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But, as luck would have it, the day I decided to travel was the very day everything went wrong.

The carriage that had been traveling along just fine had fallen into a puddle in a strange-looking forest, making it impossible to move forward.

The wheel was stuck so badly that there was nothing we could do about it. In the end, the coachman had no choice but to go to the village and bring back another carriage.

If I had known this would happen, I would have brought Becky with me, even if it was a hassle.

Just like the original Elinea, I, too, hadn’t gotten into the habit of taking a servant with me everywhere I went, so I hadn’t brought Becky today.

“Coachman, you’ll have to go and bring another carriage.”

The coachman nodded at my words.

“I’ll ride the horse and go.”

The horse didn’t have a saddle in the first place, so I couldn’t ride it to the baron’s estate. He meant that he would ride it to the village and quickly bring back a new carriage.

I nodded and told him I would wait.

After the coachman disappeared on horseback, I stared at the wheel stuck in the puddle.

“How could this have been made this perfectly?”

Honestly, it looked as though someone had deliberately known exactly where our carriage would pass and dug a puddle there.

Of course, I thought it was probably just a pointless imagination.

After all, the only person in the original story who hated me enough to kill me was Sister Perioze.

But the current Perioze was friendly toward me.

If things continued like this, it was only natural that I would eventually become her trusted right-hand person.

So, unless I betrayed her from now on, there was no reason for her to kill me.

As I thought that, I lightly kicked the wheel that looked ridiculously expensive for something so useless.

Then, suddenly—

Ssseee…

A creepy sound came from somewhere.

I instinctively turned my head.

A spider as large as the carriage I had been riding in was staring straight at me.

“What the hell is that…?”

One of my eyebrows twitched upward in annoyance as I stared at the spider.

Ah. This is a monster too.

I was certain.

This was a monster.

When I first saw the black flower, I had been unsure and had only thought, Maybe.

But the gigantic spider standing before me now looked remarkably similar to the monsters from the world I had originally lived in.

Monsters had been much more common in my old world than they were here.

They were creatures that hid in forests and ruins and preyed upon human lives.

As a black mage, I was extremely accustomed to dealing with them.

Though this thing looks even more grotesque and disgusting than the monsters from my old world.

I clicked my tongue and quickly drew up the black magic power that I had sunk deep inside my body.

At that moment, the spider monster shot several webs toward me.

“……!”

Before I could even dodge, my entire body was wrapped tightly in webs.

Even when I had been a black mage, my magic had been powerful while my physical stamina had been terrible. I had heard my acquaintances tell me to work on my physical strength until I was sick of hearing it.

Apparently, this body wasn’t much different.

If I’d known this would happen, I should’ve made up my mind and started training my stamina the moment I possessed this body.

Still, I was grateful that I had been able to bring my black magic with me into this body.

Using the black magic I had already drawn up, I covered the webs binding my body in black smoke.

The black smoke spread throughout the white webs, burning its way down them and instantly reducing them to dust.

“Ki-ki-ki-ki-gik!”

As the webs disappeared under my black magic, the spider monster let out a bizarre shriek and spat even more webs at me.

“Tch.”

I once again released black smoke from my body and burned the webs.

Then I bit down hard on my thumb, drawing blood, and traced a black magic formula through the air.

The formula drawn in blood immediately began to shine brightly before transforming into the shape of a black shadow and flying toward the spider monster.

The black shadow instantly enveloped the spider monster, forming a round sphere around it.

I stretched out my hand toward the spider and clenched my fist tightly.

The black shadow suddenly compressed the spider monster.

With a thud, the monster burst apart inside the black shadow.

“This is a technique I don’t really like using because it’s rather gruesome. But the spell formula is the easiest to construct, so it’s useful when I’m in a hurry.”

I muttered to myself as I looked at the spider’s corpse, which had already burst apart and was lying miserably on the ground.

But then—

“Ki-ki-ki-gik.”

“Kiii-ki-ki-gik.”

“Ki-ki-ki-ki-gik.”

Creepy, horrifying noises began coming from all directions.

I turned my head.

Even with a quick count, there were more than ten spider monsters approaching me, moving their grotesque forelegs in every direction.

“Oh, for God’s sake.”

I couldn’t help but let out a groan as I quickly bit down harder on my thumb, drawing more blood.

Wait, do spiders actually live in groups?

Why the hell are there so many of them crawling out?

Regardless, I figured it could become dangerous if I continued dealing with them halfheartedly.

