Chapter 2
Chapter 2
Translation: godsn
Someone was shaking her.
"Your Highness, are you awake?"
Medeia blinked. Before her was a face as blank as if all expression had been drained away—a sheet of white paper.
The lady-in-waiting flinched at her doll-like appearance devoid of vitality.
"Your Highness? Can you hear me?"
A reflection shimmered across the mirror placed on the table.
Vivid emerald-green eyes. A delicately rounded forehead and a nose with smooth, elegant lines. And small, rosy lips tinged with red.
There stood a girl caught between childhood and womanhood.
Mechanically, Medeia lowered her head to look at her own arm.
'There should be scars here... left by the Magic Beasts...'
Yet the countless wounds she'd sustained during the expedition showed not even a trace. Far from scars, her skin was smooth and white, gleaming flawlessly.
'Is Hell this vivid? It can't be that I've grown young again.'
The past. The sudden thought made her body stiffen.
"Pelleus?"
"Pardon?"
"Is he alive?"
Pelleus, Medeia's older brother and the King of Valdina, had died because of her.
Because she had stolen the Philosopher's Stone, causing Valdina's Barrier to collapse.
A horde of pitch-black Magic Beasts had swarmed in, blanketing the entire nation.
Her brother had died holding back the relentless tide of beasts.
All while Medeia had been embroiled in the imperial struggle for her husband's throne.
Only then had Medeia realized—what the Philosopher's Stone truly was. Why, despite the Magic Beasts plaguing the continent, they had never crossed Valdina's borders.
"Your Highness, what do you mean? Of course His Majesty is alive."
At the lady-in-waiting's words, Medeia shot upright.
"Where is he?"
She had to see Pelleus.
Not the corpse torn apart by Magic Beasts, barely half remaining—but him, whole and alive.
"Dea, don't even think of returning. Valdina is no longer a land of protection."
"I don't blame you. Live. That's enough."
Her only family, who had worried over his hopeless little sister until the very end.
"Your Highness, where are you going? How do you expect to see someone on the battlefield?"
The lady-in-waiting grabbed Medeia as she staggered abruptly to her feet.
"Battlefield?"
"Don't you remember? They said you hit your head when you fell from your horse..."
"The war isn't over yet? The campaign hasn't ended? He's still alive."
Her disjointed questions sounded more like mutterings to herself than actual inquiries. The lady-in-waiting shook her head vigorously.
"This won't do at all. I'll summon the Royal Physician."
Just as the lady-in-waiting let out a sigh—
"No, I need to see for myself."
Medeia sprang up from her seat and bolted out.
"Your Highness! Where are you going?"
The lady-in-waiting hurried after her, but only the empty hallway greeted her in return.
"This is disastrous!"
The pale-faced lady-in-waiting rushed out in a panic.
Beneath Valdina's Royal Palace.
In a secret place permitted only to a select few of royal blood, lights flickered.
Medeia descended the spiraling staircase to its very bottom and pushed against the stone wall with all her might.
A frigid breeze stung her nose as the door opened.
At the center, an altar shone brilliantly. No—it was the light pouring from the national treasure placed upon the altar that illuminated the chamber.
"It's still... here."
The national treasure that protected Valdina's territory—the Philosopher's Stone.
Beyond her trembling fingertips, the cold aura of the gemstone seeped directly into her hands.
Medeia buried her face against it. Transparent tears streamed uncontrollably down its smooth surface.
"I need the Sage's Eye. If my uncle brings it to me, he'll keep his promise. He said he'd relinquish the throne."
Iason Castulo had demanded the Sage's Eye from Pelleus de Valdina, the King of Valdina, only to be flatly refused.
Yet Iason ultimately obtained it.
Because the king's sister, Medeia, had loved him.
"Help me, Medeia. I am the rightful heir to the Kazen imperial throne."
"If I become Emperor, you will stand by my side, and our child will rule the Empire. Medeia, surely you wouldn't want our child to grow up without their parents, just as you did?"
"I love you, Medeia."
Blind affection.
"Sister Medeia, His Grace the Grand Duke is suffering so much. If only he had the Philosopher's Stone, he would be complete."
"The Philosopher's Stone is just a national treasure in name. You can always return it later. It's only a temporary loan. Once relations between our kingdoms improve, Pelleus will understand you eventually."
"We're only saying this because we care about you."
She succumbed to their sweet persuasion.
Looking back, the seeds of tragedy had been sown then.
In her past life, the young and ignorant Medeia had stolen the Philosopher's Stone—only for it to be shattered into fragments and buried along Kazen's border defenses.
'The Emperor destroyed it in a panic, afraid I'd demand it back.'
Medeia gritted her teeth.
"I've... returned."
How could she not believe it, when the national treasure lay before her eyes in perfect condition?
The gods had granted her final plea!
