The Baby Sprout Who Bloomed in the Villain Duke’s Family - Chapter 4

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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 4
Hair dark as a blade’s edge.
Golden eyes that flashed with lethal brilliance, sharp as lightning.
Kalid Claudian—head of the house known as the villainous Claudian, the Northern Region’s executioner.
‘Why is he here already?’
He stood at the far end of the Demper House corridor like a monument to violence.
“Your Grace……!”
Behind him, the Count’s servants bowed their heads in confusion, unsure what to do with themselves.
They must have tried to stop him from coming up this far, only to fail.
Count Demper stared at Kalid in shock.
“I’ve come to see my daughter.”
Clover’s father, who had vanished four years ago, had returned.
Kalid Claudian asked slowly, his voice sharp as a blade.
“Where is my daughter?”
Cold sweat drenched the back of Count Demper’s neck.
How could he possibly explain?
His daughter was currently locked in a cramped room, caught red-handed writing a “denunciation letter,” and was having every last one of her diaries confiscated.
Count Demper’s gaze, without his realizing it, drifted toward the direction of Clover’s Room.
Gulp.
The sound of her swallowing echoed sharply through the quiet corridor.
‘This won’t do.’
Count Demper stepped forward, desperate to defuse the situation.
“Your Grace, why didn’t you wait in the parlor instead of coming all this way…….”
“Should I wait for you?”
Kalid’s voice came out like a low, predatory growl.
That oppressive tone made Count Demper’s body stiffen.
“Tsk.”
Kalid clicked his tongue and extended his hand.
“I’ll find her myself.”
With those words, a handful of wind coalesced at his fingertips.
Storm Power.
Usable only by the direct bloodline of Claudian.
‘What are you doing?’
This was the Demper House.
To use Power within these walls was to declare challenge against Count Demper himself.
Yet Kalid Claudian wielded that Power without the slightest regard for such protocol.
‘No—if he sees—!’
But before Count Demper could stop him,
Whoosh.
The wind gathered at Kalid’s fingertips rushed in an instant into Clover’s Room, as if drawn back to its master.
The current flowed with natural, inevitable grace.
Watching this, Kalid spoke in a flat voice.
“Found her.”
And the door to Clover’s Room, which had been shut, burst wide open.
“Huh……?”
Beyond the threshold appeared a small child with pale green hair.
The reason Kalid had rushed all the way to Demper in a single day.
Clover Claudian.
***
The reason the Duke of Claudian had left his child in the care of the Demper House was simple.
‘Dear, please leave Clover in Demper’s hands…….’
Because his beloved wife had asked him to.
The Duchess of Claudian, Elissia Demper.
She was the last Spirit left in this land.
A Spirit of the Tree, now barely clinging to what little power remained.
And Clover, inheriting her mother’s nature, had been born with the faintest glimmer of the Tree Power.
Kalid’s Power, by contrast, rivaled or exceeded the Authority held by the Imperial House itself.
A vast force that called forth storms and tempests.
Kalid was the master of that immense Power—one who crushed all other wielders of the same Authority beneath his heel through sheer force.
And Clover was.
‘Ugh, uuuaahhh!’
She was absurdly, impossibly weak for one who wielded Power.
Clover’s strength was the power of a seedling.
A seedling cannot endure before a raging tempest.
This was why Clover, from the moment of her birth, faced death.
Because of the Power her father and siblings possessed.
And because of her sister’s good intentions in trying to save her.
It would have been better had she never wielded Power at all.
Then she would have no fear of being crushed beneath the weight of the Claudian name.
In this desperate hour, Clover might well have perished.
‘In Demper… in the courtyard of Demper House, I buried a World Tree Branch long ago…….’
Elissia spoke through the haze of her fading consciousness.
‘If she grows there, she’ll be safe. If she’s protected in that place…….’
The World Tree Branch.
It had sheltered Elissia until now, and it would shelter Clover as well.
For the child’s Power resembled her mother’s.
Kalid Claudian could not bring himself to set his newborn daughter down.
Yet he had no choice.
Only two paths lay before him.
To watch his daughter waste away in agony beneath his own Power, and die.
Or to send her to Demper, sheltered by the World Tree Branch, until she could grow in safety.
Only a madman would choose the first.
‘I’ll do as you say, Elissia.’
And so Kalid Claudian reluctantly sent Clover to her mother’s house.
He hoped that Clover, having inherited Power akin to her mother’s, would grow safely, protected within Elissia’s strength that remained there.
