IMYL 10

Chapter: 10

I was out in the potato fields from dawn when a kitchen maid came running toward me.

“Miss, what should we do?!”

She blinked rapidly, making a huge fuss.

“I went to the greengrocer on Jezel Street, but the ingredients are ridiculously expensive! They suddenly raised the price of strawberries to five times yesterday’s price! Strawberries were already expensive to begin with!”

Instability in the warp network meant instability in distribution.

And it wasn’t just the warps. Monsters would soon start appearing along the borders of the territory as well. In other words, soaring food prices were practically inevitable.

It’s starting already…

At least I’d been lucky enough to secure seed potatoes as quickly as possible.

In a month and a half, the young potatoes will be ready to harvest.

Potatoes were a vital source of carbohydrates and vitamin C.

I handed over the last of my emergency funds to her and said,

“Martha, there’s something you need to buy immediately.”

I had been waiting for this moment—when the distribution network began to wobble. There was something that could be bought cheaply by driving the price down now.

I already secured enough grain from the grain merchant. Even with more people, we can hold out for a month.

I had just finished giving Martha her instructions when—

“Miss!”

The gatekeeper came rushing over.

“Someone’s here to see you—Miss Dalia just arrived!”

At the name Dalia, every maid’s face stiffened.

The knights who had been planting seed potatoes all wore the same expression: Who’s that?

I narrowed my eyes.

“…Dalia? Now?”

Dalia Sears Harwin.

My cousin, who shared the name Sears with me.

My father had a younger brother—my uncle.

That uncle had distinguished himself in battle and was granted the Harwin territory, founding the lineage of Baron Harwin.

Even so, he couldn’t bring himself to abandon the name Sears, fixing it as a middle name.

Middle names were usually reserved for high-ranking nobles or royalty, so people openly mocked him behind his back.

And the House of Harwin…

They took most of our marquisate.

On the day of my father’s funeral—

Because of a thoughtless contract my father had signed, trusting blood ties, the Baron of Harwin took possession of the Baron territory and Jezel Street.

In other words, my father had signed an utterly absurd contract with his own brother.

Brothers born and raised in the same land.

That was why he had been able to cherry-pick the most valuable lands of the Sears Marquisate—Jezel Street and the Baron Plains.

Above all, losing Jezel Street—the central distribution hub and marketplace of the region—was a catastrophic mistake.

It would have been invaluable during isolation, since so many shops there stocked useful seeds and preserved food.

Baron Harwin hadn’t even consoled me at my father’s funeral. He had simply sought out Alphiers and pressured him to honor the contract.

Alphiers probably didn’t even know he was my uncle—just thought he was a creditor.

But now it wasn’t my uncle who had come… it was his daughter.

Why now?

In the original story, Dalia did come to see me—but about a month later than this.

She came to find me and the maids, worn down by hunger.

“I heard Alphiers threw out your household steward too? Honestly, if you stay there, those knights won’t take care of you. You’ll starve to death first. Come to our house quickly. The steward’s already staying with us.”

Because she was my cousin, I went with the maids…

And ended up being loaded onto an illegal human trafficking ship.

“Goodbye, Brisa.”

Dalia pushed me onto the ship herself.

“I’ve always hated you.”

It was an unexpected confession.

Hated me…? We barely had any interaction at all.

Behind her, Baron Harwin was accepting sacks of wheat as payment for our bodies. They, too, were suffering due to the collapse of distribution.

But this time, the situation was different. Full-scale famine hadn’t begun yet.

“Let’s go.”

I stood up, bringing the maids with me.

They muttered complaints behind my back.

“I hate that girl.”

“Hmph, she’s obviously jealous of our Miss Brisa’s noble blood.”

“The princess herself educated her, and she even attended the capital academy. Of course she’s jealous.”

Dalia and I had little overlap.

I stayed in the territory until I was ten, before leaving for the academy, but I spent most of my time with my mother.

My mother had been my teacher in every subject.

“You can catch up in two years. You’re my daughter, after all. Let’s enroll early.”

When I placed first in the entrance exam to the Capital Academy—an exam most children took at twelve—at the age of ten…

I went to my mother’s grave and laid my acceptance letter there.

She had passed away while I was in the capital taking the exam.

“Don’t contact Brisa. It might affect her exam.”

“You… you’re insane.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I’m not insane.”

That had been my mother’s last will.

And my father, though he’d called her insane, ultimately honored it and didn’t contact me.

I couldn’t even attend my mother’s funeral.

Living like that, I’d never had time to associate with Dalia.

Yet for her to say, I always hated you…

Perhaps the maids were right after all.

When we reached the reception room, Dalia was already seated there—brown hair, sky-blue eyes.

“Brisa, it’s been a while.”

She smiled brightly, someone who hadn’t even attended my father’s funeral.

“I heard you’re no longer the heir to the marquisate. How unfortunate. And you were even dumped, weren’t you?”

I frowned.

“Is that true? Wow. You really never know how life will turn out.”

The last time we’d met was two years ago.

Never once had Dalia openly picked a fight with me like this before.

Only then did I realize it.

I was now someone she could openly look down on.

And that she’d been waiting for this moment all along.

“You know Luman of House Joachim, right? I’ll probably get engaged to him soon, unless something unexpected happens. Father visited the count’s estate yesterday—seems they made the proposal then.”

“Oh, Luman Joachim. I always thought he was the most unpleasant of the central nobles.”

I replied indifferently.

“But starting today, I might actually pity him. Wow—life really is unpredictable. Just like you said.”

This level of provocation was easy enough to brush off.

I nodded slowly and continued.

“House Harwin must have expanded its territory quite a bit lately. Otherwise, the Joachim family—who never accepts even the slightest loss—wouldn’t have considered you as an engagement candidate only now.”

“What?”

“At this point, shouldn’t you summon our late father’s ghost to the engagement ceremony? He’s the biggest contributor, after all. If it were me, I’d at least ask him to give a congratulatory speech.”

“Don’t act so arrogant.”

Dalia glared at me, seething.

“You’re nothing more than someone clinging to a marquis with commoner blood mixed in.”

She ground her teeth and struck back.

“I’m really curious where your half-brother will end up selling you.”

“Then you’d better stay on my good side.”

I lifted my teacup gracefully.

“If I tell my brother to sell me to Luman of House Joachim, something very ‘unexpected’ might happen to your precious engagement.”

I had never lost this kind of battle of wills.

But it was starting to bore me.

After taking a sip of tea, I got straight to the point.

“Why did you come?”