The Eldest Daughter Walks Down The Flower Path

Chapter 8

“That brat must’ve lost her mind.”

Margaret had an ice bag on her head as she muttered.

Yaaawn.

While flipping through a dress catalogue, Yurhi yawned without care. Margaret had been muttering the same words for more than ten times already today.

The matter of her brother’s future and the family’s honor was simply boring for Yurhi, who was just thirteen years old.

Rather than that, it was better for Yurhi to just look at the dress catalogues piled up in her mother’s room.

A snow white muslin dress, colorful ribbons, bright yellow, pale pink, elegant blue, beautiful evening dresses that would suit her…

Yurhi finally made up her mind.

“Yurhi likes yellow!”

However Margaret continued to disregard Yurhi, not hearing the teenager’s whining as she held up the catalogue right in front of her face.

“Mom! I like this yellow dress!”

Only then did Margaret notice her daughter.

“What?”

Yurhi spoke clearly.

“Mom promised!”

“What are you talking about?”

Yurhi could feel her stomach sinking.

She stomped her foot and shook the catalogue roughly.

“Mooooom! You’re so mean! Did you forget already? The Third Prince’s birthday banquet! Mom definitely said that you’ll buy me a new dress for the banquet!!”

The colorful catalogue was flailed wildly in front of Margaret’s eyes while the sound of Yurhi’s loud whining pierced through her ears.

Margaret could palpably feel her temper rising.

She exploded and yelled at Yurhi right then.

“Will you freeze to death if you don’t get new clothes?!”

At this, Yurhi’s bright green eyes widened in astonishment.

“So you’re not going to buy me a new dress…?”

That’s not possible.

She couldn’t wear old clothes to the birthday banquet of the Third Prince of the Empire, Olivier.

If she would, she’d get laughed at by that despicable Rosalie.

Yurhi needed to get that new dress somehow.

“Uwaaaaaaaaahhhh”

She cried and cried for days upon end. She even went on a hunger strike!

“Ahhhh, shut up!”

Margaret covered her ears.

However, her hands couldn’t do much to block the child’s shrill cries.

Margaret felt like she was going crazy.

‘This is all because of Radis!’

Just look how much she’s suffering because of the fraudulent admission accusation!

Margaret and Jade tried to cover up the incident as a practical joke that a jealous sister did on her younger brother.

However, apart from the rumors, there was one problem they couldn’t fix: Klein Rockton, the admissions officer.

If Klein Rockton had been a more flexible person, things would have been smoothed over without a hitch.

However, neither Margaret nor Jade’s buttering up worked on him.

Klein returned to the academy at once and immediately asked for the Academic Committee to conduct the test once more for David. The committee, seeing that Klein’s arguments were valid, accepted the motion for a retest.

The problem was that if David would take that retest, he’d immediately be caught.

Eventually, Jade sent a letter saying that he would cancel his son’s admission to the academy to preserve his honor.

It was fortunate that things didn’t get any bigger than this, but in the process of it all, just how much solicitation did they have to do, how many things to clean up…!

“B*tch!”

Margaret, who reflexively cursed, gasped and covered her lips.

‘How could that weak Radis make an elegant lady like me swear…!’

She wasn’t the only one shocked by the aggressive words coming from her lips.

“M, M, Mom…!”

She had only been pretending to cry all this time, but Yurhi’s eyes began to be filled with real, bead-like tears.

As soon as Margaret saw those tears from her daughter’s green eyes, she came to her senses, not wanting to make her lovely daughter upset.

“Ahh, Yurhi! No, no. I didn’t say that to you!”

“Uwaaaaaah!!”

“This is all because of Radis, that wicked brat. Goodness, my baby, don’t cry! Okay, okay let’s get you that dress!”

“Hiic, hiiiic…”

“Which one do you like? The green one?”

“Hiic, uwaah, the—the yellow one…!”

While shedding tears, Yurhi pointed to the dress she wanted.

“Okay, okay! It’s a good, expensive dress, too. Stop crying now. Mom’s head feels like it’s about to split in two!”

