Sister, I'm the Queen This Life (330 Chapters Left to Complete) - Chapter 14
It had been fine up to the point where she bonded with the prince and returned home wearing the new dress gifted by the queen—but the aftermath was the problem. Just as expected, the de Mare cardinal’s residence had turned into utter chaos due to Lucrezia’s furious rampage.
“Miss de Rossi? Miss de Rossi?! Queen Marguerite must be insane! How dare she humiliate me like this?!”
—Crash!
The vase Lucrezia hurled sliced through the drawing room.
“That filthy woman from the Galico Kingdom! How dare a foreigner speak to an Etruscan lady like that?!”
This time, the letter opener she grabbed and flung flew straight into the fireplace. Arabella cowered in a corner of the drawing room, hands clamped over her ears and trembling violently, while Isabella stood beside her, eagerly fueling her mother’s rage.
“Exactly! Just because she’s a queen? She’s been married for almost twenty years and still hasn’t fixed that awful accent! Didn’t you jump when she opened her mouth and that rustic twang came out?!”
“She doesn’t even bother adapting, so of course she can’t earn her husband’s love! Clinging desperately to that pittance of royal affection—she probably sees her husband’s face barely five times a year!”
“A legal marriage that’s practically separation? If she’s going to live as the legitimate wife yet stay as useless as an empty sack of barley, she might as well just be a concubine!”
“That incompetent woman—she’s just lashing out at women who understand men’s hearts because of her own inadequacies and inferiority complex!”
Their tirade was growing increasingly fierce.
“Countess Rubina is the real power behind the throne, you know. It’s rumored that if you want to submit a petition to His Majesty the King at court, going through Countess Rubina is the fastest way.”
“You’re better than this mother of yours! You don’t even associate with any respectable ladies—oh, woe is me!”
“And Countess Rubina’s talents are just extraordinary. They’re even saying she’s about to receive a border fief for her son, Count Cesare.”
“When the king’s legitimate son, born to the queen herself, is younger than Cesare—the son of a concubine—it’s already a lost cause. Queen Marguerite couldn’t control the king even when she was young! What does she think she can do now? Alfonso hasn’t even been officially named crown prince yet! All because his mother is so utterly incompetent!”
“That’s exactly why she takes out her frustrations on you for no reason! She’s despicable! Low-minded! Vile!”
‘I’ve heard enough of this self-introduction, thank you.’
Ariadne had absolutely no intention of stepping into that madhouse.
If she entered now, she’d be nothing more than a chunk of meat thrown before a pack of ravenous hyenas. Enraged Lucrezia and Isabella, who was searching for another fire poker, would surely tear her to shreds.
‘I should quietly slip upstairs to my room.’
To get from the main entrance to her attic room on the third floor, she had to climb the central staircase—but the drawing room on the first floor happened to be right at the base of those very stairs.
Ariadne decided to hide in the first-floor corridor and wait until the two of them had calmed down, left the drawing room, and gone to their own chambers.
After all, this mother-daughter duo hardly paid close attention to when their second daughter came home—whether she arrived late or not, they likely wouldn’t even notice.
“Why won’t this girl just come inside already?!”
‘Ah…’
Apparently, they weren’t watching her return time out of care—but to use her as a punching bag.
The moment Maleta reported to Lucrezia that she’d ask the butler and stepped out of the drawing room, she bumped straight into Ariadne, who had been hiding in the corridor.
“Oh… Miss Ariadne is home.”
‘How utterly lacking in tact!’
Ariadne glared fiercely at Maleta and, cursing inwardly, trudged with heavy steps toward the drawing room, where household items were being destroyed in real time.
—Whoosh!
The moment she entered, a porcelain vase whizzed past her face.
—Crash!
Feeling the shards from the vase—shattered against the wall—stick to her hair and dress hem, Ariadne bowed her head expressionlessly.
“I’m back, Mother.”
“Mother? Mother?! If you truly saw me as your mother, you wouldn’t have humiliated me like that at the queen’s mass!”
When Lucrezia was angry, one should never talk back. But Ariadne had always forgotten that rule since childhood. Instinctively, she replied anyway.
“I did nothing wrong, Mother.”
“Don’t you—dare—talk back—to me!”
Lucrezia seized a fireplace poker and hurled it at Ariadne.
Ariadne barely dodged it by jerking her head sharply to the left—but the poker then flew straight toward Arabella, who was crouching behind her, and struck her leg.
“Aaaah!”
The ten-year-old let out an animal-like wail, but no one paid the unfortunate Arabella any attention.
Consumed by rage, Lucrezia didn’t care that her own child had just been hit by the very object she’d thrown. Only Arabella’s sobs filled the room.
