Starting in a Prison (2)
I have no idea how I ended up here. I was just racking my brain trying to figure out what to do next, and before I knew it, I was in prison. At least they seem to have put some thought into it. I’ve got a private cell with its own toilet. Outside, there are only a few soldiers stationed near the far entrance.
“Still no clue,” I muttered.
How long am I supposed to stay in a place like this? Honestly, I still don’t know anything. I might even die here. Sophia has eyes everywhere, so she probably can’t kill me outright, but in this bullshit world ruled by plot convenience, who knows what could happen?
“Tsk. Never thought I’d experience prison life in this new existence.”
Maybe it was because I’d been constantly watched and guarded by the prince and his lackeys until now, but after being thrown in here, I finally felt a little more at ease.
“Still, locking someone up on the same day? That’s cold.”
They must have been in a real hurry to get rid of me. Whatever. At least I was out of that cumbersome dress. I was basically wearing rags now, but honestly, it wasn’t bad. That damn corset. I hadn’t noticed it before, but now that I thought about it, it had been squeezing my waist like a vice. Not that it mattered. This body—Milene’s—had always had that perfectly cinched waist.
Come to think of it… this body is female.
My eyes landed on a cracked mirror hanging on the wall. Long hair with a bluish tint. Seductive, fox-like eyes. Pale skin. And the generous breasts that had drawn the guards’ stares the entire way here. I ran my hands over my body, feeling the curves. Yeah. This was literally the pinnacle of beauty that hack author had crammed into the story. That was Milene.
“So this is my body from now on.”
I shook my head. Sure, it was nice. If I had to become a woman, this was definitely the kind of body I’d want. But still… it felt strangely complicated.
Normally, something like this should be appreciated from a third-person perspective. Enjoying it while looking at myself? That was just narcissism with a side of perversion. It wasn’t like I was obsessed with women or anything, but still. The way people looked at me… Because my rags left so much skin exposed, I could feel the guards’ eyes constantly glued to my chest. It was honestly pretty unpleasant.
“How long am I going to live like this?”
It really had been the worst day imaginable. I’d gone from an ordinary Korean person to becoming the perfect woman known as Milene, only for everything to fall apart in a single day because Sophia and the prince had already set everything up. Well, technically Milene was the one who was finished. I wasn’t quite dead yet. But still.
“Hey.”
How much time had passed? I heard a voice calling me. I turned toward the iron bars. A middle-aged man with a thick beard and shiny armor stood there. I’d never written a character like this in my novel, but judging by the vibe, he was probably the warden of this prison. Though it looked like his beard and head hair had been swapped. Plenty below, nothing above.
“Is it mealtime?”
“You really are carefree. Doesn’t this bother you at all?”
“Well, dark magic is basically my nature, so there’s not much I can do about that. And I’ve already reflected on everything.”
The man frowned at my words.
“You were the fiancée of the man who will become this country’s king. Why on earth would you do something like that? His Majesty could have as many women as he wanted.”
Because I’m not the real Milene, you idiot. The original Milene never did anything like that either. Fuck. Just thinking about it made curses bubble up in my throat. Honestly, was the prince blind? How could he prefer that flat-chested girl who looked like a damn ironing board and could easily pass for a restaurant waitress? Milene had a full chest and was beautiful. The difference in appearance alone was enormous. To abandon someone like Milene? That prince was out of his mind.
“I don’t know either. Maybe something clouded my eyes. I really have no idea.”
“And yet you admit you were wrong?”
This man, who looked like he could be the brother of a dwarf, frowned even deeper. It was the face of someone looking at a complete fool who’d thrown their life away. Yeah, that was probably the normal reaction.
“The tide has already turned. It won’t change just because I insist I didn’t do it.”
I gave a bitter smile and shrugged.
“Hmm. The world of high nobles is beyond me.”
“Don’t try to understand it. This is a place where lives are thrown away over childish games. Is that my meal?”
There was a bowl beside him filled with something pale. It was probably some weird soup. It looked a bit like rice porridge. Or maybe not. This world had a medieval European feel, so it was probably oatmeal. That stuff tasted awful.
“Ah, my mistake. It’s just oatmeal. Probably not to a fine lady’s taste.”
The middle-aged man handed me the bowl. In my original world, oatmeal was commonly eaten as breakfast in Western countries. Of course, it was mostly what poor farmers ate when they had nothing else. The original Milene might have turned her nose up at it, but there was no way I couldn’t eat it.
“Mmm. It’s pretty bland.”
It really did seem like they’d just mixed it with water and served it. There wasn’t even any basic seasoning. It was basically just white porridge. Was I supposed to be grateful for even this? No way. Even in Korea, prisoners got better food than this. Was this really acceptable? Even considering the technological level of the era, this was just too much.
“That’s how it is here,” he said.
I decided to put the oatmeal issue aside for now. It wasn’t like I was going to become a prison cooking king or anything. Right now, I needed to worry about my own survival first.
