Chapter 1 - Chapter 1

Translator: Nox

Chapter 1

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The magnolia trees had reached full bloom.

Adrina Grimaldi stood in silence, her eyes fixed on the branches above.

The limbs were bowed low, the ivory blossoms sagging under the heavy weight of a sudden, thick snowfall. These flowers usually signaled the conclusion of winter, yet their arrival did not herald the warmth of spring.

Snow fell out of season. Violent gusts caught the flakes, swirling them together with falling magnolia petals in a frantic, ghostly dance. It was as if the sky itself were performing a rite of mourning.

Beneath the trees, the pristine white of the petals and the fresh snow were quickly trampled and stained by the feet of the gathering crowd.

A group of people huddled around the lifeless form of a young man, caught in that fleeting transition between adolescence and adulthood. Their voices rose in frantic denial, and the sounds of their grief saturated the manor grounds. Some were paralyzed by sorrow, others refused to accept the reality of the corpse, and many began to hunt for a target for their rage.

“This is your curse’s doing!”

That target was Adrina.

“You are the reason Adrian is gone!”

They leveled their accusations at her, condemning her very existence. Meanwhile, for reasons he kept to himself, the Count remained sequestered within the walls of his study.

“If only you hadn’t been born!”

It was remarkable how they never deviated from their script.

Despite the circumstances, a soft, involuntary chuckle escaped Adrina’s lips at the sheer predictability of her kin. That faint sound sliced through the heavy atmosphere, drawing a fresh barrage of screams and vitriol. Yet, these new insults could not pierce a soul already hardened by a lifetime of being labeled a curse.

“Give my Adrian back to me!”

She accepted it silently. It was all her fault.

The end of Adrian Grimaldi’s life had been a sudden, jarring event.

It arrived with the swiftness of a hex.

No matter how loudly they wailed or how fervently they denied the truth, they could not bring warmth back to his cooling flesh. The gray pallor of the grave was already masking his naturally fair skin. The scene felt like a fever dream.

Throughout the wake, the suffocating misery of those left behind hung over the estate like a damp, heavy mist. It was a thick fog that made every breath feel labored. Adrina struggled to identify her own internal state. She couldn’t tell if she was grieving, in pain, or simply hollow.

Her own heart was a mystery to her.

The formal burial for Adrian Grimaldi took place three days after his passing.

He lay within an open casket, a young man who possessed the exact same features as Adrina. Resting against a backdrop of white silk, his bloodless complexion looked disturbingly false. The bundle of magnolias tucked into his arms felt like a cruel irony. As the mourners wept and sighed, a single voice cut through the collective misery.

“You should have been the one in there.”

The comment was barely a whisper, yet it acted as a spark to dry tinder.

“Yes, it should have been your life that ended.”

The sentiment that she was Adrian’s misfortune began to spread, a low hum that grew into a roar. These intangible words felt like physical chains wrapping around her. The sheer venom of the crowd became a weight she could almost touch.

The hatred merged with the white haze of the afternoon, centering entirely on Adrina. She offered no defense. She simply stood tall, her gaze locked onto the cold face in the coffin—a face that mirrored her own perfectly.

“Why are you still breathing!”

She looked at her brother and felt a pang of pity.

It is said that when a family pours all its devotion into one child while neglecting the other, both become victims of the imbalance. Adrian must have been just as trapped in that misery as she was. Now that he had broken free from that cycle, Adrina imagined he had finally found some semblance of serenity.

She remained a statue. With a face like stone, she watched as people began to snatch rocks from the earth, screaming their demands for her death. She genuinely did not know what expression she was supposed to wear.

A stone struck the ground near her feet. Shaking with a fury she couldn’t contain, the Countess reached down for another projectile. When she threw it, the rock missed Adrina by a wide margin.

The Countess had always been the delicate centerpiece of the household, but her beauty had withered away with her son’s final breath. Now, she was nothing but a faded bloom hurling maledictions.

While the rest of them were drowning in a sea of grief, Adrina felt like a ghost watching from the shore. She suspected that, in life, Adrian had felt exactly this isolated.

Unexpectedly, Count Grimaldi appeared, ending his self-imposed isolation. As he climbed out of his carriage, his expression bore no trace of a father who had just buried his child.

He walked forward with measured steps. The Countess moved toward him, casting a sharp, resentful look at Adrina, silently pleading for him to deal with the heartless girl. But the Count barely acknowledged his wife, stopping directly in front of Adrina instead.

“Your hair has reached quite a length since our last encounter, Adi.”

The comment felt bizarrely misplaced.

“I find it strange that everyone is so distraught over the passing of a simple girl.”

His next words caused every head to turn in shock.

“Don’t you agree, Adrian?”

Adrina looked down at the body in the casket, then slowly raised her eyes to meet the Count’s.

Every person present was a witness to the fact that Adrian Grimaldi was the one in the coffin. Yet her father was addressing her by that name. As he rested a hand on her shoulder and called her “Adi,” Adrina’s breath hitched.

