Chapter 58

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

Translator: Harry Potta

Chapter: 58

Chapter Title: The Lone Maid (2)

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

For the first time in my life, I found myself wondering how they were faring. I'd thought they were worse than strangers, but blood is blood, after all. Maybe my heart had weakened from the gnawing hunger and exhaustion.

In the end, I returned to Pilton. Looking back now, it was a pointless trip. But at the time, it felt like my only shred of hope.

I figured Father and my youngest sister, Alicia, must be living it up. After all, they'd gotten a hefty sum of gold from selling me off. They probably forgot all about their suddenly useful eldest daughter amid their lavish spending. They might even have left Pilton altogether.

The house I returned to was on the verge of collapse, utterly desolate, with no signs of life inside. If I hadn't run into someone approaching the house just then, I might have assumed as much.

I froze in shock when I saw her disheveled clothes and tear-streaked face. It was Alicia, my once so delicate and pretty little sister.

"Alicia?"

"Who... Sis?"

Alicia spotted me and went rigid. But only for a moment—she dropped the basket she was carrying and rushed over, grabbing my shoulders and shaking me violently.

"This is all your fault! Your fault!"

"H-Hey, wait, what! Let go!"

My head bobbed up and down. I was already drained to the bone, and now Alicia was turning my insides upside down. Finally, I shoved her away, and she toppled backward far too easily. She hit the ground hard on her rear and burst into tears. I stared in bewilderment. My haughty, arrogant little sister was sobbing pitifully, snot and tears streaming down her face.

I coaxed her inside and asked what had happened in my absence.

"Who came looking?"

"I don't know. Some strange men came asking for you. Even after Father said he had no idea and that you'd been out of touch for ages, they kept coming back, and there were a few scuffles."

My breath caught in my throat. Was it the butler? He'd picked me up from Pilton himself, so he knew where I lived. Or... maybe Vincent was searching for me? I couldn't be sure. It could be someone else entirely. Everything felt suspicious now. Whatever it was, it wasn't a good sign.

"Did they say why?"

"Yeah. They asked where you were and said they'd pay if you came here and I told them. But how would I know?"

"I see... What about Father?"

I glanced around, searching for that devil spawn who'd been missing since I arrived. He should have been home by now, but there was no sign of him.

"He's dead."

"...What?"

I whipped around to stare at Alicia in astonishment.

"It's been a while."

She said it so calmly that for a split second, I thought she was joking. The news was that unbelievable.

"Wh-when? Don't tell me it was those guys?"

"No. He blew through the gold from selling you on gambling and booze, then passed out in the street one night and froze to death."

"..."

It was a death too pathetic to even speak of.

Alicia hadn't retrieved Father's body. When I asked why, she said there was nowhere to put a frozen corpse, so she'd left it outside briefly, but wild animals had picked it clean overnight. How starved they must have been to leave no trace. It was a fitting end for the man who'd killed his own children and survived.

"No gold left?"

"None. He spent it all before he died."

"How have you been surviving?"

"How do you think? With Father gone and you vanished, what choice did I have? I had to earn my own keep. But there's nothing I can do. I begged for work at Aunt Benny's farm across the way, but they fired me after one day. Said I was useless."

Alicia sniffled and huddled into herself. She poured out the hardships she'd endured since Father died, spilling her grievances like a dam bursting. It was a tale of woe that brought tears to my eyes. With nothing but her pretty face and slender figure, Alicia had no skills to offer. Her proud nature wouldn't let her bow to anyone, either.

My little sister looked nothing like her former self. Her clothes were rags, her once-lustrous hair a tangled mess, her snow-white skin rough and weathered. Even her delicate hands and feet were scratched and swollen.

"Sis, what are we gonna do now? How do we survive?"

Alicia looked utterly spent, on the verge of crumbling. I couldn't bear to leave my fragile sister behind. Maybe my heart was soft from everything, but in that moment, I pitied her. Our upbringing—Father's and mine—had to bear some blame for how she'd turned out.

"We'll survive like we used to."

"How?"

"We'll find work, somehow."

There was no reason to stay. I took Alicia and left Pilton right away. The house wasn't fit for living anymore, and we had to flee from whoever might come looking for me. We headed for Novelle, the kingdom's bustling heart and grandest city.

