Chapter 1
After eight miscarriages, I was finally with child again.
This time, I summoned the long–dormant system, hoping to trade all my points and chances to return home for the safe birth of this baby.
The system gave me three days to make my decision.
But when I tried to share the good news with Sebastian Ashford, my husband, I caught him sneaking off with a girl in the side garden.
“Sebastian, you lost Lady Grace’s babies eight times just to make our child the legitimate heir. Doesn’t she feel heartbroken?”
He grabbed her delicate cheek, voice sharp as a blade. “Mind your tongue. If Grace finds out, I swear I’ll tear yours apart.”
She laughed coyly and pressed her ruby lips to his. “My lord, haven’t you already tasted this mouth enough to know all its secrets?”
With just a few teasing words, she’d soothed his anger completely.
“Bewitching minx, you’ll be my undoing yet,” he growled.
“And will you die for me, my lord?”
“Hmm…”
His voice dropped low and soft
–
– but then it was drowned out by her heavy breaths and muffled moans.
In that moment, it hit me like a thunderbolt: the woman in Sebastian’s arms was none other than Seraphina Fairfax, the heroine doomed to bring about his downfall.
All along, abandoning everything in my original life to save him a villain destined to perish
I didn’t want to see anymore. I turned and fled in a panic.
That night, Sebastian coaxed me to drink a potion meant to end the pregnancy.
–
was nothing but a cruel joke.
My lower belly ached unbearably as he looked at me with pain in his eyes and promised he’d love me forever child or no child.
But this time, I felt no sadness at all.
Because I had already told the system: three days from now, I would leave this world for good…
“System, if I lose the baby, I choose to leave this world.”
The system was silent for a long moment, then asked coldly, “Are you sure? Once you leave, there’s no going back.”
I nodded without hesitation.
The mechanical voice sent a chill down my spine.
At that instant, Sebastian came up behind me and wrapped his arms around me, his voice filled with concern. “It’s getting cold. Why are you sitting here all alone?”
I said nothing, just clutched the tiny pair of embroidered boots I’d bought for the child, lost in thought.
A flicker of pity crossed his dark eyes. “Sweet Grace, it’s time to take the tonic to keep the child safe.”
The bitter, metallic taste of the potion made me nearly gag.
I recognized the potion – the same one I’d been forced to take countless times
–
but this time, my heart felt even more bitter than the medicine.
I tugged on his sleeve and whispered, “The baby’s been fine lately. Could we skip it today?”
Impatience flashed across his eyes. “We’ve lost eight children already. Will you still be stubborn?”
That pain
Sebastian knew exactly how to cut me deep with just one sentence.
I swallowed the harsh liquid and choked on it.
“Alright, alright. I’m not blaming you, Grace. I’m just worried…”
He held me close, soothing me gently, and slipped some sweet preserved fruit into my mouth.
The sweetness was a stark contrast to the bitterness gnawing at my heart.
I looked up at the man I’d come to know so well, feeling a strange haze cloud my mind. Chapter 1
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Sebastian was the villain in the story once a powerful nobleman who’d fallen for a lowly servant girl. He’d taken her by force, only to be undone later by her admirers and torn apart in a brutal end.
After finishing the novel, I cursed him bitterly. If it were me, I vowed, I would rewrite his fate.
So, the system brought me back in time.
I became his childhood companion – the girl who followed him through every hardship.
When he was lonely, I sold my belongings to accompany him to royal court for patronage trials.
When bandits ambushed us, I threw myself in front of his sword – it sliced from my left shoulder to my right ribs, nearly killing me.
In the harshest winter, I washed his noble clothes in the freezing river every day, earning silver so he could afford a proper room and focus on his studies.
One day, he took my frostbitten, bleeding hands in his and swore to love me forever.
sent them away.
Others mocked me as a merchant’s daughter, lowborn and insignificant – but he, for the first time, gave me a cold glare Later, after earning the king’s favor at the patronage trials, he defied the crown’s order to marry a princess, begging the king to grant him marriage to me instead.
“If the king marries us, no one will look down on you ever again.
For eight years, we were inseparable, utterly devoted to one another. Because of this, I refused the system’s offer to return to my original world.
I thought we would be happy forever.
But today, I realized it was all a cruel illusion.
He had been keeping a woman in the side garden the story’s true heroine, the one destined to destroy him.
I watched them entwined in forbidden passion, and it hit me
fate is terrifying. No matter how hard I try, some things cannot be changed.
A sudden stabbing pain in my belly shattered my thoughts. I curled up in agony.
“Grace! Grace!” Sebastian cried, holding me close with a face full of worry.
Warm blood trickled down my legs – I knew the child was gone..
Then came the system’s cold prompt:
[Host, conditions to return to original world met. Prepare to depart this realm in three days.]
