|I'M THE OP VILLAINESS| {Yuri}

CHAPTER 16『THE PAST & THE PRESENT』

It is just as I succumbed to the words of Vespertite that memories of the past flowed inside my mind. The one which I remember the most, is from when we were little.

It was 10 years ago? I don't know. We were so young, it is all fuzzy.

It was probably our first experience with magic. It was extraordinary. We both loved it. Me and Vespertite, I mean. Me and my sister weren't always like this, you know. I mean, with me trying to murder her, and her just hating me for doing so, and rightfully to tell the truth.

We were siblings. I mean, yeah, we were having fights between each other, but nothing we wouldn't resolve in the mere span of an hour.

I remember, when she held Mother's Surger...it was when she surprised everyone. A rainy day it was. We were all inside the Palace, as always, and we were playing in one of the Halls with Mother and some servants. Father used to work constantly, so we almost never got to play with him...

She held her wand, flickered around with it, until a dark reddish ray of light, burst out of Mother's Surger. Vespertite had just cast her first spell at the tender age of 4.

It was majestic. It burst through the ceiling, with debris coming down at the floor. It was such a spectacle, with some much power and emotion. I haven't seen anything like this before, and I never will, unless she does it again.

Vespertite has always been a genius. She mastered Sorcery at the age of 5, and constructed her Surger at the age of 6. She enrolled in " The Academy of Urgish Editification and Inculcation" at the age of 8, when I was still playing with a girl's toddler games.

She had this refinement around her. No matter how hard I chased after her, she seemed to achieve something much greater, leaving my chasing all the more pointless.

But I really admired her, you know? She was kind of like an older sister for me, even though we are twins. I looked up to her. I wanted to become like her. Master Magic, become as smart as she is, as athletic as she is, follow after her.

Until, at one time, it became frustrating. Vespertite, as we grew older, she became more cold. She started referring to me as "Dear Sister" instead of just "Aristea" or just "Aristoula", which was my nickname, a diminutive of mine, used by Vespertite herself.

She stopped teaching me magic, as her hobbies and homework piled up one after the other. She never had enough room for me. I was also pretty horrible at magic myself, so she must have thought I was a lost cause, which looks like it was true, judging from what she said from her hologram.

Although we were and still are twins, she just defied everyone's expectations. Everyone's, except Father's. What she saw in Vespertite, was just an annoying, hyperactive nuisance that would spend her time in trivialities instead of being a princess, like I did.

At first, I was mad at him. I was jealous of my sister, of course, but I never stopped admiring her. Until my Father started taking care of me.

He showered me with praises, he became my teacher in Magic, he became my teacher in how to be a princess because he had raised two younger sisters of his, all by himself, and he thought he could do the same with me.

He fed me and my ego, so much in fact that at one time, I believed I was the best Magician in the world. I deep inside myself don't believe that, but I just cannot help but hide my insecurities by telling myself exactly just that.

He constantly ridiculed Vespertite in front of me, he belittled her. As time progressed, and saw Vespertite time and again, together with my ego and newfound spring of power, Father's constant belittlement and Vespertite's cold but sisterly attitude, it didn't take very long to snap at her.