Chapter 3

I opened my eyes groggily to the unfamiliar sensation of my body shaking.

 

“Miss, wake up!”

 

“Mmm…?”

 

“We’ve arrived at the manor.”

 

At the maid’s words, I snapped my eyes open and lifted my body from where I had been lying collapsed.

 

“We’re finally here!”

 

My momentary despair over the situation—that the dream wouldn’t break—was interrupted. The poor riding quality of the carriage had given me motion sickness, and my number one priority was now to get off the carriage as quickly as possible.

 

To me, someone who had only ever traveled in engine-powered vehicles, the ride in a carriage pulled by living, moving horses was dreadful. My rear end kept hitting the seat repeatedly on the way to the manor, and I had closed my eyes to endure the motion sickness. I must have dozed off briefly because of my aching body.

 

‘Was the manor actually quite close?’

 

I reached to pull back the curtain on the carriage window to look out, but the carriage immediately stopped. I carefully stepped out of the open carriage door and looked up at the manor before me. Perhaps because the previous building was so grand, the grey brick manor before my eyes felt rather humble.

 

“Miss.”

 

I turned my head at the voice to see an elderly gentleman in a grey suit standing there.

 

‘Who is that?’

 

The elderly man smiled slightly as he looked at me.

 

“Do you know how worried I was when you didn’t return?”

 

“That’s right! Mr. Norman, the butler, was so anxious.”

 

The maid, who had followed me out of the carriage, quickly stood next to me and chimed in.

 

“Ahem. Winnie, when did I ever fret like that?”

 

“I saw you yesterday!”

 

I watched their exchange. Norman narrowed his eyes, looked me up and down, and asked,

 

“But, Miss.”

 

“Yes…?”

 

I flinched and shrunk slightly under his narrowed gaze.

 

“You look quite a mess, as if you thoroughly enjoyed the banquet all night.”

 

Although Winnie had straightened my clothes before we left, Norman, with his long experience as a butler, seemed to instantly notice my slight disarray. I rolled my eyes around.

 

“Is it that obvious?”

 

“Yes. It seems you couldn’t deceive my sharp eyes. The Baron will be back soon, so it would be best for you to prepare before then.”

 

Norman looked at Winnie and instructed.

 

“Winnie, go upstairs and prepare a bath immediately.”

 

“Yes! Miss, please go up quickly.”

 

I was instantly led by Winnie’s hand and stepped inside the manor.

 

 

***

 

 

A bathroom made of pristine white marble. The shiny bathtub was filled with water dotted with floating red flower petals. The rich, alluring scent of roses filled the room, seemingly wafting throughout the manor.

 

As I gazed at the bathroom, I quickly dodged a sudden touch. Winnie, who was about to help me take off my dress, blinked rapidly.

 

“Miss, you need to take off your dress.”

 

“Wait, wait, Winnie! I’ll do it myself!”

 

Winnie tilted her head at my hurried voice.

 

“You’ll do it yourself?”

 

“Yes! And I want to bathe alone.”

 

“You don’t need bathing assistance, either?”

 

Under Winnie’s suspicious gaze, I subtly avoided eye contact.

 

“But you’ve never bathed alone.”

 

“I haven’t…? But I can’t rely on your help forever, Winnie.”

 

“Well, taking off the dress by yourself is difficult, so I’ll just help you with that and then leave. Is that alright?”

 

Is taking off a dress that difficult? Recalling yesterday’s events, it didn’t seem so.

 

‘If it was difficult, he wouldn’t have been able to take my clothes off so easily…!’

 

I hugged my body with both arms and backed away, saying,

 

“It’s fine! I’m all grown up now. I should try doing it alone at least once.”

 

Winnie looked at me with a doubtful expression. Eventually, she lowered the hand she had reached out to me.

 

“Since you insist, Miss… I understand.”

 

“Yes! Thank you, Winnie.”

 

“If you need any help, please be sure to call me.”

 

I waved and smiled at Winnie as she stepped out of the bathroom. Once the door closed, I let out a deep sigh of relief and looked at my reflection in the mirror.

 

Long, glittering, lemon-blonde hair. Amethyst-like violet eyes. A peach-colored, flushed face. Plump cheeks.

 

No matter how I looked, none of my original features were visible. I was an ordinary person with black hair and black eyes. Yet, I had no choice but to accept this situation of having transmigrated into a novel.

 

“It’s a miracle I didn’t collapse from overwork.”

 

The mountain of work was quite overwhelming for me, a new employee who hadn’t been there long. I thought I was finally going to rest after several nights of working straight.

 

I suspect I died suddenly from overwork due to the accumulation of acute fatigue. I had always lived a lonely and difficult life, so I had no lingering regrets.

 

“So, I’m Lilithia…?”

 

In the carriage on the way to the manor, I kept trying to recall the character ‘Lilithia.’ Since she was completely unfamiliar to me, a reoccurring reader of the novel <The Duke’s Daughter Has Returned>, she was clearly an extra.

 

I carefully undid my dress. Red marks were blooming all over my bright, ivory skin.

