Gunther didn’t chase after me. Probably because he had to watch out for others.
…or maybe he just didn’t feel the need to chase me at all.
He might’ve thought that if he left me alone to run away, I’d ultimately realize the reality and come back on my own.
And honestly, who would welcome a woman who betrayed her homeland and joined another country?
As he confidently spouted, to the people of the Kingdom of Rhine, Brunhilde was nothing but a traitor who deserved to be put to death.
She was just a party member assigned to support the hero, but instead, she gobbled up the funds and support and slipped away to another country.
Plus, it was a coincidence that all three party members were in their prime, so rumors about the real reason for their defection being love affairs spread like wildfire.
Thinking about it, it wasn’t just a rumor. I didn’t know, but the other two were in Gunther’s bed.
…Anyway, in such a situation, it would be lucky if I returned to the Friet party without being treated like a prodigal son or worse, receiving a rock baptism.
In the worst-case scenario, I might even get arrested and thrown in jail as soon as I arrived.
As for escaping to another country besides Rhine, you ask?
Well, other hero kingdoms wouldn’t trust a woman who fled from two parties in a row either.
At most, they’d use me as a discarded pawn.
Not to mention countries ruled by other races.
If humans don’t care for each other’s rights, why would a different race care about such things?
Unless I had a weird preference for wanting to be treated like a slave, there were places I absolutely shouldn’t set foot in without a backing.
In the end, for Brunhilde to remain a member of the hero party, there was no other way than to go back and cling to Gunther.
So from Gunther’s viewpoint, there was no need to chase me at all.
He could just wait leisurely, and when Brunhilde returned with a frustrated face, he could grab her and toss her onto the bed.
I bet he was probably rolling around with the women on the bed right now, betting on when Brunhilde would come back.
He likely didn’t even consider the possibility that she wouldn’t return.
Brunhilde, who dedicated herself to restoring the fallen Eisenstein family due to treason, couldn’t possibly give up her only means of being a member of the hero party.
If it’s Brunhilde…
…of course, contrary to his expectations, Brunhilde wouldn’t return to him.
After all, I’m not Brunhilde. I’m just a poor, poor reader who’s been possessed by her body.
Restoring the Eisenstein family? Why should I care about that? It’s not even my family.
I don’t know why Brunhilde was obsessed with the revival of the Eisenstein family. The plot had concluded before such details came out anyway.
But even if I knew, I wouldn’t care.
The shame, humiliation, hardships, and deaths Brunhilde experienced all happened because of her obsession to revive her family. Why would I be crazy enough to follow that path?
I don’t even have the capacity to follow it.
Unlike Brunhilde, who was a genius as a knight, I had never even seen swordsmanship before.
My abilities are the same as the original Brunhilde, but… fighting isn’t just about ability.
If I were to fight relying solely on strength without knowing any sword techniques, I’d immediately become a half-orc factory upon meeting an orc.
While I may be stronger and faster than an average human, it’s the same for them. Unlike me, they’ve mastered weapon skills quite well.
So, I had no intention whatsoever of living as a knight of the hero party like the original Brunhilde.
No, I didn’t even have any intention of living as a knight in the first place.
The lowest cutoff line for monsters knights usually face is about orc warriors, and as I mentioned, if I met an orc, I was sure it wouldn’t be a sword fight but a struggle for survival.
If I had such an ending in mind, I would rather close my eyes and live stuck to Gunther.
Really, just thinking about it makes me want to vomit, but… still, would it be better to become a prisoner of the orcs?
Quarter-elf mom vs. half-orc mom.
Who in their right mind would choose the latter here?
Of course, the former was just as pathetic.
Therefore, as soon as I made that judgment, I quickly fled and ran all the way here.
Choosing a third option, like the protagonist of an old novel who was disappointed with both South and North Korea and chose neutrality.
…That protagonist ended up throwing themselves into the sea and becoming fish bait, but still.
In any case, even though it was a somewhat impulsive decision, the fact that I managed to escape to here safely meant I had at least made a reasonably good choice.
The problem is… how to live from now on….
◆◆
“Haah….”
I let out a deep sigh as I leaned my head against a tree stump.
My head was a mess. Like I had seven different TV channels turned on at once.
It was a relief to have escaped the immediate crisis, but thinking about what lay ahead made me feel like the future was still dark.
How on earth should I live here?
And that too, in Brunhilde’s body.
They say life is a comedy from a distance but a tragedy up close. The same goes for novels.
When I was reading text written on screens or paper, it was merely someone else’s story, so I could laugh and enjoy it…
But now the novel had become my reality. At least for me.
So this was tragedy. An unimaginably terrible tragedy.
Can you understand that despair?
I, who had poured out hundreds of lines of criticism in the comment section whenever Brunhilde appeared, crying, “Stop spinning the washing machine and just die already!”, had actually become that Brunhilde.
A thunderous, catastrophic situation. I didn’t even know the cause.
Like usual, did some transcendent being decide to mess with me, or was it just an accident or natural disaster that struck me?
But if someone possessed me in this body… then one thing was certain.
Whoever that being was, they certainly had an insufferably mocking personality.
Otherwise, there would be no reason to pick me and shove me into Brunhilde’s body.
They probably intended for me to taste the poison after begging to be killed.
And that intention seemed to have hit the mark perfectly. Seeing as I felt like I’d been handed a lifetime supply of poison all at once.
◆◆
Crack, snap.
The dry branches snapped like a mother whose son is a bum, exhaling a strangely cheerful last breath.
I was running again. On the grassy path in the forest that was starting to darken.
I still hadn’t decided how I’d live, but I couldn’t just sit still.
Gunther, who had gone into a sage time thanks to Imelia and Irina, might think it better to just pull me back instead of waiting.
So I had to escape to a place where he couldn’t chase me even if he changed his mind.
So, where should I run?
Well, the answer was obvious. At least I needed to get out of Burgundy.
Gunther Hagen was the hero of the Kingdom of Burgundy. If I quietly hid in another country, he wouldn’t be able to find me.
So, where to go?
In this world, the world of Nibelungen Tragödie, there were seven countries.
Two countries ruled by different races, one ruled by demons. The other four were human countries.
The Kingdom of Burgundy, Gunther’s base.
The Kingdom of Rhine, Brunhilde’s homeland and Friet’s base.
Both of these were out of the question. Even if I disguised myself here, I’d soon be exposed.
So that left just two choices…
I would have to give up on the eastern hero, Atli Etzel’s base.
That’s a different race’s empire. I’d stick out too much there.
In the end, the only country where I could hide was just one.
The great nation in the northern continent—Hervor.
As long as I didn’t encounter the hero of the Kingdom of Hervor, Heid, it was the perfect country to live hidden away.
◆◆
Two months passed since then.
Two months that had been incredibly eventful.
It had been more than enough time for me to realize just how terrible this world truly was.
As I progressed northward, I could even throw away my life plan I’d loosely come up with like crumpled paper.
What happened, you ask?
Well, if I were to explain it all in detail, it’d take more than a full day to get through.
So, to summarize simply…
The number of loaves of bread I had eaten since being possessed in this world was nearly equivalent to the number of people I had killed.
That’s right.
A Korean youth who had never twisted a chicken’s neck had, in just two months, become a legendary murderer who killed over a hundred people.
And that was me.
Really, damn. I can’t believe this.
It was something that made it impossible to hold back my curses. Every one of those murders was purely in self-defense.
What a crazy world this is, here.