I drew a spell formula with my blood.

But then—

Whoosh! Shhhk!

Dozens of black, sharp, boomerang-shaped objects suddenly flew in from somewhere and sliced through the necks and waists of the spider monsters in an instant.

More than ten spider monsters collapsed to the ground one after another as soon as the black boomerangs passed through them.

I turned my head, searching for the person who had cast the black boomerangs.

A carriage stood a short distance away.

And in front of it stood a black-haired man with crimson eyes.

The Empire’s only wielder of the Dark attribute.

Theodor Etherzan.

In the original novel, Caroline’s Lover, he was the devoted second male lead who gave Caroline everything he had without hesitation.

Why the hell is he here?

For the moment, since he had helped me when I was in trouble, I pushed my confusion aside and quickly bowed my head.

“Thank you, Your Grace.”

“Why are you alone in such a dangerous place without an escort?”

“Ah, the carriage wheel fell into a puddle, so the coachman went to get another carriage.”

“You mean you stayed here alone even though this is an area where monsters appear?”

“Ah, I didn’t know.”

I really hadn’t known.

The coachman hadn’t known either, which was why he had felt safe leaving me here alone.

“I received word that monsters had appeared in this area, so I was patrolling nearby. I was told that there were a large number of them, so there are probably still several more around.”

“Ah…”

“If you stay here, the monsters drawn by the smell of these creatures’ blood will swarm you, and you’ll be helpless. Let’s move.”

“Ah…”

“Where were you heading? I’ll escort you there.”

At Theodor’s words, I opened my mouth to tell him that I was on my way to Caroline’s house.

Then I stopped.

I firmly closed my mouth.

I didn’t particularly want to arrange a meeting between Caroline and Theodor that hadn’t existed in the original story.

After all, Caroline would eventually go back and forth between Lloyd, Theodor, and the High Priest Graeme, weighing her options, before ultimately becoming Lloyd’s lover.

Even if my possession of this body had slightly twisted the original plot, the ending where people who loved each other ended up together probably wouldn’t change.

So go find another woman while you still can.

It’d be such a waste to let that beautiful face go to waste.

I stared at Theodor’s handsome face, which looked as though God Himself had painstakingly sculpted it, thinking that to myself.

Then, noticing that he seemed to be waiting for my answer, I shook my head.

“No, it’s fine. The coachman will be back soon.”

“As I said, monsters have appeared nearby. The monsters in this area move in groups. Therefore, even the entrance to the forest may not be safe.”

“Spiders hunt in groups too?!”

“All monsters hunt in groups. You haven’t studied monsterology… Ah.”

Theodor stopped speaking midway and closed his mouth with an ah.

I knew exactly what he had been about to say.

Commoners didn’t possess elemental abilities, so unlike nobles, they didn’t study monsterology separately.

There was no need for them to learn it anyway.

Since commoners had no elemental abilities, encountering a monster meant they couldn’t do anything and would simply die.

I was currently the daughter of a viscount, but I had originally been a commoner.

Therefore, I didn’t possess the elemental ability that nobles were naturally expected to have.

Theodor had realized this belatedly and stopped himself after noticing how thoughtless his comment had been.

Instead of telling him it was fine, I used my black magic to heal my thumb.

I’d done it on impulse, driven by a childish desire to show off and think, I have powers too, you know?

And now I’d made things much more complicated.

“What is…?”

Theodor’s face went deathly pale when he saw the black, caterpillar-like wisps of smoke healing my hand.

Oh, crap.

I immediately made the healing wisps disappear, but Theodor had already seen my healing ability.

“That just now…”

Theodor strode toward me.

I instinctively stepped backward and spoke to him.

“W-Wait. What’s wrong with you? You’re scaring me.”

“That ability just now.”

“Ability? What ability?”

“The ability you used to heal the place where your finger was bleeding.”

“Was I bleeding? Where?”

Realizing that I was thoroughly screwed, I decided to play dumb.

After all, Theodor was the only person in the entire Empire who could use the Dark attribute.

There was no way he wouldn’t be suspicious of an ability like mine that looked unmistakably similar to the Dark attribute.

“Miss.”

“Ah, my head!”

Since he didn’t seem likely to let go of his suspicions about my black magic anytime soon, I pretended to collapse.

Theodor immediately rushed over and caught me.

Handsome and gentlemanly, too.

I briefly rested my face against his chest and pretended to be dizzy while desperately thinking about how I was going to get out of this situation.

