The Villainous Princess Wants to Live in a Gingerbread House - Chapter 32

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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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The Villainous Princess Wants to Live in a Candy House
Episode 32

“Is this the place?”
“Yes, thank you for bringing me… I’m grateful.”
After thanking him, Asha meant to explain about the sandwich wrapping, but Carno gave a curt nod and turned to leave before she could even hand over the basket. Caught off guard, Asha seized his sleeve in sudden desperation.
“Wait, please…!”
Before she could say another word, Carno turned and shoved her hard.
“Oof!”
But even Carno hadn’t expected her to tumble to the floor so easily—his face showed genuine shock. Asha lay prone on the corridor floor, staring up with a bewildered expression.
“…….”
“…….”
‘I’ve had the same thing done to me by Alexei before…’
Ah, what a life of endless shoving.
The sandwich she’d brought lay scattered across the corridor floor.
Asha raised her head, her eyes stinging, but she fell silent. Since meeting Carno, his aura—which had always been dark and rigid—now rippled like the surface of water caught in a gale. His complexion had turned noticeably pale. He must have been startled enough to forget to offer her his hand.
‘I’m the one who got pushed, so why does he look so shocked?’
Since he clearly wasn’t going to help her up, Asha got to her feet on her own, gathering the scattered sandwiches and brushing dust from her dress. Her heart ached at the sight of the ruined food.
‘I was supposed to give these to Lis.’
“I was going to lend you the basket. You looked like you’d have trouble carrying everything.”
“…….”
“I think I startled you by grabbing you so suddenly.”
“……No. I’m terribly sorry, Your Highness.”
As the Duke’s House heir and war hero, Carno had always maintained a detached arrogance even toward her, the imperial granddaughter—but this time he bowed deeply with proper deference and apologized. Though Asha had no intention of making a scene, a surge of sadness welled up, and she sniffled while looking down at the floor.
“No, it’s… sniff… it could happen to anyone…”
‘Do I grab people’s sleeves too roughly?’
Why did she keep getting knocked down? But watching him stand there with his head bowed made her own heart uncomfortable. Asha finally reached up and straightened him, pushing him back upright—though with his height, it felt more like shoving.
The atmosphere had turned cold and awkward. Asha stood there at a loss, then cleared her throat and fumbled with her skirts.
“Well… in any case, thank you for bringing me here. Safe travels!”
Though she felt his gaze on her back, Asha didn’t turn around.