"Ahahaha! Ahahaha!"
Mad laughter burst from her lips.
"Ancestors of Valdina, gods and spirits who protect this land."
She bent low and pressed her lips to the base of the altar. The faint glow of the Philosopher's Stone enveloped her.
"I won't... act foolishly again."
I won't waste this chance you've given me.
Medeia raised her head.
Her pale face was alight with piercing blue eyes that burned like ice.
"Claudio."
Every honor bestowed upon my uncle's house will fade into darkness.
"Iason."
The radiant crown Iason coveted will be torn from his grasp.
"I've returned."
The prophecy of her rebirth glowed ominously.
Medeia emerged from the dark underground passage. Her tears had long since dried.
'That maid earlier said I fell from my horse.'
Even in the haze of distant memories, certain moments remained painfully vivid—especially the wounds that had tormented her life the most.
The cursed princess. The half-blood. The child who brought misfortune.
All were epithets that clung to Medeia.
The Late King of Valdina had fallen in love with a wandering dancer during the war and made her his queen.
Though whispers about her origins were many, none dared openly scorn the queen.
For he had loved his wife so deeply that he took her with him even to the battlefield.
His son, Pelleus, had likewise followed his parents into war, but Medeia, being too young and vulnerable, had been left behind in the royal palace.
"I miss you so much. Please, come see me."
On her seventh birthday, unable to bear the loneliness, she had written a letter.
For their beloved youngest daughter, the Late King and Queen had promised without hesitation to return to her.
But enemies, embittered by successive defeats, ambushed them on their journey home.
In the end, all that reached Valdina's soil were their cold, lifeless coffins.
The kingdom was thrown into chaos.
When it became known that the King had met his demise on his way to see his young daughter, people blamed Medeia as the source of the tragedy.
"It's because of you! If only you hadn't called for them! You killed my son!"
At the King's funeral, the Queen Dowager, instead of mourning before her eldest son's coffin, seized her young granddaughter and screamed in rage until she collapsed in a faint.
Pelleus, too, ascended the throne only to immediately return to the frontlines—to restore order to an army on the verge of collapse after losing its leader, though he was barely more than a boy himself.
Amidst that turmoil, young Medeia was left utterly alone.
The Queen Dowager despised her granddaughter, her brother was always away at war, and there were no maternal relatives left to protect her.
The ones who reached out to the lonely, struggling girl were her uncle, the Regent, and his family.
To the princess in name only, they were sweet and kind.
Medeia became their puppet, moving exactly as they commanded, as they desired.
Unaware that her uncle's growing power now had her brother in its sights.
How foolish I was.
Kind lies and cunning schemes.
Medeia had failed to see the truth, failed to recognize sincerity.
"Mom, Dad... Did everyone leave because of me?"
The image of the young girl, drowning in loneliness and guilt as she wept alone, seemed to overlap with the desolate palace corridors.
But now was different.
Medeia was no longer that child. She was the mastermind who had endured grueling campaigns and the imperial succession war to place Iason on the throne.
So she could see, at a glance, the full scope of the game her uncle's family had orchestrated.
When I was around seventeen, I fell from a horse after attending a tea party.
A tea party and a fall from a horse.
Two events that should never have coincided—yet they did that day.
Had the maid Neril not thrown herself in the way, Medeia would have broken her neck and died.
But after that, Neril left the palace.
By the time Medeia awoke, she was already gone.
"She said serving a disgraced royal would get her killed first, so she left."
"She said she'd never come back. That anywhere would be better than this place."
Feeling betrayed, Medeia had forced herself to forget Neril.
But now, her reason told her this couldn't have been so simple.
She wasn't the type to leave without a word.
Now, having returned to the past with a second chance, the first thing Medeia needed to do was secure a stronghold.
She couldn't fight alone in a palace surrounded by enemies on all sides.
If only Neril had been by my side...
Had there been even one person left who was wholly loyal to her, someone she could trust at her back, her past life wouldn't have been so grueling.
"Did you hear? Jena's punishing one of the princess's maids right now."
Just then, a group of maids passed by the corridor. Medeia quickly hid herself.
"Do you know who it is? It's her! That oddball who gave up her knighthood and willingly entered the princess's service."
"Good heavens, her? What did she do wrong? She was the only one who actually worked properly there."
"She's always been too upright, so the Head Maid had it out for her. Just waiting for an excuse—seems she's using the princess's fall as a pretext to get rid of her for good. They say Jena's been ordered to punish her."
"What? That's absurd. She saved Her Highness! Everyone saw it."
"If the Head Maid says so, then it's so. If she says an earring belongs on your nose, then it does. Who in the palace right now would dare cross that woman—gasp—Y-Your Highness?!"
The maids recoiled in shock as a figure suddenly blocked their path.
"Where is this happening?"
Medeia's voice cut through the icy corridor.