Chapter 1
The Count's Secret Maid - Chapter 1
Translation: godsn
Prologue
This was a place where even the creaking noises felt sinister. Each step I took echoed loudly with the clatter of my shoes, making me tread all the more carefully.
I walked at a measured pace—neither too fast nor too slow—with my back slightly bent. Only when I reached the familiar door did I come to a crisp halt.
Before opening the door, I steadied my breath. Hoo, hoo, hoo. After a few short, controlled exhales, I grasped the doorknob and turned it.
The shadows inside rushed out, darker than the hallway. The room was pitch black, so utterly devoid of light that even stepping inside felt daunting.
Yet I entered with practiced ease and drew open the long curtains. A blinding shaft of light pierced through, so intense it made me want to shut my eyes.
So bright. Still, I finished opening the curtains and turned around.
At that moment, something came flying at my face at terrifying speed.
Thud!
A desk clock struck the window frame, bounced off, and clattered to the floor. I gave it a brief glance before shifting my gaze forward.
In the corner farthest from the window, where the shadows lay thickest, stood a bed. A rounded figure lay beneath a tangled sheet, its only visible feature being a single hand clutching the fabric's edge in a death grip. The trembling was unmistakable.
"Get out."
A hoarse voice cracked through the air, thick with barely restrained fury.
I pretended not to hear and picked up the fallen clock. The nails had popped out, and the wooden surface was splintered—clearly beyond repair. After concluding it was useless, I placed it on the fresh sheet I'd been carrying, then swept my eyes across the wreckage of the room.
Dishes lay shattered into jagged fragments, scattered dangerously across the floor alongside forks and spoons. But it wasn't just the dishes—nothing in this room had been left intact.
Step by step, I walked forward, picking up the debris as I went. With each sound of my footsteps, the rounded figure flinched violently.
"Get out."
The voice rang out again.
Once more, I ignored it and reached the bedside. What are you so afraid of? The figure on the bed squirmed restlessly before fumbling at the nightstand beside it, then shrank back. Having nothing left to throw, it had chosen retreat. But "retreat" here just meant pressing against the headboard—a pitiful sight.
After studying the figure, I reached out. Sensing my movement, it lashed out sharply.
"Don't touch me."
As if that would stop me. Again, I pretended not to hear and swiftly grabbed the sheet. The figure lurched as the fabric was yanked away, revealing itself at last.
Tangles of golden hair, a panicked twist of neck and shoulders, and protruding collarbones came into view. My gaze trailed downward. Even without checking beneath the clothes, I could tell how emaciated the hidden body must be.
When I looked back up, his face—now clearly visible—was beaded with sweat. I reached out again, and again, he slapped my hand away.
"Don't touch me!"
A thunderous shout followed.
"I told you to get out! Leave! Disappear!"
The crude outburst finally drew a deep sigh from me.
The man's pallid face had flushed red with rage. His chapped lips gasped for air between ragged breaths. Yet even now, he clung to the sheet with white-knuckled desperation, as if afraid I might snatch it away.
"Go away. Please, just go— Hhk!"
Just as expected, his breathing grew labored. The feverish color drained from his face, leaving it deathly pale again. Soon, he was clutching his chest in agony.
"Calm down, my lord."
I quickly pulled him into my embrace and took out the breathing device from my pocket, placing it in his mouth. Then, carefully stroking his back, I spoke.
"Slowly, breathe."
Hearing my words, he struggled to steady his breathing. Inhaling and exhaling through the device, the violent heaving of his chest gradually subsided. After watching him for a while, I removed the device from his mouth.
"Haa, haa."
"You'll be alright now."
By then, his face was drenched in sweat. His damp golden hair spilled messily over my clothes. I smoothed his hair in reassurance, and his tightly shut eyelids weakly fluttered open. Emerald eyes tinged with a faint white hue turned toward me.
In that instant, my body was shoved backward.
"Eek!"
In the blink of an eye, I went tumbling off the bed with a thud!
My skirt flipped upside down, exposing my undergarments in full. As I flailed my legs in the air, a face abruptly popped into view above me.
My dazed gaze, which had been staring blankly ahead, gradually lowered. It shouldn't be possible, but it felt like he was looking right at me. His face—still excessively pale, still excessively handsome—filled my vision.
His glistening wet lips parted quietly.
"Get out."
My face twisted in disbelief. What an absolute bastard.
I was born a tenant farmer's daughter with nothing to my name, and I grew up with nothing to my name. Even that was a stretch—times were so hard we could barely put food on the table.
A hand-to-mouth existence, wretched poverty. Struggling to survive in that was the entirety of my life.
The absurd part? There were still five of us kids.
Unable to endure the suffocating poverty, Mother fled alone, leaving behind Father, who drowned himself in alcohol and violence every day.
At his hands, the infant youngest died from beatings, the fourth child starved to death, and Second Sister was sold to a brothel. As for the third sister—well, she was pretty, so she was coddled like gold and jade. The plan was to raise her well and marry her off to some noble family's young master to improve our fortunes.
