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Chapter 1
Crackle.
The sharp tear of paper rang out.
Shame surged up from the soles of her feet to the crown of her head.
“Uwaaaah!”
Ayla screamed—whether it was a shriek or a roar, even she couldn’t tell—as she began furiously ripping her diary apart.
“Aaaargh!”
The sound was almost like the cry of someone in torment.
Her face flushed bright red, trembling, she shoved the diary into the fireplace.
But no matter how many times she struck flint to steel, all that came was a sharp tic-tic, failure upon failure. Still, she didn’t stop. With shaking hands, she finally coaxed a spark onto the tinder.
Soon, the clumped pages caught, fire spreading greedily across them.
Watching the flames grow, smelling the acrid burn of paper, Ayla let out a strange laugh.
“Ufu… ufufufu… ahahaha…”
She tugged at her hair by habit—then froze.
Calm down. Just stop. Get a hold of yourself.
Ayla shot to her feet, spinning in frantic circles before the fireplace, then stopped again to face the rising flames.
Get a grip, Ayla Solarun.
She collapsed onto the floor with a graceless thud, crossing her legs like a stranger in her own room. Propping her chin in her hand, she watched the fire dwindle. A wave of emptiness washed over her.
It doesn’t burn down to white ash like in my imagination, does it?
Just then, a knock sounded on her door.
“Lady Ayla, are you all right?”
“I’m fine!”
Raising her voice, she turned to stare at the half-burnt diary.
Ayla Solarun.
Currently ten years old.
She lifted her palm.
The calluses and blisters were gone—only a child’s small, smooth hand remained.
Focus. Worry about what comes next.
Ayla clenched her fist.
Ayla Solarun was dead.
Yes, she had died young. But it had been her own doing, so what could be done?
And when people die, don’t they usually see their life flash before their eyes?
Moments of life rushing past like painted scenes—stirring regret, stirring nostalgia.
Hah. So I failed after all.
or perhaps—
Ah, if only I could go back to then…
That’s how it usually went, didn’t it?
But Ayla’s reel had been different.
Every single scene flashing by was so embarrassing I thought I’d die all over again.
A reel of pure shame.
And most of that humiliation centered on those two boys in her diary.
No—let’s be honest.
Her own delusions.
Gods, it’s mortifying.
From that age until she became an adult, she’d convinced herself that Sada and Luka liked her.
Childhood friends, the three of them.
Affection blooming between them, friendship between the boys, and herself—wedged right in the middle.
Ah, don’t fight over me! Can’t the three of us just stay together forever?
That ridiculous fantasy had carried her for ten years.
And when she finally shouted—“If you really like me, then stop doing this!”—their reactions still burned her face with shame even now.
At least Luka had tried to soften the blow, not to hurt her. But Sada—
“You were still harboring those delusions? I figured you might be, but seriously… that’s just like Ayla Solarun.”
His words left her dumbstruck. And then he drove the nail in.
“Neither of us ever once thought of you that way. Not once did we like you as anything more.”
Even recalling it now made her heart race and her face burn hot.
And Luka, flustered, had tried to be kind—yet only made it worse.
“Still, it wasn’t unpleasant, humoring your fantasies. Thank you for that.”
That had only been another nail in her coffin.
She remembered clearly how she’d run from the room and locked herself away in her chambers.
The rest—their falling prey to the Crown Princess, discovering she was truly a demon, Ayla’s attempt at assassination, her own death at the hands of the Crown Prince—all of that could wait.
Ayla flopped backward onto the floor. Once, she would never have dreamed of lying on the ground. Now, she couldn’t care less.
The worst part wasn’t even their rejection. It was realizing they never trusted me at all.
And why would they?
When I spent all my time scribbling in diaries, drowning in delusions…
As her reel of shame rolled by, Ayla buried her face in her hands and rolled side to side.
It hadn’t been just childish fancies.
She’d kept those fantasies alive until seventeen.
If I knew some boy had spent ten years imagining we were destined, I’d be horrified too…
For the first time, she felt grateful Luka and Sada had at least kept her as a friend.
They hadn’t cast her out. They hadn’t severed ties.
They weren’t bad people.
The problem had always been her.
All right, Ayla Solarun.
She leapt up and strode to the mirror.
How many times had she fussed with her clothes before this very glass?
Frills, lace, layered skirts, gossamer chiffon.
Her fingertips brushed the surface.
A girl stared back.
Brown hair, plain.
Blue eyes, lovely enough, but paling beside her siblings’ bright emeralds.
I always wanted to be like my eldest sister.
Helen Solarun, eight years her senior. Head of the family.
Golden hair like the sun, green eyes inherited from their mother.
Beautiful, brilliant. Professors at the Academy had debated her as an equal.
Her romances were the stuff of legend.
Helen’s fiery love affair—and equally fiery breakup—with Duke Abend Arhen was still spoken of with awe.
Even though she never married, her love life remained the talk of the Empire.
Right now, she hasn’t even started dating him yet…
Ayla’s heart ached with longing.
But no matter what, she could never be like Helen.
All her siblings bore golden hair and green eyes.
Only Ayla, with her brown hair and blue eyes, looked the odd one out.
Her mother had always fretted—
“Oh, Ayla, how pitiful. Like a stray mutt with no pedigree.”
And most often—
“We picked you up under a bridge, you know.”
Even her late father had teased along, leaving her crying secretly into her pillow.
Still, she had admired Helen. She adored her brother.
And the youngest, Leo, beloved by all.
A child touched by the spirits.
That was what they called children in Solarun born with unusual features.
Perhaps, Ayla thought with a bitter smile, the spirits had toyed with her once again—sending her back like this.
If so, she would accept it.
Born with brown hair and blue eyes? Then live that way. What else is there?
“From now on, I’ll live within my limits.”
She wasn’t Helen. She couldn’t dream of grand romances.
If only she’d realized that sooner, she wouldn’t have wasted her life in fantasies.
No romance. Friendship. Friendship!
Marching to the vanity, she seized a pair of scissors and began hacking away at her hair.
Thinking of the Crown Princess’s words still made her burn with fury.
“Lady Ayla is their childhood friend, isn’t she? If they don’t listen to your words, why would they listen to mine?”
The demon in disguise had mocked her like that—and it had been true.
Ayla Solarun’s words had no weight.
No trust.
Then I’ll build that trust.
From now on—friendship.
Only friendship.
At the very least, when she said Don’t listen to that woman!
‘If Ayla says so, there must be a reason. All right.’
That was the kind of reaction she wanted to earn.
She set the scissors down with a long sigh.
Her hair, chopped unevenly at her jaw, was a mess.
In my head it came out sleek… but in reality, it’s awful.
No helping it. She’d ask Madam Poppy.
Poppy had been like a wet nurse, tending her since she was two.
Ayla opened the door.
Having heard her shouting earlier—and her week-long seclusion—Poppy was waiting worriedly outside.
“Madam Poppy, could you please finish cutting my hair?”
The woman stared blankly at the hacked, jagged hair framing Ayla’s face.
“Madam Poppy?”
As Ayla came closer, scissors in hand—
Poppy fainted dead away.
