I stared at Rashak, frozen in place.
If I were the female lead, I might have thought even that looked handsome, but… I was different. He was just terrifying!
“I didn’t get to ask you yesterday, but why don’t you want the job?”
“I just feel like your world isn’t one I should dare to step into…”
“Your world?”
“You tortured that… assassin right in front of me the other day.”
As soon as the words left my mouth, I wondered if I’d sounded far too rude.
But the golden eyes looking back at me were… surprisingly gentle.
So gentle that I almost wondered whether Rashak was even capable of making such an expression.
If he told me, with that look on his face, I wouldn’t make you do something like that… I felt like I might actually believe him….
“But what if I paid you a lot?”
“So you really were going to make me do it…!”
“It’s fine. You’ll get used to it once you’ve done it a few times.”
“Getting used to it is a problem in itself…!”
“You have people you hate enough to want to kill, too. Like that boss who used to throw you around.”
“That’s true, but…”
“That guy was just another person like that to me. If someone tries to take what’s mine, they need to be punished. Don’t you agree?”
“I can’t say I don’t understand how you feel, but…”
“Right?”
What am I supposed to do?
I was gradually getting talked around by Rashak.
“The annual salary is 100 million. I can’t guarantee you’ll leave work on time, but I promise you’ll get time off to compensate for any overtime. There will also be additional rewards based on your performance.”
The terms were pretty incredible, too.
Where else could I earn an annual salary of 100 million?
Finding a job at all was already a struggle.
“Fine. If you’re that afraid, how about a trial period?”
“…A trial period?”
“You work for a month, and if things go well, we’ll sign a formal contract.”
“A-and what if, even after a month, you decide I’m not cut out for it?”
“Then we go our separate ways.”
“……”
“What? Do you think I won’t let you go?”
Yes.
You certainly look like that kind of person.
“Don’t worry. I have no intention of forcibly holding on to someone who doesn’t want to work here. If you’re not the kind of talent I’m looking for, I have no reason to keep you, either.”
“……”
“Of course, things would be different if you tried to secretly steal or uncover information beyond what I gave you during that month.”
“I-I wouldn’t have the guts to do something like that…”
“That’s another thing I like about you.”
His smile grew even wider.
“I’ll send Fidel to your house tomorrow. Think it over tonight and give me your answer. Whether it’s a trial period, a full-time position… or a complete refusal.”
But I’ve been completely refusing this whole time.
…At least, that was what I wanted to say, but Rashak’s gaze was far too frightening.
In the end, I slowly nodded, and he raised the corners of his mouth in satisfaction.
“Then I’ll look forward to seeing you tomorrow.”
With that, Rashak turned and walked away.
For some reason, even his steps seemed unusually light.
I hurried away, too.
I was afraid he might chase after me and say, Actually, I’ve changed my mind. Make your decision right now.
But even after I returned to the familiar neighborhood I knew so well, that strange sense of pressure refused to disappear.
The underworld, steeped in torture and violence, was frightening.
But even more than that, I was afraid of stepping into something new in the first place.
Starting something new, meeting new people….
“Haah… I think I’m becoming more of a coward by the day…”
I rubbed my face, frustrated with myself.
“Hey! Watch out!”
At the sudden shout, I jumped in surprise and stopped walking.
Something struck my shoulder with a light thud the very next moment.
And then—
CRASH!
The sound behind me left me completely frozen.
When I finally managed to turn around, I saw shards of glass scattered all over the ground.
And a woman who flew into a furious rage the moment our eyes met.
“I told you to move! How are you going to take responsibility for this?!”
“W-what…?”
“Do you have any idea how much this vase cost?!”
The woman stamped her feet as she stared at the shattered glass, so broken that I couldn’t even tell what kind of vase it had been.
Then she turned her icy gaze on me and said,
“You’re obviously going to pay for it, aren’t you?”
The woman immediately dragged me, still dazed, to the local police station.
“Where do you think you’re going?! Pay me back right now!”
I’d been so shocked that running away hadn’t even crossed my mind.
She spoke to the knights, who then forced me into what looked like an interrogation room and made me sit down.
“Do you know how much that vase was worth? One hundred million rupen! One hundred million!”
I thought she was insane.
Who carried a hundred-million-rupen vase around a crowded marketplace in a wooden box?
“I’m going to make you pay back every last rupen of that hundred million. Right now.”
She was so ferocious that I couldn’t even open my mouth.
I wrote a statement as the knights instructed, but I barely remembered what I’d written.
So, what happened next?
Clank!
“Stay here. We’ll bring you food tomorrow morning.”
Just like that, I ended up locked in a holding cell.
“Nooo, if you just let me out, I’ll find a way to get the money and come back!”
“Who would believe that? You’d just run away the moment we let you go.”
