I Didn’t Mean To Save The Villain - Chapter 7 – I Became The Youngest Princess Of Asuramasura (6)

“…Cecil?”

“I don’t-?”

Mother and Sister turned toward me. I avoided their eyes by stabbing the fork I was holding.

‘Please don’t take notice.’

Should we let them misunderstand it as a child’s exclamation?

‘No, they might not listen to me anymore in the future.’

I am sick and fed up and not taken seriously because I am a baby, when in reality I understand what they are talking about.

‘…Yeah, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to appear gifted at this point. I don’t even need to act like one.’

It wasn’t part of my plan, but I decided it was better to make use of this opportunity.

Wouldn’t a bright, gifted child appear more adorable than an ordinary one?

I decided to take the risk, holding on to the affection and trust they’ve given me. I don’t have a Divine Power, so I need a selling point—Leverage.

“Burn it. The! Dis! Cri! Mi! Na! Tion!”

“…Discrimination?”

Grace barely realized what I was spouting.

“The number of knights has gone down.”

“…Right. We lost more than half of the Holy Knights on the battlefield.”

Grace’s face was still blank… It would have been unheard of for her youngest sister, who had only been considered a baby, to say thoughts like this.

“…Oh my god, Cecil.”

Mother, forgive me. It’s not my intention to show off like this.

“Madam, try it, please.”

“Faith… need to recover…”

Instead of replying vocally, I nodded my head vigorously. I would have liked to speak longer if I could, but thinking about it embarrassed me.

‘Adults will understand it on their own.’

Having a chance again at life, I didn’t understand the division of the deaths between nobles and commoners. It’s not like commoners do not have families…

Maybe because I lived as a commoner in my past life, I was better equipped to empathize with them.

“If you don’t give out good treatment, don’t expect a good return.”

“If you are not treated well… the Holy Knights will not recover.”

Grace mumbled, pondering the point I had made.

“Actually, we have to recruit as much as we lost—more than half of the Holy Knights in this upheaval. If there is discrimination in the treatment for the commoners’ dead bodies, even if they have Divine Power, they may not qualify to apply for the Order.”

“…There will be no difficulty in using just mercenaries. Rather than facing discrimination from the Order.”

Then Mother appeared to accept the situation a little and replied to Grace.

Phew, my story seemed to have worked somehow.

‘Can this be considered a useful Cecil?’

Hiding my nervousness, I pretended to focus on the piece of fruit in front of me to match my baby appearance. Grace had been looking at me for a long time and slowly spoke.

“…Cecil has grown a lot.”

“I know. At this time of the year, children grow taller… But really…”

“Yeah, really…”

I could feel the eyes of the two of them boring into me.

I swallowed the mango pieces I had been chewing and smiled bashfully.

“I knew that Cecil was special from the moment I saw her, but… .”

“Right, how smart was our Cecil from the start…”

“As expected, what’s special about Cecil is…”

“Yes, I think it was all God’s plan.”

“Yeah, if she were so smart and had great Divine Power, it would have been too much of a burden on this small child.”

“Will her position be jeopardized?”

I don’t think so…

‘Anyway, I guess I succeeded!’

As I listened to the conversation between my mother and Grace, I was filled with relief. It made them take me seriously, and at the same time, I became a useful Cecil. I killed two birds with one stone.

‘… what happened to the knight’s body? Anyway, it would be great to get some rest and look for a family to raise the baby…’

* * * 

“Cecil, you look like an angel today, too.”

“Brother, you visited.”

“Did you have fun studying today?”

“Yes, Viscount Onul Lentil has taught me about the ancient kingdoms.”

“Was it fun?”

“Yes, I’ve been interested in the story of the Northern Duke of ancient times.”

“I am glad that Viscount Lentils is a good teacher for you as well.”

Theodore’s own cheekbones had risen to their fullest, and he wrapped my cheeks with both of his hands and kissed my forehead.

Time had flown by, and I was already four years old. A baby’s time flows more slowly than an adult’s, but it didn’t seem that was the case for me, being somewhere in my 30s when totalling the years of my current and past lives.

That day, my risk yielded unexpected results.

Before my third birthday, I was assigned a teacher at Sister Grace’s request.

“I read a book every night, and she understands the difficult content easily. Cecil is a talented person who will work in my reign in the future, so I want to raise her well from a young age.”

“My, my, Crown Princess. You’re already stepping ahead of your Father.”

Even so, Father was pleased and immediately invited Viscount Lentil, a scholar from the Tower of Scholars, who had previously taught Rebecca and Theodore, into the Imperial Palace.

Viscount Lentil had a skeptical expression when he first met me. I could relate to the Viscount’s feelings, given I got eight knights for the role of gatekeepers for a one-year-old infant.
I mean, I was sorry for those who got inserted into our family’s ‘Cecil’s Overprotection Plan’. It was said that Rebecca and Theodore didn’t start schooling until they reached the age of five.

‘Still, I discovered I was able to communicate with you, so I approached actively.’

Viscount Lentils treated me as a disciple without prejudice, even as he came from the Scholar’s Tower, the highest ivory tower on the continent. Instead of bewailing having no Divine Power, I studied hard to do everything else well, so the rewards from the Viscount’s work increased day by day.

‘Now, I am learning Imperial etiquette…’

The fact that I was reincarnated and had the mentality of an adult was a huge advantage to me to live as a Princess.

Because studying is something I cannot avoid, I eventually accepted it as something I should enjoy instead.