* * *

Lis was horrified when Asha returned from the banquet with sprained wrist and ankle. Asha felt certain the Imperial Palace ceiling would shake from Lis’s scolding.
But her troubles didn’t end with the next day. At first, she’d thought the sprained ankle merely ached a little, but soon a fever bloomed on Asha’s forehead. After that, she remembered almost nothing of the day.
Asha lay in bed, breathing in shallow gasps. Having passed turbulent days since arriving at the Imperial Palace, and with a frail body still in its growth period, it was hardly surprising she’d fallen ill. Lis looked ready to weep, as though her nagging had caused Asha’s sickness.
<What a pitiful, worthless body you have.>
‘It’s because I’m growing… that’s just how it is.’
<What does growing mean?>
‘I get a little bigger every day.’
<Bigger?>
Pibi tilted her head, clearly baffled. Asha rubbed her temples internally.
‘Like how an acorn sprouts and becomes an oak tree.’
<But you’re human, not an acorn.>
‘Humans grow the same way.’
<Are you saying branches will sprout from your head?>
Pibi, utterly baffled, flew out from her sleeping gown’s collar and disappeared outside.
‘……I should have learned to curse a long time ago.’
Asha’s fever-hot throat burned. Unable to think or speak further, she drifted in and out of sleep, pressing her cheek against the cool part of the bed.
“Your Highness, are you suffering greatly?”
Lis, carrying a linen cloth soaked in ice water, looked ready to cry. Asha shook her head against the cold hands pressed to her cheek.
“Prince Alexei was going to visit as well……”
“Oh, no. I’m fine. We can’t risk spreading illness.”
Asha quickly shook her head.
‘He doesn’t even have medicine, so what if he catches it….’
Lis was busy being moved by her selflessness, but Asha, lacking the strength to protest, could only lower her head. Yet within hours, Asha would come to regret her careless words.
‘I should have said it more clearly!’
She heard the door creaking open slowly from a distance, jolting half-awake, and through the gap seeped a familiar bluish mist—something like Alexei’s Aura.
No, surely not, surely not, she kept repeating to herself, when Lis’s small voice came through as well.
“Your Highness, are you truly certain it’s all right to come?”
“My sister is ill—it is my duty to visit her. I shall look after her for now, so you may go.”
The sound of Lis departing echoed from afar. Not long after, Alexei appeared near the bed, settling quietly beside it.
“Asha.”
Embarrassed for some reason, she pretended to sleep, then cracked her eyes open carefully—just as a soft clink sounded and a shadow fell across her forehead. Alexei was wringing out Linen Cloth in ice water and laying it across her brow.
“Are you awake?”
“I… just now…”
Knowing it wouldn’t work, she lied anyway. Alexei didn’t press her, simply watching her in silence.
“You said you could walk from the Ball Hall to your Bedroom alone, so I sent you ahead first—and now you’re lying here ill?”
“…”
“I see. I won’t be able to let you go alone anymore, then.”
“That’s… that’s not it. It’s just… it just happened to be that time, so…”
She couldn’t leave it at that—she’d feel wronged and miserable, and wouldn’t sleep at all.
“So you schedule your fevers in advance, do you?”
“That’s not what I meant… We traveled such a long time in the carriage to reach the Imperial Palace, and that’s why… But why did you come, Alexei?”
“My sister is ill. I came to see her.”
“But you don’t even take medicine, Alexei… what if you catch it?”
“My sister made something for me, so I can take that.”
“That’s… that’s just… something good to have, but… it’s not really medicine…”
At Asha’s stammering, Alexei let out a low laugh, then placed his hand against her cheek. Surprisingly, his touch was cool, and Asha could only blink.
“Goodness, you’re withering away before you’ve even ripened.”
“I’m not…”
“Well then. When you’re better, I’ll give you a reward.”
“Not two more cages, please…”
“Not cages. Something else. Whatever you wish for.”
“Then…”
Asha rubbed her cheek against his cool hand, murmuring.
“Sugar…”
“…Sugar?”
“And butter too…”
“Butter…?”
Asha’s head sank into the pillow, and soon her breathing deepened, though slightly irregular. Alexei gazed down at her face for a long moment, then changed the Linen Cloth on her forehead once more before leaving the room.

* * *

“The fever has not yet broken, Your Majesty.”
The Emperor’s brow furrowed. The attendant who had delivered the message cowered, shrinking back as much as possible. The Emperor waved his hand, dismissing the servant outside.
“I was about to press for details about what this is—but the timing is peculiar. Surely she isn’t feigning illness.”
As the Emperor spoke his displeasure, a fierce wind swept through the chamber; the shawl on his shoulders vanished, and a precarious form appeared—something translucent flickering mindlessly between the shapes of a dog and a cat, a cat and a tree, a tree and cloth.
It was Shamal, the Spirit King of the Wind.

“Nonsense.”
The Emperor flatly denied it. The wind’s form flickered haphazardly.

“…”
The Spirit King knew the words struck at the Emperor’s sore point without mercy, yet he did not hesitate.

“You’ve become quite fluent in human speech, Shamal.”

Shamal moved back and forth before the Emperor, and presently took on a human form—whether strange or familiar, impossible to say—and smiled wryly.

“Not necessary.”
The Emperor declined firmly, but the wind had already vanished swiftly. Before he could finish his exasperated sigh, it returned.

“…”

The wind laughed boisterously and truly disappeared before him. The Emperor crumpled the paper he’d been holding and threw it down.
“There’s nothing that pleases me anymore…….”
Yuriye, his youngest son, had troubled him often in childhood with fevers that seized his attention, yet even in adulthood nothing went according to the boy’s wishes. And now his only daughter was following the same path. The Emperor recalled the day Yuriye had left him.

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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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