I Was Tricked into This Fake Marriage!

Chapter 2

Desperately Seeking the Perfect Husband

I, Leyrin Efran, the only child and daughter of Count Efran, can remember my past life.

I was a college student until my life was cut tragically short. At the tender age of 21, I died in an accident in the country with the highest rate of traffic fatalities in my previous world.

After my untimely death, I was reborn with a silver spoon in my mouth as the precious little lady of a wealthy count.

But look at me now!

It all went to hell in a handbasket just twenty-one years into my nice, cushy life as a noblewoman. It’s like my soul had a jinx I couldn’t shake or something.

I read that massive tome of imperial statutes from cover to cover until I wore out its spine. Even then, only one solution to my situation was to be found.

Hah. Marriage? Did that have to be the only solution? Really?

Under imperial law, a married couple holding peerages of different ranks would both be demoted to the lesser rank. That meant my mother had been relegated to a commoner. Why? Because my father was now one.

It gets even better.

Any offspring not yet of age would be downgraded into commoners as well. If you had officially come of age, you were in luck! You got to keep your status.

Goodie. I’m so grateful that I could just cry.

Mother faced me with her big, watery eyes. Her tears welled up at the sight of me forgoing sleep to pore over the endless laws and decrees.

“We should have married you off when we had the chance...”

I flinched. Love matches were not uncommon in my kingdom, but still, the nobility functioned differently from the masses. There were just as many, if not more, political and arranged marriages. And marrying your cousin was more common than not.

The man I very nearly ended up marrying was my favorite cousin, Schutand Efran. And when I say my favorite, I obviously don’t mean in a lovey-dovey way.

But the year I turned 15, my stupid father made a stupid surprise announcement at the year-end family gala that he planned for us to be wed. Wed to Schutand, who was like my own brother! At the time, I dashed out of the ballroom screaming like a banshee and refused to look my father in the eye for two whole months.

Sure, I could understand it, logically... But the fact that Father tried to marry me off to a blood relative gave me an ick that I couldn’t shake for weeks on end.

Poor Schutand, on the other hand, was so shocked by my reaction that he ran away from home. Unlike me, a Korean who grew up believing that marriage to someone of the same clan and surname was something to be avoided, Schutand had apparently been carrying a secret crush on me for ages.

Once I figured that out, I just stopped bothering.

I mean, I’m sorry his feelings got hurt. But out of the millions of people in the world, why the hell would you marry your own family?!

“Mother, if you had married me off, I’d be a commoner like everyone else.”

That was when it finally seemed to dawn on her that her husband, close and distant relatives—everyone she knew, basically—had become common folk. But aside from that, everyone was fine. The empire had declared all the prisoners of war would be returned to their estates, and all we had to do was pay a prince’s ransom in reparations.

I let out a sigh as I furiously massaged between my furrowed brows. The more I looked into inheritance and hereditary succession, the worse I felt.

The family court laws of the empire were... interesting, to say the least.

Extramarital lovers were also eligible for inheritance rights, and the rules for passing down titles to illegitimate children were more than lenient. It was a hard thought to swallow.

They basically all but said it outright: if you’re sick of your wife, feel free to get a new one and pass everything down to her!

Ugh. I’m gonna be sick.

As a matter of fact, even their stipulation against unwed women inheriting titles was clearly just a ruse to marry us off to the peerage of the empire.

Every able-bodied man from the Kingdom of Sopen between the ages of 18 and 50, nobility and commoners alike, had taken up arms to defend the realm. And all of them had lost their standing in one fell swoop.

In contrast, the empire was teeming with eligible bachelors who had been awarded all sorts of stylings and titles for their meritorious service in the war. The message was loud and clear—if you wanted to preserve your lineage, marry into the imperial peerage, or else.

A special little political matchmaking service courtesy of the emperor, so to speak.

Not the arranged-marriage type? Prepare to donate all of your land to the imperial throne. Not into that either? I guess you die now.

God dammit. But I don’t want to die!

The only members of nobility left in the Kingdom of Sopen were young ladies of prime marriageable age and... doddering old geezers.

