Chapter 005
It had begun to rain outside.
The dwarf led the man out, a chain fastened around his neck like a common beast, and handed the end of it to Alfredo. Alfredo took the chain, hesitating for a moment before he spoke as if he could no longer contain his indignation.
“This is truly wrong. I will report this to the Count. Buying people—no matter how much of a princess you claim to be, this is strictly prohibited by Imperial law!”
It was absurd. Louisa must have been a truly terrible person for a servant in a rigid class society to address his master’s fiancé so rudely.
I frowned. “You’re getting cocky, Alfredo.”
Alfredo muttered, looking slightly cowed. “Is buying people ever a good thing…?”
“Whether you take the carriage back first or not is up to you. But before that, remove that chain. I don’t have the strength to do it myself.”
I tossed the key I had received from the dwarf to Alfredo. He caught it, his expression shifting to one of embarrassment.
“You’re… releasing him?”
“What, did you expect me to drag him home like a dog?”
The next Emperor of this Empire? The thought was crazy enough already. As Alfredo grumbled, “You shouldn’t do this,” I watched as he undid the shackles, revealing the man’s gaunt, battered frame.
The first things I noticed were the wounds—horrible, gaping gashes that looked like they were delivered by a whip tipped with metal.
Leo Pier. He was originally the First Prince of this Empire. That was until the previous Emperor died suddenly and his brother, Callinan, seized the throne instead of the Emperor’s son. To deflect suspicion of assassination, Callinan declared Leo the Crown Prince.
But as Leo grew older and more like his late father, Callinan’s guilt turned into madness. Fearing Leo would eventually kill him, Callinan decided to strike first on the night his own queen gave birth to a son. Realizing the danger, Leo fled the castle. He was only ten years old.
“You… how old are you?” I asked.
Leo raised his head. Jet-black hair, golden eyes—everything was exactly as the novel described. In the original story, these whip marks were already scars when Louisa met him. That would have made him twenty.
He was nineteen now. He had met me a year earlier than in the original timeline.
Suddenly, Leo’s body collapsed. I looked down at him as he rolled in the mud. Even if he was the protagonist, I had no intention of helping him up. Still, my life depended on him.
Just as I reached out a hand, Leo forced himself to sit up. His entire body was trembling, but his spirit refused to break.
“Nineteen,” he answered.
In the original, he spent that extra year rotting in bars. Perhaps meeting me early would change Louisa’s fate of being executed in the street. I squatted down in front of him, and his golden eyes flared with a lethal light. I stared back as if looking into a mirror.
Louisa, being driven to the stake, must have had that same look. A pride that refuses to bow even before death.
‘Everything beautiful is mine.’
I admit it—reading the novel, I actually valued the villainess’s pride. Perhaps that’s what led to this possession. Regardless, this nineteen-year-old protagonist had a face that exceeded my expectations.
“The age is just right.”
“What are you saying—?” Alfredo asked, confused.
I grabbed Leo’s chin. He bared his teeth as if he might bite me.
“I like your face,” I said.
“…What?” Leo looked at me as if I were insane.
“I like your pronunciation, your vocalization, and the look in your eyes.”
He suited Romeo far better than the novel’s cover art.
“I’ve found you. My Romeo.”
I smiled brightly at him. The stage would be the thing to lift us both out of this hell.
* * *
“So, the Princess bought a man?”
Arno signed his documents without a hint of disturbance while listening to Alfredo’s report. It was a familiar pattern. She had sold her grandfather’s sword only to waste the money on a whim.
Management? Please.
“Yes. However—”
“Alfredo.” Arno lifted his face, his purple eyes devoid of emotion. Alfredo tensed instinctively. He looked just like the previous head of the merchant guild.
Years ago, when the previous head ordered the engagement between Arno and the Princess, he had said with that same blank expression:
> ‘Get engaged. We will proceed if it proves profitable when the time comes for marriage.’
>
And a nine-year-old Arno had asked: ‘What are the benefits for me?’
The father had smiled, amazed. ‘I will give you 30% of the profits Dience receives through the Dukedom.’
‘40%.’
‘35%. Not a penny more.’
‘Deal.’
It was a cold transaction between father and son. Alfredo had been astonished then, but now he thought of the Princess—only eight years old at the time—who was also just an object in that deal.
