Prologue

Valia was the daughter of a knight. Her father’s skills as a knight were mediocre, neither exceptional nor inferior.

It wasn’t until after her father’s death that Valia found out he was just an ordinary knight. While her father was trying to earn a living, he died on the battlefield. The palace paid Valia a monthly pension because she was the only living family her father had. She didn’t have any relatives, which was probably a good thing because there were no greedy relatives to steal her money.

‘But...’

Valia remembered clearly. When she was around the age of thirteen, all of the money she had saved up disappeared. The culprit was none other than the maid who had worked for Valia for a long time.

Her maid, who was far older than Valia, was hostile to the young girl who was a noble, even if it was just in name. Valia was looked down on because she was young with no one to take care of her.

But the young Valia desperately needed the stew and sweet bread cooked by an elder. Indeed, Valia thought of that maid like a mother.

‘Though, it was a dismal end.’

The maid ran away when Valia was asleep. Perhaps out of sympathy for Valia, she had baked some bread to last her for a few more days.

‘She probably hoped that those loaves of bread would buy her some time.’

At first, Valia thought the maid was out for an errand as she so often was. But as the days passed, she slowly realized that the maid had run away. That day, Valia sat on her old bed and wept. More than anything, the fact that she had been ‘abandoned’ became an indelible wound. She later found out that the maid was wickedly meticulous because the maid had all of Valia’s monthly pension paid to her at once before running away.

Valia would’ve fallen ill from extreme malnutrition if it weren’t for her deceased father’s mentor, Karl. When Valia finished up all the bread the maid had baked, she began to starve. Sloppily, Valia kneaded flour and milk herself while trying to remember how the maid had done it. Burnt on the outside and undercooked with a flour-like texture on the inside, Valia survived by roughly ripping off pieces and eating the thing she had made.

Even then, when the milk spoiled, she had to knead the flour with water. Karl tutted and took the dough away, baking it in the oven himself. Valia gobbled down five loaves of bread in a row without stopping to take a break. She would probably never be able to eat bread as delicious as the ones she ate back then.

“Looks like this old man has to take in a child because of one unfortunate pupil.”

Valia heard Karl mutter under his breath on the anniversary of her father’s death. Nonetheless, Karl raised Valia. Karl was a mercenary who came home once every season of the year to rest at home for a month before leaving again to work. He wasn’t affectionate on the outside, but he sent Valia living expenses without missing a date. Valia thought she was the sole reason why Karl applied to fight as a mercenary in a foreign war in days to come. It was all because Valia, a healthy girl, suddenly fell ill with what seemed like a lethal disease.

War mercenaries were well-paid because their salary included hazard pay. Although Karl didn’t die on the battlefield, he was horribly injured. The injury was so terrible that death might have been better instead. An arrow smeared with foreign poison pierced his right arm, and this venomous poison made his flesh rot. As a mercenary, his right arm was his lifeline. Karl needed a hefty amount of money to treat his arm instead of amputating it, but he had already spent his life savings treating Valia.

There was only one she had left: Valia herself.

Valia started looking for a job. Fortunately, she was a noblewoman, and there were many things a young, unmarried, noblewoman could do. Just in time, the Gehl Empire, which held the hegemony of the continent, was recruiting a large number of maids of noble status when the emperor’s death was imminent. The Gehl Empire alone had enough nobles, but seemingly not enough to hire the number of maids they wanted. That was understandable because life as a lady in waiting was equivalent to a life sentence in prison as they couldn’t leave the palace once they entered.

But no matter how poor an aristocrat might be, they were still an aristocrat. It was inconceivable for there to be ladies who would readily apply for this position with enthusiasm. That’s why the Gehl Empire had to rake in noble ladies from every other kingdom to reach their desired number.

‘I was able to pay for Karl’s treatment with the money I received.’

A large sum of money was given to Valia; perhaps as consolation for the lady doomed to spend a lifetime in the imperial palace. It was a generous gesture that befitted an empire. Whatever the reason for that payment was, Valia was able to save Karl with the money she had received. It was a large sum of money, but it was worth it. Karl had often been the savior of her life.

She owed him her life.

‘Is the same life waiting for me this time too?’

Valia shook her head. She didn’t want to relive that life. To maintain the glamour and luxury of the imperial palace, all palace workers had to work tirelessly. Valia was no exception.

In particular, a woman like her from a small kingdom with no ties in the empire lived a life where she didn’t know when she was going to die by upsetting her master.

‘Every day was like walking on thin ice.’

Valia resolved not to enter the imperial palace again even if it meant selling herself off as a war mercenary. Just then, the door swung open with a banging noise.

“Valia! How many times do I have to tell you to come out and eat?!”

