IBLC 01

Chapter 1

Rosebellia Winters

“This is just…”

A helpless laugh escaped my lips at the sight before me.
The training hall was completely empty, and wooden practice swords that should’ve been neatly stored away were scattered all over the floor.

Now that I thought about it, wasn’t today the last day of the festival?

Before coming here, I’d run into Lucas—bright-eyed and practically glowing with excitement.

He’d asked me to join him in the plaza, but I refused.
Still, knowing Lucas, the ever-enthusiastic center of the knights’ order…

“He’s probably dragged everyone out there.”

A faint headache followed that thought.
Even though I had promised myself in this life not to clean up anyone’s messes, I couldn’t just leave this disaster behind.

I untied the ribbon from my wrist and used it to tie up my waist-length golden hair.
Just as I bent down to pick up one of the fallen swords—

“Senior.”

A pleasant low voice made my shoulders flinch.
It was my first time hearing it, yet a bad premonition ran cold down my spine.

“Senior?”

Turning toward the sound, I saw a man standing there, motionless.
When I lifted my gaze, I blinked—stunned.

I knew that face.

Hair as dark as midnight, though sometimes it shimmered with deep navy—like the night sky itself.
And beneath it, eyes the color of a brighter blue flame.

The man standing before me was none other than the male lead from the novel I’d read in my previous life—
the cold-blooded tyrant who never returned the dying heroine’s love,
the man of war.

Ian Klein Martinez.

In the novel, Rosebellia—the woman whose body I now inhabited—had defected to another nation and faced Ian countless times on the battlefield, until both of them died by each other’s hand.

According to the original story, he was destined to kill me, and I was destined to kill him.
We’d tear each other apart like rabid dogs… until the bitter end.

Remembering that horrifying ending, I suddenly found it hard to breathe.

“What is it?”

“I’ll clean this up, Senior.”

“Sure… do that.”

As Ian began gathering the wooden swords, I took a step back.
Only when there was distance between us did my lungs finally start working again.

Calm down.
He’s not going to kill you now.
You’re just fellow knights—nothing more.

As I steadied my breathing, I found myself watching his back.
He was silently cleaning the place, movements precise and composed.

When I crept closer to help, he glanced at me in surprise.

“It’ll be faster if we do it together,”

I said curtly, embarrassed by my own tone.
He just shrugged and continued collecting swords.

When he walked toward me, arms full of them, I instinctively looked up.
I knew he was tall, but this tall?

The novel had described him as broad-shouldered, sculpted like a statue, and unbearably handsome.
I’d thought it was just the typical “male lead glow,” but no—the description hadn’t done him justice.

He was… breathtaking.
Enough that I forgot to breathe for a moment.

“Have you thought about it?”

“Thought about what?”

My mind lagged behind. I couldn’t quite grasp what he was saying.

“Didn’t expect you to pretend not to remember.”

“What?”

His polite words contrasted sharply with the way he was looking at me—intense, almost insolent.
The air between us thickened.

Of course. He might be hiding his royal identity now, but that innate arrogance of the First Prince of the Fonnes Empire couldn’t be concealed forever.

Then he said something that made my pulse stutter.

“If I recall correctly, you weren’t drunk that night.”

“I… might’ve been.”

“You’re saying you were too drunk to remember?”

“Which night are we talking about?”

“The night before the festival.”

The night before the festival?

My mouth went dry.

The festival lasted three days.
Today was the last day, meaning the “eve” he was talking about was four days ago—
four days before I woke up in this body.

“Maybe… I’m the kind of person who hides it well when I’m drunk?”

His expression hardened in an instant.

“Did you forget… or do you want to forget?”

“I just… want to pretend it didn’t happen?”

Too honest, maybe.

His eyes flickered. I quickly averted my gaze.

“I can’t do that.”

“What?”

“That was the first time I ever felt something like that.”

“…What?”

“For a brief moment, when we shared breath… I can’t forget it.”

Shared breath?

Excuse me, what now?

“I’m not asking for anything in return. Even if it’s a rejection, I want a proper answer.
Avoidance doesn’t suit you, Senior.”

I barely resisted the urge to shout I don’t even know what you’re talking about!

Before I could say anything, Ian gave a short bow and walked out.
Only when his presence was completely gone did I clutch my head.

Let’s think this through.

“So, on the eve of the festival… something happened?”

My logic was simple enough.
The problem was that I’d woken up in this world only three days ago.

Which meant—
whatever happened that night…
I hadn’t been there for it.

And now the male lead of the story was confronting me about a night I never lived.

“Great. I’m doomed.”

And weren’t these two supposed to hate each other in the original?

“Just what happened between you two?”

Later, after a bath, a maid approached.

“Will you be taking your meal in your room, my lady?”

