Taming The Villainesses novel Chapter 441

"Your forehead’s pretty hot too. Not as bad as my son’s, though."

Nymph Trish’s hand was cool yet incredibly soft.

Because the sensation was so exactly the same as I remembered, it felt like a hardened lump deep inside me quietly melted away.

Of course, I didn’t show it outwardly.

Now was the time to steel my heart.

If I let myself get soft, I wouldn’t be able to accomplish anything.

So, before Nymph Trish could turn me into a perfectly boiled egg, I pulled my face away.

Her slender fingers eventually withdrew from me.

Trish spoke.

"You must’ve gone through a lot." freewebnøvel_com

"How would you know that?"

Even though the words came from my own mouth, the sharp tone startled even me. Was this what kids going through puberty felt like?

It wasn’t as if I were hitting a late adolescence. But still, I couldn't help it.

How could everything I had endured until now be so casually brushed aside with a simple, "You must have had it rough"?

You don’t even know anything.

Of course, I knew these thoughts were ugly, pathetic.

I tried to pull myself together, but even the greatly swollen Bael—probably exhausted from chasing the locusts earlier—was too tired to devour my tangled emotions.

—Hioooong...

Seems like she’s still worn out from the fight. Nothing to be done.

Which meant I had to face and sort through these emotions on my own. What surfaced inside me was a mix of loss, longing, stubborn pride, and biting resentment.

Other emotions too—ones I’d never experienced before—bubbled up from the depths like foam from the bottom of the sea, but I turned my head sharply to ignore them.

It was then Trish said:

"You... you don’t have a mother, do you?"

"What, excuse me?"

It felt like my hair was standing on end.

Do people usually ask something like that so bluntly? I didn’t know whether to answer yes or no.

Was she trying to insult me?

I spoke even more curtly.

"Who doesn’t have a mother? Someone had to give birth to me, or else I wouldn’t exist. I don’t see why you’d ask such a rude question."

In response, Nymph Trish casually dug into her short, pointy ear with her pinky finger and said nonchalantly:

"Just giving birth doesn’t make someone a mother."

"......."

"My mother—she was a giant centipede. Can you believe that? I was raised in the hands of a centipede as big as a tree!"

"A centipede?"

"Yeah, a huge, creepy, many-legged centipede! She was my mother! Of course, if I ever said she was creepy, I’d get scolded big-time. But how could I help it? She really was creepy."

A giant centipede... A memory flickered across my mind. I thought of the giant spirit beast Angala we had met in the Witch’s Forest.

Could it be that Nymph Trish was somehow connected to the centipede Angala?

I remembered the old story—how, before Solomon became the Demon King, when he was still known as a great mage, he had once carried the body of a dead nymph to Angala.

But even the sage Angala, revered as an immortal, had been unable to revive the dead.

Solomon, thinking he had been deceived, had attacked Angala and fled after inflicting a grave wound.

And now Trish—Beatrice—was claiming that that very Angala had been her mother.

What in the world was going on?

I had countless questions, but before I could ask anything, Trish continued chatting away, offering up unsolicited stories.

"But you know," she said, "I’m a nymph, right? And my mom was a giant centipede. No matter how I looked at it, it just didn’t add up. I mean, she couldn’t have been my real mom."

Naturally. I wanted to say that, but held my tongue.

Maybe she wasn’t even looking for a response, because she just kept talking.

"So I turned out kind of twisted. I convinced myself that somewhere out there—beyond the big, scary centipede—my real mother must exist. When I think back to how I was then..."

Her blue eyes gazed into the air.

It was easy to tell she was recalling her past somewhere within that blank space.

"I acted just like you. Picky about everything I saw, starting fights over nothing. No mom, no dad. Believing the only person I could trust was myself."

***

Nymph Trish quickly realized she was different from others.

Because she looked nothing like her mother Angala. And being a naturally sensitive nymph, Trish kept going astray.

—I’m going to find my real mother...!

After uttering those harsh words, Trish chose to live alone. Of course, it was difficult, exhausting, and filled with moments when she wanted to give up and return.

But she hardened her heart. Until she found her true mother, she would not return.

She spent days, months, even years wandering outside.

Even though she knew her foster mother Angala was searching for her—still, she couldn't bring herself to go back. She didn’t know what face she would wear if they met again.

Because she had been away for so long, the emotions she once had for her mother had faded into awkward distance. Maybe that’s why, even as her life gradually improved, she felt hollow inside.

Somewhere deep in her heart, there was always a space she couldn’t fill. No matter how many magnificent waterfalls she saw, how many spring flowers she watched bloom, or how many autumn fruits she plucked—

even after many winters passed and springs returned, the emptiness wouldn’t go away.

It was at the peak of that restlessness that she met him.

—Hey, you there.

At first, she thought she was hearing things. That anyone would casually speak to her—the nymph who ruled over this forest filled with monsters, giant spiders, centipedes, ogres, wolves—

was unthinkable.

—Me? You’re talking to me?

—Yeah, you. You, the nymph sitting up in that tree. I didn’t expect to see a nymph in a place like this—it’s amazing. So, there’s something I want to ask you.

—You want to ask me something?

—I’m a traveler. How do I get to the city of Gargarta?

The guy was a man. His age... she wasn’t sure.

Trish, who had survived among countless monstrous beasts, found him very unfamiliar.

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