Contracting with a Demon is Foolish! (1)
Life is unfair. Some are born lowly slaves, others noble aristocrats. Rina thought so as she watched Rozette lady whipping her right before her eyes.
Thwack, thwack, thwack! Red welts crisscrossed the back of Rina's hand. She could no longer tell where the first blow had landed.
It hurts… but I can't cry. If I do, she'll punish me even worse.
Meanwhile, Rozette glared at Rina, still fuming, nostrils flaring.
"You filthy slave wench. Do you still refuse to repent your wrongs?"
"But miss… I truly haven't done anything wrong."
Rina protested in a trembling voice.
Rozette de Orpen. The youngest daughter of the Orpen Viscount family, nobles of the empire. Rozette utterly despised Rina, who enjoyed her father the Orpen Viscount's favor.
Rozette's golden blonde hair quivered violently at Rina's plea. She roughly grabbed a fistful of Rina's hair—Rina still kneeling—and yanked her head back.
A clump of Rina's fiery red locks was dragged upward.
"Agh!"
"That's exactly what makes your attitude so insolent."
Rozette scowled, her jet-black eyes boring into Rina like chips of obsidian.
"A Gano must kneel when the master commands it, bow when ordered to bow—absolute obedience to the family. Yet you keep talking back to the end."
Rozette spat coldly, then slapped Rina's cheek with all her might.
Smack! The sharp, brief sound echoed as Rina's head snapped to the side. Her cheek burned hot, and the tears she'd held back finally spilled over.
Gano—house slaves who handled household chores, bound to absolute obedience to the master and his kin, no different from furniture. Rina was a Gano of the Orpen Viscount's household.
In other words, the lowliest of the lowly slaves.
But Rina believed that her heart, at least, was no different from a noble's. Unable to contain the injustice boiling inside her, she finally spoke up.
"What have I even done to make you hate me so much?"
In that instant, Rozette's face twisted into an even uglier scowl.
"Your insolence pierces the heavens. Today, this lady will teach you a proper lesson!"
Rozette raised her hand again. Rina squeezed her eyes shut in dread.
But the pain didn't come this time. Cautiously opening one eye, Rina saw Rozette's personal Gano attendants holding her back.
"Miss, if you hit her more, we won't be able to hide it from the master."
"Exactly. It's good to discipline this stupid girl, but any more and you'll be the one getting scolded."
"Th—this…!"
Rozette gnashed her teeth.
"To think that this lady, second daughter of the Orpen Viscount house, must mind a mere Gano, daughter of a filthy Changno… What a tragic fate."
Changno—prostitute slaves specialized in selling their bodies at brothels and the like.
Rina bristled at the insult to her mother but couldn't retort. It was an undeniable truth.
Rozette seemed displeased by the look in Rina's eyes. Grimacing fiercely, she roughly released Rina's hair.
Rina's body was flung to the floor.
"Get out. And if you act so arrogant again, relying on that pretty face of yours, I truly won't let it slide next time."
"…Understood, miss."
Rina stumbled out of the room as if chased. Her appearance was a mess—hair disheveled, her Gano uniform wrinkled and dirtied from rolling on the floor.
Rina was so young that her coming-of-age ceremony was just next week. An age where someone might take pity and reach out to her.
But no such kindness came. The other female Gano in the mansion merely gossiped upon seeing her state.
"Oh, isn't that Rina? Got chewed out by Rozette miss again, huh? Serves her right."
"The master spoils her too much, so Rozette miss is keeping her in line instead."
"They say she's the daughter of a filthy Changno, and sure enough, that lowly nature she inherited doesn't go anywhere."
Open ostracism. Rina knew exactly why they shunned her.
Jealousy, probably.
Fiery red hair like burning flames, sea-blue eyes like jewels. A petite, delicately beautiful face, crowned with a voluptuous figure brimming with vitality.
Men lost their wits at the sight of Rina's beauty at least once; women shot her envious glances at least once.
Even Rina herself knew, embarrassingly enough, that her looks were stunning.