“Bring it here.”

“Of course, please wait a moment.”

As soon as the door closed, I let out a sigh and lay back on the bed.

Soft yet somehow unfamiliar—like lying on someone else’s life.

“Guess it’s only natural to feel… strange.”

My thoughts drifted back to that night.

‘Do you wish to disappear as you are?’

The voice had come to me as I lay on cold asphalt.
Engines roared in the distance—no one was coming.

I didn’t know where the voice came from, only that it reached me somehow.

‘Then how about this: would you like to live the life you’ve always wanted?’

My body had been racked with pain.
But somewhere in the darkness, I’d seen a faint glimmer.

It wasn’t like I’d been happy.
I’d once believed I was special, basking in some imagined spotlight—
but I was wrong.

When my mother and grandmother died, when I lost fencing to an injury before high school—
I endured it all, just trying to be acknowledged.

But in the end, I realized I’d only ever been a pawn in my father’s and stepmother’s games.

A failure. A shadow.

And yet, perhaps… I still wanted to live.

I clenched my hand with the last of my strength.

‘That answer will do.’

Warmth flooded my body, pain vanished—
and when I opened my eyes, I was here.

Inside the world of the book I had read dozens of times,
The Flower That Bloomed in Winter.

The story was simple.
The heroine, Daisy, loved the male lead, Ian.
Doomed by illness, she admired him from afar, saved once by his hand—but he never returned her feelings.

Even after becoming Emperor, Ian remained a man with no one by his side.
Daisy died still loving him, and he perished in war soon after.

A tragic ending.

I’d always preferred Edwin, the kind and loyal second lead.

And…

“The one I admired most was Daisy, Edwin, and—”

“Rosebellia.”

The name left my lips like a stranger’s.

Rosebellia Winters.
A side character, but a legendary one.

A knight of the Empire’s White Order, later defecting to the Lenor Kingdom.
The woman who faced Ian again and again on the battlefield,
and finally struck him down—
dying alongside him.

She was a war hero, a beauty praised as the Empire’s finest,
and a name that lingered even after the book closed.

I’d always thought—
If you could live like that, even as a side character… maybe it wouldn’t be so bad.

“But I didn’t mean literally die fighting him…”

If I could make different choices,
could I change her ending?

“If that’s possible…”

I clenched my hand again, a faint hope flickering.

The sound of a trolley snapped me out of my thoughts.

“My lady, your meal has arrived.”

“Come in.”

The maid entered with a smile—Anne, Rosebellia’s personal maid.

“Please call me if you need anything.”

“Thank you. You can leave now.”

“I was told to stay and make sure you eat well, my lady.”

“By the head chef?”

Anne laughed nervously. “He’s only worried about you, my lady.”

“I know. Mark’s always treated me like a child.”

The conversation flowed easily—strangely natural.

I knew Anne. I knew Mark.
I knew all of them.

Rozbelia’s memories had flooded into me the moment I arrived.
Her childhood, her rise to knighthood, her duel with Ian—
everything up until the night before the festival.

Her memories had become mine.
Even her swordsmanship felt embedded into my body, like muscle memory.

But one thing didn’t add up.

“Those words Ian said…”

‘For a brief moment, when we shared breath… I can’t forget it.’

That never happened in the original story.
The novel started after the festival—
so whatever had happened that night…
wasn’t written anywhere.

And yet it had already set off a chain of chaos.

“Why is it only that night I can’t remember?”

Anne looked at me anxiously.
“My lady, are you sure you’re all right?”

“I’m fine. Just thinking.”

Her worry was understandable—Rosebelia had collapsed with fever the day I arrived.

They must’ve been terrified.

“I’m fine, really.”

I smiled faintly and looked around the room—
the green-tinted walls, the portraits, the grand chandelier.

When I approached the tall window, sunlight spilled over me in golden waves.

Then I turned toward the mirror.

Smooth, pale skin.
Hair like spun gold.
Eyes of soft green.

Even in my past life, people had called me pretty,
but this—this was beyond human beauty.

“…She really is beautiful.”

“Pardon, my lady?”

“Nothing.”

Four days in this body, and still… I couldn’t quite believe it.

If someone had truly given me this chance—

“First, I need to avoid every death flag imaginable.”

“My lady?”

“Anne, I’m going out for a bit.”

“To the knights’ grounds again? You shouldn’t exert yourself—”

“Not there. Just a walk.”

Before she could argue, I slipped out into the corridor.

The mansion was vast and magnificent—
murals reaching the ceiling, gilded walls gleaming in the light.

I was still marveling at the art when—

“Rosebelia?”

Just my name—yet chills raced down my spine.

Every sense screamed a warning.

Before worrying about distant death flags,
I realized I should be far more concerned about him.