# 1
• Note
In this work, contrary to their dictionary definitions,
the terms are used as follows:
'Handmaid: A person who serves by one's side,
Maid: A person who does not serve directly but handles cleaning and other miscellaneous chores.'
Please keep this in mind when enjoying the work.
Prologue
This was a place where even the creaking noises felt sinister. With every step I took, the sound of my shoes echoed loudly. That was why I was even more careful.
With my back slightly bent, I walked at a pace that was neither too fast nor too slow. Then, upon reaching the familiar door, I came to an abrupt halt.
Before opening the door, I steadied my breathing. Hoo, hoo, hoo. After a short deep breath, I grabbed the doorknob and turned it.
The shadows from the room, darker than the hallway, rushed in. The room was so pitch-black that nothing could be seen, making me hesitate to even enter.
However, I familiarly stepped inside and pulled open the long curtains. A ray of light so strong it made me want to close my eyes streamed in.
It was dazzling. Still, I pulled the curtains all the way open and turned around.
At that moment, something flew rapidly past the side of my face.
Bang! It hit the window frame, bounced off, and rolled on the floor—it was a desk clock. I glanced at it briefly before turning my gaze forward.
In the corner furthest from the window, where the shadows lay heaviest, was a bed. On it, I could see a round figure covered by a sheet. The only thing sticking out was a hand, gripping the edge of the sheet tightly. The signs of trembling in fear were unmistakable.
"Get out."
A single, hoarse word slipped out. Deep anger was soaked within it.
Pretending not to hear it, I picked up the desk clock that had fallen on the floor. With nails popping out and the wooden surface gouged, it clearly looked ruined. Concluding it was unusable, I placed it on the new sheet I was carrying. Then, I swept my gaze over the messy room.
The tableware was shattered to pieces, and even those fragments were scattered dangerously across the floor. Forks and spoons lay among them. It wasn't just the tableware that was broken. There was nothing intact in this room.
I walked step by step, picking up the things that had fallen on the floor. Following the sound of my footsteps, the round figure flinched and trembled.
"Get out."
The voice rang out once again.
Ignoring those words again, I reached the front of the bed. What was it so anxious about? The figure, which had been shifting restlessly on the bed, couldn't hold back and fumbled on top of the bedside table beside it, then quickly backed away. Having nothing to throw, it chose to flee. But fleeing only meant staying on the bed. The sight of it pressed flat against the wall was almost pathetic.
I scanned that figure up and down and reached out my hand. Noticing this, it slapped my hand away fiercely.
"Don't touch me."
As if he'd let me. Pretending not to hear it this time either, I quickly pulled the sheet. As a result, the figure covered by the sheet swayed and revealed itself.
Disheveled golden hair, a neck and shoulder line turned in panic, and protruding bones were visible. My gaze swept downwards from there. Even without checking, I could tell how emaciated the body hidden beneath the clothes must be.
When I raised my gaze again, I saw sweat forming on his face seen up close. As I reached out my hand, he slapped it away fiercely again.
"Don't touch me!"
Following that, a thunderous shout erupted.
"I told you to get out! Get out! Fuck off!"
At the rough curse, I finally let out a deep sigh.
The man's pale face flushed red with heat. His chapped lips exhaled rough, ragged breaths. Even so, he gripped the sheet so hard his fingertips turned white, as if trying not to let it be taken from me.
"Fuck off. Please, just fuck off!"
"Please calm down, Master."
"Get out! Go, fuck of—Huk!"
Sure enough, the man's breathing began to show signs of struggle. His flushed face turned pale again, and soon he grabbed his chest in agony.
I quickly pulled him into my embrace, took out an inhaler from my pocket, and put it in his mouth. Then, carefully stroking his back, I said,
"Breathe slowly."
Hearing my words, he tried to steady his breathing. As he gulped air through the inhaler, repeating the cycle of inhaling and exhaling, his violently heaving chest gradually subsided. After watching him for a moment, I removed the inhaler from his mouth.
"Haa, haa."
"You will be alright now."
Before I knew it, his face was drenched in sweat. His wet golden hair scattered over my clothes. I stroked his hair as a sign of praise. Then, his tightly shut eyelids opened weakly. Emerald eyes with a slight white hue turned toward me.
At that moment, my body was pushed backward.
"Uwah!"
In the blink of an eye, I tumbled off the bed with a thud!
My skirt flipped up, exposing my underpants entirely. As I flailed my legs in the air, a face suddenly popped out above them.
His gaze, which had been staring blankly ahead, gradually lowered downward. It couldn't be, but it felt like he was looking right at me. His still excessively pale, still excessively handsome face filled my vision.
His moist lips quietly parted.
"Get out."
A vein popped on my face. What a bastard.
1. The Damned Master of the Count's Family (1)
I was born with nothing and grew up as the daughter of a tenant farmer who had nothing. Even that was not enough, and we reached a point where it was hard to even feed ourselves.
Living hand to mouth, extreme poverty. Struggling within that was the entirety of my life.
The funny thing is, even in the midst of all that, there were five children.
Unable to endure the crippling poverty, my mother ran away alone, and my remaining father drank every day and resorted to violence.
