Episode 16: Empire (4)
Sylvia Baltazar was furious. She’d just heard that the good-for-nothing bastard she thought had died on the northern front was alive and back.
“Is it true? That bastard’s alive?” she demanded.
“Well… his appearance has changed, but it’s definitely the young master.” a servant replied.
“How the hell is he alive when he was supposed to be dead?”
“I don’t know the details…”
“Damn it. I knew he wouldn’t die so easily. He’s probably scheming something shitty again.”
It had been eleven years since she last faced her so-called “Blood relative.” They say a decade changes everything, but her memories of him remained unchanged—sharpened, if anything, over time. Every recollection of him was nothing but bad.
“What’s that bastard’s goal? Why return to the family after eleven years?”
“I heard he came to see the count…”
Her father, unconscious due to his worsening illness?
The fact that this deadbeat, absent for eleven years, showed up the moment her father fell ill—what did it mean?
Why would the sole heir of the Baltazar family return now?
Sylvia pieced together his motives from her memories of his past actions.
A madman who threw wild parties with prostitutes and ran a drug cartel with other nobles—
“—That damn lunatic!”
He was planning to inherit the family when her father died. That bastard, who hadn’t shown his face for eleven years! The realization made something snap in Sylvia’s head. Swallowing her boiling rage, she stormed forward.
Maids were gathered around her father’s room, where That bastard of a brother was.
Most were women, with male servants standing back. Before she could question it, Sylvia barged in.
“Move.”
No laughter or conversation came from the room.
Oddly, the maids’ expressions went beyond mere caution.
Some blushed, others fidgeted nervously, avoiding her gaze. Sylvia frowned.
‘…What’s with this atmosphere?’
It wasn’t the chaotic return of a deadbeat she’d imagined.
It was as if he’d come back not as a troublemaker but as something more complex.
Sylvia flung open the door.
The first thing she saw was a well-built man sitting with his back to her.
His muscles, visible through his clothing, seemed almost alive.
He gazed calmly at her unconscious father, his presence somehow alien.
Sylvia froze mid-step, glancing back at the servants by the door.
“…Is that him?”
A new maid, face flushed, nodded.
“Y-Yes, that’s him. The head butler said it’s Young Master Ian… is it true?”
Sylvia narrowed her eyes, staring at the man’s back.
It wasn’t the silhouette of the Blood relative she remembered.
That one was scrawny, untrained, without a trace of muscle.
Could this man really be him? Then, without turning, he spoke.
“You’re alive.”
His familiar voice rang in her ears, blending the gentle tone from their childhood with the cruel one that once called her a mongrel and told her to get lost. Sylvia’s face contorted.
“Fuck, What the hell are you?”
Her Blood relative—Ian—turned to look at her. His wolf-like, fierce eyes met hers.
Though scars marked his lips and eyebrows, traces of the pretty boy from eleven years ago lingered faintly.
He was still infuriatingly handsome. A stifled gasp—not quite a scream—escaped the maids behind her.
Sylvia shot them a murderous glare.
“Oh, haha… I just remembered some unfinished work, so I’ll—” one stammered.
“M-Me too…!”
“Let’s go together!”
The servants scattered instantly. As silence returned, Sylvia glared at Ian.
“What the hell? Why are you back? Why didn’t you just die out there? Why the hell are you here?”
Ian shrugged nonchalantly.
“I just came to check if Count Baltazar and you were still alive.”
“If you’re after the family head position, don’t even dream of it. That seat’s not for trash who’ve been gone for eleven years.”
Surprised, Ian studied her face for a moment before letting out a chuckle. Sylvia’s rage surged uncontrollably.
“Don’t laugh, you bastard! You hear Father’s dying and show up after eleven years to pick up scraps?”
“I have zero interest in the family head position. Like I said, I just came to check if you were alive.”
“—That’s the damn problem, you asshole! Check if we’re alive? Are you advertising you sent assassins or something?!”
