There Is No Place For Fakes [EN]: Chapter 1

Nowhere for a Fake – Part 1 (1/183)

There’s a place for everyone, or so they say. For Philomel, that place was the executioner’s block, her final destination on this day.

A large crowd had gathered at the execution grounds to witness the end of the supposed villainess. Philomel struggled, desperate to avoid her fate, but the guards holding her arms quickly silenced her with brutal kicks.

Emperor Eustis watched impassively from his high seat as the woman who was once known as his daughter was dragged before him. Beside him, Princess Elencia, pale and shaken, clung tightly to her father’s arm.

“Let the traitor be heard!”

The official presiding over the execution stepped forward and began to list Philomel’s crimes, one by one.

“The crime of conspiring with her mother to impersonate the princess for over a decade.”

“The crime of envying and slandering the true princess, even after her life was spared by the princess’s mercy.”

“Finally, the crime of attempting to incite discord between the Magic Tower [a powerful organization of mages] and the Empire, thereby causing a national crisis.”

Several other minor offenses were detailed as well.

“Therefore, she deserves the death penalty!”

As soon as the presiding officer finished speaking, a cacophony of harsh shouts and curses erupted from the crowd.

“Kill her quickly!”

“How dare a woman of lowly birth impersonate the princess!”

“She should have been executed alongside her mother long ago!”

Eggs and stones rained down, thrown by the angry mob, striking Philomel without mercy.

After a time, the presiding officer raised his hand, attempting to quell the crowd’s fury.

“Originally, you are not entitled to this right. However, the merciful Princess Elencia has bestowed her grace upon you, granting the condemned a chance to speak her last words. Do you have any final statement?”

Philomel’s yellow eyes, which had been lifelessly staring at the ground, flickered towards the Emperor.

“…F, Father.”

The Emperor’s eyebrows rose slightly at the sound of her hoarse voice.

“I did not impersonate the princess. All this time, I truly believed I was your daughter… I deserve to die for the other wrongdoings, so I won’t beg for mercy. But please, just know one thing…”

This was the thought that had consumed her during her confinement in a solitary cell, devoid of sunlight.

So many people had been beheaded simply for being associated with her or showing sympathy for her plight.

All the lingering attachments that had bound her until now felt utterly pointless.

Why had she strived so hard to be loved, fretting so much about being cast aside? In the end, neither affection, nor position, nor anything else was truly hers.

However, there was one thing.

Among the listed crimes, the first and greatest felt particularly unfair because it simply wasn’t true.

She didn’t need the crowd to believe her. She only wanted one person to know her innocence.

Father. Eustis, the Emperor of the Vellerop Empire.

The man who hadn’t shown her even the slightest interest during the decade he knew Philomel as his own daughter.

The person she had desperately wanted to be loved by, knowing he was her only family.

Now that things had gone too far, she couldn’t lessen the hatred, but she at least wanted him to know the truth.

She never intended to deceive him from the beginning. She only discovered she wasn’t his real daughter after Elencia appeared.

Thinking about it, it was an obvious conclusion. Philomel’s birth mother had switched her with the princess at birth.

After that, Philomel continued to live in the Imperial Palace as the princess, while Elencia lived as a commoner with her birth mother, leaving no opportunity for them to meet.

So when did she meet her birth mother to conspire, and how did she plot to deceive everyone?

Anyone could deduce this simple fact, but everyone treated Philomel as a fraud. This was largely due to the notoriety Philomel had cultivated over the years.

Nevertheless, she held onto a sliver of hope. Even if no one else believed her, she hoped that the rational and wise Emperor might uncover the truth.

Of course, it was a vain hope.

“Guards, bring a thread and sew that thing’s mouth shut immediately.”

The Emperor’s command silenced the crowd as effectively as a bucket of cold water, though the commotion soon resumed.

“Yes, Your Majesty!”

“As His Majesty commands!”

“Sew it shut! Sew it shut!”

The attendants hurried to find thread to sew the condemned woman’s mouth shut, while Elencia, her complexion worsening, clutched her father’s sleeve tightly.

Elencia, with her beautiful blonde hair, so unlike Philomel’s common brown hair. The Emperor’s beloved daughter, who resembled the deceased Empress so closely.

Philomel’s eyes filled with despair.

‘What was I expecting?’

I knew this would happen.

Maybe I’ve been tortured for too long, and my mind is fractured.

‘Let’s just accept death quietly.’

That’s the only way to salvage what little pride I have left.

Yes. No matter what anyone says, I was once a princess of the great Vellerop Empire.

‘That is, that is… my only pride.’

“Your Majesty!”

I was determined to do just that…

Philomel called out to the Emperor, rising as if propelled by an unseen force, without even realizing it.

Even though she had been living on meager rations for days, a strangely loud voice burst forth. As Eustis’s cold gaze landed on her, unexpected words tumbled from her mouth. Tears streamed down her cheeks.

