‘Let’s turn everything upside down!’

The diary that I couldn’t find yesterday might appear as well. I had already searched through all the corners of Evangeline’s room, so let’s search for it in the other rooms.

‘This is the toilet, this is the bathroom, this is the drawing room, and, ah! Here!’

The door was indeed hard to open because it was stiff, but it was a room that looked like a warehouse. There were items covered with cloth, and miscellaneous goods were contained in wooden boxes instead of paper boxes. ‘Whoa… How do people here move to new houses?’

All the items covered with cloth were paintings. While searching, I came across some paints, indicating that Evangeline enjoyed painting. Seeing that there was a bookshelf, this seemed to be a studio that acted as a reading room as well. No wonder the curtains were still drawn.

Leaving the paintings behind, I looked at the books. ‘I can’t read letters, but since I wrote the diary myself, it will stand out, right?’ Then I caught a big fish. It was a bit odd since the book cover was black, but it was obviously handwritten. There were even traces of ink stains. I was one hundred percent sure when I saw numbers written on top of the page.

While flipping the book pages at a fast pace, something strange fell off. ‘What note is it?’  I picked up the paper.

‘Summoning circle?’

‘A geometric pattern inside a circle. This is one hundred percent a summoning circle! Crazy, a summoning circle appeared from this diary!’

When I looked at this, it seemed that the place I transmigrated into was a bit of an older novel. The trope of signing contracts with non-human beings is quite rare these days.
I didn’t contemplate it for long. I should draw the summoning circle. Whether a spirit or a dragon would come out, I had to draw the circle first and foremost. A villainess needed at least one ability to protect herself.

Just in time, there were paint buckets. Because there was neither an empty canvas nor any suitable papers within my sight, I decided to draw the circle on the floor. They usually draw something like this on the floor too, anyway.

I chose to use the color red, which had the largest amount of paint, just in case the paint would get spilled onto the floor while I was drawing. All the brushes were hardened and couldn’t be bent, so I just buried my finger in the paint.

‘First of all, draw a huge circle, then triangles, stars… there are a lot of letters as well.’ My hand got pricked by the wooden floor while I was drawing with great effort. Fortunately, the splinter didn’t get stuck, but I bled. It hurt so terribly that I drew the rest of the summoning circle using the hardened stiff brush. Although it was uncomfortable, it could still be used to draw. ‘I should have drawn using this brush earlier. This is why they said that if a person is not smart, their body will suffer.’

‘It’s done!’

It was a bit dented, and there were some oddities, but I finished the summoning circle. I thought something would pop out immediately, like what happens in novels, but nothing happened. ‘As expected, do I have to chant a spell after finishing the summoning circle? There’s indeed a spell written underneath the fancy summoning circle on the paper, but… so what? I can’t read!’

I tried to babble anything because I felt it was a waste after drawing the summoning circle.

“Mister Spirit King? Mister Spirit? Mister Dragon? Hello…?”

Nothing happened.

“Excuse me… I want to somewhat sign a contract, so will anyone come out?”

I attempted to beg desperately. Just as I thought, it seemed that I had to chant a spell. I should learn the alphabets and challenge it again later. ‘I can’t believe an illiterate person can’t even perform summoning magic, what a rubbish world!’

•                    •                    •

Count Rohanson looked down at the maid in front of him.

She wasn’t even a criminal, but Daisy closed her eyes and bowed her head down while trembling hard. She appeared to be more frightened than she should be, considering that Count Rohanson in front of her wasn’t such a cold-hearted employer to his servants.

But it was understandable, since Daisy had been closely taking care of Lady Evangeline for the past two days. Whatever came into the lady’s body, her outer appearance was very much alike, so Daisy must have seen the fragments of the late Lady Rohanson.

The count of Rohanson did not reprimand the maid because he was well aware of the situation. Daisy had an intimate relationship with his late daughter regardless of her status, and that was the reason why she volunteered herself to serve ‘that thing’ without hesitation. Count Rohanson slowly opened his mouth.

“So, what does that thing do?”

“It asked about Lady Evangeline. How old she is and what kind of relationship she has with her family. It acted as if it were the late lady herself, asking whether she has a favorite food or a habit that she frequently engages in. I said that Milady used to go out for a walk at eight o’clock, and it said that it would do the same. It wore Milady’s clothes and went for a walk, but…”

Her cute freckled face frowned. Her tightly closed eyelashes shivered greatly. Daisy spoke as if she was confessing her sins to a priest.

Her agonized roar gradually died away, and she trailed off. ‘It exactly seemed like it wanted to be Lady Evangeline.’ She realized that she couldn’t finish the following sentence because she was too emotional. Since it must be Evangeline’s father, Count Rohanson, who found it more dreadful than anyone else.

“It didn’t seem to care whether the maids who saw it fainted or not.”

Not only that. Daisy recalled Lady Evangeline, who saw the maid with her mouth covered and was dragged away into custody. She shouted so desperately for the Lady to spare her, yet there was obviously disgust in the Lady’s crimson eyes when she saw that maid. There was also disdain in those eyes, as if she were looking at a wriggling earthworm by the roadside.

The Lady Evangeline that Daisy knew wasn’t like that. That vulnerable girl couldn’t bring herself to throw harsh words at other people, even after she fell ill. If it wanted to be the young lady, it shouldn’t have looked at people so contemptuously. It shouldn’t have looked at them like that. Daisy bowed her head down for fear of making eye contact with it.

‘By the way… Are those eyes still looking at me?’

“Then, it suddenly said that it wanted to learn alphabets.”