“This is driving me crazy. I gave you my identity, my address, everything! Why would I run away?! Am I supposed to just stay here forever? You said I had to pay her back!”
“We said we’d let you contact your family, didn’t we? Your family can come and pay at least part of the compensation. Then you can leave. Wouldn’t that be easier for everyone?”
“……”
“You have family, don’t you?”
…I did.
The problem was that I hated them more than I hated strangers now.
“…I can’t contact my family.”
“Why not?”
At the knight’s puzzled expression, I gripped the bars tightly.
Because I could already picture exactly what they would say as soon as I contacted them.
What have you been doing to cause this kind of trouble?
You left home, and this is all you’ve managed to do?
I knew something was wrong when you told us you’d run your shop into the ground.
Have you ever seen Renoa get herself into trouble like this?
They would tear me down with one hurtful remark after another until they finally dragged me back home.
Back to that house, where my younger sister—the woman carrying my ex-boyfriend’s child—was living.
“I absolutely can’t. No, I won’t.”
“…Well, then, there’s nothing we can do.”
At the knight’s words, I bit my lower lip.
It felt like I was trapped in a horrible nightmare.
I’d barely managed to resolve a debt of 100 million, only to end up owing another 100 million right away.
And in such an absurd way, in the blink of an eye.
Think… I need to think. Hiel. How am I going to get out of this situation…?
At that moment, one person came to mind.
Just one.
I really, really didn’t want to do this, but…
“I don’t know about family, but I do have a boss.”
“A boss?”
“Please contact Lumiere Dessert & Tea Salon.”
An hour later, a man as big as a doorframe appeared in the narrow corridor outside the holding cells.
Rashak looked down at me through the bars and said,
“I told you I’d hear your answer tomorrow.”
“T-the sooner, the better, isn’t it?”
“Well, that’s true.”
He dragged a small chair over from the corner and sat down in front of me.
“So, what happened?”
I calmly explained everything I’d gone through that day.
Rashak stroked his chin and said,
“Hmm… I see.”
“So, I was wondering… would it be possible to get an advance on my salary?”
“There’s no reason I can’t do that. Your meals are covered separately, too, so even if you use your entire salary to pay the compensation, you’ll still have enough to live on.”
His words instantly eased the tension I’d been feeling ever since I was locked up.
Wait, the meals weren’t even included in the 100 million annual salary? Damn, the conditions are even better than I thought…
“But I’m not entirely convinced.”
“…Pardon?”
“I intended to hire you as my secretary, Miss Cavernon, because I believed you were an extraordinary talent. But seeing you locked up like this…”
“……”
“It makes me wonder whether my judgment was mistaken.”
If there had been a mirror in front of me, I would have seen my eyes darting around in panic.
“What if I promised to serve you with all my heart, sir?”
“In this line of work, there’s nothing more foolish than trusting a verbal promise.”
“T-then what am I supposed to do?”
“I’m the boss of an organization, not a teacher.”
My heart began racing with a rush of betrayal.
He was changing his tune as easily as flipping his palm, less than twelve hours after we’d spoken…!
“Well, I should be going, then.”
My mind began racing.
I couldn’t let him leave like this.
If I wanted to keep him here, I had to do something…!
“This wasn’t my fault.”
I gripped the bars even tighter.
“This incident wasn’t my fault. I was just walking down the street when that woman came along and knocked the vase into me.”
“……”
“Besides, doesn’t the whole thing seem strange? Who carries a hundred-million-rupen vase through a crowded marketplace? Unless it was packed with plenty of cushioning material, at the very least.”
“……”
“It’s strange that there was only one person transporting it, too. When an item is that expensive, people usually worry about it getting lost or stolen. But there was only one woman guarding it.”
“……”
“Based on my experience working for a merchant company… an item of that value should have had at least five people protecting it.”
“……”
“I might just be overthinking things, though…”
Even after talking so much, I trailed off at the end, frightened by my own words.
But I wasn’t entirely unsure of myself.
I looked straight at him, my gaze firm.
“That doesn’t sound like overthinking to me.”
Rashak sat back down in the chair.
“That’s a reasonable theory. Have you dealt with situations like this often?”
“If I had, I’d be in prison all the time, wouldn’t I? I’m just… drawing on what I learned when I was young. I was a trainee knight…”
In this world, knights also hunted down criminals, much like police officers had in my previous life.
“Good. Let’s assume you’re right, Miss Cavernon. Then who’s the culprit? Who would have arranged this?”
“I don’t know… There are too many people who hate me.”
“Then we just have to narrow it down. Someone who wants you to end up in debt.”
“……”
“And who stands to benefit from that?”
He added in a languid voice,
“It doesn’t necessarily have to be financial.”
With those words, I finally understood.
“…Renoa Cavernon.”
Rashak smiled.
It was the exact same expression he’d worn that morning—the look of a man who wanted something so badly he could hardly stand it.
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