Rapunzel Is Raised by Her Stepmother

Chapter 1: A Creepy Child

"...What did you just say?"

"I intend to make the ‘Rapunzel’ I brought in yesterday your ‘adoptive daughter.’"

A grinding sound escaped through Dorothea’s clenched teeth.

She couldn’t believe what she had just heard and practically shouted at her father, ‘Hanneman Nebrant.’

"No matter what you say, Father, this is something I cannot accept! How could you ask me to ‘sponsor and adopt’ her?! There’s no way you don’t understand what that implies...!"

The term ‘sponsor and adopt’ referred to a charitable practice where nobles took in orphans and raised them into talented individuals, a custom that had begun after the great famine.

But that was in the past.

Over time, the original intent had faded. Now, the so-called ‘sponsorship and adoption’ often meant nobles took in good-looking orphans, provided for them, and used them for perverse purposes—essentially turning them into ‘playthings.’

Even if one had the purest and noblest intentions for taking in an orphan, suspicion regarding their motives was unavoidable.

Especially if it was an unmarried noblewoman without children doing the sponsoring. If such rumors spread in social circles, suspicion would only multiply.

The whispers would claim she brought in an orphan to indulge in debauchery without consequences before marriage. Who would want to marry a lady tarnished by such vile gossip?

"Send her to my older sisters instead! How do you think society will view me—a woman unmarried and childless—if I raise an orphan under sponsorship? I—!"

Dorothea, her voice filled with outrage, was cut off by Hanneman, who smirked slyly and interrupted her. He dismissed her objection, saying the very premise was wrong.

"Choose your words carefully. You’re not avoiding marriage, are you?"

"Father!!!"

Dorothea ground her teeth at her father’s cutting remark, which touched on her deepest insecurities.

He knew how sensitive she was about the subject. How could he say such a thing?

‘It’s not as if I chose to end up like this...!’

Fighting the urge to cry, Dorothea clenched her fists so tightly that her palms nearly bled. She wanted to scream and vent her frustration immediately, but...

“Hah...”

After forcing herself to calm down, Dorothea mustered a strained smile and began explaining why it was impossible to take ‘that child’ in as her adoptive daughter.

Setting aside her own situation, she couldn’t bear to bring that child into her family or have her as her adopted daughter.

Because, well, there was something off about that child.

"...Father, there's something strange about that child. She escaped from the tower in less than a day and even made it outside the mansion. You know as well as I do that an ordinary child couldn’t possibly do that."

"......"

"I don’t entirely disagree with the idea of making her an adoptive daughter. I understand that someone might later claim to be her 'owner,' and you want to ensure everything is clear legally. I get that. But—"

"Enough. I don’t want to hear your excuses."

"What...?"

"If you had managed her properly, she wouldn’t have escaped in the first place. How on earth were you managing things... Tsk, I’ve taught you since you were young not to use excuses for your failures."

"...I’m sorry."

But all Dorothea received in return was her father’s scolding, essentially telling her to shut up, as he had no interest in her excuses. In this twisted situation, where everything had become her fault, Dorothea bit her lower lip to suppress her frustration.

Management? Of course, she had taken precautions. She had locked the door to the room with double bolts and secured the tower entrance to prevent any escape. She had even stationed guards in front of the tower.

And yet, that child had bypassed every obstacle as if they had never existed, descended the tower, and fled the mansion.

How? Was that even possible?

"Dorothea. I’m not truly asking you to raise that child as your adoptive daughter. As I said yesterday, just confine her somewhere. Keep her alive like livestock. Was that so difficult?"

"But—!"

"That child is an incredibly rare ‘remnant of a witch.’ I trust that as my daughter, you fully understand the significance of that."

Remnant of a witch.

After uttering those words, her father gestured with his chin toward the door, making it clear she was no longer welcome to speak to him.

Realizing that further discussion was futile, Dorothea swallowed the fury boiling inside her and left the room.

Walking briskly, irritation evident in her steps, she exited the main building where her father and the rest of the family resided. She boarded a carriage that would take her directly to her residence—the annex.

‘Fine, just keep her alive, right?’

Interpreting her father’s words to mean that she could do whatever she wanted with the child as long as she kept her, Dorothea headed straight to the annex’s tower where that unsettling child, ‘Rapunzel,’ was confined.

The tower wasn’t particularly tall.

Looking up at the tower, which matched the modest height of her annex residence, Dorothea unlocked the multiple locks securing the tower’s door. Without hesitation, she climbed directly to the top floor.

By the time she climbed the stairs and her breath rose to her chest, a "door" at the very top floor of the tower came into view. The door, heavily adorned with iron locks, seemed to speak for itself: "Do not open under any circumstances."

“...Open it.”

At Dorothea’s command, the old maid who followed her obediently unlocked the chains and opened the door.

As the door swung open and they entered the room, a blonde-haired girl bound tightly with ropes was rolling around on the floor.

‘...Really, no matter how many times I see her, this child is utterly repulsive.’

