The Villain Princess Rewrites Her Fate

Spiritual Power Overflow

Ever since Chester had scared her half to death for no reason that day, Lovf's head had ached without letup.

Chester's baffling proposal had thrown her into a panic. Terrified she'd done something poorly and disappointed him, she rested only a short while before flinging herself right back into the tense, high-strung life of study.

She was too little, and too weak. Everything she had, Chester had given her: the chance to study, the chance to run away later, even the fact of being alive itself. If Chester wanted to take it away now and make her a useless princess from here on, with no knowledge and no power, knowing nothing of the outside world, she would have nowhere even to flee. Whether she lived or died, she couldn't so much as get out the word no.

A headache, no big deal, a little rest and it'd be fine.

Lovf had lost count of how many days running she'd been strung too tight. At night in bed her mind was crammed with what she'd learned by day, every bit of it vivid before her eyes; she couldn't sleep at all, and had no choice but to get up and meditate. But unlike the clear-headed refreshment of her first sessions, meditation could no longer stop her headache. If anything it grew worse, because she wasn't sleeping well.

Her complexion finally turned too ghastly to explain away by lack of sleep and the strain of study. That morning, Aita, frightened by her terrible color and her called-but-no-answer, unresponsive state, ran out of the room, and ten minutes later hurried back in bringing Chester and Gene, both in formal dress.

Come to think of it, this was the first time Chester had ever set foot in her room. Lovf felt a little like laughing.

Then she actually did give a stiff little laugh.

Whoa, Lovf thought belatedly, I really did laugh. Looks like my mind's gone sluggish.

Blankly she watched Chester stride to her bedside and crouch down. Not knowing how to react, she just saw this father of hers, who never wore a kind face, gravely set her shoulders straight, a faint golden glimmer rising in his palm as he swept it through the air across her chest.

Next to Chester's hand, my shoulders really are tiny.

Lovf thought.

Oh, right, I'm only six. I barely clear the tabletop.

She sat there dazed, not knowing how to react, not even knowing how to move her body, and watched dumbly as Chester finished examining her chest and moved his faintly glowing fingertips toward her forehead.

Chester's face darkened visibly.

"Spiritual power overflow. She hasn't built a soul vortex, so the spiritual power is all swelling up inside her head." he said, and shot Gene a glare over his shoulder: "Didn't I tell you not to teach her meditation?"

Gene was flustered too: "I didn't teach her. By rights Her Highness shouldn't know how."

Chester had no time to deal with him, and patted Lovf's forehead: "Can you still hear me? Blink if you understand."

Lovf looked at him, not quite grasping what was happening.

Why's he... so worked up...

Doesn't he not care about me, his daughter?

...

Oh. Right. He does seem to care.

She thought slowly, and blinked in a daze.

Cares, and still treats me like that... this guy... so annoying.

Aita watched the little princess take a good dozen seconds after being spoken to before blinking dumbly, and clapped a hand over her mouth, nearly sobbing aloud. Laila grabbed her and dragged her out.

Chester let out an irritated curse.

"I've already sent word to the Traceless Temple." Gene said anxiously.

"No time." Chester said coldly. "Guard me."

"But you're not a spellcaster..." Gene got halfway through, then saw Chester had already pressed his forehead to the little princess's, and swallowed the rest. He drew his sword and began laying out a rough set of spell-work around the princess's room. He was no spellcaster either, but it was better than nothing. If they were disturbed now, His Majesty would be fine, but the little princess would surely be beyond saving.

Lovf didn't know what was going on. Thinking felt even harder than a moment ago, so she simply gave up thinking and became a limp, brain-dead salted fish. Whatever Chester was doing to her, she couldn't spare the attention; as long as things stayed like this, it was fine.

She had no idea how much time passed. Into her brain, already swollen and splitting with pain, into the dark patch behind her forehead, something glowing seemed to force its way in. The pain in her head shot up several orders of magnitude in an instant. Lovf's vision went black, and her awareness of her body came rushing back; she found the source of the agony was exactly where her forehead pressed against Chester's.

The pain was too violent, bringing waves of a tearing sensation that terrified her. Certain she must be injured, Lovf screamed on instinct, wanting to pull her head away from Chester's, and struggled with all her might.

