Prologue

Daphne let out a quiet, involuntary scoff. The maid who was helping her prepare for her wedding night paused, a look of confusion flickering across her face.

“Are you feeling unwell, Princess?”

Daphne smoothed over her expression with practiced ease, shaking her head and smiling gently.

“I’m fine.”

“Congratulations on your marriage once again, Your Highness!”

The maid whispered brightly, her tone brimming with excitement. It meant the preparations were complete.

Daphne stepped toward the door and drew in a breath, quietly enough that no one would hear.

‘Princess.’

‘Wedding night.’

It was all laughable. She almost snorted in their faces. Instead, she smiled sweetly and waited patiently for the door to open.

At last, the door swung wide open to reveal a darkened room.

She walked inside with slow, measured steps.

“….”

Click.

The moment the door closed behind her, the noise from outside disappeared, replaced by an icy silence. Daphne’s eyes travelled slowly across the room in which she was expected to fulfil the role of this nation’s princess.

She couldn’t remember who she truly was, yet here she was, living as someone else and bound in marriage to a man she barely knew.

The absurdity of it all hit her once again, sharp and suffocating.

On the sofa in the room that had been meticulously prepared for their wedding night sat Oswald Lawrence — famous in newspaper headlines and glorified by an entire nation as a war hero.

And now he was her husband.

A husband who was gazing at her with unfiltered contempt.

“How do you feel?”

His voice dripped with mockery. His hair was damp, as though he had just stepped out of the shower, and he wore only a loosely tied robe. There was no sign of the anticipation, tenderness or excitement that one might expect on a wedding night.

“A woman dragged here as a prisoner of a defeated nation, only to sit at the very top in the end. Hah. People would find it so entertaining if they knew.”

Hatred.

Every word that fell from Oswald’s lips was laced with unmistakable hatred. He tilted his half-finished whisky glass; the ice clinked sharply against the crystal.

“Today is the most disgraceful day of my life.”

“…”

“The day I want erased more than any other.”

His voice, which had once been calm, broke as he forced out each syllable, grinding the words between his teeth.

Thus began a night steeped in contempt.

Chapter 1

Heavy footsteps echoed against the cold stone floor.

Her body felt as though it had been dropped into deep water; it was heavy and sluggish and refused to move.

Roused from sleep, the woman forced herself to sit up, raising eyelids that felt like they weighed a pounds.

A thin sliver of light slipped through a small window high up on the wall.

‘Where was this place?’

She tried to think. She tried to remember. But it was as if someone had scraped her mind clean, leaving behind nothing but an empty, echoing void.

She furrowed her brow, struggling for what felt like an eternity until, finally, one fragile memory surfaced.

Her name was Daphne Winfred. But no matter how hard she tried, she could not remember anything else.

‘What kind of person was I? Why am I locked up in here?’

She looked down at herself.

Her clothes were colorless and worn thin, mere scraps of cotton barely holding together.

Iron shackles clung tightly to her wrists, and the echo of soldiers’ footsteps could be heard coming from beyond the heavy steel door.

It must be a prison.

‘What on earth…?’

She crawled towards the iron door, pressed her ear against it, and strained to hear any sounds from the other side.

Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud.

Footsteps — unusual ones. Heavy. Purposeful. They were growing closer.

Daphne instinctively took a step back from the door.

And at that exact moment—

Bang!

— the door burst open with a violent crash.

“Get out!”

A soldier with a harsh and hostile expression barked an order at her.

Several others in navy uniforms marched in without pause, seized her by the arms, and forced her to her feet.

Their grip was brutal, causing her body to tremble as if she were a scrap of paper in their hands.

Whatever had happened before seemed buried deep in her mind, smeared and distorted like paint smudged across a canvas.

Nothing came back clearly.

She didn’t resist as the soldiers dragged her down the corridor.

The hallway was just as dark and damp.

They stopped before another iron door.

It opened and she was pushed inside.

Sitting behind a two-person wooden desk was a man with his military cap pulled low over his eyes.

