Chapter 9: The Two’s Troubles

“Is this really a good idea…?”

Mentally exhausted, Lian collapsed onto the velvet canopy bed, the drapes falling around her, and asked the question with lifeless eyes.

The so-called “Youlin Courtyard” was supposed to be the servants’ quarters, but the room assigned to her was lavishly decorated, more luxurious than any servant could possibly expect to use.

Then there was Feiyin’s overly respectful—almost excessive—attitude, which made one thing clear—

“Ahhhh! Isn’t this just making the misunderstanding even worse?! I really thought they just treated me like a maid!”

Vera’s misunderstanding had clearly misled the two people present at the time as well.

Not to mention the already low favorability of her daughter—now even the Head Maid Sephy had been assigned to take care of her and had fallen into the same misunderstanding—

“Stop howling at the ‘Communication Pearl.’ My head hurts from overusing spells.”

Floating above Lian’s forehead was a glowing jewel.

This was a magic tool Sephy had handed her before leaving—just activate it and she could contact anyone, no matter how far away, who had the matching device.

“Can’t you see the bright side? At least now you know Vera’s killing intent toward you is the real deal.”

“And what’s so great about that, huh? If you’d told me ahead of time, I’d have avoided her no matter what! I’ve never seen her smile like that before—she’d chop me into potato chips!”

“If it really came down to a fight, she probably wouldn’t be your match. Even if your body looks like this now, you still have your full strength, don’t you? Don’t worry so much. And if, by any chance, you really do get sliced into chips, I’ll collect your corpse for you… chomp chomp chomp.”

“Don’t joke about that! …Wait, what are you doing?”

Sephy’s image appeared within the pearl, reclining in midair, eyes closed, one leg crossed over the other.

Nearby, a doppelganger dressed as a maid fed her slices of potato fried until they puffed up from a tray.

“You’re really eating potato chips! I never should’ve told you how to make those… Weren’t you going to help me find out what happened at the summoning site?”

The background inside the pearl was clearly still the Sage’s Tower. Lian puffed up angrily and pressed Sephy.

“I’m working on it, I’m working on it. Three Thousand Four Hundred Twenty-Eight, report to her.”

Sephy waved her hand nonchalantly, and the scene within the pearl switched to a room that looked like the interior of a farmhouse.

Lian recognized it instantly—it was the kitchen at the farm, her and Meliya’s original home.

“Hero, Three Thousand Four Hundred Twenty-Eight here to report the investigation results.”

One of Sephy’s doppelgangers appeared in the new image, dressed in farm worker’s clothing, and spoke expressionlessly.

“According to the magic detection array I set up, there are no traces of residual magic power in this location.”

“None?”

Lian froze, taken aback by the unexpected answer.

Sneaking out of bed late at night to find something to eat in the kitchen—that was her last memory before she woke up with a hangover.

When she came to, she’d already returned to this world.

And just when she was anxiously searching for a way to return to Aitixila, the enormous Summoning Circle had appeared in the sky and brought her back here.

“Hmm… When you came back, you also appeared in your own kitchen, right? No wonder you thought the Summoning Circle was near there. Three Thousand Four Hundred Twenty-Eight, are you sure about your wording? Not even a trace of magic?”

Sephy’s voice sounded from offscreen as the doppelganger gave a mechanical nod in reply.

“You heard her, Lian. The summoning ceremony back then required Yilansiya to muster the full strength of the nation just to barely pull it off. I seriously doubt your kitchen could prepare a ritual of that magnitude, or that there wouldn’t be any magical residue after it was done.”

“But, but that just doesn’t make sense. Before I came back, I definitely saw a giant magic circle, exactly the same as the first time I was summoned—covering the entire sky…”

“Then when you arrived in Aitixila, everyone in Seles City should have seen the same thing overhead—clearly, that didn’t happen. Otherwise, news of the Hero’s return would’ve already spread across every street and alley.”

Did the trail really end here? Lian could only stare blankly at that kitchen.

When she returned there, aside from the absence of leftovers from the wedding banquet, everything else was just as it had been the night before.

For a moment, she’d thought that this brief drift between worlds was nothing but a hangover-induced hallucination.

But when she dashed out the door, she ran straight into her runaway daughter and the wife who’d come to arrest her.

“This is just ridiculous… Is this really destiny?”

“If you bear the title of Hero, stop blaming everything on fate,” Sephy’s voice sounded a bit annoyed. She paused, then returned to her usual tone:

“Everything in this world is just the cycle of cause and effect—whatever happens, there’s always a logical explanation. I’ll keep helping you investigate. What you really need to worry about now is your situation over there.”

“You mean Vera? Yeah, that’s more than enough of a headache…”

“I’m talking about Meliya. You ran away from her, then showed up at her mansion as an honored guest with my letter of introduction—she’s probably already heard about it. You’d better prepare yourself to meet her face-to-face tomorrow.”

“S-she’s going to summon me that quickly?”

“Didn’t Vera get the letter of recommendation I gave you? Even if she hasn’t immediately shown it to Meliya, Feiyin will definitely tell her about you. And as a great mother who raised her daughter alone, it’s only natural she’d want to meet the ‘illegitimate daughter’ who, after sixteen years, came to her door with such fanfare, right?”

With that sharp-tongued jab, Sephy cut off the connection. The now-dimmed Communication Pearl dropped with a plop onto Lian’s chest.

“Sigh… That didn’t hurt at all.”

As if it would hurt. She had something there now that she never had before.

Hastily, Lian reached down to grab the pearl that had rolled into the deep valleys of her chest, only to snatch her hand back, face crimson—how were girls supposed to get used to having something this soft, this heavy, as part of their bodies?

She was completely in the dark.

…

……

…………

“Uuuu… uuuuuuuuuuu…”

The “Crimsonflame Princess,” “Northern Pearl,” “Crowned Maiden”—the Hero’s daughter Milin, who bore many beautiful titles, now squirmed in her bedclothes like a trapped animal.

After a loud wail overflowing with frustration, she kicked off her quilt and jumped up from the bed.

“She actually came to my house as a maid… What kind of spell did Sephy-sensei put her under? Seriously, what is she really after?”

Locked up in her room, gloomy, anxious, and unable to sleep—all of this was entirely that ghost’s fault: the girl who was so obviously related to “that person.”

Though her mother and all the uncles and aunts couldn’t forget him, and his legend still echoed through every street and alley, Milin had long since considered “that person” dead, doing her best to erase every trace of his shadow from her mind.

She’d never imagined that “that person” would suddenly barge back into her life like this.

Milin paced back and forth across the room, barefoot, biting at her thumbnail.

There was no way this was a coincidence. A girl about her own age, with those eyes and brows that had haunted her mother for sixteen years, showing up by chance at the farm—at their home? Impossible.

Her mother always said “that person” would never betray his family, that he must have left due to forces beyond his control.

But the appearance of this girl made everything clear—that woman, the one who led him to betray it all, really did exist.

And for them to send this girl here, it must be because they’re after the Duke’s Household’s glory and riches.

But if that was their goal, why would she come alone? Maybe those two really were dead…

These thoughts surfaced one after another, but Milin soon realized—there was no need to reach an answer so soon.

“No matter whether you’re alive or dead, I’ll never let you have your way.”

Milin turned her gaze to the tightly shut window, muttering through gritted teeth.