"Lovfrida! Follow me!" Chester pinned her down hard. That golden power churned the swollen, stagnant consciousness in Lovf's mind, guiding her toward a direction she had never felt before.

Pitted against a Divine Tier warrior, Lovf was far too green; she soon gave up struggling, and amid the agony realized her face was drenched. She knew she must look an utter wreck right now, her head so swollen she felt her eyes might be squeezed out of it. But she couldn't resist Chester, and could only endure as best she could, moving her consciousness along after his, with a faint instinctive sense: she really was not far from death.

Dragged along by Chester for what felt like ten thousand years, just when Lovf thought her brains might be squeezed out at any second and she'd drop dead on the spot, the strand of consciousness Chester had swept along with him finally loosened, and before her eyes she seemed to see golden points of light in the darkness.

Chester was in no hurry to leave. He helped hold back the spiritual power that had found its outlet and came surging in, lest it all rush at once and ruin everything at the last step by crushing her head. Lovf leaned panting against his chest, her vision blacking out from the pain, and belatedly felt that Chester too was drenched in cold sweat.

Only now did she realize how close a call it had been. On Earth she'd assumed meditation was harmless, and switching worlds she'd taken it for granted as a way to build up her health. But in this world spiritual power could be cultivated through meditation, and without a special method to channel it, all the spiritual power she'd meditated into being had stuffed itself into her head; one lapse of attention and it had nearly blown her skull apart.

Chester, ugh, Chester really had been scared half to death just now too. The way he fathered, Lovf didn't even want to comment anymore.

A long while later, Chester finally let Lovf go. His eyes, back to their cold indifference but unable to hide the lingering fear, looked at Lovf; a thin sheen of cold sweat lay on his face, along with blood smeared from who knew where.

His eyes really were a lot like Lovf's. Seen this way his features were actually rather delicate, not so gloomy at all. Lovf couldn't help feeling that her own deep blue eyes had been inherited from him.

Wait, why is there blood on his face..

Lovf belatedly swiped a hand across her own face, and saw with horror a smear of red on it. That feeling earlier, that her eyes were about to be squeezed out and burst, had not been an illusion after all. Lovf was scared stiff.

Chester looked at her, his tone edged with anger: "Do you have a death wish?"

Lovf stared at him, dumbstruck, and then suddenly blew up.

"Father said if I didn't work hard I'd go back to being a noble young lady! I do nothing all day but study, I study the moment I open my eyes, I'm memorizing new words even in my sleep. What am I supposed to do when I can't remember them? Meditation is the only way to cram them in!"

She shoved Chester viciously with a blood-covered hand. Of course she couldn't budge him; instead she toppled back onto the bed herself.

Probably never expecting to be treated this way, Chester froze, and did not cut off her hoarse, screaming indictment:

Lovf let out a wail and wanted to cry again, and this time she really did want to cry. The twenty-something soul inside her body wanted to cry: "You told me there was no good end for those who don't work hard, then you had me train as a power-wielder and a scholar. I did it your way, and then out of nowhere you ask whether I'd like to be a caged-canary princess. So what does everything I did before count for? What do I count for?!!"

Chester was struck dumb by the sudden eruption of his blood-faced daughter, seemingly never anticipating this scene. Gene was equally stunned, but dutifully lunged over first to steady Lovf regardless: "Your Highness! Your Highness, you mustn't cry! Your eyes can't take it, please calm down!"

Even held in Gene's arms, Lovf did not let up on Chester one bit. She really was crying now, no longer even knowing what she was saying: "That day with the aptitude test too, the moment it didn't meet your expectations you turned and walked out. You've never once considered my feelings! Why did you even give birth to me? Why didn't you just let me die?!"

Gene saw with horror that what was flowing from her eyes was thick clots of blood, and past caring about anything else, he wheeled and shouted at Chester: "Your Majesty! Her Highness's eyes!"

Chester finally snapped out of it and instant-cast a hypnosis spell on Lovf, which at last quieted the little girl down.

Lovf went quiet, and the whole room went quiet with her.

