Chapter 03 – Another meeting!? I’m not ready for this “Boy meets Girl” without being able to resist!

MARY! HAND OVER THE GIRL!」

「No, Madam!」

「Do it! You’re just a simple MAID!」

Again, shouting, stomping of feet.

My cradle rustling in the air like a fallen leaf in the breeze.

Or like a ship in a storm.

Pleased to make your acquaintance…I am Scarlet Ruby Noel Lingard.

I am currently in my 109th reincarnation…or perhaps…re-execution of my life.

It seems that my life was beset by difficulty from its first day.

My mother trying to attack my cradle, aiming to kill me.

My maid Mary and mother fighting before my cradle.

Mary pushing her away, desperately protecting me from my mother’s harmful intent.

「This is the child you bore through tremendous difficulty! Please don’t do something incredibly rash, madam!」

My maid courageously spoke up against her master.

She seems like a very stubborn and headstrong person – if I was queen right now, I would give her a medal.

However, I’m a simple infant, still cocooned in the mists of early life.

I can give her nothing.

Well, I can give her my heartfelt encouragement.

Hang in there, Mary!

「Waahhh! Aahhn!」

So I can live my soon to be lazy and withdrawn life!

Protect me until someone runs in and defends me from my mother!

Your deed of justice will surely be rewarded by the heavens above!

Please allow my prayers to be answered!

Heavens, give the maid your power!

「Gyaaa!」

Mary’s screams now echoed from the walls towards me.

Seems that my cheers had the opposite effect!

And because of that my mother was able to push the beleaguered Mary away!

It seems that the prayers of this former evil queen aren’t being answered.

A hand roughly scooped me up and pulled me from the cradle!

Mother!

I was picked up and lifted, swaddle and all!

Stop with all this movement! My neck isn’t even set yet!

I felt rough breathing and hair over my forehead.

It seemed as though a wild carnivore was about to tear me limb from limb.

「If only…if only…you were never…」

A curse spoken, interlaced with a sigh.

I’m scared!

I was terrified at my mother, now reduced to a primal beast.

She’s serious! She’s going to toss me to the ground and kill me!

I desperately attempted to claw onto my cradle edge.

Even a newborn has quite a grip, the same grip it clings onto its mother with…and this grip was my lifeline.

How ironic that an infant’s grip on her mother was the only thing keeping her mother from killing her.

「This…child!」

Almost like a little beetle clinging to a tree branch in a storm.

I, in my cradle, with my mother dragging it around.

Trying to pull me out of it, yet unable to do so, I heard her surprised voice rush through her clenched teeth.

What do you mean 「this…child」?!

I’m the villainess daughter that just began her 109th life!

But the badness of giving up living that life will be ever so more exquisite!

「Let…let GO!」

NO! I’m NEVER releasing my GRIP!

I will overcome this and then LIVE AS I PLEASE!

Will you mock a future woman that ROSE TO THE THRONE 108 TIMES?!

Hearing all of this tempestuous noise, someone had to come and help me, I prayed, clenching my toothless mouth, grabbing the edge of my cradle, continuing to resist my mother…

「WAaah! WAaaaha! Wah!」

I felt my insides contract as I had forgotten about everything that could control it.

PTHHHHHTHHHHH!

A sound inexpressible in words represented a sound that emerged from my rear end.

My tiny body quivered.

It was a loud sound that surprised even the adults around me.

Seems that infant flatulence is quite loud…I found that out later. This was the only time I had ever had flatulence this loud in my 108 existences…so I was proud of that.

「What the?!」

I heard a loud voice take a strange breath and gasp surprisedly,

「Ugh! Cough!」My mother coughed violently.

The fingers that attempted to grasp and pull away mine loosened.

Ah! I’ve disgusted my own mother!

She now swung her hand up to cover her own nose, retching.

Now! Mary! Our enemy is scared! Take me away from her!

…no reaction.

Mary, what’s wrong? Have you fainted?

Are you still alive?

No! No! NO!

I was so pleased with my victory, but now I clung to my cradle again.

「Ahah hah hah hah!!」

Suddenly, a burst of strange laughter…from a boy? Maybe.

Still unable to see well, I can judge things only by sound.

Was this child here from the beginning, or did it come in later?

…who are you?

A sudden new cameo. I was disappointed.

「Didja hear that fart?! A fart straight from the cradle at the person holding it! I was lucky to hide out and see this! Funny as all hell to see!」

The boy kept on laughing to himself.

「What an awesome FART! Lady, it almost scared the crap outta me!」

What a rude child…but still…

「I’ve never SEEN a baby like this. My father told me to mind to the forest but I wanted to see this…」

Seemed the air around me had quickly cooled.

I could tell the boy was smiling.

「I like you baby, so I’ll help you.」

I felt a chill go down my spine.

This voice, I had heard it before…over and over as a queen. This was the voice of a veteran soldier that spoke of the battlefield, that spoke lightly about the slaughter of humans, that lives for the work of silently killing others.

「When did you!? Get away! Someone! Get this servant child!」

I heard my mother scream.

Seems that this boy wasn’t here before.

S…servant child…even I never used that word as a queen.

「I’m no servant!」

Then the air rushed around me after the boy muttered those words.

「Whaaa?!」

There was a sound, and the voice of my mother’s screams being cut off.

Perhaps this boy slammed into my mother, knocking her down.

There was the faint sound, like a carpet hitting the ground, that proved me right.

I’m sure the boy had grabbed her and slowed her fall on the way down.

I started to shudder, because I could imagine the scene in detail because I had it from a boy like this, older, many times.