Chapter 4

The pink-haired fellow shouted from the doorway.

It didn’t take long for the butler to come pouring in with many servants.

“Second young master! Did something happen!”

“Take this bitch away from me and put her in a cell.”

“Young, young master! I’m so sorry! Young master! Young master!”

With a command from Pink Hair, the maid who had been making me sit like a pin since morning was dragged out the door.

I can’t even figure out my own physical condition right now, let alone being asked to deal with the emergency in front of me.

I supported my feeble body with one hand, the other still covering my mouth. The pink-haired man reached out towards me, and he grabbed my shoulder and shook it gently in a motion so gentle it surprised me.

“Hey… Are you okay?”

“…. …”

“Why are you just sitting there stupidly eating this? You should have screamed and flipped over the table and made a fuss like you always do, dumbass. ”

He said in an aggressive tone. That was either trying to argue with me or in his way trying to care.

‘But if I hadn’t eaten the food, I would have been stabbed to death with your fork.’

I was furious.

I wish I could respond to his words, but I can’t even make half a sound without options.

”Ha…… it’s over, right?”

Thanks to the help given by this unexpected guy, I was able to defeat that maid.

But I’m not at all thankful for what he did. Is that one valet the only one who would bully Penelope?

That maid of honor is most likely just one of them. Probably everyone in this mansion is bullying her, and all have the same mindset towards her.

This guy probably wouldn’t care, even if the bullying incident happened on the evil servant, but it was as if nothing happened. After all, that’s the most basic treatment for an evil servant.

It hasn’t been long since I woke up, and I’m already feeling exhausted.

“Hey, your face looks worse, should I call a doctor?”

The pink-headed maid seemed to have a troubled look on his face because I didn’t answer his question. I’m sure what he said was just for perfunctory purposes.

He then bent down and examined my face with his hand, moving gently as if he was genuinely worried about me.

In a flash, a white dialog box reappeared in front of me.

1. None of your business.

2. What does it have to do with you? Get out of my room!

3.Stop acting, it’s so forced.

In order to survive, I had to do my best to think about this answer again. These were simply awful.

From the three options given by the system that screamed madness, I chose the answer that offended him the least.

“None of, your business ……”

That statement totally struck a chord with me, so I wanted to answer it that way from the bottom of my heart.

But the sound I made was minimal in order to hold back from spitting it out.

“You ……”

The pink hair frowned as she realized what I meant.

But only for a moment.

When I looked at him again, he had changed back to his usual cold and unfeeling state, giving me goosebumps.

Even though my eyes were open, my poor physical state didn’t allow me to observe this properly.

“Yeah, it’s none of my business what you do. It’s also none of my business if you eat whatever they give you and then get sick like a beggar.”

The guy slowly crouched down and checked my physical condition while talking to himself.

“There aren’t half a dozen doctors in the Eckhardt mansion who’d be willing to take the time for you either.”

On top of the pink-haired head, words shimmered and floated.

[Favorability -3%]

The favorability has gone up.

Yesterday it was still -10%. In hard mode, even 2%, no! Even a 1% increase was hard to come by. 7% was simply a leap forward.

”If I knew it would raise my favorability this much, I should have completed this chapter first …… .

However, I wasn’t happy about it, and I couldn’t even muster the slightest interest in his favorability boost.

Negative numbers are still negative numbers.

After throwing up I got up and rinsed my mouth, and a magnificent young girl with a pale face was reflected in the mirror.

“Penelope.”

It was only when I was alone that those words I couldn’t say just now no matter what could come out smoothly and without error.

As I spoke, the girl in the mirror spoke at the same time.

The large eyes shone with a lime green light, like emerald gemstones. Her thick pink hair was the same color as a peony flower. This bright-eyed girl had hair that everyone would covet.

No matter how you look at it, it’s not my face.

In the game, the surname ‘Eckhardt’ belonged to the only ducal family in the Ioca Empire.

In the chapter not long after Hard Mode started, I was put to death countless times by the eldest son of the Duke’s family.

Because I chose options that fit the character’s personality. Simply put, it was topsy-turvy back.

I’ve repeated this episode so many times that now I just feel lucky. Otherwise ……

I let out a long sigh at the thought.