It would’ve been nice if we had some elder members left in the family. But alas, even my great uncle who was over 60 years old was now a prisoner of war.

That’s what happens when you insist that you’re still male and hearty enough to take up arms in battle, I guess...

Oops.

The point being, there wasn’t even a single nobleman left in the entire Efran household. Not one!

Married!

To become the Countess of Efran, I needed to get married. And to a member of nobility at that. But what if there weren’t any good, nice, sane noblemen left anymore? What if they all looked like the Crypt Keeper, or were rotten little turncoats who’d sold out their country?!

I had to marry one of them?

“NOOOO!”

I shot up from my seat, screaming. Mother let out a little gasp.

“Oops, sorry. It’s just that I had the most terrible thought...”

I didn’t know what it was about what I’d said, but Mother gave me a strange look as if something had occurred to her before she buried her face back into her handkerchief.

* * *

Two weeks flew by.

And now I had to get married and head to the imperial capital, all in under two weeks. Mind you, I wasn’t the only person who was frantically combing through all the laws of the empire.

The entire household had rallied together for the sole purpose of finding me a prospective husband, which was touching. Unfortunately, I shared the same circumstances with every other marriageable noblewoman in the realm.

This is without a hint of exaggeration, but the only eligible bachelors left were complete freaks.

Who wants to get married to a wrinkled 63-year-old bag of bones? Even if I counted all the years I’d lived in my past life along with the years of my current one, a 63-year-old was way too old for a 42-year-old!

And you can pretty much guarantee that anyone who wasn’t a senior citizen and hadn’t lost their title was a stinking, kingdom-betraying wimp.

One was even a wimp and a leech. He told me he’d kick his wife out on the street and marry me instead if I asked him to!

“Hah. Why don’t you get some rest, Mother? I think I’ll call it a night for myself as well.”

After escorting Mother to her chambers, I took a stroll around the estate until I noticed all of the servants were staring at me everywhere I went, their eyes following me with concerned pity. Suddenly feeling very tired, I barely managed to flash back what I hoped was a reassuring smile before retiring to my room.

It was drawing close to suppertime when I received a visit from Sir Galott Heiden.

The second-in-command of the Efran knights, he had insisted on remaining and protecting the estate.

Upon learning that Father had been stripped of his status, Sir Heiden immediately began deferring to me as the de facto Countess of Efran as if it were the natural order of things.

I, the mistress and lady of the house, and him my faithful servant.

He also happened to be a strapping 23-year-old nobleman of both outstanding skill and character. But I couldn’t just marry him because I was pressed for time. Not only was he engaged to my personal handmaiden, Seira, the two of them were passionately in love.

And what kind of garbage person would that make me?

I offered Sir Heiden a seat in my parlor where Mother had just been a few moments prior. After settling in, Sir Heiden began to speak with considerable difficulty.

“My lady, I’m afraid I must discuss a matter that you will probably find distasteful.”

Sir Heiden’s voice was so filled with gravitas that it felt almost comical. Nevertheless, I straightened up in my seat with exaggerated poise before finally giving him the daintiest, most dignified nod I could muster.

“You may speak.”

Sir Heiden placed the file he had been holding on top of the table.

“If you anticipate this will be a lengthy conversation, shall I call for tea?” I asked.

“Not at all.”

Oh, serious, serious Sir Heiden. Always so stoic, and proper to a fault. Definitely not my type.

Not that it mattered! Since he was already pretty much off the market and all. But the grave look on his face was starting to make me nervous.

Wait a second, this boring old fogey wasn’t about to propose, was he?!

I should’ve known from the strained, hangdog expression on his face when I complained about there not being any good, single men around!

No, this can’t be happening! I was just venting!

“Please know that I am only raising the subject, as there is no point in delaying further. I only ask that you do not take offense and take this matter to heart.”

Okay, now I’m scared.

I swallowed dryly and nodded.

“Yes, of course. Now speak.”

His head hanging slightly, Sir Heiden drew in a sharp breath. I braced myself for what was next.

Okay, fine. Sir Heiden might be stodgy and dull, but he treats Seira like a queen.

