Chapter 1.3
The executioner shouted.
“Singing at a sacred execution ground! Hey, carry out the execution quickly!”
The floor gave way with a thud.
The rope around my neck tightened.
Just then, I met the sunset-colored eyes of Aiden, running towards me pushing past the executioners, and…….
He tried to grab my hand, but.
It was too late.
My world ended.
The world is overlaid with gray paint.
So this is what ‘dying’ feels like.
The pain didn’t last long.……I just want to sleep more.
Just then, a tiresome sound reached my ears.
It was the dreadfully poor singing voice of Shirley, my uncle’s housemaid.
“There’s nothing to life, you see♪ If you open your eyes after being born and see lace, that’s a successful life♪ Me too, a noble, me too, a noble♬”
Shirley disliked me, and she used to wake me up every morning with that awful song.
One of the good things about marrying Ernst was that I wouldn’t have to hear that song again, but…….……Wait. Why do I hear Shirley’s voice now?
I bolted upright and was astonished by my surroundings.
This is my uncle’s house.
That very third-floor corner room where I was indebted for eight years after my parents passed away! The place where it was cold in winter and mold grew in summer!
Didn’t I get executed?
Could it be that my uncle retrieved my unconscious body and brought it to his house?
I felt my neck. Not even a rope mark, I couldn’t feel a single wound. Flustered, I ran to the mirror and…….
In the mirror, I saw myself from before the wedding.
My silver hair, reaching my chest, sways gently. In the Marquis’s household, they had forced me to curl it, saying I should dress like a noble lady, which had damaged it a lot.
The stretch marks I got on my belly when I was pregnant were also gone.
My fingernails, which had been in terrible condition because my husband forced me to plaster them with decorations, were now short and neat.
More than anything else…….
This familiar, gloomy expression!
In the Marquis’s household, my facial muscles were a mess from forcing smiles!
I really have returned to the past.
As I savored this absurd fortune, the singing outside grew louder.
Because I hadn’t woken up, Shirley seemed to be in a bad mood.
“Oh my, I’m so jealous! If I’m born again, I want silk stockings too! I want silk hand covers too! I want…….”
“Shirley!”
“U-uhk?”
I kicked the door open and went out.
Not having expected me to respond, Shirley’s eyes trembled.
“A-ah, ah, miss……. Did you sleep well…….”
“What day is it today?”
“The 12th.”
“Year, month, day.”
“Pardon? Uh, September 12th, 987.”
Year 987. The year I got married.
In other words, I’m single right now!
“Shirley!”
“Yes, miss!”
As my tone became firm, Shirley’s attitude changed too. Although her face clearly said, ‘Has the miss gone mad?’, I didn’t care.
I cheerfully shouted.
“Dying and being reborn is really great. I guarantee it! You should try it too!”
“What are you talking about!”
“Ahahaha!”
“Heeek! M-Master!”
Shirley was horrified and ran to the end of the hallway. From afar, I hear a voice saying, ‘The miss has gone mad,’ but I don’t care what anyone says anymore.
I’m alive.
And that bastard husband is gone!
I am free!
* * *
I hugged the blanket of my room after a long time and savored my freedom. It’s tattered from eight years of use regardless of the season, but that also makes it that much more familiar.
Thanks to having lain there for quite a while, I was able to go to the breakfast table with my head a little cooler.
My uncle from three years ago, hmm, he has an insufferable look no matter when I see him.
As soon as he saw me, he let out a deep sigh and said.
“Irene. I received an odd report this morning. According to Shirley, you’ve…… become a bit strange.”
“Become strange, what basis did she give?”
“Huh? Do you need a basis?”
“Isn’t exchanging mere words like ‘become strange’ without any basis the specialty of servants? Surely you’re not being swayed by such rumors, are you?”
My uncle’s face flushed bright red.
“Irene. Are you belittling me to the level of a servant right now!”
“How could that be? I am always Irene, your niece who seeks your guidance, Uncle. However, I merely fear that if you do not tell me what I need to correct, I, being lacking, might commit further rudeness without knowing.”
Before my uncle, his mouth wide open, I added with the smile I had learned in the Marquis’s household.
“And furthermore, it was Shirley who dared to report such a groundless rumor to you, Uncle. If you felt that I had dishonored you, please punish me. I will then educate Shirley accordingly and convey your teachings, Uncle.”
“……Ah, no. You’re right. The one at fault is Shirley.”
“So, what did Shirley say my problem was?”
My uncle scanned me from head to toe.
He seems to think, ‘Everything about you right now is the problem.’
“……It’s nothing. Just eat.”
“Very well.”
Beside me, my uncle’s daughter, Linda, giggled.
“Irene, you really seem like you lived for a hundred years as the Queen of the Underworld and came back!”
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