Masera frowned as he looked down at Cynthia, who had fainted yet again.
“Annoying human.”
Getting up from his seat, he tossed a blanket over Cynthia’s body, then simply left.
* * *
After the engagement ceremony, it took me a full two days to finally come back to my senses.
The dream of my past life had been so absurdly vivid that even now, the rising and falling wails of sirens and the blaring air raid announcements still seemed to buzz right in my ears.
But this was a place where the war had already ended. This life was set to a relatively easy difficulty!
I snapped my eyes open with determination.
“Eek.”
With a startled little gasp, Eugene, who’d been peering right down at me, scrambled away like a cat that had just shattered a flowerpot.
I blinked up at the ceiling.
“Are you awake? I should have remembered how fragile you are and protected you better. As someone who serves you, My Lady, I have no excuse. I’m truly sorry.”
It must have been Dahlia who’d been nursing me all this time, because she apologized while pressing a cold wet cloth to my forehead.
I gave her a bright smile.
“There’s nothing to apologize for. I’m not that weak. Even if I seem like one of those fainting goats that just collapse at loud noises.”
“Fainting goats? Are those real?”
“Yup. I’ve even heard that some people use them as decoys for wolves so that sheep can escape.”
Through the slightly open door, I could see Eugene peeking in. His face looked ridiculously intrigued by my story. But the moment our eyes met, he darted off again.
Dahlia began speaking,
“Since you’re awake, someone has probably already informed Brigadier General Masera, so he should be here soon.”
“Huh, no way. He’s your classic workaholic dad type who obviously values his job more than his family…”
The door creaked open, and I immediately shut my mouth the second a tall man stepped inside.
It was Masera, dressed in a combat uniform, like he’d just come straight from training.
He got here this fast? I was planning to get in a little trash talk while I could—guess it’s true what they say, talk about the devil and he really does show up.
Masera strode over, looked down at me, then gave a tiny nod with that same blank expression.
“Looks like you’re finally done being unconscious.”
“That combat uniform looks great on you. I hope you weren’t worried abo—”
“No.”
He cut me off firmly, then spun right around and left before I could even get any small talk started.
That man… seriously has zero warmth.
“Brigadier General Masera must have been worried. He’s just… not someone who’s good at showing it…”
Dahlia desperately tried to sugarcoat things.
But please. That was so obviously him just putting on a show so he could pat himself on the back.
From what I roughly remembered of the novel, the male lead only learned about the fake bride’s real identity after he’d gotten completely ensnared by her.
That’s also why he so desperately pretended not to notice the female lead’s lies.
How was I supposed to drag out a genuine, burning love from that glacial man? Just thinking about the long road ahead of me made me unbelievably hungry.
“Dahlia, I’m starving.”
“Of course you are. I’ll bring you some porridge.”
“I want a grand feast.”
“But with your stomach empty like this, it would be too harsh on you.”
“Then bring me a grand feast with some porridge, that’ll be too harsh on me…”
I gave her my saddest puppy eyes, but Dahlia was merciless.
In the end, I had to choke down bland, tasteless gruel.
* * *
Masera walked back toward the training grounds, replaying what had happened that day in his head.
“The air raid siren still hasn’t been lifted yet.”
“Don’t leave me here all alone, please.”
Cynthia had lived in the rural outskirts in order to stay hidden from the revolutionary army, it was a place almost entirely untouched by the war.
There’s no way she’d ever have heard an actual ‘air raid warning’ before.
‘She only ever read about war in the newspaper, so why is she acting like she’s lived through it herself?’
“Brigadier General. Are most of the people working here former military?”
“And why do you want to know that?”
“So I can understand them better and get along. I mean, they’re probably still carrying trauma from the war…”
“Don’t bother trying.”
“Pardon?”
“How could someone who’s lived so comfortably, never knowing war, possibly understand?”
Even then, she’d put on that same breezy act like it was nothing, but there’d been a trace of bitterness there. Almost as if she was hiding a deep wound.
‘So which side of her is the real one?’
Masera roughly raked a hand through his platinum hair in irritation.
Just then, a tiny fern-like hand tugged at his sleeve.
“Uncle.”
It was Eugene.
Eugene was looking up at him with strangely worried eyes.
