Chapter 183………………………………………….
I could hardly believe what I was seeing in Liena’s memories unfolding before my eyes.
If the “Wallace Countess” that Leandro introduced to Liena was meant to be me, then naturally, it should have been Idel.
In this second life of Liena’s, which I had possessed, I had actually met Liena as the Wallace Countess alongside Leandro.
So what were these memories and this person I was seeing now?
“Um, by the way…”
In the memory, Liena was looking across the table at the “Wallace Countess,” who was eating.
“The Wallace Countess seems very free-spirited. My brother is a bit uptight, so I’m worried that she might find him stifling.”
At that, the freckled cheeks of the woman slicing meat with a knife flushed bright red.
Liena had merely pretended to criticize her brother while subtly pointing out the woman’s awkward dining etiquette.
Honestly, even to my eyes, she didn’t seem very accustomed to aristocratic table manners.
“I-I’m sorry. I’ll study more.”
The woman apologized, looking utterly confused, and Liena responded as if she had no idea why.
“Pardon? What do you mean? What’s there to be sorry for?”
“…I just feel I’m lacking in so many ways.”
“You seem very kind. By the way, what’s your name?”
“I’m Agatha Wallace.”
“Please take care of us, Agatha. If you marry Brother Leandro, you’ll become my new sister-in-law, but I’d just like to call you Agatha casually. Is that alright?”
Without waiting for permission, Liena addressed her by name, and the table fell into heavy tension at such insolence.
Leandro tried to change the subject, but the awkward atmosphere lingered.
“You didn’t have to be so blunt,” he said once Agatha had left, standing before Liena.
“I told you from the start. I don’t like this marriage proposal.”
“You’re the one who wanted the abandoned mine the Wallace family owns.”
“I asked my brother to buy the mine, but did I also agree to a marriage proposal just like that?”
“Well, what else could I do? This is the best way to acquire the mine while avoiding suspicion from others.”
“You mean it was all just for me? Don’t lie. You think I don’t know my brother? Proposing to a woman he met for the first time, that’s totally unlike him. Not cautious at all.”
“….”
“Just be honest. You fell for her at first sight and went ahead with the proposal.”
“…I’m not sure about first sight, but I was definitely drawn to her.”
“How curious. What was it about this Agatha that you liked? She isn’t particularly pretty and seems timid.”
“It wasn’t Agatha.”
“What?”
“The woman I met the first time I visited the Wallace family wasn’t Agatha.”
“Then why did Agatha come to our house today? What about the woman you were drawn to?”
“She disappeared.”
Leandro’s expression darkened.
“She vanished without leaving a trace only a few days after I visited.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. Neither I nor the family have any idea.”
“So Agatha is her younger sister?”
“Strictly speaking, a cousin. She’s the daughter of the Wallace Count’s nephew, recently adopted by the Count.”
“Wow. They adopted a cousin so soon after the daughter went missing just to avoid breaking off the marriage with our family? What a remarkable household.”
“Don’t be so sarcastic.”
“You want to tie yourself to such a greedy family even without the woman you liked?”
“I had no choice. It was a marriage between families. I couldn’t refuse recklessly. Besides, my original purpose was to get you the abandoned mine.”
“…Fine. Do as you please.”
“After meeting her a few times, Agatha seems thoughtful and kind. She’ll surely be a good lady of the Cassius family.”
The conversation between the two, which only added to my confusion, ended there.
“Idel disappeared?”
Why? Did she run away after failing to endure the Wallace family’s treatment?
That was the only reason I could think of, but for now, there was no way to confirm it.
Meanwhile, Liena’s memories continued.
Leandro married Agatha and, as he had with me, went down to Cassius territory together.
The next memory seemed to be after some time had passed, when Agatha and Liena had grown close.
Agatha, like me, visited the Cassius townhouse once a month for family gatherings, but unlike me, she wasn’t particularly ostracized.
The core of Cassius was still Liena, as before, but the Cassius family maintained a relatively okay relationship with Agatha.
Ah, I see.
I quickly realized the reason.
The fundamental reason the Cassius family had kept me at a distance was to protect Liena, who feared losing the family’s affection.
But Agatha wasn’t me, so Liena had no special reason to be wary of her.
She treated her politely as her brother’s wife, but didn’t show deep interest.
Somehow, this is similar to the novel.
This was exactly how I had imagined the Cassius household when reading .
It was strange. Unlike in the novel, it wasn’t Idel but Agatha who took her place, yet the overall picture felt even more like the novel…
Then, a sudden realization struck me.
In the novel, the name “Idel” had never been explicitly mentioned even once.
The character appeared only occasionally as the Wallace Countess, Leandro’s wife, or Liena’s new sister-in-law, never by name.
There wasn’t even a single description of her appearance.
I just assumed she was Idel.
Since the body I possessed was that of the Wallace Countess, and Leandro appeared to propose, I naturally thought Idel was the novel’s new sister-in-law for Liena.
The foundation of my belief had been completely overturned, sending a chill down my spine.
If my theory was correct, the character I had assumed to be Idel was actually Agatha all along.
It was never Idel’s fate to become Leandro’s wife.
I felt dizzy. If this weren’t Liena’s memories, I would have collapsed long ago.
“Then is this the novel’s content?”
The second life of Liena that would have played out as in the novel, had I not possessed her body?
It seemed like the most plausible explanation so far, but something still felt off.
Why would a second life that hadn’t yet occurred remain in her soul in the form of memories?
Based on everything I’d seen of her actions, it was clear Liena didn’t fully remember this life.
And there was one more question.
What really happened to Idel?
Carrying this unsolved mystery, I had to continue observing Liena’s memories, which flowed in disjointed fragments.
As if to prove my suspicion that these were Liena’s second-life memories from the novel, everything unfolded according to the novel’s content.
Without my interference, Liena’s path to success was smooth.
She made the obstacles in the Cassius territory kneel one by one and turned the Iberian Guild into the empire’s top guild.
However, soon after defeating the false saint, Arcia, an imminent crisis struck her.
Not only did Terrence attempt a coup, but a monster wave was unleashed.
In the midst of chaos, Liena never gave up.
With the help of many people, she led the civil war to Michael’s victory and defeated the apostle of the evil god, the source of the monster wave.
From my perspective, witnessing this grand and magnificent heroic tale…
“Still, it feels a bit anticlimactic.”
Even reading it in the book, Liena had overcome these trials far more easily than expected.
The rebel forces, led by Terrence, lost cohesion as his headaches worsened, and the apostle of the evil god strangely underperformed.
The battle with Shadow was the most tense, yet the apostle controlling Shadow exited so abruptly.
“The Liena I just faced was far more relentless and terrifying.”
I thought this as I watched the apostle, impaled by Liena’s dagger, collapse.
A human carrying the bloodline of the Cassius family, marked by the evil god as an apostle.
In the reality I occupied, Liena herself had been chosen instead.
The man gazed at Liena with sharp, clear eyes.
“Do you think it ends here?”
“It ends, doesn’t it?”
“No. Until that life ends, fear the shadow of misfortune that will strike you…”
“Hmph. Not scared at all. Come anytime. I’ll smash you again!”
The apostle’s death—just as in the novel.
“Yes, but something feels… off.”
Experiencing it through memory revealed details not visible when reading the text.
One example was the apostle’s attitude warning Liena about the future.
In the novel, it was depicted like a final desperate act of a defeated enemy, and Liena seemed to accept it that way—but to me, it felt eerily sinister.
Not simply cursing Liena, but almost as if he was certain of her impending misfortune.
“Like someone who knows something…”
