Instead of the Heroine, I Married the Male Lead

 

“Miss, here you go.”

I received the orange juice that Sophia handed me.

As always, Uncle’s orange juice was delicious.

Sophia hesitated for a moment, then offered the orange juice to the person standing beside us.

“Um, Sir Knight… Would you like some?”

“No, thank you. I prefer not to do anything else while on duty, so you can ignore me.”

“Oh, I see…”

Sophia quickly moved next to me and whispered softly.

“But how can you ignore someone so huge?”

I whispered back to her.

“Exactly.”

Sophia and I glanced at the man beside us at the same time.

He was Jake, who had become my escort knight since yesterday. He will not follow me around all the time, only when I go out.

Kaien had asked how I felt about having him around, and I didn’t refuse.

“I feel like the knight will stand out too much so even if that woman is here, she might try to run away.”

“It’s fine. Sir Jake is faster than Nadia. We can just have him catch her if she tries to escape, right?”

“That’s true? As expected, you’re very smart, Miss.”

It had already been three days since we drove Emon away.

He hadn’t come back, but somehow, it didn’t feel like he would easily let go. For some reason, Emon wanted me to come back.

‘Does he think I’m crazy enough to go back?’

I felt like splitting Emon’s head open just to see what was inside.

I couldn’t understand what kind of mindset made him think I’d leave Kaien and go to him.

‘He was always a bit foolish, but not to this extent.’

It seemed that after falling for Nadia, Emon’s head had turned into a bit of a flower garden as well.

Shaking my head, I refocused on what I was doing.

‘I wonder if we won’t find Nadia today either.’

With sharp eyes, I scanned the square, looking around.

There were still a lot of people in the square, but I was confident I could spot Nadia right away. We weren’t extremely close, but I had seen her often over the past few years.

I had tried contacting Count Alice’s household, but all my messages were returned, so I had no way of knowing. Kaien offered to send someone to the Count’s house if I was really curious, but I declined.

Searching the square like this had become a kind of therapy for me.

Besides, I wasn’t that curious anyway.

“Boss!”

At the sudden call, I turned my head and saw Harnen, cloaked in a robe.

“Harnen?”

It was almost the first time I’d seen him outside the office in broad daylight, so my eyes widened in surprise.

In the meantime, Harnen, holding his uncle’s orange juice in his hand, sat down awkwardly beside me.

“Harnen, it’s been a while.”

“Hi, Sophia.”

“How did you know I was here? And is it okay for you to be outside now?”

“I’ve been practicing coming out every evening since that day. I saw you from the window and asked the uncle, and he told me, “

Still, Harnen rubbed his sweaty palms on his robe, seemingly nervous about being in a place with so many people.

“By the way, who’s the man standing next to you?”

Harnen looked Jake up and down, who stood perfectly straight without a hint of movement.

“Ah, my escort knight. It’s Sir Jake.”

“Did your fiancé assign him to you?”

“Yeah.”

Harnen then turned to look at me.

“By the way, why haven’t you been coming by lately?”

“Emon came to see me.”

“What?!”

Harnen shouted in surprise and stood up from his seat.

I grabbed his robe and pulled him back down.

“Isn’t it still hard for you to deal with people’s gazes? Everyone in the square is looking at you right now.”

“Is that really important right now? That moldy guy came back?”

“Yeah, about a week ago.”

“And what did he say? Did he apologize? Did he say he was sorry?”

“Right? That would be the normal reaction.”

“He didn’t apologize?”

“No. Do you know what he said to me? He told me he wasn’t in that kind of relationship with Nadia, that I shouldn’t misunderstand, and asked me to come back.”

“What a crazy guy.”

“It seems like he’s really lost it. He was always a bit dumb, but not this bad.”

Harren let out a series of disbelieving “hahs” and snorted in disgust.

“Why does he think you would return to him? Maybe if it were me, I could understand.”

“Yeah, if I had to choose between Emon and you, I’d choose you. Even if I were reborn as an ant, I wouldn’t go to him.”

“If you’re reborn as an ant, I’ll take good care of you.”

“I’d probably get crushed to death under the stuff you never clean up. Did you clean your office or not?”

At my question, Harnen suddenly stammered and turned his head away.

“I told you to clean up!”

“I will.”

“When?”

“Have you been saving up your nagging? You’re nagging more than usual.”