 

“It really happened…”

 

Marks from the night I spent with Freyer were everywhere on Lilithia’s body—no, my body. This was why I couldn’t let Winnie take off my dress. If she saw these marks, I couldn’t predict her reaction.

 

I bowed my head deeply. Why did I, an extra who transmigrated into this body, end up spending a night with Freyer? I tried to recall the memories of yesterday, which I thought was a dream, step by step.

 

“I hugged Freyer at the banquet…”

 

But as fragmented memories surfaced, I frowned deeply.

 

“And then?”

 

As I tried to remember the next part, I squeezed my eyes shut, feeling all the blood rush to my face.

 

“That’s it, ah, right there.”

 

“Why do only memories like that surface…”

 

After hugging Freyer, the truly important memories were not coming back clearly. While reading the novel, I had never once thought of him as an object of desire. Even yesterday, I only wanted to hug my bias, Freyer, because I felt sorry for him. So why…?

 

“I must have made the first move, right? Why did I drink alcohol!”

 

It was my mistake for drinking recklessly just because the alcohol was sweet. It couldn’t be explained any other way than that another self had awakened in my drunken mind.

 

“If I hadn’t drunk alcohol, this wouldn’t have happened…”

 

I was filled with unnecessary guilt, wondering if I had flawed a perfect character because of my mistake. I clasped my hands tightly together, looking out the small bathroom window toward the sky beyond.

 

“Author. I will never appear before Freyer again, living solely dedicated to my new life with a heart of eternal repentance. So please forgive me just this once…”

 

 

***

 

 

A silver-haired, green-eyed boy in tattered clothes stepped out of a dark, damp corridor. The boy smiled brightly as he looked at the small light shining in the distance.

 

Thump-thump-

 

Only the sound of the boy’s quickening footsteps echoed in the space. Finally close to the light, the boy looked beyond it and cried out, “Mother!”

 

There, a middle-aged woman with honey-colored hair and blue eyes, wearing a gentle smile, opened her arms to the small boy.

 

“My little sun, come here.”

 

The boy was embraced in the woman’s arms. The woman tenderly stroked the boy’s head nestled in her arms. The boy tilted his head back and looked at the woman’s face with a bright smile.

 

“Cough, cough.”

 

“Mother, are you feeling unwell?”

 

The boy tilted his head and examined the woman’s complexion.

 

Suddenly, a dark-red liquid spat from the woman’s mouth onto the boy’s face. The woman’s eyes went wide, and she frantically tried to cover the red liquid with her hand. But with continuous coughing, the red liquid stained the boy’s face and entire body. The boy’s face turned ashen at the sight before his eyes.

 

“M-Mother?”

 

The boy, terrified, trembled as he tried to pull away from the woman’s grasp. But the woman desperately gripped the arm of the boy who was hastily backing away.

 

“It hurts…”

 

The woman tightened her grip, and the boy, frowning in pain, tried to shake off her arm.

 

“Fr-Freyer…”

 

In an instant, the woman pulled the boy into a hug. Enveloped in the metallic smell, the boy shut his eyes tightly, shaking—

 

—and darkness fell.

 

Gasp-

 

Freyer sat up abruptly, taking in deep breaths. Pale-faced, Freyer ran a hand through his hair.

 

“So much for sleep.”

 

His hollow voice echoed in the silent room. Freyer hugged his sweat-soaked body with both arms and looked towards the window, where the dawn light was beginning to peer through. Because of the lingering darkness, Freyer’s appearance looked even more pathetic.

 

“When will this hellish nightmare ever stop…”

 

The pain of his arm being fiercely grabbed in the dream still felt vivid. His mother, looking at him while coughing up blood, was so clear that Freyer tightly squeezed his trembling eyes shut.

 

“Is it trying to tell me it’s all my fault…”

 

The hellish dream of his mother dying right in front of his younger self.

 

This dream had tormented him his entire life. He often stayed up all night, hoping to avoid the nightmare.

 

He lived by torturing himself with harsh training, thinking that if he collapsed into sleep, he might not dream. However, despite all these efforts, all he gained was a headache from lack of sleep.

 

“If these nightmares would stop, I’d gladly sell my soul to a devil.”

 

Freyer let out a bitter, self-mocking laugh. The nightmare ceaselessly gnawed at Freyer. Did God take pity on him and want to grant him a ray of hope?

 

The blonde woman with whom he spent the previous night. The thought of her filled him with a sense of emptiness, like letting a bluebird fly away right before his eyes. Her violet eyes that looked straight into his, and her lemon-blonde hair spread across the pristine white bedding, vividly came to mind.

 

“Freyer, I hope you’ll be happy.”

 

The warmth of her embrace as she hugged him and wished him happiness, her warm breath—everything was vivid at his fingertips.

 

“How can it be this clear…”

 

If he hadn’t found the ribbon with her name engraved on it, everything would have ended with just a hollow feeling.

 

He couldn’t be sure yet if she was the woman who could be his ray of light.

 

“But if I feel this way… it might be alright even if she can’t stop my nightmare.”