The Reincarnated Villainous Young Master's Guide to Happiness

Chapter 55: Chimera Child

This chapter is brought to you by Chimera by aeseaes. 

Edited by: bafflinghaze

---

"... What?"

Neo sat there, unmoving, as Astella revealed the one thing that, in another lifetime, would have broken him into a million pieces.

"Alouysia was half Castas. The curse of the Elysiums, which I assumed you already figured out—"

At this, Neo absentmindedly nodded because yes, it was quite obvious that his mother was a missing Elysium child.

"—would have been fully neutralized. She would not have died from a plague, or other such nonsense."

She looked at him like he was dirt. "You, on the other hand, with an Odum Father, exacerbated your Elysium bloodline and would have been susceptible to a multitude of bad luck and illness. It was a wonder how you managed to survive on scraps and the filth of the slums, but the curse was still present and dormant within you, and the plague would have done you in if your mother had not traded her life for yours."

"You're telling me I'm the reason she died."

She blinked. "No, I'm telling you I killed your mother."

There was a mix of guilt and shame in her eyes as she said this, followed by hatred, anger, and resentment.

These were emotions Neo could relate to when he was at his worst.

It would seem they were truly related, after all.

"What did she do?" he asked, feeling his voice strain.

"To save you?"

The face Astella made gave him pause.

She gave a cold chuckle, and instead of answering, she said, "I always wondered why she loved you. Child of hers or not, you were such a strange boy. Those who encountered you in the Garden could see it in your eyes. You were supposed to be impossible to love."

At that very moment, Neo almost decided he didn't want to know this.

He almost decided he didn't want to hear it.

He wanted to blink stupidly at her, filter the words out, and not understand them.

If I hear this, he thought, I would surely be destroyed.

Astella, perhaps emboldened by his lack of response, continued as if she hadn't told him he didn't deserve his mother's love.

"There is a healing spell Laurel and I invented during our apprenticeship with the Wandering Healer. We swore an oath to use it only once, for the price of this treatment required an equal exchange. Laurel traded her womb to save Duke Elysium's child, and I traded your mother's soul to bring you back from the brink of death."

---

They were alone in Alouysia's room after Astella appeased the Madam by tossing her a sack of coins.

"For me and the boy," she said.

"For how long?" The old woman weighed the sack in her wrinkly hands.

"Make it a week."

Never say Astella didn't care for her nephew. After all, no matter how much she disliked him, he was still her sister's son.

But now, she has never regretted anything more.

"I will not let you gamble with your life!" Astella cried out, unwilling to listen any longer.