Chapter 103: Storm: Mother and Son (Part 2) [VIP]
"You, you, you... these words were taught to you by Yaris! Right!"
The Grand Duchess looked at Xiao Yun angrily, her eyes almost popping out of their sockets.
"My brother has never said anything bad about you in front of me. He has always respected you and protected you!"
"Oh!"
The Grand Duchess sneered disdainfully, "What do you know! Yaris isn't even human! He's the devil's child! He's been scheming since birth, feigning a pitiful appearance to deceive those around him, making everyone around him, regardless of gender, feel compelled to sympathize with him, pity him, and protect him! In reality, his mind is filled with evil intentions. If adults let their guard down even for a moment, he'll harm them miserably!"
"If Yaris is the devil's child, then what are you, who gave birth to the devil's child?"
“…”
The Grand Duchess was stunned again. Then, recovering her composure, she cursed herself, "If I were a man, I would take up my sword and kill this demon's son! Even though I'm a woman and powerless, I've at least never compromised with the devil. I've always held onto my pride!"
"Your pride? What kind of pride? The pride of enjoying the glory and privileges brought to you by the Holy Family while despising the son who gave you all this?"
Xiao Yun interrupted the Grand Duchess's defense and looked at him sharply.
"If you truly hated the marriage imposed by the oracle as much as you claimed, you could have chosen to flee or commit suicide after receiving the oracle. If you had never coveted the privileges and glory bestowed upon you by the Holy Family, you could have found a way to abort the child while you were pregnant, or strangled Yaris to death on the day he was born..."
"Even if you can't do all of the above, you can still give up all worldly things after Yaris is born and go to the temple of the goddess of chastity to live a simple, quiet, and secluded life!"
“…Lucien! You…you…”
Grand Duchess Anna was so angry that her hands holding the fan were shaking.
At this time, the chief attendant, Kelly, walked into the reception room: "Your Highness, the Grand Duchess, Prince Lucien——"
"Brother, are you awake? Are you feeling unwell?"
Xiao Yun asked reflexively.
"His Highness invites the Grand Duchess to his bedroom—"
"What a rude boy to let his mother go to his bedroom instead of him going to her!"
Archduchess Anna snorted contemptuously.
"If you are not satisfied with this arrangement, you can leave immediately. No one will stop you!"
"you--"
"how?"
"I……"
Grand Duchess Anna took a deep breath and told Kelly to lead the way.
Xiao Yun, worried that Yaris might be at a disadvantage, followed closely behind, but was stopped by Kelly: "I'm very sorry, but Your Highness wants to speak to the Grand Duchess alone."
"……All right."
Xiao Yun stopped.
Grand Duchess Anna rolled her eyes at him smugly. "See? Even if I don't love him, I gave birth to him and gave him life! He must respect me!"
…
…
At the same time as Grand Duchess Anna and Xiao Yun were having a fierce conflict in the reception room—
Knowing that his mother was visiting, Yaris sat up with the help of his servant and asked Dr. Moss for some powder that could temporarily boost his spirits.
"Your Highness, are you sure you want to meet your mother? She has always been so…"
"I know, but some things must be made clear."
Yaris sighed painfully: "My body is like a candle in the wind. I have to arrange everything before the candle goes out..."
"The candle goes out..."
Dr. Moss hesitated. "Before, you had no one to lean on. You were forced to shoulder everything alone. When you were extremely weak, you used powder to boost your spirits. You overdrew your lifespan to become the pillar of our group... But now... Master Lucien has grown up... You can completely leave everything to him... Let him help you..."
"Everything else can be handed over to him, but not this one."
Yaris said sadly: "This is a matter between my mother and me, and it can only be resolved by me personally."
"All right."
Dr. Moss reluctantly opened the medicine box and took out the black powder: "I hope this is the last time..."
"I know that any drug has addictive side effects, and I've already..."
With a wry smile, Yaris swallowed the powder. His originally pale face quickly flushed unnaturally. He pressed his slender fingers against his chest: "Ah... It hurts... My heart is tight... It seems... Huh~"
After a long breath, Yaris finally recovered.
Dr. Moss stepped forward to check his pulse and found that his wrist was unusually cold: "You are like this -"
"I don't want to either...but..."
"—Is this how you treat your mother?!"
A sharp and arrogant voice came from outside, and everyone's eyes, including Dr. Moss, turned to the open door.
”
Accompanied by a cold declaration, Archduchess Anna broke into the bedroom without any warning, looking at Jaris with a throbbing look.
"Ah, mother..."
Yaris tried to greet his mother, but one of the side effects of the medication was a dry throat, making his voice unusually hoarse.
