The Unfilial Heir Who Tries to Kill Me Tempts Me - Chapter 2

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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 2.

“Not one step outside this room, you wretched creature! Not one!”

The Count’s furious command, delivered as he rushed in belatedly, sealed my fate. Dozens of knights stood guard outside my door.
Where had it all gone wrong?
“I’m losing my mind.”
Everything swam before my eyes.
I exhaled heavily and looked down at my hands. Shackles bound my pale, slender wrists.
A Mana Control Device—the kind the Count forced onto Charlotte whenever she displeased him. Each time I moved my wrist, searing pain shot through it as the device forcibly drained my mana.
“He uses me when it suits him, and the moment things go wrong, on come the shackles.”
Even if I was just an adopted daughter meant to be used like a tool, this was hardly fair. Wouldn’t a court call this a violation of basic rights?
“Despicable man.”
To be honest, Charlotte’s descent into a jealous villainess was eighty percent the Count and Countess’s doing.
If they’d simply treated her fairly alongside their true daughter Leoni, she would have become nothing more than a sharp-tongued, capable mage.
How rare was a genius fluent in both White Magic and Black Magic? There was only one such prodigy on the entire Continent, and they treated her like this?
I stopped trembling with indignation.
What good would anger do me now?
This was all my own karma.
“Damn it, my wrist hurts.”
The mana suppression already ached, and the shackles fit so tightly that my wrist throbbed with poor circulation.
“I can’t even escape like this….”
Leoni had been knocked unconscious from the shock, and the Count and Countess were seething with rage. Left to my own devices, I’d remain locked in this room until the Emperor noticed something amiss and had me interrogated, then face a drawn-out trial before my head rolled.
Even for the protagonist’s sake, I didn’t want that.
“I should turn myself in.”
The decision came quickly.
Once the Emperor launched a full investigation, execution was inevitable. But if I confessed voluntarily, I might receive leniency. With luck, I could even be sentenced to mere exile.
“All right. Let’s go.”
Clank.
“Oh, right. I can’t use magic with these on….”
I started to jump up, then hesitated awkwardly as I remembered the Control Device.
I’d meant to use Spatial Transference Magic, but there was no helping it now.
I slipped away from the door where the knights were posted and quietly opened the window. Fortunately, guards hadn’t been stationed below.
The problem was that we were on the second floor.
I wouldn’t die from the fall.
I should land safely enough in the shrubbery below.
“Here goes.”
I shut my eyes tight and hurled myself downward.

***

“Charlotte Schmit.”
A chilling voice fell from above my head.
I swallowed hard and bowed my head without thinking.
I felt the Emperor’s icy gaze sweep down my spine.
“Is what you’ve told me true?”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
“Hmph.”
The Emperor clearly didn’t believe me.
I understood.
If a reckless mage who’d been running amok just yesterday suddenly came kneeling before me claiming she’d seen the error of her ways, I’d doubt my own ears.
But this was my only option now.
“As you’ve surely guessed, I used Black Magic to brainwash the Crown Prince. I meant to steal my sister Leoni’s position and become Crown Princess.”
“Audacious creature. So it was your doing after all.”
In the original story, the Emperor had suspected Charlotte’s involvement but agonized over the matter for some time.
Black Magic, unlike White Magic, leaves no traces.
Especially the Magical Potion Charlotte had fed the Crown Prince—one she’d developed herself—employed techniques so intricate and delicate that gathering concrete evidence was essentially impossible.
Charlotte had mocked the Emperor and the Count’s family, saying with feigned innocence, “But the Crown Prince’s heart simply changed. What would you have me do?”
The Emperor, exasperated by the investigation and frayed by the ordeal, ultimately sentenced Charlotte to death without further deliberation—a sentence partly born of frustration.
I can’t make myself like that.
I bowed my head meekly.
“I have committed a crime worthy of death. I have no words in my defense. Moreover, I deeply regret the turmoil I have caused in the Capital, the torment I have inflicted upon the nobility through various magics, and the terror I have sown.”
“Ha, what poor acting. Surely you don’t imagine that such words could atone for the countless misdeeds you’ve committed.”
The Emperor’s voice grew heavy with menace.
“Why do you speak thus? Are you wielding that cunning tongue of yours to weave fresh deception?”
The tension was suffocating.
Charlotte truly terrified him—I could see it in how he remained suspicious even now.
And no wonder. In the original work, he had had Charlotte executed and burned her corpse to ash.
I paused briefly before answering.
“Because I want to live.”
“What?”
“Everyone wishes me dead. Without the Count’s family protecting me, my life would have ended long ago.”
The Villainess Charlotte.
Charlotte, who deserved to die.
That was what people called her. When she was executed on the scaffold and her corpse burned, every soul erupted in unified cheers.
Not a single person grieved her death.
Not one.
“I grew so weary of living that way.”
The primary reason, of course, was Leoni and Fabian’s love story—but it was also true that throughout the writing process, I had grown tired of repeating Charlotte’s wretched death, which had been the thorn in my side all along.
So banish me quickly.
You can all find your happiness.
And I will find my own path.
“How audacious—you rush before the Emperor to confess your crimes, and now you beg for your life as if it were the most amusing jest.”
“It is not merely for my life that I come. If I die before the Crown Prince’s Brainwashing is lifted, I cannot predict what side effects may occur. This magic is designed to weaken gradually as distance grows between the Crown Prince and myself. So if you would allow me to—”
That was when it happened.
“Let go! I must go to Charlotte!”
A commotion erupted beyond the door, and Fabian appeared, trailing knights in his wake. The moment he saw me kneeling before the Emperor, his expression twisted violently.
“Charlotte…!”
Good heavens.
What is he doing here?
“Why are you here? It’s all slander. Whatever others may believe, I know the truth. This feeling is not false—I love you!”
“Your Highness, you mustn’t speak so. Your mind and spirit are not yet sound!”
“Silence!”
I squeezed my eyes shut at Fabian’s outburst.
What do I do? Truly.
Charlotte, why are you so strong?
Can the Brainwashing possibly run this deep?
“I told you—the only person I truly love is you. So why do you torment me like this? What does a mere Political Marriage matter…!”
He was saying things that would make everything worse.
I hurriedly gauged the Emperor’s reaction. The anger that had softened even slightly began to rise again.
No, no, no!
I’d been persuading him so well. If this continues, I’ll lose everything!
“Crown Prince, what madness is this….”
“No, Your Majesty!”
“Charlotte?”
“Yes, I did the Brainwashing. You acted strangely after drinking tea with me, didn’t you? I put the Magical Potion in it. Who else would it be? I’m skilled at Brainwashing magic. When you wake up, you’ll regret everything you’re doing now, won’t you?”
So please, disappear.
“That’s a lie!”
“If the Brainwashing truly breaks, what will you do then….”
“Then answer me this: why did you confess? If your Brainwashing were real, you could simply keep me!”
So he has no intention of leaving quietly.
I really hadn’t wanted to say this.
But there’s no choice.
“…Why did I confess?”
“Yes! Why exactly…!”
“Because Your Highness is like my child.”
Fabian fell silent.
The knights who had been restraining him, and the Emperor gripping the armrests of his throne—all of them froze, staring at me in stunned silence.
“…I beg your pardon?”
“You’re like a son to me, you know.”
I’m the writer, and you’re the male lead.
“Your Highness can fall in love with your own son?”
I can’t.
I won’t defy the natural order of things.

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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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