Those eyes were devoid of any affection. It was a wonder why Valia didn’t notice them before, but the poor orphan girl was obedient to the maid who fed her.

Valia blinked her eyes at her maid who yelled at her like she was above her. There was something Valia had to do first.

“You’re fired.”

At age thirteen, Valia’s life met a new beginning that started with firing her maid.

The Knight’s Daughter

After Valia fired her maid, she went to a mediation agency for maids. There was an abundant number of people who were ready to replace the maid that ran away and cook Valia hot stew and bread. Valia signed a contract with the agency that mediated maids. Every two days, a new maid was randomly assigned to Valia’s house, cleaning the house and cooking her hot meals when they came.

If one thing changed about Valia, it was that she was no longer affectionate towards her maids.

It took a long time for her to realize that their relationship shouldn’t be more than that of employer and employee, an exchange of labor and capital.

These newfound changes naturally affected those around her as well. Among them all, Karl was the one who was affected the most. He visited Valia’s house around the same time as he did before. He had also decided to raise the young Valia when he saw that she was left all alone after his pupil’s death. However, the difference now lay in Valia’s personality.

“You don’t act like a child.”

Valia thought those words held great meaning. After all, it was no surprise for him to be startled when he saw a young girl who should be running around like a carefree child hiring a maid at a mediation agency on her own. But Karl was relieved because Valia was smart and mature, so he spent more time working outside and less at home.

Valia wasn’t sad about the difference in his behavior. Karl tried to raise her into an independent woman in the past too.

Valia stopped hiring maids when she reached a certain age.

She wasn’t going to spend that kind of money on maids anymore. Fortunately, household chores weren’t difficult. It might’ve been the influence of her past experiences as a lady in waiting, but she did the laundry, cleaning, and baking without any help. She took pleasure in taking a bite out of her homemade bread on a sunny midday afternoon. She couldn’t add more butter, but it was a loaf of white bread with a soft texture made from fine flour. It was the only food Valia knew how to make without ruining it; burning the pot every time she attempted to cook anything else.

Valia fell in thought as she drank tea to cleanse her palate. Even in the past, she thought about the future but she was never as passionate as she was now. Whenever she had time, the future was all she could think about.

The only question she had was: how will she make a living?

The first thing that came to mind was to live a life similar to her past life.

After Valia entered the imperial palace as a lady in waiting, she was appointed as the escort of female royalty, though she wasn’t officially appointed as a knight. Her rank was vague, and she could never commit to one role because she had to be a lady in waiting and a knight at the same time.

‘I had my limits as a knight.’

Her grip strength was quite strong, possibly due to her father’s influence, but she lacked the so-called talent in swordsmanship. The only reason why she was appointed as the escort of female royalty was that she was a noblewoman and a female knight. She was called a escort but was more like an attendant who knew how to use a sword. She earned a decent living, but it would be crazy of her to return to that thin ice again for something as trivial as that.

‘Should I just become a mercenary?’

The ridiculous idea crossed Valia’s mind, but she shook that thought off in the end. She didn’t have to go into battle to realize she couldn’t put up a fight. Karl’s strength was enough to teach Valia her place.

‘How should I live my life?’

Anyone in the world would ask themselves the same question at least once in their lives, but there was one reason why Valia needed an answer desperately.

‘I guess I’ll fall terribly ill again, right?’

At the age of nineteen, Valia was terribly ill although she’d always been a healthy girl. Her memories of those bed-ridden days were hazy. It was due to her slipping in and out of consciousness from the pain. Valia was sure that she was going to fall ill again for three days and nights when she reached that age. At least she could afford her treatments if she started saving up now.

Although the maid demanded a large amount of severance pay, Valia could somehow manage to save enough money for later if she started now. If she did, Karl wouldn’t need to go to war. He wouldn’t be shot with a poisoned arrow, and Valia wouldn’t have to be a lady in waiting in the imperial palace to pay for the formidable medical bills. When she broke the chain of events, Valia saw hope.

‘It comes down to money, after all.’

Disappointment followed realization.

‘I should’ve at least memorized the lottery numbers.’

When she worked as an escort lady-in-waiting at the palace, she purchased the lottery tickets that were periodically issued by the Gehl Empire’s Imperial Palace a few times before quitting easily. Valia heavily regretted that she stopped buying those tickets. If only she could remember those numbers…. Valia tried to hopelessly remember the numbers but gave up in the end.

Thankfully, she remembered everything else pretty clearly. For example….

“The woman sent by God….”

A beautiful woman with ivory skin appeared at the imperial lake. She had dark hair, dark eyes, and a mysterious presence that seemed to have been sculpted from the night sky. She was someone whose voice was said to have come from another world. The woman, who was later crowned as the Crown Princess, called herself Yeri.