TVRP 05

Chapter 5

‘Of course, Father giving me Eden was probably nothing more than a momentary whim.’

But what did the truth matter?

Let’s compete with lies and fabrication instead.

I summoned every ounce of shamelessness and acting ability I possessed and boldly looked up at Olga.

Perhaps my efforts were working, because Olga stared at me with a hardened expression.

A few seconds later.

“……You’ve become quite bold after being sick for several days, haven’t you?”

Crack.

Olga suddenly raised her right hand, grinding her teeth.

“To think you’ve grown this much. Then I suppose you don’t need a silly toy like this anymore, do you?”

My eyes widened when I saw what she was holding.

‘Rossi’s circuitry!’

It was practically Rossi’s heart.

I glared at Olga.

“……Give it to me.”

“You should have it.”

Olga sneered viciously.

“If you promise to go to the head of the family and stop bothering him.”

‘……Ha.’

I widened my eyes at her despicable threat.

When I remained silent, Olga shrugged.

“What? Perhaps you don’t need it that badly? In that case, I suppose I can simply destroy it.”

Olga’s huge hand, like the lid of a cast-iron pot, closed around Rossi’s circuitry.

The other parts could be repaired if they were damaged, but that circuitry, which was essentially Rossi’s heart, could never be restored.

I bit my lip tightly.

If this had been the old me, I probably would have been unable to contain my rising anger and thrown a fit immediately.

But things were different now.

In my previous life, I had lost my parents at a young age and endured even worse cold treatment and gaslighting from my aunt and uncle.

I secretly gathered evidence without letting them notice, waited for the right moment, and eventually reclaimed my parents’ inheritance.

Because of that experience, ‘Yuna Shin’ knew better than anyone.

When you’re wronged, sometimes it is most powerful to let that anger simmer for a while and unleash it at the right moment.

‘I loudly threatened to tell Father, but we aren’t even close enough for me to actually do that. I can’t get the circuitry back this way.’

I couldn’t let her destroy Rossi’s heart.

‘Olga Nadia. I’m going to deal with you properly soon.’

First objective: Deal with Olga.

I put a star next to it in my mental notebook and slowly bent my knees.

Or rather, I was about to.

“What are you doing?!”

But then, along with a horrified voice from behind me—

“Get a grip!”

Eden grabbed my arm and yanked me sharply.

“Waaah!”

Because of that, my body, which had been about to kneel, staggered sideways.

I almost fell!

I whipped around toward Eden and snapped angrily.

“What are you doing?!”

“What are you doing right now? You’re giving up without even fighting? Are you out of your mind?”

“What?”

“Even if she’s an adult, that woman doesn’t even have a weapon. Do something!”

With that shout, Eden suddenly charged at Olga.

His painfully thin leg struck Olga directly in the shin.

“AAARGH!”

Olga, attacked out of nowhere, collapsed to the floor.

Now Olga was the one who had ended up on her knees.

“Pfft……!”

I couldn’t help bursting out laughing at the sight.

‘Oh, but how am I supposed to clean this mess up?’

First of all, I needed to take Rossi’s circuitry away from that woman!

“Hey, E-Eden. Are you crazy? Stay still. I’ll handle this myself!”

I urgently whispered to Eden.

“Why are you kneeling without even trying to fight? Is dying really that easy for you?”

Despite being as skinny as a bundle of firewood, Eden shouted at me like a bolt of lightning.

His golden eyes, bright and fierce like those of a wild cat, burned with fury.

“What? Die? Who—”

Oh.

Wait.

Only then did I begin to understand what was going through Eden’s head.

Come to think of it, I vaguely remembered hearing that in the lawless regions of the north, including the slums, kneeling was essentially a declaration of death.

If someone willingly knelt and admitted defeat, apparently the victor would kill the loser without causing unnecessary pain.

Apparently, Eden had misunderstood my attempt to kneel as me surrendering to Olga and accepting my own death.

“You filthy little beggar brat……”

Olga, who had been clutching her shin, rose to her feet.

Olga was taller than most adult men.

When someone that large stood over us, her shadow fell threateningly across the room.

“I’ll make you regret this, you scrawny little beggar brat.”

“Don’t touch him!”

“Oh, so I suppose you really don’t need this after all?”

Olga shook Rossi’s circuitry and smiled maliciously.

“……You’re going to regret this, Olga. I’m not going to be a powerless child forever.”

“Oh? Once Miss grows up, you won’t be any scarier.”

Olga curled one corner of her mouth upward.

“By then, you’ll be dead at the hands of the two young masters anyway, won’t you?”

I gritted my teeth.

What Olga said wasn’t actually wrong.

In House Sergegnev, once all the children reached adulthood, they fought among themselves for succession.

The family’s secret swordsmanship could only be passed down to a single person.

Furthermore, the swordsmanship grew stronger by absorbing power the more it harmed the lives of members of the family.

‘What a cruel and barbaric tradition. Something completely unimaginable in modern-day Earth.’

That alone showed just how hopeless and bleak this apocalyptic world was.

Anyway.

My eldest brother, Edward, was a genius with the sword.

There were even rumors that he would eventually become a talent comparable to Father himself.

My second brother, Lawrence, was also quite talented.

One of the two would eventually win the succession battle—or lose and become nourishment for the victor.

Eloise, Edward’s fraternal twin, had no talent for the sword and was also born physically weak.

Ironically, that meant she was more likely to survive.

Even if someone harmed my sister, the victor would gain no power from her.

‘But I’m different.’

I was mediocrity personified.

The moment I came of age and the succession battle began, I would be doomed to die.

‘It seems the original Lilyan survived because it was eventually revealed that she was a human magic stone.’

But even then, my mana would be drained away until my life force ran out and I died.