After getting what she wanted, Yurhi’s tears quickly abated.

Margaret sighed as she saw the price written under the design of the yellow dress.

Then, something interesting caught her eye.

 

* * * 

In her previous life, Radis’ body was left in a horrible state.

The demonic energy that entered her system was extremely poisonous to humans.

Those who were exposed to that were supposed to take enough time to rest while waiting for the demonic energy to go away on its own. If not that, they would need to go to a temple and pay a hefty sum to receive a purification ritual from a priest.

Back then, Radis had no choice but to endure it all on her own.

Her skin, which had also been exposed to the blood of demonic monsters for so long, became dark purple, and some parts of her body were even already rotting.

It wasn’t just her skin.

The demonic energy permeated every part of her whole body deeply.

Her eyesight had gradually declined and her body weakened.

In that dire situation, she overcame the limitations of the human body and mind that she thought she couldn’t withstand.

She found out how to change demonic energy into mana.

As a result, she did not die. She grew stronger.

But that was just a temporary measure.

And there were side effects.

Even though she gained strength from the demonic energy, she had to live with the pain of a body addicted to demonic energy.

Her vision was blurred and, even when her skin was only slightly touched, it felt as though her bones were being crushed.

There were times when black crystals would be mixed with the blood she coughed out. Every time this happened, she would think that her demise wouldn’t be far away.

So now that she had returned to her sixteen-year-old body, Radis felt utmost comfort for the first time in a long while.

“I can’t believe it feels this good to be healthy.”

Her bedroom door was locked from the outside, so she slipped away to the roof by going out her window.

She had no problems moving at all.

These nimble limbs and light body were unfamiliar, but it felt good.

Without her body hurting, she practiced her swordsmanship even if she didn’t have a sword in her hands.

She could feel the scorching clay tiles of the sunlit roof with her bare feet.

The roof was sloped, but it was like flat land to her.

She was someone who once lithely wandered through the harsh demonic forest.

On the steep roof, she made her way bare-footed and bare-handed.

Her foundation was the Imperial swordsmanship basics that Armano taught her.

Without a sword, she assumed the position of a knight’s stance.

Of course, during battle, there was no time to take this stance perfectly, but whenever she could, Armano’s voice always seemed to resonate in her ears.

‘There are enemies in front of you and there are people you have to protect behind you. At the center is your sword. You must observe everything.’

Armano would look into the eyes of the young Radis, who was still in the knight’s stance, and continued.

’There is also something you must never forget—behind your sword is someone you must also defend preciously. It’s yourself, Radis. You have to protect yourself.’

Armano never said these words to David, and this always made Radis curious.

Why was it that Armano said this only to her?

Her feet stepped onto the bricks.

Her footwork was the foundation of her movement.

Quickly, slowly, strongly, softly.

She moved forward like a flowing current.

As she lunged, she didn’t forget to keep her back defended.

The essence of Imperial swordsmanship was defense.

A knight must never lose hold over their emotions like a raging wave.

There must always be room to protect what’s behind her, and so her form was ready to spring back at any time, like ripples over a lake’s surface.

Many things had happened ever since she learned Imperial swordsmanship from Armano, and her technique had changed, but she never forgot this essence.

She had often practiced this swordsmanship technique dozens or even hundreds of times in just one day alone.

Regardless of whether she was on dry land, in a harsh forest, or in the vast darkness.

She would sometimes lose her balance and collapse on the ground, but she would stand back up without fail.

Because it was through her sword that she lived.

“Huuu…!”

Soaked in sweat and now unable to move one muscle, Radis lied back down on the roof.

The blue sky above her was endless.

The white clouds scattered at some places, then merged again in others, reaching out as far as they could.

“The sky—it’s so pretty.”

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In her previous life, she couldn’t even afford to look up at the sky.

It was only before she died that she could look up while she was laying on her deathbed.

However, by then, she had already lost almost all her sight.

Right now, she could see clearly even the edges of the fluttering clouds.

This alone made her cry tears of joy.