Then, Lucio now realized that he couldn’t answer any of my questions.
Also, why I am standing in the rain right now.
As I blinked, tears flowed. No, perhaps it was rainwater.
“Lia, are you okay now?”
The Duchess approached me and wrapped her arms around my shoulders, but I didn’t notice when she came.
It was only then that I realized the heat that had been burning in my heart had subsided.
And the wizards around me were standing in a circle, doing something.
“I’m okay. Everything is fine now.”
The Duchess hugged me tightly.
I smiled and nodded at her murmuring.
“Nothing is fine, madam.”
From the moment I opened my mouth, I couldn’t control my tears.
“I have never been fine.”
“Lia…”
“Is it my fault that I’m an orphan?”
“…”
“I’ve never wished for that. But still, it’s all my fault… cough.”
As I spoke, I hastily covered my mouth with my hand.
Suddenly, a severe dizziness struck me, and something surged in my stomach.
Feeling overwhelmed, I vomited, and my palms were hot and moist.
The red substance, unable to be contained in my small hands, fell to the ground along my arm.
For a moment, I thought I was dying like this again and stared blankly at the blood I had expelled.
Gradually, my vision narrowed, and everything in front of me became dark.
And just as the world seemed to spin, my body swayed.
“Lia…!”
Feeling the hand holding onto me, I lost consciousness.
* * *
When Lia suddenly lost consciousness, the startled Duchess rushed over and quickly checked the child’s breathing and heartbeat.
Externally, there seemed to be no major issues…
“A mana rampage.”
Telin, the chief wizard of Duke Ellard, spoke anxiously in a trembling voice.
“Your Excellency, we need to treat her immediately.”
The Duke nodded in agreement and held the child in his arms.
Despite being drenched in rain, Lia’s body was hot with fever.
If he hadn’t felt the violent surge of mana as soon as he entered the lodging, it could have been a disaster. The thought sent a chill down his spine.
Similarly, Lucio, who quickly realized the situation, gave a signal, and it was fortunate that the Duke’s wizards were already summoned.
However, contrary to the Duke’s expectations, the situation had only reached this point because of Lia’s action to control her mana rampage and escape the room.
The wizards quickly unfolded mana stones and magic circles to try to contain the rampage, but controlling Lia’s mana was impossible.
The Duke carried Lia in his arms, followed by the wizards, as they hurriedly made their way to the main building.
In the garden, numerous servants had gathered after hearing the commotion, including the maids who had escaped the fire. However, apart from the sound of rain falling, no one uttered a word.
The face of the child who had shed tears like morning dew just moments ago remained untraceable.
Everyone was at a loss for words at the sight of the small child trembling and questioning if her birth as an orphan was her fault.
They couldn’t believe their own past actions of ignoring and rejecting the child.
Jack, who had arrived late after hearing the news, was also standing, his fists clenched, staring at the spot where Lia had disappeared.
He wanted to rush to the main building right away and make sure she was okay, but he didn’t have the right to do so.
The guilt of not having done anything until it reached this point weighed heavily on him, but he still couldn’t do anything for Lia at the moment.
That’s when it happened.
“Young master, what are you doing? Please, come inside quickly…”
Like Jack, Lucio stood motionless, letting the rain pour down on him. The servant’s voice shook him.
Finally looking at Lucio, Jack stiffened in a peculiar sensation.
The man, drenched and disheveled, who had loosened his tightly bound aura to an almost dangerous level, spoke coldly.
“Where is the head maid?”
At that moment, Jack felt as if he had heard the voice of a grim reaper.
* * *
As the rain poured down, a thunderbolt struck, briefly illuminating the dark room before quickly disappearing.
“Ah!”
At that moment, a sharp scream of a woman filled the room.
Shortly after, the door opened with quick footsteps, and the light turned on.
“My lady.”
A man quickly approached the bed and held the woman’s hand.
The drenched woman in sweat breathed heavily.
Her light pink hair was stuck to her forehead and cheeks with sweat, making her look disoriented.
“My dear! Our baby keeps crying, saying that it hurts. What should we do?”
“….”
“It feels like she’s looking for me. My baby. I should be by her side…”
The frail and dry woman cried, clutching her chest.
Then, the man firmly held the woman, who was trying to rush out into the pouring rain.
