Chapter 1
1. I Was Reincarnated in a Novel Where the World Was Doomed to End
My story goes something like this.
I was hit by a car and died, then I was reincarnated inside a novel.
Usually, when you hear about someone being reincarnated or possessing a character in a novel, you probably imagine a noble lady wearing beautiful dresses, surrounded by handsome men and living a luxurious life.
Until recently, I had lived a life somewhat like that too.
‘Until recently.’
This was a world with social classes, high society, and parties, much like 19th-century Europe, where industries had developed.
But this world was about to end.
Because of a virus.
I was reincarnated in an apocalypse survival romance novel called Love in a Ruined World.
And not just as anyone.
I had become Cherry Sinclair, an annoying supporting character who would eventually die after causing trouble and putting the life of the second male lead in danger.
I discovered this fact when I was nineteen, in early spring.
Three years ago, my parents died in an accident, leaving me all alone in the world.
But I wasn’t lonely.
The enormous fortune I inherited made sure of that.
‘Money is the best, after all.’
I wasn’t a noble, but I had been born into the bourgeois class, which had more money than most nobles.
Thanks to that, I lived happily.
I could spend as much money as I wanted and do nothing but enjoy myself like a carefree rich girl!
“I’ll take this one too, and please pack that one as well.”
That day, I went on another extravagant shopping spree at a shoe store.
Afterward, I walked through the busy streets while humming proudly to myself.
My maid, Susanna, struggled to follow behind me while carrying bags full of shopping.
She certainly stood out.
I could hear noble ladies who recognized me whispering among themselves.
“Isn’t that Lady Sinclair over there?”
“Who designed the dress she’s wearing today?”
“That hat is pretty.”
Heh.
I swept my hair back and smiled proudly.
I wasn’t a noble, but all the nobles admired me.
It was quite thrilling and made me feel good.
People often talked about me in the newspapers, calling me a spoiled heiress.
But I didn’t mind.
I thought of it as attention toward me.
Until then, I had been living without a care in the world.
Completely unaware of the dark clouds that were about to hang over my future.
“Miss, please wait a moment.”
After I finished shopping, Susanna loaded my things into a four-wheeled carriage.
The steam automobile I was going to ride in didn’t have enough space for luggage.
I simply stood beside her and watched.
The boxes filled with shoes were heavy, and she struggled to carry them.
‘She looks tired.’
After checking whether anyone was nearby, I easily lifted the boxes with one hand and placed them inside the carriage.
“Wow…… Miss, you really are strong.”
Susanna clapped as she looked at me.
I casually shrugged.
Just as she said, I was stronger than other people.
I wasn’t born this way.
When I was young, my body had been weak.
But one day, after taking some medicine my parents had brought home, I developed this strength a few years later.
However, superhuman strength was not considered a virtue for an upper-class woman.
Until now, I had desperately hidden my strength because I was an immature girl who wanted to become a noble.
“Hm?”
I had finished loading everything and was about to get into the steam automobile when I suddenly felt a chill.
Susanna looked at me with one foot inside the automobile.
“What’s wrong, Miss?”
“No, it’s just……”
‘What is this ominous feeling?’
I suddenly felt as if a strange energy had wrapped around me.
Thinking it might just be my imagination, I tried to step into the automobile again.
But I suddenly lost my balance, missed my step, and fell.
Crash!
My head slammed against the ground.
Ugh.
The pain was so intense that even my scream was swallowed.
Susanna hurriedly helped me up with a shocked expression.
The pain from smashing the back of my head against the hard ground was unbelievable.
It felt as if someone had split my head clean in half with an axe, just like splitting a watermelon.
And then—
Memories suddenly poured into my mind through that split.
Like a flood.
Memories that felt like mine, yet somehow weren’t mine, appeared vividly before my eyes.
As if they had happened yesterday.
‘What the hell is this?’
And then, all of a sudden, I realized.
What the hell was going on?!
I had a past life.
And even more surprisingly, the world I had been reincarnated into was the world of a novel I had read in my previous life.
A novel called Love in a Ruined World.
‘What the hell? This is like something straight out of a novel.’
They say life always happens at the worst possible timing.
Even the heroine of some survival novel had once said something like that.
“Miss, are you really okay?”
“I’m fine.”
In truth, I was anything but fine.
Still, I got into the automobile with Susanna’s help.
My head was still throbbing.
I leaned against the back of the seat and thought.
The novel I remembered after hitting my head was the apocalypse survival romance novel Love in a Ruined World.
Love in a Ruined World, also known as Ruined Love, was a story about the heroine, Aurora, gathering the male leads together to form a ‘survival team’ and searching for a cure after the world had ended.
Various survivors and the survival camps they created appeared throughout the novel.
The size of a camp was directly connected to its power.