The girl's hair, gleaming like a golden wheat field in autumn, extended all the way to her feet. Her crimson eyes, staring upward, resembled freshly spilled drops of vivid blood, sending a chill down Dorothea’s spine.

“...Listen carefully, Rapunzel.”

A disgusting, unsettling name. She had half a mind to throw the child out of the estate immediately, but suppressing that urge, Dorothea approached Rapunzel, knelt on one knee, and met her gaze.

“...From today onward, I’ve reluctantly taken you in as my ‘foster daughter.’ But understand this—my decision to foster you wasn’t made out of affection. Nobody would care for a repulsive child like you.”

Cold, sharp words.

Dorothea deliberately twisted her face into an expression of malice and spoke with a tone designed to pierce Rapunzel’s heart. Her intention was to wound the girl as deeply as possible.

“After all, you were abandoned despite possessing that so-called ‘blessing’ or ‘curse’ of your hair. That only proves there’s something wrong with you, doesn’t it?”

Yes, that was the only reasonable explanation.

“What on earth could you have done to be abandoned when ‘your severed hair turns into gold’? Truly, you’re a horrifying child.”

What could have possibly happened to the people who raised her, to make them choose to discard her instead of nurturing her like a goose that laid golden eggs?

Dorothea neither wanted to know nor cared to understand.

Lifting a strand of Rapunzel’s long hair that was sprawled across the floor, Dorothea brushed it off her hands with an expression of pure revulsion, as though she had touched something filthy.

“Don’t delude yourself into thinking that coming here will improve your circumstances. The only thing that’s changed for you is the ‘place’ you’re confined to.”

...Surely, even a child would understand after being chastised to this extent.

Dorothea furrowed her brow irritably as she rose to her feet.

Yes, as Father said, it’s enough to keep her alive like livestock. The maids could take care of raising her anyway.

“......”

As Dorothea stood up, Rapunzel stared intently at her.

Her wide eyes made her look surprised, almost as if she was about to cry.

What’s that? That stupid expression?

“...What’s with that look? Are you cursing me, perhaps? Fine, cursing me is probably all you can do here anyway. I’ll forgive that with my broad heart.”

“...I see.”

Rapunzel’s tightly shut lips parted, and soon, her mouth curved into a smile, drawing an elegant arc. That smile inexplicably sent a chill down Dorothea’s spine, making her flinch and step back.

“So, being your foster daughter means from today on, you’re my mother, right?”

“...What? What part of what I just said made you think that?”

“I heard it loud and clear. So, according to what you just said, starting today, I’ve become your daughter, haven’t I?”

Even after hearing all that, this is her response?

As Dorothea recoiled in shock, Rapunzel, still bound by the ropes, began wriggling toward her, dragging herself across the floor.

“...Actually, this works out. Given that I can’t move on to the second chapter of my life in this situation, there’s not much I can do anyway. Maybe getting along with my stepmother is the best choice...”

“What? What nonsense are you muttering now—”

Rapunzel murmured something quietly under her breath while staring at the floor, her words too faint to hear. Then, she abruptly lifted her head and beamed brightly.

That expression...

It was the kind of face a daughter might make when showing affection to her mother. The sight left Dorothea utterly horrified.

“I said I’m so happy to have a family now! Since you said you adopted me, that means starting today, we’re family, right? I’ve never had a family before, so I’m overjoyed!”

A primal fear overtook Dorothea’s entire body.

For the first time in her life, she experienced an overwhelming terror and confusion, her face growing pale.

“The fact that you said all this to me, Mother, proves that you care about me, doesn’t it? If you didn’t care, you wouldn’t have gone to the trouble of saying such things. What should I do? I’m so happy!”

“Ah, no, I—”

“Mother, can you untie these ropes? They’ve been so tight that my arms hurt. Please? Mother? Huh, Mother?”

Still tightly bound, Rapunzel grinned as though truly thrilled to call her “Mother.” Dragging herself closer, crawling between her own legs, she crept toward Dorothea.

The sight of it was so deeply unsettling that Dorothea finally—

“Ugh...!”

“Mother? Where are you going? Untie me before you go! Mother! Mother!!”

—ran away without looking back.

Her face pale as a sheet, Dorothea fled from Rapunzel, her trembling hands locking the door with as many bolts as possible.

Even as she frantically secured the locks, she could hear Rapunzel’s playful, singsong voice calling out from the other side of the closed door, “Mother~! Mother~!”

‘What on earth is wrong with that child...?’

After all the scolding, the torment, the humiliation—

How could she smile at me so sweetly and call me "Mother"?

What kind of mindset does one have to possess to act like that…

‘...Yes, she must be such a peculiar child. That’s probably why she caused such a scene yesterday.’

Dorothea rubbed her arm, which was covered in goosebumps, and recalled the "incident" Rapunzel had stirred up the previous day.

Just a day after being confined to this tower, she had escaped and was running around the mansion, laughing gleefully…

Even now, thinking back on it, it was utterly incomprehensible from any rational perspective.