“If you listened to me, I wouldn’t have to keep saying the same thing every time.”

“Oh, man. I shouldn’t have come out.”

Harnen stood up and headed straight for the office.

I yelled after his retreating figure.

“If it’s still the same next time, I’ll move the office to a pigsty!”

At that, Harnen quickened his pace and dashed into the office.

“Ugh, he’s older than me, but when will he ever mature?”

“Well, you’re pretty mature for your age, and Harnen is a bit childish.”

“Is it because he has a long lifespan that he matures late?”

No matter how I thought about it, that was the only explanation that made sense.

“Ah, that could be it. As expected, Miss, you’re really smart.”

“What’s so smart about that?”

“No, it’s more like… you think of things that others can’t.”

“Is that a compliment?”

Sophia smiled without answering and took a sip of her orange juice.

Just then, Jake suddenly blocked my path.

He hadn’t moved an inch since arriving at the square over an hour ago. Confused by his behavior, I turned my head.

Someone had approached me.

It was hard to see their face through the parasol, but their walk told me who it was.

“Philome, it’s been a while, hasn’t it?”

“…Marchioness Kevan.”

It was Emon’s mother, the Marchioness of Kevan.

 

☪︎ ִ ࣪𖤐 𐦍 ☾𖤓 ☪︎ ִ ࣪𖤐 𐦍 ☾𖤓

 

An awkward silence hung in the air.

While the Marchioness savored her tea, I was looking down at my teacup.

“I sent you several letters. Did you not receive them?”

“I haven’t received a single letter.”

In my words, the Marchioness’s eyebrows twitched.

“Why not?”

“There are quite a few people who reach out to me, digging up our old ties for their own benefit.”

“Are you saying that’s me?”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Ha…”

The Marchioness trembled slightly as she set her teacup down.

Then, folding her arms, she stared at me.

“You’ve become the fiancée of the Duke of Wintebel, and now you’re acting so haughty. You don’t even recognize the favors you’ve been given.”

“…Favors? Did I receive any favors from you, Marchioness?”

I asked out of genuine curiosity.

As far as I remembered, all I had received from her were insults and humiliation.

The Marchioness never approved of my relationship with Emon. She seemed to think that I had manipulated Emon into getting engaged, and she has always been wary of me.

She often summoned me to her house to do menial tasks and errands. What kind of favor did she think she had granted me?

“Who do you think you are, talking back like that? You think just because you’re engaged to Duke Wintbell, you can act out? If the duke gets tired of you, the engagement will end in no time.”

It was true that divorces among the nobility were not uncommon.

But I couldn’t understand why the Marchioness was so confident about it.

“The Duke of Wintebel doesn’t know about you, does he? You may have fooled him with your innocent act, but there are no secrets in this world, Philome.”

Though her words were absurd, the Marchioness’s firm words made me wonder if she knew something about my past with Winston.

‘Her confidence is making me more anxious.’

However, that was an event from ten years ago, and at that time, I had no connection to the Kevan family.

‘What exactly does she know?’

When I didn’t immediately deny it, the Marchioness twisted her lips into a smirk.

“Ah, so you do feel guilty about something? Well, it was foolish of you to think you could wash away your identity with such a sordid past.”

I subtly shifted my gaze to Sophia and Jake, who were sitting at a table a bit farther away.

Sophia was anxiously tapping her foot while looking at me, and Jake was still sitting straight, watching me intently.

He had said that he would come running at the slightest signal from me.

As if to prove that was true, one of Jake’s feet was positioned outward, ready to approach me at any moment.

I turned back to the Marchioness.

“What exactly do you want?”

After Emon left, I had thought about it carefully.

He should have been the one feeling scared. With all the things he had done to me, he should have been worried that I would take revenge with Kaien’s help.

‘Why are both the parent and the child so brazen and shameless?’

Still, the Marchioness was old enough that I expected her to be a little different.

I expected her to at least offer a formal apology.

“So, you’re finally willing to listen.”

The Marchioness lowered her voice.

“Are you sure the Duke of Wintbell really wants you?”

“…Why are you asking me that?”

“Marry Emon. I’ll give you my blessing. I’ll also allow you to live as the Duke’s mistress.”

“…What?”

“I’ll grant all of that, so just give us money. You have to pay for the permission.”

 

TL/N: The whole Kevan family is so dumb! Like really!!!!