Chapter 5: What Is This…?

Stab.

The brutal sound of a dagger tearing through flesh echoed inside the carriage.

The smell of iron and a sickening stench pricked my nose.

Fearing the pain that would soon follow, I closed my eyes.

I hate pain, and I hate dying.

Blocking my vision seemed like the only way to make it less scary.

However, no pain actually came.

‘Am I in so much pain that I can’t even feel it?’

‘Then am I dead?’

Since there was no pain, it seemed appropriate to think I died from the shock of being stabbed.

Yes.

Until I heard a voice.

“I stepped away for just a moment. And two little rats have brazenly entered.”

“Wh-what the f*ck?!”

My body froze at the aged voice.

‘Am I not dead right now?’

‘How can I hear a person’s voice?’

The absence of pain, the man’s flustered voice. And the old man’s voice I heard earlier on the mountain. With everything feeling out of place, I cautiously opened my eyes.

“Th-this fck!! Yoten, you fcking bastard!!! You said there was no one around, f*cker!!”

“Enough with the vulgarities. It’s not pleasant for a young lady to hear.”

“F-fck… Yo-Yoten, you fcking-“

The man holding the dagger couldn’t finish his sentence before his head was severed.

Pshhhhhh!

His severed head… no, sickening blood spurted like a fountain from his neck, and the cross-section revealed dangling veins and blood-soaked bone.

The grotesque sight froze all my thoughts, and I lost control of my body.

It was more brutal and disgusting than any movie I had seen back in 21st-century Earth.

The old man, no, the butler, who had taken the brunt of the splattered blood instead of me, turned around.

He bowed his head and spoke with words mixed with apology.

“I apologize for showing you such an unpleasant sight.”

As the butler said, it was a shocking and cruel sight for a 19-year-old girl to witness.

However.

“Your hand… are you okay?”

Even so, I couldn’t just rebuke the person who saved me for being cruel and dirty.

The butler’s hand looked like it had been cut by the dagger, torn straight across.

It seemed he had caught the dagger with his hand instead of me.

Perhaps because he was an assassin, he had taken the dagger he caught and used it to cut the man’s throat.

The butler’s eyes widened at my words, then he glanced at his own hand before looking back up at me.

As if he hadn’t expected me to worry.

“Y-you’re, khm. hurt. You’re bleeding…”

He was bleeding.

Just a tiny bit.

Like a paper cut.

…Still, he was hurt.

More importantly, how developed must his hand muscles be to get such a minor wound from a dagger?

‘Turns out it was a clay knife…?’

That can’t be right.

The butler showed a brief expression of being touched, then immediately hardened his face. As if something that shouldn’t have happened had occurred…

“I appreciate your concern, but it would be best to look at your own body first, young lady.”

“Eh…?”

‘My body? Why my body all of a sudden…?’

The butler’s gaze shifted to my stomach, so I followed his gaze and slowly lowered my head.

What entered my field of vision was a red stain spreading outwards from the center of my stomach.

Panicked, I looked closer at my clothes and saw a small, straight tear near my stomach.

He must have blocked the dagger just before it entered my stomach, and the recoil tore my clothes and grazed my stomach.

Seeing the wound made me break out in a cold sweat.

If the butler had been even a second later, I wouldn’t be alive right now.

Thinking that sent a chilling sensation sweeping through my entire body.

I looked up and spoke.

“Ugh… I have a wound, khm. It’s there. But it’s not, cough. cough. serious…”

The butler straightened his bent back, approached me, and took out a small box from his pocket.

It was a small first-aid kit.

‘So even assassins carry healing items,’ I thought.

“Excuse me, could you lift your clothes slightly?”

I obediently nodded at the butler’s words.

Having saved me and now applying medicine, I trusted him.

“It might sting, but please bear with it.”

Saying so, the butler carefully applied medicine to the wound on my stomach and placed a slightly large bandage over it.

With my stomach exposed, I felt the cold air, so I immediately pulled my clothes down after the bandage was applied.

‘I hate being cold…’

The butler finished applying the bandage, introduced himself as a Butler, picked up the headless man who was on the opposite side of me, and threw him outside.

Thump.

The lump of meat hit the ground, soaking it with the blood that was still flowing.

But I remember there being one more person outside.

I lightly assumed that one had probably been killed too.

Butler threw the two corpses far towards the mountain, returned, wiped the blood splattered inside the carriage, and spoke.

“I see. Your body is in poor condition, and vomiting blood on top of that must have been very difficult.”

While Butler was cleaning the blood, I felt awkward just sitting there, so I started talking to him to keep him company, and somehow the conversation turned to me vomiting blood after eating stew.

Talking with him, I realized Butler felt like… a neighborhood grandpa.

