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Translator: penny
Chapter: 32
Chapter Title: Camilla's Past
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A week passed in the blink of an eye.
After declaring I wouldn't pay any more attention to Camilla, I hadn't run into her even once. Maybe that's why time seemed to fly by even faster.
Coincidentally, our paths had naturally diverged. Camilla only stirred at night when everyone else was asleep, and the sole daytime tutoring sessions—the only time she was awake—I spent out running errands.
It was comfortable enough in its own way. No need to fret over those eerie eyes of hers. They were as cold as if she were staring at a corpse.
But even so, a nagging unease lingered in one corner of my heart, refusing to fade easily.
Her face the last time I'd seen her, a week ago.
Camilla's suddenly flustered expression had looked for all the world like she wanted to hold onto me.
That face kept vaguely surfacing in my mind, circling endlessly.
I'd told her outwardly to stop bothering me, but maybe what she truly wanted was something else entirely. The thought kept rising unbidden in my chest.
"Bella."
The voice brushing my ear snapped me out of my reverie. When I looked up, Roselia's red eyes were fixed on me.
Our daily morning meals together.
Camilla used to make an occasional appearance before, but now it was just Roselia and me.
"Something on your mind?"
"...No."
I pushed the swirling thoughts from my head for the moment and quietly bit into the bread before me.
In truth, avoiding Camilla wasn't a bad thing for me. She was an utter enigma, and besides, wasn't she the villain who'd claim thousands of lives down the line?
"Hmm... Come to think of it, Bella, did you two quarrel or something?"
"Pardon?"
"You seem a bit distant lately."
"We never crossed paths much to begin with."
I answered calmly, as if it were nothing out of the ordinary.
Roselia knew Camilla kept nocturnal hours, so she didn't press the issue.
"Even so, after you arrived, Camilla seemed a touch brighter. Lately, though, she's slipped back to her old ways."
"..."
It was hard to credit.
Those lifeless, corpse-like eyes of hers brightening up?
"I meant it when I said I hoped you and Camilla would get along."
Roselia carefully sliced the bread on her plate into neat bites and placed them on mine. I still wasn't used to her tender gestures.
"...Do you worry about Camilla, Roselia?"
"Of course. She's my daughter."
But she's not really.
The words nearly tumbled out.
Camilla and Roselia weren't linked by blood.
Like me, Camilla had simply been brought into this mansion as someone Roselia needed.
In the game, their bond was more alliance than family.
After Roselia's downfall, Camilla had shown up in a later DLC, vowing to slay the archbishop in her stead—but it was little more than a convenient pretext.
In reality, it was closer to Camilla's savage thirst for the blood of countless souls.
At least, that's how it played out in the game.
"...Come to think of it, you mentioned Camilla had a dark past."
I watched Roselia's reaction carefully.
She didn't seem overly perturbed.
"I did."
"Do you know what happened?"
I wanted to hear it straight from her.
If even Roselia deemed it a grim history...
"Curious?"
Roselia peered into my eyes and turned the question back on me.
I nodded quietly instead of answering.
She propped her chin on her hand, falling into brief contemplation.
A short silence stretched between us.
Then Roselia slowly spoke.
"Bella. What I'm about to share is a secret unknown even to the rest of the Rahel Tani family."
Her voice was low and grave, worlds apart from her usual tone.
Her gaze upon me matched it.
The shift in atmosphere made me tense, straightening my back.
"Is it all right to tell me something like that?"
"Perhaps not. But you strike me as someone who keeps her mouth shut, Bella. Don't you?"
"I-it's heavy, but yeah..."
"And now that you bear the Rahel Tani name too, I figure it's time you knew."
I hesitated.
Better not to hear it, maybe.
Deeper ties to this family could spell trouble down the line.
One day, I might vanish without a trace for knowing too much.
"Do you want to hear it?"
Roselia checked once more.
It felt like a warning of sorts.
A hint that she wouldn't let a leak slide easily.
Logically, no reason to listen.
I could draw a line—say I didn't care to know—and keep my distance from the family.
But in the end, I couldn't bring myself to.
The image of Roselia smiling warmly, reaching out to me, kept resurfacing.
Her hand hovering near my hair—cautious, gentle, brimming with warmth.
The Blood Witch from the game's lore held no such kindness.
Yet the woman before me was utterly different.
That gap kindled a faint spark of possibility in my heart.
Could I halt her inevitable corruption, stop her march toward ruin?
I brushed my fingertip over my lips.
Why? The sudden sensation was Camilla's lips.
At odds with her hollow, icy gaze, they had felt unmistakably warm.
Surprisingly soft and delicate—the heat of a young girl just like me.
"...Please tell me."
In the end, I chose against reason.
I couldn't say what drove me.
But perhaps this tale would soothe the nagging discomfort buried within.
I'm such a pushover.
Just a week ago, I'd sworn off caring about Camilla—yet here I was, meddling over some lingering qualm.
Well, hearts aren't constant.
Minds change.
Just keep it to myself.
Worst case, swear a blood oath never to spill the secret when I leave the family someday. That'd set Roselia's mind at ease.
Roselia smiled faintly.
After a moment's silence, she spoke at last.
"Camilla isn't my daughter."
I already knew as much.
But I feigned wide-eyed shock.
"Then... the Family Head's...?"
"Not his either. She's adopted, just like you."
"I see..."
Roselia nodded.
"Camilla was a sacrifice."
"A sacrifice?"
"Yes. One meant for a cult of heretics."
My eyes flew wide.
Totally unforeseen.
Heretics.
The term rang familiar.
There was such a group.
Known as the Black Altar.
A festering force of lunatics, most out of their minds.
Sinister folk who offered up children as sacrifices and wielded necromancy with the corpses of the elderly.
But what chilled the blood more was their warped faith, viewing such atrocities as commonplace.
They revered the Demon King—the entity that had plagued half the world with sickness three centuries past.
For his revival, no moral boundary was sacred.
Camilla, a sacrifice for them? No such detail in the game.
"For a pittance—not even a hundred runes—her parents sold her to the heretics and slunk away."
"That's..."
I trailed off, speechless.
My parents had abandoned me at birth, but they'd at least left me at the orphanage.
Camilla's? They'd hawked their own child to the most depraved cabal imaginable.
"Our family clashed with the heretics. During a raid on their stronghold, we found her by chance."
Reliving old memories?
A veil of quiet sorrow shadowed Roselia's red eyes.
"She was just four. Bound on the altar, her face resigned to death."
Far weightier than I'd imagined.
I'd assumed Camilla was discarded and orphanage-raised, like me.
No such luck. The truth she'd shared was orders of magnitude crueler.
"Why... adopt Camilla?"
I ventured cautiously.
In the game, Roselia spotted her magical gift and groomed her as a weapon against the archbishop.
But somehow, that rang false as her motive.
"I thought that girl... might one day stop me."
Regret colored the tail end of Roselia's words.
Then it clicked.
The Roselia sitting across from me...
Was no Blood Witch from the game.
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