The Grand Duchess stood beside her master and held up a glass of water: "Your Highness, you need to drink water immediately."
Your Majesty, as you can see, His Highness Yaris is in very poor health."
"...Okay, it seems like you're not pretending to be sick this time."
Archduchess Anna said with a frown.
Then she looked around and said, "Have you finished your water? Let them all go out. I want to talk to you alone."
"terribly sorry……"
"Your Highness..."
Kelly was heartbroken.
Dr. Moss couldn't help but say to Grand Duchess Anna, "My students and I can leave, but Kelly and the others must stay. His Highness's condition is very grim, and someone must stay in the room to take care of him."
"Take care? Are you afraid that I'll kill him or that he'll suffocate and die on the spot from my scolding?"
"Your Highness the Grand Duchess!"
Dr. Moss was filled with intense anger.
Kelly also raised his head and said desperately, "As a servant, I shouldn't interrupt at a time like this, but... I beg you to allow me to stay... Your Highness's condition is really..."
"Even though he was so ill, he didn't give up his evil idea of plotting rebellion!"
The Grand Duchess said coldly.
Upon hearing this, Yaris couldn't help but frown, and the blood color on his pale cheeks caused by the medicine faded away without a trace.
He ordered in a hoarse voice: "Everyone go out, let me talk to my mother alone."
"But……"
Kelly and others looked at him worriedly with pale faces.
"It doesn't matter."
A complicated bitter smile appeared on Yaris's lips: "You go guard the door and don't let Lucien come in and interrupt our conversation."
“…”
The attendants nodded painfully and followed Dr. Moss out of the room.
The door slowly closed. Yaris raised his head gracefully, his long eyelashes trembling slightly because of the impending dark storm: "Mother..."
"Don't use that name! I don't want to be your mother!"
The Grand Duchess looked at her son coldly: "You monster who should never have been born!"
"Maybe..."
Yaris's eyes dimmed slightly, but he didn't express this gloomy mood in his words: "It has been thirteen years since I was born, and today is the first time my mother has come to see me on her own initiative..."
"Do you think I came here on my own accord?! If I hadn't received a personal letter from His Majesty, informing me that you and your bastard brother were planning something as crazy as betraying the Emperor and tearing the Empire apart, I would never have set foot in the Little Love Palace until I died!"
The Grand Duchess yelled at Yaris, knowing that he was weak and didn't have enough strength to refute her.
"Although you are a child of unknown origin forced upon me by fate, you are at least smarter, calmer, and more rational than most people in this world. Why would you suddenly do such a crazy thing? Were you bewitched by that bastard Lucien? Or do you hate me so deeply that you want me to die with the shame of a traitor!"
"Lucien is not..."
"Not Lucien? How could it not be him! Who else but him has the ability to instigate and influence you? As expected, you're just as easily attracted to people of low birth as Alex. A few sweet words can make you lose your mind and become a puppet at the mercy of others!"
"Mother...Lucien is my brother. It is my duty to protect his interests. Besides..."
"What's more! Lucien is your brother, so I'm not your mother? His Majesty is not your brother? The duty and mission of the Holy Family is to assist the Emperor, protect the Empire, and transform the Western Continent into a beautiful world of lasting peace! But you tried to drag the world into the hell of war to satisfy Lucien's selfish desires! You brought shame to the family and made me suffer! You are indeed a son of the devil born to torture me, the country, and the world! I really hate why I didn't strangle you to death back then!"
"Mother……"
Yaris opened his lips several times, trying to argue, but when he raised his head and met the woman's burning eyes——
Realizing that it was pointless to argue with his stubborn mother, he drooped his eyelids wearily.
"—When I learned that you had been bewitched by Lucien, I thought of Ilex for the first time in a long time! I never loved him, and when I received the oracle that I must marry him, I briefly considered ending my own life. But I ultimately put down the blade of suicide, because after my death, the oracle would quickly choose another girl to marry Ilex as a sacrifice to maintain the sacred heritage of the Holy Family. But I never imagined that the Holy Family would be so... dark! Dirty! Ugly!"
The Grand Duchess looked at Yaris with gritted teeth and uttered extremely sharp words.
"For so many years, I've been enduring pain. I finally waited until Ilex died and Alice committed suicide, thinking I could live a peaceful life from then on! But... you, the monster who tortured me for half my life! You actually did something worse than Ilex! To please your bastard brother! To satisfy his ambition! You even betrayed your country! Your emperor! Your people! You're absolutely crazy! Insane!"
"If you still have any shame left in you, come with me to the capital to see His Majesty immediately! Kneel before him and beg for forgiveness! His Majesty is always magnanimous and considers you a dear and precious treasure. He will accept your apology on the spot, forgive your sins, and tenderly embrace you and kiss you on the cheek!"