‘If this was me in my past life, even if I read comics, I wouldn’t be able to concentrate on reading even just for a few minutes.’

So, befitting my life as a princess, I was already mature.

‘Besides, thanks to the superior genes of the Imperial family, Cecilia’s good intelligence also played a part.’

With the combination of genes and past life experience, I grew up a mature and bright four-year-old child who received a lot of love from the Imperial family even though I had no Divine Power.

At an age when I probably would hate my parents, my siblings, and everything, I took the bitter herbal medicine, another symbol of their love and overprotectiveness.

“Theo, you couldn’t even finish the text when you were Cecil’s age. Don’t drag her down.”

“Isn’t Cecil so smart? She’s like me.”

“Shh, It’s time for Cecil to take a nap.”

While Rebecca and Theodore were busy fighting, my mother had noticed that my eyes were getting drowsy, hugged me and carried me to bed.

The green eyes that resembled mine were overflowing with love today.

“Cecil, my dear sweetheart. When you wake up, the chef will make your favorite duck leg confit.”

“Wow, hurry, confit…”

Without realizing it, my mouth was wide open and my eyes were shining. Mother gave me a smile, laid me down on her arm, and stroked my face.

Ah, I studied hard despite having the brain of a child, and so as I lay down to bed, I fell asleep.

“Sleep well, my dear sweetheart…”

A mother’s lullaby that lingers softly in my ears.

The regular rocking of gently tapping my shoulder made me fall asleep. It was something like mom’s touch. It’s warm…

The Imperial family’s love for Cecilia was like the law of universal gravitation. There is no Newton here.

‘I should try to look that up later.’

Not only my parents, but also my siblings, and everyone praised everything I did. There are many reasons for that, but probably, as Cecilia was mentioned as being like a fairy in ‘The Deductible Eyes’—me, that is… Having the same appearance would have been significant.

‘Isn’t it possible that I didn’t have to become a gifted child?

I mean, really…. Even from my point of view, Cecilia the Child looked lovely. I resembled only the beautiful parts of my parents, and indeed, it was a beauty that no one in the world would ever demean.

Looks that will not be passed over or forgotten easily like a shrimp-flavored snack, but rather these soft cheeks were more like a Royal kitchen delicacy.

‘If I had been born with this face in my past life, I would have become the Nation’s Niece on social media.’

So all I had to do was grow up harmlessly into a mature, beautiful youngest.

Occasionally, when the anxiety from my past life was high, I read a difficult book and made a cute expression. I think it’ll be okay if I do everything well without changing myself.

“What do you want to be when you grow up?”

A dinner of siblings presided over by Grace. Grace, sitting at the top of the table, asked me.

When Grace married last year, she moved with her husband, Prince Edel, to the Seokgung Palace for the Prince’s family. After that, once a month, she would invite us to dinner at Seokgung Palace and spend time with us siblings.

At twenty-three, Grace was now obviously the Emperor. Her golden blue eyes always shone sharply, and there was even a solemnity in her face that could not be easily read now.

If I could express my dignity as a human, it would feel like that.

I was grateful for the expectations that Grace had for me, but at the same time, I felt a tickling sensation, so I answered, sitting with my crossed legs hanging from the baby chair.

“I want to get rid of all the pirates in the North Sea.”

It was just a random answer because I had heard about trade with the North Continent in class with Viscount Lentil today.

After hearing this, my siblings stopped for a moment and fixed their eyes on me silently.

Silence passed for a while.

“Y-You want to become a soldier?”

Grace barely broke the silence.

“Since Cecil is bright, it would be nice if she were to become this Unnie’s Prime Minister.”

“There are many ways to defeat pirates without joining the military.”

“There is also a way to give assistance for the residents of the North Sea who suffered damage from pirates.”

“Or how about setting up a charitable foundation for the North Sea region with your brother?”

My siblings, no matter who started it, began to offer their own suggestions for my hopeful career path.

Ah, without Divine Power, I also had no fighting power, so it was a bit overwhelming.

I glanced around the table as I chewed on the meat Rebecca had cut into pieces for me.

“I want to help Older Sister…”

My siblings’ faces froze as I spoke while rolling my eyes with a cute moue, like a puppy pleading. It seems I’ve been trained in aegyo?[1] Even if I didn’t do that, my family was already obsessed with Cecilia.

It was quite addictive to accept everything even if I had to pretend to be cute, so sometimes I acted like a child to my heart’s content.

As expected, this is all thanks to Cecilia’s fairy-like appearance. Was having this lovely appearance meant to be this convenient?

And have I lived without knowing this for more than twenty years in my past life?

‘And so I…’

Ah, and then the old depression from my past life reappeared.

There was nothing that could eradicate my sorrow, that feeling of sitting isolated in a riverside park where everyone but me laughed and chatted happily.

For some reason, the taste of dessert seemed lacking.
“Cecil, I ordered your favorite brownie for dessert today.”

“Wah! Brownie!”

There’s no way a dessert will taste bad.

“The syrup is hot, be careful when you eat it.”

“Yes~!”

In this life, my family is my therapy and medicine.

Hearing those words, I lifted my head and smiled broadly, and Grace’s returned smile was very nice to see.

‘Alright. I’m not going to disappoint everyone and hold onto this malaise. I can’t miss this underserved love.’

—

[1] Aegyo describes behavior that shows one’s affection, cuteness and overall charm, typically directed to an individual.