Frowning, Ariadne stepped back and crouched down, pulling Arabella into her arms.
Whether the frail limbs of a fifteen-year-old offered much comfort was questionable—but Arabella, grateful for even that, eagerly buried herself in Ariadne’s embrace.
That human warmth comforted not only Arabella but Ariadne as well.
Yet the looming threat was far too overwhelming to be soothed by such small comforts. Lucrezia loomed over Ariadne, who was stroking Arabella’s back, spreading her legs wide in a menacing stance and thrusting her upper body forward, eyes wide and wild.
“You! You did that on purpose with that chemise, didn’t you?!”
‘For a fool, her instincts are uncannily sharp.’
Though Lucrezia’s accusation was baseless and purely aggressive, it struck the truth precisely—and Ariadne, impressed despite herself, obediently shook her head from side to side.
“Of course not. Absolutely not, Mother.”
As she feigned innocence by bowing her head even lower, Ariadne simultaneously straightened her posture deliberately.
Everything Ariadne wore—dress, accessories, everything except the chemise freshly given by Queen Marguerite—was cheap trash sent by Lucrezia.
“I truly own nothing else to wear.”
It was a blatant lie.
The moment the words left her lips, Ariadne felt a sharp throb in the tip of her left ring finger—the new finger that had regrown upon her return, having once rotted away due to the illness she’d taken in Cesare’s place.
Lucrezia’s eyes darted wildly as she scanned the room.
“Who’s responsible for this child’s wardrobe? Which one of you stole it?”
All the maids in the room instantly turned their heads away, avoiding Lucrezia’s gaze.
But Maleta’s demeanor seemed unusual. She kept fidgeting, glancing around nervously, clearly torn over whether to say something.
Ariadne held her breath. Maleta looked ready to cause trouble.
‘I should’ve warned her to keep her mouth shut…!’
Blackmail? Bribery? From her past life, Ariadne knew Maleta well—she was the sort who’d risk everything for the tiniest gain.
She should never have given the chemise to Sancha without first hinting to Maleta about some future advantage. It had been shortsighted.
‘Please, please just let this pass smoothly…!’
Whether Maleta noticed Ariadne’s anxious, pleading eyes or not, she lowered her head deeply—and after about three seconds, as if making up her mind, pointed directly at Sancha, who stood beside her.
“It’s her! Her!”
Sancha, the freckled girl, widened her dull green eyes until they were as big as lanterns.
“She’s the one in charge of Miss Ariadne’s clothing!”
Lucrezia’s high cheekbones twitched irritably. Relieved despite herself that she’d escaped blame, Ariadne let out an instinctive sigh—and Sancha, terrified, took an involuntary step backward.
“So you stole that wench’s undergarments.”
“No! No, ma’am!”
Ignoring Sancha’s frantic denials, Lucrezia gritted her teeth and barked an order at Maleta.
“If you wanted that expensive chemise the young lady wore, it must be hidden among your things. Maleta—go search her belongings!”
“Yes, ma’am!”
Maleta accepted the command with evident glee. Watching her sprint up to the maids’ quarters on the third floor, Lucrezia loomed over Sancha, who stood frozen and trembling, and growled a threat.
“If I find that wench’s chemise in your luggage—you’d better be ready.”
Ariadne wrestled with whether to confess the truth right then and there.
She didn’t know what thoughts swirled in Maleta’s tiny mind, but for now, Ariadne had escaped the accusation of deliberately framing Lucrezia.
Yet it had been Ariadne who’d suggested swapping chemises—and now Sancha, completely innocent, was about to be torn apart.
Even if Sancha insisted on her innocence, Lucrezia wouldn’t believe her—because Ariadne’s chemise truly would be found in Sancha’s luggage.
Once someone’s mind was already made up, any supporting evidence would only cement that belief. Sancha was surely about to become Lucrezia’s scapegoat.
But Ariadne simply couldn’t gather the courage to step forward and confess the truth before Lucrezia, who was bellowing like a mad beast.
She’d thought nine years as a socialite had erased those memories—but Lucrezia’s snarling voice instantly reignited the deep-seated childhood terror etched into her bones.
Memories of her birth mother being whipped by Lucrezia. Of Lucrezia kicking her mother while she shielded little Ariadne behind her back, then grabbing Ariadne by the hair.
Of Ippolito, Lucrezia’s eldest son, casually patting her birth mother’s behind as he passed by—and her mother, who couldn’t utter a word of protest.
Of kneeling and sobbing before her mother’s wooden coffin in pouring rain—then, terrified of running into Lucrezia near the barn where the coffin was kept, abandoning her mother and fleeing alone to hide—carrying the greatest guilt of her life.
