RTWE CH 02

The day Lumiere was born.

Her mother was executed for uttering an ominous prophecy while delirious during childbirth.

‘The day the Black Hawk of the North spreads its wings, a shadow shall fall upon the sun.’

It meant that the black hawk symbolizing the Grand Duchy of Winterheim would cover the sun of the Wizer Empire.

For the Imperial Family, which held hegemony over the continent, this was an insult they could not tolerate.

As a result, Lumiere had been confined to a forgotten corner of the Imperial Palace, treated worse than even a commoner.

Even after the previous Emperor passed away about three years ago and her half-brother ascended the throne, her circumstances did not change.

No, they had only gotten worse.

From then on, she was forcibly dragged to every party and made into an object of ridicule.

“I’m seriously going crazy…”

Lumiere ran both hands down her face.

Once. Twice. Three times.

She repeatedly rubbed her face, but nothing changed.

She had returned to the dreadful Imperial Family she had grown so sick of.

She sat there in a daze for a while before suddenly looking down at the invitation.

Wait. Since I received this just a little while ago…

That meant the day she would leave the Imperial Palace was not far away.

In her previous life, she had been sent to the North exactly one month from this point.

Then I’ll be able to meet him again soon.

As she searched through the distant memories of her past life, she thought of the man who would soon become her husband.

The master of the Grand Duchy that had guarded the border of the land of the most dangerous monsters in the world for hundreds of years.

Axid von Winterheim.

He had taken the position of Grand Duke after the previous Grand Duke’s death, but she did not have many memories of him from her ‘life.’

It was common knowledge, not merely a rumor, that anyone who carried the bloodline of the Grand Ducal Family would be cursed and die.

Every Grand Duchess throughout history had died without exception after giving birth to an heir.

Terrified of that curse, she had fainted the moment she saw the Grand Duke. She had remained shut inside the carriage throughout the journey to the North, only to take her own life on the very night she arrived at the Grand Ducal Castle.

But ten years.

For ten whole years after her death, she had remained bound to the Grand Ducal Castle and watched him.

Rather than resenting the bride who had chosen death to escape their marriage, he had bowed his head and pleaded with the Emperor—the very man who had mocked him as a barbarian.

He had asked him to please allow the princess’s body to be buried in the Imperial Family’s cemetery.

Burying a princess who had turned her back on the world because she could not accept the marriage in the Grand Duchy would be no different from killing her twice.

But the Emperor had rejected his request without hesitation, and in the end, the Grand Duke had no choice but to bury her in the sunniest spot within the castle grounds.

The man who stood before her gravestone until sunset every year on the anniversary of her death…

What had he been thinking as he gazed at the cold stone?

Her violet eyes became distant and clouded for a moment.

She did not know why she had returned, but one thing was certain.

She knew exactly how she wanted to live this life.

I want to repay the debt I owe him.

It was not a debt that could be repaid with a few simple words.

Because she had chosen death, the world had become even more convinced that the Grand Ducal Family was cursed, and people had come to regard him as an even more ominous existence.

Moreover, he had been the only person who remembered and honored the anniversary of her death every year.

Even if the time she had spent after her death had been erased by her regression, the comfort she had received during those years had not been erased.

Whether it was atonement or repayment, she could not repay that debt anywhere except by his side.

And since she knew that the curse was a lie, there was nothing for her to fear.

She looked at her reflection in the mirror once more.

Untidy hair and dry, rough skin.

Dark circles beneath her eyes and a body reduced to little more than bones.

A dress that had been washed so many times that its color had completely faded, carrying a stale odor.

First, I need to recover my health.

If she left the palace looking like this, she would certainly become an object of ridicule.

More than anything, she did not want to look like a bride being sold off when she stood before the Grand Duke.

I should eat something.

After moistening her dry throat with the water on the bedside table, she pulled the bell cord.

But even after some time passed, no one came.

Well, I suppose that’s only natural.