“Have I, have I ever been a daughter to you? Have you ever regarded me as a daughter, even a little bit?”

Yes. All this time, I had wanted to ask him.

Not just since Elencia appeared, but even when I believed I was his real daughter.

Why do you always look at me with such cold eyes? Am I truly your child? Even if you can’t love me, can’t you at least treat me like your child?

I was afraid of the answer, so I couldn’t ask all this time. But now, facing death, a strange courage surged within me.

“…”

“Dad, please stop…”

The Emperor, who had opened his mouth as if to answer, turned his gaze when his daughter whimpered.

The kind-hearted Elencia found it difficult to watch Philomel’s execution, no matter how much of a villainess she was accused of being.

The Emperor affectionately wrapped his arm around his lovely daughter’s shoulders, who was begging him to leave this place, and ordered the execution to proceed without him before departing the execution grounds, completely ignoring the Philomel he left behind.

“…You could have at least given me an answer before leaving.”

Philomel uttered her last words in vain.

Thus, the infamous villainess Philomel met her end, unmourned by anyone.

Fortunately, the Emperor had ordered them to dispose of her quickly, so her mouth wasn’t sewn shut. It was the last vestige of luck afforded to the villain.

Although she met a long and painful death by the executioner’s dull blade instead of the guillotine, it was because they couldn’t grant her a comfortable passing.

Her only innocence was obscured by countless alleged misdeeds and eventually buried without seeing the light. Truly fitting for a villain…

“Kkyaaaaaak!”

Screaming, Philomel threw the book she had been reading.

“How could they do this! I mean, even if Philomel in the book did something wrong, it wasn’t enough to warrant death!”

Even as the girl stomped her feet and beat her chest with her small fists, the contents of the book remained unchanged.

The nine-year-old princess regretted ever picking up the suspicious book she had found in the garden.

She was dumbfounded because, from the very beginning, it introduced an unheard-of commoner woman as the Emperor’s real daughter, claiming that this Philomel was a fake…

“I’m going to tell Father right away and ensure the author of this book doesn’t get away with it.”

It was a piece of writing filled with the potential to insult the Imperial Family.

How dare they call the sole heir of the Vellerop Empire a fake!

To make matters worse, she even met a cruel end. If they had just not killed me, I would have been lenient and given them a life sentence, but this is not something that can be resolved without the death penalty.

“Huu.”

Philomel, who had been acting as if she were about to run out immediately, sat down powerlessly on the carpeted floor.

If her nanny saw her, she would scold her for her unrefined behavior, but she was alone, serving her disciplinary action, so it didn’t matter.

In the first place, the reason she had read this absurd and insulting novel, , almost to the end was because she was terribly bored.

Except for the time when she took a walk in the garden twice a day, she had to be confined to her room. Even after the disciplinary action is lifted, I don’t know if I’ll be able to meet my father.

Eustis was a heartless father who had no interest in his daughter at all. The number of times they had faced each other and talked could be counted on one hand.

If she sent a request through someone to have a meal or tea time together, it was often ignored, and even if Philomel went to see him without a prior arrangement, she was treated as a nuisance and dismissed.

The reason she received disciplinary action yesterday was because Philomel, upset that he wouldn’t see her, barged into the Emperor’s office and threw a tantrum.

“Get rid of that thing immediately.”

Looking at his daughter crying because he didn’t come to see her, the Emperor ordered the attendants with an extremely cold expression.

In the end, she had no choice but to be dragged back to her room.

As the Emperor’s cold attitude persisted for nearly ten years, others also began to subtly look down on the princess.

Rumors that the Emperor would adopt a child with excellent qualities from a collateral branch of the family instead of Philomel and pass on the throne further fueled their arrogant behavior.

It was said that the Emperor, who loved the deceased Empress so much, resented the daughter who was born at the cost of her mother’s life, so it was natural that he didn’t like her.

Moreover, the princess didn’t resemble her mother at all, and she only caused trouble without being outstanding in any way, so it was natural that he didn’t like her.

Philomel, dejected, walked unsteadily to the mirror hanging on the wall.

“Do I not resemble them that much?”

Philomel in the mirror was a flawless and cute girl with brown hair and yellow eyes.

But she didn’t seem to resemble her mother, whom she had only seen in portraits, or even her father.

The Emperor had black hair and blue eyes, and the Empress had blonde hair and green eyes. Even a simple comparison of their hair and eye colors revealed no match.

At least when she was young, Philomel’s hair color was lighter than it is now, giving it a closer resemblance to blonde.

She prayed every night that it would lighten further and turn golden, but as she grew up, it became darker, and now it was just plain brown.

Well, even if we say that her hair color resembles her long-deceased maternal grandmother, where did her bright yellow eyes come from?

The girl became depressed because it seemed like she wasn’t her parents’ real child.