5. Reincarnated

"Hello everyone, it's me, your beautiful high school girl. Urgh, this is stupid. I'm so bored!" Although she intended to speak, she failed to do so. People would only see her as a baby kept making weird noises. After her ridiculous death, she, fortunately, was reincarnated. At first, she didn't know. She only thought she was in a vegetative state because she couldn't see, couldn't move but was still able to hear the sounds around her. Then she realized something didn't add up.

She kept hearing the baby's cries. There's no way they would lay a patient next to a baby, right? There were also other voices that used language she had never heard before. And she realized it's not that she couldn't move, but rather it's hard to move and somehow, she was lying on a bed with bars. "Um, what the heck? Is this a prison? Hey, I'm not a criminal."

But all that stuff was irrelevant when she found out that she couldn't control her bowel. If she wanted to p!ss, she'd p!ss. If she wanted to sh!t, she'd sh!t. "No!!! What is this horrendous nightmare!" She wanted to scream, but she couldn't hear her voice. All she heard was the baby's cries. "Huh? Wait a minute!" She began collecting her thoughts. "When I stop screaming, that baby stops crying too. My throat was dried but someone gave me milk, not water. When I dirtied the sheet, they cleaned it up..." A horrid deduction flickering in her mind. She felt like her brain was jammed because she was too scared of the conclusion. "Hah. No, no, no. This must be a dream. Wow, I'm so smart! Now it all makes sense."

But her delusion didn't last for long. The day she could open her eyes to see was when she had to accept the reality. "Yup. This is definitely not my room. D@mn it!" She looked around and realized that this place was so luxurious. "Wow! It's like I'm in a palace or something. Everything is so sparkling. Even the curtain was more beautiful than my best dress."

She also saw the maids going around taking care of her. "No way! Am I really in a palace? Did I reincarnate into royalty or something? Am I a princess now? Ah, no, wait! I haven't ascertained that my gender is female. There's a possibility that I'm a prince." She got shivers at such a thought. "No, no. Stop overthinking. I'm definitely a girl."

She concentrated to hear what the maids were talking about but all she heard was:

- E%7#sj0¥?

- Yo$=5_nvt/^;@wj33z×*#⊙¿☆~

- Cq4'€¡●gil8₩♧¤°d9

"Um, hello. Can you speak human language? English, Chinese, Japanese, Russian, German, Hindi, Nepalese, Korean, Finnish, Swedish, Spanish, French, Vietnamese, Iranian, Arabic, whatever ... No? Well, okay." She now faced the dilemma of learning another foreign language. "To think that I have to study even after death..."

Even after a very long time, she still couldn't comprehend most of the words. Thankfully, she was able to make out to some extent. And she noticed two important-looking people called her Lucia. "Hah. What an ominous name!" She ignored this strange feeling, thinking that it's just a coincidence.

"Yeah, f#ck your coincidence!" After she ascertained the reality she's in, she just wanted to suicide and have another reincarnation. "Out of all the characters it could have been, why it had to be Lucia? I'm okay with being an extra character that didn't even appear in the novel. Is that too much to ask?" She wanted to scream out loud but right now it's essential to analyze her situation beforehand.

"I'm Lucia, the Evil Princess. Ah, no. I won't become the rumored villainess." She contemplated the novel's plot again. And she concluded, "Almost all of the issues were caused by the stupid princess. So I just have to be not stupid and the tragedy won't occur. Oh, and I can change some events to my favor. The king and queen died by accident and illness respectively. I just need to prevent that happen." Thinking back, it wasn't complicated to change the plot. One could consider it's fortunate for her to be reincarnated into Lucia. The very existence of the original Lucia was the cause of everything. So when she was reincarnated, Lucia disappeared and the following problems disappeared too.

She was giggling from thinking about the ingenious plan she made. "Well, reincarnators are omnipotent after all. D@mn, I'm a princess now. I guess I'm going to have a sweet life ahead, huh?" Then she started dreaming of pretty things that hadn't happened yet.

- Oh, Her Highness is finally sleeping. – A maid noticed this and covered her body with a blanket.

- Well, she is an energetic child. It's a good thing though. – Another maid followed the topic then she heard a voice complained.

- But it's tired when Her Highness is energetic all the time.

The maid before intended to stop her from making such remarks but she paused, covered her mouth with her hand and her eyes widened.

- Huh? What's with your reaction? Is there something behind m… - The ignorant maid wasn't able to finish her sentence because she saw someone standing near the door was glaring at them.

- H-head maid. – They greeted and bowed in unison but that didn't ease the head maid's anger.

- Oh, so you think you have too many works. But you look free to me though. – The head maid was smiling but her eyes weren't. She spoke in a tone that was light and cold at the same time.

The two girls shivered. They'd rather hear the head maid angrily scolding than use such a tone talking to them. The ignorant maid spoke up, tried to save the situation. Noticed what she was about to do, the other maid glared at the stupid girl next to her, tried to convey the message with her eyes: "Just shut up!" Apparently, she failed miserably when the dense maid didn't even notice her glare.