On top of that, she enjoyed the special favor of the household master, the lecherous Orpen Viscount. He never assigned her hard labor, taught her to read and write basic letters, and even took her outside the mansion sometimes to see the world.
Preferential treatment excessive for a slave. It was such over-the-top favoritism that rumors once swirled she might be the viscount's bastard child.
Indeed, it wasn't uncommon for nobles to keep illegitimate children with slaves as slaves, only to free them later and take them as vassals.
But Rina had never harbored such hopes. Because the viscount's gaze upon her was never that of a father looking at his daughter.
She knew that look well. She'd seen it endlessly as a child in the brothel.
The filthy eyes of customers leering at her stripped mother.
Rina was certain that if the church didn't deem intercourse with underage slaves—even those not yet come of age—a grave sin, she would have already been violated by the viscount.
But now, even that shield of the coming-of-age ceremony won't last much longer.
Rina had wandered to a secluded corner of the garden behind the mansion. Her favorite spot whenever she wanted to rest alone—a place shielded from prying eyes, sunlight, and gazes alike.
Slumping there, she hugged her knees.
After the coming-of-age ceremony next week, no protective barriers would remain for her. Then, she'd be nothing more than an official receptacle, church-sanctioned.
The viscount would surely lay hands on her body then. And it might not end with just him.
In this mansion, more than one or two men eyed her with dark desire—not just the young masters of the house, but male retainers and even male Gano hid a sticky lust when they looked at her.
"Disgusting."
Rina murmured, wrapping her arms around herself.
Though she'd unwittingly used men's attention to her advantage since childhood, she felt an instinctive revulsion toward their lust.
Because her mother, a Changno, had died due to men's twisted desires.
Rina's mother had perished while servicing a perverted noble, her neck squeezed too hard by mistake. Though it happened when Rina was young, she could never forget.
Her mother's corpse, eyes wide open, vivid red handprints on her throat. Even now, closing her eyes brought that sight vividly to mind.
More cruel was what followed her death. The customer was a noble's son; her mother just a somewhat known Changno. In the end, the brothel madam covered it up for a pittance in compensation.
That day, Rina first realized it: This world had walls too high to climb, no matter how she struggled.
If only Mom and I had been born nobles… no, even commoners, it wouldn't have been like this.
She'd once dreamed of avenging her mother, vowing someday to change her status.
But such vows wore away with age and harsh reality.
And next week, she'd be in the same plight as her mother: men's plaything, a Seongnoye.
"A Seongnoye… horrifying."
The senior Seongnoye's scream-mingled moans echoing daily from the viscount's chambers felt like a preview of Rina's future.
Even more chilling were the perverse sex toys in the viscount's room. Cleaning them always gave Rina nightmares of being violated by those devices.
Today too, she'd had to clean a new one he'd bought—one that expanded inside.
"Ugh… the worst."
Rina shook her head vigorously, trying to banish the unwanted memory.
"I wish I'd been born a noble like Rozette miss."
Rozette was the same age as Rina. But the only thing they shared was years.
One a noble, one a slave. The gulf between them was heaven and earth.
Just as Rozette hated Rina for stealing her father's affection, Rina envied Rozette.
A noble surname, a proper name, a status that didn't require offering her body freely. Everything Rozette had was what Rina could never have.
"Why was I born a slave? Mom a Changno, my father unknown… Why was I born like this?"
Rina buried her face in her knees, trembling.
"I hate this world! I hate this fate!"
A cruel world where everything was decided at birth by status. Rina cursed the fate that made her a slave here.
And at that moment.
"Sick of your fate?"
Rina startled at the sudden cute, delicate voice and lifted her head.
"Want to change your miserable slave-born destiny?"
There stood a young lady dressed impeccably like a noble, looking down at Rina. She appeared Rina's age, yet exuded an oddly mature air.
"Wh-who are you?"
The lady giggled at Rina's words, then murmured softly.
"A demon."
The demon looked down at Rina arrogantly and continued.
"The demon Purpur, here to save you. Nice to meet you, cute little kitty."