TUHWKM 03

Chapter 03

“Since there is a risk of escape, confine her in the underground prison. In three days, we will proceed with the capital expulsion.”

“How merciless.”

I turned myself in and everything, yet they didn’t even give me time to have the mana suppression device removed and threw me straight into the underground prison. What a heartless Emperor.

“Still, I’m relieved. I avoided the death penalty.”

I sat down on the cold stone floor and let out a sigh of relief.

This was the deepest part of the underground prison. The very place where Charlotte had been confined before her execution in the original work.

“It’s strange seeing it in real life.”

I touched the dark stone floor with my fingertips. It smelled musty, and it was unpleasantly slippery, probably from moss.

“No wonder Charlotte hated it.”

With her personality, this would be hell.

Although Charlotte was a villain in the story, I never hated her. Rather, throughout all my writing, I felt sorry for her and worried about her.

Because that child resembled me.

People who couldn’t even be called family.

A personality twisted from never being loved.

Even the fact that she could never become the protagonist of the world.

All of it was a reflection of me.

Truthfully, I had been more deeply immersed when portraying Charlotte than Leonie, the female lead loved by everyone.

“Good grief. But that doesn’t mean I wanted to become Charlotte.”

Is this also karma, if it’s karma?

As I sat there looking at the ceiling with a melancholic mood, the entrance of the underground prison suddenly became noisy.

Several voices tangled together, and then footsteps drew closer. Soon, along with flickering torches, a short figure in a robe appeared.

It was a familiar face.

“…Leonie?”

The knight who had followed her spoke anxiously.

“Lady Schmidt, this is a heinous criminal sentenced to exile by His Majesty. She may be dangerous.”

Well, well.

I’m also a Lady Schmidt, you know?

As I glared at the knight with an incredulous look, Leonie smiled softly and replied.

“It’s alright. I heard she’s wearing a suppression device. Please open it.”

“…But.”

“Please.”

There it is.

Leonie’s specialty.

Smiling with a harmless face.

“Th-then, truly just for a moment.”

“Thank you, Sir Knight.”

At Leonie’s thanks, the knight’s ears turned red as he cleared his throat and opened the prison door.

Clank.

Leonie entered the cell and removed her robe. Her wavy cherry-blossom-colored hair, completely unlike Charlotte’s, cascaded down. Her pale sky-blue eyes looked down at me with complicated emotions.

“Charlotte, you’re a mess.”

“What brings you here? I thought you’d collapsed.”

“…Is your head alright? I didn’t think Mother would do something like that.”

“I’m fine, don’t worry about it.”

Come to think of it, was this the first time having my hair grabbed in front of Leonie? The Countess had abused Charlotte terribly, yet she tried hard to keep that fact from Leonie.

After an awkward moment of facing each other, Leonie asked.

“…Why did you do it?”

It was a resentful voice.

“You knew I loved that person. Why did you do that?”

It was a strange feeling.

Leonie, the Count’s daughter, standing upright in a clean robe, resentfully confronting someone. Charlotte, the criminal, sitting on a dirty, dark floor wearing a suppression device, listening to that resentment.

If the real Charlotte were here, she would have sneered coldly.

To hide her own wretchedness.

But because I wasn’t the real Charlotte, I didn’t feel that pure wretchedness the way she would have.

So I answered Leonie’s question as objectively as possible.

“I was curious what it felt like to be loved.”

“…What?”

“Because everyone loves you, as if it were a predetermined law. I was jealous and envious, so I wanted to try taking away the thing most precious to you, Leonie. I failed, though.”

Yes, that was the feeling. Charlotte had never been loved. She envied Leonie. She wanted to be like her. She didn’t know any way other than taking.

“Ha.”

Leonie let out a trembling breath. Shaking, she raised her hand.

Smack.

My head turned helplessly.

“I thought of you like a younger sister. And yet how could you do this to me…!”

Wow, did Leonie just slap me?

My mouth fell open.

When I turned my head, I saw Leonie’s face brimming with tears. Though she was the one who hit me, she was trembling more precariously and pitifully than I was. Even at a glance, she looked fragile enough to trigger one’s protective instincts.

Right, this is Leonie.

The female lead of my novel.

A being who receives everyone’s attention and love. A being who lives without knowing the dark sides and pains of the world.