But then, as if fate itself had a sense of humor—

It seemed the day I decided to travel really was the day everything would go wrong.

The carriage that had been traveling along just fine had fallen into a puddle in a strange-looking forest, making it impossible to move forward.

The wheel was stuck so badly that there was nothing we could do about it. In the end, the coachman had no choice but to go to the village and bring back another carriage.

If I had known this would happen, I would have brought Becky with me, even if it was a hassle.

Just like the original Elinea, I, too, hadn’t gotten into the habit of taking a servant with me everywhere I went, so I hadn’t brought Becky today.

“Coachman, you’ll have to go and bring another carriage.”

The coachman nodded.

“I’ll ride the horse and go.”

The horse didn’t have a saddle, so I couldn’t ride it to the baron’s estate. He meant that he would ride it to the village and quickly bring back a new carriage.

I nodded and told him I would wait.

After the coachman disappeared on horseback, I stared at the wheel stuck in the puddle.

“How could this have been made this perfectly?”

It really looked as though someone had deliberately known exactly where our carriage would pass and dug a puddle there.

Of course, I figured it was probably just a pointless thought.

After all, the only person in the original story who hated me enough to kill me was Sister Perioze.

But the current Perioze was friendly toward me.

If things continued like this, it was only natural that I would eventually become her trusted right-hand person.

So, unless I betrayed her from now on, there was no reason for her to kill me.

As I thought that, I lightly kicked the wheel that looked ridiculously expensive for something so useless.

Then, suddenly—

Ssseee…

A creepy sound came from somewhere.

I instinctively turned my head.

A spider as large as the carriage I had been riding in was staring straight at me.

“What the hell is that…?”

One of my eyebrows twitched upward in annoyance as I stared at the spider.

Ah. This is a monster too.

I was certain.

This was a monster.

When I first saw the black flower, I had been unsure and had only thought, Maybe.

But the gigantic spider standing before me now looked remarkably similar to the monsters from the world I had originally lived in.

Monsters had been much more common in my old world than they were here.

They were creatures that hid in forests and ruins and preyed upon human lives.

As a black mage, I was extremely accustomed to dealing with them.

Though this thing looks even more grotesque and disgusting than the monsters from my old world.

I clicked my tongue and quickly drew up the black magic power that I had sunk deep inside my body.

At that moment, the spider monster shot several webs toward me.

“……!”

Before I could even dodge, my entire body was wrapped tightly in webs.

Even when I had been a black mage, my magic had been powerful while my physical stamina had been terrible. I had heard my acquaintances tell me to work on my physical strength until I was sick of hearing it.

Apparently, this body wasn’t much different.

If I’d known this would happen, I should’ve made up my mind and started training my stamina the moment I possessed this body.

Still, I was grateful that I had been able to bring my black magic with me into this body.

Using the black magic I had already drawn up, I covered the webs binding my body in black smoke.

The black smoke spread throughout the white webs, burning its way down them and instantly reducing them to dust.

“Ki-ki-ki-ki-gik!”

As the webs disappeared under my black magic, the spider monster let out a bizarre shriek and spat even more webs at me.

“Tch.”

I once again released black smoke from my body and burned the webs.

Then I bit down hard on my thumb, drawing blood, and traced a black magic formula through the air.

The formula drawn in blood immediately began to shine brightly before transforming into the shape of a black shadow and flying toward the spider monster.

The black shadow instantly enveloped the spider monster, forming a round sphere around it.

I stretched out my hand toward the spider and clenched my fist tightly.

The black shadow suddenly compressed the spider monster.

With a thud, the monster burst apart inside the black shadow.

“This is a technique I don’t really like using because it’s rather gruesome. But the spell formula is the easiest to construct, so it’s useful when I’m in a hurry.”

I muttered to myself as I looked at the spider’s corpse, which had already burst apart and was lying miserably on the ground.

But then—

“Ki-ki-ki-gik.”

“Kiii-ki-ki-gik.”

“Ki-ki-ki-ki-gik.”

Creepy, horrifying noises began coming from all directions.

I turned my head.

Even with a quick count, there were more than ten spider monsters approaching me, moving their grotesque forelegs in every direction.

“Oh, for God’s sake.”

I couldn’t help but let out a groan as I quickly bit down harder on my thumb, drawing more blood.

Wait, do spiders actually live in groups?

Why the hell are there so many of them crawling out?

Regardless, I figured it could become dangerous if I continued dealing with them halfheartedly.

