Chapter 01. The Duke’s House is Ruined
Things in the world don’t always go as planned.
It was like being born, but what about dying?
Even though I still have regrets, I thought it was a life without regrets.
‘Aunt is coming soon and I’ll buy you a shoe store!’
I left hundreds of shoe stores with money from my family.
To prevent people from being persecuted like her mother, she built a tower where wizards could live, and she worked hard by collecting disciples as well.
She sealed the Demon Spirit and saved the Empire.
Isn’t this enough?
Of course, I have a lot to say about my death, but let’s omit it for now.
What matters now is not how she died.
Why am I alive?
That’s the problem…….
“Why am I alive?”
The problem is that there is nothing to point out.
“No, but where am I?”
Looking around, one thing became clear.
Dark, damp, and humid air. To the tombstones built at regular intervals.
It was a graveyard.
“Huh?”
Let’s summarize the situation for a moment.
‘I certainly died sealing the demonic spirit.’
Perhaps the body was not intact.
The whole area must have been blown away by a magical storm caused by the explosion of the demonic spirit’s body.
But when I opened my eyes, I found myself lying on the side of a tomb, and I woke up in the body of a 12-year-old girl, for unknown reasons.
What worries me a bit is that there is a magic circle drawn in blood around…….
Knock, knock!
“There are senses of being alive…….”
The body is fine. Her skin was soft and supple.
“Then I’m really alive?”
Why? How?
She was fatally wounded before she died, so she couldn’t have survived…….
‘Did the Black Star Church do it?’
Hildegard rose from the dust and looked carefully at the magic circle drawn with blood.
‘The magic of collecting souls…… The shape of the magic circle is slightly different. It’s the first time I’ve seen it.’
It must have been the work of a wizard who handled black magic.
That was then.
An angry voice was heard.
“Hildegard! I’ve been looking for you all day and you’ve been here!”
When she turned her head, a boy was standing there.
The boy appeared to be about fourteen years old, and he was holding the reins of a donkey.
The familiar silver hair and the firm forehead.
Shaggy bangs and an angry face.
‘Huh?’
Hildegard looked at his face and was startled.
The boy and Leonhard looked overlapping.
“……Brother Leon?”
Nope. It’s not Leonhard.
He is too young to be himself.
But he had a face that was too similar to be called a stranger.
Anyone can tell its blood.
While Hildegard was startled, the boy approached without hesitation.
“What are you doing here without fear? Do you know how much I found?”
“…… uh…….”
“What! Uh, you’re saying the same thing! Hurry up! Let’s go home.”
What do you mean, on that donkey?
Hildegard was briefly confused.
“…Are you still angry?”
As she stood still, the boy wrinkled his brows even more and misunderstood.
“Okay. Let’s go home and talk. Soon the day will be over. You can’t do this at your great aunt’s grave.”
“Huh?”
“Stop running away from home and come back!”
The boy grabbed her and put her on the donkey.
“Wait a moment! wait a sec… … !”
“Let’s go home and talk.”
“No, I’m not angry… … !”
“No, what is it? Go home and talk!”
Leaving behind the struggling Hildegard, the boy nodded his head toward the grave.
“Great Auntie, I’m sorry for being noisy. She doesn’t have any friends. I’ll come back later with my brother.”
“Ouch! Don’t carry me like a load! put me……!”
Hildegard’s eyes, who were struggling, turned to the tombstone.
At that moment, her body stiffened.
[Hildegard Acaraxia (412-435)]
The noblest princess sleeps here.
“……!”
Hildegard’s mouth widened.
‘Crazy.’
She quickly grasped the situation.
I didn’t get younger.
‘Crazy!’
It was a reincarnation.
* * *
“Prince Redith, the lady…You’ve found it?”
“Yes, thank you for your help.”
“Thank you. I’m glad you’re safe. Please go in carefully.”
So, to summarize the situation:
I am not alive, I am reincarnated.
And suddenly this boy appeared in front of me.
A child who looks just like Leonhard oppa is probably…….
“……Redith Acaraxia?”
“Are you just calling by your brother’s name now?”
Redith got angry like an angry weasel.
His angry eyes twinkled in a blue-violet light.
He also had the same eyes as Leonhardt’s.
Hildegard didn’t even have the energy to be surprised, so he bit her mouth tightly.
Old gravestone tombstone.
Great aunt.
A boy who looks exactly like Leonhardt.
All of this pointed to one thing.
‘I’m reincarnated.’
It’s hard to believe, but that’s the reality.
‘Besides, did he call me Hildegard?’
It was common to give the names of ancestors who died at a young age to their children.
In this case, ‘dead ancestors’ seems to mean me.
‘Then I’m really dead? Can this also be called reincarnation?’
Unfortunately, the confusion did not end there.
“Hildegard. I know you’re upset, but don’t keep your mouth shut like this in front of Mikhail-hyung.”
“……Why?”
“My brother is doing his best while being desperate. You know that.”
Redis said to her as if taunting her.
“We’re supposed to help hyung. What if he’s upset?”
