Translator: Nox

Chapter 40

* * *

Within the world of Coriko, the path to a perfect resolution was clear. To secure the true ending, one had to marry the heir of the Frazier lineage, Lisian. Conversely, the game’s scandalous, “immoral” conclusion required a union with his twin, the second-born Leon.

Both men were the sons of Marquis Aster Frazier. More importantly, they were Tulia’s older brothers.

The reality of their sibling bond was far from pleasant. A cold distance defined their history with Tulia, though the friction between her and Leon was on an entirely different level. Calling them enemies felt like an understatement; they were closer to mutual antagonists in a lifelong feud.

Inside the dressing room, Adel worked with frantic precision to prepare me.

“The report says they will be here in ten minutes,” she whispered.

The butler had delivered that impossible deadline before making a hasty retreat, clearly terrified of being caught in the impending explosion of family drama. It was obvious that Viscount Lilius had orchestrated this time crunch specifically to sabotage my appearance and prevent me from leaving the estate.

“Adel,” I said.

“I am listening, My Lady.”

“The arrival of the twins will undoubtedly throw the castle into a state of chaos.”

“That seems inevitable,” she agreed.

“In that case, the plan we discussed earlier? Today is the day to move.”

Adel’s hands, which had been flying as she secured the ribbons of my dress, froze for a heartbeat. Then, without a word, she resumed her work with even greater focus.

“You are referring to the staff members Viscountess Aubrey dismissed?”

“Exactly.”

“While you were away with the Grand Duke, I managed to track them down,” Adel replied.

“And? What did you find?”

“They were subjected to brutal physical punishment by the Viscountess’s personal retinue. It lasted for days.”

Adel was being diplomatic, but the subtext was gruesome. It was easy to imagine the level of violence—likely enough to leave them scarred or worse.

I felt a frown tugging at my lips. “Did they kill Rilda?”

Rilda had been Aubrey’s hand-picked choice for head maid. She was a woman who had carried herself with insufferable arrogance, constantly undermining Adel and treating me with thinly veiled contempt.

“She survived,” Adel said, her voice dropping an octave. “However… they removed the tip of her tongue.”

A sudden chill raced down my spine. “That’s… that is monstrous.”

“It is an open secret among the staff,” Adel noted grimly. “Viscountess Aubrey is known for her ‘strict’ discipline.”

It explained why my former servants had been so desperate to torment me; they were likely terrified of what would happen if they failed to please their true mistress.

I didn’t ask how Adel had gathered such specific intelligence. Despite her position, she was an outsider from the borderlands—a region shunned by the rest of the Empire. Rising to become a senior maid in the Frazier household while hiding a connection to someone as influential as Ruk Kelfosher required a specific kind of steel. She clearly had her own network of eyes and ears.

“What about the others?” I asked.

“Sold off.”

“There was one from the borderlands among them, wasn’t there?”

Adel nodded. “Clara. She was one of my own.”

“Where is she now?”

“She was sent to a slave auction.”

I blinked, stunned by the sheer illegality of it. “In this day and age? How is that possible?”

“For a woman of the Grand Duke’s house, finding such a place isn’t difficult,” Adel replied.

Aubrey’s obsession with her son, Tedrick, apparently knew no bounds if she was willing to stoop to human trafficking and mutilation.

“Can you get inside, Adel?”

She didn’t hesitate. “With a proper disguise, yes.”

I wondered briefly what Adel’s life had been like before she entered service here. Pushing the thought aside, I reached into a velvet-lined drawer and pulled out a hairpin crafted from shimmering pure gold—a personal gift from Empress Carmi.

“My Lady, that was from the Empress herself…”

“Can you liquidate this without leaving a trail?”

A small, knowing smile touched Adel’s lips. She realized I wasn’t asking her to be a maid anymore; I was asking her to be an operative. She seemed to relish the challenge.

“I can. The quality of the stones alone will fetch a fortune.”

“Use the funds to buy that girl back.”

I wasn’t acting out of the goodness of my heart. I wasn’t a martyr or a saint, and I felt no urge to rescue the people who had actively plotted my downfall under Aubrey’s orders. My interest in Clara wasn’t born of pity for a fellow borderlander. It was purely pragmatic: I needed her.

Adel understood. She saw the lack of sentimentality in my eyes and seemed to approve of it. After draping a cloak over my shoulders, she asked one final question.

“Shall I bring her back quietly, or make a scene of it?”

“Bring her back with as much fanfare as possible,” I told her.

Aubrey was too busy weeping over Tedrick to notice much of anything, but even if she did, I wanted her to see it.

“As you wish, My Lady.”

* * *

The meeting had run long, leaving me no time to fix my hair. I dashed down the grand staircase, my fingers working frantically to weave a braid as I ran. I was headed toward a confrontation with two brothers who despised me; I couldn’t afford to give them any ammunition.

In noble circles, greeting guests while looking unkempt was the ultimate silent insult. Even in a world that functioned like a game, the social stakes were high. By the time I reached the ground floor, I had finished the rough plait.

I caught my reflection in a massive, floor-to-ceiling mirror in the Great Hall. I expected to see a bird’s nest of stray hairs and lopsided loops. Instead, I stopped dead.

My hair looked flawless. It was a masterpiece of intricate weaving that looked like it had taken an hour of professional styling.

Then it clicked. The Skill Stat.

I had cursed the day I was forced to dump five points into dexterity, but now those points were paying off in the most unexpected ways. My hands had moved with a precision I didn’t know I possessed. Life had a funny way of turning a misfortune into a tool.

I bet I could make some incredible jam with this level of coordination, I thought, a mock-tear of relief pricking my eye.

But there were bigger problems than fruit preserves. I swallowed hard and pushed through the massive main doors. The guards saluted and pulled the heavy, wave-carved wood open, flooding the hall with afternoon sun.

The estate’s officials and servants were already lined up in a perfect corridor of service. I marched to the very front of the line, arriving just as the sound of thundering hooves reached the gates.

Two horses galloped into view, stopping in a cloud of dust. The sun was positioned perfectly behind them, casting their silhouettes in a dramatic, cinematic glow. It was a classic hero’s entrance, even if these two were anything but heroes to me.

The men dismounted with practiced grace. They were seventeen now—two years older than Tulia.

My brothers. The stars of the game.

Our gazes locked.

* * *

The Frazier genes were truly unfair. Even though I’d seen their portraits countless times, the reality of their beauty was breathtaking. They were every bit the striking protagonists the game had promised.

However, their expressions were made of stone. We stood there in a tense, three-way standoff until I decided to break the silence.

“It is good to see you, brothers,” I said, stepping forward with a polite dip of my head.

The man on the right was Lisian. He was the elder twin, named for our grandmother. His silver hair was tossed by the breeze, giving him an air of elegant disarray.

On the left stood Leon. He was the younger of the two, possessing a shock of deep black hair that contrasted sharply with his brother’s. In the original story, he was the true terror.

Please, I whispered to myself, let your personalities be even half as decent as your faces.

Leon’s lips curled as he spoke. “…Brothers?”

“Yes,” I replied smoothly. “It has been quite some time since we—”

“What is this pathetic act?” he interrupted. His teal eyes narrowed, radiating a pure, unfiltered disgust as if he were looking at a pile of refuse. “Drop the charade, Tulia Frazier. It makes me sick.”

My silent prayers were answered with a resounding crash.