BCHA CH 01

Prologue & Chapter 1 

Prologue

“Amannet, Daddy’s home.”

With those words, my father came in one day—holding the hands of two boys who looked exactly the same.

‘Oh, for crying out loud. Not again?!’

I barely stopped myself from swearing as I looked at my father’s innocent, cheerful smile. That clueless, sunny face of his made me sigh from the bottom of my lungs.

Ha… Father. Even in this life, you’ve brought those brats again.

The two boys standing before me now—those little angels—will one day grow up into madmen who kill me.

And the beginning of everything awful always started with this moment: my softhearted father bringing them home.

I was furious. Who would ever be happy about two random strangers suddenly showing up at their doorstep? They were nothing but unwanted guests.

‘And thanks to them, I died last time.’

I realized far too late that this was the world inside a novel—and by the time I figured that out, my death had already been written.
But not this time.

“Amannet, these boys will be your older brothers. Don’t fight with them, all right?”

That was when I made up my mind.
I grabbed the ends of my skirt and gave a polite bow toward the two boys—wearing the fakest, sweetest smile I could muster.

“Welcome, brothers.”

My reaction shocked even my father more than it did the twins.

“Eh? You’re… not angry?”

You shouldn’t have brought them if you thought I’d be angry, Father.

“Of course not!”

But what’s done is done—so I’ll play the part perfectly from the start.

“I really like my brothers.”

With the fakest, most sugary smile I could manage, I looked up at the future maniacs and smiled again.

Chapter 1

I remember how my life ended.

Sounds insane, right? But it’s true.
In fact, this is my third life.

In my first life, I was a child who lost both parents in a car accident.
The insurance payout should have secured my future—but my greedy relatives took it all.

“You’re too young to handle money. We’ll manage it for you. When you grow up, we’ll give it back.”
Lies. All of it.

They took the money and never cared for me.
It was my elderly grandmother who ended up taking me in, and she raised me alone until she passed away when I was fifteen.

After that, no one looked after me.
Even when I became an adult, they never returned a single cent.

Just thinking about it still makes my teeth grind.

“That money’s long gone!”
“We spent it raising you!”
“It wasn’t even that much!”

Those shameless relatives never once helped my struggling grandmother, who raised me in a tiny, collapsing room.

In the end, with no money, no family, and no one to protect me, I dropped out of school to survive—working four part-time jobs a day.
I finally died of exhaustion the day before my twentieth birthday.

***

That was the end of my first life.
I know—it sounds ridiculous. Who dies of overwork at twenty in the modern world?
But one day, after days of heart palpitations and dizziness, everything just… stopped.

Damn it.

Well, honestly, there wasn’t much to live for anyway.
No one would’ve mourned me.
So maybe dying wasn’t such a loss.

That’s why I thought the next life would be better.
Except… the world I fell into was pure chaos.

Instead of cars, there were carriages.
Instead of skyscrapers, there were grand mansions.
Everywhere I looked—extravagant dresses, shimmering jewelry, and hair colors like rainbow candy.

Still, for once, luck seemed to be on my side.
I had been reborn as the daughter of a noble family.

“My precious girl,” my father would say.

I had a doting noble father who loved me more than anyone, and servants who gave me everything I wanted before I could even ask.

Ah, yes. The fabled golden spoon life.
No—diamond spoon.
Maybe God was finally giving me happiness after all the misery I’d endured.

Sometimes, though, I’d get strange flashes of déjà vu—
a place name popping into my head or a stranger’s face feeling oddly familiar.
But I brushed it off.

It was a good life. A happy life.
I got to do whatever I wanted.

Of course, not everything was perfect.

“Tsk. That woman still lives here? And you let your daughter near her? Are you sure she’s even your real child?”

“Mother! Please, enough! If you’re going to speak like that, leave!”

Yes… even noble houses have their family drama.
In ours, it was my sweet, timid father—and my terrifying, monster-like grandmother.

Because my mother was a commoner, my grandmother never accepted her.
From the moment I was born, she doubted my bloodline.

And when my mother died young, Father never remarried—saying he wouldn’t let me live under a stepmother.
That must’ve driven Grandmother mad with frustration.

She grew colder and crueler toward us.

Then, when I was fifteen, Father suddenly died.

What followed was predictable:
Grandmother accused me of being the reason he died—“the cursed commoner’s daughter who killed her own father.”

After that, my position in the family dropped lower than dirt.

And by eighteen, I was dead again.

Accused of my father’s death, locked away for “the sins of the family,” and handed a vial of poison by my grandmother—
“For the family’s honor,” she said.

I drank it. And died an unjust death for the second time.

***

Now, staring into a beautifully carved mirror, I couldn’t help but sigh.
I’d died—and yet here I was again, reborn as a noble’s daughter.

“At this point, shouldn’t I be compensated?!” I shouted.
“I don’t even need compensation—just a different life, please!”

Was I doomed to die young, no matter what?

“Why… why am I her again?”

The mirror reflected a little girl with navy-blue hair like a night sky full of stars, deep violet eyes, soft cheeks, and silky curls cascading down her pale face.

“So cute. Too cute, honestly.”

It was the same face I’d seen in my second life—the adorable little girl named Amannet, daughter of Marquis Reize.

And now, unbelievably, I’d become her again.

No matter how much I tried to deny it, the soft pinch of my cheek confirmed the truth.
This was real.

“Could this… be a chance from God?”

Despair slowly turned into resolve.
If I’d been given another shot at life, I’d take it.
And since it was before those twins arrived—this was the best timing possible.
A chance to change fate.

“What day is it today?”

I looked around quickly. Judging from my reflection, I was about eight years old—the same age as when those brats first came home with Father.

If only I could stop them from ever arriving…

I was lost in thought when—

“You’re already up, my lady?”

The door opened, and someone familiar entered: Nanny Reina.
She’d raised me since I was a baby.

“Nanny!” I shouted, louder than I meant to.

“Oh my, you’re that happy to see me?” she said with a warm smile.

“Uh-huh! I missed you!”

Of course, I didn’t mean that in a good way.
She was one of the people I cursed the most in my previous life.

Looking back, the entire Reize Marquisate was full of enemies.
Grandmother was too powerful, so everyone tiptoed around her instead of standing by Father.

Even though Father inherited the title young, he had two brothers—so enemies surrounded us on all sides.

And thanks to Grandmother’s “family unity” nonsense, everyone lived together in one estate.
That’s why, even as the marquis, Father and I were forced to live in the west wing.

All because of her.