Daphne was forced into the chair opposite him.

She wanted to ask where she was, why she had been brought there, and what it all meant. But the room’s suffocating emptiness and oppressive cold made her too afraid to speak.

“Lift your head.”

His voice was quiet, yet he commanded absolute authority.

Daphne lifted her head and looked at him.

With his cap pulled low and the dim light obscuring his features, she couldn’t see his face.

But there was no room for doubt.

The medals across his chest and the stripes on his shoulders made it clear that he was a man of high rank.

“Ugh…”

The moment she heard his voice, a sharp pain stabbed through her temples.

She squeezed her eyes shut and furrowed her brow.

It was a voice she was sure she had never heard before, yet it felt familiar.

In fact, it was so familiar that the fog drifting through her memory suddenly stirred and sharpened around the edges.

This was the great nation of Phozmeri

.

There had been a war.

She was a prisoner, captured in the small kingdom of Astasha.

Fragments — thin, fragile scraps of memory — began to rise to the surface.

It was as if her mind were responding directly to the sound of that man’s voice.

“Daphne Winfred.”

He spoke her name in a low, deliberate tone. From the clarity of that voice alone, Daphne could feel the hatred he held toward her.

“Do you remember anything?”

“…No.”

She answered calmly. But she did not understand why she could comprehend this country’s language—
or why her first words had slipped out naturally in Phozmeri.

“You’re not pretending, are you?”

He slammed his fist down on the desk. The sound was so sudden and loud that the soldiers guarding the room flinched, but Daphne did not. She simply stared back at him, unmoving.

‘I’ve met this man before.’
‘Who is he?’

“I truly remember nothing.”

Silence followed. She could feel his eyes dissecting her.

With a motion of his hand, the soldiers in the room filed out.

Clang—

The iron door slammed shut behind them with a cold, final echo.

They were alone.

A chair scraped against the floor.

A shadow slipped across her vision.

The man walked around the desk, taking measured, deliberate steps, and stopped behind her.

A faint trace of his scent drifted past her nose as though he had leaned in close to her ear.

It was a familiar scent.

Daphne tried to place it.

Someone had once told her that smells linger in the memory longer and more deeply than anything else.

‘Why do you feel familiar to me?’
‘Were we… acquainted?’
‘No. That’s impossible.’

“…Ah!”

A sharp burst of pain shot through her scalp.

He had grabbed her hair without warning and pulled it back forcefully.

Her head snapped back, forcing her to stare up into a pair of icy blue eyes.

Her dark, tangled hair was crushed mercilessly in his fist.

“Keep your eyes wide open and look at me.”

Daphne forced herself to obey.

The room was dim, with shadows pooling in every corner and making it difficult to see.

The pressure on her scalp kept pulling her gaze downwards, but she gritted her teeth and raised her eyes to meet his.

“If you’re lying, remember that I can drag you to the t*rture chamber and drown you without a moment’s hesitation.”

It was a terrifying threat, delivered almost gently.

Hatred — pure and unfiltered — filled his voice. Contempt for Astasha seeped from every syllable.

Daphne nodded wordlessly.

She tried to keep her expression steady, but fear clawed at her.

No matter how hard she tried to stay calm, her mouth felt unbearably dry.

“Miss Winfred.”

“….”

“From now on, you will live as Allen Howard.”

Allen Howard?

A name half-buried in her foggy memories, familiar and unfamiliar all at once. She did not understand what he meant, so she kept quiet. The man continued.

“Everything about this is strictly confidential. Understood?”

“…I will remember.”

She answered reluctantly. She knew nothing—yet she couldn’t dare question him.

The soldier released her hair roughly and returned to his seat.

“If you’re found out, I’ll kill you.”

He spoke again, his voice calm—almost gentle.

“Do you understand how easy it is to take an Astashan’s life here?”

Daphne raised her gaze to look at him.

For the first time, the man’s lips curled faintly upwards. It was a slight, cold smile—as if he were quietly anticipating the day he would kill her.