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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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Chapter 79
"If I truly am their daughter, if I truly am their family, then why...!"
It was supposed to be a ‌‌‌‌blessed day—the day of my ‌‌‌first awakening as a beast tamer.
Yet on that very day, I was abandoned by my father, stripped of my core by my older ‌‌‌brother, and cast into the Cold Palace.
Those three years, alone in the Cold Palace where not a single ray of light penetrated.
What tormented me more than the maidservants' cruelty was....
What hurt more than losing my core was....
What was harder to bear than the cold, the pain, the hunger was....
The loneliness and despair that seeped into my ‌very bones, gnawing at me relentlessly.
In that place, I yearned for ‌‌‌the father who abandoned me, yearned for ‌the older brother who never came.
Yearning and yearning until loneliness consumed those three long years of waiting, I clung to them alone.
Yet in the end, my family turned away from me, and with Riri's single word asking them to dispose of me, they abandoned me forever.
"Why did I have to suffer such a fate?"
―....
"If they were truly family...! If they were truly family, why did they...! Why did they do this to me...!"
My ‌‌‌older brother Hyeon had said it.
True family cherishes and protects one another, no matter what form they take.
But they—those bound to me by blood—did not.
They despised me terribly, treated ‌‌me with contempt, persecuted me, and ultimately cast me away.
I no longer considered them family.
Yet I felt the injustice of ‌‌it all.
My lost years, irretrievable and unrecompensed, were so heartbreaking, so bitter, so unbearably unjust.
[But great power demands great sacrifice. The heavens are sometimes cruelly just and fair.]
Suddenly, words Tae Irim had spoken three years ago echoed in my mind.
If my abandonment by family was the price for awakening a divine beast, the price for wielding such power.
"It's too cruel."
Tears streamed down.
"It's too heartbreaking, too terrible."
Hot tears flowed down my cheeks.
Even as I wept, the visions of the past unfolded endlessly before my ‌‌‌eyes.
The Lady of the House, who ‌‌had seemed to recover briefly, deteriorated once ‌‌more.
―The purifying flames could not save one already destined to die, but they could extend life for a time.
The Lady of the ‌‌House survived the night the Physician had called critical, endured ten more days, and closed her eyes in the family head's embrace.
Even at the end, wiping away tears of worry for the young Jeok ‌‌Soya ‌she was leaving behind....
"...."
I opened ‌‌‌‌and closed my eyes painfully.
Soon ‌‌‌the illusion conjured by the flames faded, and crimson feathers scattered gently around me.
I slowly raised both hands.
The purifying flames blooming in my palms blazed forth as if to consume the entire world.
I closed my eyes and collapsed.
"Soya...!"
With that desperate call, my memory faded to ‌‌black.
* * ‌‌*
I suffered through a growth spurt.
My head throbbed relentlessly, and my entire body felt weightless, as ‌‌‌though I were caught in the grip of a fever.
This first unexpected growth spurt was truly agonizing.
For ‌‌‌‌most of the ordeal, I drifted in and out of consciousness, and whenever I came to, Father was ‌‌always there beside me.
"F...Father..."
I called out for him in a hoarse, fractured voice.
"Father, Father... Don't leave me alone. I ‌‌don't want to be ‌‌by myself. It's so cold and frightening."
I wept uncontrollably, reaching for him endlessly.
"It's alright, my little cotton ball. Father is here."
Sayeon soothed me with a deeply pained expression.
"Father is right beside you. Don't cry."
Each time his hand patted my shoulder, I would swallow my rising ‌‌sobs with hiccups, ‌‌only to pour them out again in anguish. ‌‌
Father, Father, Father... ‌‌
I, I...
I'm so cold and scared...
Don't hate me. I've done wrong...
Next time... next time I'll surely succeed. I'll do it brilliantly...
So...
"My little cotton ball has done nothing wrong. Father doesn't hate you."
