Chapter 1.4

Five minutes later.  

The man was about to climb into an open carriage parked in a deserted alley.  

“Sir! Wait, please wait!”  

He turned at the urgent call to see Lucia clutching a lamppost, panting heavily.  

Suppressing the curses that threatened to spill out due to the sharp pain in her chest, Lucia handed him the gold coins.  

“I must have written the wrong price on the label. It was supposed to be three banon, but you gave me three hundred.”  

“Oh! No, it was labeled as three banon, but I must have made a mistake again! Haha! This is clearly my error, so please keep it.”  

“What are you saying? I ran all the way here to return this to you. Take it and just give me three banon.”  

“Oh! I’m a wealthy man overflowing with money, so I only carry gold coins! I don’t have small change like three banon! So just keep it for today! Haha!”  

“Then I’ll put it on the ledger, and you can pay me next time—”  

“See you next time, Miss Bianchi!”  

Before Lucia could finish, the man quickly climbed into the carriage and waved cheerfully.  

Lucia wrapped the coins in a handkerchief, tied it tightly, and hurled it into the carriage with all her strength.  

“Ugh!”  

She had only intended to place it inside the carriage, but the heavy bundle of coins hit the man squarely on the back of the head.  

Lucia fled immediately.  

***

The walk home always felt heavy.  

Lucia sighed as she opened the door.  

Marisa happened to be coming down the stairs.  

The worst timing.  

“Why does it take you so long to come back from a walk? You have so much to do.”  

Marisa placed the hat Lucia had just removed back on her head.  

“Let’s go. We need to get your dress fitted for the ball.”  

“The Imperial Ball?”  

“Yes.”  

The Imperial Ball was held once a year and invited only the most important figures in the empire—members of the Imperial Family, nobles, ministers, dignitaries, renowned figures, and highly successful merchants.  

The Bianchi family couldn’t even dream of attending such an event.  

However, fueled by ambition, Lucia’s father had bribed his way to an invitation five years ago and brought the entire family to the ball.  

Ever since, he seemed to live solely to find a way to attend the Imperial Ball again.  

There was no better opportunity to build relationships with the empire’s influential figures.  

Who had he bribed this time to get an invitation?  

“There must still be one man left in this empire who doesn’t know about you.”  

Marisa said.  

“Even with my face like this, you’re still trying to find me a husband?”  

“So what?”  

Marisa traced Lucia’s split lip with her fingertip.  

“You just fell down the stairs, Lucia. That’s unfortunate, but it’s not something to be ashamed of, is it?”  

Marisa smiled beautifully as she led the way out of the house.  

***

Having barely escaped from the ball preparations, Lucia leaned against the windowsill of Saper Bookstore, reading the magazine ‘Roxana,’ hidden inside an ordinary etiquette book.  

The thin paper smelled strongly of ink, as though it had just come from the printing press.  

The weekly magazine ‘Roxana’ covered a wide range of topics, from poetry and short stories to essays on ethics and current affairs, featuring works exclusively by female authors.  

Recently, the magazine had gained popularity through word of mouth, but the more its fame grew, the stronger the backlash became.  

Society mocked and criticized women not only for writing but also for daring to publish their works.  

Moreover, the magazine’s content often contained provocative views on inequality, which incited public outrage.  

Slapping the cheeks of women caught reading it or splashing water on their faces was common.  

Occasionally, all the copies found in a town would be gathered and burned in the square.  

Yet, like a stubborn homing pigeon, the magazine would reappear on the streets the following week.  

Years ago, Lucia had submitted an essay to the magazine arguing that women deserved access to higher education.  

When it was published, she was so thrilled that she eagerly read her own work—only to be caught by Ferris.  

Her father’s fury reached its peak, and the subsequent beating worsened her wounds to the point where she fell gravely ill for a time.  

Since then, Lucia had satisfied her thirst for the magazine by secretly reading it in the bookstore’s corner.  

After reading the magazine twice, she gazed at the bustling street below.  

