I Was Hired by the Black-Minded Prince for My Life's Ransom - Chapter 1

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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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Prologue
Have you ever killed someone?
I hadn’t. I swore by heaven itself—not once in my life.
…So why had I ended up in this situation…?
A sliver of moon, no wider than a fingernail, cast its faint glow across the darkening night.
Dark clouds swallowed the moon’s shadow, and a pitch-black darkness descended.
Deep within the Imperial Palace,
in an Abandoned Garden that no one ever visited.
“Haa….”
No one saw that, right…?
I clutched my frantically pounding heart.
Everything was a complete mess.
“Just… just hide it somewhere out of sight for now… Hic!”
A hiccup forced its way up my throat.
My head wouldn’t work properly, and my fingertips felt cold as ice.
Before me lay three men, all collapsed.
First, there was—
my employer, the back-alley fixer, Dai.
He lay sprawled with half-open eyes, staring blankly into space.
Blood poured from his chest in thick gushes.
I reached a trembling hand to his neck.
There was no pulse.
“…He’s dead.”
The moment the words left my mouth, reality crashed down on me.
I clamped my hand over my mouth and stumbled backward.
Every part of me wanted to run, to flee this instant….
‘…But then I’d die too.’
So I couldn’t stop. I couldn’t freeze.
With an almost mechanical numbness, I dragged the fixer’s body toward the edge of the overgrown grass.
The hem of his clothes trailed across the ground, soiling it.
I’d scrubbed that fabric diligently in ice-cold water through the depths of winter…but that was finished now.
I shoved his body deep into the tall grass.
The untended growth concealed him entirely, with plenty left over.
Next was—
a portly, middle-aged nobleman.
A man draped in luxury, with the soft jowls that wealth cultivated, his mouth bearing the marks of excess.
“Ugh… it’s so damp….”
He too lay where he’d fallen, bleeding from a wound.
I gritted my small teeth and dragged his body to bury it in the grass as well.
Thus disposed of: the second man.
And then the last.
A man collapsed on the ground.
Platinum-bright hair that gleamed even through the darkness of night, features so finely sculpted they seemed carved from marble.
Someone I’d only just met today, yet could never possibly forget.
Yulian, the Third Prince of the Oswald Empire.
My hands trembled violently.
I felt as though I couldn’t breathe, certain that at any moment he’d open those golden eyes wide.
I didn’t want to check….
But I had to.
I drew a deep breath, then felt for his breathing with trembling fingertips.
The flutter of air reached my touch.
…He was alive.
“Haa, haa….”
Thump—!
All strength drained from me, and I collapsed right there.
It felt as though all the blood were pouring out of my body.
“Vanillin, you idiot….”
You fool…!
I wrapped both trembling hands around my face.
Was it lucky that the Third Prince was still alive?
…or would that be worst of all?
“What was I thinking, reducing the Third Prince to this state….”
I lifted my head, gazing up at a sky that remained shrouded in darkness.
As though it were foretelling my own future.
“How did things spiral so completely out of control?”
Sniff.
In the center of the Abandoned Garden within the Imperial Palace, trembling beside the collapsed Third Prince.
I found myself replaying this morning—the moment everything began to unravel.
Chapter One: I Was a Slave, You See…
“One hundred gold coins, Vanillin! A full hundred!”
Bang!
Dai burst through the door, practically vibrating with excitement.
His nostrils flared as he bounced on his heels.
This was the Fixer’s Office in the Slums of the Imperial Capital’s outer reaches—a shabby corner of the Oswald Empire.
In that cramped space, Dai flailed about his arms as though he’d just seized a throne.
“Hahahaha! If I can just see this job through, I’m rich! I can finally ditch this two-bit fixer business and live in style!”
“Wow…. That’s wonderful, Fixer.”
I clapped my hands on instinct.
But my heart told a different story.
Whenever Dai got this excited, trouble always followed.
“One hundred gold coins? What kind of job could possibly be worth that much?”
“Hehehehe! Simple, simple!”
Dai answered as though he’d been waiting for the question.
“All I need to do is steal the Sacred Contract from the Imperial Palace!”
“…I’m sorry?”
What did he just say?
“The… the Sacred Contract?”
I bolted upright.
“That’s a Prohibited Item. The Sacred Power belongs only to the Royal House bloodline—.”
“I know, I know! That’s why it’s expensive!”
Dai smirked and kicked his chair back with his foot.
“The client seemed a little skittish about it too, but what’s the problem? It’s just a job.”
“But Fixer, this job is far too dangerous. As much as we need the hundred gold coins, perhaps we should decline—”
“Dangerous? What danger? It’s just a slip of paper. Three days, and the coins are mine. What could go wrong?”
“Still….”
“Look, whether you whine or not, I’m not paying you a damn coin either way. You’re getting on my nerves, you beggar trash.”
My meek objections were, as always, swept aside.
