I Became the Female Lead Ruined by Others - Chapter 6

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 6

“Yes, please tell me anything!”

I drew a long breath.
Then, speaking in a hushed, conspiratorial tone, I asked him.

“Do you know what happened to the Young Lady?”

Sordi’s face stiffened subtly at those words.
While his expression twisted in anguish, he fumbled to add something more.

“The situation came so suddenly that I’ve scarcely had a moment to think…….”

Sordi averted his gaze and clenched his fists. His lowered eyelids trembled faintly.
It was the reaction of someone who had just heard something deeply distressing.

“It appears the Young Lady passed away last night.”

Sordi continued speaking at a pace much slower than usual.

“I learned of the news of death in the early dawn, so it’s only an estimate that it occurred at night.”

I recalled yesterday’s events once more, just as I had at the funeral hall earlier.

‘So something happened after I fell asleep?’

The Duke’s manor was under such stringent guard. And yet someone managed to breach it? But who would be reckless enough to risk so much just to murder the Young Lady?
I pressed him further, my voice dropping even lower.

“I don’t know the details myself. Perhaps the Duke’s household is keeping silent about it…….”

Someone had infiltrated the Young Lady’s chambers and killed her. This assumption had too many holes. Both breaching that security and the existence of someone with a grudge strong enough to kill her seemed improbable on multiple fronts.
Then could it be sudden death? But that made no sense either—the game hasn’t even begun yet, so the Young Lady dying now is illogical.

And besides, I still didn’t understand why I had come to inhabit Rozelina’s body in the first place.

The gap between the Young Lady’s death and the moment I opened my eyes as Rozelina. Something had clearly transpired, but now I could only speculate.

“……Miss?”

The sound of his voice pulled me back. Sordi was studying my face with careful concern.
I nodded, feigning indifference.

“You’ve been very helpful. Thank you.”
“I’m grateful you say so. But, Miss……”

Sordi trailed off, hesitating at length after broaching the subject.
At last, he exhaled a sigh, scratched the back of his head, and glanced back at the knights behind him.

“I don’t wish to judge you by rumor alone.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Haven’t you already endured considerable envy simply by maintaining a good relationship with the lady?”

Sordi closed his reddened eyes, then opened them slowly.

“That they harbored resentment over how you solidified your position with the lady’s help, and spread malicious rumors because of it… I truly think it was cowardly.”
“…….”
“Of course, I know very little of these matters…….”

It wasn’t entirely unexpected.
I remember the moment the atmosphere froze when I, reborn as the beloved lady, appeared in society with the forgotten marquis’s daughter in tow.
To be precise, I had simply turned a blind eye, thinking it had nothing to do with me.
If only I had known then that it could become poison for me now.

‘So those people over there must be hostile toward Rozelina too.’

They had looked down on her as easy prey because she was so ruthlessly scorned in noble society.

“But I don’t think there’s any need to dwell on such things. Just as the lady cherished you, I would like to trust in you as well.”

But what Sordi said next was entirely unexpected.

“You may not realize it, but I too have received kindness from the lady. Since you are someone who has earned her affection, I’m certain you must be a good person as well.”

With that, Sordi stepped back two paces and bowed deeply.

“Thank you so much! I will never forget this kindness!”

As I watched him turn and hurry back toward his companions……

‘Did I give birth to him?’

My chest tightened strangely.
That boy who wept every day yet never set down his sword. His cute face still fresh in my memory, the one that would turn sad whenever I called him “little knight.”
Watching Sordi’s retreating figure as he ran off, I turned away.

“Anyway.”

I stood before the grand entrance of the decrepit mansion.
The Mersh Marquis Residence was currently a fallen noble house, but apparently in its heyday it had been known as a wealthy clan. Perhaps the female protagonist’s grandfather gambled away the entire fortune?

‘The irony is that history lingers here, as if the house itself is a ruin.’

The iron gate before me was rusted in places, and one careless brush against it seemed likely to invite sickness where none existed before.

“Ugh.”

I gave the slightly ajar gate a light kick with my toes and stepped through.
At the sight of the sprawling Garden before me, I couldn’t suppress a sigh.

“Huh.”

The Garden was overgrown with wild grass and weeds that had sprouted haphazardly.
The large and small trees, unpruned, tangled with one another in chaotic growth.
The stones laid along the paths were spotted with moss here and there. It was obvious they would be slippery without even testing them.

‘It’s gotten far worse than when I was here before.’

With each step, my feet sank deep into the lush undergrowth.

“Ugh!”

Now and then, when my foot caught on a stone, I let out an involuntary cry.
Watching the ground carefully, I made my way toward the entrance.

‘I’ve been sending him living expenses on schedule—so why hasn’t he maintained the estate?’

The sum I’d disbursed to him monthly, set aside for expenses separate from his escape funds, would have been considerable.

‘Calling in a gardener periodically shouldn’t have been difficult. And he must have heard the carriage arrive—yet no one came to greet me.’

I recalled once pressing living expenses into Rozelina’s hands and advising her to hire servants.
I’d even walked her through what to look for when hiring staff, and introduced her to the Guild.
But I had no reason to return here after that first day I came to meet Rozelina.
I’d always sent a carriage to fetch her instead.
So this was only my second time stepping into the interior of this weathered mansion.

‘Dust had billowed everywhere when I last entered.’

Once from the acrid reek of mold, and twice more from dust stirred up by the creaking floorboards beneath my feet.
After preparing for a sneeze, I placed my hand on a smooth door handle that looked newly replaced—at odds with the decrepit exterior.
But in that moment—

“Master, welcome home!”
“Master, you’ve returned!”

I had barely laid my hand on the handle when the door swung open.
Behind a middle-aged man visible in the doorway, several sturdy servants called out in resonant voices.
It sounded less like a greeting than a battle cry.

“What—”

About ten people stood in a neat line. They all bowed deeply with perfect formality.
Remarkably, toward me.
But the shock didn’t end there.

‘What is all this?’

The interior of the dilapidated mansion was, in a word, lavish beyond measure.
Everything gleamed as if coated in gold leaf. In all my years—before and after possession combined—I had never seen such crude, primal interior decoration.
Six enormous chandeliers hung from the lobby ceiling, every component save the bulbs glittering with golden lustre.
Lowering my gaze, I found not rotted wooden floors but marble tiles etched with delicate gold patterns.

“Did you have a good outing? I trust the business went well—”

Looking around further, the walls that had been chipped and cracked, left to deteriorate, were now pristine.
Moreover, instead of the musty odor I’d braced for, a gentle fragrance tickled my nostrils—the sweet scent of freshly laundered and dried linens.

‘What in the world happened here?’

Had he used the money I gave him to create all this?
I had provided him with sufficient monthly funds, true enough, but not to this degree.
Not enough to lavishly refurbish the interior of a mansion like this.
So what exactly had occurred in the past two years?

“Master?”

Standing dumbfounded before this impossible sight, the middle-aged man spoke to me in a trembling voice.

“Are you quite well?”

Is something wrong?

“Or perhaps there’s some trouble…….”

Trouble? Could this situation really be summed up in a word like that?
Her mind went blank, as if wiped clean by an eraser.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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