The Villainess Turns the Hourglass

Chapter 9

Dressed in the simple but very luxurious outside dress borrowed from Mielle, Aria went into town in a carriage with two escort knights and her maid, Jessie.

It was unusual for a noble child to go out without her parents, but things were different for Aria. She had been wandering the streets alone since she was younger than Mielle, and the countess didn’t see why it would be dangerous for a child to be out alone. No one was foolish enough to waste time kidnapping the child of a commoner, after all. And now that they were nobles, she had knights to escort her, so it was even safer.

Mielle, on the other hand, never left the manor grounds without a family member. In the past, she had often gone with her mother or the count and would avoid going anywhere without them. At times, she would go out with her brother Cain, but only if the destination was predetermined and private, such as visiting another noble’s manor or attending a small tea party. She would never go anywhere public without her father now, partially due to everyone around her being so concerned for her safety.

Aria scoffed as she thought about how preciously the other girl was treated. Jessie, who sat nervously across from her in the carriage, looked up at the sound of soft laughter escaping her lips. Aria pretended not to notice and looked out the window.

Fresh grass, trees, flowers, and people bustling about, occupied with their business—Aria found herself a little irritated by the fact that the view hadn’t changed at all. While she was spending restless nights screaming into her pillow and having nightmares about being beheaded, the world around her was as peaceful as ever.

Aria stroked her neck, which was soft and smooth. There was a strange sense of imminent death hovering around her slender neck, though it had no scars on it whatsoever. She felt as though her head might suddenly fall off and hit the dusty ground at any moment.

I’m all right. None of that happened. She ran a trembling hand down her throat again. As she noticed a yellowed leaf fall to the ground, having reached the end of its lifespan, she was reminded of her head rolling around on the execution stage amid the crowd of onlookers. It sent a chill down her spine.

I’ll never forgive them. I swear to make Mielle and Cain experience the horror of losing their heads one day, too. The miracle of the hourglass would certainly never repeat itself, which would mean eternal death for them. Aria calmed her wildly beating heart and trembling hands by imagining the final moments of her brother and sister, focusing her mind on their demise.

Soon, the carriage arrived at a boutique that sold cheap clothes even commoners could afford—the kind of place those with more money didn’t even bother to visit. As soon as Aria had told them the name of their destination, both the horseman and Jessie had blinked in confusion, wondering whether they had heard her wrong.

However, this was most certainly the place Aria wanted to visit: the boutique that sold ordinary clothes. If she wanted to escape her image of being a willful brat, she couldn’t afford to spend ostentatiously. She needed to act humble and frugal for the time being to make everyone see her in a different light. If she spent a lot of money on expensive clothes right after burning her old dresses, the bad rumors surrounding her would only get worse.

Her goal was to quell those rumors. She needed to show up in public in relatively shabby clothes for a noble a few times. Any noblewoman who saw her would undoubtedly whisper about her behind her fan, saying that it was Aria and not Mielle who was to be pitied and that the shabby clothes were proof. Everyone who had criticized and looked down on her would then realize that the rumors were all false, since Aria still wore common clothes even after her rise in status.

Of course, this could also give rise to new rumors about Aria being treated badly at House Roscent, but this was the only way for her to put an end to her reputation as a villainess. It was clear that visual proof would be far more effective than continually making excuses for herself.

Aria only intended to put on this act for a short while before going back to expensive dresses. She could, for example, show up in an elegant gown at a coming-of-age party and shock everyone. In order to achieve her revenge in the distant future, she simply needed to show a little patience now.

It would be good to show off her humble new wardrobe to the count, too. He would obviously be enraged to see her dressed so poorly after she had earned him a vast amount of money with her tip. If Aria then cried crocodile tears, apologizing profusely about playing with matches, he might even respond with a tear at the pitiful sight.

Aria looked forward to that moment so much her mouth went dry. Wetting her lips with the tip of her tongue, she entered the slightly run-down boutique.

“Wel… come?” The owner had barely looked up from the snack she was eating, but she dropped her food at the sight of the young girl entering with three retainers at her side. She was clearly a noble. The owner quickly wiped her oily fingers on her dress and put on her friendliest smile. Her attitude was only to be expected, as any commoner who irritated a noble could pay for it for the rest of their life.

Aria hardly acknowledged the owner’s greeting and began to look around the shop. It was filled to the brim with various items ranging from shabby and cheap-looking garments to halfway-decent dresses. Aria picked out just a few dresses that seemed to be the best quality and asked that they be wrapped.

Before she had joined the count’s family, even three months’ of starving herself to scrounge up money wouldn’t have been enough for her to afford even the cheapest dress at this boutique. I used to pass by the shop window every day and admire the clothes hanging there, she thought. But now, she could most likely buy the whole boutique and still have pocket money left over. It was in the distant past for her now, but in this life, it had technically only been a year ago that she had been so poor. Her mother’s marriage had completely changed her life. Aria felt strangely bitter about it.

Before Aria knew it, the owner had prepared a steaming cup of tea and a plate of cheap cookies in one corner of the boutique. Inviting Aria to partake in the refreshments, the owner carefully said, “The dresses upstairs are higher quality than these… Are you sure you wouldn’t like to see them?”

