The Oracle of the Villainous Baby - Chapter 35

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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 35
At the sound of that adorable cry—so incongruous with the situation—both men’s heads snapped toward the source simultaneously.
“What is that? A Divine Beast?”
“It appears to be the child’s Divine Beast.”
“That fluffy thing?”
“Yes.”
Kiriel answered tersely.
“So it’s not a Black Flame Dragon. That’s quite the disappointment.”
At Ludbreed’s remark, Kiriel turned to him with an incredulous expression.
“Chirp—eek!”
The Red Sparrow pushed off from Kiriel’s shoulder with its tiny legs and took flight, fluttering its small wings frantically.
Thud.
Tumble.
Then it plummeted straight down, landing with a soft thump directly on Bunny’s belly, its wings beating pitifully.
“….”
“….”
“…Chirp.”
The Red Sparrow rolled once and then stood up abruptly, as if nothing had happened.
A heavy silence descended upon the moment.
The Red Sparrow suddenly settled onto Bunny’s chest with a soft plop.
“It hatched from that enormous egg? This is supposed to be it?”
“Yes. My son brought it and asked me to give it to Bunny. By the way, he certainly kept his mouth shut well. The child was so absorbed in her lessons that she came running like that.”
Kiriel’s flat expression and monotone, languid voice carried a faint undertone of reproach.
Ludbreed noticed it and paused for a moment, his eyes widening.
“…Are you blaming me?”
“Then who else should I blame for failing to keep quiet?”
“Last time and this time too…. How unusual for you to be angry.”
“….”
At Ludbreed’s words, Kiriel’s eyes narrowed.
In Ludbreed’s memory, his youngest son had lived as though dead, despite still drawing breath.
After his eldest son’s death, the boy had seemed to lose all will, turning his back on the world, merely breathing and barely managing the tasks assigned to him.
Kiriel had always been poor at expressing emotions.
As if something within him were broken, he rarely spoke of likes or dislikes, and he was largely indifferent to others’ suffering.
He could not empathize, and he would say things that wounded others without the slightest hesitation.
Yet despite all this, his combat instincts were innate, and his intellect was a natural gift.
But from the moment of his birth, he had felt like a machine manufactured in some factory—inhuman, in other words.
There was one suspected reason.
Black hair.
Crimson eyes.
Those were the colors of the Demon Clan.
In other words, possessing that color was tantamount to evidence of a Demon Clan curse.
Generally, those cursed by the Demon Clan developed crimson eyes.
However, Kiriel was peculiar in that his mother had carried him in her womb when she received the curse early on, causing him to be born with jet-black hair as well.
She endured until the child’s birth, but died not long after he was born.
Thus, Kiriel Yudia, born barely at death’s threshold, possessed red eyes and the jet-black hair that marked him as evidence of the Demon Clan.
He had inherited neither the blue eyes nor the silver hair that any direct descendant of the Udiah Duchy possessed.
So in his childhood, everyone who encountered Kiriel called him disagreeable, unsettling, and repugnant.
Fortunately, his brothers Klein and Salame seemed to think that was simply his original temperament and treated him as though he barely existed, letting it pass.
Yet despite this, there was one person who grasped Kiriel and taught him that pain was pain, wrong was wrong, and sorrow was sorrow.
It was Dios Yudia.
The fact that I now interact with people to some degree and conduct myself as human is entirely thanks to Dios’s efforts.
It was an effort even Ludbreed Yudia had not made.
He approached me ceaselessly and transformed me into something human.
It was only after Dios Yudia, my eldest brother, went missing while fighting the Demon Clan that I, who had no interest whatsoever in war or combat, participated in the Holy-Demon War.
My sole purpose was to find Dios.
When I joined the war, the tide of the Holy-Demon War shifted.
And I severed the Demon King’s head. I was the only one who faced the Demon King’s true form and conversed with her.
“You… do you really intend to play house? I don’t think you…”
“I don’t think I’ll be able to raise a child.”
Before Ludbreed could finish speaking, Kiriel replied in a flat voice.
