Chapter 18
My heart trembled with anxiety. My mother and father were very strong people, but this was a world inside a book. A terrifying place where extras could disappear at any time as background for the protagonists.
“Ah.”
A sharp sting spread, and I tasted blood on my lips. It seemed I had been chewing on them without realizing it. I gently touched the slightly torn skin with my finger and let out a low sigh.
‘The unfair thing is that no matter how anxious I am a hundred times over, there’s nothing I can change.’
I decided to turn my thoughts elsewhere. For example, to our poor Vasilisa, who had fiercely pressured Teshya. No, if he’s one of the male leads, shouldn’t he recognize his life partner at first sight? What kind of attitude was that? I clicked my tongue without realizing it.
‘Poor guy.’
Thinking about the prologue scene of the original story, it felt like our Vasilisa—who was supposed to leave a strong first impression—had already been pushed aside by Adrian from the very beginning. Quietly, I prayed for his future.
Stay strong, Vasilisa. Teshya liked you a lot too. Even though I was rooting for her to end up with Adrian!
“By the way, the older sisters have been looking for Vasilisa a lot these days?”
I muttered awkwardly while glancing around the empty room.
It was true. Once or twice could be overlooked, but no matter how high-grade a Tilet he was, Vasilisa was still a little boy, even smaller than me. What could they possibly want from such a child? The only thing I could roughly guess was that competitive knight uncles had dragged him to the training grounds.
Tilting my head, a memory suddenly flashed through my mind.
“Ah!”
I jumped up from my seat. If there was something I had been born with again besides my weak body, it was this brilliant memory. And yet I had forgotten this.
Since there was no one in the room, I quickly moved and pulled out my secret notebook hidden deep inside a drawer. It was the record I had started writing as soon as I learned how to write. Everything I had written in terror when I realized this was the world inside a novel—the world I would have to live in from now on.
So that I would never forget it was a novel.
And at the same time, so that I could completely forget it was a novel.
‘It’s been quite a while since I took this out.’
A hardcover notebook sealed with magic that only I could open.
It was a record about the novel Red Rose.
“Pick up your sword.”
With pale, smooth skin and delicate, refined features, the boy looked as beautiful as a doll. But in this mansion, there was no one who would be swayed or shaken by his pretty appearance.
Because someone else had already stolen all of their hearts completely.
When that tiny life had been born in this mansion, when she had let out her loud cry, when the brilliant trace of her beautiful Tilet had colored the air—
Everyone in the Ducal House of Tinya had devoted their loyalty and souls to that small life.
To them, that young and bold boy was a risk factor.
The boy, who did not shrink even under the gaze of the adults staring at him, narrowed his eyes sharply.
“Isn’t this kind of jealousy a bit ugly?”
“Kid, this isn’t jealousy. It’s a test.”
“Is it?”
“It is. A test to see whether you’re worthy of staying by our lady’s side.”
Swish. The sharp sword rolled like decoration in Sasha’s delicate hand. But the edge, honed to perfection, was terrifying enough to cut with just a brush against skin.
The knights surrounding the training ground, Sasha standing with a serious face, and the small boy smiling casually even in that frightening atmosphere—none of them found this strange situation unusual.
“I won’t go easy on you today.”
Sasha raised her sword and charged forward, and at the same time, killing intent surged as the sharp air grew tense and tight.
“Yes, that definitely happened.”
Even without doing anything, I could recall the memories of Red Rose as clearly as if I were reading the book in front of my eyes. But what was written in this notebook was my struggle.
A struggle not to forget the contents of the novel.
And after some time, a struggle to forget that I was merely a character inside it.
‘Because I was afraid of disappearing.’
It was because everyone was kind. Because everyone was happy. My time living as Azalea had become so precious that later, I was suddenly afraid of losing it. I ended my confusion only after writing down every single thing I remembered about Red Rose, word by word.
The end. After placing that final period, I had felt relieved.
And I became even more certain. There was no way I would get entangled in this story.
So I decided to love my family and live happily until my own ending came.
