The Villainess Is My Cute Daughter

”If you are here to heal Adrian, then please follow me.” Serena stated flatly.

She did not wait for the guy to answer. She just spun on her heel and walked right back out the front doors.

Duke Silas just sat there in his chair, looking incredibly conflicted. His own daughter was ordering a high-ranking royal minister around like a common servant.

Roderick just laughed out loud.

He saw the awkward, tense look on Silas’s face.He got up from his chair. He casually brushed some dust off his expensive coat and followed the girl outside.

Serena went straight back to the teleportation gate. Hugo followed her and Roderick stepped in right behind them.

The runes began to glow and the three of them popped out inside Marquis Draven’s territory.

Serena practically rushed straight into Draven’s mansion.

She pushed the front doors open. The main hall was practically empty. A couple of servants were busy scrubbing the floorboards.

She walked right past them and hit the stairs. She headed straight for the top floor master bedroom.

She shoved the heavy door open, only to see that Adrian was gone.

Serena stood frozen in the doorframe and just stared at the bare mattress. The bloody sheets were gone, Adrian was gone and even Aria was gone.

Her heart did a painful flip in her chest and a really dark thought crossed her mind.

’Did he die... did they already bury him?’

She took a step back into the hallway. She looked down the left hall. Then the right.

She grabbed the nearest door handle and threw it open. Empty guest room.

She ran to the next door and pushed it. Empty again.

She found them on her third try.

Two doors down from the main room. She pushed the door open and stopped walking.

Adrian was in there.

He was not alone though. Two large beds were pushed close together right in the middle of the floorboards. There was just a tiny gap between them.

Adrian laid on the left bed and Claire was on the right.

Aria sat on a wooden stool right between the two mattresses.

”I brought Hugo.” Serena said, her voice tight. ”And I brought a healer from the Royal Palace. My father helped me with this.”

Aria slowly turned around and looked past Serena. She locked eyes with the man standing in the hall.

And pure hate boiled up in her chest.

The reason? she knew exactly who this man was.

Roderick, the empire’s financial minister. The cold-blooded politician who slaughtered his own siblings for a seat of power. This man was the one who spearheaded the entire continent against her in her past life. While the princess did it on the outside, Roderick was the one pulling all the strings.

Just looking at his polished shoes and his clean, expensive coat made her want to rip his head right off his shoulders.

She actually visualized it. She imagined wrapping a thick, invisible telekinetic thread right around his smug neck. She pictured just crushing his skull until it popped like a grape.

Aria really wanted to do it, but didn’t. She just stayed on her stool.

She kept her hands folded in her lap. She refused to move a muscle, and just glared at the man.

Roderick caught her gaze. He offered the little girl a polite, practiced smile which didn’t reach his eyes.

Aria just gave him a dead, blank look.

Roderick didn’t seem to care. He brushed past Serena and walked right up to the first bed. He looked down at Adrian’s swollen, ruined face.

’So this is the man.’ Roderick thought to himself. ’This is the bastard who transformed a dead mining town into the richest territory in the empire.’

He reached out. He placed his clean, uncalloused hand flat against Adrian’s bruised chest.

Thin, almost invisible strands of pure magical energy shot right out of Roderick’s fingertips. The mana threads sank deep through Adrian’s skin. They bypassed the cracked ribs and torn muscle, probing the internal organs like tiny snakes.

The room went dead quiet. Hugo shifted his weight by the door while serena and Aria just watched.

A few seconds passed.

Roderick slowly pulled his hand back and let out a soft sigh.

He turned his back to Adrian and walked over to the other mattress.

He reached down and took her good wrist. It looked like a regular town doctor checking for a pulse. A fresh batch of mana threads shot out of his fingers. They slid up through Claire’s veins, scanning the damage in her torn leg and the missing chunk of flesh on her hand.

He didn’t sigh this time. He just gave a slow nod as he let go of her arm.

He turned around and looked at Serena. Serena was the only uninjured adult in the room. He defaulted to her for the briefing.

Someone else beat him to the punch.

”What is the verdict?”

Roderick looked down, and Claire was staring at him from the pillows. She had been awake the entire time. She just lacked the energy to speak up earlier.

”How long until I recover?” Claire asked. Her throat sounded completely dry. ”And what about Lord Adrian?”

Roderick adjusted the stiff cuffs of his coat.

”Well.” Roderick started, his tone casual and detached. ”A few high-tier healing spells, some targeted blessings, and decent potions will sort you out just fine. You just need a few weeks to bounce back. You do not even have to worry about scars.”

Claire let out a sigh of relief. Some of the tension finally dropped from her shoulders.

Then Roderick turned his head. He looked back at Adrian’s broken body on the other mattress. He let out another heavy sigh.

”As for him.” Roderick muttered. ”It is a bit complicated.”

Serena felt her stomach tie into a knot. Aria grabbed the edges of her wooden stool. She squeezed the wood until her knuckles turned white.

”His body is not the actual issue.” Roderick explained slowly. ”Bones can be mended. Ruptured organs can be stitched back together with decent magic but his organs are fine so there’s no need to worry about that. Before I tell you what the actual problem is... can someone in this room tell me what exactly happened out there?”

Nobody answered him. Not because they didn’t want to, but because no one knew except for one person.

Before Serena or Claire could even form a sentence, Aria opened her mouth.

”Can you just do your job?” Aria snapped.

Her voice was dead cold as she glared right at the minister.

”Just tell us what the problem is without poking your nose into our personal business. Mister healer.”

Aria spat his title like a dirty curse word.

The corner of Roderick’s mouth twitched.

It was a very small muscle spasm. He pushed down the annoyance flaring up in his chest. He refused to let a spoiled kid bait him into losing his cool in front of a Duke’s daughter.

He shifted his gaze away from the kid, and looked back down at Adrian.

”Well.” Roderick said. ”His mana veins have multiple, severe cracks in them.”

”He will never be able to use mana again.”