OFR 03

3. Ian Lombardi

Edna was eighteen again.
But this time, she didn’t become a knight.
She no longer wanted to die with her head plunged into a puddle of her own blood.

Even now, Edna often dreamed. In those dreams, the desolate land, thick with the metallic scent of blood, was always trapped in winter. The dry wind clung to the blood splattered on her armor, drying it into a crust before shrieking away into the distance.

She had never truly wanted to fight.
Her arms and legs merely swung out of reflex.

“I’m tired. I want this to end.”

Beneath her feet, blood flowed like a crimson river, and piles of innocent corpses rose like small mountains—but there was no one left alive to mourn them. Everyone knew they would soon join the dead.

Edna wanted to end this meaningless battle.
When she lifted her head, she saw Ian in the distance.
His silver hair, so like the color of winter, gleamed even from afar.
She began to walk toward him. Those who stood in her way were cut down without mercy. She didn’t intend to kill anyone, but her blade—honed over long, senseless years—moved with deadly precision anyway.

Like a puppet controlled by unseen strings, her soulless limbs moved on their own. As she advanced, the enemy surrounded Ian, forming a thick wall of bodies.

“Protect His Excellency!”

‘Must be nice,’ she thought bitterly, spitting blood from her mouth.
She had always wondered—what would it be like to live a life where someone would lay down their life to protect you? What kind of life did that require? The thought stung, sharp with envy.

“Stand down!”

Ian’s voice rang out.

“But, sir—!”

“Do you wish to die? Must I remind you who I am?”

The human barricade split in two, revealing Ian.
Even in this brutal battlefield, the man before her stood with a cold, austere grace.
Suddenly, Edna felt pathetic.
She had survived this long with every ounce of her strength, and yet, here she was—begging this man for death.

How could someone look that beautiful, even here in this ruin of war?

She squeezed her eyes shut, then opened them again, raising her sword and pointing it at him. Between the sweep of his silvery lashes, Ian’s golden eyes narrowed in displeasure.

Seeing that frown brought a faint, satisfied smile to Edna’s lips.
At least she could still make him feel something—even if it was disgust.
It was a pitiful sort of victory, but it would have to do. She was going to die soon anyway.

Edna smiled—and ran straight into Ian’s blade.
His sword pierced her stomach. The cold metal twisting inside her was so vividly painful that even after waking, she couldn’t move for hours.

It was a memory that hurt too much to recall. For a while, she’d fallen into depression.
She’d tried everything to forget—taking sleeping pills, lying motionless for days—but it was useless.
The dreams came back again and again, cruelly persistent.

The chill that rose from the blood-soaked earth, Ian’s desperate tears falling on her face, the rancid scent of the battlefield—none of it ever faded. Those memories were carved into her very skin.

Edna tilted her head, puzzled as always.
Why had Ian Lombardi wept so bitterly over her corpse?

She searched her memories.
In her past life—and the one before that, and even the one before—they had barely known each other.

They’d exchanged greetings when they met in society. That was all.
Not friends, not enemies.
He wasn’t a bad man, but he’d never been a good one to her either.
Their acquaintance was limited to what any noble of Saluga would know of the imperial registry—his face, his title, his name.

So why on earth had he cried like that?
What was so tragic about her death?

The more she thought about it, the more embarrassed she felt. Alone in her room, she scratched her cheek awkwardly and glanced around, as if someone might have overheard her thoughts.

It wasn’t as if thinking would bring any answers, and it certainly wasn’t a pleasant line of thought. She shook her head and walked to her bookshelf.
If she lingered on it too long, she might dream of that nightmare again tonight.

“Milady.”

“Come in.”

It was Anna, her personal maid.

“My lady, the madam is calling for you.”

Without any particular preparation, Edna rose and headed to Katrina’s room.
Sunlight poured through the long corridor’s windows, spilling over the gloomy, somber paintings hanging on the walls. The contrast was eerie.

She paused to study them.
Recently, it had become fashionable to hang dark, melancholy paintings—scenes steeped in despair.

It was understandable. These were hard times.
The Imperial Treasury, drained by the royal family’s lavish excesses, had begun raising taxes.