Yet at the same time, fearing the greedy Demper House would use Clover as a political instrument, he never fully explained why he was sending the child away.
The Claudian were called villains in common parlance and had many enemies; the Emperor stood behind them, but few knew that much.
So instead, to make clear that the Claudian were watching over the child, he sent vast sums in monthly allowances—far more than adequate.
But.
“I had no idea they were stupid enough not to understand the message…….”
Kalid spoke slowly, his gaze sweeping over his absurdly small daughter.
“W-who are you?”
His daughter, Clover.
When he finally saw her properly, she was small.
Had she not been fed enough?
Or was she simply born small?
Clover’s siblings were all tall and well-built, so the former seemed more likely.
Dirt-smudged cheeks.
Eyes red-rimmed and damp—she must have been crying until moments ago.
The sight of the child was far more wretched than what Kalid had steeled himself for when he sent her away.
‘Thank you for helping me.’
The image of the child he had witnessed through his Summon rose before Kalid’s eyes.
Ordinarily, he should not have spied into another House’s domain, especially Demper’s.
Yet Kalid broke that rule and secretly watched the inside of Demper House through his Summon.
Because today was the birthday of his daughter, Clover.
The day Clover turned four.
Though he could not be there himself, Kalid wanted at least to see the moment his child celebrated her birthday.
But.
‘You’re forbidden from going out!’
His precious daughter had not celebrated her birthday happily in Demper House.
‘Heeey…….’
Instead, she was being dragged away by her aunt’s hand.
The moment Kalid saw this, he raced to Demper House.
Having witnessed how his child was being treated, he could not remain idle.
Kalid slowly took in the sight of Clover’s room.
Handmaids stood frozen, parchment clutched in their hands—they had been pulling stacks of worn parchment from beneath the bed.
It seemed to be other pages of the “Diary” that his Summon had carried down from a tree branch.
“Give it to me.”
“Y-Your Grace!”
“I said give it over.”
At Kalid’s threatening voice, the maid trembled and handed over ‘that’ to him.
Kalid snatched the Diary from the maid’s hands as if fishing it away.
And he read through the uneven handwriting.
I want Papa to see.
Aunt said something to me again.
She scolded me for eating too much food. But I didn’t eat a lot…….
Though it was somewhat difficult to make out, Kalid could still read it.
After reading a few lines, Kalid knelt down and sat in front of the small child.
Had she been rubbing at her eyes just moments before?
The child with reddened eyes looked at Kalid with a bewildered expression.
Kalid gazed at her sorrowfully and spoke.
“Clover. Papa’s here.”
Clover echoed his words.
“……Papa?”
He replied calmly.
“Yes.”
Kalid carefully lifted his daughter into his arms.
And he whispered in a low voice.
“Sorry I’m late. Let’s go home now.”
Crash! Boom!
Beyond the small window at Kalid’s back, a massive bolt of lightning descended.
A ferocious, ominous, and tremendous bolt of lightning that seemed to speak his very mood.
The faces of those in Count Demper’s household drained pale with terror.
***
Papa? Are you really Clover’s papa?
Clover, nestled in Kalid’s arms, rubbed at her eyes.
Then Clover’s Summon, Lucky, shimmered as it spoke.
[That’s right! This fellow really is your papa! Your wavelengths are identical!]
‘Really?’
[I’m telling you!]
Clover stopped crying and lifted her head to look at the man’s face.
He was tall, and his face was handsome.
His hands were large enough to lift Clover with a single palm, and his eyes gleamed like precious ornaments.
And he held Clover warmly in his embrace.
In that moment.
Clover recalled something Lucky had always told her.
[It’s alright, Clover. When you grow up a little, your very handsome and wonderful papa will come to take you away!]
“A handsome and wonderful person…….”
Clover, quietly dwelling on Lucky’s words, opened her mouth softly.
This man was handsome and wonderful.
And he had said he was Clover’s ‘papa’.
So that meant…….
[That’s right! Little one! This really is the papa you’ve been waiting for your whole four years!]
Upon hearing Lucky’s words, Clover’s large eyes brimmed with tears.
As Clover gripped Kalid’s chest tight and blinked, large tears spilled forth in streams.
Kalid, taken aback by this, pressed his lips to Clover’s forehead.
“Clover.”
“A-are you really really Papa?”
“Yes, I’m truly your papa.”
Hearing Kalid’s words, Clover wept bitterly, tears flowing down her cheeks.
Why…….
“Why did you come now……? Sob…….”

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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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