“Wait a minute. What…?”

Overwhelmed by an unbearable feeling, my hands instinctively pushed against his shoulders.

Yet his thick, firm body didn’t budge an inch, solid as a rock.

“What.”

His low voice echoed like a cave as his hot breath pressed harder against my neck.

“This is too much…!”

This is strange.

Unable to resist his approaching force, my body tipped backward, but his large hand immediately supported my back.

Heat rushed up my spine as his thumb gently caressed me.

Simultaneously, a small commotion erupted in the corridor outside.

People listening to us seemed startled.

“Ha, are we allowed to do this?”

His hair brushed against my skin as he lowered his head, making the exposed skin above my dress respond sensitively. The ticklish sensation shot down to my toes.

“You said kissing wasn’t a big deal.”

“What?”

“Then this must be child’s play too, right?”

His gentle touch contradicted his sarcastic tone.

I was about to ask who had said such a thing when yesterday’s events flashed before my eyes.

“It doesn’t mean anything. It’s just an accident.”

Right. Those words had indeed come from my mouth.

My cheeks couldn’t possibly get any redder as clarity suddenly struck me.

“M-maybe we should talk?”

Desperate to do something before losing myself further, I grabbed his face.

Though I barely applied any pressure, he easily lifted his head, and our eyes met.

My heart sank immediately.

Beneath his slightly disheveled golden hair, his blue eyes—usually indifferent—had turned somehow cold.

“No.”

His expression seemed both mocking and angry.

He looked at me with dispassionate eyes while pinning my hands to the bed sheets, preventing them from moving.

“Are you angry? Why?”

Despite his calm gaze, he firmly held my hands down and asked:

“Why do you think I would be angry?”

What are you asking? You’re literally restraining my hands right now.

“Um… you just seem angry?”

“That’s impossible.”

“No?”

“You don’t recognize help when you see it.”

Help? Before I could respond, my waist was grabbed and I was pulled forward.

Before I knew it, I found myself sitting on his lap.

Pressed against his chest, I faced the man’s beautiful face—elegant yet chilling.

“See for yourself. How much of this you can still consider just play.”

Not long ago, I was running through the dead of night.

“Stop right there! Hey! Catch that b*tch!”

The tuition and dormitory fees I’d saved by working three part-time jobs every day during my year-long academic leave had just been taken by thuggish men right before my eyes.

The bigger problem was that they weren’t satisfied with just that—they were trying to catch me too.

“Would you stop if you were me?”

If I were being chased for my own mistakes, I wouldn’t feel so wronged.

“Just like her father, she runs fast as h*ll! Hurry up and catch her!”

As expected, they were trying to take out their frustrations with my father on me.

The person they were looking for—my father—was someone even I didn’t know the whereabouts of.

Still, he had promised he would find me somehow.

Quickly wiping away the tears that had begun to fall, I ran with all my might.

My father was a genius con artist and master gambler who swindled those who had accumulated wealth illegally and returned the money to their wronged victims.

Because of my father’s self-proclaimed role as a champion of justice, I had to grow up alone, hiding my identity from the world, though I knew he had been looking after me in his own way.

Had his promise that we would soon live together like a normal father and daughter been just another lie?

“Stop right there!”

The angry shouts followed me closely.

With the sound of footsteps growing nearer, my heart pounded and I gasped for breath, but I couldn’t stop running.

As I turned the corner and dashed onto the crosswalk, a terrifying horn blared.

HONK—!

The shouts of the men trying to grab me suddenly ceased.

I was sure the light was green when I ran out……

Mister, how could you drive when the light is green……

CRASH!

My body collided with the vehicle and was thrown into the air. Sharp metal fragments flew up, and my vision turned white.

Strange. I thought I had died.

When I opened my eyes, I was in a different world.

At the same moment, I locked eyes with a man looking at me with an expressionless face.

“……”

Big.

That was my first thought upon seeing him.

A silk shirt showcased his broad shoulders, falling in a soft silhouette, with black pants cinched below. His neat appearance made his physique seem even larger.

“What do you have to say?”

His voice was low and clear, resonating like a well, sending shivers down my spine.

“What do I have to say…?”

“Yes, let’s hear it.”

Ah. I could tell exactly what this situation was.

I nodded carefully toward the seemingly arrogant man and respectfully folded my hands as if praying.

The man’s long eyes narrowed slightly as he watched me.

“I repent.”

“…What.”

“Please forgive all my sins. I wish I could tell you all the sins I’ve committed, but I just arrived here and I’m completely disoriented. Though honestly, I didn’t live a particularly sinful life. Really.”

The impassive-faced man slightly furrowed his brow. He didn’t like my answer.

“No, you’re right. I am a sinner. Of course. Why wouldn’t I have committed the sins that all humans commit? I repent. I’ll reflect like this. I’ll live with remorse. Now, where am I headed? Heaven?”

