I Live With My Villain Uncle

Russphe, who gobbled up the carrots and broccoli in an instant, whispered and pointed to the grilled onions.

I nodded my head as if possessed, and Russphe dipped the onion this time.

Russphe’s cheeks immediately became full.

Munch, munch.

Russphe’s brows furrowed for a moment, then straightened.

“It’s delicious.”

“D-Delicious?”

Nod, nod.

In the blink of an eye, the vegetables on my plate disappeared.

Russphe ate all my vegetables!

“Russphe, do you like vegetables?”

How can you be so brave?

“Mmm. Kinda. Can you eat potatoes?”

Russphe pointed his fork at my potato.

I nodded, and Russphe smiled and started eating the chicken again.

I blinked several times before following Russphe and stuffing the chicken and potatoes into my mouth.

“Oh my.”

Zenda looked at my plate and let out a gasp.

“You’re eating well like this… Look, Miss. Eating meat and vegetables together is so delicious, right?”

Zenda’s eyes lit up.

“Ah, yes! D-Delicious.”

Russphe was just concentrating on eating his own food, as if it had always been like that.

Thanks to that, I didn’t have to eat grilled vegetables until I was full.

***

“Goodbye, Russphe…”

It was time for Russphe to go.

It was really fun, but hearing that he was going made me feel depressed.

“I really had fun today, Aika.”

“Me too! Let’s play like this again. Can I go to your house?”

“Yeah, whenever. Thank you for today.”

Russphe nodded to Zenda as well.

“Thank you for having fun with the Miss, Sir Russphe.”

Eventually, the carriage carrying Russphe left.

I raised my arms and waved until the carriage pulled out of the garden gate.

“Did you have fun today?”

“Yep! I want to play with Russphe again. When will Uncle come back?”

“Won’t he be back soon? Let us go in too, Miss. I will prepare warm bath water for you.”

“Alright.”

So I took a clean bath and returned to my room, hugged the doll I named Lulu and lay down.

These days, I fall asleep hugging this doll every day.

Oddly enough, hugging this doll made me feel at ease.

I was going to wait for Uncle some more, but Zenda said he might be a little late.

“When His Grace returns, I will make sure to tell him that the Miss waited for him a long time before falling asleep.”

“Okay.”

I was rolling around and jumping around so much today that I felt like the bed was pulling me even though I was lying down.

“Miss, have a nice dream.”

After seeing Zenda kissing my forehead, I fell asleep.

***

“Umm.”

I woke up feeling strangely itchy and cold.

It was midnight when I woke up rubbing my eyes.

“…Is Uncle here?”

Zenda left a soft sleep lamp on so that I could see the room dimly.

I slipped my toes under the bed, holding the doll by one side.

“I’m going to see if Uncle is here.”

Now that I’m awake, I’m going to say goodbye to Uncle before going to sleep.

I was about to go down with the intention of sleeping there if Uncle was sleeping, yet at that moment, I felt something pulling me from behind.

Why do I feel the pull when I’m the only one in the room?

I stiffened. Then my sleepiness ran away.

I never had the courage to look back.

Mom, it must be a ghost! Should… Should I run away?

I held onto the doll with one hand and kept my mouth shut, intending to run straight to the door.

One, two, three…!

“Hap!”

I put my bare feet on the floor as hard as I could, but I couldn’t budge from the pulling force from behind.

Cold sweat broke out.

The moment when I gave strength to the tips of my toes with one single thought that I must go to Uncle unconditionally.

Suddenly, I felt a cold feeling creeping up my back.

I was startled and struggled, but I saw a black snake in front of me. Red eyes!

“Hello-ing.”

“Hiyaaaak!”

The black snake’s body was dangling from the back of my neck.

Even in the dark, I could see the snake wiggling its bright red tongue.

“Mom!”

I turned over on my back and, using both arms and legs, ran like lightning onto the bed.

“Calm down-ing.”

“M-Mom. U-Uncle!”

“It’s me-ing.”

“Huwaaa, what is this. This one.”

Tears welled up as it used a strange tone and dragged me with strong force.

“I’m Serpens, you called me.”

At that, my movements stopped.

Its voice got thicker all of a sudden?

And who? Serpens?

“What?”

“I’m Serpens-ing.”

I slowly turned my head with a creak.

The snake had come down from me before I knew it, coiled itself around, and was staring at me with only its head in the air.

Come to think of it…

‘Its eyes are just like the jewel Mom fed me!’

One of its eyes resembled Serpens’ scales, black as obsidian, and the other eye was ruby red.

“Y-You’re Serpens?”

“Right-ing.”

Now that I’ve come to my senses, I screamed softly.

“Why would you come out now!”

“I kept butting in since earlier-ing.”

Butting in?

The only thing Serpens did was getting me creepy because it kept walking around with a cold body behind me when I was playing with Russphe earlier.

While holding the doll tightly, I was wary of Serpens.

“You kept interrupting me earlier!”

“Are you mad-ing? It’s because the two of you looked like you had fun playing-ing.”

“…”

“I’m sorry-ing.”

When Serpens apologized, my heart melted away.

Knowing that it was Serpens, the fear quickly disappeared.

“W-Why did you come out so late? I called you when I met Lepus. I’ve waited so long.”

Then Serpens swayed its body from side to side as if it was dancing.

“I needed to prepare my mind-ing.”

“…”

Why would it take so long to prepare its mind.

I’ve been hot, cold, sick and went through it all.

I was about to give up because it was difficult, but Serpens is finally ready.

Lepus said Serpens was shy, but I didn’t expect it to be this much.

I slowly straightened my posture and sat down in front of Serpens.

As I stretched out my hand, Serpens licked my fingertips once.

“It’s cold.”

Is a snake’s tongue really this cold? It was as if it had brought some ice.

Suddenly, I remembered the day I had succeeded in calling Serpens.

The day I had a dream that I was wrapped around a black snake.

“I had a dream about you.”

“Dream-ing?”

“Mm. In my dream, you just rolled me up on the bed!”

Then Serpens drew an ‘S’ in the air and fluttered.

“That’s not a dream, though-ing.”

“What?”

“I did turn around you at night. Were you awake?”

You said it wasn’t a dream? I was very scared, you know?

“W-Why did you do that?”

“Because you’re cute-ing.”

Involuntarily, my mouth opened and my eyebrows furrowed.

“How scared I was back then.”

“People say babies like to play, so I thought you would like it-ing.”

While grunting, I looked at Serpens carefully.

Even though the view wasn’t perfect due to the dark water surface, each of its scales shone clearly like a jewel.

Serpens’ body was smaller than expected.

I thought it would be as big as the snake I saw in the book for it was a representative of God and was in the necklace, an ancient relic, for a long time.

However, its length was only a little longer than that if I stretched my arms out on both sides.

Its torso was like a piece of rope the size of two adult fingers put together and smooth as if it were oiled.

If I look closely, there are sharp points on the sides of its head.

Perhaps because of that, it looked like it had pointed ears standing on either side of its head.

But what’s with that tone in the end of its words?

It was to the point where my ears kept ringing with -ing, -ing, -ing.

“Why do you keep adding ‘-ing’ at the end of your words?”

“Such a thing exists-ing.”

“You let out a deep voice earlier, though.”

Even now it seemed that it was raising its voice on purpose. As if it has OCD.

“Such a thing exists-ing.”