Either way, it was a bad ending for me.

“For now, Miss, stand over there with your hands up. I need to teach this filthy little beggar brat some manners first.”

Olga limped toward Eden.

Apparently, he had really landed a solid hit on her shin.

As the large Olga approached, Eden cautiously stepped backward.

His eyes were filled with hostility, but there was an overwhelming difference in their physical size.

Unlike Olga, who ruled over the servants and stuffed herself with rich food, Eden was so painfully thin that he looked as though he had survived on tree bark alone.

“I’ll teach you exactly what happens when you dare defy an adult.”

Olga rolled up her sleeves.

At that moment, a scene flashed through my mind like lightning.

“The Emperor burned down our hometown…… so now we have nowhere to return to, Lilyan.”

It was a line Eloise had spoken to Lilyan in the original story.

The ‘hometown’ she was referring to was our Sergegnev territory.

In other words, the male protagonist would eventually burn this entire territory to the ground.

I had always found it strange that Eloise, supposedly born into a wealthy ducal family, had no personal property whatsoever……

‘All that enormous inheritance must have burned down along with the territory!’

Why would Eden burn down a perfectly good territory?

Obviously, he must have had a grudge!

And apparently, I was witnessing the very moment that grudge was beginning.

Olga’s enormous hand, as big as a pot lid, rapidly descended toward Eden.

‘No!’

Why was I trying so desperately to hold on to this place in the first place?

The only thing worth tolerating about this rotten household was the enormous inheritance I could eventually receive!

“Stop!”

Without thinking, I shouted and shoved Eden aside.

Because of that, Olga’s hand was now heading toward me instead.

‘I don’t want it to hurt!’

Just as I squeezed my eyes shut, thinking that—

BOOM!

A tremendous explosion pierced my ears.

At the same time, my body was pushed slightly backward.

‘W-What was that?’

I opened my eyes in shock, but all I could see was white light.

My entire field of vision had been dyed white, making it impossible to see anything.

A moment later.

The brilliant white light that had filled my vision suddenly faded away and became a small cluster of light hovering above my palm.

I looked around in bewilderment.

Olga was sprawled across the floor as though she had just been hit with an uppercut by a boxer.

The ends of her clothes appeared to have been slightly burned by the explosion.

“What is this……?”

I stared blankly into the air.

Blue, purple, yellow, red.

Rainbow-colored particles floated through the air like fireworks.

‘Pretty…….’

Along with that instinctive thought, an ominous feeling washed over me.

These beautiful, brilliantly colored remnants of light.

I had seen this scene somewhere before.

Yes.

In the original story.

[“Oh! To think you can control mana explosions so freely.”

“As beautiful a sight as Lady Lilyan herself.”

“Truly, you are a genius of magic!”]

Whenever magic was used, remnants of mana were left behind.

Beautiful, rainbow-colored remnants.

In the original story, Lilyan would explode her mana like a clown setting off fireworks, simply to show off her magical abilities.

Afterward, Lilyan’s followers would gaze at the beautiful remnants of mana and shower her with praise.

“……You, just now.”

I heard Eden’s astonished voice.

Realizing my mistake, I turned around.

Eden was staring at the multicolored remnants with his eyes wide open.

“Just now, you used magic…….”

“No!”

I shouted immediately.

“What do you mean, no? You just made something white go boom and blasted that woman away!”

Eden’s golden eyes trembled in confusion.

“You’re a mage—”

“Shh! Shhh!”

I rushed at Eden and clamped a hand over his mouth.

“Mmph! Mmph!”

Eden struggled and twisted his body in protest.

But having grown up eating meat dishes as the daughter of a ducal family, I was more than strong enough to overpower him.

I quickly whispered into Eden’s ear.

“Listen carefully. You saw it wrong! A young and stupid child like me using magic? Magic is something only smart people who attend academies use.”

“But what happened just now—mmph.”

“I’m absolutely not a mage. Watch what you say!”

No one could ever find out that I had mana inside me.

The original Lilyan had proudly scattered her mana everywhere because she wanted recognition, but that was essentially suicide.

For me, mana was the same thing as my life force.

In other words, the remnants of mana from that explosion just now were basically pieces of my lifespan.

I looked sadly at the brilliantly colored remnants that had now settled onto the floor.

‘How much lifespan was that……? Three days? A week?’

Thinking that much of my lifespan was lying there as scattered remnants made my heart feel like it was being torn apart.

Eden escaped from my grasp and asked with eyes full of defiance,

“Then what was that explosion just now?”

What else could it have been?

One of the lowest-level spells, ‘Mana Explosion.’

It was such a weak spell that I had managed to cast it instinctively despite knowing absolutely nothing about magic.

Still, apparently it had been enough to knock Olga down while she was caught off guard.

“That explosion was…… right. Static electricity.”

“Don’t make me laugh! Where have you ever seen static electricity that big?!”

“The weather has been really dry lately!”

I was desperately arguing with Eden when—

Knock, knock.

A cautious knocking sound came from the door.

“Lily, it’s me. Eloise.”

I froze at the sound of my sister Eloise’s voice.

“Could you open the door for a moment? You seemed strange earlier, so I couldn’t help worrying about you.”

She had come all the way here for a little sister who had just thrown such a terrible tantrum.

As expected, my sister was an angel.

‘But why now of all times?’

I frantically looked around.

The room was an absolute disaster.

Rainbow-colored remnants of mana were scattered everywhere, and Olga was sprawled out flat on the floor.

There was no way I could let her see this.

“Lily? Aren’t you in there?”

“…….”

“That’s strange. I definitely saw you go inside…… Are you perhaps unwilling to talk to me?”

What should I do?

I nervously bit my lip.