“Alphabets?”

Daisy nodded and continued her speech.

“It said that it lost its memories, so it didn’t remember how to read as well. That’s why it told me to buy alphabet books for it.”

Daisy had pledged to take care of that thing, so she couldn’t go to buy a book. Therefore, she left her spot empty for a little while to ask someone else to do so.

Afterward, the room was empty. She looked all over the fourth floor, wondering where it had gone with the lady’s body.  Thereafter, she saw the room in the very last corner of the fourth floor being opened. It was the room where the late lady would not let anyone in. She couldn’t find the key to open it either, so she decided to just leave it be. The room was locked, so she was briefly curious about how it opened the room.

There was a very tiny gap in the door. If she opened it wider, it would create a noise. Then Daisy would receive that scornful look as well. She held her breath and peeked into the room through the gap in that door. It was obviously holding a book.

“Its statement, which said that it didn’t know how to read and told me to buy a book, was a blatant lie in an attempt to detach itself from me. When I went back, I saw that thing was reading a book. And and…”

She could vividly recall what happened afterward. She wanted to forget about it, but the more she attempted to do so, the clearer the memories came to her mind.

“Her finger was bleeding. It seems that she drew a pattern on the floor with that blood. It was a drawing that made me feel uncomfortable just by looking at it.”

She was drawing on the floor with her finger, and there was a really coarse sound. It was akin to the sound of fingernails scratching the floor violently.

“And after it finished its drawing, it murmured something, but what I could hear clearly was… only the word ‘contract’.”

She couldn’t hear that thing very well. Daisy put her ear closer to the door. Then, by mistake, she pushed the door slightly. She begged so desperately that it wouldn’t notice her. However, their eyes met in the air. Terrified, Daisy closed her eyes tightly. That was everything Daisy witnessed.

“Contract, huh…”

Count Rohanson stroked his chin. A pattern drawn using blood and a contract—no matter how much he thought about it, it didn’t seem like a good situation. ‘Was it some kind of black magic? I’m already frustrated enough because of that thing that went into my daughter’s body, it’s not like another monster will come out of its blood ritual, right?’

Count Rohanson sighed. This was all because his daughter committed suicide. The temple didn’t want to host a funeral, and she couldn’t even be enshrined there, which is why a demon was attached to her body. The problem was that the demon couldn’t be cast away even after they used holy water.

Because there was no other choice, he could only monitor her, and he was about to encourage Daisy to endure it for a few more days before he suddenly became curious about why the maid still closed her eyes tightly.

“Say, why are you closing your eyes all the time?”

“What do you mean? It’s clear that I closed my eyes because I’m scared. It keeps staring at me. Your Excellency.”

Daisy responded as if it were odd for him to ask her that question instead. ‘It keeps staring at her?’ The count suddenly turned his head.

Then his gaze was drawn to the lumpy eyes that were staring at them.

•                    •                    •

I was chosen by a three-eyed, leopard-patterned yellow cat to be its owner. ‘What’s up with this world’s quality? Why does even a cat look extraordinary?’

I didn’t know where it came from, but it was lying on the bed with me when I woke up. ‘Is it the cat that this household raises? I’ll just ask the maid who is coming to serve me.’

But it was a different person from the last time. Well, of course, she must be busy with work, so they were doing shifts.

“Are there a lot of cats in this household?”

“Cats? It’s been a long time since all of them were killed.”

‘All of them were killed, she said?’

The maid gave an additional explanation, saying it was because of the circulating infectious disease caused by the cats. Plague-like disease appeared to be widespread here as well.

Meow~

“…Do you hear a cat meowing, Milady?”

“I don’t hear anything.”

“Weird… I can hear it very clearly.”

I frantically pretended not to hear it. ‘Of course you can hear it clearly! No! Baby, don’t meow! If you meow, you will get caught! You’re going to die!’

Fortunately, the maid went back without searching the room.

‘Whoa, I thought my heart was about to drop. I used to be against adopting pets without family permission, but… my dad, who was against cats, just—! I didn’t like the content of a story that told me about the recent conditions! So what? I’ll be someone who adopts a cat as I please without my family’s consent!’

‘But it’s going to die! She said that they killed all the cats because of the infectious disease, so all of its family must have died as well. Can’t I have a priest and a doctor to do a checkup on this cat and raise it myself? They won’t kill a count’s daughter’s pet cat, right?’

First of all, I should get permission from the count.

‘Did they say that he was in the office?’ It was a relief that I remembered where the office was. I went down the stairs and headed to the second floor. A butler came out after I knocked on the door.

“I want to meet His Excellency.”

“Let me ask him for a moment.”

The butler went inside again and came out soon after.

“I apologize. Milady. His Excellency told me that he’s currently too busy to be able to meet you.”

“Is that so?”

‘Whoa, the villainess’s father is really so mean. He doesn’t even visit his daughter after she resurrected, which I discovered because we never eat together even once. So he slammed the door in my face even after I came to visit him? That’s why his daughter became a villainess. Isn’t it also a lame excuse to tell his daughter that he’s too busy to see her?’

“You can tell me if you have something to say to His Excellency, Milady.”

The butler bowed his head down. ‘What kind of person is Evangeline to receive a 90-degree bow from an old man?’ I put my hand on his shoulder and was about to tell him to get up quickly when the butler got startled. ‘Ah, I won’t hit you!’

“I want to raise a cat.”

“A cat…?”

“I can’t do that?”

“It’s not like that…”

‘Yay! I was granted permission!’

I went back with light steps while humming.

“Your name is Pudding!”