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Chapter 4
I wasn’t particularly interested in the other male leads besides Lennox, but I still knew the rough outline of the story.
Thanks to that, I also vaguely remembered Solard’s hidden setting… though what exactly was it again?
For some reason, my head throbbed painfully. After forcing my sluggish brain to work for a while, a few fragments finally surfaced.
Everyone was made to loathe Solard due to a witch’s curse, but the heroine was a soul from another world, so the curse didn’t affect her… was that it?
Ah, right. That’s why he became obsessively attached to the heroine—the only person who treated him like a human being.
Honestly, just hearing that setup made me a little interested. A devoted male lead who only loves the heroine? That’s premium material.
“They say most women faint if they even get close to him, so marriage is completely out of the question.”
“Right? Apparently almost nobody’s even seen his face. I heard he’s only come to the capital once.”
Even while I struggled to recover my memories, everyone around me kept talking about Solard with visible disgust.
Just how bad was this curse?
I only knew the setting vaguely, and since the curse didn’t affect me, I couldn’t fully understand what they meant.
Losing sanity points just by approaching him? He sounded like some incomprehensible cosmic horror creature from a Lovecraftian myth.
If I remembered correctly, the curse even made his face appear grotesque…
But really, how horrifying could a human face possibly be? It’s not like he suddenly turned into a giant bug like Gre—
…Ah. Was that it?
Did Solard literally look like Gregor Samsa to them?
Ugh. Okay, if that’s the case, I guess I could understand why they hated him.
The useless thought sent goosebumps racing down my arms, and I rubbed them vigorously as the conversation continued.
“Seriously, that’s awful. At that point, shouldn’t he just live alone forever? I’d feel bad for the woman who marries him.”
“Exactly. What’s the point of being rich and buried in jewels if every day of your life feels like hell?”
Depending on the situation, noble couples usually lived separately even after marriage.
Many even slept in different bedrooms, and if they shared breakfast or dinner together, people considered them unusually close.
There weren’t many jobs women could have in this world, so a lot of them aimed for social advancement through marriage.
And if the man in question was a grand duke, then at the very least he’d be wealthy. Whoever married Solard would probably live quite comfortably.
Yet despite that, everyone reacted like this…
The curse really must have been severe.
“I could never marry someone like that.”
“Same here. Ugh, terrifying.”
If Solard really looked like Gregor Samsa in their eyes, then maybe I could understand a little. But hearing everyone reject him so violently made me start feeling sorry for a character I’d never even seen.
Still, wasn’t this a bit too much?
Of course, it was easy for me to say that since the curse didn’t affect me at all…
Unlike the heroine, though, I was just another outsider in this world.
As I mulled over my thoughts while absentmindedly shoveling spoonfuls into my mouth, the parfait eventually disappeared. I scraped the bottom of the glass with my spoon and organized my thoughts.
“The Grand Duke of the North, huh…”
Come to think of it, what happened to the male leads that Daisy didn’t choose?
I began recalling the love interests one by one, starting with Solard.
Lennox, Eugene, Colton, Lowelln, Shien…
The romance routes opened after Daisy’s seventeenth birthday, and the male leads appeared one after another.
Among my utterly depressing extra-character life, one of the few enjoyable things had been watching Daisy’s first encounters with all the male leads unfold in real time, just like in the game.
Honestly, coming to this world was the first time I’d ever thanked the god I’d spent my whole life cursing.
For an otaku, there was no greater gift than this.
And on top of that, Daisy chose Lennox as her male lead. Probably because he was the main character…
To be honest, as someone who’d gone all-in on Lennox stock because he was my favorite character, I’d secretly been nervous she might not choose him.
I still vividly remembered bursting about five or six cushions from excitement when the two of them finally started seeing each other.
Good times…
Everyone, can you see this? My stocks skyrocketed.
I couldn’t exactly follow them on their dates, which was a little disappointing, but they deserved to enjoy their alone time. I shouldn’t interfere.
Though okay, maybe I was just a tiny bit disappointed…
Anyway!
I didn’t know what the others were doing now, but for those five whose faces I’d seen several times, I clearly remembered everything—their names, appearances, occupations, and even when they first met the heroine.
So why was my memory of Solard so fragmented?
Why did it feel like I was forgetting something important?
“There’s definitely something there, but when you can’t remember it, it drives you crazy.”
I tapped the empty glass with my spoon while thinking hard.
It was strange. Only my memories about Solard felt hazy. I didn’t usually have bad memory, and oddly enough, I rarely forgot game settings.
There was no way I could forget someone whose entire concept was “Grand Duke of the North.”
Right. Solard was…
The only long-haired romanceable character in the game. Originally handsome, but because of the curse, even his appearance became monstrously distorted.