Who would sincerely attend to a princess who had no power, let alone the ability to bestow even a single reward?

She rose from the bed, her body creaking like rusty hinges, and stepped outside.

Dust lay thick in various places, and the old surroundings were eerily silent.

She quietly walked down the shabby corridor, so unlike the residence of a princess, until she frowned upon reaching the empty drawing room.

How dare those women who called themselves maids fail to appear immediately when their mistress summoned them?

She let out a hollow laugh of disbelief and was about to walk away when a familiar voice came from deeper inside the rear garden.

“…Honestly, people like that sure are stubbornly hard to kill.”

“You can tell just by looking at her. If she’s still breathing, she obviously only pretended to die.”

“Exactly. If she really intended to die, do you think a few handfuls of medicine would have been enough? Not a chance.”

“She’s going to die anyway once she gets married. She should just stay quiet and leave when the time comes. Honestly, I don’t understand why she makes such a fuss.”

Pretended to die.

As memories of what they had done to her came flooding back, a small sigh escaped her lips.

The dusty room where she had been left neglected.

The crumpled dresses that smelled stale.

Those things were nothing compared to the rest.

They had forced her to eat leftovers that others had already abandoned. Whenever she returned from a party, they would applaud and mock her, congratulating her for becoming the ‘flower of the wall.’

And on the day she had tried to die…

“Your Highness, there is no need to be so discouraged simply because you were not chosen by Duke Trovitan.”

“Exactly. His Majesty the Emperor must care about you very much to personally find you a marriage match.”

“Though he may be a foul-smelling barbarian, I’m sure he’ll be excellent in bed, so you’ll have quite an enjoyable time every night.”

They had dared to mock and humiliate her with such words.

She had never intended to leave quietly anyway, but this was practically an open invitation for her to punish them.

Perhaps this is for the best.

They had handed her the perfect excuse themselves.

With a mocking smile, she deliberately made her presence known.

“I’m sorry to disappoint you by having such a stubbornly persistent life.”

“Gah! You scared me!”

The three women, who had been chatting away, jumped in surprise.

“I should have just died properly and stopped being a nuisance, shouldn’t I?”

Lumiere gently crossed her arms.

One of the maids cleared her throat and spoke.

“…Ahem. If you’ve regained consciousness, you should have called for us, shouldn’t you? Instead, you came all the way here while you were supposed to be bedridden, only to eavesdrop on the words of your inferiors. It’s hardly becoming of Your Highness.”

Well, well.

How dare they treat a person like a filthy little rat?

“If you had come immediately when I called, I wouldn’t have needed to come all the way here.”

“Did you call us? You have such little presence that I suppose we didn’t realize you were calling.”

The three women twisted their lips and snickered.

“…I thought you had no limbs since you didn’t come even when summoned. Now I see that you simply don’t know your place.”

“If Your Highness had possessed the dignity befitting royalty, we would have rushed to you immediately.”

Lumiere gave a quiet chuckle.

How shameless.

Their words were polished, but their arrogance was unbelievable.

It seemed the years of getting away with everything had made them far too complacent.

It was time to shatter that complacency right here.

“As it happens, I was thinking of restoring the dignity befitting a member of the Imperial Family.”

They snickered again, as though she were saying something ridiculous.

Of course, what could they possibly fear from her when she was a princess in name only?

But how long would they be able to maintain that relaxed attitude?

Lumiere spoke with a meaningful look in her eyes.

“Who will come with me?”

“Come with you? Where?”

All three stared at her with wide eyes, looking utterly bewildered.

They seemed unable to understand why someone who had only just risen from her sickbed was suddenly saying such things.

But then—

“Where else would a princess who is about to be married go?”

“……!”

The faces of the three women, who had been sneering at her with such insolence, instantly hardened.

Because they understood exactly what she meant.

She was taking them with her to the land of the barbarians—the very place they feared more than anything.