“Ha, ha …… Pretty? Very, very beautiful. At least I’m pretty beyond compare ……”

I knew she was very good looking when I looked at the illustrations, but when I saw her with my own eyes after I became Penelope, I realized she had unparalleled beauty.

If this had happened before I left home for my solo session, I might have been thrilled and praised Penelope’s looks.

I might also have happily accepted the incredible situation as it is now.

‘I would have thought it was a gift kicked to me by God out of pity …….’

However, through my patience and hard work, I have managed to get rid of that damn home.

I was accepted to a world-renowned school, and I had a small, but relaxing house.

After I left those two assholes behind, everything only led me to the brightest future possible.

And here, Penelope’s life would only come to an end because of my tiny mistake, could there be anything worse?

If I were the main character in normal mode, then everything would be different. All the decisions she made would have gone down the road to Convoy.

“…… But why?”

But why? In favor of me who only just escaped that hell?

“Tell me why!”

Bam one!

I screamed, slamming into the sink. The beautiful face of the girl in the mirror wore a chilling expression.

More than sad, she was angry. The expression certainly made her look like the worst villain in this game yet.

“Ha……”

I let out a deep sigh and gently played with my hair. Penelope’s story came to my mind.

Penelope Eckhardt, the evil servant of the game and the main character in the hard mode.

In fact, Penelope was a commoner without a family name.

[Penelope had lived with her impoverished mother. While wandering around, the two caught the attention of the Duke who was looking for his daughter. After her mother died of an illness, the Duke adopted her].

Penelope was able to become a daughter of the Duke’s family due to her similar appearance to the Duke’s missing daughter.

The pink hair looks like it was inherited from the deceased Duchess, and the clear blue eyes are the symbol of the Eckhardt family.

I remembered the second son of the Eckhardt family that I had seen not long ago.

His head was a light peachy pink.

But the maiden color of the girl in the mirror leaned towards a flaming red, not pink.

The turquoise colored pupils were also slightly different from the other family members.

“He should have continued searching for his real daughter, why did he have to bring back a child he didn’t recognize?”

As time passed, Penelope no longer looked like his daughter. The Duke loses interest in her and orders her not to be seen in his presence.

Penelope, who has lost her father’s good graces, is only treated coldly by her two stepbrothers and the marquises.

“Our stories are so similar it’s unpleasant ……”

It hadn’t occurred to me while playing the game that we were even that similar.

I suddenly felt disheartened.

‘Fake duke’s daughter.’

Every karma person in the mansion called Penelope an impostor. Even though Penelope herself is incredibly beautiful, in the eyes of others, she’s just a two-dimensional imitation.

If she knew how to pamper people, perhaps the story would have developed differently. But as an outsider who entered the family by chance, her personality is still poor.

In the prologue of the story, she is described as being the same as a hedgehog, cum spines to anyone. Constantly giving trouble whenever and wherever she can.

“I’d like to know exactly why no matter which route I take, it’s going to cause a storm all over the city.”

I nodded, finally realizing why every option was so crazy.

Penelope was just an evil servant who seemed powerful on the surface. Unlike the naive heroine in normal mode, she seemed sharp and resourceful.

But I can actually understand her.

Just the way she was treated one day today, no, just a few hours ago was enough for me to understand what kind of life she was living.

‘Even if she was called an imposter.’

How could they stick her with a needle just to wake her up? Even if she’s an impostor, she’s still a girl who was led back by the Duke himself.

There wasn’t even any maid who would wake up other maids in such a way.

Penelope was adopted by the Duke when she was twelve.

If she had suffered this kind of abuse since that day ……

No matter how much she yelled and screamed, no adult would be willing to listen to her, after all, there wasn’t much a child could do.

“Was this why she was destined to become a wicked servant?”

Of course, that didn’t mean that her bullying behavior thus far was correct.

But the Raiders who appeared in the game were the only ones who showed no mercy to her, and their method of executing Penelope was ridiculously rough.

“I feel so sorry for her.”

I raised my hand to caress Penelope’s fragile yet soft face quite.

The pink figure reflected in the mirror looked so harsh and sad.

But I quickly got rid of that emotion.

“Ha, who’s pitying who.”

Now is not the time to think about that.

I was Penelope right now.

That meant that I could die at any time because of some male character like Penelope in the game.

Recalling this gives me the creeps.