Ch.150Past Story: Serena Elizabeth – 1

Though it might seem quite surprising, Serena believed in fate.

Even if she now lived a life far removed from destiny after meeting her true lord, it was certain that the young Serena had blindly believed in fate.

After all, if fate hadn’t guided Serena’s hand, she would never have met her lord.

“…Ugh!”

With a loud crash of breaking dishes, Serena’s body collapsed sideways. Her head slammed hard against the floor.

A moment later, food spilled over her head, sticking to her lusterless blonde hair. Bright red broth dripped down her forehead, trickling between strands of hair.

Her hair was completely disheveled even without the food that had been dumped on it. Her skin was grimy, and her clothes were tattered and filthy.

A thin, bony hand caressed her swollen cheek. Judging by how her body flinched with pain each time her fingers touched her cheek, she must have been hit quite hard.

The servant who had created this disaster looked down at Serena sprawled on the kitchen floor with cold eyes. Those eyes held not a trace of remorse.

“Are you in your right mind?”

“…”

Serena hung her head low. This treatment was familiar, as was the pain. If she just endured a little longer, they would leave, snickering among themselves as they always did.

It was better to stay quiet rather than provoke them by speaking. Whatever she said would only be used against her.

Displeased by Serena’s attitude, a booted foot stomped on her head. Her head slammed into the floor again, making her skull ring.

This time it hurt quite a bit more. Tears welled up in her blue eyes, but Serena gritted her teeth and tried to maintain an expressionless face, holding back her tears.

Showing tears would only embolden them further.

“Do my words mean nothing to you? I’m asking if you’re in your right mind. Why aren’t you answering? Are you deaf? Should I clear your ears for you? Hmm?”

The boot grinding on her head twisted left and right. Her already disheveled hair became even more tangled and damaged under the boot, making her look even more pitiful.

“…I’m sorry.”

“What? Sorry? You’re sorry?”

Serena barely managed to squeeze out a response. It was the best she could do while in pain. But it still wasn’t enough to satisfy them.

With a snort, the servant picked up the teapot from the table and poured its entire contents over Serena’s head. Serena couldn’t even resist as she was drenched with tea.

Thankfully, the tea was only lukewarm rather than freshly boiled and scalding. If it had been hot tea, she would certainly have been burned, and then she would have been scolded again.

Laughter erupted in the kitchen as they looked at Serena, who now resembled a drowned rat. The servant who had poured the tea laughed the loudest.

Not a single person in this kitchen was on Serena’s side.

“Do you even know what you should be sorry for?”

“…”

What should she be sorry for? Well. Serena stared at the floor with empty eyes. There was no way for her to know what she had done wrong.

She woke up first in the morning to clean, did all the chores that the servants were supposed to share, and handled all the odd jobs that should have been done by the servants as well.

She had taken on all the work that should have been theirs, so what had she done wrong? She had already finished everything she was told to do.

It was the same this time. She had been told to hold a plate, so she stopped cleaning the floor and took the offered plate. That was all. She hadn’t done anything else.

The plate itself only contained leftover food scraps, and she was slapped for having a “disrespectful look in her eyes.” And now she was in this state.

She had long given up on any help. There were several other servants nearby, but they were all busy laughing at Serena, who was covered in food scraps and tea.

While looking at a mere ten-year-old.

The servant pushed back the foot that had been stomping on Serena’s head. Serena fell flat on her face. Despite being the one who had hit Serena, the servant clicked their tongue and wiped their boot on the kitchen floor.

“Clean all this up. Understand?”

“…Yes.”

Serena nodded. She had no choice but to agree. Even if she expressed refusal, the violence would continue until she agreed.

“Ugh, how did we end up with a girl like that under our supervision.”

“What should we make her do next time? Haven’t we already dumped all our chores on her today?”

“Just make her clean again. It’s easy to find fault with her, isn’t it?”

Serena’s unfocused blue eyes watched as they discussed what to dump on her next, deliberately talking loudly enough for her to hear about finding fault with her, their voices gradually fading away.

After remaining collapsed for a while, Serena gathered the broken dish fragments in her dirty apron and put them in the trash.

A fragment grazed her fingertip, drawing a small drop of blood, but she ignored it. She had become too accustomed to pain to complain about a small cut on the tip of her finger.

She picked up the scattered teapot, cleaned it thoroughly, and brewed fresh tea. Then she took a mop and cleaned the floor with practiced movements.

