Chapter 3
Go away. Give me back my body.
In this place where only my mind remained, no one could hear my voice. Even though my voice cracked and my tears dried up, nothing changed. It felt like someone tied me up and locked me in the dark. Time passed slowly.
Am I just going to disappear like this? Why did this happen to me? What did I do wrong? Where am I? I’m scared. Anyone, please… help me. Save me.
I’m not dead. I’m still here…
“Florence, do you remember nothing?”
“You are my daughter.”
“You are…”
No. I’m not that woman…
The world that the woman saw came and went in my mind. It was a world I had never seen before. Is this a dream?
A smiling father, older brother, and sister.
A fiancé coming to me first.
Even people who used to talk badly about me now came to me with friendly smiles and reached out their hands.
That woman easily got everything I had always wished for.
Everything moved perfectly, like well-fit gears.
It was like I was the only piece that didn’t fit.
Why were things that were so hard for me so easy for her? Why didn’t they work out for me? What was different? It’s my body, that’s me — why only now…
“Usually, the characters people possess are unlucky, but this one’s too much. Her family ignored her, the guy she loved didn’t care, she had no talent, and in the end, she was kicked out and died alone…”
That woman mumbled.
“But the body is nice. She’s pretty… and I can use magic and spirit arts. What was Florence so mad about with such a kind family?”
Kind? My family was kind?
“If you smile first, others open up too. But she only got angry. That’s why nothing worked. Didn’t she know something that easy?”
I smiled. I loved them so blindly that I could’ve cut open my stomach if they asked me to. I always wondered what I could do to make them see me.
“Florence seemed to love her fiancé… Should I at least help her fall in love as a thank-you for the body? She was supposed to end up with the main girl, but so what? The original story is already broken now that I’ve possessed her.”
I don’t want that. Don’t do it. Please stop. Give it back…
I grew tired. Even though someone else took over my body, no one noticed it wasn’t me anymore. Even the tiny bit of consciousness I had left felt useless. What’s the point of still being alive here? Just kill me. If I had truly died, I wouldn’t have had to see this.
A world that became more perfect because I disappeared?
I don’t want to see it.
I was begging to die, crying…
When I suddenly woke up in a new world, in someone else’s body.
Right away, I knew — this body belonged to the woman who stole mine.
It was a small room.
The body on the small bed was thin and weak. I smelled medicine, saw a thin tube in the wrist, and a few books nearby.
Old books, worn out from being read too much, were next to the pillow. I remembered what that woman said.
“I ended up possessing a side character in a romance fantasy novel… Sorry, but if someone could possess her, she was probably meant to die anyway. Just like in those stories.”
I opened the book. The letters were unfamiliar but somehow easy to read.
Inside the book was my world.
My world. My country Yulia, the beautiful Marib River, the wide Kelligrian Plains… Magic and spirit arts had created a shining civilization. Warriors, swords, bows, kings, knights…
The main character of the story was a commoner girl.
A girl named Lyla Green, even though she had a hard life, was very talented. She traveled the world with handsome male leads and found love. She was pretty and kind, and everyone loved her. Even when people tried to stop her or hard times came, she found happiness.
Everyone loved Lyla Green.
Even my fiancé, Linus. Even Yulia’s second prince. Even my brother, Blake.
But in the novel, Linus and Blake weren’t the people I knew. As I read, I couldn’t help but laugh. They never looked at me, even when I cried, screamed, or fell down in front of them. But to Lyla Green, they were so kind and loving.
If she cried, it felt like the world was ending.
This wasn’t the world I knew.
Even though it looked like my world, it was just a fake story.
A fantasy made from someone’s dream.
In the story, “Florence Love Seymour” only appeared briefly. She was Linus’s ex-fiancée, who had gotten engaged because of her family’s power, but was hated by everyone because of her bad personality and lack of talent.
She got angry easily, broke things, and yelled at her kind family out of jealousy. Her mother died giving birth to her — a great spirit mage — but Florence had no magic or connection to spirits.
Just a trash human with noble blood. Of course she was ignored by her fiancé and rejected by her family.
Not even a true villain. I laughed. Even in strange letters, I looked miserable and pitiful.
In the story, she gets mad and yells at the main girl out of jealousy and ends up getting hated by Linus and Blake, and falls down alone.
It made sense. If someone tried to steal my fiancé, I wouldn’t have stayed quiet.
I knew he didn’t love me. But I was his fiancée. Even if there wasn’t love, we had a promise. So, I had every right to blame the one who broke it.
If a girl steals your fiancé, isn’t she a thief? I lost him right in front of my eyes. Should I have just smiled and let it go? I was the one who lost everything. So why was I the villain?
The “Florence Love Seymour” in the story acted just like I would.
She got mad when treated unfairly. She fought back when it was too much. She was too emotional to see danger. She was upset that no one understood her and only screamed and begged.
She didn’t know — if you want sympathy, you have to be quiet, even when you’re hurt and angry.
I was foolish and stupid.
But I’d rather die than get sympathy.
I’d rather die than have everything stolen.
If I have to lose everything in the end, then I’ll choose that end myself.
Why must I be the only one unhappy? Why only me? Why can’t I have anything?
Why only me?
The answer to this question I’ve asked my whole life was in just a few lines.
Because I was a side character.
Because I wasn’t the main character.
That world was made for the main character.
But Lyla Green wasn’t the main character of my world either.
Everything was taken by the woman named Jang Hyunji, who stole my body.
In her 5 years of memory, Lyla Green didn’t get any of the things she was supposed to have. Not the love, not the achievements — everything was taken.
Jang Hyunji was a 23-year-old woman from Korea.
She spent most of her time alone in this small room. Sometimes she took short walks or talked with a rare visitor, but she was mostly alone. In the past few months, only two people came to see her — a worker from an insurance company and an old woman who said she was a distant relative.
She lived a lonely life, so getting lucky and entering her favorite novel must’ve made her happy. She could forget reality.
Jang Hyunji knew everything about that world.
What would happen in the future, what the characters liked and hated, and how to win their hearts — she knew it all.
How easy it must have been. How convenient.
How sweet it must have been to live in a world where everyone loved her.
And me… I’m the one dying instead of her.
