I Thought It Was a Common Transmigration - Chapter 151

17. Flashback (10)

‘This is my last chance, and if it doesn’t work out, I’ll……’

One day in her fourth year of marriage to Cliff.

Lizé has been waiting for this day, even as she feels herself going crazy.

The day of the final episode of the original story, the one where Lizé wins the heart of the imperial family.

“Where are you going?”

“I thought you decided not to care where I go?”

Lizé was fed up with Cliff making expressionless faces and asking questions mechanically, as if he did so because he had little sense of obligation left to fulfill the prenuptial agreement.

She slammed the carriage door as if to erase the dry look on Cliff’s face from her mind and ordered them to set off.

‘A month before the National Day ball, a slave auction on the outskirts of the capital……’

In the original story, Lizé is trying to buy a gift for the Duke and Duchess to celebrate National Day, but mistakes a shop for a slave auction, and finds a lost relative of the imperial family.

Of course, she didn’t know his identity at first.

She just impulsively brought him along because she felt sorry for the way he was being treated.

The boy claims to have no memory of his past, but is surprisingly intelligent and knowledgeable about aristocratic etiquette.

Lizé is so impressed with the boy that she makes him her errand boy, until Princess Catherine arrives at the mansion and is surprised to see him.

‘It’s a top secret that the Emperor’s nephew has been kidnapped.’

Recognizing her cousin at once, Catherine invites Lizé and the boy to come with her to the palace, where the boy’s biological mother, whom Catherine had called in advance, has an emotional reunion with her long-lost son.

The ending of the original story is that Lizé, having found the lost imperial relative, is instantly favored by the imperial family, and she and Cliff live happily ever after.

‘I don’t want to lose anymore. This time I must succeed.’

Lizé’s shoulders trembled, even though it was still hot outside.

Thinking of all she’d lost over the past few years, she felt like getting rid of the 13th Edith and replacing her with a new one wouldn’t make her feel any better.

The affection of the Duke and Duchess, which she had thought she no longer needed, only after she had lost it completely did she realize how warm and comforting it had been, and Cliff’s love, which she had thought tiresome, could never be replaced by anyone else’s.

There were many men who professed their love for Lizé, but they all admired her appearance and her position as the next Duchess of Ludwig.

The more she listened to others profess their love, the emptier her heart became.

‘If I can win the imperial family’s favor, they’ll all love me again. I have to.’

Lizé clutched her hands, which were trembling with anxiety, as she made her way to the outskirts of the capital.

She wrapped herself in the hooded cloak she had prepared in advance, shielded her face with a fan, and waited for the boy’s turn at the slave auction house she had entered.

She was nervous as if it were the first time, even though she had done this many times in her life.

‘This is the last auction. He’ll show up this time, right?’

Lizé clutched the bidding board tightly in her hands, her eyes never leaving the stage.

“Alright, the last auction of the day! This time it’s a rare beauty boy, his age is thirteen, and in my fifteen years of slave auctioning experience, I’ve never seen one so pretty!”

The auctioneer’s words were exactly the same as in the original.

However, Lizé’s hand stiffened as she hurriedly raised the bidding board.

‘W- what?!’

The boy on stage is a handsome boy with fair skin and dazzling blond hair, just like in the original story, but he is not the Emperor’s nephew.

Instead of the boy who, even at his young age, held his head high and clenched his teeth in pride, this one stood trembling with fear and glancing uneasily around him.

Lizé’s heart sank.

‘There’s really nothing left of the original story……’

She felt like my life was over.

‘So I’m just going to grow old as a mere duchess isn’t even loved by her husband?’

Horrible. Like an extra in a novel whose name won’t even be mentioned.

In the midst of Lizé’s panic, she suddenly heard the auctioneer’s voice.

“5 million pesos! It’s gone up to 5 million pesos! Hehe, a beauty like this must have a lot of uses. Is there anyone who’s willing to pay more?”

At the word ‘use’, a plan quickly flashed through Lizé’s mind.

She quickly raised the bidding board.

“8 million pesos! 8 million! Anyone else?”

Funnily enough, just like in the original story, which is no longer in existence, Lizé was able to bid on a boy for 8 million pesos.

***

“Your name?”

“I- I’m called Peryl.”

“No, from now on, your name is Johann.”

“J- J- Johann?”

Lizé frowned at the boy, who continued to stutter.

“Yes. Johann. You’ll have to work on that stuttering habit.”

“I- I will. I’m sorry.”

“And you don’t remember anything before last year, do you understand? You only remember your name, Johann.”

Peryl, now Johann, widened his eyes at the sudden order.

“No matter what anyone asks you, you say you can’t remember it. That’s not hard, is it?”

