Chapter 1

It was the dead of night at the Duke of Gazard’s mansion.

A deep crimson slowly spread across the Duke’s office, where darkness held sway.

“I’m sorry, sister… there was simply no other way…”

The trembling hands of Cordelia Gazard, the Duchess’s twin sister, were stained red.

A stain bloomed across the expensive, long-piled carpet.

In inverse proportion to that, the warmth was rapidly fading from the body of Diana Gazard, the Duchess of Gazard.

“You… Diana, it’s all your fault…!”

(Why, Cordelia…)

The dagger that Cordelia had been holding just moments ago was buried deep in Diana’s stomach.

Blood continued to gush from the wound, thrumming with every beat of her fading heart.

The words she wanted to say to her twin sister could no longer form into a voice.

(Weren’t we supposed to be two halves of one soul?)

The sister she had trusted was taking her life.

That reality eroded Diana’s soul even more than the physical pain.

It was a color far darker and more abyssal than the carpet in the office, which was soaked in Diana’s blood.

(Cordelia… Damn you, Cordelia…)

As her consciousness drifted away, the only thing that occupied her mind was the twin who had killed her.

(I will never… forgive you!)

And so, Diana, Duchess of Gazard, brought the curtain down on her short life of twenty-five years—or so she thought.

Morning light filtered through the lace curtains.

The usual time. The usual view.

However, waking up this morning was far from refreshing.

“Cordel…ia?”

She muttered her twin sister’s name like a delirium, and her consciousness suddenly surged to the surface.

Diana woke up in her own room at the Duke of Gazard’s mansion in the Royal Capital.

It was a room she knew well.

When she sat up, her body felt incredibly heavy and dull.

(This is strange. Didn’t I die after being stabbed by Cordelia…?)

The stomach that had been drenched in pitch-black blood was now wrapped in a clean nightgown.

She stood up from the bed and walked to the full-length mirror.

Since inheriting her title, her skin had been rough from hard work and stress, and she had dark circles under her eyes.

But the Diana reflected in the mirror looked youthful, her white skin firm enough to spring back at a touch.

“What is this…?”

She stared at the mirror and muttered in a daze.

Long silver hair, eyes like sparkling amethysts.

Cheeks with a rosy glow, and glossy lips.

The features, which bore a striking resemblance to her twin sister Cordelia, were exactly those of Diana in her younger years.

“Sister, are you still asleep!?”

The door swung open with a bang, and the person who burst in was the spitting image of the Diana reflected in the mirror.

Her amethyst eyes blinked wide, and a cheerful smile played on her lips.

—Her twin sister, Cordelia.

The person who had stabbed Diana to death in her memories.

“Oh, you’re awake after all. Let’s have breakfast soon.”

Cordelia, who called out with a carefree expression, was also younger than the version Diana remembered.

Noticing Diana’s gaze as she stared at her, dazed, Cordelia pouted.

“Really now, today is the day of the graduation ceremony. We have to eat quickly and get ready.”

“The graduation ceremony…”

The ceremony held upon graduating from the Royal Academy.

Noble children of the Rutledge Kingdom graduated from the academy in the spring of their eighteenth year and were recognized as adults by being celebrated at the graduation ceremony.

That graduation ceremony was taking place today.

“Come on, let’s change quickly and have breakfast.”

The expression Cordelia directed at Diana was one that had always been etched into Diana’s memories.

A smile without a trace of turbidity.

The other half of her soul, from whom she had not been separated for even a moment since birth.

It was a smile filled with heartfelt trust, one that Cordelia showed only to Diana.

(Was that… just a dream?)

Even as she ate, the scene from that night refused to leave Diana’s head.

The pain of being stabbed, the feeling of her heart churning, the blood she had shed, and the body temperature that had slowly faded—everything was vividly etched into this body.

If that had been a dream, how wildly imaginative the world she could fly off into would be.

Unfortunately, Diana was realistic and lived with her feet firmly on the ground.

Once the meal was finished, black tea and dessert were brought to the dining room.

The usual scene at the Duke’s mansion.

While the maids poured the tea and arranged the cake plates, Cordelia smiled proudly.

“I baked a pound cake for the first time in a while.”

“──h!”

Hearing the words “pound cake,” Diana’s body shuddered.

A sensation of her stomach shrinking from the bottom up.

Nausea welled up, and to wash away the sour taste in her mouth, she gulped down her black tea.

“I think I’ll pass on the pound cake…”

“Oh my, and it’s your favorite, Sister.”

“Well, you see… I’ll be wearing a dress today. I’m a little worried about my waist.”

“Oh my, oh my goodness. You really are something, Sister.”

Cordelia giggled cheerfully.

In the past, she would have been healed by this smile.

Not even realizing how much hatred was hidden beneath it—

Diana’s husband, Miles, had been a childhood friend.

He knew them both well as twins and was one of the rare people who didn’t confuse Diana and Cordelia.

As the eldest daughter of the Gazard family, Diana had needed to take a husband and inherit the title of Duchess of Gazard.

Miles was the second son of the Marquis of Odonoghue and was in a position where he would not inherit his family’s title.

Even if there were no romantic feelings between them, they understood each other well, and she had thought he was the optimal partner for marriage.

The Marchioness of Odonoghue had been sickly from birth, and it was said that bearing children would be difficult.

Even so, declaring that it didn’t matter, it was the Marquis of Odonoghue, Miles’s older brother, who had passionately approached and won over the Marchioness.

Their passionate love had been the talk of high society at the time.

Due to those circumstances, it was promised that the children born between Diana and Miles would inherit the Gazard family for the first child, and the second child would be adopted by Miles’s older brother and wife to inherit the Marquis of Odonoghue’s family.

Yet, not a single child was born, despite three pregnancies; children who should have had such a brilliant future waiting for them.

The doctor’s diagnosis was a miscarriage due to overwork and mental exhaustion.

However, it was a fact she hadn’t wanted to admit at the time.

Now that she knew of Cordelia’s murderous intent, certain things came to mind.

Three miscarriages.

Every single one of them had occurred after she ate baked goods brought to her by Cordelia.

The pound cake right before her brought back the scenes of those days.

Cordelia, who had brought her treats with a smile.

How much hatred must have been hidden behind that face?

Following the repeated miscarriages, the relationship between Diana and Miles deteriorated.

It had been a political marriage between friends to begin with, and there was no love there.

Yet, she had believed that friendship truly existed between them.

‘I shouldn’t have married a woman who couldn’t bear children.’

The words Miles spat out as he left the Gazard mansion resurfaced in her mind.

Not only was the promise to the Marquis of Odonoghue unfulfilled due to the miscarriages, but the marital relationship between Diana and Miles had also shattered.

(Miles didn’t want to marry me. He just wanted a woman who would bear his own children…)

Abandoned by the husband she had sworn to spend her life with, and killed by the twin sister who had stayed by her side since birth.

Could there be any life more miserable than this?

(Whether that was a dream or reality, I don’t know. I don’t know, but…)

Only one thing could be said.

“Sister?”

Cordelia’s smile bloomed like a flower.

In the past, she had believed she could do anything if it meant protecting this smile.

—The foolish and pitiful Diana was no longer here.

She would never be fooled by that smile again.

She would walk her own path in life.

Diana Gazard was reborn on this day.