The white ceiling swam in and out of focus.
The smell of disinfectant. The steady beeping of a machine. And a small, warm hand resting on the back of her own.
She knew who it belonged to without even opening her eyes.
"Big sister."
Her younger sister's voice trembled. She was crying. Crying again.
She tried to move her lips, but her tongue felt heavy. The inside of her throat was rough as dry sand. Just drawing a breath made the spaces between her ribs throb.
She knew she was dying.
The doctor had told her a month ago. There was no more treatment they could offer. Seoha had nodded, and her younger sister had cried in the hallway. That was all Seoha knew. That her younger sister had cried in the hallway. And that after that, she had come to the hospital room every single day without missing one.
"Big sister, I'm here."
The same greeting every day. The same spot every day. She would sit in the chair beside the bed, hold Seoha's hand, and sit there without saying a word. Sometimes she talked about school. Sometimes she laughed. Sometimes she cried.
Seoha felt sorry for every one of those moments.
She didn't remember her parents' faces.
When she was five and her younger sister was three, they had been abandoned in front of an orphanage. There hadn't even been name tags. The orphanage director had given them their names. She knew nothing about what their parents looked like or why they had abandoned them. She didn't want to know. Her younger sister was different. Her younger sister was the only person who had ever treated Seoha like a human being.
"Big sister, squeeze my hand."
She tried to muster her strength. Her fingers wouldn't move. Her younger sister's hand closed around them. It was warm. The only warmth Seoha knew in this world.
She knew the cherry blossoms had started blooming beyond the hospital-room window. Her younger sister had told her yesterday. The cherry blossoms were blooming along the road in front of the hospital. They were pretty. They should go see them together next year.
There would be no next year.
I'm sorry.
She wanted to tell her. That if she hadn't been there, Seoha would have given up long ago. That she had endured one more day because her younger sister came every day. But now she couldn't hold on anymore.
The beeping slowed.
Her younger sister tightened her grip.
"Big sister, no. Big sister."
Her vision darkened. The smell of disinfectant faded away. The beeping faded away. Her younger sister's voice faded away.
The last thing she felt was the warmth on the back of her hand.
And then—light.
White flooded her vision. This wasn't the hospital room. There was no ceiling, no machine, no smell of disinfectant. There was only light. Warm, dazzling light that somehow made her ache with longing.
Someone was standing in that light.
A silhouette. She couldn't see its face. But it was beautiful. It looked as if the light itself had taken human form. She wasn't afraid. Strangely, she wasn't afraid at all.
The silhouette approached.
Then it pressed its lips to Seoha's forehead.
A kiss.
Light, soft, and playful.
"Please take care of me!"
The bright voice rang out, as casual as if it were speaking to an old friend.
Before she could even open her mouth, light poured over her. Light wrapped around her entire body. Light so bright she couldn't open her eyes. Her consciousness melted away within it.
She felt a cold floor beneath her.
She opened her eyes.
The ceiling was high. It wasn't the white ceiling of a hospital room. It was an impossibly high ceiling carved with golden patterns. Candle flames flickered from a chandelier.
Her body felt light.
Her ribs didn't hurt. Her throat wasn't rough when she inhaled. Her heart was beating strongly. It was a sensation she had forgotten. A body that didn't hurt. A body that was alive.
She slowly sat up.
She was in a room. A massive room. The bed alone was larger than the entire hospital room. Rose-patterned wallpaper covered the walls, and moonlight poured in through the window.
The window was slightly open. Cold night air drifted inside. It was still chilly, the last remnant of winter just beginning to recede, but there was a softness to it. A faint floral scent mingled with the breeze. It wasn't the smell of disinfectant from the hospital room. It was the scent of something alive.
And there was a mirror.
A full-length mirror with a golden frame. She walked toward it.
The person standing in the mirror wasn't Seoha.
Silvery hair shimmered in the moonlight. Golden eyes stared back at her. Fair, delicate skin. Features as finely crafted as a doll's. It was a face she had never seen in her life.
She was beautiful.
So beautiful she looked unreal.
She touched the girl's cheek in the mirror. The girl in the mirror made the same movement. The skin beneath her fingertips was soft. It was real. This face, this body—it really belonged to her.
Her heart dropped.
She knew this face.
Silver hair. Golden eyes. The young lady of House Belfior.
Ariella de Belfior Rosher.
The villainess from the novel she had been reading before she died. The character who tormented the protagonist, lost everything, and met a doom ending. The character readers hated most.
Seoha had entered that character's body.
"...You're kidding."
The voice that came from her lips wasn't her own. It was clear and crystalline, exactly as the novel had described it.
She sank to the floor in front of the mirror.
She had died. She definitely had. She had let go of her younger sister's hand. She had heard the machine stop. And yet she was alive now. In someone else's body. In another world.
Please take care of me.
The silhouette's voice lingered in her ears.
Take care of what? What on earth?
She stared into the eyes in the mirror. They were unfamiliar eyes. But the emotions reflected in them were hers alone. Fear. Confusion. And—a tiny, faint—sense of relief.
She wasn't in pain.
For the first time, she wasn't in pain.
She looked down at her hands. White, slender fingers. They weren't the hands covered in bruises and needle marks from the hospital. They were clean. Whole.
Tears spilled down her cheeks.
Tears fell from golden eyes. She didn't wipe them away. She couldn't. This body was so healthy, this heart was beating so strongly, and that was unbearably sad.
Was her younger sister crying right now?
Was she alone beside an empty bed, holding a hand that had gone cold, crying by herself?
"...I'm sorry."
She cried with the face of the girl in the mirror.
She cried for a long time.
Then, after her tears finally stopped, she slowly raised her head.
The eyes in the mirror stared straight back at her.
Ariella de Belfior Rosher. In the original novel, this young lady's ending was doom. She was a character who lost everything, was abandoned by everyone, and met a miserable end.
But Seoha had already been abandoned once.
She was used to being abandoned. As for doom, she had already gone through it once.
She smiled with tear-streaked cheeks. The silver-haired girl in the mirror smiled along with her. It was a spirited smile that didn't suit her at all.
"...All right. Let's do this."
In this life, she wouldn't die.
In this life, she wouldn't be abandoned.
And—in this life.
She thought of her younger sister. The girl who came to the hospital room every day, sat in the cold chair, and held her hand without saying a word.
In this life, she would be the one who protected her.
Moonlight poured through the window. It silvered her hair. Spring-night air blew in through the open window. It was still cold, but it was definitely spring. Somewhere, flowers were beginning to bloom, and she could smell it.
Yoon Seoha had died. The painful, lonely life in which she could do nothing was over.
The one who rose to her feet before the mirror was Ariella.
It was the first night of her new life.