And me, the ugly eldest, was kept around because I was at least good at housework.
My days consisted of cooking, laundry, cleaning, waiting on Third Sister, working at Mark the baker's shop in town during the day, and getting beaten by Father at night.
It was an exhausting life without a moment to breathe.
My already ugly face swelled up even uglier from the beatings, and my legs broke during my growth spurt, stunting my height permanently. Ugly dwarf. That's what the village kids called me.
If hell existed, this was it. I envied Third Sister, who grew more radiant and beautiful by the day, and I could barely endure Father's violence. There were multiple times I tried to hang myself. Each time, by sheer bad luck, I was caught—either by Father or a passerby—or the rope snapped just as I was about to lose consciousness, leaving me alive.
This was my prison, and I was a convict serving a sentence for crimes I didn't even know. No—real prison would've been better.
The reason Father didn't sell me to the brothel was that he needed someone to manage the household. But that was only half true. From village gossip, I learned that he had tried to sell me—a clueless toddler sucking her thumb—to a brothel, but they offered a pittance because I was too ugly. So instead, he kept me and taught me housework.
Mother used to call Father a devil's spawn. I inherited the term. My life would be dictated by that devil's spawn from here on out.
If this wasn't tragedy, what was?
But God didn't abandon me in the end.
When my stunted height miraculously grew by a handspan, when my frizzy bangs began to hide my ugly face, just as people started calling me "blooming"—an old gentleman visited our village. Why a distinguished old man oozing nobility from head to toe would visit our tiny, backwater village, I had no idea.
As he was wandering through the village, he happened to gesture toward me just as I was passing by the crossroads.
"I wish to employ your daughter."
The old gentleman extended a pouch filled with gold coins as he made his courteous proposal. Father, his mind instantly captivated by the gold, swallowed dryly. His vile mind spun rapidly as he took in the old gentleman before him and the pouch of gold coins placed on the table.
Father clenched his trembling hand, barely restraining himself from snatching the pouch outright, and schooled his expression.
"Sir, it is an honor beyond measure that my lowly daughter has caught your eye, but she knows nothing beyond menial labor. I fear she may prove inadequate in many ways. Should you find her unsatisfactory later..."
"Please do not concern yourself with that. Even if she does not meet my expectations, I will not ask for this to be returned."
The old gentleman calmly replied as he slid the pouch toward Father. Father's lips twitched upward uncontrollably before he forced them down and turned his gaze toward me, seated beside him. The way he looked at me—as if I were a beloved daughter—sent shivers down my spine.
"Child, your father respects your thoughts. Money is nice to have, but you matter more. Speak your mind freely."
As he said this, his large hand clamped around my bony wrist with a grip so strong it felt like my bones might twist. Outwardly, his face was that of a father fretting over his precious daughter, but his eyes gleamed savagely, fixed only on the gold.
The old gentleman, too, waited quietly for my answer. If I refused here, he would leave to find another girl, and Father would beat me to death as punishment for being a disobedient daughter.
"I will go."
"Oh, my child!"
Father pulled me into an embrace, his voice thick with feigned emotion, his face the picture of moved gratitude. I had to suppress the urge to wrench myself away from the hand that patted my back with exaggerated gentleness.
With that, I prepared to leave and followed the old gentleman. My belongings amounted to nothing more than a single bag. I owned little in the way of clothes or possessions. The only difference from usual was that instead of the tattered, dirt-covered rags I wore daily, I was dressed in a pretty flower-embroidered dress.
"Go safely. Be careful."
Father saw me off at the door, patting my shoulder. His touch carried the unspoken pressure to please the gentleman at all costs.
Beside him, my younger sister Alicia looked at me and suddenly burst into laughter.
"Take care, sister. Stay away for a long, long time."
Never come back. Alicia mouthed the words silently. But when I showed no reaction, her smile vanished, and she pouted petulantly.
I had just one thing to say to her.
"Take good care of that pretty face of yours. It's all you've got."
"What?!"
Leaving behind a sputtering Alicia, I turned away.
The place the old gentleman led me to was a mansion so vast it made my eyes widen in disbelief. It was far larger and more magnificent than even the Lord of Pilton's estate—the grandest house in the village I'd lived in. Wow. I let out a genuine gasp of awe before following the old gentleman inside.
"You've arrived."
A middle-aged woman in neat attire greeted the old gentleman. He gave a single nod in return before removing his bowler hat.
The woman noticed me standing behind him and asked,
"And this child?"
"She will serve as the Young Lady's attendant from now on."
Young Lady? I glanced at the old gentleman in confusion, and he motioned for me to step forward with a look. Hesitantly, I did so, and the middle-aged woman swept her assessing gaze over me from head to toe. Nervous, I swallowed dryly and waited quietly.
"I see."
Whether the assessment was favorable or not, the woman gave a nod before turning away. Soon after, the old gentleman turned in the opposite direction. I looked back and forth between the two as they parted ways before ultimately following the woman.