/
Emma grabbed the shaking fingers and crouched down. She felt unsteady.
She had gotten herself into trouble by entering the shadow of the Bolsheik family.
She hoped to live a normal life without being noticed or chased.
She couldn’t explain why the young lady had taken interest in her, but now she was in the spotlight and her past would inevitably be uncovered, something she desperately wanted to avoid.
Emma, chewing on the inside of her cheek, closed and opened her eyes.
She hadn’t made a decision yet but knew she had to disappear.
As she stood up, she jumped at a sudden knock.
Her heart pounding, she sighed deeply at the sound of her colleague’s voice.
“Emma, the butler told you to move the room. It’s near the room where milady is staying, so get rid of everything you’re using now,” the colleague said.
“Yes, I’ll be there shortly,” Emma replied and got up immediately.
She laughed bitterly, realizing she had nothing to get rid of since everything she was using was either paid for by the duke’s house or provided by her colleagues.
She had nothing of her own, not even a personal belonging to bring with her.
As she looked around the room she had grown attached to, she grabbed the door handle and stepped out, feeling like her life as Emma was coming to an end.
The door closed with a thud behind her, and she walked away as if she were being pursued.
Do they say trouble comes in threes?
Emma was walking down a deserted side road where outsiders sometimes passed with materials, trying to avoid her colleagues, when a stranger suddenly appeared in front of her.
“Hello,” he said.
“Hello,” she replied, cautious but not suspicious enough to think he would harm her right away.
She tried to pass him politely, but he grabbed her wrist.
Emma took a deep breath to yell for help, but stopped herself.
“You’re Becky, right?” the man asked with a smirk, recognizing her despite her attempts at denial.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Becky replied, trying to sound confident.
“Oh, come now. Don’t pretend. I’m talking about Lady Baroness Becky Graham,” the man continued.
But Becky didn’t give in.
“I’m telling you, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said, trying to hide the fear in her voice. The man chuckled.
“Well, I didn’t expect you to admit it, but it’s no matter. You see, I have something here that will make you talk,” he said as he took out a half-burned necklace from his pocket. Becky’s expression changed as soon as she saw the necklace.
It was a powerful reminder of her past, and she struggled to maintain her composure.
“That’s… No way,” she stammered, unable to hide her shock.
“Oh, but it is. This is your mother’s necklace. The one she held onto until the very end, when you ran from the burning house,” the man continued, relishing in Becky’s distress.
Becky was speechless, her mind consumed by the memories and emotions the necklace evoked.
The man had struck a nerve, and she could feel her resolve crumbling.
A voice that could not be heard from the necklace on the man’s rough palm struck Becky’s ear like thunder.
– I’m your mother! You can’t abandon me! Come back! Come back! Becky! Becky!
Emma, no, when Becky was confronting her past, Lyna also faced the past, the past before regressing.
“Her name was Becky,”
Lyna said with a sigh.
Her aide, who was handing over some documents, looked at her in confusion.
“Milady?”
“Leave me alone,”
Lyna said, dismissing the aide with a wave of her hand.
She leaned back in her chair, deep in thought.
“There’s more to Becky’s story than meets the eye,” Lyna muttered to herself.
A servant who moved as Jane’s limbs in the past before regressing and in the future that has not yet come.
Jane must have something unrivaled, unlike her usual appearance.
Naturally, Lyna had no intention of using Becky as her limbs like Jane.
She just wanted to get out of where she was right now, do nothing, just breathe.
In order to do that, she will have to avoid the annoying things that will happen after Jane reaches out to Becky.
“No, if I don’t do anything, I would have nothing to do with Jane…… Hmm… That can’t be true.”
Has her life ever gone the way she wanted it to?
“Should I rather move the opposite way of what I want to?”
Lyna, who uttered a silly hypothesis, soon let out a light sigh.
She has already realized that her terrible “luck” doesn’t fall for such shallow tricks because of the countless experiments and failures before regressing.
One lifetime experience of investing emotions, time, and effort into fruitless endeavors, leading to frustration, desperation, and finally, anger and outbursts, was sufficient.
“Anyway, I’ll have to keep her close to me for now.”
She knew that keeping her enemies close was a smart strategy, and so, a small piece of the past that she had previously overlooked began to take shape in Lyna’s present.
The man, who shook the half-burned necklace a couple more times in front of Becky’s eyes, slowly left the duke’s mansion.
He looked up at the sun behind the Duke’s mansion, which had sunk heavily, and soon began to hum and walk.
The leisurely pace gradually accelerated, and the man was running at some point.
After running for a while, when he finally reached his destination, he roughly opened the old door that had been tightly closed.
“Jane! Jane! I’m back!”
Unlike his rough behavior and loud voice, there was only endless joy and pride in his eyes.
A quiet voice rang from the inside of the shabby but clean house at his call.
“Hans, I told you.”
Hans nodded at the words of a person who was not even seen and shrunk his thick shoulders.
“Sorry, I’ll be quiet.”
It was not long before Jane appeared from inside the dim house.
She gestured to Hans with the same calm expression as when she met Lyna, Ainar, and Smith in the temple.
“Come and sit down for now.”
Hans, who sat quietly like an obedient dog following Jane’s gesture, looked enthusiastic to speak.
But Jane just slowly picked up the cup in front of her and took a sip and savored it.
She seldom gave him permission to speak.
When about half the tea was left in Jane’s teacup…
“How did it go?”
Only then Jane’s permission was granted, and Hans twinkled his eyes and laid out his conversation with Becky in great detail.
“I told her I’d be back in two days and asked her to make sure to set up a place for a duke’s servant in the hunting competition. She doesn’t have a choice anyway,”
“Yes, as long as the permit is in my hands before the hunting competition.”
“Oh, that hunting contest.”
“What?”
“A talkative hunter who buys arrows from me said that there will be great prey this time. It’ll be dangerous……”
“What’s there to be dangerous? Hans will make me a weapon to protect me, right?”
Hans had no choice but to nod toward Jane, who was smiling calmly, the smile which cut off his denial, rejection, and even anxiety.
“Well…. Of course, no beast can hurt you.”
“Yes, I believe in you.”
Hans smiled when he saw her with a light smile, but distracted by the smile, he couldn’t see her eyes that didn’t smile.
“By the way… Did you say …. Becky”