Don't Touch What's Mine and Get Lost

The Duchy of Lander.

A massive carriage procession came to a stop before the enormous manor. The carriages bore the imperial crest.

Inside, regional specialties and gifts sent from all over the empire were packed tightly together.

At the imperial carriages’ unexpected arrival, the key figures of Edelheid spilled out.

"What is all this?"

"Who knows? Maybe there’s some celebration we don’t know about."

Leaving the murmuring retainers behind, Cassius stepped forward as their representative.

"You’ve had a hard journey coming all this way. But why has the imperial envoy come to Edelheid? And what are those carriages?"

"These are gifts His Highness the First Prince is sending to Lady Renoa, his close friend."

"...Close friend? Renoa is the prince’s?"

Cassius’s brow furrowed.

"His Highness the First Prince regrets deeply that, because he must focus on his studies, he cannot come to the duchy in person, and has bestowed these gifts in place of a visit."

The crowd stirred at the envoy’s words.

"That illegitimate girl is His Highness the First Prince’s close friend?"

"Nonsense. That woman was dragging a slave around and bringing shame on the family!"

"And yet there are so many gifts......"

Illegitimate Renoa was the shame of Edelheid.

They had only hoped she’d go to the academy and do nothing but lower the family’s prestige.

But in that short time, she had forged a close bond with the prince.

So close that it could be called friendship rather than a lord-and-vassal relationship.

It was an unbelievable accomplishment.

The retainers were at a loss for words.

There were also voices like this.

"If His Highness the Prince is paying her that much special attention......"

"If things go well, couldn’t we deepen the ties between Lady Renoa and His Highness?"

"That would mean we’d have a direct line to the imperial family. Even if making her his principal consort is out of the question, a position at his side could be worth aiming for."

Those were the same people who had only moments ago been denouncing Renoa in unison for disgracing the family.

And yet, before long, they were busy sizing her up with naked greed and profit calculations.

From that day on, the way the retainers looked at Renoa also began to change subtly.

A bridge between the imperial family and Edelheid.

If used well, she might bring the family a great prize—it would be like catching a big fish with an earthworm.

"Disgusting."

Renoa sharply cut down those retainers’ foolish fantasies.

The person involved wasn’t even thinking about it, yet some third party was freely plotting everything out. It was infuriating.

"Still, as the retainers said, the young lady will have to marry someday, won’t she?"

At Leon’s casual remark, Renoa, who had been reading, flinched and stiffened.

"What... do you mean?"

"Once this is over, you’ll go back to living a normal lady’s life, so eventually you’ll marry, right?"

Renoa was desperate to rise in the world.

As a woman, marrying into a powerful house would no doubt be the fastest and surest way to seize power.

"The problem is whether anyone would even want to take our young lady, since her personality is so awful......"

Leon was already dreading the thought that all the cleanup would fall entirely on him.

Leon tossed out a lame joke, then watched Renoa’s reaction.

Normally, this would have been the moment she’d come at him and yell at him not to spout nonsense.

But she was terrifyingly quiet.

"And you...... what are you going to do?"

When she finally spoke after a long pause, hesitation colored her voice instead of sharpness.

Pretending to read, Renoa was sneaking glances at Leon out of the corner of her eye.

She probably wanted it to look like a casual question.

But her shoulders, stiff with tension, were laying her anxious heart bare without any filter.

Would she be hurt if she heard an unexpected answer?

Or had she revealed too much of her true feelings with this flimsy probing?

Those were the sort of girlish worries she was harboring.

"I’m a slave, you know? Do I even have a choice?"

"Idiot? I’m asking what if."

"Hmm."

Leon pondered.

He had thought he’d like to build a harem since he’d finally come to another world, but that was nothing more than wishful thinking.

He still didn’t have any detailed plans.

Since Leon stayed silent, Renoa added another thought.

"Well... if you really don’t have a plan, I could keep you by my side for the rest of your life. Just this once."

That was when it happened.

The air in the room froze.

Only the sound of the curtains rustling in the wind from outside rang out especially loudly.

It was an unexpected direct hit. Even Renoa herself seemed to realize after saying it that she’d slipped up, and she gripped the book until it crumpled.

"I mean, that’s not what I meant......"

"No, thanks. Why would I want that?"

But Renoa, who had been hastily trying to explain, froze at the flat refusal.

Her gaze dropped from the book.

She stared blankly at Leon’s face.

"......You don’t want to?"

"Isn’t that obvious? What kind of person in the world would want to stay a slave for life?"

It might sound strange to say that after coming back to Renoa’s side of his own accord.

Leon hadn’t come back that day because he wanted to remain a slave. He had simply been unable to leave Renoa alone.

Once everything was settled and Renoa returned to the girl he had known, Leon would set out in search of freedom again.

"And honestly, my abilities are too good to be wasted on slavery. Young lady, if you have any conscience, don’t work me too hard."

"......"

The sincere words he had carefully wrapped around his meaning instantly turned into the tyranny of a heartless, merciless master.

Renoa’s expression, frozen in shock, sharpened. The shame and resentment that surged up were transmuted into anger.

"You idiot."

"Yes?"

"With that level of intelligence, if you got your freedom back, you’d probably be picked up as a slave again before long. In that case, it’d be better to stay my slave for life."

"You’re suddenly insulting me......"

Even Leon, whose immunity to insults had risen quite a bit, found the remark about his intelligence rather painful.

"You’re interfering with my reading. If you’re going to say something pointless......"

"Should I leave?"

