“Sophia. When you enter the Ludwig family, find out how Lise Sinclair is doing, what she likes, and if there is anything special about her, and then write to me. Don’t tell my father about this. Understand?”
The orders Shane secretly gave her floated around in her head. When the little master she had admired for a long time brought up Lise’s name, dyeing her ear lobe red, Sophia realized that he had Lise in mind. At that time, all she wanted to do was to tear apart Edith and the illegitimate daughter of the Sinclair family. She didn’t dare covet Shane’s place as her wife. But she couldn’t even let Shane be deceived by an illegitimate daughter, who was only born on a maid’s boat. However, the Ludwig family treated Lise more like a real daughter of what she imagined, and her escort was also impenetrable. Of course, it was not Sophia who would give up easily.
‘Because I will never leave that bastard bitch alone…’
Sophia, while sharpening her sword inside herself, bowed slightly to Lise and left in front of her. Then she casually passed by a servant and quickly handed her a little note.
– The territory that Killian Ludwig will receive is Ryzen,
It was unclear whether he would take Edith with him. Another mercenary planted in the Ludwig family was paying for his meal properly.
‘Even this ignoramus pays for food, but Edith is still so useless, ha. That’s why she doesn’t have the right to eat, and that’s why her husband ignores her.’
When she thought of Edith, she could only think of how pathetic Edith was. Even though she was confident that she would do much better if they gave her the status of the Countess’s daughter.
Sophia took pity on them for having to call those lesser than her lady, and took Edith’s meal for her to eat. While thinking about how to make fun of the starving Edith today.
* * *
After five days of starvation, all she could think of was something to eat in the morning. However, because Renan was away on a business trip for several days, she couldn’t even get refreshments.
‘I’m hungry…’
Sophia took her meal and she ate it all in front of Edith. Even that alone made her angry, but she deliberately scratched her insides even more.
She said, throwing the pieces of bread she ate last night on the floor.
“If you’re really hungry, do you eat that?”
Honestly, if Sofia hadn’t been watching, she might have really picked it up. But she had a longer ego to crumble.
“How can a man eat what a dog used to eat?”
At that, Sophia also laughed for a long time. She heard that a girl who was not as good as a dog was uselessly stubborn. Anyway, if she had suffered such humiliation for lunch today, she would have picked up bread without knowing it, so she ran out of the room while Sophia went to get her meal.
They were busy preparing meals, and the smell of food was everywhere.
She searched for a place where she could not smell as much as possible, and then she remembered the Great Hall and headed there.
‘I’m hungry… so hungry…’
It wasn’t that she didn’t think about hiding somewhere else and calling another maid to bring her something to eat. Indeed, she had done it the first evening, laughing at Sophia.
She did, but she went back to the room and Sofia forced her to vomit all of it.
When she vomited up, her stomach hurt so much that the memory of moaning all night still lingers like a trauma. When she went to the Great Hall, the smell of grass and flowers masked the smell of food, so it was much better. As she was walking around like that, something caught her attention.
‘And… That pie looks delicious…’
A peach pie that looked like it was freshly baked was placed on a table. How beautifully the sugar water was baked, the smooth surface made it look even more appetizing.
“…Deet!”
Unknowingly, she was just staring at the pie, and she was startled when someone called her.
“Edith! Why are you doing that?”
It was Lise. The moment she thought why Lise was there, she could see her surroundings properly. Lise, Cliff, and Killian, who had eaten lunch a little earlier, were about to have tea and dessert on the balcony of the great hall. She was passing in front of them, but she was standing there staring at the pie…
‘I think we can do a disgrace here before Killian cuts my throat…?’
Since she hadn’t eaten, her head wasn’t spinning, and she couldn’t think of anything to explain her actions just now.
“If you have eaten, would you like to have tea together?”
Lise asked kindly, but she shook her head, recalling the nightmare of vomiting.
“Just… I just looked at it because I thought it was already peach season.”
“Oh, I see…”
She looked at the pie again and her eyes met Killian’s. As if she was pathetic, he frowned and doubled her shame.