The stains that had soaked into the wooden floor wouldn’t come out easily. Surely, tomorrow they would find fault with this. Where would they hit her next? Her cheek? Her shin? Her hair?

Whatever it was, it was clear that tomorrow would be a much more grueling day than usual. She almost wished tomorrow wouldn’t come.

Even as she worried about tomorrow, Serena diligently finished cleaning and shook out her clothes, which were soaked with food scraps and tea. She did this outside to avoid leaving stains on the floor that would require more cleaning.

The sky was already pitch black. Most of the servants would have gone to bed by now, except for those on night patrol. As evidence, the mansion was very quiet.

It had already been quite late, with the sun completely gone from the sky, when she was called to the kitchen and found fault with. So it must be the middle of the night now.

After returning the mop and bucket to their places, she headed home. Serena’s home wasn’t the mansion. Nor was it the servants’ quarters.

The building Serena called home was located in a corner of the estate, far removed from the servants’ quarters, in a neglected area.

It was barely worthy of being called a home—a dilapidated structure made of old, tied-together wooden planks. This was the building Serena called home and where she slept.

Serena slapped her cheeks a couple of times to compose her face as much as possible, then pushed open the wooden plank that barely functioned as a door and entered. The hinges creaked.

The inside was filthy. The building itself was no bigger than a single room, and the ceiling was very low.

Mold grew on the walls, the floorboards were worn out, and the lit candle was almost completely burned down. Of course, magical light sources were out of the question.

The only furniture was a bed and a few clothes hangers. Because of this, despite the room being quite small, it felt extremely empty.

Serena called out to the bed in the brightest voice she could muster:

“I’m home, Mom!”

At that voice, a figure lying on the filthy bed slowly sat up.

The golden hair, identical to Serena’s, was dull and lifeless. It was so thin that it seemed it would break if pulled.

Dark circles hung heavily under her eyes, and her face was so gaunt that her cheekbones protruded. Her wrists were so thin that it was painful to look at.

“My daughter… *cough* you’re back?”

Her voice was phlegmy, completely devoid of strength, and seemed like it could fade away at any moment. Serena ran over and hugged her mother tightly.

“Your clothes… why are they so wet… *cough*.”

“I-I just accidentally spilled some water! It’s nothing!”

She hurriedly made excuses to her mother who immediately noticed her wet clothes. But she couldn’t fool her mother.

Her mother’s eyes turned sad. That gaze pricked at Serena’s heart.

Her mother seemed unwilling to question her daughter who had returned late from work. Instead, she tightened her arms around Serena and patted her back.

Although her physical weakness meant that the added pressure was barely noticeable, it was enough that Serena could feel it clearly.

After embracing each other silently for a while, Serena was the first to pull away.

She changed from her dirty maid’s uniform into equally dirty nightclothes, and snuggled into her mother’s arms, who had moved slightly to make room. The bed was too narrow for two people, but they managed by pressing close together.

Lying on the worn-out bedsheet and covered with a tattered blanket, Serena tightly embraced her mother with both arms.

It was the only moment of peace for Serena after a day of suffering.

Serena hadn’t always lived like this. Until she was seven years old, she had been recognized as a noble young lady and lived a wealthy life without any lack.

Serena’s father was a member of a renowned noble family, largely thanks to his well-placed ancestors. He was important enough to be permitted entry to the royal palace for significant events.

Although many nobles had died due to Charlotte’s tyranny, as long as they weren’t extremely unlucky, Charlotte generally left alone those nobles who prostrated themselves before her.

This meant that if they stayed in their territories, collected taxes from their people, paid the required amount to the kingdom, and didn’t harbor rebellious thoughts, they wouldn’t randomly lose their heads.

Serena’s father was from such a lineage. From the beginning, they had quietly obeyed Charlotte’s commands, so they were nobles that Charlotte didn’t pay much attention to.

They were the type of people who realized early on that it was better to abandon pride and preserve their lives and family than to resist out of useless pride and lose everything.

So they survived while execution grounds were being stained with blood, and could even pass down a much larger family estate to their descendants.

It also helped that when high-ranking nobles like dukes and marquises, who unnecessarily clung to their pride, were all swept away, lower-ranking nobles in ambiguous positions opportunistically filled those positions.

Thus, Serena’s father was able to rise in rank thanks to such ancestors.

