Chapter 66

Translator and Editor: Bunny and Einna

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Chapter 66

Before you read, (G)=Grand Duke, (W)=Wyndert, (D)=Deleign, (S)=Shushu, and (C)=Children

As I murmured and pointed out the people inside the sun room one by one, the people around me began to talk among themselves. It must’ve been a surprise to them that a six-year-old little kid had memorized all of the Grand Duke’s family members.

“Look, my daughter is so intelligent,” the Grand Duke said as he hugged me from behind me.

(W) “As expected, our Shushu is amazing.”

(D) “See, my little sister likes studying too!”

My brothers, too, were astounded as if I had done something amazing.

“She’s really wonderful!”

Is it due to the presence of his subordinates that made the Grand Duke want to brag about his daughter? Watching people applaud all at once made me want to hide in embarrassment.

‘Let’s escape!’

Nyam nyam, so I fled for food. I took a peek at the Grand Duke and my older brothers who were continuing their conversation and bragging about me, so I escaped.

I was sitting on a chair quietly, swinging my legs while finally eating a meal to take the place of breakfast and lunch, when I heard someone approaching next to me.

“Excuse me.”

“Huh?”

It was the voice of a young boy.

***

Visteon couldn’t calmly bring his eyes that were wide open back to a normal size and had his eyes fixedly staring at her. The Grand Duke had told him, ‘Shushu is an angel so serve her well, but stay away from her’.

The children gathered on one side as they trembled because they experienced the curse of the Grand Duke for the first time in their lives.

It was a birthday for the Grand Princess whom they had never seen before, but who would have thought that they would want to go home in less than half an hour. The Grand Princess may be just as fearsome as the direct descendants of the Grand Duke.

They exchanged glances as they were too sacred and asked their parents not to bring them again to the Grand Duke’s to meet the Grand Princess. However…

“Wow.”

All of the children were overwhelmed, unable to speak properly and only exclaimed.

She was completely different from the Grand Duke’s direct descendants, who looked terribly terrifying…. She had long, blonde hair that looked as sweet as honey, big, round eyes that looked like a lake with her soft and gentle expression.

Shuelina, who was wearing a strawberry milk colored frill dress with a pink ribbon tie at the top of her head and holding hands with her older brothers, looked very lovely.

It felt like their eyes were attached to Shuelina like a magnet. Visteon opened his mouth widely and continued to stare at Shuelina.

“Theon, can you take the other children over and tell the little princess it’s okay to open the presents?”

(T/N: Theon is Visteon’s nickname. )

That little boy who was stomping his feet inwardly, jumped with joy at the request from his grandfather, the Marquis Atrea. Perhaps because the other children also wanted to get close to Shuelina they started chasing after Visteon.

“Hello. My name is Visteon de Atrea. Can I take up a moment of your time?”

Visteon smiled contentedly as he stared at Shuelina, who was eating.

Her fork looked too big for her slender wrist, which seemed like it would snap at one touch. He felt like he was going crazy to the extent that he wanted to raise the fork and feed her himself, and poke her cheeks that were the chewing meat.

Of course, it wasn’t the job of a gentleman to poke a lady like that no matter how young he is. He tried to calm himself down.

“Nice to meet you. I’m Shuelina.”

Even her voice was cute! It was a baby-like innocent voice, but it was very cute of her to answer like an adult.

“What can I help you with?”

“I’m here to inform you that the adults let us open the presents amongst ourselves.”

“Oh, really!”

Shuelina burst into laughter. He felt their surroundings light up when she laughed softly in a clear and light voice. Visteon held his breath and struggled to cool his reddened face.

(W) “What is this over here?”

But his feeling of floating on the clouds quickly disappeared – because Deleign and Wyndert approached with terrifying expressions upon hearing Shuelina’s laughing voice.

As the two Grand Duke’s sons drew near, the weak children began to tremble.

“Oraboni!”

However, Shuelina wasn’t afraid of them at all, greeting the two with a big smile plastered on her face.

“Little Marquis, you’d better take care of your eyes.”

(T/N: That simply means ‘look away from my cute little sister/stop staring’. Aww, I can’t with this Wyndert hehehe)

Wyndert, who came closer, inched his face close to Visteon’s ear and whispered. Visteon wanted to ask ‘Yes?’ but sadly, Wyndert was quick-witted.

All the boys in the room were sure that they had been warned.

“Come on, let’s go check out the presents together!”

Shuelina spoke kindly and led the children to the podium full of gifts. Anyway, the main event of the birthday party is the gift-opening portion. Everyone stood in a circle as they watched the process of Shuelina peeling off the wrapping paper from the presents.

There were expensive toys, marvelous artifacts, colorful jewels, and even cute pictures and dolls that children will love. There were also luxurious gifts lined up that were diligently prepared by the vassals for her first birthday. The highlight was the presents prepared by her family though.

“Oraboni, this is really pretty…!” Shuelina exclaimed in admiration after unpacking the package and seeing the contents.

There was a small tea set with a delicate rose pattern. It was a set with teacups, a teapot, as well as cream and sugar pots tailored to the size of a small child.

(S) “I’ll use it when I play house! Thank you so much, oraboni!”

(W) “Is there a drink you want to drink now, Shushu?”

(S) “You’ll bring it to me? I’m fine…”

(W) “But still, tell me at least one.”

(S) “Well, then a cold cocoa!”

Wyndert placed Shuelina’s hand on the tea pot’s handle, putting it together then pretended to pour the said drink into the teacup. Then magically, cocoa began to overflow from the teacup.