His kind voice and gentle atmosphere unknowingly made me feel relaxed.

Having nearly finished cleaning the blood, Butler suddenly asked a question.

“Young lady, are you not afraid of me?”

Butler, having wiped the blood off the seat, turned his head to look at me.

A bittersweet smile hung on his expression.

I pondered the question for a moment before opening my mouth.

“I am scared and afraid.”

At the reply, Butler gave a wry smile and nodded.

“That is only natur-“

“However.”

As Butler started to reply with understanding, I cut him off and continued.

“Even so. Even if I’m scared and afraid. I feel like I know you’re not someone who kills just anyone.”

I mixed sincerity into my cracked voice, moved my facial muscles into a smile, and conveyed my thoughts.

Hearing those words, Butler stopped as if struck on the back of the head, then returned the gesture with the smile of a kind grandfather.

“Hahaha. Is that so. I see… Thank you. I believe this is the first time someone has said that to me.”

Somehow, I felt like his voice trembled slightly.

Butler dusted off the cleaned seat once and sat down, smiling.

‘He really does look like a neighborhood grandpa.’

As I stared blankly at his completely non-threatening smile, I heard footsteps approaching from outside the carriage.
One set sounded like Lilac’s, and the rest seemed to be the knights’.

The light footsteps neared the carriage, and soon Lilac appeared, stepping onto the footboard and climbing into the carriage.

The knights also mounted their horses behind the carriage and stood beside it.

“Lady Lilac. Thank you for your hard work.”

“Yeah, yeah. But it reeks of blood.”

Lilac, sitting down next to me, accepted the greeting dismissively.

Then she looked at my clothes, reached out, and lifted the sleeve.

Even between women, being exposed so openly like this feels strange.

Lilac, having lifted my clothes, saw the bandage on my stomach and frowned.

“Who did this.”

“Uh… well…”

As I wondered how to phrase it to appease Lilac, Butler interjected and explained the earlier situation.

After hearing the story, Lilac sighed deeply, picked me up, and brought me into her arms.

‘Seems like I spend almost half my day like this…’

Regardless, Lilac stroked my head once and fiddled with my stomach.

Gently, so it wouldn’t hurt.

“You got hurt because of me.”

Huh?

“Why is that, Kheum. Lady Lilac’s fault-“

“Lilac.”

Lilac cut me off, saying her own name.

What does that mean?

As I stared blankly, Lilac explained.

“Call me Lilac.”

Uh…

“Bu-uut… you know I’m a commoner, right?”

“What about it.”

……

‘Do nobles and commoners usually become friends like this? World history didn’t say so.’

“Say it.”

Lilac seemed to want me to call her by her name.

Then it would be right to follow her wish.

“La-Lilac, Lady…?”

Frown.

‘What’s wrong now to make her scowl like that?’

“Drop the ‘Lady’.”

“B-but, no matter how…”

“Drop it.”

…I definitely didn’t start this.

“Lilac…?”

“Yes.”

Only then did her expression relax, leaving me speechless.

‘This is nobility…?’

A-anyway.

I kept asking why my getting hurt was Lilac’s fault, but she ignored me and continued playing with my stomach and cheek.

‘Is this right?’

For the record, the carriage started moving as soon as Lilac got in.

Edwyn seemed to be driving.

I couldn’t see Edwyn through the window.

The carriage quickly picked up speed, and the scenery visible through the window changed rapidly.

Yet, the inside of the carriage was steady and extremely quiet.

And so, until we arrived at the Duchy estate, Butler witnessed in real-time how my cheeks and stomach were molested by Lilac’s hands, and I felt several chilling sensations from her touch stroking the wounded area.

Before long, the carriage entered the bustling main street crowded with citizens of the Duchy, and at the end of it, a massive mansion, large enough to be called a ‘castle’, came into view.

“I shall disembark first to announce our return.”

“Do so. Ah. And prepare a room for Sia… no, never mind. Just go.”

“Loyalty.”

I noted that even the butler performed the knight’s salute, then sensed something strange in Lilac’s words.

“Um, wasn’t I brought here as a servant…?”

“?”

Lilac tilted her head at my question and looked at me as if asking what I meant.

‘If anything, I’m the one who’s more baffled here.’

‘Weren’t you bringing me here as a maid?!’

“I never said such a thing.”

“What? B-but back then, you definitely.”

“I said I would help you. Not bring you as a servant.”

Come to think of it, that’s true…

‘Then am I a s*ave…?’

“Uh… Theeen, what kind of work, cough. Khm. do I do here?”

“Just being like this.”

…?

As I looked at her with an uncomprehending face, Lilac pinched my cheek gently with her fingers.

“Sitting here with me like this is your job.”

……

‘That kind of thing is a job…?’