Whenever I hesitated even slightly, a hand inevitably came flying toward the back of my head.
Smack!
“Ow!”
“Stop dallying and pack your things. You’re coming with me this time.”
“M-me too…?”
“What, you don’t want to?”
That was impossible.
I quickly shook my head in denial.
To go outside… to the Imperial Palace, no less.
How long had it been since I’d left this place?
“The timing couldn’t be better. The Foundation Anniversary celebration begins tonight.”
“But Fixer—”
Crack!
Dai raised his hand in a threatening gesture once more.
I instinctively hunched my shoulders, and the man, irritated, kicked over the desk.
“You keep testing me, and I stop investigating your brother’s death. Clear?”
“…Y-yes.”
I bit my lip hard.
My brother. Dead under mysterious circumstances fifteen years ago.
This fixer had been the only one willing to take the case when no one else would.
Though, to be honest, I haven’t received a single piece of information yet….
— What are you doing? Get to work and clean the floor, you wench. Or do you want me to stop investigating your brother’s death?
And in exchange for his promise, I’d bound myself in a contract barely better than slavery, confined to this dingy office to handle his every menial task.
He was my only hope in my brother’s case—I had no choice but to follow him.
“I’m sorry. I’ll get ready right away.”
“Yes, that’s more like it.”
In the end, I lowered my eyes and complied.
Dai shoved me aside with a cruel smile.
“If you care about your brother’s business, then do your job well, understood?”
I had no words to offer him.
* * *
Was it because of the Foundation Anniversary?
The streets, which I hadn’t seen in so long, were far more crowded than before.
“They say the Third Prince will attend this banquet.”
“Oh! Yulian? How wonderful—I’d love to see him too.”
A prince, no less…
He seemed like someone straight out of a fairy tale, and my heart couldn’t help but quicken.
Squeak—
The carriage came to a halt in front of me.
Dai descended with an air of importance, impeccably dressed.
“I’m a nobleman, so I’ll enter the banquet hall. You find the Sacred Contract and bring it to me.”
“Yes, of course.”
A task dumped on me as though it were only natural.
So this was why he brought me along.
Just so he could enjoy himself.
Even as I pouted, I carefully changed into the maid’s dress he’d given me beforehand.
Soft pink hair cascading gently over my shoulders, eyes that looked innocent and obedient.
Once I stepped out of my threadbare clothes and into the fine fabric of a proper maid’s uniform, my appearance transformed—as if I’d been given a brand new dress. I felt a little flutter of excitement.
“Now, get going. Don’t come back until you’ve found the Sacred Contract, and don’t let yourself be seen.”
Thwack!
Dai snorted and kicked me away.
“Ow…”
It hurt.
Tears pricked my eyes, and I rubbed at them.
Dai didn’t spare me a glance as he headed toward the banquet hall.
Well, it wasn’t as though this was new.
Rather than dwell on my sorrow, I took in the vast expanse of the Imperial Palace.
“Still… it’s thrilling.”
Had it really been three years since I’d been outside?
Even if this outing would last only a day at most, at times like this the world seemed impossibly wide, and I felt almost awestruck.
“The maid’s quarters are this way.”
Clutching the résumé Dai had insisted I prepare, I hurried along with the other applicants as a palace attendant led us through the halls.
We passed through the main palace corridors and arrived at the maid’s quarters—far grander than any office I’d ever seen.
“So, your name is Vanillin?”
“Yes, Head Maid. It’s an honor to meet you.”
When my turn finally came, I stood before her, fidgeting with my fingers.
Rustle—
The head maid examined the résumé carefully.
The résumé and letter of recommendation she was reading, the seals stamped on the paper—I had forged them all myself.
I’d perfectly replicated the texture of the paper, the bleeding of the ink, even the peculiarities of handwriting.
To my eye, there was nothing amiss about it…
— ‘No one but me would ever accept your pitiful skills. You should be grateful,’ Dai had always said.
He said it every time.
“A year with the Gurlisey Baronial House, two and a half years with the Gebaksen Earldom… ah, and six months with the Hardeen Duchy, I see.”
Fortunately, the head maid nodded with evident satisfaction.
“Yes. My specialty is Art Handling.”
“Quite impressive.”
She even offered praise.
She seemed to harbor no suspicion whatsoever.
…Had I really gotten away with it?
What a relief.
I glanced about nervously.
The herringbone-patterned floor, the overflowing bookshelves, the sofa, my fidgeting toes…
I drifted here and there until my gaze fell upon the head maid’s desk by pure chance.
‘…What?’
I blinked.
My thoughts ground to a halt.
‘Am I seeing things…?’
I rubbed my eyes dumbly.
And no wonder — in one corner of the desk, half-buried beneath a chaotic sprawl of documents,
‘A… a Sacred Contract…?’
Unsigned Sacred Contracts lay scattered across the surface.

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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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