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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 11
Chapter Title: The Worn-Out Male Lead Picked the Wrong Opponent
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Masera looked down at Cynthia, who had fainted again, and frowned.
“Annoying person.”
He rose from his seat, tossed a blanket over her body, and left.
After the engagement ceremony ended, it took a full two days before I regained consciousness.
The dream of my previous life had been far too vivid. The roar of explosions and the blaring air raid sirens still seemed to echo in my ears.
But this place was done with war. It was a life of comparatively low difficulty!
I snapped my eyes open with vigor.
“Eek.”
Along with the breathless gasp of a child, I saw Eugene—who had been peering down at me—bolt away like a cat that had just smashed a flower pot.
I blinked up at the ceiling.
“Have you awakened? I should have recognized your delicate constitution and taken better care to protect you, but as your lady’s servant, I am deeply ashamed. I apologize.”
Dalia, who had been nursing me the whole time, pressed a cold compress to my forehead as she apologized.
I flashed a bright smile.
“No need to apologize. I’m not all that fragile. I might have looked like one of those fainting goats that keel over at loud noises.”
“Are there really goats like that?”
“Yeah. They say they used them as wolf bait to help sheep escape.”
Through the slightly ajar door, I spotted Eugene peeking in.
His face showed intense fascination with my story. But the moment our eyes met, he vanished again.
Dalia spoke up.
“Word of your awakening will have reached the brigadier general by now, so he should arrive shortly.”
“Nah, no way. He’s the textbook image of a workaholic dad who puts his job over family...”
The door creaked open, revealing a tall man striding in. I immediately clammed up.
It was Masera, dressed in combat gear as if he’d come straight from training.
He got here this fast? I’d been planning to gossip a little, but sure enough, even tigers show up when you badmouth them.
Masera strode over steadily and peered down at me. He nodded with an impassive face.
“Good. You’re awake.”
“The combat uniform suits you well. Were you worr—”
“No.”
With that curt denial, he spun on his heel and left before my small talk could even get going.
That man really has no warmth...
“The brigadier general must have been worried about you. He’s just not one for expressing it...”
Dalia hurriedly tried to spin it positively.
But it had clearly been for show, just a token gesture.
From what I vaguely recalled, the original story’s male lead only learned the fake bride’s true identity after he’d already paved the way for the heroine.
That was also why he’d turned a blind eye to the heroine’s desperate lies.
How was I supposed to coax out that icy man’s burning pure love? The thought that the road ahead was long left me ravenously hungry.
“Dalia, I’m starving.”
“That’s hardly surprising. I’ll fetch some porridge.”
“I want a lavish feast.”
“But your stomach’s empty—it might upset it.”
“Then a lavish feast including porridge...”
I shot her my most pitiful look, but Dalia remained unmoved.
In the end, I had to settle for bland rice gruel that tasted like nothing.
Masera returned to the training grounds, replaying the day’s events in his mind.
“The air raid siren hasn’t been lifted.”
“Don’t leave me all alone, please.”
Cynthia had hidden away in a remote rural village to evade the revolutionary forces—a place barely touched by the war.
She’d probably never even heard a real “air raid siren” before.
‘She’s only ever known war from newspapers, so why does she act like someone who’s lived through it firsthand?’
“Brigadier general, are most of the people working here former soldiers?”
“Why do you ask?”
“So we can get along and understand each other. There might be some war trauma, after all...”
“No need to bother.”
“Pardon?”
“How could someone like you—who’s lived carefree without ever knowing war—possibly understand?”
Even then, she’d played it cool as if it were nothing, though a trace of bitterness seeped through. Like she was concealing some deep wound.
‘Which side is the real her?’
Masera irritably ruffled his platinum blond hair.
At that moment, a small hand tugged at his sleeve.
“Uncle.”
It was Eugene.
Eugene gazed up at him with uneasy eyes.
“What?”
“If you mess up around nobles, you get whipped?”
“No. Who told you that?”
“The maid named Roze.”
Roze was the maid from the Queensguard Count family who had come with Cynthia.
The incident at the engagement ceremony was suspicious enough, and the fox-like count’s intentions were obvious—but Masera was keeping watch for the time being.
“Did you do something wrong to someone?”
Eugene fidgeted with his tiny fingers, hemming and hawing before finally confessing his misdeed.
“I gave Cynthia sis a frog that was hibernating. To scare her. But she wasn’t scared at all. She even said thanks and that she’d raise it well. Now the frog’s cold and sleeping, so we’ll meet again in spring.”
Masera recalled the glass tank sitting by the window in her room.
It was decorated with pinecones and fallen leaves, complete with a bizarre nameplate reading “Frog’s Bedroom.”
‘So that’s what the frog house was.’
“Even hearing the full story, I can’t see a reason for a whipping. Has someone hit you?”
Masera’s gaze turned icy. Eugene had looked frightened from the start.
“Actually, last night after dinner, when it was time to light the lamps...”
It was hard to describe the shocking scene he’d witnessed, but Eugene pressed on with difficulty.
“The maid who came with Cynthia sis... she hit Mary and Ginny. Said it was because they didn’t clean the bathtub properly. And that Cynthia sis ordered her to whip them.”
Mary and Ginny were still young apprentice servants.
Masera’s eyes gradually narrowed as he listened to Eugene’s words.
Thanks to Dalia’s harsh meal restrictions, I was gripped by extreme hunger. My stomach was so empty I couldn’t even sleep.
“War orphans often fell ill from gorging on greasy food on an empty stomach. I’ve been through it myself.”
Dalia explained with a woeful expression as she handed me a bowl of porridge.
I couldn’t argue with that anymore, but surely the “sudden on an empty stomach” phase had passed by now.
In the end, I slipped out of my room in secret. My plan was to sneak into the kitchen and grab just a little something to eat.
“Hm? The kitchen crew should’ve wrapped up and gone home ages ago.”
I blinked in surprise at the light leaking from the kitchen.
As I crept closer cautiously, a stern scolding voice rang out from within.
Oh no, does the head chef have a temper? Keeping someone behind this late just to chew them out.
“You planning to upset Miss Cynthia?!”
“But if we do, the rations will—”
Smack!
It was unmistakably the sound of a strike. This wasn’t mere nagging.
“Why would my mood be upset?”
I stepped right into the kitchen and demanded answers.
There stood Roze, switch in hand, looming over the young apprentice servants who were standing there with tear-streaked faces.
“Ah, miss. I-I’m sorry.”
The kids, who couldn’t have been older than thirteen, immediately started begging the moment they saw me.
“Roze, what is this?”
Even back when I worked as a maid, violence disguised as “servant training” had been all too common.
It was always overseen by the master of the house—no one could punish another servant without explicit permission.
“I never told you to use violence on the servants.”
“Of course, miss. You’re right.”
At my words, Roze bowed her head meekly, feigning compliance.
“You’re so generous and magnanimous, miss—and since you’re not yet the lady of the house, you don’t have that authority anyway. It’d be trouble if the brigadier general, whom you’ll soon marry, took a dislike to you.”
It was as if she were saying I’d given the order but that she should play it off as her own initiative.
“You did that on purpose, didn’t you?”
She was trying to paint me as the villain here in the quarters.
That way, no one would bother investigating properly after I was murdered down the line.
I’d been agonizing over how to get rid of these spies who had dirt on my weaknesses.
Roze withdrew her switch and spoke.
“Shall we call it punishment enough, miss?”
“Why do you keep framing it like I ordered it?”
“Oh, right? My apologies.”
Just as a vile smirk crept across Roze’s face, a chill prickled at my back.
I whirled around to find Masera standing there, his expression frigid.