“I-I’ll just go back. I was just taking a walk.”
She was sad to be hungry, but being treated like a beggar made her feel like crying, so she hurried back to her room. But maybe the look in her eyes wasn’t serious, so around three o’clock a maid came to her room with a peach pie.
“Lady Lise sent it.”
It was the peach pie she had been staring at before. The sweet smell of peaches quickly filled the room.
‘I’m sure I’ll eat that myself.’
While she was trying to get rid of her lingering thoughts, Sophia, who had been thinking about something for a long time with her back turned to her, suddenly set a table for refreshments. Then she served hot tea with a piece of peach pie and told her to eat it.
“If you continue to starve like this, I’m sure someone will suspect me. So, I will allow you this much.”
Then she even left the room so Edith could eat comfortably.
“She… Why is this suddenly…?”
At first, it was absurd, but when she thought about it, Sophia seemed to be good at using her brain. It’s not because she hadn’t eaten, but she was getting really dizzy. Her pride was still hurt, but she thought she could compromise on this level, so she gulped down the peach pie. It was as delicious as she had imagined.
‘I think my favorite fruit from now on will be peaches.’
Even thinking about that, she was sweeping her stomach, though it was not enough, but she was still able to avoid dying of hunger. After a while, she felt a pain like squeezing her stomach.
“Ah…! Oh, what is this… Hah!”
It hurted. It hurted terribly. Her stomach ached so much that her eyes turned yellow, and she broke out in a cold sweat, and her limbs trembled.
“Huh…”
Unable to walk to the bed, she fell to the floor, but struggled with the pain as if something sharp had stabbed her in the stomach. After waiting on the floor for a long time, when her mind became hazy, an episode from the original story came to mind.
‘No way… The poisoned cake incident…?’
It was Edith putting poison that caused stomach pain in the cake Lise sent as a gift and performing a self-play.
‘But I didn’t put any poison in it…’
But the mystery was quickly cleared. The door opened in the distance, and Sophia came in, and she wasn’t at all surprised to see her down.
‘Sure, damn it…’
By the time her vision went completely dark, she could vaguely hear Sophia screaming.
“Kyaaaagh! Miss! Wake up! Miss!”
* * *
How lost was she? She slowly opened her eyes feeling that the surroundings were bustling.
Sophia’s voice pierced her eardrums.
“How can you be like that, Miss Lise! Did you hate my lady enough to want to poison her?”
“Oh no! I never did! I just sent it because I thought Edith would like it!”
“Yeah, she liked it. How happy she was when she heard that Lady Lise sent it. But while I was out for a while, the lady… Hehe…”
As expected, Sophia was accusing Lise of being the culprit. Yes, that scene was perfectly original. Even if Killian was a bit different from the original, her express train to kill has not stopped yet. But she couldn’t give up. She finally realized that the original story could be different, but she couldn’t go back to the starting point. Her stomach still hurted, but she had to stop Sophia’s scheme somehow.
“Cow… Pia…”
When she finally called Sophia, everyone’s surprised eyes turned to her. Even in the midst of that, she was happy to find Killian. Still, he must have come to see that she fell down. No, did he come because Lise was accused of being the culprit…? Anyway, she had to put a stop to this situation.
“Miss! Are you alright? Are you in a lot of pain? You’re not feeling well right now, so don’t force yourself to talk. Hehe, my poor little girl…”
Sophia came to her with a face wet with tears, like someone who couldn’t live without Edith. But her gaze was clearly closer to ‘Shut up!’ and she was not the one to shut up though.
“Lise… what did you do… I’m just, kinda… It’s just pretending.”
“What? It’s just pretend!? Lady, you even vomited blood!”
What? Was she saying that you just fed her a poison that would make her vomit blood?
‘Ah, I’m so pissed off…’
Even if she couldn’t avoid the future of being decapitated by Killian, she would definitely kill Sophia! She clenched her teeth and said with the most pitiful expression on her face.
“I just felt a little bad. So, fuss… Don’t smoke.”
Then, without giving Sophia a chance to say anything, she spoke to Lise.
How do you feel?