The man with the unreadable expression pressed his lips firmly together.

“Don’t tell me… h*ll?”

It was a short life, but I tried so hard!

As I looked at him with a resentful face, suddenly feeling wronged, he abruptly turned to look beside him.

In the direction he looked, quite a few people were standing.

They must be waiting their turn for judgment, like me.

“Did she come here in her sleep?”

At the man’s question, everyone looked at me with puzzled expressions.

What’s going on? This seemed too real to be the afterlife, and the man before me, as well as those standing over there, appeared too vivid.

As I discreetly rolled my eyes to survey my surroundings, I noticed something odd about everyone’s clothing. They all resembled costumes from Western TV shows.

Could they all be living people?

Thinking it might be rude for those people to overhear, I leaned forward and lowered my voice to ask the man opposite me:

“Can you see me?”

“I can.”

“Look, I don’t mean to be rude to someone I’ve just met, but I was definitely hit by a dump truck. It was a traffic accident. Can you perhaps see ghosts? You seem to be alive, or rather, living. Though you do look a bit old-fashioned.”

“…Old-fashioned, what?”

“Oh, is this like a drama set or something?”

“…What are you talking about?”

“Then where am I?”

The man, who had been staring down at me as I whispered, let out a faintly annoyed sound and leaned deeper into his chair.

“If you’re playing games, stop it.”

“Excuse me?”

“You look crazy enough already.”

No, that’s not it—would you just listen to me? As I hurriedly waved my hands in the air, there was a knock and the door opened.

A woman entered pushing a trolley, and a middle-aged man who had been standing among the people glancing at me approached us.

“May I prepare the tea, my lady?”

The middle-aged man with neat brown hair streaked with gray asked politely.

“My… lady?”

“Yes, my lady.”

The middle-aged man nodded and turned around to explain.

On the trolley the woman had brought in was a tea set.

“This is the tea that you’ve specially procured for His Highness, who has returned after a long time.”

What is all this about?

Ignoring my reaction, the woman who had pushed the trolley began to neatly place teacups on the table with precise movements.

Unable to understand what was happening, I instinctively looked at the man across from me for help, but his gaze was so intimidating that my eyes automatically lowered again.

I wasn’t exactly afraid, but he seemed somewhat… difficult to face.

That’s when I noticed his arm was wrapped in bandages.

“Oh? You’ve injured your arm?”

When I asked, the man across from me studied my face as if to verify my intentions.

He seemed to be asking why I would ask such a question.

Sensing I should read the room and grasp the heavy atmosphere, I quickly closed my mouth.

Just then, the woman who had placed the tea set and food on the table stepped back.

“It’s a flower that blooms only once every hundred years and is difficult to obtain. I was amazed that you managed to procure it.”

The middle-aged man standing beside the table extended his arm to pour the tea himself.

A flower that blooms once every hundred years? Wait, this sounds familiar.

“That tea’s name is…”

“Lamberoo tea, of course. Didn’t you instruct us to prepare this? This is the first time in my life I’ve seen this tea with my own eyes, and it’s thanks to you, my lady.”

The middle-aged man smiled kindly as he finished pouring tea into the man’s cup across from me and began pouring into mine.

Lamberoo? Could it be the lamberoo tea from the novel “Emilia Loves a Bad Man”?

I remembered this word clearly because it appeared in the novel I was reading just before I died.

Moreover, that tea—laced with poison—was the catalyst for all events in the story and was mentioned frequently.

“We’ll take our leave now. Please enjoy your conversation.”

Before I could gather my thoughts, the middle-aged man bowed respectfully and walked toward the door, followed by everyone else in the room.

This is bad! If this is the Lamberoo tea from the novel, it contained a powerful sleeping drug—a poison.

After drinking that sleeping drug, the Grand Duke would lose consciousness and be murdered.

By his wife.

And they just called me “my lady”… which means that’s me.

In the novel, the grand duchess murdered her husband and was publicly executed on the guillotine.

Her head was chopped off on the guillotine! Huh?!

“Eek!”

Just as the handsome man across from me was about to lift his teacup, I screamed and flailed my hands.

CRASH!

The teacup fell from his hand and shattered on the carpet.

After looking down at the tea soaking into the carpet, the Grand Duke’s gaze traveled back up to me.

“What are you doing?”

The man asked with his handsome brow furrowed.

What should I say now?

That tea is poisoned.

And apparently I’m the one who prepared it.

I’m not the criminal, but the woman who was in this body before me did it!

Wouldn’t that sound crazy to anyone who heard it?

But regardless of how I explained it, if that man died in this situation, I would certainly be the murderer. That would be too unfair!

Holding onto the man’s large hand, I struggled to speak.

“Run away.”