Chapter 1: A Royal Summons

After coming back from work at the Magical Ministry, I had a hefty dinner and then went to my room to rest on the bed. For no particular reason, I raised my hand and visualized my wand appearing inside it, which it instantly did.

What with being black and having a skull on it, it definitely looked like something a villain would use. As if that wasn’t enough, I had the Dark Covenant next to my bed and Pochi, my Dark Familiar, living inside my shadow.

That’s a whole villainess starter kit, all right, I thought, sighing to myself.

This all started when I was eight years old. I hit my head while walking around in the castle, which made me recall the memories of my past life as a Japanese high schooler. Before long, I realized that Katarina Claes, the girl I was in this life, was the villainess in Fortune Lover, the otome game I’d been playing in my previous one.

Having played Fortune Lover, I knew that the character I was now living as was destined to meet doom, in one way or the other, by the end of the game. I did all I could to avoid this, including learning how to farm vegetables and build snake-shaped wooden toys, and, by pure chance, I ended up befriending all of the main characters in the game. My list of friends included the characters that the protagonist could romance, their fiancées, and in some cases even their siblings.

Speaking of the protagonist, that’s another person I became friends with. I met her—Maria—during my years at the Academy of Magic, the setting for Fortune Lover, which I somehow managed to get through without falling prey to doom.

Oh, how relieved I was! I could spend the rest of my days without worrying about the game’s bad ends...or so I thought.

The issue was that, right after graduating, I was supposed to marry Prince Jeord, my fiancé. I was barely getting by as a duke’s daughter, and I definitely didn’t have it in me to be a princess. In order to delay the marriage for as long as possible, I used my noble-society connections to get myself a job at the Magical Ministry, saying that I wanted to work for a while before becoming a bride.

That worked, except that there was something very important I didn’t know at the time: Fortune Lover had a sequel...and it was set in the Magical Ministry! The reason why this was so important was that in Fortune Lover II, Katarina Claes—who had been exiled in the canonical ending of the first game—comes back as an antagonist. This time, depending on the ending, she has the choice of either being killed or rotting in prison for the rest of her life. Either way, she’s doomed.

And to think I was so relieved about having gotten past the first game! Now I had to come up with a plan to survive the second. All my efforts, however, seemed to be useless. I was looking more like the Katarina in the game every day: I had the Dark Familiar, the Dark Covenant, and as of late, even the Dark Wand (skull included)!

All I could do was sigh.

I wish I at least could change this wand into something cuter, like a star-shaped one or something.

I had tried doing that, but to no avail. Maybe it was because I couldn’t change its shape after deciding on it the first time, or maybe it was because I was just destined to be a villainess.

And if all these dark items weren’t enough, I was also taking Dark Magic lessons at the Ministry. Not that I wanted to, of course... My superiors had ordered me to so that I could demonstrate for them the content of the Dark Covenant. The only way to show a spell contained in that book was to actually perform it, since no one else could read the covenant and it magically prevented me from speaking or writing about its contents.

So, since I couldn’t really use any Dark Magic, I was told to practice under Raphael, who was very good at teaching. I was worried that this would bring me closer to becoming the villainess Katarina as portrayed in the game, but on the other hand, I didn’t want to waste all the efforts I’d made to decipher the covenant.

I also figured that maybe I could learn some kind of escape spell to help me run away and out of the country as a last resort in case doom caught up with me. Running away without putting up a fight wasn’t very in-character for an antagonist, but what could I do? My priority was still surviving.

What made surviving so difficult was that, unlike with FL1, I had never played FL2. I didn’t know when it was supposed to end or what kind of events its story involved. My only hints were some dreams I had (I didn’t know how or why) that showed me my past-life friend Acchan playing the game, and a mysterious note I found which contained some information about FL2. The note, which I happened to find inside of a book, was written in Japanese.

I needed to learn more about the game, but I couldn’t have those dreams on command and I never found any additional notes after the first one.

For the time being, I had to focus on my Dark Magic lessons. Since one of the bad ends seemed to involve me ending up in prison, I also had to think of a way to escape from there just in case.

Maybe Sora knows how to break out of prison. He knows lots of stuff. I’ll have to ask him.

All this doom-avoiding stuff kept me busy enough, but then, a few days ago, something else happened to further complicate my life. Something I didn’t really want to think about...