(C1) “Cocoa suddenly appeared!”

(C2) “A magic tool!”

(C3) “This is my first time seeing something like this!”

The magic tools produced by high-ranking wizards by driving magic stones were priced at an astronomical amount.

Unless you are a high-ranking noble, it is an item that is difficult to see even as a heirloom. Of course, it wasn’t something that children could normally access.

“This is a tool that automatically fills your teacup by producing the type of drink you want if you way it out loud while you pour.”

“Can I just say anything?”

“Of course. I’ll tell you how to use it later.”

Shuelina thought that the tea set would be worth more than her ransom so she carefully placed it back in the box and set it aside.

“Wow! A bracelet!” Shuelina exclaimed in an excited voice as she opened Deleign’s gift afterwards.

It was two pairs of ribbon-shaped bracelets to fit on her two wrists. When Shuelina put on the bracelets, Deleign crossed her wrists over the bracelets so they overlapped.

“Oh, wow!”

Then, when she moved her wrists apart, something like the start of a thread came out from between Shuelina’s hands, and it started to clump together like clouds.

“Oh, I know what that is! It’s cotton candy!”

Someone shouted in a voice full of admiration. Cotton candy that was made by melting sugar and pulling it thin like a very long thread, was so expensive that you can’t eat it easily. (E/N: Might be closer to dragon’s beard than cotton candy but they’re really similar)

Delaine’s gift was a magic tool that made cotton candy in an instant!

Shuelina was very cute, making cotton candy while waving her hands around ecstatically.

“Let’s all share!”

Shuelina made plenty of cotton candy, and gave some to each of the children. After receiving the sweet cotton candy, the children’s cheeks were full of happiness.

‘Oh, what should I do?’

Meanwhile, Eve had a dark expression on her face which contrasted strongly amongst the children gathered here. Her complexion turned pale as she looked at the splendid and expensive luxuries laid out one after another on the podium.

She only prepared a ring that she made with great care. It was woven from small wildflowers and was small and cute, but honestly, it wasn’t something worthy of the Grand Princess.

‘I will be in big trouble…!’

Her family ran out of money but they couldn’t come empty-handed, so she had to bring it, but it seems like it was a wrong choice. It would be nice if they would only laugh at her. She may even be told things like, ‘Do you hold contempt against the Grand Princess?’.

‘Even now…’

Eve stared anxiously at the small box placed near the edge of the podium. She eventually made a decision and reached out carefully to snatch it back.

“Huh?” but then her eyes trembling with tension met Shuelina’s bewildered eyes.

Eve was so startled that she dropped the gift she barely held in her hand onto the floor. She looked tearfully at the gift that was tossed away.

‘Oh my God! Will she think that I am stealing?’

As she was nagging herself with her head hung down, she felt a tug on the hem of her clothes. Eve turned her head with a yelp, and she couldn’t help but take a deep breath in surprise.

Shuelina suddenly approached and stood beside her.

“Excuse me.”

“Y-yes, Princess.”

Unable to relax and answer carefully, Shuelina reached out her small hand and beckoned her over. Eve felt like Shuelina was asking for her to bow down her head a bit.

“Hey, is there something wrong?”

Shuelina whispered softly into Eve’s ear with her head bowed. She must’ve seen her touching the gift earlier.

It was enough to be misunderstood. It would also be understandable if she yelled at her angrily about why she was touching the gift right now.

However, Shuelina seemed to have come to quietly ask about it.

‘She’s such a kind person, but I can’t even congratulate her on her birthday… I’m an idiot.’

Eve’s face turned red from embarrassment from not preparing a proper gift.

“Ah! What’s this!”

A boy suddenly shouted. Eve turned her head reflexively, but her heart sank as she took a step back – her gift was in his hand.

“What piece of dried grass is this?”

Gift wrapping also had its own fads in high society.

This season’s fashion was to wrap gifts in expensive silk and decorate them with ribbons lavishly tied like flowers.

Eve, who could not obtain neither silk nor high-quality ribbons, had no choice but to decorate the gift with pressed flowers.

Knowing that the princess was going to have a birthday party, she picked the prettiest flowers and carefully pressed and dried her pressed flowers into pieces of ribbon.

‘It’s unfortunate…’

She felt miserable in an instant. By any chance, will they reveal her present here and will she be ridiculed by the public? She wanted to say that it was from another person, but it was impossible. Eve already knew that.

“I can’t believe that this was a gift worthy of the princess’s dignity… who was it?”

However, what she prepared wasn’t even treated as a gift. She forgot to think while being stuck in a state of being as stiff as a stone.

“Eh, what is that? It must be … from that young lady.”

“You really came up with something like that?”

She realized receiving their malice wasn’t that unexpected as she heard their little whispers around her. After all, her family was a wimp compared to the Grand Duchy’s social circle.

She is so poor that she was barely protecting her title, and everyone must be sure that it was prepared by the Hazel family. Eve lowered her head.

“It’s mine.”

At that moment, Shuelina stepped out in front of Eve and held out her hand.

“Give it to me.”

“Uh, uh… y-yes.”

Shuelina smiled very lovingly. It was a face that was saying ‘You will give it to me, right?’. Unable to refuse the Grand Princess’ words, the boy stuttered with a puzzled voice and offered her the present.

(E/N: Eve seems really cute, I hope she and Shushu become friends! Also, I wonder if Visteon is a ML candidate.)

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