He had never used that name for her. Not once.

Though both siblings shared the nickname, it had always been a term of endearment reserved solely for Adrian. Adrina had long ago concluded that the name would never belong to her.

The only person who had ever called her Adi was now lying dead. For a moment, her composure nearly shattered at hearing the name she thought she’d lost forever, but she hardened her heart as the Count continued.

“Is it not a blessing that the blight upon our bloodline has finally been removed?”

She had always been treated as nothing more than a shadow cast by her brother.

“In fact, this is a moment for celebration.”

A name that belonged only to her was a luxury she was never permitted. On every official record, she was merely a backup for Adrian; in person, she was addressed as ‘you,’ ‘it,’ or ‘the curse.’

“Isn’t that the truth?”

The Count’s scheme became instantly clear to her.

Adrina was the ‘curse’ because of the local superstition regarding twins, who were viewed as the handiwork of witches. By tradition, she should have been discarded or executed at birth.

She could feel the weight of the onlookers’ stares. They all believed she was the one who deserved the grave. But Spencer Grimaldi wasn’t saying she should have died—he was declaring that, officially, she was the one who had.

“Because your sister was always so frail.”

He was defining her new reality with cold precision.

“And a man has no business indulging in such public displays of grief.”

She realized the truth: she should have been the one to go. In a way, she had.

The Count took a firm hold of Adrina’s long tresses and lifted them. Finding the length unsuitable, he drew a blade and sliced through the hair without a second thought.

The dark locks drifted down without a sound. Some fell to the snow, while the Count tossed the handful he held onto Adrian’s body with a look of pure loathing. He wiped his hands as if he had touched something filthy.

The crowd stared in horror at the hair draped over the boy’s corpse, but no one dared to move.

Adrina looked down at her brother, who was now partially hidden by the remnants of her hair.

The sight was chaotic. She reached out and began to smooth the severed locks, arranging them until they covered him like a dark shroud.

As she moved away, the mourners began to sob anew at the sight of Adrian’s face. To them, the sight of him covered in the ‘cursed’ hair was a final, tragic insult.

“That concludes the service.”

At the Count’s word, the coffin lid was hammered shut. The sound of nails piercing wood rang out.

“How much longer will you weep for a daughter?”

She looked at the casket. She had always envied everything Adrian possessed.

“Get up and return to your duties.”

Perhaps that desire had been her downfall.

“That applies to you as well.”

The truth was, she had always wanted his life.

“Adrian.”

But she had never imagined inheriting it under these circumstances.

“You have a legacy to uphold.”

Adrina looked up as Spencer spoke. The crowd was paralyzed with confusion, looking between the father and the child. The Countess, her eyes red and raw, stared at them with a mixture of shock and growing hatred.

Adrina wondered what calculations the Count had made in his office. Had he been mourning? Or had he been strategizing how to save his lineage and his authority now that his only son was gone? The answer was now clear.

“Yes.”

He had decided to erase Adrina Grimaldi.

“You are absolutely right, Father.”

In that moment, Adrina realized she was no different from him.

Adi.

“We cannot spend our lives grieving for Adrina.”

She had only truly become ‘him’ once she herself was dead.

“It is time to let her rest.”

The crowd let out a collective gasp, but Spencer Grimaldi looked satisfied.

The snow continued to fall. As the final nails were driven in, a white layer settled over the wood. The casket was lowered into the dark earth.

Dirt followed, burying the flowers, the snow, and the collective agony of the family.

Adrina Grimaldi was gone.

The twin’s curse had been satisfied.

The people would likely feel a sense of relief, believing the ‘wrong’ child had been taken. Without looking back at the grave, the Count spoke to Adrina. “Adi.”

“Join me in the carriage.”

It was a command, not an invitation. Adrina followed. For the first time in her life, she sat across from the Count in his private transport. As they began to move, he broke the silence.

“Who do you think should carve the inscription for Adrina’s stone?”

The bluntness of the question made Adrina look up. The Count’s face was a mask of indifference. Suddenly, an inexplicable urge to laugh bubbled up inside her.

“I will find the most talented stonemason on our lands.”

Her voice held a faint, sharp edge of amusement. The Count’s eyes drifted over her, taking in her new appearance.

“She passed when the magnolias were in bloom,” Adrina added, looking out the window. “It seems appropriate to have them carved into the marble.”

Outside, the Countess had collapsed onto the fresh grave. Her screams of Adrian’s name were silenced by the thick glass of the carriage. Adrina could only read the agony on her mother’s lips.

“Magnolias. Very well. Do as you see fit.”

Adrina turned her gaze back to him. She saw a flicker of surprise in the Count’s eyes, as if he found her reaction unexpected. Then, a cold smile touched his lips.

“It truly is a blessing that Adi is dead.”

Whether he meant the son he lost or the daughter he was erasing didn’t matter.

The person now known as Adi Grimaldi felt the exact same way.

The death of Adi Grimaldi was a profound relief.