"Mother……"
Yaris, who had been enduring, finally couldn't bear it anymore.
He raised his eyelids, and his eyes, as deep and mysterious as a night lake, stared at the Grand Duchess's ruthless face.
"Lucien and I are both direct descendants of the Holy Family. Attacking his bloodline is tantamount to attacking both me and the Holy Family. And what makes you think that everything I do now is the result of Lucien's instigation, and not my own ideas and opinions? And who told you that Edmund was magnanimous and that he and I had a good relationship?"
"What did you say? You want to defend him! You actually attacked your mother for a bastard! And the Emperor who loves you so much! You were born just to torture me! Yaris, I regret giving birth to a devilish child like you!"
The Grand Duchess spoke coldly, completely unaware that every word she uttered was like a whip hitting the exhausted Yaris, causing him to suffer severe pain even though he thought he would never be hurt by his mother's vicious words again.
Exhausted, he raised his head and looked into the Grand Duchess's blue eyes - the blue eyes similar to his brother's were the only part of her that made him feel familiar.
Of course, Lucien's eyes could never gleam with such intense anger.
"...Mother, I know you hate me, and I know I'm a child who shouldn't have been born. So, all these years, even though you've always forced me, tortured me, and denied me, I've always respected you with the courtesy a son should show his mother. I've helped you clean up the mess you made, including plotting to kill my father, forcing poor Lady Alice to commit suicide by poisoning, and sending a mage to infiltrate the house and kill an innocent girl because Millia looked so much like Lady Alice. I've even been accused of patricide because of this."
"you--"
The Grand Duchess panicked, her hands instinctively clutching her lace folding fan. After taking a deep breath, she shouted, "What nonsense are you talking about! Are you suffering from a high fever and falling into a world of fantasy?"
"Imagination?"
Yaris sighed, "Mother, if I hadn't cleaned up the mess for you in time, how could you have concealed Father's affairs from the world with your crude methods?"
"...That's impossible! Impossible! You were only eleven when Alex died! How could an eleven-year-old child... How could it be possible..."
The Grand Duchess was extremely panicked and muttered to herself: "Okay, some unreasonable things did happen at that time, but, but... since you knew everything, why did you still..."
"Because you are my mother."
Yaris smiled bitterly and said, "Although I am not the child you wanted, and although you have never considered me your own child, even for a moment... you are my mother after all, and the one who brought me into this world..."
"Really? So you, you..."
The Grand Duchess looked at Yaris in astonishment, then sternly ordered: "If you truly regard me as your mother, why did you conspire with that bastard Lucien in rebellion!"
"We didn't—"
"Really? Didn't you brothers fabricate the slander against the lizard monsters at Lake Lilia, which directly targeted His Majesty the Emperor?"
The Grand Duchess sternly questioned Yaris, "I won't let you make any more mistakes! You've made me, at my age, a sinner of the Holy Family! The city of Maga will also be destroyed because of your arrogant behavior!"
"what are you up to?"
"I want you to come with me to the capital immediately to ask for forgiveness from His Majesty the Emperor! I will intercede with Queen Mother Catherine to ask him to forgive you but allow Lucien, who caused all this, to spend the rest of his life in captivity! At least he won't die in such a humiliating way as having his head hung on a pillar in the square!"
"...Mother, do you know what you are saying?"
Yaris looked at the Grand Duchess sadly, with crystal tears sliding down his cheeks.
However, his tears may move the whole world, but they cannot move the heart of the Grand Duchess.
She was even angrier!
"Whenever you realize you can't get what you want through legitimate means, you make this pitiful expression... You've been smart since you were little, and you know you're prettier than everyone else. You're a bad kid, and you're very good at using other people's love and sympathy to get what you want..."
"Mother, that's enough, stop talking..."
Yaris muttered in a hoarse voice.
The Grand Duchess looked at his face and roared excitedly as if she was trapped in a vortex of madness.
"Everyone's been so obedient to you, their indulgence has turned you into a bad kid! They've made you think that as long as you put on a pitiful expression with your pretty face, no matter what mistakes you make, they'll be forgiven... You don't realize what you're doing anymore! You don't realize that the mistakes you've made can't be forgiven by shedding a few tears!"
Not wanting to look at Yaris's face again, she quickly turned around, opened her folding fan, and fanned herself vigorously while reminding him, "If you still refuse to go to the capital with me to admit your fault to His Majesty the Emperor in two days, I will go to the capital alone! Please let me go when His Majesty calms down! Remember, I'm giving you two days to think about whether to go to the capital with me not because I need your company, but as a mother, my last act of kindness to you!"
