The year Lillian was taken in by her stepfather, she was an apprentice at the town apothecary's shop.
The arrogant noblewoman, her face veiled, wore velvet gloves as she tossed the filthy girl into a carriage. She told her that she was the long-lost daughter of the Percy family, and that her biological mother, the fabulously wealthy duchess, was gravely ill.
After returning home, Lillian soon understood that Leon had taken her in only to use her in the fight over the family fortune. Her young, handsome stepfather had no children, while the Percy family's collateral branches circled like a pack of wolves.
Lillian agreed to "work together" with her stepfather. He manipulated her like a puppet, while he coiled around the wealth he had worked so hard to obtain like a snake. But when everything was finally settled, he cast her aside like a piece of trash and sent her to a convent.
Will he really get what he wants?
Lillian stood on her stepfather's chest, clad in velvet and studded with diamonds. Crumpled beneath her, he was wracked with pain from the poison and begged her for the antidote.
"You can't treat your father this way." His eyes were red and wet with tears as he clutched her ankle and pleaded.
"Then have you learned how to serve a true heir?" Lillian asked, lifting his two-faced chin. "My dear... stepfather?"
*
Leon Percy disliked his stepdaughter. She was gloomy, vile, far too clever, and impossible to control. Fortunately, she came from a lowly background, and his sweet talk had her wrapped around his finger.
But it wasn't until he realized something was wrong with his body that he discovered the wicked little brat wasn't just coveting her mother's inheritance. She was also coveting... him.
What a despicable, rotten, irredeemable little fiend!
[Reading Guide]
1. Gender reversal, conventional anatomy. The female lead is a good girl who knows how to use her tools to care for her lonely adoptive father :-)
2. A completely fictional Western setting, with no historical research. The setting exists purely to serve the plot.
Theme: Science and technology are the primary productive forces