Meetings were held in the palace every day, but they were more like banquets than councils.
Even though these gatherings were meant to address financial ruin, the Emperor—ever fond of appearances—decorated the chambers in luxury, filling tables with flowers and exotic fruit. Servants served champagne and wine instead of tea.

No one criticized the hypocrisy.
No one except her late father.

A carriage accident, they’d said.
Edna’s gaze darkened.
How had she ever believed such an absurd excuse?

She turned back to the paintings.
One showed a ragged woman and child picking grains from a barren field under a gray, clouded sky. Rain threatened to fall, yet no one looked up. All eyes were fixed on the ground, searching for stray kernels.

And these are what’s fashionable? she thought bitterly. Shameless, the lot of them.
Perhaps people bought them simply because the artist was famous, not because they cared for the subject—but still, didn’t they have eyes?

Peasants who couldn’t pay their taxes became serfs.
Some even chose serfdom, preferring servitude to starvation.

But that would only worsen the empire’s decline.
What use was raising taxes when there were fewer people left to pay them?
If the Emperor had any sense, he would have tried coaxing his subjects instead of bleeding them dry.
Then again, if he’d had such sense, he never would have destroyed Saluga—the empire’s treasury—and House Whittaker so recklessly.

Edna’s teeth ground together. Flames flickered in her blue eyes as she recalled that morning.

The Crown Prince’s proposal to Marianne had nothing to do with love. He needed Whittaker gold.
In her previous life, when Edna had taken Marianne’s place as his fiancée, he had accepted just as quickly—for him, any Whittaker would do.

But Edna had been overjoyed, believing her long unrequited love had finally been returned.
Less beautiful than Marianne, less clever than Roderick—yet he chose me, she had thought. That alone felt like proof that she mattered.

She had given him her gold, all of it. Then her inheritance. Then her merchant ships, her trading company—and finally, the Saluga treasury itself.
All at his request.

Crown Prince Rubens Tüberin had acted as though everything she owned already belonged to him. His gentlemanly manners hadn’t lasted long. Soon he was demanding more and more, until he gutted the golden goose itself—House Whittaker.

Edna resumed walking.
The sunlight streaming through the tall windows made the corridor’s dark paintings seem even darker, as though black canvases hung in their place.

“Announcing Lady Edna,” said the guard, knocking lightly on the door.

“Lady Edna Whittaker has arrived.”

Edna gave him a polite nod of thanks before entering.
The young knight, Thomas, blinked in surprise at the gesture before straightening again. His freckled face still carried the roundness of youth.

He was young, but even the Imperial Knights had once tried to recruit him. When he’d chosen to serve House Whittaker instead, people had sneered that he’d sold himself for money.

A faint smirk tugged at Edna’s lips.
He had made a poor choice—serving a master as unworthy as her.

Her gaze brushed over him briefly, lingering on his boyish features glowing under the sunlight. A pang of sorrow stirred in her chest.

In her past life, Thomas had stayed by her side until the very end—dying on his feet, sword in hand, his body riddled with wounds he’d hidden from her.
His death had been as stubborn as his loyalty.
All because of her.

I’m sorry, she whispered silently, then stepped inside.

A girl with golden hair and an icy expression entered the room.
At the sight of her, Ian stood up reflexively, then quickly sat back down. It was uncharacteristic for someone often called mature for his age.

Countess Katrina, the temporary head of House Whittaker, chuckled at his flustered behavior. Ian’s cheeks turned pink.

“You called for me, Mother,” Edna said politely, bowing—then froze.

Ian Lombardi.

He was there.

Beneath the bright sunlight, his silver hair… wait—what was that?

Her eyes widened.
He wore a red beret that half-covered his beautiful hair—that was fine, perhaps.
But the short cape barely covering his broad back? Ridiculous.
And that massive emerald ring gleaming on his finger? Absurd.

The white stockings hugging his long legs might have been technically fashionable, but still—did he have to wear them? And those pointed shoes…

Edna realized, for the first time, that suppressing laughter could make breathing difficult.
If this hadn’t been their first official meeting, she would have doubled over right then and there.

Where was the radiant, solemn man who haunted her dreams?
All she saw now was a clown in fine clothes.

“This is Duke Ian Lombardi,” Katrina said smoothly. “Introduce yourself.”

Composing her face, Edna curtsied with practiced grace.

“Edna Whittaker,” she said simply.

A truly minimal introduction.