“These will do. Just tell me what they cost.”

“Yes, my lady. Right away. Please enjoy the tea while you wait.”

Though the cookies coated the roof of her mouth with the taste of cheap butter, the feeling was more nostalgic than unpleasant. It occurred to Aria that her past self—the naive girl who was poor but innocent—might have been better off than the spoiled brat who was suddenly given everything she ever wanted.

Altogether, she had picked out ten dresses. One of the knights held onto them as Jessie paid. Their next stop was the general store, where Aria’s repaired hourglass was waiting. All she needed to do now was retrieve the hourglass and return to the manor.

Maybe it’s a little soon to go back, she thought. Thinking about it now, she had never actually spent time observing her surroundings during her outings in her past life. She had always just been too focused on her destination and the next thing she was going to buy.

Before the knights helped her back into the carriage, Aria stood outside the boutique for a moment and watched the people pass by. As the shop was located in a more humble part of the capital, she could see young children running around in shabby clothes, looking as though they had rolled in the dirt. Merchants were yelling at the tops of their lungs to attract more customers to their stalls, and a few interested passersby eyed their wares.

Aria, too, had once run around these streets. Unable to go too far on her own, she had played in the general vicinity of this very shop. Though her memories consisted mostly of her fighting the other children for insulting her mother’s occupation, she also remembered having fun here.

Now, she was in a constant battle of life and death against people who pretended to be perfect and elegant, but hid just how desperately they were treading water while they tried not to make fools out of themselves. It was a shocking battlefield filled with nothing but pain, so much so that she wondered how she had ever felt joy in such an environment in her original life.

Aria stood by the carriage for a long while and watched the people pass by without moving. The knight escorting her asked cautiously, “Is there somewhere else you need to stop, my lady?”

“No, not really.”

It was meaningless to reminisce about a time long past that she could never go back to. But just as she turned to get into the carriage, a very familiar voice reached Aria’s ears. “Borrow a newspaper! Five shillings for ten minutes! There’s some very important information in today’s edition, so be sure to take a look! Only five shillings!”

Aria paused and turned to where she had heard the voice. There was a boy waving around a newspaper, trying to attract customers. Aria knew him very well since they had played together sometimes. Hans provided for his entire family by renting out the single newspaper he got his hands on. On the first day of the month, he would earn some money renting out his newspaper from morning until close to midnight. As he was always running around, his feet had always been blistered. Aria remembered hearing in her past life that he had been working while sick when he was hit by a carriage and ended up dying.

The newspaper, hmm? She did need some news, now that she thought about it. Newspapers were delivered to House Roscent every day, but they were informative ones targeted toward the nobility. They were very different from those read by commoners. While the newspapers of nobles merely listed factual information, the commoners’ newspapers contained all kinds of gossip as well. More than half of the rumors were false, of course, but some of them were so spot on that it wasn’t entirely a waste of time to read them. Moreover, since Aria knew the future, the false rumors wouldn’t ruffle her anyway.

“Jessie, go and buy that newspaper from that boy,” Aria said. “Tell him you’ll give him what he makes in a month, and whenever another paper is printed, go and buy it from him.”

“Pardon? Oh… Understood, my lady.”

Aria’s attendants looked down on her when she declared she would buy a newspaper that was equivalent to garbage. They thought it was inevitable for someone of her background to crave such provocative and vulgar content. But Aria ignored them and carefully began to read the paper. It barely took any time to arrive at the general store, so she didn’t have the chance to read it very closely, but it was clear that something significant had happened.

—Mysterious Disappearances

The headline made it clear. The story covered incidents of human trafficking in their empire, where slavery did not officially exist. Horrible things had occurred somewhere deep underground, specifically in the hidden basement of a flashy casino. The people kidnapped and locked in cages in this basement had been drugged so they couldn’t even think of escaping. The women had their bodies mutilated and were sold as sex slaves, while the men were sold abroad to spend the rest of their lives doing hard labor. Aria remembered this case vividly because the crown prince had uncovered himself, leading to it being widely publicized and discussed in her past life.

A case uncovered by the crown prince… She wondered whether she could discover some sort of connection, but as she skimmed the article again and tried to remember more details from her past life, she couldn’t think of anything. Back when the case first broke, she had been too young to care about such things, and while many had loudly discussed the issue, they had mostly shrugged it off.

As much as she was aware of the future, Aria didn’t think it would be possible to get close to the crown prince through this incident. In her past life, she had charmed many of the empire’s men with her captivating beauty, but she had never even caught a glimpse of the crown prince. He lived in an entirely different world, so she never had the chance to meet him. The fact that she had grown close to Sarah, the future marchioness, was already enough to secure her future, and she would be meeting Oscar soon as well.

Her changed behavior could perhaps provide her with an opportunity to actually meet the crown prince this time around, but now wasn’t the time to think about it. There wasn’t much she could do in such a small and frail body. A young girl could arouse suspicions just by snooping around the casino, after all. She decided to forget about the kidnappings.