At his hands, the baby youngest was beaten to death, the fourth starved to death, the second was sold to a brothel, and the third, at least, was pretty, so she was raised like a precious jewel. The intention was to raise her well and marry her off to a young master of a noble family to try and improve our lot in life.
And the firstborn, ugly me, was kept around because I was good at housework.
My day consisted of cooking, doing laundry, cleaning, attending to the third, working at Uncle Mark's bakery downtown during the day, and getting beaten by my father's violence at night.
It was a hard life without even a moment to catch my breath.
My ugly face swelled up and became even uglier, and during my prime growing years, my leg broke, so my height stopped growing and came to a halt. Ugly dwarf. The neighborhood kids called me that.
If there was a hell, I thought it was now. I envied the third, who grew more beautiful and radiant day by day, and it was hard to endure my father's violence. There were many times I wanted to die and hanged myself. Every time, I had bad luck—either I was caught by my father or a passerby, or the rope snapped right before I suffocated, and I survived.
This place was my prison, and I was a prisoner being punished without even knowing my charges. No, it would be better to be in an actual prison.
The reason my father didn't sell me to a brothel was because he needed someone to do the housework. But that was a half-lie. When he tried to sell young me, who knew nothing and sucked her fingers, to the brothel, they offered a cheap price because I was ugly, and I learned through the neighborhood women's gossip that he didn't sell me and taught me housework instead.
My mother called my father a devil bastard. I followed suit and called him that too. My future life would be dictated by that devil bastard.
If this wasn't a tragedy, what was?
But the gods did not abandon me in the end.
My height, which hadn't grown, miraculously increased by a handspan, my dry bangs covered my ugly face, and when I began to be called of blooming age, an old gentleman visited the village. I don't know why an old gentleman, overflowing with nobility from head to toe, visited such a small, remote village.
It started when he, who was walking around the village, gestured to me as I happened to be passing by the intersection.
"I would like to hire your daughter."
The old gentleman politely proposed, holding out a pouch filled with gold coins. Distracted by the gold coins, my father swallowed dry saliva. My father's despicable mind spun quickly as he looked at the old gentleman before him and the pouch of gold coins on the table.
My father grabbed his hand, which twitched wanting to snatch the pouch right away, and controlled his expression.
"Sir. It is a grateful thing that my humble daughter has caught your eye, but all she has learned is begging, so there is much she is unskilled at. If perchance you are not satisfied later..."
"Do not worry about that. Even if she does not meet your expectations, I will not ask for this back."
The old gentleman smoothly pushed the pouch of gold coins toward my father and answered calmly. At that, my father forced down the corners of his mouth, which were rapidly rising, and looked at me sitting next to him. It gave me goosebumps because it was a gaze like looking at a beloved daughter.
"Child, your father respects your thoughts. Money is good to have, but it is not more important than you. Comfortably tell me your thoughts."
Even as he said that, he grabbed my thin wrist with his large hand. It was a strong grip, enough to twist bones. Outwardly, he had the face of a father worried about his precious daughter, but his eyes, clouded by gold, flashed fiercely.
The old gentleman also quietly waited for my decision. If I showed any sign of refusal here, the old gentleman would leave to find another girl, and my father would beat me to death as if punishing a wayward daughter.
"I will go."
"My child."
With a face full of emotion, my father spat out a voice tinged with tears and hugged me. At the hand slowly stroking my back, I had to suppress the desire to push him away.
Right then, I got ready and followed the old gentleman. My luggage was just one bag. I didn't have many clothes or belongings. However, unlike the dust-covered rags I wore every day, I wore a dress embroidered with pretty flowers, which was different from usual.
"Goodbye. Be careful."
Seeing me off at the door, my father patted my shoulder. That touch contained an unspoken pressure to please the gentleman well.
The third, Alicia, standing next to my father, smirked at me.
"Goodbye, sister. Stay a long, long time and come back."
Never come back. Alicia added, moving only her lips. However, when I didn't show any particular reaction, Alicia erased her smile and pouted sullenly.
I spat out a single line to that Alicia.
"Take good care of that pretty face. It's the only thing you have going for you."
"What?!"
Leaving the fuming Alicia behind, I turned around.
The place I followed the old gentleman to was a massive mansion that made my eyes widen. It was much larger and grander than the mansion of the wealthiest lord in the village where I lived. Wow. I let out a pure exclamation of admiration and followed the old gentleman inside.
"You have arrived."
A middle-aged woman in neat attire greeted the old gentleman. The old gentleman nodded once and took off his bowler hat.
The middle-aged woman noticed me standing behind the old gentleman and asked.
"And this child?"
"She is the girl who will attend the Master from now on."
The Master? As I looked at the old gentleman with doubt, he signaled me to come forward. When I hesitantly stepped forward, the middle-aged woman looked me up and down with an evaluating gaze. Nervous, I swallowed dry saliva and waited quietly.
"I see."
Whether a satisfactory evaluation had been made, the middle-aged woman nodded and turned around. Immediately after, the old gentleman also turned the other way. I looked back and forth between the two people splitting in different directions, then followed the woman.