I thought Novelle would be teeming with jobs. But even there, we found nothing we could do on the spot. No place to stay, either. I dragged Alicia from shop to shop, begging for work, but no one would hire women of uncertain background. The only places that would were the brothels.

"Not you—the pretty one."

"No way!"

Even they only wanted Alicia, after brushing her off. She freaked out, refusing flat-out and threatening to die before she'd do it. It took all my energy to calm her down.

We went back to sleeping rough and scavenging trash bins to scrape by. Alicia stopped whining once she grasped how dire things were.

Days dragged on in exhaustion, each tomorrow as grueling as the last. Then Alicia spiked a raging fever, making everything worse. Watching her teeter on the brink of death, I pounded on doors, screaming for help. But everyone turned us away.

No one offered aid. We were ignored, as expected. It hurt all the more, filling me with dread. All I could do was watch Alicia gasp for air—powerless, pathetic.

What if even Alicia leaves me?

What then, all alone?

Life alone in that mansion had terrified me. Would anyone remember me if I died? Who would even notice? That fear consumed me. The thought of dying unnoticed, unlamented—it was heartbreaking.

That's why I sought out my family. Father was gone, leaving only the sister I'd hated. But that was okay. Keeping Alicia close wasn't just to fend off loneliness. It was fear. If my last blood kin left too, I'd truly be alone—and I didn't have the strength to endure it. I'd grown that weak.

I hammered on every door like a madwoman. After my knuckles swelled from the effort, one finally opened by miracle. An elderly couple stared at me wide-eyed.

Thanks to their kindness, Alicia got a bed and treatment. They were gentle even to filthy, reeking girls like us.

I'd never dreamed of such kindness, no matter how desperately I wished for it. Yet here it was—I survived on the charity of strangers.

"You'll find work easier in the village next door."

Following the couple's advice, we headed to a small village beside Novelle. Tucked away in such an out-of-the-way spot, I wondered if it even existed—but it was larger than expected. Deeper in, toward the woods, we found abandoned houses turned into a slum for folks like us with nowhere else to go.

That's where we settled. I snagged manual labor gigs by mingling with the village women. Most folks here commuted to Novelle for day jobs. For nobodies like us, it was brute force work—and cheap labor, at that.

Hard to get your foot in the door at first, but once you did, connections kept the jobs flowing.

It was no different from Pilton life—easy to adapt. I was used to the grind. Manual labor was a breeze.

Alicia griped about the deeper poverty, but complaints changed nothing. To live, you earn; to earn, you toil. She'd never worked a day in her life, so she fell sick often, forcing me to cover her share too.

Three years passed like that. One day, while walking, I overheard news of them by chance. Seasons cycled—new shoots greened, flowers bloomed and withered—until Pilton felt a distant memory.

Sometimes I wondered. Were they well? How were they living? He—Vincent...

Maybe I'd run into them someday by sheer luck. Brushing past on the street, or reuniting at a job through some connection. But since leaving the Bellunita estate, I hadn't seen them once. Instead, I caught snippets of news through newspapers.

That was it. All there was.

Five years since leaving the Bellunita mansion. I'd been too busy surviving to dwell on it. Those memories faded into mere reminiscences. They say time polishes recollections into something beautiful.

Already five years.

"I'll bring you back to my side. No matter what."

No—five years had slipped by since then.

"She probably doesn't even remember me now."

My mutter vanished on the wind. Time lost to memories grew shorter by the day. Looming reality demanded attention first.

My hand-to-mouth existence snapped without warning. No food in sight. Skipping one meal was fine, but not for long. As hunger stretched, Alicia started whining.

I scraped together every last coin and headed to a street baker. Street bread was stale and tasteless, but cheap enough to buy often.

But even one was out of reach with what I had.

"Anything cheaper?"

"This is the cheapest."

I sighed. Couldn't even afford this lousy bread. Poverty wrung a lament from me.

As I hesitated, the vendor eyed me up and down, then pointed aside.

"Give me that, and I'll toss in three of my best loaves."

He was pointing at the ribbon tying my hair. Somehow, he'd zeroed in on my one valuable possession.

I wavered. It held precious memories. Faded and worn now, but the emotions from receiving it lingered in my heart. I'd never taken it off since.

But hunger won out.

After a moment's pause, I undid the ribbon and handed it over.