Chapter 2

Translator: HH Editor: HH

“Uwaa.”

My entire body quivered when I heard rumors about the person who’s supposed to be my dad.

The only information I had about him was from the maids, but that guy was a total psycho. It was so obvious what kind of guy he was when I heard the maid unnies whispering.

The place that I lived was called was the Ruby Palace, and it was where the Emperor’s concubines lived.

In other words it was the Emperor’s harem. But for some reason, one day, the Emperor killed everyone here.

No one knew the reason why to this day.

My mother, Diana, was a dancer who was invited to the Emperor’s royal banquet and she had caught his attention, but afterwards, she was forgotten by him and birthed me.

Diana was a lowly commoner, so she couldn’t even be an official concubine of the Emperor. Then she died leaving me behind.

And since then, the Emperor’s sole bloodline, me, has been abandoned here ever since. And so I was raised by the maids who were in the Ruby Palace.

Hmm, now that I say it like that it seems like we’re a real mess of a family. No, all else aside, just what in the world is the Emperor doing leaving his only child here?

Anyways, so I was living in the castle where a violent massacre had taken place.

Shiver. After first hearing that story, I had nightmares every night. You had to be really evil to put a baby like me in this place.

However, I was more scared of the Emperor I never met than this castle where literal horror stories took place. What if he was like ‘Oh yeah!’ and suddenly came over to kill everyone here? I just got to be a princess, but my life was already really hard.

“Ung-aung.”

Oh right. Did I already mention my name? In my last life, the manager of the orphanage had given me a random name that he found in his contacts, but in this life, my mother had named me herself.

And that name was Athanasia. It was a fancy name meaning ‘immortal.’

Lilian told me last night, and I thought it was an extravagant name for an outcast princess like me.

And it was also the same name as the unlucky princess in

My mother probably named me that so I would be able to hold my ground and survive against the Emperor but….

Cough. But the Athanasia in the novel had died a tragic death at 18 and the name made me a bit uncomfortable.

And she died by the hands of her own father!

“Uhuh.”

So when I opened my eyes today, I kept on glancing over at the door in fear that my father was going to storm in.

At that moment, the door suddenly opened and I was completely scared out of my wits. But thankfully, it was just my maids. The maid unnies looked over at me like I was a complete nuisance.

“Sheesh, she’s still not sleeping.”

“Do we have to stay here? It’s not like she can move.”

“You know Lilian will make a big deal out of it. It’s so annoying.”

There they go again. They always bully me like that. It’s not like you’re much better than me anyways, since you’re stuck here too.

“We can just think of it as a break and leave later.”

“What if she starts crying?”

“Rock her cradle so she starts sleeping.”

Wow, if someone heard them, they would think I always cry. If there’s a baby as nice and quiet as me, I’d like to see if there is one!

Lilian was always worrying about me since I was always gurgling instead of crying, but these maids always said those things whenever they saw me.

It was obvious they looked down on me because the Emperor never sought for me.

But was I sad? Of course not! My goal was to continue living like this. I would get along just fine with all the gold in this room. So please forget about me.

“Even if the Emperor doesn’t care about her she gets to live a good life because she’s a princess.”

And the grumbling maids were right. I still got 3 square meals a day even if it was only infant formula. My bed was warm and soft. And most of all, there was gold everywhere.

If I continued living like this, it wasn’t too bad, cause I was still a princess.

Once I grew a little bit older, I was going to run away with the gold.

So first, let’s just out of this crib first. Like Lillian said, I would eat well and sleep well to grow up faster.

I kicked furiously to grow some strength in my legs.

‘It’s just a candle against the wind. Anyone could kill me right now.’

“Yeah..I can’t believe we were assigned here…Did you hear? That a ghost appears every night in the kitchen.”

“I just got goosebumps. We might end up like that too.”

The maids continued to whisper, glancing at me occasionally.

It wasn’t like I didn’t understand them.

Even I didn’t like living in this palace where people were killed. I’ll escape as soon as I gather the funds!

I once again promised myself.

***

“Hehe.”

I was feeling really good right now! As I laughed at the object in front of my face, Lily looked at me contently

“Do you like it that much?”

“Ah lik!”

Shiny gold. How pretty.

I was so excited about the gold ball Lily gave me. I screamed in laughter and made cute gestures. Lily kissed my cheek as if she was happy.

As time passed, I was able to crawl around the room. I look at the objects around me in greed.

It seemed like a palace was definitely a palace. There was splendor everywhere, and it was overly fancier than it needed to be. But this was all real gold and jewels, right?

As I kept trying to touch the gold decorations and jewels, Lily thought I liked shiny things.

And after that, she brought me a gold rattle and a mobile. My eyes widened. The palace was fancy because people used to live here, but all my toys were poorly made because of the lack of money.

“I’ll bring you something else once you get sick of it.”

Lily’s pretty face looked even more beautiful today.

“Gya. Ohowa.”

I was playing with the ball Lily brought me on the carpet. I wasn’t able to walk yet, so Lily had placed me on the floor so I could at least roll around.

I’ll take good care of this ball so I can take it with me later. Hehe. Oops, I drooled.

The days in the place were peaceful. It seemed like the Emperor really forgot about me.

The maids were all nervous, but now they were all relaxed too. Although the ghost story about the ghost in the kitchen continued to be told.

I hoped I could walk quickly. Then I’ll be able to gather money to run away. I don’t know if it was just me, but I kept on getting the feeling that the decorations in my room were disappearing one by one.

Maybe they’re storing it away because they think I might hurt myself by dropping it? No no no. Give me my gold back!

“Uwaa!”

I let out a loud cry while I was playing with my gold ball.

My butt felt wet. It’s embarrassing, but I gotta get my diaper changed!

***

The Magician of the Tower is the strongest out of all the magicians.”

I was in Lily’s lap, reading a fairy tale. But it wasn’t just a fairy tale, it was basically a condensed history book with lots of images.

I liked reading it since I was curious about this place, but usually kids my age didn’t understand information like this.

Hm. Seems like Lily’s interested in early education.

But the book Lily read to me was super interesting so I was quietly listening. Especially the existence of magicians!

There’s magicians in this world! Wow, this world didn’t seem normal and it really wasn’t.

“Ooh wah!”

I pointed at an image in the book. There was a black top that was covered in thorny vines.

“They say that if the Magician of the Tower wants to, he can easily get rid of an entire empire.”

I was excited about hearing about magicians. I want to see! I want to see magic!

“And that’s why they intentionally freeze their own hearts.”

Finally the boring history book seemed like a fairy tale. What Lily told me about the Magician of the Tower was super interesting.

I had something else I definitely wanted to do. I’m going to see a magic with my own two eyes

I listen to The Other Stories Lily read to me with a pounding heart. then something caught my eye.

“Wa dis?”

What’s this?