IDMLG 07

IDMLG

Posted by Ali, Released on October 13, 2025

Chapter 7

…What the?

Even though I stared at him with a dumbfounded expression, my brother Michael just laughed heartily, completely unbothered.

“As expected, it takes at least this much to bring Rixion Luhanes down.”

He smiled brightly, a rare sight, then gazed at the large bouquet Rixion had sent me with satisfaction, muttering to himself.

“I never had much of a good impression of him as a person, but it seems the duke has a decent eye for women. Well, of course—good men recognize good women.”

Sorry, but I think you’re the one with terrible taste in men, brother.

“You might not know this, but that type of man—once married—becomes unexpectedly devoted, cherishing only his wife for life. Even in noble society, with all the gossip about affairs and scandals, I can tell the duke isn’t the kind who’d ever turn his eyes to another woman.”

Yeah, as if you’d know.

“In any case, this brother of yours approves.”

……? Approves? Approves what?

I blinked in shock at my brother’s sudden change of attitude. Just two days ago he had been cursing Rixion up and down, calling him this and that, and now—what on earth was he saying?

But regardless of what I thought, Michael kept smiling pleasantly.

Seeing that “formidable” Rixion Luhanes act as though he were deeply infatuated with me must have restored a great deal of my brother’s pride, which had been bruised every time I came back rejected from a blind date.

“That Kalten fellow bragged last time about how his sister was marrying the 9th prince of the Fedra Kingdom. But so what? A prince at the very bottom of the succession line doesn’t even compare to the head of the Empire’s only ducal house. And on top of that, he’s the younger brother of the Empress herself.”

By “Kalten,” he must have meant Count Kalten, one of my brother’s old friends. I’d heard his younger sister had recently married into a rather prestigious family…

‘So that’s why he’s been so obsessed with my marriage lately, huh?’

Even though I didn’t want to listen, I couldn’t help hearing his muttered self-talk. I stared at him, exasperated, like my soul had already fled to the Ajalenta Desert.

“Well, I’ve got to go. I’ll be busy preparing for the Ajalenta trip, so I won’t be home for a few days.”

And with that, my brother’s big hand smacked my back again.

My body swayed helplessly, like a jellyfish drifting on the sea, under the force of his pats. I lifted my gaze weakly.

Now that I noticed, he was already dressed neatly from head to toe, ready to go out. Compared to him, I—disheveled hair, still with sleep in my eyes—looked like a complete mess.

“Tomorrow, you go have a nice boat ride with the duke.”

He didn’t even give me a chance to reply, just pressed the message card he had snatched earlier back into my hand and left like the wind.

He looked so pleased and happy as he walked away that I couldn’t even bring myself to shout after him: “I have less than a speck of interest in going on some boat ride with Rixion Luhanes!”

Nor could I tell him the truth—that this so-called “unexpectedly devoted type” of duke was actually the kind of man who, if his woman ran away, would hunt her down, shackle her feet, and lock her up.

My time has always been stuck in that summer when I was twenty.

Ever since I discovered and read that cursed book.

It was at the very end of my first summer vacation after entering university.

At the city library I often frequented, I stumbled upon the romance-fantasy novel The Saintess of Erendel.

It turned out to be the first and last romance fantasy novel I ever read—and rather than a true fantasy, it was more of a romance-turned-tragedy.

The original heroine, Ji Eunha, had been an ordinary 19-year-old Korean high school senior. She, too, found The Saintess of Erendel by chance at a library and read it. Not long after, she was hit by the proverbial reincarnation truck and transported to the continent of Erendel.

She landed in the middle of a scorching desert where not even grass grew. The one who found her wasn’t the male lead but the sub–male lead, Michael Christener.

While crossing the Ajalenta Desert on business, Michael discovered her by chance and brought her to the Kaiden Empire. That was where the original story truly began.

In the early chapters, Michael seemed almost like the male lead, steadily building a romance arc with Ji Eunha. She slowly began to warm to him, too—he was the classic kind, gentle male lead.

But once Ji Eunha arrived in the Kaiden Empire and came under imperial protection, the story took a drastic turn.

By the emperor’s command, Rixion Luhanes was assigned as her guardian.

Ji Eunha, despite having Michael—the endlessly kind “gentleman” archetype—at her side, fell helplessly for the “beautiful trash” that was Rixion Luhanes.

The carefully built romantic foundation collapsed, and Rixion, the true male lead, pushed Michael into the shadows as nothing more than a background character.

Ji Eunha was politically exploited as the so-called “Saintess from the land of death,” caught between the Empire and the Temple.

The Temple, whose reputation had sunk beneath the abyss, sought to use her to regain influence. The Empire, meanwhile, sought to keep the Temple firmly beneath its heel.

Both sides wanted to claim her for their own ends.

Through all this, Ji Eunha suffered terribly, pushed around by forces larger than herself, while also deepening her romance with Rixion Luhanes.

At first sight, the two fell madly for each other, and their future seemed to shine with rose-colored light.

Until Ji Eunha began to dream of her family—those she longed for back in her original world.

Her yearning for them, and for her homeland, grew unbearable. She even lost sight of the Rixion she loved.

Soon, she began searching for a way back.

Every hundred years, a great pillar of light descended on Erendel, called a divine blessing. But in truth, it was a path across dimensions—a gateway back to another world.

She sought to take it. And so, she secretly fled the Empire, shaking off Rixion’s hand.

Michael, the sub–male lead, and other supporting characters helped her in her escape.

When Rixion discovered she had left him, the shock of betrayal drove him mad.

He had trusted only two people in the world: the Empress Serena, and Ji Eunha. And now one of them had abandoned him.

He tracked her down by any means necessary.

And when she begged to be let go, he forced her into captivity by his side. He even murdered, without hesitation, the very companions who had helped her.

The sight of him, half-crazed, whispering “I love you” as he held her trembling form—it wasn’t love. It was closer to madness.

I had wanted Ji Eunha to keep running, to escape Rixion and return to her original world.

Or for Michael, the sub–male lead, to rise up as a hero and defeat the demon that Rixion had become, rescuing her.

But The Saintess of Erendel gave me neither ending.

In the end, Ji Eunha chose to stay.

She chose to remain with Rixion, who was endlessly cruel, devastatingly beautiful, and shackled her while whispering of love.

She chose to bury herself in that obsessive love forever.

I hadn’t known what kind of cruel, twisted story it was when I first picked it up. By the time I reached that point, I had recoiled in horror and thrown the book away.

What was The Saintess of Erendel even trying to say?

What were Ji Eunha’s feelings for Rixion—pity? Fear? Stockholm syndrome?

Either way, I despised both her choice and the man who forced her into it. I knew I would never, in my life, understand or forgive them.

I tore my gaze from my brother’s retreating figure and crushed the message card in my fist.

Go on a boat ride with the duke? Like hell I will.

‘Am I insane?’

That man was destined to fall hopelessly for Ji Eunha the moment she appeared.

‘And to prove himself to her, who knows what he’d do to his ex-girlfriend?’

If he decided I was an obstacle to his “true love,” he wouldn’t hesitate to erase me from existence.

Why should I ruin my peaceful life by playing the dangerous role of the male lead’s ex-girlfriend?

I dropped the crumpled card on the floor and ground it beneath my heel.

I didn’t know what game he was playing, but I had no intention of quietly letting myself be used.