go like this!”
…….
“I’m a daughter of the Castrain Ducal House. We never forget kindness or revenge—we always repay our debts.”
Her eyes glistened as though she might weep at any second, yet somehow she did not.
“How can someone just accept dying? How can that ever be right?”
Dear Bibi.
Bibi, who never gave up.
Of course. That’s why she’s the protagonist. I found myself laughing. Yes, I don’t regret saving her.
“…Thank you. Thank you.”
Now I was truly, unbearably sleepy.
It didn’t matter anymore what happened next.
“Stay with me, Titania! Don’t close your eyes!”
The world went dark.
Was it my imagination, or did I glimpse Raymond in the distance, his face etched with desperation, rushing toward us…?

* * *

There is one trait shared by all the members of the Castrain Ducal House: they have excellent instincts.
After all but coercing the Emperor with a threat that wasn’t quite a threat, Raymond had scoured the Imperial Palace by every means at his disposal.
Once he confirmed that a young girl matching Bibi’s description had been spotted near the labyrinth, he rushed toward her without hesitation.
He shattered the central passage that led downward.
He dispatched a Magic Beast that came snarling at him, its fangs bared, in a single strike. Raymond’s face had grown sunken without his knowledge as he charged forward.
The stench of blood hit him like a punch.
His heart pounded with terrifying urgency. The moment he saw what lay before him, his stomach dropped.
“Brother!”
Bibi, whimpering. And Titania, unconscious in her arms, clinging as if she would never let go.
Raymond felt the world drain from his mind.
Though Bibi was covered in blood, she was remarkably unharmed. Only Titania was a mess.
Deep wounds carved into her flesh still wept blood freely—she had bled far too much.
His hands trembling against his will, he lifted Titania into his arms.
Her face, always pale when he saw her, was deathly white today—like a corpse.
She weighed almost nothing. The pool of blood beneath her was evidence enough that her life hung by a thread.
“…Princess Titania?”
Raymond felt his throat tighten without warning.
It was strange. Over the years, he had witnessed many sides of Titania. When they were younger, he had felt something like pity. But as they grew, that feeling had quietly extinguished itself each time they met.
She had shown him a sudden change, making him wonder if she had been deceiving everyone all along.
“Please save her, big brother! We need the High Priest! She’s lost so much blood, and right now….”
None of that mattered now.
He couldn’t understand why this person was dying in his arms.
Was she worried about Bibi?
Or about Titania herself?
Was it simply the shock of witnessing something he’d never imagined?
He didn’t know. He couldn’t know. He had seen countless people dying in such agony before…
Without thinking, Raymond brought his trembling fingers to Titania’s nose.
Nothing. He felt nothing. The person in his arms felt like a corpse, and that terrified him.
Had she died?
Just like that? So easily?
“…Titania?”
Ironically, this was the first moment Raymond called Princess Titania by her name alone.
And then it happened.
Titania’s eyelids, which had seemed lifeless, opened once, then fell shut again.
A fresh green light bloomed—like the first shoots of spring after a thousand winters, like sunlight filtering to the deepest bottom of a lake.
A heartbeat he thought had stopped began to pound again. Raymond’s breath caught.
Was it a miracle?
Or a final spasm of a body spending its last strength? It didn’t matter which.
“…You’re… okay….”
Her voice was as faint as a dying bird’s song.
“…Bibi… first…. Save….”
“…Don’t strain yourself. You must stay conscious.”
Raymond clenched his teeth as he spoke. Rage flared in him at how light she was in his arms.
There had been a time when this girl would throw a tantrum if the world’s most precious things were laid beneath her feet, ungratified.
So why, now that her body was barely clinging to life, was she worrying about someone she’d only just met?
Without sufficient blood, the mind cannot think properly. In a critical patient whose breath hangs by a thread, even less so.
The last time he had seen Princess Titania…
Right. It seemed unlikely she would show such an expression.
Even incomprehensible as she was, she had seemed possessed of a noble’s dignity, someone who would preserve their own honor.
So why were her final words, spoken with all her remaining strength, the name of another? Until the very end?
Not Raymond’s name, which she had always claimed to love. Not her parents. As if none of it mattered….
An inexplicable desolation filled Raymond’s chest. He clutched Titania to himself and ran toward the High Priest without looking back.
It was a sensation he was experiencing for the first time in his life.

* * *

[The Covenant of Rod is activated.]
…Twilight has not yet ripened,
and the veil of light remains too thick
to be drawn back now.
I am the dawn eagle
who endures the night dreaming of spring,
I am the boundary between
the dying and the living.
Open your eyes, O living one,
for your ending is night beyond the veil,
O one who chooses,
you are the wick of dawn’s candle.
[The death of the contractor ‘Titania’ is erased.]

And as ‘Titania’ drifted in the sea of death, she dreamed a dream that was past, present, and future all at once.

* * *

It was inside a tower.
Desolate, as if it had truly been empty for centuries.
There was no warmth of living things here.
At most, only one being drew breath in this place.
Even that was not in any normal state.
Titania stood as a beggar left in the slums might—worse even than that—staring silently into empty air.
A pale form spoke to her from the void. Its voice was plain rather than seductive.
—I shall grant your wish.
…….
—Shall I turn back time? Make that man named Raymond love you? Shall you become Emperor of the Empire? Do you wish to see all those who looked down upon you kneel at your feet?
“…What happens if I don’t make a contract?”
Titania fell silent after hearing the answer.
“I…”
Titania deliberated.
Titania envied Bibi.
She truly envied her—envied her for being loved by Raymond.
But now…
“I want to meet a real family. I want to feel the love of true parents. And I…”
She wanted to truly live.
To live properly—not swayed by anyone, making my own judgments and my own path.
At least in the right direction.
Like Bibi.
“…I want to live again.”
That was Titania’s true wish, buried deep in her heart.

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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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