After saying this, the Grand Duchess walked out of the room arrogantly.
Yaris watched her back, a complex, self-deprecating smile appeared on the corner of his mouth. His body fell weakly, and when it was about to touch the bedclothes -
Held tightly in strong arms.
"Yaris! Why are you…"
"It's okay... I just said too much at once and I'm a little tired..."
Yaris muttered in a hoarse voice, and his cheeks turned extremely pale without the support of the medicine.
"Don't cover up for her... I heard everything..."
Xiao Yun looked at him with pity and murmured, "If I hadn't heard it with my own ears, I would never have believed that a mother would say such vicious words to her son..."
"...Did you hear... everything?"
"Yes, I heard everything, including the parts about Alice and Miria..."
"...So are you very angry now? Do you think I'm both pitiful and hateful?"
Tears welled up in Yaris's eyes again, but he didn't care at all. "I feel more and more that this life is a joke. I've tried so hard to please my mother who doesn't love me, buried the evidence of her murder, and carried the suspicion of murder for her..."
"Don't talk yet, drink some water to moisten your throat."
Xiao Yun took the warm water from Kelly and fed it to Yaris.
"Just now, outside the door, if Kelly and the others hadn't stopped me, I would have rushed into the room and slapped her twice, or even strangled her to death... I'm feeling very complicated right now... I'm very angry. How could she be so arrogant, heartless, and selfish? But I'm even more sad for you... Thinking about how hard you tried to beg for her love, but in return, this is..."
"Stop talking...it's all my fault...if I hadn't been born...if I had..."
"No! It's not your fault! You did nothing wrong! You did good enough!"
"Really? Do you really think so? I've been used as a tool since I was born... My mother hates me, my father ignores me, my family, the royal family, and the cult are all using me... And I... knew that no matter what I did, I couldn't get my mother's love, and yet... and yet... I ended up hurting you badly... When you screamed Miria's name and stabbed the dagger into your heart, I... I, my heart almost stopped beating..."
He muttered, nestling exhaustedly into his brother's arms.
Xiao Yun then hugged him tightly, allowing him to lean on his chest as much as he wanted.
"Don't think about these unpleasant things anymore. They're all in the past... If you really care about that matter, I can tell you the truth - even in deep hypnosis, I still don't hate you at all. I believe you, and I believe you are not the murderer of Milia."
"Has it never occurred to you that I might have ordered Miria's death?"
"If that's the case, then you must have your own reasons. You're such a kind person that you'd faint at the sight of blood. How could you possibly order the killing of an innocent girl for no reason?"
In an instant, Yaris's body trembled violently.
He raised his head and stared at his brother's face in a trance: "Lucien..."
"Yes, I have always firmly believed in you. It was this belief that allowed me to briefly break free from the control of hypnosis at the critical moment and stab the dagger into my heart - because I would rather kill myself than hurt you!"
"...Thank you, thank you for saying such warm words to me... I, I..."
Yaris tried hard to suppress the urge to cry, leaning tremblingly in his brother's arms, making choked sounds.
"...I just tried my best to stay calm and not let my mother's words get to me...but, but...can I really remain completely unaffected? Even though I keep telling myself, 'You're not a child anymore...' and 'You shouldn't be shedding tears over trivial matters like a disagreement with your mother at your age,' I still...still..."
"Cry if you want to. People are more fragile and sensitive when they are sick. Besides, you have been..."
"Well, I admit that my personality is a little twisted..."
Yaris said with a wry smile, holding Xiao Yun tightly with his weak hands, like a drowning person holding the only piece of driftwood.
"—Rather than my mother's threats and insults, what's more concerning to me right now is her repeated requests for me to go with her to the capital to meet Edmund... Even though we have a bad relationship, it's really strange that she suddenly said, 'Edmund is a magnanimous person.'"
"Do you suspect she's possessed by the same 'demon spores' as Lias?"
"Yes, I'm worried..."
"Then let us prepare for the worst."
Xiao Yun reached out and touched his forehead: "You have a fever again."
"sorry……"
"Don't talk about this, just lie down and rest."
He carefully placed Yaris on the bed and tidied up the pillows and quilt: "Sleep well, everything will be fine with me here..."
"Well...I believe...I believe you..."
Yaris spoke softly, slowly closing his eyes, tears still lingering in the corners of his eyes.
Xiao Yun looked at Yaris gently, and after making sure that he had fallen asleep peacefully, he stood up and his face immediately became gloomy.
(Archduchess Anna!)
(Unforgivable! Absolutely unforgivable!)
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