And Aurora, the heroine of the novel, conquered these camps one by one and took control of their power.
But there was one problem……
‘The novel was put on an indefinite hiatus.’
The reason why the virus spread had never even been properly revealed.
The only things that had been clearly mentioned were that the scientist male lead, who had the ability to develop a cure, would meet Aurora and her group two years later.
And that was when they would finally discover that Aurora’s older brother, Eden, possessed antibodies against the virus.
Damn it.
And that wasn’t all.
The only thing Cherry did in the original novel was complain that Aurora’s group wasn’t taking care of her.
And Cherry’s final fate?
She caused a disturbance, was bitten by a virus monster, and died.
Fuck.
“Miss, are you crying?”
Susanna, who was sitting beside me, looked shocked and handed me a handkerchief.
I had been quietly crying with my head leaning against the seat.
I answered Susanna.
“No. This is sweat.”
“……What?”
Susanna asked again with a confused expression.
I took the handkerchief from her and wiped the tears running down my cheeks.
That’s right.
I wasn’t sad.
These weren’t tears.
Why did I have to be reincarnated into Love in a Ruined World of all novels?
Why did it have to be an apocalypse?!
Fuck.
Why are you doing this to me?
The capital of the Kingdom of Grayedon, Benton.
Located in the center of the city, the Sinclair family’s townhouse was extremely extravagant.
Golden sculptures were carved into the pure white walls of the building, showing off the grandeur of the mansion.
The roof was covered with lavender.
It was obvious that the owner of the mansion cared more about being ‘flashy’ than being ‘harmonious.’
On the third floor of the building was the largest room, complete with a closet.
A three-tiered tray filled with desserts was always placed on the table in the room.
Scented candles were also constantly burning, filling the room with a soft floral fragrance.
Beside it was a bed decorated entirely in gold.
And I was lying right on top of that bed.
As soon as I returned home, I had simply lain there helplessly without even eating.
Because I wanted to deny this unbelievable reality!
Even when the COVID virus had spread throughout the entire world in my previous life, I had been a unicorn who had never even taken a PCR test.
I had thanked God for my good luck.
And then I suddenly died in a car accident.
But after that, I was reborn in a world from a novel.
And that world was going to be destroyed because of a virus?
The difficulty level had increased way too much.
‘So this is why you left me as a unicorn. You wanted to give me an even bigger fuck-you later.’
—If the world were to end tomorrow, today I would plant an apple tree.
There was a famous saying like that, wasn’t there?
But the Cherry Sinclair of this world had no one she loved because it hadn’t been long since she had lost her family.
Of course, there was no way she would care about something as useless as an apple tree either.
Because of my parents’ business, I had always traveled around the world.
I had no friends.
I didn’t even have a single cousin, which was something most people had.
‘Ah. I do have Harrison.’
Harrison Howard.
He was the Sinclair family’s legal advisor.
He wasn’t my biological brother, but we had grown up together since childhood, so we were as close as siblings.
I also hadn’t been living with the servants of the Sinclair mansion for very long.
So if there was anyone I had developed some attachment to, it was probably Susanna, my personal maid.
While I was lying on the bed and crying, Susanna came into my room.
“Miss Cherry. Here are the newspapers you asked for.”
She was holding newspapers from several different dates.
I rubbed my eyes, sat up, and took the newspapers from her.
“Thank you.”
Then I immediately began going through them.
I spent quite some time looking through the different newspapers.
Finally, I found the article I was looking for.
[Cherry Sinclair’s Spending Habits Fully Analyzed! How Far Will the Spoiled Heiress Go with Her Extravagance……?!]
Ah.
This wasn’t it.
The article analyzed my spending habits and even revealed the dresses I had worn.
Whenever the clothes and jewelry I wore appeared in newspapers or magazines, those designs would become huge hits.
‘Everyone points fingers at me, but they’re really interested in me.’
I shook my head and read the article underneath it.
[Massive Funeral Held at the Marquis of KC’s Estate! Family Spokesperson Reveals That the Deceased Were Servants Who Had Been Suffering from an Infectious Disease……!]
This was it.
Just as I remembered from my previous life, something was happening at the Marquis of KC’s estate.
‘This is crazy. Does that mean the memories from my past life are really true?’
The tragedy of this novel began with the suspicious experiments conducted by the Marquis of KC.
Alchemists sponsored by the Marquis eventually spread a disastrous virus after conducting unethical experiments.
And in order to avoid responsibility, the Marquis’s family hid the fact that the experiments had taken place.
‘In the novel, the world ended exactly three months after this article was published…….’
I quickly checked the publication date of the article.
Two months had already passed!
“No, damn it. What is this?”
There were only 21 days left until the end of the world.
Less than a month.
“This is crazy! Twenty-one days is way too little time!”
I grabbed my hair and pulled at it.
