Otaku Witch

Chapter 2014 - 1021: Original Sin of Envy (Part 2)

She’s the Witch of the Forest, after all. The Academy Head giving her some face is only normal.

Thinking of this, she really did feel a bit tempted.

Anyway, Dorothy is a good kid; what bad intentions could she possibly have?

"Also, Sensei, what do you think of my new workshop?"

Seeing that her teacher was already wavering, the homebody witch pushed harder with the sales pitch, pointing at the workshop in front of them as she spoke.

"Of course it’s great. There are still a few minor issues in some places, but that’s only because you haven’t taken the Elite, Professional, and Master courses yet. You just haven’t learned those High Level techniques. But you actually managed to stack and combine these Basic Level techniques to produce an effect not inferior to those High Level techniques. It’s a bit bloated, sure, but the flaws don’t overshadow the virtues. It’s already amazing. Even if I did it myself, it’d be hard to do much better than this."

Noelle Rose praised her without the slightest stinginess.

The workshop in front of her was completely good enough to be treated as the disciple’s graduation project. At this point, her level was already enough to leave the master. Even in the whole construction field, this was already at a Basic Level master’s standard.

And more importantly, Dorothy had really gone all-in here. During the tour just now, she had examined everything carefully: all the materials used in this workshop were top-tier High Level stuff, nothing cheap. The total cost made her little heart pound wildly.

Way too extravagant. With that little nest egg she’d scraped together by fighting life and death outside, there’s no way she could afford to burn money like this.

Yeah, having money is great. Having a mom like Senior Euphilia, with a huge family business and willing to dump cash on her kid, is really great.

The Spider Witch thought so with a bit of envy in her heart.

Actually, her own family was quite rich too. They were, after all, a Devil King Direct Lineage family. Their Ancestor Arachne was the Devil King’s second daughter and also a Venerable Sage.

It’s just that the family environment at her place was really nothing to write home about. Their desire to control was pretty strong; they always wanted to plan out their children’s entire lives for them, as if the kids were string puppets in their hands.

Heh, the title "Demon of Domination" clearly belongs to the Devil King’s eldest daughter Aphrodite, okay.

But whatever. That’s a taboo topic in the Arachne House. After all, the Original Sin their Ancestor held was Envy; she had always envied her elder sister, always loved to compare herself with Her in everything, yet lost in every comparison, and thus became notoriously brutal.

Aphrodite and Arachne were both famous socialites among the Demon Witches.

But the former was a true Princess that everyone adored. People wanted to dedicate themselves to her from the bottom of their hearts. She had a great reputation and lived in the light.

As for the latter, there’s no need to say more. The nickname "Black Widow" already says it all. She lurked in the Shadow.

And with a family whose very foundation was Envy, you naturally couldn’t expect any kind of harmonious "kind mother, dutiful daughter; respectful elder sister, obedient younger sister" nonsense.

In that home, the air was filled with the atmosphere of comparison. Everything had to be measured against others. All resources were distributed according to rankings, blatantly encouraging this culture of comparison.

They even had a ranking board for how outstanding the children were.

So all the little Arachnes became tools for their parents to compare and show off with each other, and naturally turned into string puppets in their hands, forced to act according to their parents’ wills.

Anyway, the sentence Noelle Rose heard the most ever since she was little was "look at how good other people’s children are."

Of course, she actually knew that her mothers did love her; they had just gone too deep down the Original Sin of Envy and had already been eroded by its Strength to a certain extent.

Besides, this was how every generation of the Envy Family had grown up: comparing everything with each other, always fighting to win, forcing themselves to maintain their Envy. The mothers themselves had grown up in such an environment; they probably didn’t even know how to properly get along with their daughters.

Still, understanding is one thing; it didn’t stop Noelle Rose from disliking that kind of family environment.

So, from a young age she kept company with dolls. Rather than faking it and comparing herself with those plastic sisters, she preferred the quiet time spent with her silent dolls.

She was actually someone who was easily satisfied. For her, having a quiet life of slacking off and living on autopilot would already be more than enough. She was innately unsuited to walk the path of the Original Sin of Envy.

However, sometimes when she looked in the mirror, she would despairingly realize that in the end, the blood of Arachne’s envy still flowed in her veins.

For example, she promoted based on merit alone, giving especially preferential treatment to talented kids with good grades while looking down on the weaker ones.

She had realized this, yet by instinct refused to change.

The family’s brand had sunk into her very bones. Even though she had escaped from the family for many years, she still couldn’t escape the Original Sin’s dominion in her bloodline.

As she grew older, she even started to long for family more and more.

Sometimes she really did want to find someone to start a family with. But if she had kids of her own, would she treat them the same way her mothers had treated her?

Whenever she thought of that possibility, she grew a little scared of "family."

So all these years, she’d been going around mouthing off every day about how she wanted to find a girlfriend, but in terms of actual action, her real body just stayed holed up in her lair like a shut-in, never going out, as if waiting for a fated home-invasion encounter.

After all, nobody seriously thinks that with her figure, her looks, and her talent, she’d really end up left on the shelf, unable to find a husband or wife, right?

Forget it, enough bragging. No matter how good she made herself sound, it wouldn’t change the fact that she was indeed a single mutt. Even if she dressed like a married woman every day, that was still just a façade.

And the more she tried to restrain her desire for a family, the more jealousy that longing gave birth to. It was seriously annoying.

Every time she saw other people’s happy families and then thought of her own solitary self, the seeds of envy would uncontrollably take root and sprout in her heart.

She was truly afraid of this version of herself, so she became more and more resistant to the idea of family, worried that she’d end up harming her loved ones. But the more she resisted, the more envious she became.

This was the Curse of Original Sin, a loop with no way out.

The price of bearing such a Curse was that her Strength had been skyrocketing like crazy these past years, like she’d turned on cheats.

Original Sin really was a damn cheap bone to pick. Her sisters at home were breaking their backs trying to outdo each other, doing everything they could to win the favor of the Original Sin of Envy, yet the Original Sin barely gave them the time of day.

Meanwhile she hated this damned jealousy with all her heart, and the thing just clung to her like some shameless floozy, refusing to let go.

But the stronger Envy’s Strength grew, the harder it became for her to control herself sometimes.

For example, when she first heard that Senior Euphilia actually had a daughter, the first feeling that surged up inside her wasn’t happiness for her senior, but ugly jealousy.

She thought, with a violent maniac like Senior, such a tomboy, how could anyone like her, how could she have a family, how could she have a daughter?

And when she later found out that the disciple she’d taken a fancy to, Dorothy, turned out to be Senior’s daughter, she couldn’t help being jealous again—jealous that Senior’s daughter was actually this outstanding.

As for the reason she ended up taking Dorothy as her disciple, even now she couldn’t say if it was really because she wanted a disciple, or if it was purely because of her jealousy toward Senior and wanting to snatch her daughter away.

It was truly ugly and disgusting.

So, did someone like her really deserve to stay by the side of such a good kid like Dorothy? Did she really deserve to join Senior’s family?

Looking at her disciple’s earnest face, shining like the Sun, Noelle Rose hesitated.

Someone as ugly as her, who’d been hiding down here in the underground Shadow all this time—could she really step into the sunlight?

Better not. If she lost control again and stirred up some other moth-like mess, throwing Senior’s peaceful family life into chaos, she’d be a sinner for the ages.

"Maybe I shouldn’t move in after all. The Academy is actually pretty nice too."

She chickened out and said it while dodging the issue.

But Dorothy wasn’t about to give her a chance to back off.

"Come here, Sensei."