The Tragic Male Lead Chose the Wrong Partner

* * *

Masera treated me like I was invisible, and the staff in the residence were all cold.
Eugene gifted me a frog that had been hibernating through winter. When I smiled brightly, he panicked and ran away.
Everyone was cold to me, yet just being able to eat until full and stay in a warm room made me happy enough.

If I had to choose between “warm encouragement at work” and “cold treatment with rest,” I would always choose the latter.
“This is what it means to be alive!”
Just as I lay back on the bed enjoying the leisure, a knock came, and the door opened.

“Here is the cocoa you requested.”
Dalia had brought me a cup of warm cocoa.
I immediately sat up and took a sip. It tasted like chocolate briefly dipped in warm water and removed.

Dalia had quite a few of these kinds of slip-ups, and at first, I’d wondered if she was doing it to mess with me.
But after seeing the mess she made when folding laundry, I long concluded that she just wasn’t cut out for domestic work.
“Thanks, Dalia.”

“And this… I’m very sorry. I was ironing and…”
She held out a dress with a round burn hole, apologizing.
“Ironing’s really hard, right? It’s definitely not easy.”

I remembered being frustrated myself when asked to use a frying pan with a lump of charcoal in it, or a metal iron.
“I sincerely apologize. I’ll try to repair it right away.”
She pulled out a sewing kit and began threading a needle. Looked like she was planning to patch it somehow.

“Hmm, hmmm.”
With a serious face, Dalia tried to get the thread through the eye of the needle.
I offered a tip.
“Try wetting the tip of the thread and twisting it into a point?”

“I’ll give it a try.”
While watching her struggle, I noticed something odd—her right hand didn’t move quite naturally.
If she left the military at a young age… it must’ve been a medical discharge.

Likely due to nerve damage from an injury.
There were many in this residence who bore war scars: a gardener with a limp, a butler with a huge scar, a coachman who couldn’t speak…
Even if they protected the country and came home with trauma, the reality was that no one cared. Masera must have a decent side to him after all.

“Take your time.”
I sat quietly, waiting until she succeeded.
By the time I had finished the cocoa that only smelled like chocolate, and the heavy snow had finally let up, the dress was done.

Dalia wiped the sweat from her brow and handed me the dress.
“Sorry, I can’t help it, it’s too funny!”
I burst out laughing when I saw the pink dress patched with clumsily sewn checkered fabric. It reminded me of a pair of jeans my grandmother once patched with every scrap of colorful cloth she could find.

Dalia looked embarrassed.
“If you wait until payday, I’ll reimburse you.”
“It’s fine. I was getting sick of that dress anyway. Let’s just say it got a makeover.”

In truth, I’d never even worn it once. But I smiled like it was no big deal.
“In return, come with me to the shopping district on your day off. And eat parfait with me.”
“...Yes, understood.”

Dalia scratched the back of her head with an awkward face.
“Thank you for your kindness, my lady.”
* * *

The residence’s utility room.
The maids were gossiping about Cynthia during a break.
“She’s such a princess. Even when she goes out briefly, she’s got a parasol. It’s ridiculous.”

“What even are those attendants that came with her? They don’t lift a finger, like noble-born maids.”
Dalia stayed quiet, folding towels.
“It’s absurd. The royals were all executed for throwing the people into hell, and now she gets treated like a princess just for being the ‘last surviving bloodline’?”

“But she’s marrying General Visente—the person who hates royals more than anyone. Don’t you think that’s kind of sad?”
Just as Cynthia had predicted, most people in the residence disliked her because of her royal blood.
“Dalia, when you burned her dress, didn’t she get angry or hit you?”

Someone asked with concern, and Dalia shook her head.
“She didn’t seem like the type to get angry.”
“No way. I heard she acts all nice but then had the Earl’s maids beat a young maid in secret. She’s totally vile.”

Dalia tilted her head.
The woman who had smiled kindly even when her dress was ruined… did something that ugly?
“Once the wedding’s over, she’ll start showing her true colors.”