Gene didn't dare meet the current Chester's eyes at all. Yet the little princess, bleeding from all seven orifices, now lay fainted in his arms in her nightclothes, while Chester sat on the bed. Bright red droplets of blood were spattered across the sheets and over him; whether by his clothes or his expression, he was a complete mess.

As the two men fell into a silence that was awkward for Gene alone, someone knocked at the room's great door.

"Pardon the intrusion." The minstrel's face, one eye blue and one green, exotic in its cast, appeared behind the door, his lute still cradled in his arms. "Looks like you've settled it and don't need me. Would you mind handing the little Highness over to this Lady Aita who cares for her, and having His Majesty the King come out for a walk with me?"

Gene shot him a grateful look.

Chester said not a word, stood, and walked toward the door, leaving behind his unconscious, blood-faced daughter, freshly escaped from death with her state of mind in pieces, and the personal maid rushing screaming toward the princess. He pulled the door shut on his way out, sealing it all inside the room.

The great door closed, and the corridor, empty but for the two of them, fell silent at once.

The minstrel looked Chester's disheveled state over twice and gave an understanding smile: "By the look of those clothes you're in no state to see your ministers. I just came from the outer court and dismissed them all. I'm guessing you don't much feel like haggling with that crowd of Mortals right now either. Nothing pressing today, I take it?"

Chester was silent for a few seconds: "No."

"Then come look at your garden with me?" the minstrel said with a smile, gesturing for them to walk together.

Chester was silent a few more seconds: "Say... 'please lead me.' This is my palace."

"Very well, His Majesty Chester, King of Radiance, might I have the honor of being personally led by you on a tour of the garden?" The minstrel obliged readily, knowing Chester had recovered, and plucked his lute strings; the assortment of trinkets hanging from his robe gave off a fine, tinkling sound. "Spiritual power overflow?"

"Spiritual power overflow."

"And here I thought it could wait. That teacher I found for her is in poor health. Seems it can't wait after all; I'll bring him over in the next day or two." The minstrel sighed and tilted his head to look at Chester. "You give the little girl far too little sense of security. Cold-faced day in and day out, hardly talking with her, how is she supposed to believe that her feelings matter to you too? I told you to show her more care, and you wouldn't listen. The little one's heart is broken now, isn't it."

Chester kept his silence.

The minstrel was in no hurry. When Chester didn't answer, he turned to look at the flowers and grass outside the window. The lush green trees swaying once in the breeze seemed, to him, a thoroughly fascinating thing.

How long they walked, no one knew. Then Chester spoke: "That Venerable Majesty, what kind of person was she in life?"

There were several Venerable Majesties, but the minstrel knew which one he meant.

"Her?" A shade of remembrance surfaced in the depths of his mismatched eyes. "...Beautiful." he said. "Extraordinarily beautiful. Free, and gentle, and fearless, so proud she seemed to glow."

He glanced at Chester, seeming to understand something: "Little Lovf will not become a person like her. That child's temperament... as long as you go on living well, she won't stake her life to fight for anything. You needn't worry."

They had already come into the garden. Out of habit the minstrel plucked his lute strings, and a wilting flowering tree by the path burst back into life.

"You, on the other hand, Chester, express the love you bear your own flesh-and-blood daughter to her, fully and without reserve." he said, casting Chester a slightly reproachful glance. "You yourself are Divine Tier; naturally you can choose whatever life you please. Your little girl is not there yet. You saw it too: she has no wish to have her whole life's fate sealed at such a tender age."

The golden-haired man hung all over with trinkets began plucking his strings to cut the weeds. Chester watched a stalk of foxtail grass topple pitifully under the lute-song of a Legend Tier power, a song that could unmake heaven and earth and blanch the faces of all who heard it, and stayed silent, saying nothing.

"If you don't tell her, how is she to know you care whether she lives or dies, that you care about her feelings? If you didn't care about her feelings, then of course you could crush her, hurt her, destroy her every hope, at any moment you liked. You are a Divine Tier king; what power has she to resist? The terror of being crushed at any moment, we may never have lived through it ourselves, but we have surely seen a great deal of it." The minstrel sighed, and concluded: "That child has been living all this time under exactly that kind of fear."