CH 1

Prologue

As if it had now become a habit, Raeliana McMillan opened the window and stretched her body out the window as soon as she opened her eyes.

Warm sunlight bathed her eyelids, and she could see the Syamcane River flowing gently around the mansion. Across the river were rows of upper-class mansions thoroughly planned as sculptures of beautiful scenery. It was a stunning view worth millions.

How much money her father, Baron Johndein McMillan, lavished in order to purchase the mansion in this sweet location was of tales from bygone days.

Raeliana sat on the stool by the window and gazed blankly into the Syamcane River.

The Syamcane River, which circled once around the capital and swirled inward, was the pride of the capital which was also known as the city of water.

Thousands of tourists visited the city every day to see this river. Even to this day, a painter who painted portraits for tourists and couples had set up the easel by the riverside.

Raeliana rested her chin on her hand and sighed. Even though two months had passed, she realized it once again.

This is not my home.

Han river flowed through the capital of the world she lived in, but rather than overlooking the Han river, her home was now billions of light-years away.

Raeliana McMillan… No, Park Eunha rolled around on the king-size bed, screaming.

”Ah why…!”

Right now, she was inside a world of a novel.

***

On February 18, 2015, Park Eunha died.

Because someone pushed her off the roof.

Even until now, she did not know why she had to die.

It was during the winter, after she took the College Scholastic Ability Test. She had been rejected by all the universities of her choice and had been spending her days commuting to the study hall, waiting desperately for additional admissions.

Feeling restless and unable to focus on her studies, she had gone up to the roof of the study hall, wallowing in the agony and pain of life, when an unknown man started speaking to her.

”Well… Bzzzz…Tss.”

Park Eunha conversed with the man for about three minutes, but all she could remember now was the crackling sound like a broken radio.

She took wild guesses thinking that it may have been due to the shock of getting sent into a novel, but ultimately, she could not figure it out.

She tried to remember the conversation hoping that it might hold some clue. But the man’s voice, his words, and even his face, nothing remained clear in her memories.

All that remained was curiosity and suspicion about the unknown man. And a vague feeling of joy about something.

While she was talking to the man, her phone had vibrated. The call informed her that she had been admitted to the Seoul National University of Education. Overcome with joy, she twirled round and round while holding her phone. That’s when it happened.

Suddenly, she was looking up.

”Huh?”

Her feet rose into the air and vertigo hit her as if she was coming down from the high on a swing. Her shocked eyes saw a man that was smiling.

Even before she could cry out for help, her body plummeted downward. They say you see your life flash by before death. All different kinds of thoughts came to her mind.

Her mother who raised her alone, her brother who was a troublemaker yet had a good heart, friends who were kind and funny, and lastly she thought of……

”Your life is short-lived.”

That’s what the fortune teller had said.

It was when she was nine years old and went to see a fortune teller with her mother.

Her mother, tough like a military general, had flipped the table, barraged the fortune teller with obscenities, and marched out of the room with young Park Eunha. Those words had been stuck in her brain like a small thorn, and then suddenly came out.

Short life it is.

That moment, a light surrounded her body.

And once she opened her eyes, Park Eunha had become Raeliana McMillan.

***

”I brought the water to wash your face, my lady.”

Venia the maid knocked on the door upon hearing Raeliana’s screams.

Raeliana’s strange ritual of screaming every morning had persisted for two months now, but Venia was an experienced maid.

Smiling, she casually let her employer’s eccentricity slip by.

Venia gently brushed Raeliana’s long hair while she washed her face.

Feeling the fluffy towel against her face, Raeliana looked in the mirror.

Fluffy light brown hair to her waist, bright light green eyes, smoothly curved chin with peach-colored cheeks and dainty facial features, she had the looks to draw attention even in the capital city full of beautiful women.

It feels strange even if I look at it everyday.

The face she had known for the past twenty years had changed, so obviously, two months would not have been enough time for her to adjust.

But fortunately, she felt that a beautiful face like this was worth millions of strange moments a day.

Raeliana McMillan was beautiful to that extent.

”You should go eat.”

As she was examining her own face, she heard Venia’s words and nodded.

”Okay.”

When she headed toward the dining room on the ground floor, her father, Johndein McMillan, folded the newspaper and greeted her from the drawing room.

”Did you sleep well, Raelie?”

”Father…”

As Johndein stretched his arms out, Raeliana hesitantly approached him for a hug. He kissed her cheeks and led her to the dining room.

”Raeliana!”

Her little sister Rosemary, who had been sitting at the table swinging her fork, ran toward Raeliana’s legs.

Raeliana picked up Rosemary and walked to the table.

”Rose, I told you not to run around with the fork! Keep your manners!”

Hands on her waist, Katie, her mother, scolded Rosemary in a stern voice.

”Raelie, I also told you not to coddle her so much.”

”Madame, please come sit before the food gets cold.”

