The Baby Sprout Who Bloomed in the Villain Duke’s Family - Chapter 2

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

Episode 2
Bang.
Just then, someone opened Clover’s door without permission and walked in.
Clover quickly scrambled up onto the bed and pulled the blanket over herself.
Then she whipped her head around to look at whoever had opened the door.
“What are you doing?”
It was her wretched cousin Louis who had burst in.
He was Count Demper’s only son, and he took great pleasure in tormenting Clover.
And besides Louis, no one else went around flinging open Clover’s door like that.
‘Ugh…….’
Clover let out a small sigh and yanked the blanket up over her head.
“I’m sleeping.”
“Sleeping? I heard you rustling around just a moment ago!”
……His ears were awfully sharp.
Clover felt caught, but clutched the blanket tighter to hide it.
Thump.
She sensed Louis stepping toward the bed where she lay.
His footsteps grew steadily louder.
“Hey.”
That voice she hated to hear.
Flinch.
As Louis drew closer, Clover squirmed beneath the blanket, trying to put distance between them.
Clover despised Louis.
He tormented her every single day.
He’d obviously come to bother her today as well, and she had no intention of engaging with him.
But then.
“Hm, what’s this?”
She heard Louis rustling around after discovering something.
The moment his attention shifted away from her to something else, Clover released a sigh of relief, but—
Rustle.
‘Rustle?’
Clover’s eyes snapped open as she realized there was only one thing in this room that would make that sound.
“Louis!”
Clover cried out and spun around to look at him.
Sure enough, Louis was pulling something out from under the bed—her Diary.
“What’s this grimy paper? What did you write in here?”
“No! Give it back!”
Clover reached out toward Louis, desperate to snatch the Diary back.
She couldn’t lose that.
She needed it to get Louis and her aunt punished!
Wretched Louis!
“‘This idiot,’ is what you wrote? I can barely make out your handwriting.”
The one fortunate thing was that Louis couldn’t read Clover’s sloppy script properly.
“Tch, write so people can actually read it next time.”
Louis scoffed at Clover’s crudely scrawled Diary, unable to decipher it.
That was a stroke of luck.
But with the Diary now in Louis’s hands, she couldn’t afford to relax.
“Give it back! It’s mine!”
“Why should I?”
“You’re such a bully! Why are you taking it?”
“Why can’t I take it?”
He laughed, a nasty smirk on his face.
“Everything in this Residence belongs to me anyway.”
…….
“The clothes you’re wearing, this paper—it all belongs to me. Mother said everything inside this Residence will be mine when I inherit the family.”
‘Louis, you’re absolutely insufferable…….’
Clover glared at the pompous Louis, though he failed to notice her icy gaze as he drifted toward the window.
When Clover caught sight of Louis’s intentions, her eyes widened in alarm.
“Louis!”
“Which is why I can take it.”
Louis threw Clover’s Diary out the small window with a spiteful grin.
Flutter.
Countless pages of parchment scattered to the wind, billowing out through the windowpane.
“This works too.”
“……!”
Clover’s Diary.
The precious pages she’d carefully collected scattered in all directions like autumn leaves caught in a gust.
Clover, robbed of half the diary she’d worked so hard to fill, collapsed to the floor.
“No, don’t…….”
This wasn’t just any diary—it was irreplaceable.
And if it was found, the consequences would be equally dire.
Clover had written in it everything about how Count Demper had been skimming her living expenses.
Lucky had been the one to tell her, of course.
After Lucky had explained that embezzling living expenses was just as wicked as stealing cupcakes meant for snacks, Clover had immediately written that down too.
But what if Count Demper read it?
Clover’s face went pale.
No one likes finding pages written about themselves in vicious terms.
And no one likes the person who writes such things.
Given Count Demper’s cruel and sordid nature, she would absolutely fly into a terrible rage if she discovered Clover’s Diary.
[That vile brat!]
Lucky fumed, thrashing about in fury.
But Clover had no time to be angry with Louis.