With news of the Imperial Ball taking place next week, rumors about Emperor Aristide Savio Segrio of the Bederon Empire were swirling in the air.  

“A reckless and selfish emperor…”  

“A lecher who only cares about women, not the affairs of the state…”  

“An ignorant man who abolished the mathematicians’ guild merely because he didn’t understand their research…”  

“They say he has more than ten concubines…”  

Lucia listened to these remarks with one ear and let them out the other.  

She’d heard them countless times before.  

She looked out the window, wondering if any of the gathered people might become customers for her inventions, but her hopes were dashed.  

“Lucia, come here.”  

Mr. Saper called her angrily from the storage room.  

“You… Don’t tell me…”  

“Yes, I organized the storage room.”  

“I told you not to! You’re not even fully recovered yet!”  

The mark on her split lip was still visible. She had deliberately bitten her lip to ensure the wound would remain until the day of the ball.  

“Uncle, I read something interesting today. Dogs smell pleasant scents with their left nostril and unpleasant ones with their right nostril.”  

Mr. Saper’s pupils wavered.  

He didn’t want to fall for Lucia’s attempt to change the subject, but he couldn’t resist pulling out his notebook and jotting it down.  

When Lucia returned to her seat, the regular customer had already arrived.  

He was carefully relocating an ant that had been crawling across the magazine as if it were a piece of text.  

Lucia froze for a moment.  

She didn’t know how this regular customer would react to her reading the magazine.  

Even people she thought were kind would often turn hostile upon seeing this magazine. 

“I need to buy one on my way back. Fortuna’s essay is supposed to be published this week…”  

To her surprise, he muttered favorably about the magazine.  

Even Mr. Saper, who encouraged Lucia to read it, never actually read the magazine himself.  

For the first time in the year since they’d met, Lucia felt curious about this man’s identity.  

After successfully relocating the ant, the man leaned against the windowsill with one hand while flipping through the magazine with the other.  

He didn’t seem to have noticed that Lucia had returned.  

‘He’s taller than I thought.’  

Lucia thought to herself.  

Even though he wasn’t standing straight, he seemed at least a handspan taller than her.  

It occurred to her that he must have been lowering his head during their conversations.  

“What can I help you with today, Sir?”  

Lucia asked, startling the man.  

He lowered his head and replied with a cheerful smile.  

“Oh, Miss Bianchi! What fascinating item will you show me today?”  

“You came yesterday, so I don’t have anything new to show you. Not even toys.”  

“That’s unfortunate…”  

He lowered his gaze, his characteristic drooping eyes reflecting disappointment.  

“Well, then, I’ll see you on Friday, Miss Bianchi!”  

“I’m off that day.”  

“Oh, attending the Imperial Ball, are you?”  

“Unfortunately, yes.”  

His smile seemed to deepen as he turned to leave.  

But then, he stopped and asked, 

“Miss Bianchi, may I ask what you think of Emperor Aristide?”  

‘A beast who sees women as mere playthings.’  

Lucia didn’t answer.  

Why would she share such thoughts with someone she barely knew?  

“You don’t need to answer. The disdain in your eyes says it all!”  

He whistled as he walked away.  

***

Finally, the day of the ball arrived.  

Under the frescoed ceiling that mirrored the sky, people bustled about.  

The polished floor reflected everything like a mirror, doubling the chaos and making it dizzying.  

Amidst the crowd, Lucia had one thing she wanted to do today.  

She wanted to talk to her childhood friend, Elvia Monti, whom she hadn’t seen in a long time.  

Lucia and Elvia had been inseparable as neighborhood friends, playing together every day.  

But as they grew older, Elvia became the flower of the social scene, while Lucia avoided social gatherings altogether.  

Still, when they did meet, they would chat for hours, losing track of time.  

Their conversations sometimes faltered due to their vastly different interests and values.  

In truth, their friendship was rooted not in compatibility but in having spent a lot of time together in similar circumstances during childhood.  

Even so, Lucia preferred maintaining this imperfect relationship over letting it fade due to misunderstandings.