“Yes, I- I can do that……”

“Good. Then I’ll give you a tutor starting tomorrow, and you’ll learn aristocratic etiquette and speech. Even the smallest gesture must be perfect, so that you look like a noble.”

Johann seemed insecure, but Lizé knew that humans are capable of anything when pushed to their limits.

Like the last twelve Ediths did until the end.

Lizé summoned a servant to bathe the boy and gave him one secret order, “Put a sleeping pill in his dinner, and while he’s asleep, tattoo a butterfly near his collarbone.”

The red, butterfly-shaped dot on his collarbone would be conclusive proof that he’s the Emperor’s nephew.

The kidnapping had been five years ago, so if he bore so many similarities to the lost boy, the Emperor and the boy’s biological mother would be fooled.

‘Well, if the original story can’t help me, I’ll have to make my own.’

From that day forward, Lizé took care of Johann’s every move, making sure to pass him off as the Emperor’s lost nephew.

This led to another big fight with Cliff.

“What did you buy a slave for?” he asked.

“I needed an errand boy for myself.”

“Why would you need an errand boy? Your maids do it all.”

“What do you think you know?”

“Aren’t you afraid of what rumors might arise if you let a handsome young boy always be around you?”

“To hell with you!”

After that big fight, she locked the door.

Annoyed and angry, Lizé struggled to regain her composure. She couldn’t afford to stay angry like this.

‘I have to do something about this before Edith comes up to the capital.’

Killian and Edith will be coming to the capital with their son for the National Day ball.

Before that, I have to reclaim my rightful position as the female lead.

***

“It’s been a long time, Lizé.”

“Thank you for inviting me, Your Highness.”

Lizé greeted Catherine graciously, who had invited her to the palace for the first time in a very long time.

Catherine, who used to send invitations every single day, also hadn’t heard from her for some time.

However, perhaps because Lizé managed her image better outside the Ludwig family than inside, Catherine welcomed her without any significant difference from before.

And then, as Lizé had intended, Catherine turned her gaze to the boy behind her.

“Who’s that?”

“Oh, he’s the boy I have as an errand boy. I rescued him because of his miserable condition, but he’s surprisingly good at aristocratic etiquette.”

“Is that so?”

Catherine furrowed her brow as she studied the immaculately attired boy.

Then she stood up abruptly and stepped in front of him.

“What’s your name?”

“My name is Johann.”

“Johann?”

Hearing the name, Catherine’s expression grew more serious.

That’s when Lizé stepped forward.

“Princess, is there a problem? I rescued this boy from a slave auction, and unfortunately, he doesn’t remember much of his past.”

“S- slave auction? Goodness……!”

“He does remember a few things, though, Johann, what were they?”

Johann bowed his head and replied, “I remember living in a very big, very nice house when I was younger. I don’t know what I was doing in that house, but I remember there was a rug or something hanging on the wall with a sun in the middle of it.”

“And?” Catherine asked, her hands shaking.

“All I remember is that a beautiful woman with hair the same color as mine called me ‘Johann’, and that I had a white dog with black spots, and that the dog’s name was Othello.”

Catherine was now pale as if she were about to faint, and she hastily called for her maid.

“Send for Aunt Sierra! Hurry! Tell her I think I’ve found Johann!”

The maid scrambled to fulfill Catherine’s urgent orders, and Lizé looked at her in bewilderment.

“Your Highness……? Suddenly, what is this……”

“Lizé, where did you find this boy?”

“At a slave auction house on the outskirts of the capital, I mistook it for a store and went in and found him…… but, what’s wrong?”

Catherine clasped Lizé’s hands in hers, tears welling in her eyes. “You saved Johann.”

“Yes?”

“I think he’s my cousin Johann, who went missing five years ago.”

“Yes?”

Lizé’s eyes widened, feigning surprise.

But in the back of her mind, she was thanking the heavens.

‘That’s it! All my hard work to maintain friendship with Catherine has paid off.’

It felt like all the headaches she had been enduring had paid off at once.

Moments later, Catherine’s door burst open without a knock, and a despondent-looking woman rushed in, followed by the Emperor and the Marquis of Theroux, the Emperor’s brother and the woman’s husband.

“Johann!”

Rushing into the room, the woman stood tall as soon as she spotted the boy, then slowly approached him and knelt down in front of him, her eyes searching his face as if looking for something.

Her face was already wet with tears.

“Johann, do you remember me?”

The boy glanced at Lizé, then shook his head awkwardly.

“He says he doesn’t remember much of the past, but he remembers the tapestry hanging in the Marquis’ office, or Othello, the dog he had as a child. That’s something he could never remember if he isn’t Johann.”

At Catherine’s explanation, the woman burst into tears again.