IVF 1

Chapter 1
“Vicious little thing.”

A middle-aged woman slandered the girl in a cold voice and slapped her across the cheek.

Smack—

With the sharp sound, the small girl’s head snapped to the side.

The girl, no more than twelve, was so thin she stirred pity just by looking at her.
On top of that, she had an innocent face—judging by her appearance alone, the woman’s description of her as “vicious” felt completely wrong.

“Isn’t that Madam Valles? What could that little girl have done to deserve that?”

“Oh my.”

A startled woman covered her mouth with her hand as she asked. A casual reply came back.

“Who knows? Just leave it be. That child is the eldest daughter of the Langshus family.”

“Ah. That child. I see.”

The moment she heard that the girl was the eldest daughter of the Langshus family, the questioner withdrew her sympathy at once.

Lumina Langshus.

The eldest daughter of Count Langshus.

The daughter born to the Count’s first wife—

‘The byproduct of a loveless arranged marriage.’

So it was only natural that after her biological mother’s death, she had become little more than a mistreated outcast.

Her father had wasted no time taking in a stepmother, and Lumina had naturally been treated as if she didn’t exist within the family.

And that remained true even after her father’s death.

“She’ll probably run off crying soon. She’s still just a child.”

As they said, Lumina was a child.

She had neither the spirit nor the life experience to stand up boldly against a middle-aged woman.

Everyone assumed it would end as nothing more than a brief disturbance.

Even now, tears were welling up in Lumina’s eyes.

“I knew it from your mother’s funeral, but you are truly wicked to the core. Just like your mother.”

The middle-aged woman seemed to interpret the onlookers’ silence as support.

Emboldened, she poured out harsher and harsher insults.

As her words escalated, murmurs of concern rose among the crowd.

Of course, they were not worried about Lumina.

“Still, isn’t this too much during a funeral?”

“It’s disgraceful behavior at a ceremony meant to be solemn.”

Count Langshus and his second wife—Lumina’s father and stepmother—had died in an unexpected accident, and the funeral was currently underway.

The ceremony should have been carried out in a quiet, reverent atmosphere.

Instead, a scene straight out of a cheap commoner’s novel was unfolding, souring the nobles’ mood.

Yet none of them wanted to miss the spectacle, and not a single pair of eyes left Lumina and the middle-aged woman.

Lumina’s lowered eyelashes trembled faintly.

Her eyes, brimming with tears, were red, and a vivid handprint burned across her pale cheek.

She looked as though she might break down at any moment and plead her innocence.

Everyone assumed she had done nothing wrong but was too timid to defend herself.

But that wasn’t the case.

‘She hit me so hard I accidentally bit the inside of my cheek. For someone her age, why is she so strong?’

Lumina was listening to the woman’s rant with one ear and letting it flow out the other.

“Hey! Are you even listening to me?”

Lost in her thoughts, Lumina looked up at the woman when a shout loud enough to sting her ears rang out.

‘Was she my aunt?’

The woman was the late Count Langshus’s elder sister.

Since she was from the paternal side, that must be it.

“Madam… it is a funeral, after all. Perhaps you should refrain from causing a scene…”

A man who could bear it no longer cautiously stepped in.

At his words, the aunt snapped sharply.

“Didn’t you hear what this child said? Her parents died, and she said it was good that they did! A brat like this needs to be beaten to come to her senses.”

Good that they died.

She had said something like that.

But the subject of those words hadn’t been her parents. It had been herself.

Lumina expressionlessly brushed her burning cheek.

Her aunt’s so-called shock therapy had worked—halfway.

Being slapped had indeed snapped her into clarity.

She had wondered if this was a dream, but now she was certain it was reality.

As for whether it had made her obedient, as her aunt likely intended—absolutely not.

‘If getting slapped could change a person, then getting hit on the right cheek would make you good, and the left cheek would make you bad.’

If people could be remodeled that easily, life would be convenient.

As she thought idly, her gaze met her aunt’s.

The woman glared at her as if she wanted to tear her apart.

That was when—

Lumina suddenly took a bold step forward.

And—

Smack—

This time, her aunt’s head snapped to the side.