“What is it?”
“Do you get whipped if you do something wrong around nobles?”
“No. Who told you something like that?”
“One of Cynthia’s maids, Rose.”
Rose was a maid from House Queensguard who’d come with Cynthia.
Masera had already seen how things went down at the engagement ceremony, and he had a pretty good sense of that fox Count Queensguard’s intentions—so he was just observing for now.
“Have you done something wrong to someone?”
Eugene fidgeted with his little fingers, hesitating, then finally confessed what he’d done.
“I gave Big Sis Cynthia a frog that was hibernating for the winter. I wanted to startle her. But she didn’t even flinch—she just said thank you. Even said she’d take good care of it. Then she told me since frogs have to sleep when it’s cold, we wouldn’t meet it again until spring.”
Masera suddenly recalled the glass bowl sitting on the windowsill in her room.
It had been decorated with pinecones and dried leaves, with a bizarre little tag on it that said ‘Froggie’s Bedroom.’
‘So that’s what that was. A frog house.’
“Even after hearing all that, I still can’t think of a single reason you should be whipped. Did someone hit you?”
Masera’s eyes turned icy. Eugene had looked scared from the very start.
“Actually… after dinner last night, when it was time to light the lamps…”
It seemed hard for Eugene to even talk about the shocking thing he’d seen. He struggled for words.
“One of the maids who came with Big Sis Cynthia, she hit Mary and Ginny. Said it was because they didn’t clean the tub right. Said Big Sis ordered her to do it.”
Mary and Ginny were still just young apprentice servants.
As Eugene spoke, Masera’s eyes gradually narrowed.
* * *
Thanks to Dahlia’s harsh food restrictions, I was stuck in the depths of gnawing hunger. I was so hungry, I couldn’t even sleep.
“There were a lot of war orphans who ended up sick because they ate rich food on empty stomachs. I experienced it myself.”
Dahlia spoke with a sorrowful look as she handed me yet another bowl of thin rice porridge.
That shut down any stubbornness I might’ve had. But by now, it felt like I’d moved past the ‘empty stomach’ stage.
So in the end, I quietly, sneakily slipped out of my room. I was planning to head to the kitchen and snag just a little something to eat.
“Huh? The kitchen staff should’ve clocked out ages ago.”
I blinked wide-eyed when I saw light spilling out from the kitchen.
Just as I was cautiously approaching, I heard someone inside scolding in a harsh voice.
Jeez, was the chef here a real crank? Must be, if he was chewing someone out this late.
“Are you planning to upset Lady Cynthia?!”
“But… that would mess up the rations…”
Smack-!
That was definitely the sound of someone getting hit. Okay, this was way beyond a simple scolding.
“Upset me, how?”
I strode straight into the kitchen and asked.
What I saw was Rose holding a switch, and a bunch of young apprentice servants standing there on the verge of tears.
“Ah, My Lady. I-I’m sorry.”
The kids, who looked maybe around thirteen or fourteen at most, immediately started pleading the moment they saw me.
“Rose, what on earth is going on?”
Back when I’d worked as a maid, it wasn’t uncommon to see violence disguised as ‘training’ for the staff.
But that was usually under direct supervision of the master of the house—there was absolutely no way you could punish other servants without explicit permission.
“I never told you to lay a hand on the servants.”
“No, My Lady. Of course not.”
At my words, Rose bowed her head in this prim, submissive way.
“My Lady is truly gracious and magnanimous, and as she is not the mistress of the house yet, she has no such authority to do so. It would also be difficult if your future husband, the Brigadier General, ended up disliking you because of it.”
She sounded exactly like someone trying to imply I’d given the orders and was just pretending otherwise.
“You did this on purpose, didn’t you?”
Trying to paint me as the villain here in the residence.
That way, when I ended up dead later, nobody would bother looking into it.
I was already racking my brain over how to get rid of the spies who held my weakness—this just made it even clearer.
Rose lowered her switch and said,
“My Lady, shall I stop the punishment here?”
“Why do you keep talking like I ordered you to do this?”
“Oh, is that so? I’m sorry.”
Right then, just as Rose curled her lips in a nasty smile, I suddenly felt a chill run down my spine.
When I turned around, there was Masera standing there with a frigid look on his face.
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