- N-no, we didn't mean anything. We are just chitchatting a bit.

Hearing her answer, the other maid became pale instantly. She turned to look at the head maid and bizarrely, the latter was beaming even more radiantly.

- Oh, wow! You're so busy that you even have the leisure to chitchat. It seems I was too harsh on you. I'm so sorry.

This time, she didn't bother to hide the sarcasm in her voice. Knowing what they did was wrong, the maids hurriedly bowed and apologized.

- We're so sorry. There won't be a next time.

While waiting for the final verdict, their whole body was shaking vigorously. Looking at these foolish girls, the head maid sighed and said:

- Go, go. Do your works!

Heard this, they overjoyed like someone who's about to receive a death sentence was acquitted. They thanked the head maid and hurriedly staggered out of the room.

The head maid turned to look at the princess in the cradle. The reason she didn't punish them for their mistake was that they kept their voice down in the entire conversation. At least they're attentive enough to know that they shouldn't wake the princess up. So she decided to let them off easily. After confirming that the princess was still sleeping soundly, she quietly walked out and closed the door.

~ ○ ~

Coming to this world, she got a new life and also got a lot of works to do. She, foremost, had to learn this world's language. And after a few years, obviously, she's still not done yet. "Please somebody wakes me from this never-ending nightmare!" She wanted to quit. No one ever said being a baby could be this hard.

She also had to practice crawling and walking. This was the first time she felt her head was so heavy. So heavy that it's off-balance. And practiced speaking was also a new challenge. The way the sounds coming out of your mouth different from the sounds you pictured in your mind was so frustrating. Thankfully, it's all over.

Nope. There's a bunch of things waiting for her to be done. Aside from living her life as a princess, this included literature lessons, history lessons, etiquette lessons, lessons that she didn't even know the name…, she also had to get accustomed to her new family. This world now was her world. She wanted to have a closer relationship with people here, especially with Lucius, as he was going to be a king in the future.

One might ask why she wouldn't become a ruler herself. Here's the answer. She knew what she was capable of, okay? A normal high school girl was reincarnated didn't mean she changed into an excellent ruler. And she also wanted to abstain from doing things the original Lucia did in the novel. Like messing up as a ruler!

She now taught Lucius everything she knew. One good thing was that she remembered every little detail in her previous life. What she experienced, what she learnt in school, books she read, or even a song she only heard once when she passed by the convenience store many years ago. She's not sure if that was the aftereffect of her reincarnation or this body's ability. But she didn't found any differences between her memory and others'. So she guessed it's the reincarnation's aftereffect.

And after a few years of painstaking hard works, she was finally able to relax a bit. "All I have to do now is eat and sleep." She thought so while sipping on a cup of tea. "Okay, that sounds like a life of a pig. Let's change the phrasing. All I have to do now is living leisurely." She giggled as she found herself resting in the garden recently.

Putting a cookie in her mouth, she couldn't help thinking as she was savoring it. "Whoa, this is dang good." As she found out how delicious it was, she tried to compose herself. "Can't let it show on my face. Right now I'm an elegant princess." Still, this thought couldn't keep her from finishing the rest of what was on the table. "The cook must have put a lot of effort into this. Let's give him a reward!" She decided so as she finished her tea break.

- Lucia, don't you think you have eaten too many sweets lately? – A beautiful blonde boy sitting opposite her said worriedly.

- What? Are you saying that I'm fat? – She widened her eyes and stared angrily at him.

- No, you got it wrong. – Hearing this sentence, she changed her face back to normal until… - I'm not saying that you're fat. I'm warning you against becoming one.

Lucia glared at him angrily then she huffed.

- I don't give a care about your comment. I'm doing what I want. – "Oops, I almost say the 's' word." She found herself lucky to be able to hold back.

Lucia observed the boy and only found him smiling.

- Humph! I solely forgive you this time because of your handsome face. Consider yourself lucky!

- Pfft.

She ignored him and asked her maid what time it was. Found that it was about time her father got out of work, she stood up and glared at Lucius one last time.

- I have something to say to father so I'm leaving first.

Saw that Lucius was still snickering, she couldn't help but grit her teeth. He waved his hand, signalled that she could leave as he hadn't finished his tea.

Lucia turned around and stumped away. But after a couple of steps, she started to walk gently as she kept reminding herself. "I'm an elegant princess now. Can't let it show for others to see!"

Looking at her walking away with the maids, Lucius was smiling as he knew exactly what's in her head. Didn't know that her pretense was futile to her brother, Lucia headed to the king's study. "Tomorrow is the day the accident happens in the novel. I must prevent him from using the broken carriage. This is not hard to do but I want an excuse so people won't find it weird when I suddenly pay attention to something I normally don't. I might be too cautious but better safe than sorry."

As her mind was wandering, Lucia found herself standing in front of the study. She asked the guards to inform her arrival. After some knocks, her father answered.

- Come in.

She braced herself before stepping into the study. "This is a crucial point to change the future." Lucia looked at the king. "And this man is the person I want to save."