> ‘Even with a mask, everyone knows who I am. The whole Empire is anxious to bite me.’
>
Perhaps the people around her had molded her into someone who only saw the world in terms of buying, selling, and owning, because they only ever saw her value, never her.
Alfredo, feeling a pang of sympathy, was interrupted by Arno’s cold voice. “Enough. If she wants to buy the man jewelry, lend her the money and record it in the ledger. There is still more money coming from the auction, so—”
“No, that’s not it. She doesn’t want to buy him jewelry,” Alfredo bit his lip. “She says she wants him to be an actor.”
Arno frowned. What nonsense was this? Commoner actors were ten a penny; why buy a slave for such a thing? Another excuse, he thought.
“She has already taken him to the theater to practice,” Alfredo added quickly. “She’s even finished casting the others. I think—”
“Just say it,” Arno snapped.
Alfredo took a deep breath. “The maid overheard her that night. While treating his wounds, the Princess told him he could perform in the play if he wished, but if not… she would let him go.”
“Let him go?” Arno’s eyebrows twitched. “After spending that much money? What kind of trick is this?”
“Maybe it isn’t a trick,” Alfredo recalled the look in Louisa’s eyes when she asked the man his age. “Perhaps the Princess saw herself in him? Both of them… cast aside and sold like her grandfather’s belongings.”
Arno fell silent as Alfredo bowed and left the office.
Abandoned and sold.
The Count pondered those words before picking up the script the Princess had left behind.
<Romeo and Juliet>
A woman forced into an unwanted marriage by her family.
‘Surely… this isn’t your own story, Louisa?’
* * *
“Ah.”
“Ah…”
“Ah!”
“Ah…”
I glared at Leo Pier. He was standing with terrible posture, doing a miserable job with his vocal exercises.
“Vocalization is the key to delivering lines! If the audience can’t hear you, they can’t evaluate your acting!”
I was starting to see red. I was Shin Geum, a star director. Back in New York, not even Broadway veterans dared to slack off in front of me.
“Master,” Leo said, rubbing his head while maintaining his slouch.
“I told you not to call me ‘Master.’ It sounds indecent.”
“It is an indecent relationship. You bought me. I’m yours.”
I was speechless. It had been a week since I bought him, treated his wounds, fed him, and finally made him look human. During that week, I had been clear: ‘If you don’t want to be an actor, I’ll release you.’
I didn’t want the future Emperor’s hatred. But he had looked at me with those strange golden eyes and insisted: ‘I’m going to work hard, Master.’
I should have expected this. He had heard my reputation—the profane, extravagant Princess. He was likely just playing along until he found a chance to escape.
“Didn’t you buy me because you wanted me?” Leo approached me, his golden eyes sparkling with a dangerous intensity. “There’s no need for this ‘acting’ charade. Even if I’m not an actor, I am yours. My mouth…”
He leaned in closer. “You can kiss it if you want.”
It was a ‘seduction’ attempt by someone who looked like he was about to kiss the most disgusting thing on earth. Even while gambling with his life, he couldn’t drop his pride. Typical Leo Pier.
“You are, without a doubt, Romeo.”
“What, Master?”
I shoved his chest and went to sit in the box seats. “Angry people’s voices are heard easily because they use abdominal breathing naturally. If you get into the emotion, the vocalization follows. Now, open the script.”
I looked at him. “Tell me, you insolent slave. What did you feel when you read this?”
If the future Emperor wanted to be called a slave for now, I’d indulge him.
“A traditional love story?” Leo asked with disdain. “If you want to kiss me, just say so. You’re making me the male lead and you’re the female lead, right?”
I chuckled. He was indeed my Romeo. And I was this damned Juliet. It was ironic to think he would kill me in the future, but I saw the truth in his eyes.
“No. You read something else in this script.”
I liked the arrogance in his eyes. I liked the fact that he wanted to seduce me while hating me.
“A man who has lived under the name Montague his whole life, but refuses to be defined by it. A rebellious love against the old people who hinder his ambition.”
I smiled bitterly, pointing at him. “You read your own story in Romeo, didn’t you? Slave.”
Just as I read Juliet’s story, so did he.
