The Story of Becoming a Married Man in Another World

004 The Sold Bride

The lord’s soldiers brought criminals to the village. The village had been waiting for them since the beginning of the year.

It was said that criminals would live as slaves for a period depending on the severity of their crimes.

Lizzie didn’t know much because she hadn’t been here long. There were no stories of slaves sent by the lord in her village.

From what she overheard from the village women, it seemed they collected a bit more tax in exchange for sending criminals as slaves.

This village had fewer women compared to other places. Because of that, the women said it was better not to be noticed by the soldiers, so all the young women hid inside their houses.

Only women who had been widowed for a long time or were old gathered with the village men to greet the soldiers.

She felt relieved when she was told to hide, thinking she might have to entertain the soldiers herself.

‘But….’

This time she got through safely, but who knew what would happen next time.

‘What will happen to me from now on?’

Hiding her anxious heart, Lizzie moved some oat porridge into a bowl. The oat porridge, boiled with a lot of water and without salt, was bland.

The village women distributed the porridge every other day. It would be nice to have a bit more to eat, but she had to be grateful just to have something to eat.

—

Lizzy approached the child huddled in the corner. She crouched down beside the child.

Without a word, she handed over a bowl and a wooden spoon, and the child began to eat hastily. The cold oat porridge quickly reduced to half.

The child glanced at her and took a few more bites before reluctantly extending the spoon.

While Lizzy quietly ate the remaining porridge, the child continued to watch her.

“….”

When there were only a couple of spoonfuls left, Lizzy offered the bowl to the child.

She was hungry too, but there was no other choice.

The memory of being hungry as a child lasts a lifetime. She knew this well from her own experience.

The child began to eat again, almost burying their face in the bowl.

Once a day, she shared a thin oat porridge with this child in an abandoned house where no one lived.

‘How long do we have to stay here?’

The uncertainty of the future made her body shrink involuntarily.

It had always been difficult to find food in winter, but this year was especially hard.

Many men who were dragged into the war a few years ago did not return. Even before that, many men had been taken to the battlefield multiple times, leaving few to farm.

Fields were abandoned even though there was land. It became harder to make a living each year.

To make matters worse, the increasing number of monsters caused damage to various villages.

Money was needed to request monster extermination from the guild, but many small villages could not afford it.

Originally, the lord’s soldiers regularly exterminated the monsters. However, due to the war, the number of soldiers decreased, and now most villages had to fend for themselves.

Fortunately, Lizzy’s village had not suffered from monster attacks.

However, with the reduced number of men, there were more women left. The number of women who could not marry even after reaching the appropriate age increased. Lizzy was one of those women.

Lizzy’s sister, who was two years younger, got married at sixteen.

As the tasks women had to do at home increased, more men wanted healthy and strong brides. Her sister was not only healthy but also good at embroidery and housekeeping. She was an ideal bride.

Her older sister, though a bit late, also managed to marry without much trouble. Her husband was an older man. As a second wife, her sister soon gave birth to a son.

Women who gave birth to boys, future workers, were preferred over girls who only consumed dowries.

Among her husband’s children, who were not much different in age from herself, her sister secured her place by giving birth to a son.

Lizzy, who was neither exceptionally beautiful nor particularly skilled at household chores, remained unmarried at home.

Just before winter, her father sold her ten-year-old brother to a slave trader. For a few years now, boys had been valued more than girls.

Her father tried to sell Lizzy along with some money, but the slave trader refused. With an abundance of women, there was no reason to take Lizzy, who was neither attractive nor particularly skilled or healthy.

In the end, her father sold Lizzy to a trader looking for brides for other villages.

The peddler, who traveled from village to village selling goods, often delivered letters or acted as a matchmaker.

—

—

The merchant was asked by a man from a distant village to buy a bride.

A man who couldn’t find a wife in his own village and wanted to buy a woman from elsewhere couldn’t be a good person. Especially if he was buying a bride from far away with money….

While the men in the village with daughters hesitated, her father finished negotiating with the merchant. Lizzy’s bride price was a single rabbit skin.

It was only after arriving here that she realized she had been sold as the wife of a mountain keeper. The merchant handed her over to a stranger whose face and name she didn’t know, and then descended the mountain.

As soon as they met, her husband started beating her. The reason was that she was supposed to arrive a day earlier but was late.

It wasn’t her fault that she was late, but she had no chance to explain. She curled up and kept getting beaten. It seemed like she was beaten for at least an hour.

Recalling that day, Lizzy trembled involuntarily. Even now, thinking about it scares her. Sometimes she dreams about it.

“….”

The child, while eating porridge, suddenly looked at her.

Lizzy awkwardly raised the corners of her mouth to indicate that she was okay.

Her husband seemed to have some duties as a mountain keeper. After beating her for a long time, he shouted at her to prepare a meal and then went into the mountain.

That evening, her husband did not return.

Her husband had a five-year-old daughter from his first wife. After her husband went into the mountain, she stayed in the mountain keeper’s hut with the child for several days.

But the next day, and the day after that, her husband did not come home.

It was only after several days that she heard that her husband had been killed by a wolf.

Later, she learned that he hadn’t just been killed but had been eaten by the wolf. From head to toe, he was completely eaten, and they could barely recover his clothes and a few bones.