Even the abuse and contempt Charlotte secretly suffered from the Count and Countess—Leonie never knew. Because they gave Leonie only affection. Probably even this incident, she thinks it’s just the Countess losing her reason out of anger.

If Charlotte was a character who reflected me, Leonie was a character who was handed everything I never had.

So whenever I looked at Leonie, a strange envy and sense of deprivation always coexisted.

Actually, if I were to become a character in a novel, I wanted to be someone like Leonie. But far from that, the reality is that I became Charlotte and am getting slapped by Leonie.

Is this what they call black comedy?

I touched my cheek, which now only stung slightly, and spoke.

“Once I’m expelled from the capital, His Highness the Crown Prince will soon come to his senses. I made it so the brainwashing gradually breaks as he distances himself from me.”

“Is that why you requested the Grand Duchy of Lucifenia as your place of exile?”

You already heard about that.

I nodded.

“It’s the farthest from the capital. Wouldn’t that be better for you too?”

This is how I think of you two.

“…Do you even know what kind of place that is?”

“Yes.”

The Grand Duchy of Lucifenia.

The Empire’s frontier touching the edge of the continent, a land once under the influence of black mages.

But there was a reason Leonie spoke this way.

It was because of the land’s current owner.

He hated black mages enough to usurp the land of black mages and make it his territory. After he planted his flag, the territory of Lucifenia was even called the graveyard of black mages.

“Just go to a remote place instead. What are you going to do at the Grand Duchy?”

“Who knows.”

I shrugged vaguely.

I understand your concern, but I absolutely must go there. That way, you two can be happy and I can live.

Meanwhile, Leonie looked like she couldn’t understand me at all. She parted her lips to say something, then sharply turned her head.

“Fine, do whatever you want. I won’t think of you as a sister anymore either. You… you shouldn’t have tried to take that person away.”

I was at a loss for words for a moment.

It was because something caught in my chest.

Leonie felt unfamiliar.

This child who has never even lost anything, yet can be this tormented by the fact that her lover was taken away, even for a moment.

This child who can so freely hurl resentment at a sister about to be exiled.

It was a strange feeling.

I’m the one who knows Leonie’s innocence best.

Is it because I’m Charlotte now? This situation felt so miserable and sad.

“Leonie.”

I met Leonie’s blue eyes. I quietly gazed at the freshness that Charlotte, with her pale ashen eyes, could never possess.

After a brief silence, I parted my lips.

“…Let’s never meet again.”

That will be the path for both you and Charlotte to be happy.

I didn’t say “take care.”

Because my female lead will be fine, just as she always has been, and will continue to be.

“…….”

Leonie ultimately didn’t answer. Instead, she pressed her lips together and left the underground prison cell.

The flickering torch grew distant.

I watched her retreating figure for a long time in the pitch-black darkness without a single point of light.

***

Clank.

“Come out.”

On the third day of being confined, the iron bars finally opened.

Finally, I’m leaving.

I thought my back was going to break and kill me.

“By any chance, could you remove this?”

I held out both my wrists. It was because of the shackle-type suppression device still binding them.

However, the knight scanned me with a dry expression, then sharply turned his head.

“You can remove it yourself after you’ve been transported.”

Seriously?

So harsh.

They could at least remove this since I’m being transported anyway.

Judging by the atmosphere, it didn’t seem like saying one more word would change anything, so I obediently stepped out of the cell.

In the underground prison corridor, two imperial mages were waiting. They were the ones who would transport me to the Grand Duchy of Lucifenia.

“Begin.”

As they chanted a spell, a blue magic circle appeared at my feet.

Flash!

Soon, light seemed to overtake my vision, and when I opened my eyes, I saw a blue sky instead of the dark underground prison ceiling.

A vast meadow and low trees swayed, and far in the distance, the familiar grand ducal castle rose faintly.

“…I really came here.”

I never thought I’d end up in a place like this.

Well, did I know I’d be possessed?

I rubbed my face with my hand, feeling complicated. The suppression device, still not removed, clanked.

“Anyway, it hurts like hell. How am I supposed to remove this?”

At least give me a key.

I need to take this off to do anything. I’ve been starving for three days, so I don’t even have the strength to walk.

It was the moment I was groaning, using both hands and even my mouth to somehow remove the suppression device.

Shing.

Suddenly, along with a chilling sound, something cold was laid against my neck.

“Hello, witch.”

A soft voice was heard.

“Welcome to the grave.”