Youngest on Top - Chapter 104

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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 104

Shuri had always been a child so beautiful that even I, accustomed to the beauty of gods and angels, was taken aback.
But dressed like this, he looked like a being from the heavens themselves.

‘Hmm, at least more… than that Parmanase fellow.’

Parmanase certainly gleamed on the surface, after all.
Of course, no matter how much he gleamed, he couldn’t compare to our Artemia!

Enrik: What is that thing?
Enrik: How is he even alive in that state?

‘I find that strange too.’

A curse so thick and dense it obscured even that perfect beauty wrapped around Shuri.

Enrik: Wait. Part of the curse is sealed, isn’t it?
Enrik: You’re saying it’s this bad even while sealed?

Enrik was right.
Despite sealing it twice, the curse was relentlessly consuming the child.

Grrr—
Alkiers’ growl brought me back to my senses.
The other party was the Crown Prince, yet I’d been staring without even greeting him.

‘For Alkiers to be so wary… Is it because of the curse’s aura?’

I patted Alkiers reassuringly and greeted Shuri.

“Hello.”

Shuri showed no reaction to my greeting.
When I looked at him curiously, he furrowed his brow.

“You…”
“…?”

Eyes of mysterious light fixed upon me with an unwavering gaze.
They were beautiful enough that an eccentric collector would covet them.

Yet simultaneously, they were overwhelmingly oppressive—the kind that made my heart sink.
Eyes that radiated an innate dominance in their very essence.

‘Why is he looking at me like that?’

I forced myself to smile nonchalantly.
But cold sweat trickled down my back.

He won’t know.
He couldn’t possibly know.
There’s no way he’d figure it out, right?

My appearance has changed so drastically—how could he recognize me as Ricardo?
Besides, Shuri still thinks I’m a boy.

Smile, smile, smile.
How long had I been holding up the corners of my mouth?
Though only a brief moment had passed, it felt like years to me.

“Sacred Maiden.”

Shuri approached me with a smile.

“Yes?”
“Everyone is waiting for you.”

He extended his hand to me with utmost courtesy.
It was the posture one would adopt when addressing a princess.

I was startled—I’d never received such treatment before.
Admiral Ekellan occasionally treated me like a lady, but that was always tinged with playfulness.

I awkwardly placed my hand in Shuri’s.
He smiled gently and drew me forward with a fluid motion.
It was a refined and elegant escort, as natural as flowing water.

‘So Shuri had this side to him.’

It was fascinating.
When I wore Ricardo’s face, he was such a rough child.
Even though I was his benefactor, he kept his guard up against me.

‘His personality was absolutely terrible back then.’

Yet now he was treating me with such meticulous respect.
The Crown Prince didn’t need to use formal speech with a mere low-ranking Sacred Maiden of Octagon.

‘Is he perhaps kinder to young women?’

Then why was his reputation so terrible before I regressed?
In any case, his courteous treatment wasn’t unwelcome.

“Thank you very much.”

As I bowed, Shuri looked at me with an odd expression again.
Like he was observing a laboratory rat….

‘Oh, come on.’

A laboratory rat, really. Haha.
I’m overthinking things. He’s being so kind as to escort me.
Hahaha.

As I laughed awkwardly, Shuri turned his head and muttered softly.

“Peculiar.”

What did he say?
But I missed the moment to ask.
We had already reached the hall.

“Oh my, there…!”

People gasped in surprise, their eyes turning toward us.
It was only natural.
After all, I had reappeared with the Crown Prince himself.

‘It was already unexpected that the Crown Prince would attend the Sacred Maiden’s coronation, but to receive an escort like this on top of it all…’

However, their reaction was slightly different from what I’d anticipated.

“With the Crown Prince…”
“Ah…”

A faint dread lingered beneath the whispers of the crowd.

‘What is this?’

When I glanced at Shuri, he offered me a smile.
As if the people’s reaction meant nothing to him.

‘Ah, I see.’

Shuri’s curse was invisible to their eyes.
Yet the peculiar aura emanating from him alone was enough to unsettle an ordinary person simply by standing before them.
Without understanding why, they would instinctively recoil.

‘Has he been shunned like this every single time?’

The people bowed their heads to him, but their posture screamed reluctance.
Their backs trembled as though they stood before a monster.

“Every time I see you talk back to your master without backing down, it’s fascinating.”

Now I understood why Shuri’s subordinates had found such delight in that.

Shuri himself appeared unbothered.
But he surely wasn’t truly fine.

Though it manifested differently, I too had experienced ostracism.
So I could understand.