And sure, he was old-fashioned, but if I became his wife in an arranged marriage, he would be completely devoted to me.

And did I mention he was handsome?

What am I doing, trying to convince myself? I mean... I’m only human...

Let’s face it. Once you had forty-two years of living under your belt, you learned that sometimes you had to settle. Just as long as I wasn’t settling down with a blood relative or a hoary old man.

No! Seira is like a sister to me. I simply must refuse.

I steeled myself as Sir Heiden parted his lips to speak.

“It is imperative that you start considering members of the imperial peerage as prospective suitors.”

“Absolutely not.”

Sir Heiden let out a long sigh as if he had already anticipated my response.

What he didn’t realize was that I had blurted it out almost automatically, thinking that he was about to propose marriage. I felt a hot flash of blood rushing to my face.

What the hell?! So this wasn’t a proposal?

I let it all get to my head, dammit!

Seeming to not know how to read the expression on my face, which was now a lovely shade of tomato, Sir Heiden bowed his head deeply as if to apologize for his misdeed.

“Forgive me for my impudence, my lady...”

“...Wait,” I cut him off.

I hemmed and hawed while fanning my still-burning face, then cleared my throat.

“It’s not that I won’t consider the imperial peerage; it’s that we don’t know anything about them. Did you have anyone suitable in mind?”

“If it pleases you, I believe that there may be a way to arrange a match.”

In our kingdom, marrying a commoner was viewed more favorably than marrying a foreigner.

But who the hell cared? It’s not like I hadn’t already lived fifty percent of my life amongst people from a completely different world.

Whether I married someone from the kingdom or the empire didn’t change the fact that it would be a marriage of convenience. The problem was finding someone who was convenient to marry.

Most available information about the empire was limited to achievements on the battlefield—so-and-so distinguished themselves in the war, and so forth. What little we knew was only highlighted by the vast expanse of the continent that was the empire’s territory.

With all this in mind, how do you even start searching for a potential suitor?

Sir Heiden continued to speak as if reading my concerns.

“I believe our best option is to enlist the help of the Nine Nights Guild.”

I dropped my jaw in the most unladylike manner, then hastily closed it before Heiden could see.

The Nine Nights. The greatest intelligence guild on the continent.

They were infamous for getting you any kind of information you wanted, so long as you could pay the price. You could hire them to find out exactly how many strands of armpit hair the emperor had if you wanted.

But the Nine Nights Guild held no allegiance to the empire. An equal opportunity operator, they would just as quickly sell information that was beneficial to the empire as they would information that could topple it.

Rumor had it that the emperor, gnashing his teeth in his supreme displeasure of the Nine Nights’ existence, had ordered the Mad Murderer to kill them himself after the war ended.

“Weren’t they rumored to be enemies of the emperor? Does the guild even still exist?”

“It appears that the emperor has given them official authorization to operate in the empire in exchange for gathering intel on possible insurgent forces. They established their headquarters in the capital last month and have dispatched agents in every region.”

“Have you ever met an agent from the guild?”

“I have hired them for a case and found them extremely efficient.”

Sir Heiden coughed, seeming somewhat embarrassed.

“Why?”

“I beg your forgiveness, my lady... I hired them to compile a dossier about... you.”

What?!

My look of shock spurred Sir Heiden to apologize again profusely.

“They say that they never sell the same information twice, so I only thought it was right that I purchase your dossier first before anyone else might...”

He sheepishly pushed the file on the table toward me. I unfurled it.

“I-I didn’t look at it very closely.”

“...What are you on about? Then how would you have known that they’re efficient at what they do?”

“It’s just, some sections were... No, never mind. I beg your pardon. I’ll leave it to your consideration.”

Sir Heiden jumped up from his seat and rushed out of the parlor before I could say another word.

Bewildered, I studied the documents in my hand before groaning in exasperation. The information was agonizingly comprehensive.

And personal. It detailed everything from my physical measurements down to the exact dates of my menstrual cycle.

So this is what he was so embarrassed about. Heh. Ahem.

Those Nine Nights... What a terrifyingly efficient group. Even I hadn’t known my own measurements! How in the world did they find that out?