Ruins of Us

In the month before my 20th birthday, Dad digs out the information on the oldest daughters of the four most prominent families in Jorvale and tells me to select one of them as my partner for our upcoming marriage alliance.

I choose Grace Sutton without hesitation, which shocks everyone else.

After all, everyone in Jorvale knows very well that Connor Foster, the sole heir of the Foster family, has always been crushing on Abigail Chandler since I was a kid.

Only I know that I've gotten to marry Abigail in my previous life.

But on the day after our grand wedding, Abigail told me that Louis Hayes, the low-income student Dad had been sponsoring, was the man she loved.

She announced in public that she was only my wife in name, but she'd always be Louis' wife for real.

But when Abigail tried to pick Louis up the next day, she found out that he had already disappeared after leaving a relationship-severance letter behind.

Abigail was hell-bent on believing that I was the one who forced Louis to leave. Because of that, she treated me like her mortal enemy for the rest of her life.

She went through a lover per week, and she'd always be intimate with them in front of me. All of those lovers resembled Louis one way or another.

Finally, on the day Abigail officially took over Foster Group, I died in a car accident by "coincidence".

Now that I've been reborn, I decide to marry another woman and avoid getting caught up in Abigail's affairs anymore.

But once Abigail hears my decision, she goes absolutely berserk.

"Hey, why is Connor here too? You're impressive, Abigail. Your lapdog even followed you all the way to Lothriel!"

"He's chasing you across half the world. He just won't leave you alone, will he?"

Abigail Chandler's friends' sharp taunts pierced my ears. I turned back with indifference.

Abigail's expression darkened slightly. She frowned at me and asked, "What are you doing here? It was bad enough that you followed me around shamelessly in Jorvale. Now you even chased me to Lothriel."

She put on a stern face and lectured me. "You're the only son of the Foster family. Do you have no sense of dignity at all?"

Her supposedly righteous yet deeply disdainful tone was something I had known for over a decade in my previous life. They felt painfully familiar.

In the past, I had forced myself to stay composed in public, only to drown my feelings in alcohol once I got home. I had constantly questioned what was wrong with me that I could never earn her affection.

But now, I merely dropped a detached remark. "My dad asked me to bid on a piece of jewelry here as a gift for my 20th birthday. What does that have anything to do with you?"

Abigail clearly didn't expect me to react like that and froze for a moment.

Before she could react, the friends around her erupted