Chapter 111
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Dear, I believe you may be misunderstanding.
Chapter 111
'I... I...!'
Norman, who had been gaping as if desperate to say something, turned deathly pale and scrambled away the moment Elenoa reached toward him.
Mother's gaze remained fixed on Norman's retreating figure.
* * *
Clatter.
'Ugh...!'
Grace Oellin's spoon fell to the floor.
The child's face had turned ashen as she clutched her belly, gasping for breath in shallow, pained pants.
'Ah... I remember now. My stomach hurt so badly while eating soup that I cried.'
The pain had been so severe that even through the haze of memory, I broke into a cold sweat, unable to cry out loud.
I could only tremble, releasing thin whimpers.
'Miss! What's wrong? Does your stomach hurt?'
Elia, who had been attending to the child's lunch, rushed over urgently.
Grace Oellin could only groan, unable to form words.
'Wait just a moment. I'll fetch Madam!'
Elia hurried back with Elenoa.
'M... m... mother...'
Grace Oellin, without thinking, clung to the white hem of Elenoa's skirt and burst into tears.
It was a pain that twisted her very insides.
It felt as though invisible hands had reached into her belly and were wringing it mercilessly.
Then Norman entered.
'If you leave her like that, she might die.'
Norman declared triumphantly, waving the green bottle he held in his hand.
'Unless she takes this.'
Elenoa's cool gaze turned toward Norman.
'Go on, beg, Grace Oellin. Beg like the worthless thief you are and apologize! And then get out of this mansion!'
Young Grace Oellin had nearly lost consciousness.
Cold sweat had drenched her dress in an instant—the pain she was enduring was so severe that even onlookers felt their hearts ache.
Tears streaming down her face from the agony, Grace Oellin reflexively crawled toward Norman, who held the medicine.
'Don't go, Grace Oellin. You don't have to do that.'
Elenoa gently pulled her daughter's hand and drew her into her embrace.
'M... mother, mother.'
Elenoa looked down at her young daughter, whose face was streaked with cold sweat and tears, her expression pained.
Soon her hand moved gently to caress Grace Oellin's belly.
'It's alright. You'll be fine soon, Grace Oellin. It's alright... Mother will make it better.'
As Elenoa rubbed Grace Oellin's belly in circular motions, a faint light seeped into the child's abdomen.
And remarkably, the pain subsided almost instantly.
'Mother....'
The moment the pain subsided, young Grace collapsed into unconsciousness in her mother's arms.
Elenoa soothed Grace and handed her over to Elia.
'Lay her in my room.'
'Yes, madam.'
Elia lowered her gaze as if she had seen nothing and disappeared with Grace in her arms.
Now only Elenoa and Norman remained in that space.
'W-what are you?'
Norman cried out urgently, staring blankly at how Elenoa had erased Grace's pain in an instant.
'You witch! You're a witch!'
Norman pointed his finger accusingly, his face contorted.
'Norman, you're a child yourself—why are you tormenting Grace, who's even younger than you?'
'I'm no child. I am Norman Oellin, the firstborn heir of the Oellin Family!'
Norman declared arrogantly, lifting his chin high.
Elenoa regarded him with an expression of utter incomprehension.
'What does being Norman Oellin have to do with tormenting Grace?'
'Because she's a foreign element!'
'...A foreign element?'
Elenoa repeated coldly.
'Y-yes! She needs to disappear! You should stop coddling her too. When I become the master of this Estate, I'll remove her first! If you want to remain the Marquess's wife, abandon her. She's of no use to you whatsoever!'
Norman trembled with fear yet spoke with stubborn conviction.
'Come to your senses! You are the wife of Marquess Oellin! The Oellin!'
Just then, Elenoa's eyes widened as if she had grasped something.
'You... only hate Grace.'
'....'
'You wish only for Grace to disappear.'
Norman said nothing in response to her murmur.
He merely breathed heavily and glared at Elenoa.
As Elenoa observed him, she perceived something.
Norman had tormented young Grace and ranted for her to vanish, yet he had never once said such things to Elenoa.
The only one Norman wished would disappear from this Estate was Grace alone.
...So that was it.
Norman wanted to eliminate Grace and take her place in her mother's embrace.
Yes. That was it.
Even this greedy and cruel Norman had desperately yearned for someone's affection.
Elenoa let out a hollow laugh as if finding it absurd, then slowly approached Norman.
Norman flinched but did not retreat.
Rather, he watched Elenoa approach with a slightly flushed face.
'I'm sorry, but without Grace, I have no reason to live.'
'...What?'
'So stop tormenting Grace, Norman.'
Elenoa extended her hand toward Norman.
As that pale, delicate hand drew near, Norman found himself unable to tear his gaze away, as though entranced.
That hand only ever rose to stroke Grace's hair or caress her cheek.
Within that hand lay the warmth of a 'mother'—something Norman had never once experienced in his entire life.
He craved it with maddening intensity.
As the firstborn of a distinguished Marquess House, he possessed everything, yet this one thing eluded him.
And that made him all the more bitter, all the more covetous.
A mother's love? No, that wasn't what he yearned for.
Norman simply could not bear it.
The fact that there existed something he did not possess.
