In This Life, I Will Be Your Dog - Chapter 9

“Sir Knight! The sun is already high in the sky! Surely you’re not still asleep?”

The loud voice jolted Bellona awake. Her clear green eyes, resembling fresh foliage, darted around, struggling to grasp the situation. She noticed a spider dangling in a familiar yet unfamiliar corner of the ceiling, busily spinning its web, as if determined to build a grand home. Her gaze, growing narrower, slowly shifted to the opposite side of the room.

Her eyes eventually stopped on the faded desk after passing by the old cabinet. Slowly, her gaze moved upward to the wall, which was filled with densely written words. Bellona’s eyes trembled as she read the inscriptions—sword stances, techniques, and the virtues required of a commander were all meticulously recorded there.

But the most shocking was the large phrase written above everything else:

“I will become the Empire’s first female knight commander!”

That… I wrote that.

Am I dreaming? If not, there was no other way to explain the situation she found herself in—waking up in the quarters she had stayed in during her knightly days. How else could she explain such an impossible reality?

“I’m sure I died—”

“Sir Knight! Were you really asleep? What are we going to do!” Eshil…?

The woman who had burst into the room was staring at Bellona with a bewildered expression. But even more bewildering was Bellona herself.

What is this…

“Sir Knight! Hurry and get up! Your turn is coming up soon!”

“My turn…?”

“Why are you acting like this all of a sudden? Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten about today’s trial?”

A trial? Bellona had no idea what Eshil was talking about. Seeing the confused look on Bellona’s face, Eshil grabbed her hand and pulled her up.

“Get up, quickly! At this rate, you won’t even make it to the trial and you’ll be disqualified! You trained day and night to become the vice-commander, and now you’re going to lose it all because you overslept?”

Vice-commander… Today is the vice-commander’s trial?

The startled Bellona quickly scanned Eshil from head to toe. Now that she looked more closely, something about Eshil seemed different—she appeared younger, more childlike.

A sudden, ridiculous thought crossed Bellona’s mind.

“Eshil, how old are you?”

“What?”

“How old are you?”

Bellona’s abrupt shout made Eshil jump, and she answered in a small voice, “E-Eighteen…”

“What? Ha! Then what about me?”

Terrified by Bellona’s fierce glare, Eshil stammered, “T-Twenty-two…”

My God. Bellona’s face turned pale. She had died at the age of twenty-seven.

This can’t be real… Have I really gone back five years?

“Sir Knight, I don’t know what’s going on, but we need to go now! We’re running out of time!”

Without giving her a chance to process the unbelievable situation, Eshil pulled Bellona out to the training grounds. The shouts of the knights in the middle of their matches and the cheers of the spectators rang in her ears. Her chest tightened painfully.

It was an unforgettable sight. The thrill of victory she had felt that day was still vividly imprinted in her heart. Her heart, which had been pounding with excitement, suddenly sank.

She caught sight of the faces of her subordinates who had died in the final battle. They had come back to life, smiling brightly.

This can’t be…

Even as she saw their faces, faces she had personally sent off in cremation, Bellona couldn’t believe it. A familiar scent of sweat brushed against her nose. As if entranced, Bellona tightened her grip around the worn wooden sword in her hand.

The rough texture, both unfamiliar and familiar, made her click her tongue. All these sensations confirmed that this was indeed reality.

Suppressing her complicated emotions, she forced herself to focus. As she looked around, she heard someone calling her name.

“Next! Bellona Riknis, Ether Dorta, step forward!”

“Sir Knight! It’s your turn!”

Still dazed, Bellona was shaken out of her stupor by Eshil’s urgent tug on her sleeve. Finally snapping back to reality, Bellona turned her gaze to the training ground. Her eyes instantly hardened into a fierce glare.

Ether Dorta…!

The image of the man who had shed tears, promising to save her siblings, was as vivid as if she had seen it just yesterday.

To think that she had entrusted her siblings’ lives to that beast without knowing he was the Empress’s dog.

Rage surged within her. She wanted nothing more than to behead him and vent the fury burning in her chest.

“Sir Knight…!”

At Eshil’s desperate call, Bellona’s green eyes grew cold and calculating.