Ian waved his hand, exasperated. As Sylvia, seething, reached to grab his shoulder, something rising from him choked her breath.
—Killing intent.
More precisely, the mere turn of his head froze the room’s air solid.
What he exuded wasn’t killing intent or hostility.
It was simply the natural presence of someone who’d survived slaughtering monsters in the north.
A human whose every breath carried the weight of hundreds of deaths.
That aura filled the room like liquid in a tank.
Sylvia felt as if an invisible hand gripped her throat, her breath catching. Her heart pounded wildly, her stomach churned.
“Ugh…!”
Her legs gave out, and she collapsed to her knees.
Unable to breathe, she coughed, retching.
Tears and saliva mixed, streaming down her cheeks.
The maids, watching from hiding, gasped in muffled shock.
Sylvia couldn’t even lift her head, her body trembling like prey before a beast.
Ian turned to her quietly, his wolf-like eyes devoid of emotion.
He patted her shoulder with a casual hand.
“No need to be nervous. I didn’t send assassins. There’s no reason to. And I don’t need the family head position either.”
Without further response, Ian left the room.
Just before exiting, he tossed out, as if an afterthought,
“By the way, I’m not Baltazar anymore. I’m Valencia. Call me Duke Valencia if we meet again.”
As he exited, whispers spread among the remaining servants.
“I heard he was a good-for-nothing. What happened to him? Is that really the same person?”
“He didn’t seem like a former degenerate at all. Did he undergo some kind of secluded training?”
“I heard he came from the north.”
Pride, anger, and tangled emotions surged to Sylvia’s throat.
‘…That’s really Ian? How could that lunatic—'
The realization hit her: the war hero from the north, granted the title of a duke, was named Ian.
***
‘Why did she suddenly throw up?’
Kneeling out of nowhere, vomiting—my sister was something else.
‘They say siblings are alike. One’s a degenerate, the other… total failure. What a mess.’
Walking the streets after leaving the estate, I sank into thought.
Unlike the original story, Sylvia and Tirian were alive and well.
Tirian was unconscious due to illness, and Sylvia, unscathed by being stuffed alive, was acting as the family head.
In the game, Tirian, driven mad by his wife’s death to a monsters, began experimenting with monsters to revive her.
His obsession turned him crazier, eventually transforming everyone in the estate—family and servants—into monsters. This was a side quest, an inevitable event no matter what.
‘Has the original story been distorted? No… that word doesn’t feel quite right.’
The emperor, the Sword Saint, and other key NPCs had drastically changed appearances.
Most became more attractive, and the emperor even switched genders.
No butterfly effect from my time in the north could explain this.
Add the fact that the Baltazar estate was still intact, and it raised the possibility that this world wasn’t the one I knew.
Yet, my experiences in the north contradicted that.
If this wasn’t the game’s world, what were the monsters I faced and killed there?
Conflicting contradictions negated every possibility. What was this world I’d transmigrated into?
Lost in thought as I headed home, a shadow flickered in a dark alley. It rippled, taking form under the light. A tall man in a black long coat emerged.
“Duke Valencia.”
A handsome man with striped black-and-white hair stood there. As a sense of déjà vu hit me, he continued.
“Her Majesty has prepared to open the Imperial Blood Vault. Come to the palace at once.”
His words triggered recognition. I knew who he was. That distinctive checkered hairstyle marked him as a key figure in the game.
Walter Gernhardt.
The empire’s third Aura user and head of the imperial intelligence agency—a specialist in eliminating high-ranking nobles. But there was one problem.
‘Why’s he a pretty boy now? What’s the standard here?’
Walter Gernhardt was a middle-aged man in the game, with advanced M-shaped baldness. He wasn’t some young heartthrob from a romance fantasy. It’s not like I installed a rofan mod.
(TL Note: Rofan “로판” (ro-pan) is short for “romance fantasy,” a popular Korean genre blend of romance and fantasy.)
Peak as always I love how serious the novel feels even while being a otome lmao
ReplyDeleteThanks for the chapter!!!!!!
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