Chapter 21

Lelia looked blankly at Emperor Perseus and bowed her head.

“…”

In the original novel, she was a tool made for an episode for something.

The first was to show how fussy Juliana’s brothers were, and the second was this.

The person who caused great hurt and sorrow to Emperor Perseus.

In short, she was a wasteful character. An unfortunate supporting role for Perseus.

In the original, Emperor Perseus learns the truth long after Lelia dies.

When he comes to know about her, he greatly suffers and falls into despair… Juliana, the adopted daughter, comforts him and becomes a hope for him to live again.

[Honestly, I don’t want to think of him as my real father, but….]

She had been looking away on purpose so far, but seeing him in front of her made her feel strange. It wasn’t like her brothers who were just kids.

“Your eyes resemble that man.”

The man whom Princess Iris loved, the knight’s eyes were light-green, similar to Lelia’s.

And Elizabeth, Perseus’ late wife and Lelia’s biological mother, also had beautiful eyes resembling Peridot.

“…”

Lelia looked up again at Perseus. He twisted his cheek in agony and soon turned his head.

“Take her back.”

Perseus spoke to the servant behind Lelia.

“All right, Your Majesty.”

The servant immediately approached Lelia and pulled her from the back. It was rude to treat the royal family without any politeness.

But no one pointed it out.

The emperor turned his back on the chair as if he were turning away, and other servants and knights just looked at Lelia with a cold stare.

She was speechless.

[What if you regret it later?]

Lelia sneered at Perseus inwardly as she returned to the tower.

In the original, Emperor Perseus belatedly finds out that Lelia is his own daughter and regrets hurting her.

But it was too late to regret. Because Lelia had already died in the story.

Honestly, she thinks it would be better if she could tell the Emperor the truth even now, but…

[There’s no way.]

If she says such a thing without proof, she will be treated like a crazy person.

It will never be revealed until the missing nanny shows up.

But there was still a long way to go before the nanny showed up. She didn’t mean to wait here in a daze until then.

Before that, she will be used for national marriages.

It will be of no use if she were to be found to be his own daughter after getting married to a strange punk.

[The only way is to escape.]

Lelia returned to the tower determined. She had lost all her energy and lay on the bed.

“I’m tired…”

After she ran into Cedric, Damien, and Emperor Perseus, she had no energy left.

Lelia lay motionless and looked at the ceiling, recalling memories of the story.

[The nanny is the key to the secret….]

The nanny suddenly disappeared one day while taking care of young Lelia. In the novel, the nanny’s whereabouts were revealed long after.

She, who was a maid of Empress Iris, was living by guarding Lelia at the order of the Empress. Then one day, she suddenly receives urgent news from her family. It was news that her parents, who lived in her country, were imprisoned for being mistaken for heresy. Those who were stigmatized as heresy could never escape execution. She immediately ran away by stealing her imperial debris. With her parents, she ran outside the border.

No matter how much the Imperial Palace has to offer, there is nothing more important than family.

The nanny, the only one who knows the truth, will return to the imperial city in a while.

[And she will confess all the facts to Emperor Perseus, recalling the situation at the time…]

At the time, both Elizabeth and Princess Iris were pregnant with children.

If it were normal, the delivery period would have been different, but unfortunately, Elizabeth gave birth earlier than her time.

Perseus had left the expedition at the time, and his two sons were being held by Elizabeth’s family.

And around that time. Perseus’ father, the then emperor, suddenly collapsed.

Everything was the strategy of Lydios, who was aiming for the throne. Even the fact that Perseus, the prince at the time, left the expedition.

Having noticed all of his schemes, Elizabeth realized that Perseus would probably never return.

And that with her own life, even the child in her stomach would not survive.

In the meantime, Elizabeth’s labor began, she called all her servants, and gave birth to her child by herself.

Maybe it was good.

Before Lydios’ surveillance got worse, she had to take her child away.