“Why is he desperate?”
“The more you earn, the better. Haven’t you know that before?”
Hildegard asked, seemingly incomprehensible.
“Additional income? Why don’t they have any money? Aren’t there any mines?”
“mine? There’s no such thing in our family!?”
“What? Why not?!”
The two had their outfits torn for different reasons.
Redith, who was calmly riding his sister, once again cried like an angry weasel.
“Hey, you childish little sister! There’s no such thing as a mine in our house! It was like that 80 years ago when our great aunt was alive!”
“80 years ago?”
Hildegard almost fell off the donkey.
The voice that rose to Do Re Mi Octave step by step took a picture of the soul.
“Oh, oh, what year is today?!”
“……Are you sick?”
“How many years?!”
For a brief moment, Redith reached a reasonable doubt that his sister had eaten something that had fallen to the ground.
“It is 515 years of the Lunar Calendar. Don’t you remember that New Year’s Day was yesterday?”
Hildegard felt the blood drain from her face.
‘80 years? It’s been 80 years since I sealed the demonic spirit?!’
I’m just glad the world didn’t fall apart.
I’m glad…….
‘Then what about brother Leonhard? Sister Maeve? What about Michaelis?’
Countless faces passed before her eyes.
80 years.
In the distant past, her hands trembled.
Had Hildegard’s silence been taken differently, Redis said again.
“Hilde, I know you hate to admit it, but you’re twelve now. You have to accept what you don’t want to accept.”
“What?”
“We have to support him and rebuild the family somehow.”
“Want to rebuild it? Don’t tell me that the duchy is ruined.….”
“It’s not ruined, but it doesn’t work.”
Redith threw a bombshell remark.
“Because our family is poor.”
“What?!”
“Why do you keep doing this?!”
Redith got angry this time as he grabbed his sister, who almost fell off the donkey’s back.
Hildegard was dumbfounded.
‘What nonsense is this?’
What kind of place is the Duke of Acaraxia!
From red to purple, the family owned all seven-colored gemstones, and they were called ‘Acaraxia of the Rainbow’.
A rich family who lives well even in the 8th cousins of three generations of in-laws. That was the Acaraxia family.
But now we’re poor?
My family?!
‘The Duchy of Acaraxia even said that even roaming wild dogs had different colors?!’
Even 80 years ago, there was no large family that dared to compare with the Duke of Acaraxia in terms of wealth.
If there is, maybe the Imperial Family?
‘That imperial family also relied on Acaraxia during difficult times!’
It is the law of this world that the poor get poorer and the rich get richer.
But why was it that only the Duke of Acaraxia evaded that rule?
‘Come to think of it…….’
Hildegard gradually looked around and regained her reason.
As the night fell, the road was getting darker and darker.
If it’s normal, it’s normal.
However, the Duchy of Acaraxia was different.
This is because Hildegard herself laid the magic stone to light the night road.
The shiny mana stone was installed so that not only young women and children but also anyone could walk around at night with confidence.
Of course, I even put lighting magic on it so that it can be used semi-permanently.
‘How hard it was to procure those expensive things from all over the empire!’
Due to Hildegard’s great work, the Empire’s Manastone had dried up for a while.
I did…!
‘What kind of madman pulled out all the magic stones?!’
It wasn’t just the magic stone.
The standard of living was so low that it was incomparable to what it was 80 years ago.
‘There are a lot of old buildings.’
A street where you can feel the traces of time.
The road had been in maintenance for a long time at first glance, and the creaking bridge looked in need of repair.
More than 80 years ago, when she and Leonhard took care of the estate together, a scene that she could not have imagined unfolded.
‘I can’t do this.’
Hildegard blindly denied reality.
‘I, I, I can’t do this. The duchy couldn’t get to this point…!’
But she couldn’t just deny reality.
The familiar houses and streets were the same as Hildegard remembered.
Even the sloping hill road leading to her mansion evoked her nostalgia.
“We’re almost there. Are you hungry?
Knuckle!
Before answering, there was a roaring on her stomach.
“So who told you to run away angry without having breakfast? You’re still at home anyway, but running away from the house.”
Laughing, the smiling Redith’s face was the same as Leonhard.
“…….”
Hildegard stopped clenching her fists.
This is because the boy in front of her kept overlapping Leonhardt.
“Let’s eat first when we get home. I couldn’t eat anything today because I was looking for you.”
I finished climbing the hill.
‘Yes. Let’s go home and think about it. I have to figure it out slowly….’
Hildegard, who ruled her mind, soon reincarnated and faced her most unacceptable reality.
“Come on, we’re almost there.”
“……we’re almost there?”
Whoa! Whoa!
The roaring crow cried.
Rusty and broken iron bars.
An ivy vine that has been grown randomly to hide a cracked stone wall.
It opens with a squeaky, gloomy sound… old mansion door.
“……Are you kidding me?”
This haunted mansion, which seems to be greeted by a ghost even at any moment, is called the Duke’s House?
Hildegard soon realized that something was wrong with this reincarnation.
But he began to see more and more incredible sights.