‘…Would it help a little if I ate something delicious?’

Shuri probably wouldn’t even taste it properly, but still.

I picked up some finger food arranged at the corner of the hall.
It was a large cookie.

“Here, have some.”

I had no talent whatsoever for comforting people.
But whenever Randel gifted me pudding, I’d feel happy before I even tasted it.
So.

I smiled brightly and held out the cookie to Shuri.

“It’s not bad.”

Smack!
Shuri sharply knocked my hand away.
His expression was utterly cold.

‘…Why?’

“Forgive my rudeness, Sacred Maiden.”

As if that cold expression had been a lie, Shuri smiled politely.

“I forgot I had something to attend to. Congratulations on your awakening as the Sacred Maiden. May glory accompany the Artemisia Temple.”

He left after saying only that.
As I stood there bewildered, the children suddenly swarmed around me.

“Protagonist, why aren’t you eating? Oh! You’re saving it for me?”
“I don’t eat such ordinary cookies, but if you wish to give it to me, I suppose I could make an exception.”
“Sae, there’s raspberry cheesecake over there too. You like that, don’t you?”

Dmitri, Edmund, and Ilay, of course, along with the other children crowded around.

* * *

The adults watched Saelika and the children with satisfaction, conversing amongst themselves.

“Haha, the Sacred Maiden certainly is exceptionally popular with the children.”
“Surely not just the children? Even the adults were competing over the Sacred Maiden.”
“Yes, I heard that even Kaiser himself has melted away for her.”
“That Kaiser…! I can’t even imagine it.”
“Is that all? Madame Caitlin was also infatuated with this child. She said she fell for her after meeting her at a gathering with Reyatan.”
“Ah, I heard she became a devoted follower. What was it about the bread?”
“Bread? What kind of bread could it be?”

The people tilted their heads in confusion for a moment.

“Gerald of White Pearl also goes weak in the knees at the mention of the Sacred Maiden.”
“Admiral Ekellan personally went shopping and gifted this child—that’s even more famous.”
“So all these distinguished people took an interest in her even before she manifested as the Sacred Maiden…”

The same thought crossed everyone’s minds.

‘Could Artemisia really be causing some kind of phenomenon?’

—was what they thought.

“Wait, isn’t that the Duke of Noishurael’s son?”

The Noishurael ducal house had connections to many temples.
Moreover, far more prestigious ones—the upper temples of Octagon than Artemisia.
Yet his attendance at the Artemisia Temple event was still unexpected.

“It seems he attended because of Admiral Ekellan.”
“Indeed, if not for that reason, there would be no need for him to come to an Artemisia Temple event.”

Even as the people accepted this explanation, they perked up their ears to hear what the Duke’s son was saying.

“Saelika is like a flower to me.”

…Huh?
Did I mishear that?

“That’s right, isn’t it, Sae?”
“Mm… y-yes…”

It didn’t seem like there was a hearing problem after all.
So it’s really true?
The Perardin Noishurael Duke—the ice of the Northern Mountains?!

* * *

Saelika was distributing cookies to the children.
Shuri observed her from a distance.

“It’s fine, Shuri. Let’s go get dessert with Rika.”
“Don’t be sad. You should be happy.”

Though they were completely different, for a moment that child’s image overlapped with another.
Ricardo—that impudent brat.
The one who never held back his words, never lost an argument, and always talked back without hesitation.

Ricardo wasn’t like a puppy unaware that tigers were fearsome, recklessly playing around.
He knew full well how powerful Shuri was.

‘Yet he treats me so casually?’

That was strange.
There had never been such a being before.

Most people trembled before him, groveling in submission.
A tiny minority either showed him respect or expressed hatred.

Both were merely means of self-defense.
Those who showed respect wanted to survive by belonging to him, while those who expressed hatred inflated themselves, pretending to hold the upper hand in any way they could.
Whenever Shuri faced them quietly, they were too busy hiding their fear.

All of them, without exception, were the same worms.

But what was Ricardo?
Fragile limbs that seemed like they’d snap clean off with just one bend.
Soft cheeks torn open from merely standing against my momentum once.
A small body that barely reached half my height.

Yet despite all that.

“I told you to take off your pants, didn’t I?”

On the day we first met, that child faced Shuri without hesitation.
Not a trace of fear could be found in those large eyes.
Was there anyone else who gazed at him with eyes so transparently pure?

Like someone encountering an unknown life form for the first time and unsure how to handle it.
Shuri couldn’t make a decision about what to do with this child.

