WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Malfoid
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ I Don't Need a Family ◈
Episode 19
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“Madam! You’re back?”
At last, Fadde returned to the annex.
Lola ran to her before I could finish checking the list of luggage.
“You must be exhausted! How did it go?”
Fadde looked down at the maid, who was practically bouncing on her feet.
Fadde valued dignity and supposedly disliked chatty attendants. Perhaps because Lola served me, Fadde could not bring herself to show her displeasure.
“Lola, come here.”
“But my lady, weren’t you more curious about what happened to those rude people in the main house?”
“Ahem.”
Of course I was curious. More than curiosity, though, I was worried.
The main house was the exclusive domain of the head of the family and the heir. Since she had openly trespassed there, she must have clashed with Duke Ashwilt at least once.
‘Will Madam be all right?’
“There was no trouble.”
“What did Father say?”
The stepmother the Duke had tried to drive out with his own hands had returned on her own two feet.
How had the Duke reacted?
“The Duke was not there.”
“What?”
Vivette’s memories, which contained every detail of her father’s schedule from trailing after him, spun rapidly through my mind.
“But today isn’t a day Father goes to work at the Imperial Palace.”
“The head steward said he left for Plaford late last night and has not returned yet. I wanted to see that wretch’s face before leaving. Tsk.”
‘The Duke spent the night away?’
No matter how urgent the matter, that was rare. The portal in central Erenston was less than half an hour away by carriage.
‘He ran away from his own guilt.’
The Duke was never truly a villain.
He must have been so troubled by sending his stepmother off to that countryside that he could not bear to greet this morning at the estate.
So he fled. Perhaps he thought I would come looking for him, weeping and begging, so he ran all the way to the capital.
Come to think of it, the Duke had always been unable to bear seeing Vivette despair or grieve.
‘Was that why he got so angry that day? Telling her to stop.’
Whether the Duke was angry or not, Vivette drove herself to the end. And that day became her final night.
Only at the end of her life had she been able to resist her father’s words.
It was simply sad that the Duke Vivette had feared and loved so dearly was actually such a weak person.
“The head steward said it was impossible to dismiss so many people from the main house without the Duke’s permission.”
Fadde clicked her tongue.
“Still, authority over the estate’s personnel belongs to me, so I cut all their wages in half before coming here. Oh, and just in case, was there anyone among the main house servants who treated you kindly? I ask because I should not punish innocent people.”
“No.”
“How neat.”
Lola grumbled beside me.
“Even so, the punishment seems far too light for what they did. Our lady has been ignored for over ten years.”
“Well, I do not think I need to stain my hands with blood. Once cowardly Arion returns home and learns his daughter has vanished, he will rage and throw everyone in the main house out.”
“Oh, you’re right.”
“Too little, too late. Now then, is that all your luggage?”
Fadde looked down at the bundles I had gathered in one corner.
“Yes. I thought the rest would only make things heavier.”
“Heavy? Do you think I told you to leave today without any thought?”
A bright light swept over the corner of the room where the luggage was piled. The next moment, every bundle had vanished.
It was as though the light had swallowed them whole.
“Subspace Magic!”
Lola cried out.
“H-how did you do that?”
Her voice trembled. Even the maids who had come to help organize my belongings looked at Fadde with reverent eyes.
“Is that really Subspace Magic? I heard it was only theoretically possible!”
“They say space-time magic is a divine domain that even the Mage Tower Master and House Ashwilt’s founding head could not touch...!”
“You are incredible, Madam!”
I would wager the uproar was worse than it had been in the main house after their wages were cut.
Everyone was thrilled as if they had seen a living fairy, but I remained indifferent.
Because I could not use magic. One kind of magic was no different from another to me.
Still, I knew from Vivette’s memories just how remarkable it was. It was almost impossible through an individual’s power alone.
The portal connecting Erenston and Plaford was the only proof that spatial magic was possible, but it was practically a divine relic. It had not been made by humans. It had existed since the beginning of time.
The only pair of portals in the world had eventually fallen into the hands of powerful mages.
Just as countless territorial wars had been fought to claim the portals, spatial magic itself was a divine magic worth a fortune.
I did not know how Fadde had learned it.
‘She had not become an Ashwilt for no reason...!’
“Stop making such a fuss. How low did you think of me?”
When Fadde furrowed her brow, everyone flinched and stepped back. Their expressions of awe did not fade, however.
“I am an Ability User. Anything involving ‘moving,’ I can do. Vivette, is there anything else you wish to take?”
“Just a moment!”
Lola darted into the next room and returned carrying more boxes.