Johndein said gently while pulling out the chair and inviting Katie to sit.

”You are too soft.”

Katie chided with a smile.

Raeliana took the fork from Rosemary, who was babbling about how she dreamt of flying through the sky last night, and sat down at the table.

The atmosphere at the table was very warm and friendly. The reason Park Eunha from Korea could so quickly adapt to being Raeliana in the novel was because of how considerate the McMillans were.

Though two months was not enough time to accept them as her true family but it was enough to have them closer to heart.

They calmed and comforted their distraught daughter who was confused about everything overnight, ordered everything in the mansion to be met to her needs, and took care of her sincerely.

Thanks to their efforts, the longing for the previous world or the apprehension about the current one had subsided significantly.

”So this contract…”

”John, please don’t talk about work at the breakfast table. You agree with me, don’t you Raelie?”

As Katie asked, Raeliana nodded while munching on the greens served on an ornate plate.

Raeliana McMillan was the eldest daughter of Baron McMillan.

Johndein McMillan, the head of the house, had hit the riches with the oil business and the House of McMillan was what one would call the nouveau riche that had acquired the title of baron with their significant wealth.

Nouveau riche or not, it did not bother Raeliana since she had come from the world where riches meant everything.

Rather, she almost felt thankful for reviving from death and gaining a comfortable life of wealth and a warm family.

Park Eunha who became Raelie had initially sighed in relief upon realizing that she had reincarnated as a happy, rich child. Had Raeliana McMillan been a regular person… She must’ve constantly thought about this.

But God had given her one darn short of a straw to draw.

This was the world within a novel and Raeliana McMillan had a very insignificant role.

Even worse, her role was to die in the beginning of the story to prompt the protagonist to return from studying abroad.

Yes, Raeliana McMillan was to soon end her happy, rich and short life.

Raeliana McMillan wants to live.

”Oh, that’s right, Raelie. Lord Brooks is to arrive six o’clock tomorrow.”

Pfft.

Raeliana involuntarily snorted out the tea she had been sipping on after breakfast.

”Wh…why.?”

”What do you mean why? The Royal Ball is tomorrow.”

Francis Brooks. He was Raeliana’s fiance.

The McMillans loved his sturdy shoulders and revered family name of ”Brooks,” but Raeliana hated the crow’s feet that already adorned his young face.

Those wrinkles are because of his flirting glances that he throws all day as if singing a wooing sonata.

Recalling the man’s unctuous smiles, Raeliana clenched her teacup hard enough to break it.

That accursed man.

He was the bane of her life.

The cause of her premature death.

The murderer-to-be of Raeliana McMillan!

“I’ll be up in my room.”

Raeliana put down the cup feebly and trudged to her room.

Concerned voices asking if she felt ill or if she was alright sounded behind her, but she insisted that nothing was of trouble. The McMillans seemed to mistakenly think that she was nervous because of her upcoming wedding.

You could call it the nerves all right, since I’ll die even before the ink on the marriage certificate dries.

For the past month, Raeliana did not just spend her days shedding tears on her pillow and mourning the reality.

First, she wrote down the details of the novel that she could barely remember, clarified the character relationships and the plot, then delved into how Raeliana will meet her death.

Raeliana dies from arsenic poisoning. Even before the ink on the marriage certificate dries, Francis Brooks mixes poison in the tea he brews for her every night.

Having won the trust of the McMillans, Francis Brooks would talk the bereaved family into taking a trip away while he gets on with the plan to get the company under his control.

In the novel, the protagonist would be the one bringing this to light.

As Raeliana McMillan’s friend, the protagonist returns home upon the news of her passing and starts to investigate the truth behind her death.

But if the story were to progress that way, Raeliana would already be dead!

Regardless of the plot of the novel, she had to first break the engagement.

But that was the big problem.

Raeliana’s family loved her, but she could not break the engagement like she would cancel a restaurant reservation because she ”felt that way” or ”did not like him anymore.”

Because the marriage between the nobles was an agreement of the two families, one side could not simply break off the engagement. Especially for the McMillans, such customs were even more binding.

Although the glories of the past were gone, the House of Brooks still held prestige as nobles. They had connections to many high ranking nobles and could retaliate in any unpredictable manner.

And also, it wasn’t like she could go around screaming saying ”That’s the bastard! That bastard will kill me!” and such like some fortune-teller with powers from God.

Since, even in a world where magic had developed superior to science, mental illnesses still existed and so did asylums.

To think that it was normal to shoot flames from her hand, but to be treated as mentally ill if she revealed that her fiance will kill her, as per the novel… That was a sad reality.

She needed a good reason in order to fairly break up with the man.

No matter what Raeliana does, Francis Brooks will go forward with the wedding. So she had to anger him as much as possible to act violently or forcefully.

If so, she could probably use this as an excuse to break the engagement on the grounds that she could not possibly live with such a coercive husband.

Thus, Raeliana had four meetings with Francis Brooks.