“Are you embarrassed?”
“It’s fine, it’s fine. There’s nothing to be embarrassed about~! Not even a little bit!”
“It’s just the same as being examined by a doctor.”
“Huh? You’re still embarrassed? Shuri gets embarrassed easily!”

…Truly an unknown life form.
In every way.

I simply disliked others touching my body.
If one descended to the very depths of consciousness, they would face the curse.
A creeping, repulsive and vile existence.
A monster that lived within me, one that seemed capable of driving me mad just by witnessing it.

The curse revealed outside my body was only a fraction.
No, not even a fraction. It was closer to a trace.

Yet everyone who saw it retched and wept tears and mucus.
The weak-hearted even lost their minds.

Shuri paid it no mind.
I wasn’t idle enough to waste mental energy on the reactions of insects.

But then.

“Are you scared?”

I wasn’t scared.
It was just—

The child was staring at me with eyes that had grown slightly wider.
As if asking why I was gripping his shirt.

Even Shuri himself didn’t understand why he’d done it.
Suddenly, all of this seemed absurd.
So Shuri released his grip on the fabric.

‘Yes, rather—.’

It would be easier if those eyes looking at me twisted with revulsion, terror, and confusion.
If he convulsed and collapsed into unconsciousness.
If he retched and became a mess of tears and snot, unable to stand properly, desperately dragging himself across the floor to get away from me.
Then it would be easier.

Sure enough, the child’s brow furrowed.

Now that face would completely contort and he’d gag.
Or perhaps a piercing scream would erupt, the kind only the mad could produce.
Maybe he’d drool like an idiot, unable to form proper words.

But.

“It’s much bigger than I thought.”

A bright, clear voice rang out calmly.

“Since you’re still young, I can’t pair you yet. But let me try anyway.”

A writhing, living curse.
The child’s fingers moved carefully along it.
With such complete indifference.
To something even Shuri himself found so horrifying he couldn’t properly face it.

The child’s soft voice settled gently over that dreadful mark.

“It’s hard.”

It’s not hard.

“It hurts.”

It doesn’t hurt.

“You’re sad.”

I don’t know such emotions at all.

Only.

“It’s okay, little one.”

That soft, gentle voice settling down.

“Shh, it’s okay now.”

A voice so fragile it seemed it could extinguish at any moment.

“I’ll hold your hand.”

A voice that would crumble formlessly before his curse.
It seeped strangely deep into my chest.
Without Shuri even realizing it.

‘…And in an instant, he slipped from my arms. Like grains of sand.’

When I awoke, that one had vanished without a trace.

In truth, I had sought out the Papuka black market after hearing from a fortune teller.
Because they said the key to breaking his curse was in the black market.

‘Of course, I thought that strange stone I could sense was the key to breaking the curse, but it wasn’t.’

Ricardo—that bastard was the key.
How dare he disappear without a word? I’d find him and make use of him.
That’s what I thought.

But when I happened to encounter that child in the forest,

“Ah, hey there… long time no see.”

Seeing that foolish grin spread across his vacant face, everything suddenly felt absurdly pointless.

“Master.”

At the sound of someone calling him, Shuri snapped out of his reverie.

“…That bastard.”
“I’ve searched through all these crowds, but he’s nowhere to be found.”

The fortune teller had said what I was looking for would be here, so I came specially.
Otherwise, I wouldn’t have come even with Admiral Ekellan’s invitation.

“The fortune teller has been wrong before, hasn’t she?”
“I even brought peanut cookies for that Ricardo bastard.”
“And strawberry cookies too.”
“He’s the master’s first friend in so long…”
“Friend, my ass.”

Shuri dismissed it outright.

“What about the Sacred Maiden? Isn’t she the Sacred Maiden who appeared at Artemisia Temple for the first time in decades?”
“I suppose.”

Shuri’s gaze turned toward Saelika.

“She has a talent for souring one’s mood.”

With that, Shuri rose from his seat.
If Ricardo wasn’t here, there was no reason to stay any longer.

* * *

Saelika’s Sacred Maiden coronation ceremony concluded successfully.
And several years passed.

“Saelika!”

Saelika froze mid-leap through the window frame at the sound of her name being called.

“Are you trying to sneak out again?”

The limbs grasping the window frame had grown slender and graceful, as if they’d never been gangly.
Golden hair flowed in undulating waves.
Blue eyes that held the sky itself.
The child’s smiling face was as beautiful as an angel from a sacred painting.

Saelika, age twelve.
It was spring.

—————
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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