She woke up with her cheek against a firm, velvet pillow with a pool of saliva at the corner of her lips. Almost as though there was no trace to what had just happened.

Until, she felt her stomach lurch and gurgle, and she found herself doubling over and hurling out bile in one violent contraction, emptying whatever water that was left inside her body into the nearby waste bin.

She found herself hastily wiping away at the liquid that she had emitted, pushing back her long black hair.

Long... black hair...?

She stared at it for a few moments, long strands weaving their way through her slender fingers. It cascaded smoothly past her hips in the color of a dark and hazy night sky. Hair so black against the skin the color of honeyed caramel, soft skin kissed golden.

She trailed her hands around her neck to glide them through the silky locks, stepping from her crouched position to the nearest mirror.

She prodded her plush face, running her fingertips across a facial structure that had previously never existed. The cat-like narrowed eyes that looked back at her were a beautiful mixture of reddish-pink, like the color of sakura trees under the moonlight. Underneath her left eye was a small mole, dotted like a spot of ink on parchment. 

A woman with haunting looks stared back at her, the type of person that could make the whole world slow down to revolve around her.

She blinked once, then twice. She stared and stared, but it didn't seem like a dream but was, in fact, her reality.

She felt disoriented. She was scared. So had she truly died? Could she return to her world?

She paced around the unfamiliar room, trying to retrace her steps. But what was there to do at this point, other than to live with her confusion and move forward?

The scratching sound of pen on paper resumed yet again. She could hear it start to fill her ears, but it was louder than before. She rose to walk around the room hesitantly, attempting to find the sound's origin. The closer she got to the source, the fainter the noise grew in her head. Then, it stopped.

There, sat a book on the top of a nightstand. It was a new book that has no wear from being used, smelling of freshly printed paper. It had an almost ethereal glow to it, as though it were tempting her to open it.

Emi was very much hesitant to open it, but when her fingers lightly brushed against the cover, the book flew open of its own accord. The pages began to turn by themselves, as it's frenzied page-flipping began to fill her with sudden warmth that made her regain the memories of the previous owner of this body.

Emi was to go by Angelika now. A girl who was written in at the last minute by Mari, so much so, she didn't even bother to give Angelika the courtesy of a last name. She was passed around from family to family to be used as a pawn for the nobles. And as of now, working under the Abella estate as their child's tutor.

Her former benefactors, the Penn estate, are targeting the Crown Prince. Her shared hatred for him was something that they intended to use to their advantage. She was offered a large sum of money to make the first heir disappear.

But why did Angelika hate the Crown Prince so much?

It was because he was the one who organized the hit on her entire village, leaving her as the only survivor. He was the one who watched coldly as her mother was executed right in front of her eyes. And at that time, Angelika wanted to die. Angelika wanted him to end her life.

In her last moments, she spat on his face, the final effort in opposing the empire. Yet, there was nothing inside those swimming pools of crimson: no remorse, no fear, no anger. Angelika was appalled, watching as he waved his hand to signal the fighting to stop. He showed her mercy because he knew the mercy he gave her was much worse than living.

That had been five years ago. It seemed as though the previous owner's memories were blurred until that point (most likely due to Mari's lazy writing), but Emi could make out little bits and pieces.

Angelika's free-flowing way of speaking was her charm; everyone who met her instantly felt drawn to trust her. That was why she was able to make her way through the rankings despite being orphaned and impoverished.

But, the true owner of this body had died. She had committed suicide in a last-ditch effort to sanctify her sins. No matter how much she hated the Prince, she could not bring herself to do the Penn family's dirty work. And that was what left Emi in her body, as the new Angelika.

But again, it didn't make sense. It was clear that Mari's writing was effecting the storyline. If that was so, why would the real Angelika have free will to the extent of ending her life?

If that was the case, wouldn't that completely change the plot of the story that Mari was attempting to write? Are the characters sentient, and separate from the novel? Could she consider them as real, three-dimensional people? If so, was the storyline something that can be manipulated outside of Mari's writing? Could she end up changing the fate of the story?

It seems as though she had missed a lot while she was gone. She found herself flipping through the book, and it was clear that Mari had wholly changed the route of the storyline. It was currently nearing the Prince's 22nd birthday, and there was no sign of the female protagonist. In the previous story, they had met long before that. But... there were so many changes in this new novel that left her stunned. Mari wrote an entirely different story, and unfortunately, the only knowledge Emi had was the novel in front of her.

Suddenly, the book she had in her hands began to shake violently, thrusting itself back onto it's resting place. Before her very eyes, she watched as ink sprawled itself into the form of words on the next empty page:

The empress candidates are to be chosen around this time. He had always thought the tradition was so foolish, as every year it was the same. It wasn't that he was picky, but none of the women could be considered intelligent enough to equal his needs. He hoped to finish it as soon as possible, as the harvest reports were due two days into the ceremony.

If she could remember correctly, the harvest report was something that never had a set date. This is one of many quirks that Mari had justified to Emi when she was going over the plotline. The female protagonist was going to come into the story and introduce a scheduling pattern for optimum efficiency (or something like that). It was that plan that gave the kingdom the ability to produce excellent crop yield.

So, it wouldn't make sense that the harvest report had a set date. Especially when the empress candidates were chosen in the fall, and it was currently late summer.

So that would mean that the book in front of her was predicting the future?

If there was a God, who had the sense of humor to reincarnate her into her book, surely they were merciful. This book would help her predict at least some parts of the plotline that Mari has planned, and would allow Emi to attempt to avoid the bad ending that Angelika is most likely going to receive. Was it possible to even do so in a novel that is still being written?

Now that she was thinking about it, there was no convenient time skip for Angelika. She was stuck in this world, which passes the time the same way her world would. Does that mean that the actions she performs between the time it takes for her to return to the main plotline can change the story's outcome?

But if that was so, what was supposed to do for the rest of her time up until then?