00: How in the world…?

"Ready?" the man sitting nearby the filming site asked.

Aileen paid attention to the clicking sound; the sign meant the camera was now recording. Hence, they need to play their part.

"Run! Escape! Save yourself," says the woman who was stabbed and bled to death. Her expression was a bit bland for someone who's facing death. Aileen thought at that moment that her fellow actress needed more rehearsal to fit her role.

"Cut!" The mad director stood up, and they had no choice but to redo the scene.

"Run! Escape! Save yourself."

Aileen practiced well to execute a lady hesitating to leave as she watched her nanny bathed with its own blood.

Her nanny is the only person in their manor that genuinely takes care of her.  

She gasped when a man with a sword stabbed the nanny. Aileen ran away as fast as she could until she found herself in the forest. It was raining hard, and the soil turned wet. Consequently, her dress has been painted with splattered blood and soil until now as she escaped through the forest. However, she sprained her legs which made Aileen lose her balance, but the odd thing happened, she suddenly felt dizzy as her body fell from a never-ending abyss.

'What the hell is happening? My eyes are getting blurry, and the noise is deafening me. Don't tell me, I'm going to faint. Oh, come on. I can't fail this drama' — is what keeps her mind busy amidst the excruciating pain she's feeling.

She wanted to scream, but her voice wouldn't come. Everything is too painful. It was as if her soul was leaving her body.

When Aileen got a hold of herself, she found an unfamiliar place and unfamiliar fellow actors. 

'I don't remember filming with these people. Look at their extravagant costume, and they are even wearing a crest. Woah! Look at those swords; it had not been so realistic a while ago,' is what she thought as she studied her surroundings.

"Did they change the background?" Aileen muttered but was soon interrupted by someone's presence.

"Your excellency, we found the last member of the house Lestinna," says the Marquise, the class where knights came from.

"This wasn't part of the script! Director!" She glared at the Marquise as she tried to call out the director for changing the script without her knowledge, but instead of an old geezer, a man with a red cape, wearing a crest of a snake enveloping a sword had appeared instead.

He was too illuminating to see, but Aileen shoved off the idea of admiring an unrealistic beauty of a man with golden hair that sparks in a melting yellow-orange tint of the sky.  

'I have a fiance waiting for me to finish this shoot, so I should wrap this filming as soon as possible,' says a tiny voice in her head.

Suddenly, the guy who had an aura of a ferocious tiger had pointed the sword at her neck, and blood dropped to the ground. She almost fainted and panicked at the thought that it was not a drama, and the place she befalls was neither a filming set.

~pak~ 

She slapped her cheek to test the water, and it was coastal clear that she was about to die at the sword of this scary fellow.

'If it was a drama, the director would have panicked already because it wasn't food coloring but my real blood. Damn! Where am I? And what the hell am I doing in this place? How did..." she murmured to herself but was soon interrupted by the baritone voice.

"Stop pretending crazy; even if you are, I will still end your life because it was my father's request," says the guy while meeting her gaze.

Aileen trembled in fear while slowly swallowing the lump in her throat. She closed her eyes, then suddenly, a voice that resembled her mother whispered to her. If it was her hallucination or the sudden need for a mother's comfort, Aileen could not determine it at all. 

*Aileen, sweetie. Listen carefully. Even if you meet a grim reaper, you should not tremble. Look him in the eyes without fear, and yell your deepest will to live.*

Thus, she followed those words. Aileen melted in the deepest blue like an ocean as she lay her eyes on the guy with golden hair and blue eyes. 

"So, you finally accepted your death. Let me make your reunion with your family as quickly as the blink of an eye," he said as he swung his sword.

She started shedding tears at the thought of her dying without seeing her fiance. She dreamt of having a family of her own with the man who had loved her for four years. She wanted a happy and contented life with him... She wishes to...

"I wish to live!" She yelled out of desperation.

Then, a striking light had them close their eyes for seconds. Then, Aileen had hoped that the light would bring her back to the world she originally belonged to, but it was not the result Aileen expected.

The next thing she knew was seeing the guy stricken by a blinding light, and getting his knees on the ground as he roared in pain. When the light fades, an unpredictable turn of events surprises everyone. The guy who supposedly had slashed her neck had tossed the sword and carried her by her waist instead.

"W-what the hell did happen?" she whispered through the wind as she blinked her eyes.

"Forgive my rudeness, and let me make it up to you." He placed her in the carriage. 

He called a medic to treat the subtle cut on her throat. Then he carried her again to bring to the carriage.

She was nervous and scared even though the guy no longer wore a cold demeanor. She jolted when the guy held her hand and said, "How about marrying me and ruling the kingdom with me?"

W-what??????????!!!!!!

"Perhaps, are you proposing to me... a stranger whom you only met today?" she asked to clarify things.

"Yes, I had fallen in love with you at first sight. Be my queen, my lady," he replied as he kissed the back of her palm. 

She was dumbfounded, and all she had to say was, 'what in the world happened?'

How in the world did a guy propose marriage to a woman whom he almost killed?

Moreover, how is she going to go back to her world?!