The Baby Has No Strength to Hide! - Chapter 11

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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 11
The voice was so faint it seemed to dissolve into darkness at any moment. Yet Kiki and Didi’s eyes snapped open in unison. Beast-eyes pierced the black night and found each other.
In the room where not a single ray of moonlight touched, the small, huddled form trembled with barely perceptible shudders.
“Squeak.”
Didi spoke carefully, pressing his entire body against Ailien’s cheek. Behind her, Kiki—transformed back into human form—held the child in a tight embrace.
“Squeak.”
“It’s all right. I can manage this.”
“Eek.”
“This mouse really won’t stop talking.”
Kiki said with a low laugh. Her whole body ached, but not unbearably so.
“Yes.”
Compared to watching the child cry in her sleep.
“I thought things had improved at the Cottage, but I suppose the strange surroundings turned out to be more stressful than I realized.”
“Eek.”
“Yes, let’s stay by her side and protect her.”
Kiki carefully drew Ailien closer, patting her back in silence while sharing warmth.
Ailien’s trembling gradually ceased, and her breathing grew calm.
Kiki’s smile lingered for a long time.
“There’s something to be said for having front paws.”
“Eek.”
“Yes, hands, hands.”
In Kiki’s arms, Ailien had drifted into peaceful sleep. Kiki tilted her head back to swallow the lump rising in her throat, her nose stinging.
On that first night Marlin left the Cottage, Ailien had tried to appear brave, but wept the whole time before sleep took her.
Everything in the forest Cottage—Kiki and Didi included—had been prepared solely for Ailien. So the child would not be lonely, not anxious, not uncomfortable.
Yet there was one thing.
‘I couldn’t comfort her while she cried in her sleep.’
All she could do was curl up beside the child and desperately hope that human warmth might transfer to her.
But not anymore. Now she had arms to hold her.
The strange sensation of walking upright on two feet remained unpleasant, yet there was something good about having a human body after all.
Kiki and Didi slipped back into sleep, hoping Ailien would dream of better things.
***
‘Marlin, where are you?’
The forest was pitch-black, hemmed in on all sides.
Ailien searched frantically for Marlin, heedless of thorny branches tearing her clothes and briars scraping her cheeks.
But all that returned was heavy silence.
She must have called that name again and again until breath caught in her throat.
Then, struck by a discordant chill like a cold wind, Ailien froze mid-stride.
‘But who was Marlin?’
As her mind grew hazed as though wrapped in fog, she passed by a gnarled tree.
Beyond the forest’s veil, a strange scene suddenly thrust its face into view.
In the center of an empty clearing where all surrounding noise had been completely silenced.
She locked eyes with a girl who stood weeping bitterly, cradling a woman growing cold in her arms.
‘It’s because of you!’
The moment the girl’s gaze tangled with Ailien’s, her face twisted into fury and hatred. Ailien wanted to step forward, but she could not move an inch from where she stood.
‘You coveted something that wasn’t yours!’
‘I…’
She wanted to deny it, to excuse herself—to say it wasn’t her fault—but her lips would not part.
‘You destroyed our entire family!’
The girl’s cry tore through the dark forest.
‘No, I…’
That is, I….
I only wanted to rewrite this story….
***
And then came morning.
The castle’s quiet was easily broken by the child’s light, eager footsteps.
“Good morning!”
“Yes, good morning.”
Calisto and Kaius were already present in the Count’s Household Dining Room. While Calisto smiled and responded warmly to Ailien’s cheerful greeting, Kaius pretended not to notice her.
Ailien paid him no mind either, settling into the seat Peril guided her toward.
“Did you have pleasant dreams?”
“A fight?”
At Calisto’s words, Ailien tilted her head, then her eyes widened.
“Did someone complain about Lili yesterday?”
“They complained about me?”
“More than one, I’d wager.”
She tried to reach back into the dream that had already grown distant, when a voice dripping with sarcasm came from beside her.
Ailien pouted her lips and, determined to feign ignorance, swept her gaze across the ceiling before letting out a gasp of wonder. The Chandelier hanging from that impossibly distant expanse seemed ready to rain starlight at any moment.
“Ailien?”
“Mm?”
She was so absorbed that even as Calisto called to her, she kept her eyes fixed on the Chandelier, answering automatically each time—it was almost exasperating.
He worried her slender neck might snap from craning it back like that.
“Ailien?”
“Mm-hmm?”
“When someone calls you, you should look at them, you know.”
At Calisto’s gentle rebuke, Ailien slowly lowered her head. Then, looking sheepish, she stuck out her tongue slightly and grinned.
“Sorry, Lili just doesn’t have very good focus.”
“Doesn’t have good focus?”
“Uh-huh, Lili’s an outstanding child!”
“Ha ha ha.”
As Ailien nodded, Calisto finally broke into laughter. Kaius, watching the exchange, found his face creased with confusion.
Were these two actually having a conversation right now?
What in the world did “outstanding” even mean in this context?
“Father, did you understand what she meant?”
“Not a chance.”
Unable to help himself, Kaius asked the question, and Calisto answered, still barely suppressing his amusement. Kaius’s eyes were swimming in bewilderment. By any reasonable standard, this situation made no sense whatsoever.
“It means ‘outstanding,’ sir.”
Just then, Kiki approached silently and spoke in her blunt voice.
“She’s praising herself.”
“Self-prai—!”
Ailien, parroting Kiki’s words, broke into delighted laughter. The starlight that fell now came not from the Chandelier but from the small mouth of the child.
“I see.”
“And who is this person?”
The woman with black hair and yellow eyes stood behind Ailien with such natural confidence that Kaius found himself questioning whether such a figure had been present when the ragged girl first arrived at the castle. Or had there been something—a black cat and a flying squirrel? Something terribly cute, at that.…
He stopped himself mid-thought and quickly shook his head. Yes, those creatures had been scruffy little animals, nothing more.
“Ah, allow me to introduce you. She’s Ailien’s Personal Maid.”
“Her Personal Maid?”
Kaius, who knew the hiring procedures of Rubentine Castle better than anyone, looked toward where Peril stood, but unfortunately, he too merely bowed his head.
“This makes no sense. Even this incomprehensible child, and now….”
Ailien, who had begun eagerly devouring the Hotcakes placed before her, lifted her head. Kaius’s brow furrowed naturally.
“I don’t understand her either, frankly, but to bring in someone whose identity you can’t even verify, just like that?”
He tried to speak as calmly as possible, but his heart was racing wildly. How long had it been since he’d talked back to his father like this?
Yet this couldn’t be left alone. He steadied himself and was about to speak again when—
“Lili made Kiki a person!”
“What?”
“Kai, Lili can make you a person too….”
The air at the breakfast table turned cold in an instant.
Ailien meant it sincerely enough. This thoughtless, babbling child—she needed proper sense knocked into her to act like a human being. It was almost pitiable.
Ailien, who had been glaring sharply at Kaius, finally surrendered to the sweet syrup aroma dusted across the Hotcake and lowered her head again.
“You shouldn’t bow your head while eating.”
Ailien, her mouth already open wide to bite into the Hotcake, simply pouted her lips instead. As she lifted her head from her plate, Kaius was there with an irritating expression, a Carrot already in his mouth.
There he was, munching on a Carrot someone else had prepared for him, yet he had the audacity to correct Lili?

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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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