There were so many stacked atop one another that they nearly blocked her view.
‘Right, she has Weight-Reduction Magic too.’
Thud!
A large box made from carved mana stone fell heavily to the floor.
“These are things from when you were little, my lady! You treasure them, so let us take them too!”
“Lola, what is all this?”
My hand froze as I opened the box on top.
Gifts from the Duke, letters little Harris had written in crooked handwriting, toys Vivette had played with Gillian, and more.
It was a box of Vivette’s memories.
Things she had taken out again and again with her tiny hands whenever she was sad or going through a difficult time.
Clothes she had worn as a child, which she had saved to pass down after giving birth to a healthy mage daughter.
She had not spent a single coin of the pocket money her uncle gave her when she entered the Academy. It remained untouched in its envelope.
Along with several framed family portraits, old and unfashionable now, there was a set of baby clothes.
They were tiny enough for a newborn to wear.
“I made that.”
A chilling voice sounded behind me. Fadde stood with her arms crossed, looking down at me.
“You kept it all this time?”
“Y-you made it? I thought Mother had.”
At least, that was what Vivette had believed.
Fadde snorted without looking hurt.
“Your mother did not even know how to make things like that. She only studied magic. When I scolded her for knowing so little about household matters, your father flew into a rage.”
“Ah...”
“She was an unskilled wife, but she was not a bad mother. She silently watched you wearing this, then came to me and asked to be taught how to make baby clothes. She insisted on learning until the very end. The one underneath is what your mother made.”
“I see. I wondered who I got my poor handiwork from.”
I put everything back into the box and snapped it shut.
“Leave these behind.”
“Why?”
‘They do not feel like they are mine.’
I was Vivette, and this was the body I would live in as Vivette, but her past was not mine to claim.
Especially not the belongings Vivette’s mother had left for her daughter. I could not bring myself to touch them.
The rest was the same. Everything here was what young Vivette had left behind.
No matter how cruel her family had been, they should at least be allowed to keep her things.
‘Besides, they are only unpleasant, meaningless memories to me.’
“My lady, are you sure? If we leave them here, they will fall into the Duke’s hands!”
To reassure everyone, I gave them a broad grin.
“It’s all right. Let him see them and regret it. Shouldn’t we leave him something to miss me by?”
* * *
Everything proceeded smoothly.
After saying goodbye to the few maids, I changed into the clothes Vivette usually wore when she went to the Mage Tower for treatment.
My bedroom was quiet. The wardrobe was still full of clothes, and I left behind the jewelry box where she kept the mana stone bracelets she received.
It was to make it look as though I had simply gone out for some fresh air.
Lola insisted that we take even a silver candlestick, but I shook my head.
“If the Duke decides to chase after his daughter for stealing a family heirloom, it will be troublesome.”
“A family heirloom? Which one, the candle or the candlestick?”
“You do not know how cowardly that Arion is. If even a single coin goes missing, he will spread rumors everywhere that we are thieves who stole the family property and fled, then he will hunt us down. You are far too innocent. Tsk.”
Lola finally quieted down after Fadde added her own words.
Part of the reason I left things behind was because I was uneasy about what the Duke might do, but...
‘I do not want to take anything that belongs to the Duke. It would be like living off his money.’
If the young lady who had gone out with Fadde did not return even after the night had passed, the servants would finally report it to the Duke.
The Duke, who had been resting leisurely in the capital, would grasp the situation too late and search through my room. But because I had only taken what I needed and left the rest behind, he would find the note I left at the very end.
By then, we would already be settled in a new land.
“Have a good trip.”
The head steward bowed to us with a terrible expression.
The people in the main house had their wages cut in half because of us, yet we were off enjoying ourselves. That was what their face said.
‘I will let that final disrespect slide, Head Steward.’
With a pleasant smile, I climbed into the carriage with Fadde and Lola.
Lola was skilled enough to drive a mana carriage. Thankfully, we did not need to fool a coachman.
As I took Fadde’s offered hand and climbed aboard, I felt a sharp gaze pricking at me from somewhere.
I did not even need to find its source. The Duke and Gillian might be at the estate in the capital, but one person would still be at this estate. I had not heard that Harris had followed them.
To him, it would probably look as though we were merely going out. Who would have expected me, that Vivette, to leave home?
Even so, the reason he wore that expression was probably nothing more than frustration and jealousy that Fadde had stolen the seat beside me.
As Lola urged the carriage onward, I caught glimpses of a white-haired young man between the ornamental hedges of House Ashwilt.
Vivette’s eyes merely turned in silence, unconsciously, toward the youngest member of her family.
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