At that, Ludbreed faltered.
“Why? Because I’m an ill-fated creature born after killing my mother? Or because I was cursed by the Demon Clan and became a monster who knows nothing of emotion?”
“Hah… That’s not it. It’s because you can’t even take care of yourself properly…!”
“But you resent my mother’s death, don’t you? If it weren’t for me, she might have received treatment.”
“Kiriel! You really…”
Kiriel regarded Ludbreed with emotionless eyes.
Ludbreed faltered.
Those eyes. The eyes I had grown tired of seeing since childhood.
Eyes indifferent to others, uninterested in myself, desiring nothing—eyes inhuman.
“You resent it, don’t you? And you fear me in subtle ways. That I might run amok and become a monster like the Demon Clan at any moment.”
“What are you saying from the start? I have never once…!”
Kiriel Yudia met Ludbreed’s gaze directly. At that, Ludbreed faltered and widened his eyes.
Kiriel’s eyes bore reproach toward him.
“Let’s end this conversation here. For now, the issue is Bunny.”
The moment Kiriel spoke, Ludbreed lowered his gaze.
Pop!
As I lowered my gaze at the peculiar sound, a single red feather, undulating like a flame, descended onto Bunny’s chest.
It was far larger than a Red Sparrow’s feather.
When I turned my head, the Red Sparrow had apparently tumbled away, now nestled beside Bunny’s face with its small wings wrapped around itself, its face buried deep within.
“A feather?”
A soft rustling sound.
The feather shimmered once before dissolving like mist, seeping slowly into Bunny’s chest.
“…Wait, this is—!”
Kiriel, rarely showing alarm, hastily reached out, but the feather had already completely absorbed into Bunny’s body.
At that same moment, my rough breathing began to gradually calm. The savage, churning demonic energy that had emanated from me was also slowly fading away.
The three others in the room seemed to sense it, their eyes widening.
“…The demonic energy…”
As Ludbreed murmured softly, Kiriel grasped my hand and urgently channeled his holy power back into me.
“Is the Young Lady alright, Marquis?”
Lebon, approaching closer, asked.
“…It’s gone.”
“Gone? What do you mean—”
“The demonic energy is gradually dispersing.”
I didn’t know what the feather that had just seeped in was, but it was clear that it was having some effect.
‘A red feather?’
Kiriel’s eyes widened slightly as he looked at the Red Sparrow beside Bunny, its wings curled into a nest, sleeping peacefully just like me.
The red feather that had suddenly appeared.
And the Red Sparrow that had happened to fall to Bunny.
Though the feather seemed two or three times larger than the sparrow, the probability that it was the feather of that bird, or a feather that bird had brought, was high.
‘It’s not always true that a Divine Beast’s size corresponds to its power.’
Though this was the first time I’d ever seen such a small Divine Beast.
Kiriel watched as my breathing stabilized and my fever gradually subsided, then cradled me in his arms.
“Since the child seems to be doing better now, I’ll take her with me. What did the Emperor say?”
“He said once Bunny’s matter is settled, we should meet again.”
“I warn you in advance—do not force anything upon the child.”
Kiriel answered calmly with an expressionless face, then slowly turned his body.
Lebon also bowed respectfully and followed behind Kiriel.
“Raising a child is not easy. I speak out of concern, so give it careful thought.”
Without responding to Ludbreed’s words, Kiriel left the Holy Temple.
“Lebon.”
“Yes.”
“We need to move to a different room.”
“I beg your pardon???”
Lebon raised his voice in question, his face showing no inflection, as if asking what he meant.
“We’ll need to use the Byeol Residence, so prepare it.”
“The Byeol Residence, you say…”
“The mansion my mother left me. Open it.”
At Kiriel’s words, Lebon’s eyes widened in surprise before slowly returning to normal.
He glanced briefly at Bunny cradled in Kiriel’s arms, then slowly bowed.
“I shall prepare it at once.”
A faint smile flickered across Lebon’s lips before vanishing just as quickly.

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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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