In contrast, Serena’s mother was a commoner. She was born as the daughter of an ordinary merchant in the territory ruled by Serena’s father, living an ordinary life.

But they fell into a fated love. In her mother’s words, they fell in love at first sight the moment they saw each other.

Serena’s mother always proudly described her romance with her husband to Serena. When she spoke of it, her mother was full of vitality.

“Those were such happy times. We would feed each other food, and go on private trips into the forest.”

“But aren’t there monsters in the forest?”

“That’s why we got scolded so much when we returned to the mansion. They said the forest was dangerous. But it was fine. We still held hands the whole time, wiggling our fingers to express affection. We had to try harder not to laugh because of that.”

Naturally, their relationship led to marriage, and Serena’s father brought her mother, who had been an ordinary merchant’s daughter, into the mansion as its mistress, despite all opposition.

Serena was born around that time.

Serena grew up receiving abundant love from her mother and father, and everything seemed to be going smoothly.

Until a woman came to the mansion when Serena was about seven years old.

The last time Serena saw her father, he came into the bedroom, embraced his daughter and wife, and repeated apologies while crying.

After that, Serena never spoke with her father again. He rarely came out of his bedroom, and on the rare occasions when he did go out, there was always some woman clinging to his side.

A woman with the appearance of a vicious cat.

Serena didn’t know where this woman came from or why she was always by her father’s side. She was too young, at seven years old, to understand such things.

“The head of the family has collapsed. Therefore, from now on, I, as his wife, will hold all authority.”

That was the announcement she heard one day.

The woman with the appearance of a vicious cat declared that Serena’s father had collapsed due to a serious illness, and that she would now hold all authority in the family.

Indeed, Serena could no longer see her father, whom she used to occasionally encounter within the mansion. This all happened after that declaration.

When her mother went to speak with the woman who claimed to be the wife of the head of the family, she returned much later with a pale face and held Serena while crying. Not understanding why her mother was crying, Serena cried along with her.

After that, the treatment of the mother and daughter gradually worsened. All the servants in the mansion were replaced with unfamiliar faces, and the new servants treated the mother and daughter almost as if they didn’t exist.

Despite Serena and her mother repeatedly requesting to see her father, they were always refused on the grounds that his condition was critical.

The standard of living for the mother and daughter deteriorated endlessly, reaching a point where they were fortunate if they were given three meals a day and allowed to stay in the mansion.

Finally, after a year, they fell to a status lower than the mansion’s servants. Protests were of no use.

“From now on, you will work like the other servants. If you don’t like it, well, you can leave with nothing but the clothes on your back. But I wonder if a married woman with a child can stay safe at night if she’s thrown out alone? If someone attacks you at night, it would be quite a sight for your child to see, wouldn’t it?”

At first, it was Serena’s mother. But Serena’s mother had never been in good health to begin with, and due to various adversities, she couldn’t continue working for long and fell ill.

From then on, it was Serena’s turn. An 8-year-old girl’s hands held a rag and bucket, and she wore dirty rags instead of elegant dresses.

Now there was no one in the mansion whose face Serena recognized. Servants, butlers, maids—all were unfamiliar faces.

And they all tended to bully Serena. Insulting her behind her back or laughing at her would have been mild in comparison; she was slapped or had her hair pulled.

There was not a trace of guilt about bullying an eight-year-old girl.

As time passed, Serena lost her smile in proportion to how accustomed she became to servant work. With dead eyes, she silently performed the endless tasks dumped on her.

She could only find her lost smile when her mother read her fairy tales. Serena especially liked stories about honorable knights.

Stories like that of a knight who risked his life to fight for a lord who had been executed under a dishonorable false accusation, eventually restoring the lord’s honor before meeting his own death.

Or stories of knights who turned the whole world against them to protect their lords, staying with them until the end to create their own country.

Even accounting for the exaggeration typical of fairy tales, such stories made Serena’s heart race. She wanted to give or receive such loyalty.

Perhaps because almost all fairy tales were told from the knight’s perspective, she leaned more toward wanting to meet a true lord to whom she could give such loyalty.

But her mother’s condition worsened to the point where she could barely perform simple actions like reading fairy tales, and Serena’s treatment grew increasingly harsh.

As Serena thought about her dying, ill mother and her own worsening treatment, gradually killing her spirit, it was on one such day.

That she faced her destiny.