"Hic, sob. But. But..."
"I love you more than anything in this ‌‌‌world, my child."
Those strongest arms in the world wrapped around me tightly.
"Father loves my little cotton ball more than ‌anything in this world."
"Sob, hic, sob, hic..."
Yet Father wore such a pained expression.
So I shouldn't ‌‌‌‌cry.
But the ‍‌‌tears kept coming, my heart so heavy.
"Father, Father, Father..."
Though my hazy mind couldn't fathom why I felt so sorrowful, I simply clung to Sayeon and ‌‌‌‌wept.
"Father..."
I sobbed like a child in his embrace.
When the brief but intense growth spurt finally ended and I opened my eyes again.
I realized I was lying in my chamber at Baek Ho Palace.
"Father...!"
I gasped in alarm and bolted upright.
I froze.
I found Sayeon kneeling beside my bed, his head buried against it as he ‌‌‌‌lay slumped over.
"Ah...." ‌
Jeok Soya's vacant gaze gradually ‌‌‌‌‌sharpened as reality reasserted itself.
"Why am I here...."
What happened?
I was fighting the poison beetle, and then....
I met Phoenix and obtained the purifying flame....
It was so hot and painful....
Did Father stay by ‌‌‌my side the entire time I was suffering? But....
"Cotton ball?"
At the sound of Jeok Soya's presence, Sayeon lifted his head groggily.
"Father, why am I...."
She murmured in bewilderment, when suddenly a single crimson feather caught her ‌‌‌‌eye.
"...?"
At the sight of Jeok Soya blinking in confusion, Sayeon let out a deflated chuckle and picked ‌up the feather.
"Impressive, isn't it, cotton ball? Your feather shimmers like a ‌‌‌flame."
He then held the feather out to her with a ‌‌‌grin.
"Congratulations on your growth, little cotton ball."
"...!"
Shock bloomed across Jeok Soya's face.
"What's wrong? Why are ‌‌‌you so quiet? I thought now that you've grown, you'd protest being called little cotton ball anymore."
Sayeon asked in a playful tone.
"Are you that pleased with your first growth?"
"...."
Yet Jeok Soya could not answer easily.
She had noticed the wounds covering Father's body.
Sharp scratches as ‌‌if ‌‌from a chick's talons and red marks that ‌looked like burn wounds were scattered across Sayeon's skin.
"Father, these...."
Jeok Soya's voice trembled as she seized Sayeon's ‌‌‌wrist, where the scars were ‌‌‌‌particularly deep.
"Ah."
Sayeon flinched and tried ‌to hide his wrist, but Jeok Soya had already seen everything.
"I ‌‌‌‌did this to you, didn't I?"
"No, this is...."
"I did this, didn't I? That's right, isn't it? I hurt Father, didn't I?"
I had heard that demihumans undergoing growth pains become violent and aggressive.
That was what I had done.
I had lost my reason and attacked Father.
"That's ‌‌not it, little cotton ball."
"How is ‌‌‌it not? It's true, isn't it? I hurt Father...."
Whoosh―
Jeok Soya's trembling form was drawn into his broad embrace.
"Father wasn't hurting at all."
Sayeon patted the child's back to comfort ‌‌‌him.
"What parent would feel pain ‌watching their child grow so magnificently?"
At those words, Jeok Soya's throat tightened painfully.
The man who gave me his blood abandoned me simply because I lacked those crimson feathers.
Yet this father who picked me up tells me that everything about me is fine, that everything about ‌‌‌‌me is wonderful.
Even if I grew slower than others.
Even without those crimson feathers, or even with them.
Even though I caused him pain....
"Thank you for growing so beautifully, my precious child." ‌‌‌
He smiled gently at ‌‌‌‌me and thanked me.
"Sob, sniff, waahhh...!"
After the prolonged growing pains that came from developing slower than others, Jeok Soya burst into tears once more in her father's embrace.

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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
---------------