‘I have to collect them all, and fast!’
Every page had to be gathered before the wicked aunt saw them and lost her mind!
Clover burst from her room, leaving Louis behind, and bolted through the door.
Patter-patter-patter!
She raced down the Spiral Staircase and reached the Garden in moments.
This was the Garden visible from her room’s window.
So the Diary pages Louis had thrown had to be scattered somewhere here.
“Hurry, hurry, search……”
If aunt sees me, I’m finished!
Hunched over, Clover combed through the Garden, finding the Diary pages one by one.
‘There’s one!’
‘And here too!’
It was like a treasure hunt.
Except there was no reward for finding them…….
‘Not getting punished.’
That was reward enough.
One page.
Then another.
Even the Gardener, passing by, handed her one.
“Were you looking for this?”
“Yes, thank you…….”
Clover clutched the parchment and nodded in gratitude.
She’d gathered the pages faster than expected.
Was that all of them?
Since she hadn’t counted as she wrote, she couldn’t tell if she’d found them all or missed some.
That was when Clover, still searching the Garden for her Diary, spotted something.
“Oh!”
One page hung caught in the branches of a tree!
What now?
‘Clover, you can’t climb.’
This tree was tall and massive—even Louis struggled to climb it.
There was no chance Clover, much smaller and shorter than Louis, could reach it.
Clover stamped her feet beneath the tree, frustrated.
“Clover! Where in blazes are you now?”
From somewhere came the furious voice of her aunt.
[Oh no, the villain’s here!]
Lucky cried out.
‘Eek!’
Startled, Clover pressed herself flat against the base of the tree.
Somehow, she had to climb up and get it!
Otherwise, she’d surely face another terrible scolding from that fearsome aunt.
Then.
Whoosh.
“……Huh? A cat?”
A blue cat appeared from nowhere.
It was a large cat with long, fluffy fur, and it was looking straight at Clover.
[Hmm?]
The cat watched Clover struggling for a moment, then leaped effortlessly up into the tree.
And it brought down the parchment she’d been searching for, carrying it gently in its mouth.
“You’re giving it to me……?”
The cat looked at Clover for a long, steady moment, as if affirming her question.
Clover hastily threw her arms around the cat’s neck.
“Thank you!”
Lucky, who had been watching quietly, murmured to himself.
[This really looks like a Summoned Creature…….]
But before Lucky could finish his thought.
“Clover!”
Gasp.
That sharp voice again—Count Demper’s and Louis’s.
Clover hastily released the cat and spoke urgently.
“I—I have to go now.”
“…….”
“Thank you for helping me.”
She rolled up the parchment tightly, concealing its contents.
“Clover…… So you were here!”
“Oh! Aunt!”
The moment Clover finished rolling up the parchment, Count Demper appeared as if on cue.
“You little thing! Didn’t I tell you not to go outside!”
She lifted Clover up with ease.
Clover dangled limply from Count Demper’s grip.
“You’re confined indoors!”
“But I didn’t want to go out…….”
“Don’t talk back to me!”
“Yes…….”
She strode away, fuming, with Clover in her arms.
Held fast in Count Demper’s grasp, Clover kept her gaze fixed on the spot where the ‘cat’ had been moments before.
But that helpful cat had already vanished without a trace.
Had it been a guardian angel sent to her aid?
‘Thank you, cat.’
Silently thanking the cat, Clover hugged the rolled-up bundle of parchment tightly to her chest once more.
***
August 2nd. Clear skies.
Aunt was angry again.
She said not to tell Father.
That was what was written on the parchment the Summoned Creature had brought down from the tree.
There was no need to verify the truth of the contents.
Clover, the diary’s owner, was running about with her face drained of all color, gathering the scattered pages.
So it must be something that really happened.
The tear stains scattered across the parchment proved it.
Looking at the little child gathering the pages and the tear marks lingering in the corners of the parchment, Duke Claudian spoke.
“……I must go to the Demper household.”
His voice was bleak and cold, befitting the reputation of the Northern Region’s infamous killer.

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————