I drew a spell formula with my blood.

But then—

Whoosh! Shhhk!

Dozens of black, sharp, boomerang-shaped objects suddenly flew in from somewhere and sliced through the necks and waists of the spider monsters in an instant.

More than ten spider monsters collapsed to the ground one after another as soon as the black boomerangs passed through them.

I turned my head, searching for the person who had cast the black boomerangs.

A carriage stood a short distance away.

And in front of it stood a black-haired man with crimson eyes.

The Empire’s only wielder of the Dark attribute.

Theodor Etherzan.

In the original novel, Caroline’s Lover, he was the devoted second male lead who gave Caroline everything he had without hesitation.

Why the hell is he here?

For the moment, since he had helped me when I was in trouble, I pushed my confusion aside and quickly bowed my head.

“Thank you, Your Grace.”

“Why are you alone in such a dangerous place without an escort?”

“Ah, the carriage wheel fell into a puddle, so the coachman went to get another carriage.”

“You mean you stayed here alone even though this is an area where monsters appear?”

“Ah, I didn’t know.”

I really hadn’t known.

The coachman hadn’t known either, which was why he had felt safe leaving me here alone.

“I received word that monsters had appeared in this area, so I was patrolling nearby. I was told that there were a large number of them, so there are probably still several more around.”

“Ah…”

“If you stay here, the monsters drawn by the smell of these creatures’ blood will swarm you, and you’ll be helpless. Let’s move.”

“Ah…”

“Where were you heading? I’ll escort you there.”

At Theodor’s words, I opened my mouth to tell him that I was on my way to Caroline’s house.

Then I stopped.

I firmly closed my mouth.

I didn’t particularly want to arrange a meeting between Caroline and Theodor that hadn’t existed in the original story.

After all, Caroline would eventually go back and forth between Lloyd, Theodor, and the High Priest Graeme, weighing her options, before ultimately becoming Lloyd’s lover.

Even if my possession of this body had slightly twisted the original plot, the ending where people who loved each other ended up together probably wouldn’t change.

So go find another woman while you still can.

It’d be such a waste to let that beautiful face go to waste.

I stared at Theodor’s handsome face, which looked as though God Himself had painstakingly sculpted it, thinking that to myself.

Then, noticing that he seemed to be waiting for my answer, I shook my head.

“No, it’s fine. The coachman will be back soon.”

“As I said, monsters have appeared nearby. The monsters in this area move in groups. Therefore, even the entrance to the forest may not be safe.”

“Spiders hunt in groups too?!”

“All monsters hunt in groups. You haven’t studied monsterology… Ah.”

Theodor stopped speaking midway and closed his mouth with an ah.

I knew exactly what he had been about to say.

Commoners didn’t possess elemental abilities, so unlike nobles, they didn’t study monsterology separately.

There was no need for them to learn it anyway.

Since commoners had no elemental abilities, encountering a monster meant they couldn’t do anything and would simply die.

I was currently the daughter of a viscount, but I had originally been a commoner.

Therefore, I didn’t possess the elemental ability that nobles were naturally expected to have.

Theodor had realized this belatedly and stopped himself after noticing how thoughtless his comment had been.

Instead of telling him it was fine, I used my black magic to heal my thumb.

I’d done it on impulse, driven by a childish desire to show off and think, I have powers too, you know?

And now I’d made things much more complicated.

“What is…?”

Theodor’s face went deathly pale when he saw the black, caterpillar-like wisps of smoke healing my hand.

Oh, crap.

I immediately made the healing wisps disappear, but Theodor had already seen my healing ability.

“That just now…”

Theodor strode toward me.

I instinctively stepped backward and spoke to him.

“W-Wait. What’s wrong with you? You’re scaring me.”

“That ability just now.”

“Ability? What ability?”

“The ability you used to heal the place where your finger was bleeding.”

“Was I bleeding? Where?”

Realizing that I was thoroughly screwed, I decided to play dumb.

After all, Theodor was the only person in the entire Empire who could use the Dark attribute.

There was no way he wouldn’t be suspicious of an ability like mine that looked unmistakably similar to the Dark attribute.

“Miss.”

“Ah, my head!”

Since he didn’t seem likely to let go of his suspicions about my black magic anytime soon, I pretended to collapse.

Theodor immediately rushed over and caught me.

Handsome and gentlemanly, too.

I briefly rested my face against his chest and pretended to be dizzy while desperately thinking about how I was going to get out of this situation.