—Hic… sob… sob…
Sancha’s hunched back trembled violently as muffled cries escaped her. She couldn’t even close her eyes properly—just stared wide-eyed, swallowing her sobs and letting silent, chicken-dropping tears fall.
Watching Sancha’s pitiful back, Ariadne felt as though her heart were splitting in two—caught between terror and conscience.
She felt horribly guilty for pretending not to notice out of fear—but her voice wouldn’t come when she tried to step forward and speak up.
The guilt she’d felt that rainy day—abandoning her mother’s coffin and hiding alone in the stable—was now stabbing her chest again.
Yet standing there like an icicle, doing nothing, was unbearable second by second.
—Throb!
Her left ring finger burned as if branded. The hot blood that had formed her new finger seethed under her skin, spreading its heat.
‘…It hurts!’
For a moment, she thought she heard a voice—not human speech, yet not quite human either.
—Golden Rule.
A divine whisper, not of this world, echoed in her mind. Its meaning slammed into her consciousness so directly she couldn’t even discern the sound itself.
—Treat others as you wish to be treated. You grieved and resented the betrayals you suffered. But have you never betrayed others for your own gain?
It felt both like a whisper and a thunderous rebuke.
While everyone in the drawing room suffered, Maleta returned from the maids’ quarters in a flash.
She proudly pulled a clean young lady’s chemise from the old cloth sack she held and thrust it toward Lucrezia.
“It’s her! This was in her luggage, ma’am!”
With a face like a demon risen from hell, Lucrezia snatched the chemise with one hand, waved it in the air, then threw it down onto Sancha’s face as she knelt on the floor.
“Still got something to say, you thieving rat?”
Sancha just clamped her mouth shut, clenched her fists, and trembled violently.
Furious, Lucrezia grabbed whatever object came to hand and began hurling it at Sancha. First flew a paperweight, then an inkwell.
—Whoosh!
—Thud!
The blue inkwell struck Sancha square on the forehead. Ink burst into the air, splattering the drawing room with blue stains.
Drenched in blue ink, Sancha’s hair was red, her skin blue, and her wide, terrified eyes—overflowing with injustice—were green.
But Lucrezia didn’t stop there. She seized an ivory pen with its nib attached and began striking Sancha wherever her hand landed.
—Thud!
Sancha didn’t even whimper as she took each blow—but she couldn’t hide how her whole body shuddered with every strike.
Each time Sancha was hit, Ariadne trembled too.
Each strike—and more precisely, each time Ariadne averted her eyes from Sancha’s beating—made the blood in her left ring finger burn fiercely, the red glow visibly expanding.
—The righteous shall suffer for the gains of the wicked. Such is the curse of the Golden Rule.
Yet Ariadne couldn’t tell whether the pain she felt came purely from the red glow—or from feeling Sancha’s blows as if they were her own.
The moment Lucrezia raised the ivory pen high in her right hand, Ariadne could hold back no longer and screamed—
“Stop!!”
Male lead is a Love-Obsessed Merman
When he discovers she has gone, he risks everything to pursue her on land, enduring agonizing pain to transform his tail into human legs…
One-line summary: Male lead chases female lead. The male lead’s love is a bit sick, an invincible love brain.
Synopsis
During a voyage at sea, Jiang Yang accidentally captures a merman.
Servant: I heard that mermen are fierce and brutal.
Jiang Yang looks at the merman obediently rubbing her palm like a puppy: “You call this fierce and brutal?”
Servant: I heard that mermen have no human nature.
Jiang Yang looks at the merman with wet puppy eyes, obsessively calling her ‘A Yang’ like a childish infant: “You call this having no human nature?”
With great difficulty, she releases the merman back into the sea and returns to shore.
Who would have thought that in less than half a month, the merman, who should have been freely wandering in the South China Sea, would shed his scales, endure the pain of losing his tail, transform into human legs, and come ashore to find her?
He kneels at her feet, rubbing her palm, with merman tears rolling down: “A Yang, don’t abandon me.”
_____
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Chapter Comments (4)
Inline Comments (8)
“Let’s say you wanted to ask me to dance, Your Highness.”
Wah! Isabella is very cunning. Perfect fit for Cesar.
“My sister and I are so close that she herself insisted we match colors—she aske
Wow! Isabella’s impudence knows no bounds. We’ll pretend to believe you this time.
– “Didn’t that older lady make her cry?”
Every time Isabella amazes me with her cunning. Smart at turning the situation to her advantage. ( ◐ o ◑ )
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Ari realmente é incrível. Cada capítulo mostra o quanto ela é inteligente e sempre um passo à frente de todo mundo. Mal posso esperar para ver até onde esse plano dela vai chegar.
I’m still curious of what Alphonso meant by the last chapter
I’m still curious of what Alphonso meant by the last chapter