Chapter 03
“That crow keeps showing up.”
Ever since the first day I woke up in this body, I’d often heard its ominous caw.
I was about to pass it by without much thought when, all of a sudden, an image flashed through my mind.
A crow swooping into a doorway in broad daylight, then transforming into a man.
I snapped my head up again, but the bird was still perched on the tree branch, its silhouette sharp against the night sky.
What was that?
Just my imagination?
Am I that exhausted?
Shaking my head, I stepped inside the building.
Well, this was a world of magic, after all.
Whether a man turned into a crow or a crow turned into a man, it wouldn’t be the strangest thing I’d seen.
My body was being dragged deep underwater.
No matter how much I flailed, my limbs thrashed uselessly as I sank further and further down.
“You vile witch…!”
Someone’s voice thundered from above the surface.
Witch?
Who are you calling a witch?
But no sound escaped my throat.
In the midst of my struggle, I caught sight of something sinking beside me my phone.
Its screen glowed faintly, showing a page from the webnovel I Will Abandon Revenge.
One line burned itself into my vision:
[And so, Amelia Wentworth drew her last breath as a witch beneath the water.
Vincent’s revenge was finally complete.]
No… not me! I didn’t do this!
Desperate, I clawed at the water, reaching for anything—something solid, something real.
My fingers scraped against something hard and smooth.
I seized it with all my strength and pulled.
Suddenly, my body shot up toward the surface.
“Puhahh!
Hhhahh, cough, cough!”
I spewed water violently, my chest heaving.
When I finally blinked through the blur, a cascade of tangled violet strands filled my vision.
I shoved the hair aside, and light spilled in.
My hands clutched the rim of a porcelain tub brilliant white.
“Hah… I was… dreaming.”
The bathwater around me had long since cooled from warm to tepid.
This was the bathhouse of the Wentworth ducal estate.
It was the very place where, the day before, I had been dragged by the maids without warning and scrubbed raw before being presented to the Crown Prince.
Even after returning from the palace, sleep had evaded me until dawn, my mind restless and heavy.
Eventually, I’d slipped into the tub for comfort… and dozed off.
“Of all dreams… why that one?”
Thanks to that dream, Amelia’s final moments came into sharper focus.
Framed by the crown prince’s schemes, branded a witch, and drowned in the end.
“Ugh… chills.”
I wrapped my arms around my cold shoulders, stood up from the bath, and glanced into the mirror at my side.
Tumbling violet hair, eyes the color of fresh blood, skin pale as porcelain, features delicately arranged, and a slender, shapely figure.
The reflection staring back at me was a beauty rarer than anything you’d find on TV.
“So pretty, and yet…”
I slipped into a robe, twisted a towel around my damp hair, and stepped out of the bathroom.
Beyond the door was the bedroom.
For a duke’s daughter, Amelia’s chamber was surprisingly bare.
Almost no decorations, only the minimum amount of furniture an empty, subdued space.
Still, there was one thing to be grateful for: during the few days I’d been living as Amelia, little by little, fragments of her memories had begun to return.
Clatter.
“The duke requests your presence in the study.”
Because of that, even such unfamiliar words reached my ears without confusion.
“What did you say?”
My question made the maid’s face tighten instantly.
But when I fixed her with a steady gaze, she faltered and answered reluctantly.
“His Grace has summoned Lady Amelia.”
Yet even as she spoke, there was something subtly insolent about her tone.
She stepped a little closer.
“Shall I dry your hair for you?”
“Kate?”
I called her name as it rose to mind.
At that, Kate flinched and looked at me in surprise.
“Yes?”
“Forget it.
You can go.”
“But.”
“Planning to yank out every strand of my hair again, like yesterday?
I said I’m fine.
Leave.”
Kate only pouted her lips, unable to retort, before storming out.
The truth was, Kate was the maid who took particular pleasure in tormenting Amelia.
Whenever that happened, Amelia would explode in fury, lashing out and even striking her.
And still, Kate never stopped if anything, she endured it stubbornly, all the while tarnishing Amelia’s reputation and painting herself as the pitiable victim.
What a tiresome character.
Of course, there were reasons why a mere maid like Kate could dare to look down on the duke’s daughter.
First, Amelia was an illegitimate child.
