“Exhale more!”

“Uh, urgh… can’t… breathe… ! hah, hah….ahhh….!”

“More, tighter!”

“Aaaah!”

“It may be painful now, but in the future you will thank me. A thin waist and a soft, slender body are one of the most important virtues of a lady. Got it? Isolde.”

“Mother… breathe… I can’t breathe… .”

“It was originally like that. get used to it. From now on, make sure you wear a corset when you sleep. Do you understand? Of all your peers, your waist should be the thinnest, your gait should be the most elegant, and your tone and pronunciation must be the most cultured!”

“… Yes, mother.”

“Don’t gasp, you’re not a dog Isolde you are… .”

“… in the future… I have to become the Empress… I have to be the most dignified lady in the whole empire… .”

“good job, my daughter.”

The Duchess looked down at her daughter with an affectionate gaze and sweet voice, tenderly stroking her soft silver hair.

She had to be the perfect empress. So the devastated Elysium could be revived. In other words, it was an investment. The Duke generously offered thousands of gold pieces just to educate Elizabeth. Whilst the Duchess taught her how to be a great lady strictly by all means. Fortunately, Elizabeth was a good, mature child who followed her education without rebelling.

The Duchess stood with her back straight, chin up, contented expression was visible on her face, she patted Elizabeth’s head with a grin. Elizabeth’s pure and clear eyes were looking up at her, containing solid trust without a single glint of doubt.

As soon as the Duchess left the room, the maids swamped around to help untying the corset as she staggered. Elizabeth was suffocated by the tightened corset to the point she felt dizzy and collapsed into the arms of her maids. But none of the maids reported it to the ma’am.

If the madam knew, she would be the first to make sure that there were no scars left on her body, if there were, she would be frustrated claiming that it’s not ladylike, as well as scolding servants.

It would have been better for them to help the lady secretly like this. Of course, they should never be caught by their masters. None of the people caught were kicked out with their necks intact.

There was only once Elizabeth decided to run away from home back when she was barely used to the corsets and shoes.

The nanny, who could not put up with the Ducal couple’s abuse, held the girl’s hands and whispered to her,  ‘Let’s run away, no matter how many good things you think are around you, this is not it.’

Even that day, the corset wick marks were clearly visible on Elizabeth’s delicate skin, and her little toes were wrinkled and bleeding.

“Don’t I need to wear a corset? shoes too? But am I a lady?”

“It’s okay to no longer be a Lady. A lady is not a doll. Even though we might be poor, I will let you know what true happiness is.”

However, their plan to run away was caught by the duke before they even managed to escape the forest surrounding the mansion.

Her nanny was dragged somewhere along the way, and Elizabeth was forced to confront her own father, who had a mancing expression at the time.

The Duke of Elysium was holding an ebony staff, but it was filled with lead inside. Beside him, the Duchess was standing with an ice pack over her red, swollen cheeks, as she had been slapped by her husband, who blamed her for not having managed to educate her child properly.

The Duke of Elysium raised his staff.

“It’s been four years…” The poor girl muttered to herself.

Eventually, Elizabeth was able to erase what had happened that day from her mind as her furious father lifted his heavy wooden cane up high in the air .

She didn’t even want to remember it, but whenever she forcibly recalled that day, there were a few things that came to mind as she was looking at it from a third party’s perspective.

Her own screams, begging for forgiveness, begging for help. The mother’s voice, dissuading the duke, ‘What if you leave a fatal scar on the child who will become the next empress?’ And the terrible pain she felt the moment her bone broke.

She thought she had forgotten, she thought that she had erased everything, hence, the memories buried deep beneath her subconscious often became nightmares and tormented her.

Elizabeth, drenched in cold sweat, jumped up and only after groping with her hands and checking in front of the mirror to see if she had any broken bones or any left scars on her, was she assured to go back to bed.

From that day onwards, every time she closed her eyes, the nightmare repeated.

‘I was wrong. It was my fault for doing something not ladylike. Dad is always right. If I had followed mother’s instructions, none of that would have happened. If……If only I had been a little more ladylike…..’

She was afraid to close her eyes.

Even now, when she thinks about it again, she gets goosebumps all over her body and suddenly it becomes difficult to breathe.

Would it be better if she left it in writing, or would she be relieved if she confided it on a pillow?

But instead of opening her diary or  weeping on her pillow, she vowed to conceal everything she had done, instead of telling how painful she was.

If she didn’t tell anyone and kept it all to herself, her daily life would go on as usual.