Among all of it, the name that was making my nerves stand on edge now—Teshya. I traced the word “Teshya,” which was mentioned several times in one paragraph.
‘She seemed a little different from the image I had imagined.’
What was it? What exactly had changed? In fact, our family was never mentioned in the original story, and that made it even more unsettling.
What if we got caught up with the protagonists and Mother or Father got hurt? That scared me more than dying or disappearing myself. I was afraid our family members might be harmed. That something might go wrong.
Because—
‘I was the one who brought Vasilisa here.’
It had been said jokingly, but Vasilisa’s lack of reaction even after seeing Teshya made me uneasy. In the Red Rose I remembered, neither Adrian nor Vasilisa had some special moment of realization before falling in love with Teshya. They simply loved her from the beginning. An unconditional love close to sacrifice. An obsessive love that did not care for themselves.
My contradiction was that this place was both a world inside a novel and my reality.
My heart began beating fast with a nameless anxiety.
‘There’s nothing I can know right now. But things started changing when I brought him here.’
The handwriting in the notebook grew messier the further I flipped, like earthworms crawling across dirt. That was because the later pages were written when I was younger.
Since I had copied the novel exactly while also comparing it with rumors I heard in reality, the character I had examined most deeply was my favorite, Adrian. The one I had written the least about was Vasilisa.
And then—
“Ah, here it is. Akta! Information about Akta.”
My eyes, which had been scanning quickly, stopped.
Mother and Father believed I didn’t need to know about politics or the current situation yet. Put nicely, they cherished me. Put bluntly, it was an environment perfect for spoiling a child. But I understood them. The daughter of a duke was in a position easily used politically in many ways. And I was weak—so weak that I couldn’t even protect myself.
“Akta. One of the two ducal houses of the Enderos Empire. Surpasses Tinya in wealth but is below Tinya in military power. Has only one daughter, but very few have seen her face. And he is greedy for power…”
I tapped the sentence with the tip of my quill.
“And the one he treasures like that is Teshya.”
The pitiful female lead also had a harsh and difficult childhood.
The Duke of Akta was very strict and narrow-minded. He believed that unless his daughter was praised as perfect, she must be educated again and again. In other words, he was not a good father.
He thought that unless his daughter was outstanding enough to surpass other noble ladies at once and become the Crown Prince’s bride, she had no right to even step outside the castle walls.
So what were the chances that a girl under the Duke of Akta’s strict surveillance could escape alone to another duke’s territory so far away? Teshya didn’t look injured, nor did she seem to have suffered.
“Yes. Unless the Duke of Akta personally sent her here…”
I muttered meaninglessly, then a chill ran down my spine.
N-no way, right?
“Ugh, that’s scary.”
I refuse everything. I refuse getting dragged into the bloody love triangle ahead and ending up crushed in the crossfire. If that happened, I would definitely collapse from stress-induced gastritis, coughing up blood.
“What. You’re not sleeping. What are you doing?”
Just as I slammed the diary shut and hid it deep in the drawer, grumbling, that voice came from behind me.
I almost screamed. If the uninvited guest who had rushed over hadn’t covered my mouth instantly, I definitely would have.
“……”
“Am I a monster? Why are you so startled?”
The boy smiled prettily when our eyes met and removed his hand. But that smile wasn’t pretty at all.
You brat! Why do you always move around without making a sound?
“Breathe slowly. It would be terrible if you had a heart attack because of me.”
I shot him a glare full of rising complaints.
“If you know that, then stop sneaking up on me from behind. I hate it when someone suddenly approaches like that.”
“Okay. I’ll remember.”
Liar. We had had this conversation countless times, yet the boy always appeared like a ghost and startled me. Suppressing the irritation bubbling up, I pressed my fingers against my temples.
“……What is it?”
I didn’t call for you. At this late hour. As I looked at him with suspicion and reproach, the boy put on a blank expression. Even when he did something wrong, that face alone made him seem innocent enough to be forgiven.
“Is a lady’s attendant someone who only comes when something happens?”
“Even so, shouldn’t you come only when called?”