“The duke has summoned you, Miss,” one of the servants said from outside of the room, surprising me. Mother used to summon me at the drop of a hat, but it was rare for father to do so. I went to his quarters, scared that I’d done something terrible without remembering it.

“It’s me, Katarina. I take it that you want to see me?” I asked while knocking on his door.

“Oh, come in, my dear,” he briskly replied. From the tone of his response, I could tell that he wasn’t mad at me—which, to be honest, he almost never was—but I kept my guard up in case he still actually wanted to scold me about something.

“How can I help you?” I asked, looking at my father sitting at his desk and going over some papers.

The usual expression of delight that was on his face whenever he saw me suddenly gave way to a much more serious one.

I knew it! I’m gonna get scolded.

“It’s about you and Prince Jeord,” he began.

“The prince?”

The only problematic thing that happened involving Jeord lately was that he came with me to the orphanage, so I thought that this was about that.

“You two have been engaged for nearly ten years now. Since you have already graduated from the academy, many of our relatives insist that it is high time that you be wed to the prince.”

“W-Wed?!” I parroted back at him, surprised.

I knew that marrying right after graduation was the norm for many nobles, but neither my friends nor Jeord’s older brothers were married, so I had assumed that I’d still have a lot of time before having to deal with that issue.

“But the prince’s older brothers are still only engaged, is that not so?” I asked, and father nodded at me.

“Exactly. And that is precisely why being the first to be officially married would give Jeord a great advantage in becoming the next king.”

That makes sense. It’s probably easier to become king if you aren’t single.

“But,” I objected, “as mother is always saying, I am unfit to be a princess, let alone a queen, and I am inclined to agree with her.”

Being a duke’s daughter was already difficult, and if I somehow managed to barely scrape by, it was all thanks to the help of my brother Keith. How could I ever make it as an even nobler noble?

“I believe that you are fit to be a princess and indeed even a queen, Katarina,” father replied, looking me straight in the eye.

“Are you sure?!” I asked, convinced that his unconditional love for his daughter must be compromising his judgment.

He chuckled as if he knew exactly what I was thinking, and responded, “I know very well how much you struggle with etiquette and that you are not the most elegant of ladies. That being said, your mishaps are never catastrophic, and you are very good with people. You are good at understanding them and you are liked by many. If you put your heart to it, you could become a wonderful queen.”

I still thought that he was biased, but the way he looked at me made me believe that maybe he wasn’t wrong after all.

“So, do you also believe that I should marry as soon as possible?” I asked him.

So far, since he had never pressured me into marriage, I had assumed that this wasn’t a problem for him.

“Not really. I feel no need to strengthen our family’s connection with the king’s, so I believe that the choice should be yours.”

“R-Really? But then why did you bring this up in the first place?”

“I wanted you to know that many of our relatives are talking about these things, and so they may try to discuss them with you when you meet during balls and other such gatherings.”

“Oh...” I sighed, relieved. The situation wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be.

What surprised me though was how father said that he didn’t need to strengthen our family’s connection with the king. He never acted like an especially ambitious man, but hearing it outright like that was still surprising.

“However, I remember how happy you were when my engagement with the prince was decided. Was that not because of how much it would strengthen our bonds with the royal family?”

“Hahaha! You both ask me the same questions.”

“Huh?”

“No, it’s nothing. The reason I was so happy is that you, back then, were very fond of the prince. What father doesn’t rejoice for his daughter’s happiness?”

“Father...”

He really only thinks of his daughter... I wonder what will happen to this family...

“But I can see that right now you don’t want to marry the prince, which is why I said that I leave the choice to you.”

Back when I was a kid, I’d fallen in love at first sight with Jeord...but things were different now, and father had noticed.

“I want you to marry someone you truly love, Katarina, like I did with Millidiana.”

“Like you and mother...?”

During my childhood, my parents had been acting coldly toward each other because of a mutual misunderstanding. However, after the memories of my past life came back, the misunderstanding was cleared up and they started being so affectionate that it made things awkward for their children.

“Yes. Of course, if possible, I wish for you and your husband to avoid going through any stupid misunderstandings, like we did, and to communicate with each other effectively to live a happy married life.”

It was easy to tell from his words how harsh that misunderstanding had been. I was very glad that the issue had been resolved.