Whether this was a dream or reality, it seemed best to deal with the situation at hand first. She could figure out what was going on later.

“Alright, I’m going.”

Seeing Bellona’s face return to its usual calm demeanor, Eshil let out a sigh of relief.

As Bellona stepped into the training ground, the previously noisy arena fell silent as if doused in cold water. A small laugh escaped her lips.

To think I would experience this again.

Back then, as a mere knight, she had been treated with little respect. The Imperial Knights, composed entirely of robust male knights, had regarded Bellona, the only female knight, as a disgrace. Despite passing the knight’s trial with flying colors, they had belittled her simply because she was a woman.

In the icy atmosphere, memories from the past came flooding back.

She had cried many tears, stung by the injustice and humiliation.

But now that she had traversed time, those bitter memories felt like nothing more than laughable recollections.

Just then, a haughty voice broke through her thoughts.

“You’d better give it your all. No one’s going to go easy on you just because you’re a woman.”

Bellona’s expression turned icy again. Ether’s words brought back a forgotten memory.

Today’s vice-commander’s trial was the turning point that changed her circumstances.

Ether was a skilled knight and ranked higher than her. But when she defeated him and became the vice-commander, the other knights could no longer ignore her.

Moreover…

Bellona’s gaze shifted to the high platform reserved for the imperial family. As expected, there sat Impes, who had only recently ascended to the position of crown prince, his face full of arrogance.

Impes.

The crown prince, who had been enamored with her swordsmanship, had openly commanded her to become his personal knight.

She had seen it as an opportunity. Having seen firsthand how much life could change when one caught the eye of the imperial family, she hadn’t hesitated.

Bellona had gladly accepted Impes’s command. After that, her status truly changed. No longer was she the unwanted female knight. She became the vice-commander of the Imperial Knights, composed of the empire’s finest, and rose quickly as the crown prince’s favored guard.

She lived in a fine house bestowed upon her by the crown prince and earned enough to feed her siblings well. Her youngest sibling, who had been frail since childhood, even received medical care from the imperial doctor, courtesy of the Empress.

Blinded by the immediate happiness in front of her, Bellona had served the imperial family as if her life depended on it, never realizing that the so-called happiness was a noose tightening around her neck. Only after she became the knight commander did her life begin to fall apart. Reports that had been conducted in the office gradually shifted to the crown prince’s bedroom. The Empress, treating her like a dog, ordered her to do things no knight should ever have to do.

By the time she realized something was wrong, it was already too late.

The once-comfortable home had become a prison where her younger siblings were held as hostages. The Empress’s so-called kindness was nothing more than a leash, using her siblings’ lives as bait to control her.

Even knowing everything, there was nothing Bellona could do. She had no choice but to serve them with dogged loyalty, accepting it as her fate.

She had deluded herself into thinking that if she continued to devote her body and soul, her siblings could at least live comfortably. She believed it was the only way to preserve the honor she had fought so hard to attain, even if it was just an empty title.

But in the end, she was discarded like an animal, and her foolish greed led not only to her own death but also to the deaths of her siblings.

A sharp gust of wind sent her red hair swirling. She pressed down the horrific memories that kept surfacing and steadied her mind. Clenching her trembling fingers into a fist, she took a deep breath and focused on Ether.

If she demonstrated her skill here, Impes might extend his hand to her again, just as he had in the past.

But this time, what choice would she make to bring him down?

“Are you just going to stand there? If you’re scared, you can run away now,” Ether said, his voice brimming with confidence.

A faint smile curled Bellona’s lips.

I can worry about that choice later. For now, I’ll feel better after I knock him down.

“Come at me.”

“What?”

“I’m not going to take it easy on you, so don’t cry about it later.”

Her taunt made Ether’s face twisted with anger. “Your mouth is the only part of you that knows how to fight. I’ll show you just how worthless your skills are today.”

No sooner had the words left his mouth than Ether launched himself at her. Though it was only a wooden sword, the killing intent emanating from him was palpable.

And at that moment, Bellona remembered one crucial thing she had overlooked.

‘You’ve held onto this grudge ever since that day, haven’t you?’