Lizzy was his third wife. She heard from the child that the second mother had been beaten to death. She thought it was fortunate that her husband was dead.

‘But was it really?’

Now, she wasn’t sure. Maybe it was better to have a husband who beat her. She might face even harsher situations in the future. A woman without a husband is like a sheep without a protector. Everything around her is a threat.

“….”

A small sigh escaped from Lizzy’s lips.

The mountain keeper’s hut was in the mountains. The village chief said it was dangerous for a woman and child to stay in such a place without a man, so Lizzy came down the mountain with her husband’s child.

Since then, she and the child have been staying in this empty house on the outskirts of the village.

They couldn’t bring anything from the mountain keeper’s hut.

The village chief said he would provide what they needed from the village, so they shouldn’t take anything.

It would have been different if her husband were alive, but in such a small village, the village chief’s word was absolute. A bride who was sold, especially an outsider who hadn’t taken root in the village, couldn’t go against the village chief’s word.

Lizzy left the hut with only the clothes on her back and the child.

The village chief and the village men kept watching. They were constantly monitoring her to see if she was hiding or stealing anything while she was in the hut.

Lost in thought, Lizzy was brought back to reality by the sound of the child slurping. The child had stuck out his tongue and was licking the bowl.

Lizzy gently pulled the porridge bowl from the child’s hands.

—

—

After scraping the bowl clean and rinsing it lightly with water from the small bucket, Lizzy lay down on the straw bed with the child.

To block the cold even a little, she held the child close and closed her eyes. The sound of their hungry stomachs growling echoed from both her and the child.

“….”

The child put their cold hand into the gap between them. In the darkness, their white breaths rose. One slightly larger, the other smaller. The white breaths continuously scattered into the darkness.

“I’m hungry.”

The child suddenly murmured. Tears welled up in Lizzy’s eyes.

“I’m sorry.”

If she had handled things a little better, clung desperately to the village chief, had a personality that could seduce men, or at least had something she was particularly good at, the situation might have been a little different.

Lizzy hugged the child and whispered once more.

“I’m sorry.”

She already knew she was a worthless being. It had always been that way.

But it shouldn’t be like this when the child was by her side. It wasn’t just about ending as a foolish me, but the child’s life was also at risk.

Even though it was her daughter, everything in that hut belonged to this child, but she couldn’t protect it because she was foolish.

She didn’t know if they would ever return to that hut. But even if they did, all the important things would be gone.

The several pieces of leather that were left, the stockpiled food, someone must have already taken them.

‘I’m really sorry.’

*

Bang! Bang! Bang!

At the sudden noise, Lizzy, who had been lost in thought without falling asleep, jumped up.

Someone was knocking on the door.

The child clung to her in surprise. Lizzy was also startled. Who could be coming at this hour?

Holding the child tightly, they held their breath, and a voice was heard.

“Hey, it’s the village chief.”

“….”

Lizzy got up.

She quietly approached the door but couldn’t decide whether to open it or not. Should she just pretend to be asleep?

But the village chief continued to speak as if he knew she was at the door.

“No need to open the door, just listen. After an all-night meeting, it has been decided that your husband has been chosen. He’s a man brought by the soldiers. It has been decided to accept him as our village’s mountain keeper. He’s not a criminal, so don’t worry.”

“….”

Lizzy swallowed her breath.

—

—

It was not uncommon for the village chief to forcibly decide the marriages of widows or unmarried men and women. It happened often.

Especially in the case of women who had lost their husbands, many ended up that way. There was no choice because it was not a world where a woman could live alone.

Rather, in these difficult times, it would be a blessing if someone took her as a wife. Especially if she had a daughter who couldn’t even be used as a worker.

But it was terrifying. The village chief said he wasn’t a criminal, but who could really know?

Most of the criminals who became slaves were bandits, thieves, or murderers. It was said that those who committed minor crimes did not fall to the level of slaves.

Even her husband, who wasn’t a criminal, beat people until they died. How much worse would it be with a man who had been with criminals?

No.

Lizzie’s lips moved. Could she say that? Could she say no? She opened and closed her mouth several times, and while she did, the village chief spoke again from beyond the door.

“That’s how it is. Go back to the mountain with the man who will be your husband. Come back with him at dawn.”

No. No. It’s terrifying. But her lips closed without making a sound.

The child standing behind her tightly held Lizzie’s hand.

‘What should I do? What should I do?’

Would she be beaten again? It was too terrifying.

She suddenly thought of running away, but she couldn’t. Doing so would only lead to a worse situation. The chances of a woman alone with a young girl surviving in the outside world were almost none.

But she couldn’t think of abandoning the child.

She couldn’t leave the child who had been starving alone in the cold mountain hut, hiding from her father’s eyes.

She couldn’t leave the child who had no one to share even a little cold porridge with, the child who didn’t even have a name at five years old.

‘I can’t do it.’

Tears welled up.

The child clung to Lizzie’s waist. It seemed like she was afraid Lizzie would run away.

The small Lizzie and the even smaller child, who hadn’t grown properly, hugged each other tightly.

The cold wind howled like a ghost as it blew into the house.

—