“Now you see why I want you to take your time and think about your own feelings so you can avoid issues like those. But since you have been taking more time than I expected, I just want to offer you some advice.”

So that’s why he never insisted I marry early. Father was thinking about what’s best for me... Thanks, father.

“I want you to marry someone you love. But you are an adult now, and so are the people around you. If it takes you too long to realize that you love someone, that someone may already be married to another person by the time you have made up your mind. Should that happen, you would not be able to do anything about it anymore. Take the prince, for example. Suppose that, after a long period of introspection, you realize that you are indeed in love with him. But if that time of reflection comes at the cost of postponing your marriage again and again, the engagement may be canceled and he may find another fiancée. He is royalty, after all.”

“Yes...”

“I believe in your ability to judge people, Katarina. When you come to me with someone, telling me that you want to marry that person, I will not object—whomever that is. You will always have my blessing. Now, I know that work at the Ministry is keeping you busy, but just remember that those you have feelings for may not wait around for you.”

The facts he had laid out hit me pretty hard, and I still couldn’t think clearly when I left his room.

I have to find someone I love and tell them before I lose them... I didn’t want to think about that. Just thinking about loving someone, for some reason, gave me the chills. I knew how important that was, but I really couldn’t bring myself to think about that whole issue.

I’ll do it someday...

I’d let myself keep so busy with work that a convenient someday had never come, and now father had to tell me these things because I still hadn’t given them proper thought. I imagined he was very disappointed about this. I had to think about my feelings, but also about surviving the game’s bad ends... Too much stuff.

So much stuff that it made me sleepy. Next thing I knew, it was morning and I was just waking up. Of course, I hadn’t managed to think about either of the two issues at hand. Now even I was disappointed in myself.

My wand, by the way, had disappeared back into its darkness-realm home. It looked scary, but maybe deep down it was a good...boy?

Since I had work on that day, Anne got me out of bed by stripping away all the covers as usual.

“It is morning, Miss. Please wake up.”

“Urgh...” I replied, still half-asleep.

She helped me get ready to leave, then I ate breakfast and rode on the carriage, where I slept once again on the way to the Ministry. After reaching my workplace and being forcefully awakened, I walked to my department’s office.

“Good morning,” I announced, opening the door to the Magical Tool Laboratory. Sora was already there, along with Raphael, our department’s vice-director and the busiest person in the department—if not in the whole Ministry!

It was normal for Sora to be there early, as he had joined the department’s ranks at the same time as me, and we newcomers were supposed to clean the office before work started, but that didn’t explain why Raphael was already there too.

I looked at him, confused, and he explained that, “I had to come in early because there’s so much that I still need to do.”

“If you are busy, I could train by myself today,” I proposed, seeing how tired he looked.

I had been training under his supervision almost every day, as ordered by the higher-ups, but this was obviously taking a toll on him. I didn’t want him to overwork himself because of me.

“Don’t worry about that. Actually, I came in early so that I could finish before starting your lessons, so there really is no problem at all,” he replied. His tone was much more relaxed than the one he used when our superiors were around, but his words still left no room for objection.

While Raphael kept running his pen across documents at his desk, I started helping Sora out with cleaning. The office was cluttered, containing an assortment of random items including anything from dumbbells to cosmetics, but it wasn’t exactly dirty, so some reorganizing and cleaning were enough to put it into a presentable shape.

While sweeping the floor with a broom, I recalled the thought I’d had on the previous day, and I approached Sora with a question. “Say, Sora, would you know how to escape from a locked prison cell?”

“Huh? What’s this all of a sudden?” he asked back, clearly suspicious.

“It’s just that, er, you never know when that might come in handy, right?” That was the best that I could come up with on the fly. Judging by the tired look Sora gave me, my best hadn’t been very good.

“When’s breaking out of prison going to come in handy for a noble lady like yourself?”

When they put me in there for being a villainess in the game’s story! I wanted to say, but obviously I couldn’t... So I tried to come up with a better excuse. Yeah, when could it come in handy? Oh, right!

“Like, remember when I got caught during our last mission? I want to learn how to escape if something like that ever happens again,” I explained.

I was sure I’d come up with the perfect excuse, but Sora looked kind of troubled.

“That, yeah... That was all my fault. I’m sorry.”