Elizabeth sobbed, holding her child who had not made up her number of months and came out in the world early. But there was no time to cry.

‘What should I do… ?’

She tried to think of someone to ask for help. However, there was no one to help her in the Imperial Castle.

Her mother-in-law, the Empress, passed away long ago. Her father-in-law, the Emperor, fell unconscious, and her sister-in-law, Princess Iris, hated her very much.

‘There must be a way…’

Elizabeth left her residence, thinking that she must protect herself as long as she is this child even if she dies.

Later at night, she visited the residence of Princess Iris.

Unfortunately, Princess Iris had also finished giving birth to her child. But her princess’s bed was full of her gloom.

As soon as she entered her residence, Elizabeth felt the shadow of death.

The child of Princess Iris, who came out after her last month, died.

Princess Iris was crying in pain. Her loved one died, and even her last child died.

She was no longer motivated to live.

Elizabeth knelt in front of the princess and begged.

“Princess Iris, please save this child… Please show mercy only once with the same mother’s heart…”

Princess Iris glared at Elizabeth, whom she usually hated.

“When my child is dead, you ask me to save your child? Did you come here thinking that I’d listen to you?”

Princess Iris wanted to kill the mother and daughter right away…

But when she saw the child in Elizabeth’s arms, her heart was shaken. As soon as her child was born, he died, but Elizabeth was a mother nonetheless. She is someone’s mother, and she couldn’t hurt the child.

Princess Iris wept for a while and made up her mind.

“Leave the child.”

“Princess Iris… .”

Iris took the child from the maid, who handed her over from Elizabeth.

Iris had to give her dead child and Elizabeth had to give her child to Iris, leaving her behind in order to protect her.

On that day, Lelia’s fate was decided.

Elizabeth returned to her dwelling place, holding the stillborn baby and crying.

Lydios heard this news belatedly and was delighted. As soon as the child was born, he tried to kill the child, but he died without him doing anything. He thought God was on his side.

He was told that Prince Perseus and his two sons also had died.

Lydios had nothing to hesitate anymore. He made Elizabeth eat poison, depriving her of the throne, which she had to return to her brother, and became emperor.

In the midst of the turmoil, Princess Iris raised Elizabeth’s child by herself, but she was deeply ill, and she began to suffer.

Foreshadowing her death, Iris closes her eyes, telling the nanny that she is the only one who knows her truth and to take care of Lelia.

This is all Perseus’s tragedy, and the lovely daughter, Juliana, who heals him. It was a narrative prepared only for the two.

Lelia had no intention of becoming a tool for the narrative.

“…”

Lelia got up from her bed and stared quietly under the wooden floor. Down there were letters shared with her friends and the fountain pen.

Maybe more letters were coming. But she thought that she would never open that wooden floor again.

After seeing it, she might write a letter again.

[I don’t want you to feel betrayed by me.]

Lelia looked away and slipped completely into her blanket. The pleasant memories she had at the temple seemed like a distant dream.

It was like a lie to see herself smiling so brightly. Come to think of it, she never seemed to laugh as loud as she did back then since she returned to her home country.

Her heart ached at the fact, but Lelia shook her head.

[Not the time to play like a child now, you have to be alert.]

Lelia recalled her original plans and painted a hut near her in front of her eyes.

Elizabeth, the late wife of Emperor Perseus, the cottage left by Lelia’s biological mother.

[It’s time to run out of food, though.]

There will be quite a few helpful magic tools as well as emergency food.

[Maybe there is something to learn magic.]

Mana affinity is usually hereditary, so there was a possibility that she could develop something.

[If I knew how to do magic, I could leave the castle without having to wait until I  grew up.]

She will be able to protect herself.

Lelia bit her lips nervously.

There was not much time left until she dies in the story.

[It was after the doll incident… It will probably be in two or three months.]

Until then, she was going to be stuck in the tower as much as she could.