Second, Kate had an intimate relationship with the duke’s eldest son, Aiden Wentworth.
Not that those two reasons fully explained her obsession with tormenting Amelia.
Beyond that, even I couldn’t fathom her motives.
“Hmph.”
Kate snorted, slammed the door shut, and was gone.
I towel-dried the rest of the moisture from my hair, then picked up the wide comb from the vanity and began running it through my locks.
Oh, that’s… kind of amazing.
It was a magical comb that dried hair.
I had seen it yesterday, when the maids had scrubbed me raw and forced me to sit until they were satisfied.
The strands slipped free without resistance, smooth and gleaming, the dampness vanishing in an instant.
A world with magic, huh…
Aside from little conveniences like this, it still didn’t feel real.
Anyway, that’s not the issue.
I need an excuse not to enter the Crown Prince’s palace.
How did the story go again?
Once my hair was dry, I chose a suitable outfit and stepped outside.
I strolled down the corridor strange yet familiar gathering my thoughts.
Should I just run away?
But the thought lasted only a breath before I shook my head.
Two trackers would be sent after me without fail, and in this body still unfamiliar with this world I wouldn’t stand a chance.
“…But does that mean the me from before is really dead?”
The last thing I remembered was collapsing on my bed after days of working through the night.
Exhausted beyond words, I’d still insisted on opening I Shall Forsake Revenge before sleep claimed me.
At some point, my consciousness had slipped away.
And when I opened my eyes… I was here.
In this body.
In the story.
At the point after the Crown Prince’s regression.
Seeing him with my own eyes left no doubt.
I knew exactly why I was sure of it.
Before he regressed, the Crown Prince avoided Amelia as much as possible.
And when chance forced them together, he treated her with polite detachment.
Until, one day, she poisoned him and he died.
After regression, however, his path diverged entirely.
He summoned Amelia into the palace, kept her close, showered her with charm and affection then, at his whim, humiliated her, making a spectacle of her misery.
He toyed with her heart, lifting her high with false hope, then dropping her into despair.
And when the perfect moment came, he maneuvered her into committing a crime with her own hands.
That crime became his justification to cast her into ruin.
And her end was death.
As a reader, the Prince’s revenge had felt sharp and satisfying, a catharsis of justice served.
But living it myself?
Nothing had ever been so terrifying.
What a terrifying man…
Of course, it made sense.
He had been betrayed, killed, then given another chance.
Why would he spare mercy, when revenge burned so hot in his veins?
I understood. I truly did.
But understanding didn’t erase the truth: I hadn’t done it.
I wasn’t the one who killed him.
And that made my situation unbearably unjust.
These thoughts scattered the moment I arrived before the study doors.
I paused, recalling Amelia’s memories of her relationship with the Duke.
What surfaced left me sighing heavily.
“Pathetic,” I muttered under my breath.
With that short judgment, I knocked and opened the door.
“Father, you called for me?”
I asked cautiously, stepping inside.
Phillips Wentworth, Duke of Wentworth.
Like Amelia, he bore purple hair and crimson eyes.
In fact, she resembled him more than the two sons born of the Duchess ever had.
The original Amelia was willful, selfish, even cruel in front of others earning her the reputation of a villainess.
But before the Duke, she never dared raise her voice.
Phillips Wentworth didn’t so much as glance up.
His eyes remained fixed on the documents before him, as if I were nothing more than a shadow on the wall.
‘Wasn’t he the one who called me here in the first place?’
With half bewilderment and half boredom, I fixed my gaze on him.
When the silence dragged on too long, I finally spoke again.
“If you have nothing to say, then I’ll be—”
Only then did I hear the duke’s voice.
“I hear you visited the Crown Prince’s palace yesterday.
Did he say anything to you in private?”
So, the official summons for me to move into the Crown Prince’s residence hadn’t reached the duke yet?
Then maybe just maybe there was still a chance.
“No, Father.
It was the same as always.
If anything, he see
med even more indifferent than before…”
By “the same as always,” I meant the Crown Prince looked at Amelia the way a cow looks at a chicken utter disinterest.
If he grew even more indifferent, it would be like a cow looking at a rock.
Since I desperately wanted this engagement broken, I deliberately lied.