“Well, I’m going to live as a commoner anyway, so this is fine.”
“You’re going to live as a commoner?”
“Yeah, so there’s no need for you to be so polite to me, mister.”
From a Korean perspective, it actually felt a bit awkward to have an older person speaking respectfully to me. I wasn’t some rich young master. Besides, Milene’s connections were all gone, and I wasn’t even the real her anyway.
“R-really?”
“Since I’m bored anyway, it’d be nice if you could chat with me sometimes. Win-win, right?”
In the original story, it had only said that Milene was imprisoned. The female lead was Sophia, so there were no details about how Milene had behaved in prison. I never expected there to be a guard like this. Well, from the guards’ perspective, this was probably just a fight between nobles. After we got a bit closer, we started chatting back and forth whenever he wasn’t busy.
He was sitting in a chair, moving his thick fingers to write something with a pen.
“What are you doing?”
“Ah, it’s a letter to my son.”
“You should be heading home, but because of this foolish former noble lady, you’re stuck working all night.”
“No, no. Being a prison guard is my job. Besides, who knows? Maybe you’ll be restored as a noble lady someday?”
The guard winked. In other words, he was treating me well now so that if I somehow got released and regained my status, I might repay the favor. Well, the real Milene probably would have. Honestly though, the chances of the prince letting me keep my status were slim. But then a fun idea occurred to me.
“Hahaha. I don’t think that’s going to happen. Hmm.”
“What is it?”
“Mister, could you get me a pen and some paper too?”
“What for? Do you have someone to write letters to?”
“Haha, of course not. I’m just bored, so I thought I’d write a novel. The paper would be my manuscript.”
Since I had nothing else to do, I figured I might as well write a story. That hack elf author had been terrible. At least I should be better than her. I’d read plenty of fantasy novels back in my day. Instead of blatantly plagiarizing, maybe I could take some ideas and dress them up a bit. After all, people loved fantasy novels. Or was that a misjudgment? Either way, writing a fantasy story right now didn’t seem like a bad idea.
I started writing the day the guard uncle brought me the paper and pen. Surprisingly, the words flowed easily. It wasn’t even a web novel, yet I didn’t feel tired at all. The body of a saint really was something else.
“Wow, miss. You’re really serious about this.”
“Yeah. Want to read it?”
“Sure, why not?”
The guard started reading the manuscript like a father reading his daughter’s school essay. At first he was smiling, but then his expression gradually grew more serious. Uh… was it really that bad? I’d inherited all of Milene’s knowledge of this world’s language, so there shouldn’t be any problems with the writing itself.
“What do you think, mister?”
“Did you really write this yourself?”
Even after I called him, it took the guard a full five minutes before he finally looked up at me.
“Of course. Honestly, who would ghostwrite something for me in my current situation?”
“Maybe you referenced some other books?”
“I’ve read some novels, but I wouldn’t waste time copying them. I can swear on my parents.”
Not that Milene’s parents would care, since they’d abandoned her. And I hadn’t copied anything from this world. I’d borrowed some concepts from my original world, though.
“Then… it’s original.”
“Why? Is something wrong?”
“No, it’s just… I got way too excited for someone my age.”
“Huh?”
“It means it’s that good.”
It was just the opening where the hero’s party sets out to defeat the demon king. And he thought that was interesting? Well, in this era, heroes actually existed, so maybe he could relate and immerse himself in it. Either way, thanks to the guard, my novel started spreading quite a bit even inside the prison.
“This was written by that young lady?”
“It’s really amazing. Pretty entertaining.”
For some reason, the guys here seemed to find it genuinely fun. It was basically just a quick, instant-style short story with fast pacing and no typos, but they read it with real enjoyment. Of course, the guard had kept my identity a secret. Thankfully, the prince seemed eager to hide the fact that he’d thrown me in prison, so he wasn’t spreading much information about me either.
“But the length feels a bit short, doesn’t it?”
One day, the guard suddenly said that. Was he seriously expecting proper serialization length from something I wrote just to kill time? I’d only written enough to keep the guards from getting too bored.
“Well, it’s not for official serialization. I just wrote it because I was bored.”
“You wrote something this good just because you were bored?”
“Why? Is that strange?”
The guard stroked his thick beard, then suddenly clapped his hands as if an idea had struck him.
“Why don’t you submit this to a publishing house in the royal capital?”
“Is it good enough for that?”
“Of course! It’s more interesting than the short stories in the magazine my son reads! It’s even better than the stuff that occasionally appears in the newspapers!”
The middle-aged guard suddenly got so excited that his beard was practically flying around as he spoke. A publishing house? Was civilization developed enough for that here? Well, this was a fantasy world with magic, and the capital seemed fairly advanced. It made sense that they’d have publishing houses. After all, even Sophia and her friends passed novels around. So why wouldn’t there be publishers?
But was my writing really good enough to submit? I didn’t know when the king would show up, but I figured I might as well try whatever I could. Who knows? Maybe I could at least earn enough to put food in my mouth.