Apparently, his presence itself felt so alien that merely thinking about him made people uncomfortable.
At this point, he was basically treated like a walking plague.
As a result, he spent most of his life alone, trapped in crushing loneliness.
And Daisy had probably been the first person he’d ever formed a genuinely human connection with.
Well, in a world centered around the heroine, there was no way anyone else would conveniently possess such a special ability. She was his only option.
If someone lived such a miserable life, then of course they’d become attached to the first person who treated them like a human being…
Ugh, my head hurts.
Trying to drag up old memories after so long made my brain rebel, and a pounding headache swept over me.
I pressed my thumb against my temple and rested for a moment when I noticed a couple flirting affectionately outside the window.
As I rubbed my temples, I unconsciously snorted.
Ah, youth.
Solard probably never even got to experience something like th—
“…Wait.”
If Daisy could be with Solard because she was a soul from another world…
Then didn’t that mean I was in the exact same situation?
“Huh?”
Now that I thought about it, that was true. I didn’t hate Solard, nor did he seem horrifying to me like some bug monster.
Why hadn’t I realized this sooner?
Obviously, I couldn’t become the heroine…
But couldn’t I at least marry him?
If it was just a marriage arrangement, then there’d be no need for romance.
“…This actually sounds plausible.”
The moment the idea struck me, my mind began racing.
I hated romance.
The whole emotional push-and-pull with men was exhausting.
I didn’t even really understand the emotion people called love. Having never received affection from my own family—only criticism and neglect—love itself felt burdensome to me.
Even after living in Seluce’s body, I’d decided not to date because I’d learned firsthand that relationships ended the moment people stopped loving each other.
After all, Min Ji-eun’s dating history had started with trash men and ended with complete wrecks.
Sob…
Since I’d never even been loved properly by my family, whenever a man said he liked me, I’d give him everything I had.
In my early twenties, I was too young and naïve to know better. I thought being wanted meant happiness. I thought that alone was enough.
As painful memories resurfaced, I mentally listed my exes one by one.
The Screamer.
The Obsessive One.
The Two-Timer.
Seriously, how had I managed to date nothing but garbage men?
At this point, I was basically a trash-man collector.
Haah…
Because of all that, I was utterly sick of men.
And lately, after constantly watching Daisy surrounded by absurdly attractive men—including my favorite character in real life—my standards had skyrocketed to impossible levels. Every ordinary guy looked like squid to me now.
All the exceptional men were already hopelessly devoted to the heroine, and the rest weren’t worth looking at.
At this rate, I had absolutely no desire to date anyone.
But…
Solard was cursed.
He couldn’t form ordinary relationships with other people.
Daisy already had her male lead, Lennox, and the two of them would probably marry soon. Which meant Solard would be left with absolutely nothing.
I wasn’t the heroine, so I couldn’t break his curse…
But maybe I could still help him somehow.
To Solard, I’d probably be his only option.
Maybe… maybe he’d need me.
And if it was just marriage, then it perfectly matched my own situation, since I didn’t want romance anyway.
I still hadn’t found my place in this world. I didn’t even know what I wanted to do with my life.
As grateful as I was to Daisy, her unwavering affection sometimes felt overwhelming to someone like me, who struggled to love others.
So maybe staying beside someone who actually needed me wouldn’t be such a bad choice.
At the very least, maybe I wouldn’t feel completely useless there.
Maybe Solard would understand this strange feeling—that even while alive and breathing, it felt as though I alone had been separated from the rest of the world.
The more I thought about it, the better the idea sounded.
“Ooh…”
And besides, Solard was a Grand Duke of the North.
He had to be filthy rich.
As long as he wasn’t a complete lunatic, sticking around for the money didn’t sound half bad.
Besides, characters like northern grand dukes were always more fun when they played hard to get. I could handle that much.
And if I got to splurge extravagantly while I was at it, then sure—I’d gladly provide emotional support for one grumpy northern duke. Money therapy was the best therapy in life, after all.
Solard wouldn’t be lonely anymore either, so wasn’t this a win-win situation?
After thinking it over quietly, I stood up.
Then I approached the group still gossiping nearby and carefully asked,
“Excuse me. Sorry for asking out of nowhere, but… when exactly is the Grand Duke of the North arriving?”
Solard Artensia.
A man who possessed power, wealth, and authority.
But there was one thing he didn’t possess:
Me, Min Selly, 32nd descendant of the Yeoheung Min clan.
And so I made up my mind.
If life was going to be boring anyway, then I might as well roll around on piles of jewels and spend money extravagantly.
Which is why I decided—
I was going to seduce the Grand Duke of the North.