“What? It wasn’t your fault at all! I got into all that trouble myself!”

It was I who had decided to run after Sora, ended up getting captured, and caused him to get captured as well. Surely, anybody would agree that it was my responsibility, but Sora shook his head.

“I shouldn’t have lost my cool back then. Don’t worry, I’ll make sure nothing like that ever happens to you again,” he promised.

I was grateful for those kind words of course...but I really wanted to know how to escape from a prison cell.

“Thank you, but, see...if you could tell me how to actually break out...”

“I told you you don’t need to worry,” he replied, confused by my insistence.

This won’t get me anywhere... I thought, but all of a sudden Raphael unexpectedly joined our conversation, looking at us as if we were completely hopeless.

“I think that Lady Katarina just wants to learn how to open locked doors, Sora.”

“Huh? But wouldn’t it be easier just not to get caught again in the first place?”

“That seems to be unrelated to her concerns. Maybe she read about lockpicking in a book and got interested in it. You know how curious she can be,” he replied wryly.

“Really...?” Sora asked me.

“Yes! I read about it in a book!” I affirmed, grateful for Raphael’s help.

“I guess you have always been curious after all...” Sora murmured as the look of doubt dissipated from his face.

“So, do you know anything about lockpicking?” I asked again.

“If it’s a simple lock, you can usually pick it with a bent piece of metal, but there are all kinds of locks out there. For the most complicated ones, your best bet would be getting a mold of the actual key,” he explained, raising his hand to his chin as if he was trying to remember. He was probably speaking from experience based on some old job of his.

Unfortunately, I guessed that the prisons in Sorcié didn’t settle for the simple kind of locks.

“And how would you go about getting a mold?”

“You need clay or something like that to take the shape of the key, and then you make a metal copy with the mold. That’s easier said than done though.”

Also, wouldn’t it be too late to do that once I’m already in prison?

“I see... Isn’t there a faster way? You know, something so easy that anyone could do it?”

“Of course not! What good would locks be if anyone could easily open them?” he replied incredulously.

He...has a point, I conceded, now sad that my plan wouldn’t work, when Raphael spoke again.

“If the problem is taking a mold of a key, maybe you could do that with Dark Magic.”

“Really?!” I asked, moving closer to Raphael’s desk, which seemed to amuse him.

“You can control darkness, and we know that you can materialize it as physical matter. I don’t know for certain, but it’s a possibility.”

“I want to try it! Please teach me!”

“We’ll look into that during today’s lesson then,” he assented.

“Yes! Thank you!” I replied with a smile.

“Listen,” Raphael then whispered to me, “I helped you out because you seemed very concerned about this lockpicking thing, but please don’t do anything dangerous. If you need help with anything, just ask me.”

His words sounded so final that I couldn’t tell him no, even if I wanted to. He was so smart that he had probably realized I was up to something.

“I will,” I assured him.

“It’s a promise, all right? If you don’t keep it, I’ll have to punish you,” he continued, smiling in an unusually creepy way.

I often forgot it, but Raphael, kind as he was, knew how to be tough too. That being said, I could tell that he was genuinely worried for me, so I knew that I had to keep my end of the bargain.

After a while, our other colleagues came into the office and started working, and Raphael and I walked into the room where we always had my Dark Magic lessons.

“We have already been over this, but it bears repeating: Dark Magic controls darkness,” he said, ready to teach me about lockpicking as soon as we were in the room.

“Yes,” I replied.

“The spell you are already practicing, the one that lets you summon a sphere of darkness, is a simple form of that. However, as with other types of magic, this spell doesn’t necessarily have to be a sphere. You can shape it however you want.”

Like he told me, I knew that Earth, Fire, and Water Magic spells could take on different shapes too. Not my spells though, since I wasn’t good enough.

“And you managed to materialize something out of darkness, didn’t you?” he asked.

“Yes, the skull wand.”

“Exactly, the, er, skull wand. This is why I think that you may be able to materialize other objects too. If you were able to shape darkness so as to fit a lock and then materialize it, you would have yourself a key. Let’s practice that.”

“Yes!”

I couldn’t shake off the feeling that he was tricking me into being interested in the lessons, but I couldn’t help agreeing anyway. To be completely honest, I was actually starting to get bored practicing the same old spell. My darkness sphere had grown from the size of a pea to that of, say, a tangerine, but it wasn’t getting any better than that. Maybe Raphael had realized that I needed something new and refreshing to stay motivated. He could always read people like that.