"......Stay in the corner."

Leon crouched in the corner.

If this were the old days, he would have passed the time by joking around with Bibi.

But now that she was gone too, he had absolutely nothing to do.

'Where is she, and what is she doing right now?'

If Bibi really hadn’t betrayed Renoa, but had remained loyal to her instead.

She wouldn’t have poisoned her for no reason when a single sentence would have sufficed.

It was best to interpret it as her being in a situation where she had no choice.

Just as the people of the forest villa had entered into a contract preventing them from speaking to outsiders about what happened at the manor.

Bibi, too, must have had some sort of contract, leaving her no choice but to ruin Renoa’s body.

But from the witch’s point of view, that was still an act no different from betrayal.

The witch would never leave Bibi alone. She’d definitely pay the price. One way or another.

She might be tortured, or if not......

'She might already be dead.'

It was only frustrating not to know whether she was alive or dead.

-Bang!

Then, without warning, the door was roughly thrown open.

"The two of you are together again. Why is the bodyguard sitting on the sofa and loafing around?"

It was Sylvia, Edelheid’s youngest daughter.

Renoa frowned.

She made no attempt to hide her hostility.

"Didn’t Madam teach you to knock before entering a room?"

"I was taught that you don’t need to be polite to a bastard. Half-sister."

Sylvia strode into the room.

"Get out. I never gave you permission to come in."

"Do I need your permission? There’s nothing in this house that’s yours. Even this room is borrowed."

"......"

"You don’t have to glare at me like that. I’m leaving right now."

Sylvia stopped in front of Leon. She smiled brightly.

"Hello?"

"Uh, hello?"

"Stand up. Come with me."

"Come with you......? To where, exactly?"

At the sudden request for him to accompany her, Leon just blinked blankly.

Had they made some kind of promise? That couldn’t be it, since this was the first time they’d even spoken.

He couldn’t even begin to guess what was going on.

"You’re coming to my room."

"To Lady Sylvia’s room?"

"I like you. So you’re mine starting today."

"Yes?"

"You’ll like following me more than that half-sister anyway. So let’s go to my room."

To Sylvia, Renoa had never once been family.

They had only happened to share the same surname; in Sylvia’s eyes, Renoa was nothing more than something wearing her sister’s guise.

She would sometimes tag along whenever Florencia went to the villa.

Because there was something extremely entertaining to see there.

Namely, the sight of Renoa being beaten. Watching it made her feel strangely good.

Even at a young age, she understood.

That this person, despite being her sister, was far beneath her in rank.

That every time this person was abused, the authority she held as the legitimate daughter shone that much more clearly.

Renoa ought to spend her whole life crawling along the bottom, remaining a toy to feed Sylvia’s superiority complex.

And yet.

'What the hell is this all of a sudden?'

A bastard who goes to an imperial banquet, becomes friends with the First Prince at the academy, and even gets gifts sent to her.

Impossible.

It should not be allowed to happen.

Her position was being threatened.

'It’s all because of this slave.'

There was no way some half-sister could achieve such accomplishments on her own.

It had to be because this slave had taken care of all the dirty work.

So if she just took him away—

Renoa would fall to the very bottom again, just like before, and all the glory she held would belong entirely to Sylvia, the true young lady of Edelheid.

"What are you doing? Why aren’t you getting up?"

If there was something she wanted, she took it. Sylvia had both the right and the position to do so.

But a mere slave?

There was no need to say more.

"Uh......"

Leon, who had no idea what her intent was, was only flustered.

Unable to make sense of anything, Leon sent Renoa a pleading look.

Unlike Leon, Renoa immediately grasped Sylvia’s filthy intentions.

It was a woman’s intuition.

"What is this nonsense after barging in out of nowhere? Stop spouting garbage and get out of my room right now."

Even more blatant hostility.

But Sylvia found it only amusing.

"You’re awfully harsh to your little sister for someone who’s the older one. Anyway, that’s why bastards are low-class. I, the true young lady, will just have to bear with it."

A statement as if she were being generous. Sylvia sighed and shook her head.

"I told you to get up, so why aren’t you getting up? If I tell you to do something, you should do it."

"Hmm......"

"Looks like you still haven’t been properly educated. I’ll have to take you and teach you some manners. How should I do it? A good beating is probably the answer if I want you to listen, right?"

As Sylvia was busily laying out her education policy as if Leon were already hers.

-Scrape.

Renoa pushed back her chair and stood up. She walked toward Sylvia with click-clacking footsteps.

Expressionless, Renoa came face-to-face with Sylvia. Sylvia was still grinning.

Even if Renoa glared at her with all her might, she wouldn’t dare lay a single finger on the legitimate daughter of Edelheid.

Just as she was expecting the half-sister to bow her head and accept her powerlessness, as always.

"I rather like your training policy."

A sneer slipped through Renoa’s lips.

"Huh?"

Just then, Sylvia tried to furrow her brow as if she didn’t understand.

-Slap!

The sharp crack of flesh striking flesh rang out.

"Agh...!"

With a short cry, Sylvia’s head snapped sideways and she collapsed to the floor.

Clutching her burning left cheek, she couldn’t even understand what had happened.

Renoa’s shadow fell over Sylvia as she lay there.

"Just like you said, a beating is the right answer for a beast that can’t understand what it’s told."

Renoa casually shook out her stinging palm and dropped her gaze to the dazed Sylvia.

A murderous glint settled in her green eyes.

"Don’t touch what’s mine and get lost. Before I rip you apart and kill you."