Yet that wretched vermin living under the same roof held the one thing he could never have.
Norman despised it with a hatred so profound it consumed him.
The 'mother's' hand touched Norman for the first time.
'No one will ever love you if you continue like this, Norman.'
The moment that warm hand pressed against his abdomen, Norman seized it desperately and spoke.
'Just pretend she never existed! That girl is worthless, completely useless!'
'...And you have value?'
'Of course I do! I'm the only eldest son of this Estate! A man is far superior to a girl!'
'How amusing... as if a mere difference in anatomy makes such a grand distinction.'
Elenoa chuckled softly, her hand gently caressing Norman's abdomen.
Norman's face, which had been gazing at her hand as though under a spell, began to contort slowly.
'A... aaaahhh!'
He gasped for breath, clutching at his stomach.
The very pain he had inflicted upon Grace moments before now transferred to Norman's abdomen.
'Do not torment that child. No matter what you do, you will never replace her.'
'I'll... I'll kill you!'
'Remember this... if you continue to torment her, I will make you suffer tenfold, Norman.'
Elenoa's hand caressed Norman's abdomen once more.
With a ghastly pallor spreading across his face, Norman let out a strangled gasp and curled inward.
He writhed and crawled across the floor.
As Elenoa observed Norman's trousers darkening with moisture, she murmured coldly.
'As you said... I am a witch.'
Norman's eyes flooded with blood.
Elenoa passed by his side with utter indifference as he wept and thrashed about.
'...I won't... I won't let this go. I won't forgive... this.'
From Norman's lips, as he stared after the retreating Elenoa like a madman, poured those words without cease.
And that very night, Norman—his eyes now devoid of all reason—crept into Grace's chamber.
* * *
The blade of the pale blue scissors gleamed beneath the moonlight.
Norman stood pacing beside young Grace's bed, his eyes rolled back in madness, scissors clutched in his trembling hand.
'...I'll kill her. I'll kill her. I can kill her. If I kill her, my heart will feel so much lighter.'
With hands quivering uncontrollably, Norman gripped the scissors and made the motion of striking down toward Grace's face again and again.
'You worthless thing.... You worthless thing!'
As Norman's teeth clenched, the moment clouds obscured the moonlight, his hand holding the scissors moved with terrible force.
And in that instant, young Grace's closed eyes snapped open.
'...!"
The sickening sound of skin tearing, and a small body writhing and crying out in sudden agony.
And the bed, drenched in blood....
Clang.
The scissors Norman had brought fell onto the cold floor.
Norman stared down at his trembling, blood-stained hands, unable to comprehend what he had done.
Just then, the door burst open and Elenoa rushed in.
'You, you! What have you done!'
Elenoa shoved Norman aside with a fierce expression and cradled Grace.
'Oh, my baby. My baby!'
'Mother, mother. Mother, my eyes, they're burning, they're, ugh...! Mother!'
'No. No. My baby!'
'Y-you, you sh-shouldn't have, you sh-shouldn't have touched me, you!'
Norman screamed from where he had collapsed on the floor.
Elenoa's eyes blazed with murderous intent as she glared at Norman.
Her body lunged forward, pinning him down.
Cold hands seized Norman's throat.
'Gack! Ga, gack!'
'You're a demon. A demon...! You deserve to die!'
'P-please...!'
Struggling desperately, Norman's hand found the scissors he had dropped.
His face had gone deathly pale, as though he might expire at any moment.
Norman gripped the scissors with all his remaining strength.
And he raked them across Elenoa's eyes.
Screech!
Crimson blood erupted, pouring down over Norman's face.
Yet Elenoa's hand did not release its grip on Norman's throat.
Elia, who had come running in her nightclothes, let out a piercing scream at the sight.
'My lady! Miss!'
'W-what in the world!'
Marquess Oellin, jolted awake, came rushing in and stared at the blood-soaked scene with a stunned expression.
It was Elia who regained her senses first.
'M-Madam! If you leave her like this, the young lady will die!'
At those words, Elenoa, who had been strangling Norman, came to her senses.
She rushed toward Grace.
Whether from the pain or the blood loss, Grace had already lost consciousness.
'No, no. No...!'
Elenoa pulled Grace into her arms, completely oblivious to the blood streaming from her own eyes.
And she immediately fled the mansion.
The Marquess tried to chase after her, but he couldn't catch her.
When Elenoa reached the open field, she hurled the bead from the bracelet on her wrist to the ground.
Moments later, a man appeared.
'Please! Please save this child! Please, I'll do anything!'
'....'
A small body limp with fatal wounds.
A half-witch drenched in blood.
The golden-haired man looked back and forth between Elenoa and the child.
'I'll do anything. Anything! Please!'
Elenoa pleaded, tears of blood streaming down her face.
Throughout the desperate rush here, she had poured all her power into Grace, but the child would not wake.
Why wouldn't she heal?
Why wouldn't consciousness return to her?
Elenoa clung to Rudiger's legs, crying out as if screaming.
Rudiger, who had maintained his silence, finally spoke.
'...Anything?'
Elenoa's head snapped up.
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Brought to you by Valir Scans! To support our team and enjoy the latest releases, please read directly on our official site: valirscans.org
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