Episode 6
Crash!
Every dish and glass bottle nearby shattered.
Tiseriel was throwing a fit and wrecking the room.
It was rare for her to show her true nature this openly.
But this was a place with only people close enough for that—her family.
And more than anything, she was mentally cornered enough to lose control.
“My ring! What am I supposed to do about my ring?!”
“M-my dear, d-don’t worry. Father will have an even better ring made for you and give it to you—”
Her real father, the Count Consort of Sellos, tried to calm Tiseriel, but it was useless.
“A new one? A better ring? What good is that? It won’t be the Lady’s Ring!”
Watching her raging daughter, Danika nodded.
“Tiseriel is right. The Lady’s Ring is an old and prestigious family treasure.”
“My dear, th-then what should we do…?”
Danika stroked her cane as she muttered.
It was a keepsake that had belonged to the former Duke of Atherion—her uncle.
Danika treasured it like a priceless possession.
“There is no choice. We’ll just have to make an identical one.”
Just like how she had passed off her own daughter Tiseriel, a collateral relative, as Stacia, the direct heir.
After her mother and father left to deal with the aftermath,
Tiseriel was sent to her bedroom in her nanny’s arms.
But she could not fall deeply asleep.
Lying on her soft silk bed, Tiseriel suddenly sat bolt upright.
“Ahhh! No! I’m not a fake!”
It seemed she had had a nightmare. Her nightclothes were soaked with sweat.
The nanny rushed over and held Tiseriel as she struggled.
This happened often enough that the nanny did not panic.
“It’s all right, my lady. You are still the lady. Please relax.”
“…Really?”
Only then did Tiseriel finally realize she had been having a nightmare.
And she blamed the cause of that nightmare on something else.
“My ring, ahhh!!”
She threw herself back onto the bed and flailed her arms and legs like a spoiled child throwing a tantrum.
If other people—those who only knew Tiseriel as an angel or a saint—saw her now, they would have been horrified.
Because Tiseriel had to pretend to be kind so often in daily life, she sometimes acted like a complete brat as a reaction.
But only in front of the nanny, who spoiled her even more than her mother did.
She behaved exactly like an impossible seven-year-old.
The nanny began seriously soothing her.
“Oh, my poor little lady. But you still need to sleep. You didn’t sleep well yesterday either, and you must sleep well tonight too so your pearl-like skin won’t suffer.”
“But, Nanny! What about my ring? My riiing! Waaaah!”
“It’s all right. The count—no, the acting duke—said she will take care of it somehow.”
“But, but…!”
“If you cry like this, your pretty eyes will get all swollen. Aren’t you going to the imperial palace tomorrow to see the First Prince? Will you be all right going there with swollen eyes?”
“…I hate that!”
Tiseriel’s cheeks turned pink.
The First Prince was a strong candidate to become Crown Prince.
Her mother often told her that Tiseriel would, of course, become Crown Princess.
Tiseriel believed that too.
“Then you should sleep now.”
“But I’m too angry to just let it go!”
“Oh dear, our poor little lady.”
Tiseriel’s eyes turned vicious.
“Then bring me that thing.”
“That thing?”
The nanny knew very well what she meant.
Every time the young lady she served had that look in her eyes, one of the “toys” brought from the orphanage ended up dead.
It seemed today was one of those times.
Well, she had lost the ring and even had a nightmare.
“This all happened because that little rat spilled honey. I showed mercy and let her serve my tea, and this is how she repays me? I’m not letting her off.”
“That’s right. Exactly. We can’t have our little lady upset like this. We have to help you let it out somehow.”
The nanny called for a maid and ordered her to bring Tii.
Buried in the folds of the nanny’s skirt, Tiseriel’s dark blue eyes gleamed cruelly.
***
I had succeeded in stealing the Lady’s Ring.
Of course, I had deliberately spilled honey on Tiseriel’s hand at the tea party.
‘I had to make her take the ring off, even if only for a moment, so I could steal it.’
And that was not the only reason I spilled the honey.
I had deliberately splashed it onto the magic lamps around Tiseriel too.
‘My real goal was to break the magic lamps and take away everyone’s sight!’
And it had worked beautifully.
The fact that honey and ash together could break magic lamps was a ridiculous piece of information that would not be discovered until about ten years later.
No one knew it yet.
Except me.
‘Staying up all night was worth it. Cleaning all the magic lamps with lye until they shone was worth it…’
Because of that, when the lamps touched the honey and malfunctioned, the error spread directly to the surrounding lamps.
They all reacted to the lye still left on them.
‘Of course, no one will know I made it happen.’
Anyway, after preparing everything like that,
I waited.
I waited for my chance.
And the moment all the magic lamps went out at once, I quickly stole the ring Tiseriel had taken off.
Of course, there were still difficulties after that.
Even if the magic lamps went out, they could just bring in other lights.
And naturally, they would search everyone for the ring, with the maids sure to be first.
‘I never imagined they’d even search the guests.’
The reason the ring was not found on me during the two body searches was simple.
‘Because no one knows the ring can turn invisible!’
Astraia—the Lady’s Ring—was the key to unlocking the sacred relic.
In terms of ability, it could be called a “small sacred relic.”
‘Turning invisible is its simplest ability.’
Now that all the traditions of the main family line had been cut off, I was the only one who knew that.
I had not heard it from my grandfather or my mother.
Both of them had died on the day I was born.
‘I learned it through my blood and pain.’
After the collateral branch of the Atherion family discovered my bloodline, they experimented on me.
At first, with me and the Lady’s Ring.
And after that, with the sacred relic.
Of course, they never let me actually hold the Lady’s Ring or the relic.
They were always extremely cautious around me.
But they carried out countless experiments using my blood, my hair, bits of my flesh, and more.
Because of that, I knew the powers of the sacred relic and the Lady’s Ring very well.
The corners of my lips curled up.
But I could not laugh out loud.
I was still in the middle of enemy territory.
‘For now, I should make it invisible again. I don’t know what might happen.’
I brought my bloodstained finger toward the blue ring glowing on my hand.
Once my blood touched it, the ring would turn invisible again.
But then—
“!”
Suddenly, the jewel in the ring began to shine with a dazzling blue light!
‘What is this?!’
Soon my vision was swallowed by light, and I could no longer see anything.
From far away, I heard what sounded like someone calling me.
“…my lady.”
The voice became clearer and clearer.
“My lady!”
At that moment, I opened my eyes.
“!”