Like a broken faucet, he bit his lips, unable to control his trembling, as he watched his wife’s tears fall.
“I’m sorry. I couldn’t protect our child… I’m truly sorry.”
“… Your Grace, should I call the head nurse, Marta?”
The butler, who was standing in front of the open door, asked cautiously.
In response, the man, Duke Kael Belus, nodded heavily.
* * *
“What is the current condition…?”
The Duke asked with a suspicious expression.
Telin swallowed his saliva and repeated what he had said earlier.
“It’s dangerous. She will be engulfed in flames, experiencing excruciating pain like being pricked by needles. Tonight is a critical moment.”
“Didn’t you say we were in the clear?”
He had said that the situation was resolved when they moved the child.
And now it’s a critical moment?
But Telin nodded as if there was no falsehood in my words.
“Fortunately, it’s fortunate. Many people die instantly when their bodies explode due to mana running rampant.”
Even when unable to control a small amount of mana.
Having such a massive amount of mana like Lia and still reaching this point could truly be called a miracle.
However, the Duke still couldn’t believe it as he looked down at Lia lying on the bed.
Not trusting the maids anymore, the Duchess herself dressed the child and wiped away all the moisture.
Lia, even in her unconscious state, moaned softly, tears streaming from her closed eyes.
She looked painful enough to make one’s heart ache just by looking at her, but she didn’t appear to be suffering from such excruciating pain.
“If only she would struggle and make noises like she did during the mana rampage, then I could believe it.”
It was an indescribable feeling of sorrow to see the child just whimpering and moaning, quietly enduring the pain.
“Waaah!”
At that moment, as the door opened and closed briefly, Diana’s crying voice resounded loudly.
The Duchess, who had entered the room, frowned with a tired expression.
Unfortunately, Diana, who had woken up from a nap and was coming downstairs, happened to meet the Duke, who was carrying Lia.
Although Allen, who was waiting in the hall, hurriedly covered Diana’s eyes, it was already too late, as she had clearly seen the exhausted Lia, soaked in blood and unconscious.
Diana insisted on going to Lia’s side, but Lia needed extreme stability due to her poor condition.
In the end, the Duchess went to console Diana, but judging by the sounds from outside, it seemed to have no effect.
While wiping away Lia’s cold sweat and flowing tears, the Duchess asked.
“Is Lia okay now?”
“….”
Telin slightly lowered his head, sensing the terrifying gaze of the Duke.
Then, quietly, he went outside to replenish the mana stones of the artifacts that helped control mana.
Thump.
The door closed, breaking the heavy silence
The Duke, who had been staring intensely at Lia, turned his gaze away.
“It’s all my fault.”
The Duchess, with reddened eyes, blamed herself as she spoke.
“I thought she was doing well. I should have paid more attention.”
Having lived her whole life in an orphanage, the child had completely adapted to the new environment of the Duke’s residence. So, naturally, the Duchess thought she would be fine when she came to the capital.
She had shown openly how much she cherished Lia, so she assumed that the servants would take good care of her.
It was a careless judgment.
The Duke’s household servants were different from those at the Duke’s residence, and all the actions they took for Lia turned out to be detrimental.
“It’s not your fault.”
Lucio had already taken the maidservants who were about to punish Lia and dragged them to the underground prison.
The Duke was sincerely enraged as he listened to their excuses.
He couldn’t believe such things were happening inside his own house.
This wasn’t what he had brought her here for.
Just as the child had said, he hadn’t reached out his hand to make her suffer and be tormented like this.
“But…”
As his wife shook her head with her lips bitten, the Duke could sense the words she couldn’t say.
(I could have left at any time. I could have gone anywhere!)
He was surely recalling the words the child had shouted.
The Duke himself had also constantly had those words ringing in his ears.
“Sigh.”
The Duke sighed deeply, washing his face with his hands.
“I could never understand why this clever child refused sponsorship and insisted on being a maidservant. When I see her carefully choosing books to read, it seems she’s not uninterested in studying either. Honestly, one of the reasons I allowed Diana’s education early on was because of Lia. I thought maybe I would feel something by watching them together. But now… thinking back, I wonder if she had always planned to leave at any time from the beginning.”
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Translator Note:
This chapter was translated by Bree.
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Thanks for the chapter, eagerly waiting for more xd