Title: From a Knight to a Lady Vol. 1
Author: Ink (Art), Ein (Story), Hye-rim Sung (Original Story)
Publisher: Crossed Hearts
Language: English
Format: Paperback
Pages: 378
Genre: Romantasy
Publication Date: February 24, 2026
The Story
There was a female knight by the name of Estelle; however, during a normal embrace with one of her fellow knights, Khalid, she was stabbed to death. However, death wasn’t permanent for her, as she awoke three years later in the body of a noblewoman named Lucifela Aydin. Apparently, the version of Lucifela before Estelle took over her body had a love interest with the crown prince, but an incident took place, and she jumped into the palace lake.
She uses that incident to feign memory loss so that she can understand what happened to her, where she is, and what became of the homeland that she was trying so hard to defend. While she’s doing that, news of her incident reached her father, and when he comes to check on her, he states that there has been a marriage arrangement between her and Zedekiah Heint, the duke who was in charge of leading the attack on her homeland of Eashen!
The duke visited her; however, she is slightly relieved to learn that he’s not in favor of the arranged marriage either, although he doesn’t come across pleasantly about it. The topic of marriage has to wait as the emperor summoned him and Lord Luke, commander of the Second Division, to investigate a string of murders in the capital of Greenhill. The murderer is targeting women, but there haven’t been any leads. The emperor is insistent on solving this case within three days!
Meanwhile, they get a lead on a possible suspect, and it just so happens to be someone that Lucifela knew when she was still Estelle, making her wonder even more about what happened after the war, and what had become of her homeland of Eashen. Once things settle down, Lucifela attends a grand event. There, she overhears the second division’s training, and that’s when she makes a shocking discovery!
Characters
Lucifela used to be Estelle, a soldier of Eashen who was proud of her homeland. Once murdered by someone she thought she could trust, she found herself in the weakened body of a noblewoman. Now, she has to try and find out what happened to her, all while trying to remain as inconspicuous as possible, but that’s not exactly going too well, as some eyebrows are already being raised. There was even a moment when she accidentally spoke to Zedekiah in her Eashen accent and caught herself. She prides herself as a knight, but curses how frail Lucifela’s body is. It’s something that she still needs to get used to; however, one can say her love for her land, and her soldier’s mindset haven’t changed, but because of that, she’s not exactly acting like a noble either. This is a nice balance to her character, but it means other characters are aware of the change. Some prefer this new version because the previous Lucifela would always raise her voice and talk down to others as a noble typically does. Whether this is a blessing or a curse remains to be seen, but being a soldier means that she has a backbone and isn’t afraid of many things… a good trait for a main character.
On the opposite side, we have Zedekiah. From the way Estelle/Lucifela painted him, he seemed to be a ruthless killer who enjoyed the flames of war; however, when you meet him, he’s just a blunt soldier who simply does what he’s told, but also hates to be inconvenienced. We saw that with the arranged marriage, and again when he learns that Lucifela got involved with the murder case… especially at a time when his back was up against a wall with a tight deadline. One has to wonder if he truly is the ogre of war that she painted him to be, but right now… those signs point to no. Also, thanks to Lord Luke, we learned he hates being upstaged, too. It’s only been one volume, so there is a lot still to uncover with his character, but our first impression of him may be wrong.
When it comes to Lord Luke, Zedekiah does have a disdain for him. He looks like he’s all smiles and innocent, but he doesn’t mince his words. There are some undertones to him that lead us to believe that he’s more of a snake than we think. Once the Greenhill investigation wrapped up, we saw evidence of that first-hand. It is uncertain if this is just the way he is or if loftier goals are floating around in his head, but he certainly became an interesting character to keep an eye on.
Final Thoughts
Overall, this was an entertaining first volume. A lot of Romantasy stories focus on things like arranged marriages, or going from rags to riches, etc, and while the whole “reincarnated” aspect isn’t anything new, I love how this series broke that trope right off the bat. It seems as if the arranged marriage cannot be prevented, but both Lucifela and Zedekiah came up with the obvious solution… just get a divorce right after. A lot of stories treat the arranged marriage as the be-all-end-all golden rule, so it was nice that a series threw out the obvious answer and accepted it as a solution.
Then, the pivot happened with the murder mystery of Greenhill, which was a nice detraction. It is as if the genre switched from a romantasy to a detective series, and the case was quite enjoyable. There were some red herrings along the way, but they only served to tease us with both plot and character development. When you take a step back and look at this series through a wider lens, you realize that this isn’t truly about a romance. It’s the story of a knight who lost everything, was given a second chance at life, and is using that chance to figure out what happened (and maybe get some revenge), all while juggling an unexpected new life as a noblewoman.
I enjoyed this first volume as the artwork was pretty well done. Everything was in color, and the paper quality was pretty top-notch. My only complaint has nothing to do with the story (which is shocking, because you know how I love to poke a stick at plot holes or overused tropes). Instead, my complaint has to do with the book’s binding. It’s a perfect-bound book, as I’ve read with so many other series, but the binding was so tight that it was quite the chore to hold open and read. It was as if the book was fighting against me for nearly 400 pages, and I had to stop and relax my hand a few times because of it. That doesn’t take away from the gorgeous cover, or the fact that there is glossy, raised lettering which looks fantastic, but yeah… the binding could have been a bit looser. I’m sure it had something to do with a thicker-than-normal cardstock for the paper, though. At that point, you have to wonder… should quality outweigh convenience? I’ll leave that up to you to judge.
Again, I felt the story was pretty good. There were plenty of great moments, and the cliffhanger at the end wasn’t something that I saw coming, but it does open up an even bigger mystery that is just begging to be explored! If you’re a fan of Romantasy and want something more fantasy than romance… then this is going to be a series you’ll want to pick up!
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This item was provided for review by Crossed Hearts