Another maid folded her arms and predicted Cynthia’s doomed married life.
Feeling uncomfortable with the trash talk, Dalia stepped outside. She didn’t know why, but something felt off.
Just then, one of the Queensguard attendants approached her with a sly smile.

“So, you’re the lady’s personal maid? This place is full of male soldiers. You’d better keep a close eye on your lady so weird rumors don’t start flying. She does act a bit... light, after all.”
He tapped his temple, implying she was empty-headed.
Dalia asked flatly, without expression:

“Your name was Charles, wasn’t it? Are you saying that out of concern for your lady?”
“Of course. She’s always all smiles, so rumors started spreading about her and her ‘brothers’ being too close, you know?”
Incest scandals were the worst kind of slander.

Dalia realized he was saying this deliberately.
He wanted that rumor to reach the General’s ears.
And rumors always grew more distorted and exaggerated the more mouths they passed through.

“Don’t chase me away. I’m all alone.”
Dalia recalled Cynthia’s lonely words and turned away in silence.
The more time she spent with her, the more she couldn’t shake the feeling that behind Cynthia’s gentle smile was a sorrow no one else saw.

“Report everything. Even the small things.”
Masera’s order still echoed in her ears—report what Cynthia ate, what she said, everything.
Even dirty slander, apparently, was part of the report.

Dalia let out a long sigh.
* * *
The Queensguard County mansion.

From the day Cynthia departed for the capital, Edford had been drowning in grief and fury.
When he saw the invitation to her engagement ceremony, he immediately badgered Helene.
“Helene, she asked you to convince me to elope with her!”

“I tried my best to convince her. But she’s already having an engagement ceremony. It’s irreversible now.”
Helene, who had just concluded her own marriage talks with a duke and was preparing to head to the capital, answered calmly.
She looked her brother over—his pug nose, small eyes, stumpy figure—and added with slight hesitation,

“You could… no, should try meeting someone else.”
“No other woman interests me.”
Probably goes both ways, Helene thought silently.

“She looked like she liked that guy too.”
At her words, Edford thought of Masera’s handsome face.
“She obviously got swayed by his good looks. Has no idea he’s a heartless demon.”

Jealousy, thinly veiled as concern, made Edford start pressing Helene again.
“Come on, don’t you have a plan? Crash the engagement ceremony and break them up or something!”
Helene looked bored.

Feeling ignored, Edford raised his voice.
“Hey. You’re just letting this slide because your own marriage to the duke is already secured, right? If I reveal that she’s a fake and this whole marriage is a scam, your engagement’s finished too!”
Edford was well aware that Helene was the better speaker.

And so he threatened to sabotage her match if she didn’t persuade Cynthia.
“Edford.”
Helene smiled sweetly, but the corners of her mouth twisted unnaturally.

“Back off.”
“What?”
“Why is it you whine to me, but never say a word to Carlos or Father?”

She stood from her seat and glared coldly at her brother.
“Unfortunately for you, the only way I can move up in the world is through a bloodline-based marriage. You know that. And now you’re trying to exploit that as a weakness?”
Helene recalled the years she spent locked away in their rural estate, being trained to be the perfect bride.

She knew exactly why a duke would want to marry her.
‘He must be thinking of restoring the monarchy.’
She gave him a sharp warning.

“Father always gets what he wants. You {N•o•v•e•l•i•g•h•t} know that, right?”
Edford recalled his father’s threat: ‘If you interfere, I’ll kill you.’
Helene’s voice dropped, low and chilling.

“And I’m his daughter. Get in my way, and you’ll see something worse than hell. Think carefully.”
“...Ugh.”
Edford, stunned by his normally calm sister’s cutting warning, couldn’t say a word.

‘She’s really going to marry him? Leaving me behind?’
Still unable to let go of his obsession, he brooded over it all the way up to the day he was set to go to the capital for the engagement ceremony.