Twinkling Little Stars

Chapter 1

Lilian York was holding the newborn Athanasia in her arms and there was a man before her.

He had a striking appearance, with his shiny blonde hair and the blood of the innocent people, which he had taken the lives of just minutes ago, all over him.

He held his sword, which was covered in blood from the slaughter, and took a look at the little baby. He recalled her name. 'Athanasia'.

The word "Amusing" came out of his mouth. It was like he could pierce the baby along with Lilian while only using his eyes. Her legs were trembling, knowing that she could die any moment.

And he said one last sentence "I wonder how long this thing can live in accordance to it's name."

When, at last, he turned his back to them and walked away from the graveyard he created, Lilian's legs gave off.

Vision blackens.

She knew she was dreaming, but that didn't keep her from being terrified of what she saw. And since she was close to awaking, she saw the end of the dream half sleeping, half awake.

She knew where this scene could belong to. She guessed it was the story Who Made Me A Princess. When she was a devoted fan of the work, it would be unforgivable if she didn't recognize such important characters from it.

But she didn't remember seeing a part exactly like this. Still, she didn't care. It was just her overimagination. She was just glad that she was alive now. But she wasn't sure if her current life would be worth living.

She was feeling weird, but that was to be expected. Maybe some, or many of her bones were broken. She tried to open her eyes, but they wouldn't open. They were feeling as if she had rubbed them with sandpaper, just like the times she slept too little for her own good. Thus, she tried to focus on her hearing.

Her ears didn't seem to be working well enough to make words out of the noises she heard, but she could at least grasp that it was abnormally loud for a patient's room. Maybe she was in the emergency ward, but she would probably need to be operated on, so shouldn't they have anaesthetised her?

But this wasn't all. There was something strange. She felt way lighter than she should have. For a moment, she was afraid she had lost some of her limbs. Gratefully, after a second, she realised she could feel all her limbs and even fingers, though they weren't working as they should have. She noted she didn't feel pain either, other than in her eyes. Since they weren't as bad anymore, she tried forcing them open once again, and this time, succeeded.

Contrary to her expectations, her eyes opened to a different place then any place she expected herself to be. She was in a darkened room with a beautiful chandelier right above her and was surrounded by four walls which looked like they were made out of fabric. Confused, she tried reaching her hands out and saw chubby, little hands with tiny fingers.

She became worried and started crying unknowingly. She couldn't stop. Not because she was afraid of the situation she was in, but because she was unable to.

The next thing she saw was someone approaching the thing she assumed to be a craddle. Though unlogical, a craddle was the only thing these unnecessarily close four walls could have been. Then the person came even closer and got her out of the hateful thing.

Now she saw her face. She was a grandma who had wrinkles all over her face and also wore a maid's uniform. She was smiling at her... a little sadly.

Still, she was conforted by her and stopped crying. Her touch was warm and gave off the feeling that she cared for her. And she uttered the words "Poor thing." While she didn't get what was going on, she disliked that someone was calling her a 'poor thing'. Being seen as a poor thing was rarely a good thing.

Then a bed way bigger than her tiny craddle came into her view. A person was lying on it. But the figure didn't move. After a while, she noticed it was a woman and there were many maids getting in and out of the room.

Trying to keep calm, she came to terms with the fact that she was now a baby, and that the lying lady there was probably her mother, with the grandma here wiping her eyes all the time and calling her a poor thing.

Suddenly someone came running way faster than the others. And to her surprise, he was a man, whereas all the other people running around were maids, which were of course women. With the man's arrival, everyone was frozen in their places other than the grandma, and the air started feeling chilly to her.

He looked at the dead body first. She was sure the lady must have turned cold by now, but he hugged her for what seemed like the last time.

The next moment, his eyes fell on her. The tiny little creature in the grandma's arms. She supposed this person to be her father, juding from his actions. But he looked at her with a piercing gaze.

Then the grandma called her father "Your Highness." So, was she a princess then? But she wasn't sure if it mattered if she was a princess or a village girl if her father didn't like her, looking at the situation. Her mother was probably dead because of the childbirth, so he would hold her responsible, a tiny baby who couldn't even act according to her own will.

She thought all of this in a short moment and predicted all this based on the many novels and manhwas she read, judging from how this place looked like thoose fictional worlds. But since this really turned out to be her reality, she wasn't sure if she could reach a happy ending or survive from this. And was there even an ending?

Then he started coming towards them. The grandma called him again, "Your Highness." She could hear it from her voice, the kind old lady holding her was deeply wounded. After the second call, her father stopped for a moment. Holding her with only one arm, the grandma put her other hand in her uniform's pocket and took out an envelope.

He quickly reached his hand for the envelope after seeing it. "Lady Melanie wanted me to give this to you if something ever happened to her..." the grandma said.

Her guesses were right, after all. But it was sad. Her mother and father seemed to love each other dearly. But now her mother was dead and she couldn't predict what her father would do to her.

He opened the envelope carefully, probably trying not to damage it. His eyes moved like crazy and he got to the end of the envelope in the blink of an eye. And she could just watch him with fearful eyes.

When he finished reading, he turned to the two of them. She could see tears forming on the corners of his eyes. That surprised her.

And there was some other thing which made her widen her eyes in disbelief. He had deep blue, jeweled eyes. That meant very much to her. She was probably in the story Who Made Me A Princess - or The Lovely Princess, which happened in a different timeline but had the same characters - and she was of royal bloodline.

She didn't know what time it was, like which emperor's daughter she was. But then she also paid attention to his hair and whole face. He shared the same shiny blond hair and the same face with the man from her dream.

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Hi, readers who might read this in the future. This is the first time I'm trying to write a story and I hope you will like reading this as much as I love writing this. I wish you a good week!