Lumina had slapped her without hesitation.

Her aunt’s lips parted slightly, as if she couldn’t process what had just happened.

“Y-You… what do you think you’re doing?!”

Her eyes wide, her aunt raised her voice.

Lumina, looking gentle and composed, replied without the slightest hint of fear.

“You said you need to be hit to come to your senses. I thought you might need help coming to yours, Aunt.”

“Have you gone mad?! You’re out of your mind!”

Perhaps she had assumed Lumina would simply endure it. The woman frothed with rage.

In contrast to her aunt’s hysteria, Lumina was calm.

“I’m perfectly sane. But you still don’t seem to have come to your senses. Should I hit you one more time?”

It almost sounded polite.

Her aunt’s face turned pale.

“You crazy bitch!”

“Oh? How did you know? That’s my nickname.”

Lumina said it without blinking.

“If you knew I was crazy, you should’ve avoided me.”

If she had truly been an innocent twelve-year-old, she would have been unable to utter a single word to a relative several times her age and would have simply endured it.

‘And I did. Before.’

But not anymore.

‘Being obedient in a house where I have no one on my side will only make them look down on me.’

Lumina recalled her first life, still vivid in her mind.

A life where she was thoroughly used by her relatives and then forced into marriage with a man she had never even seen.

‘An arranged marriage made purely for money. And that money went straight into my relatives’ pockets.’

They had slowly tamed her so that she would never defy them.

Even recalling it sent chills down her spine.

‘Aunt married early and attached herself to another family, but she always coveted the Langshus fortune. She must have had a hand in my death as well.’

Every adult here was blinded by money.

To them, ruining the life of a twelve-year-old girl meant nothing.

So she felt no guilt.

After all, her aunt had been the one to strike first.

Steeling herself, Lumina clenched her fists tightly, as though ready to throw a punch at any moment.

‘One miserable life was enough.’

She would not squander the opportunity granted to her after one wretched death.

Lumina was the legitimate heir of the Langshus family, yet she had been treated worse than an illegitimate child.

Her misfortune began with her mother’s death.

Count Langshus remarried almost immediately afterward.

Her stepmother came with a son two years younger than Lumina—a boy who resembled the Count so closely that one might believe the Count had simply grown younger.

Her younger half-brother, Endymion, was proof that the Count had been unfaithful during his first marriage.

Yet they acted as though they had nothing to hide.

If Endymion’s mother had not been a commoner.
If Lumina’s mother had not forced the marriage by leveraging money.

If that had been the case, Count Langshus would never have married Lumina’s mother in the first place.

Everyone said the same thing.

Lumina’s mother had been an obstacle to true love—a villain, not a good person at all.

According to them, the true antagonist was Lumina’s mother.

And as the daughter of such a villain, it was shameless for Lumina to hope for happiness with her new family.

Her life as a perpetual outcast—seemingly endless unless she married out—came to an unexpected early end.

Five years after the Count’s remarriage, when Lumina was twelve—

Count Langshus and his wife died in a sudden carriage accident. Of everyone in the carriage, only Endymion survived.

“…Have mercy on these fragile lives. We gather here today to hold the funeral of Count Langshus and his wife, who have departed into God’s embrace.”

All the relatives had gathered for the funeral.

Lumina remained in her place, wishing only for it to end quickly.

And just as the ceremony was nearing its close—

“Lumina! You’ve grown so much since I last saw you!”

A man, wearing the expression of someone reunited with a long-lost daughter, suddenly pulled her into an embrace.

“…Who are you?”

“Since my sister Chloe passed and we lost contact, you can’t recognize me at once. I’m your maternal uncle. I saw you briefly when you were just born—perhaps you’ve forgotten!”

Logically, no one would remember someone they had seen only briefly as a newborn.

Yet the man, who claimed to be her uncle, murmured in an exaggerated tone.

“Oh dear. You look so thin—have you suffered greatly? Of course… no child could be at peace after losing their parents.”

He spoke as if he understood everything.

“Shall we move somewhere else to talk?”

Lumina nodded.

And then she received an unexpected proposal.

“Lumina, I believe you should become the head of the family.”