“Now, try producing some darkness.”

“Okay.” I materialized my skull wand and made a tangerine-sized black glob appear in front of me. This was the point where normally I would try to make the darkness larger, but today I was to try to change its shape instead.

Become a key! Become a key! I shouted in my mind, and the sphere suddenly got squished into a key shape. Sort of. First try! Yay! Go me!

“That’s amazing! You managed to do it on your first try!”

“Hehehe!” I was more than happy to hear Raphael’s compliments.

Maybe I do have some talent. Check me out, I’m gonna become the best Wielder of Darkness there ever was!

Just as I was thinking of an even better key shape, someone knocked on the door. Raphael looked me in the eye, and I understood what he wanted me to do, so I made the wand and the key disappear back into darkness. These lessons, as with most things that concerned Dark Magic, were to be kept secret.

However, when we heard the voice of the person who had knocked, we realized that there had been no need for secrecy to begin with. “It’s me, Larna!”

It was our magic-loving, work-avoiding, very talented but slightly problematic department director. She was very curious about my progress with Dark Magic, but since Raphael, the most hard-working person in the department, was busy with me, she had to make up for that by actually doing her job. She had been so busy, in fact, that this was the first time she had managed to walk in on us before the lesson ended, and I had to wonder whether she was here because of a problem of some kind.

“Please come in,” Raphael said, and a very gloomy-looking Larna walked in. My guess about there being a problem seemed to have been right.

“Is anything the matter?” he asked her.

“It’s a summons,” she replied.

“From...your superiors?” he guessed. Larna often skipped out on her work to pursue her personal magic interests, which would explain being summoned by her superiors.

“No. From the castle. From His Majesty, to be exact.”

Raphael and I exchanged a worried look. Just what has she done?!

“Did you get into trouble?” Raphael had naturally also assumed that she had been up to no good.

“Me? No. The summons isn’t for me. It’s for Lady Katarina here.”

“M-Me?!”

Why would the king summon me?! What did I do?!

“It’s about the Dark Covenant,” Larna continued. “Maria was also called, and you’re supposed to bring the books with you when you go to the castle.”

“Oh... So it’s about that,” I muttered, relieved that I wasn’t in trouble.

After coming into possession of the Dark Covenant by sheer coincidence, I was told to decipher it, because its contents were apparently very important. Maria was also deciphering a book, except hers was the Light Covenant.

“Why do you look so distressed then?” I asked Larna. After all, she wasn’t the one being summoned and we also knew the reason why the king had reached out.

“Research on Dark Magic is strictly regulated, and we have to report to the royal family about everything we do concerning it,” she explained. “So far, they haven’t really seemed to care about our experiments, but if they want you to go to the castle, that could mean that they want us to stop researching Dark Magic altogether! They could tell us to stop, now that we’re this close to uncovering new kinds of magic never seen before!”

Oh, so it’s all just about her personal interest in it. This doesn’t concern me one bit, I thought, but what she had just said was probably true. The royal family were supposed to be the only ones who knew about Dark Magic, but we had found other people who could use it, such as Raphael and that mysterious woman, Sarah.

Maybe they’ll take the covenant from me and I won’t have to work on deciphering it anymore! That’d be good... But I still want to learn spells to blind my opponents during a getaway, or to create a key to escape from prison, and since Pochi is a Dark Familiar, they would probably also forbid me from letting him out of my shadow. How can I deal with this?

Larna, still looking gloomy, informed me that I was supposed to go to the castle on that very day in the afternoon, so I didn’t even have time to think about it, and I felt nervous about how sudden this all was. I was also supposed to keep the summons a secret, probably because this all involved Dark Magic.

Thankfully this wasn’t a particularly busy day at the department, so I could just say that I had to go because Prince Jeord had invited me to the castle. My lesson with Raphael was therefore cut short and, alongside Maria, I prepared to leave the Ministry.

Raphael noticed how worried I looked, and he saw me off with a kind smile that seemed to tell me that everything would be fine.

As I rode the carriage that was taking me to the castle, my anxiousness, thanks to Raphael’s smile, subsided, but then I started getting nervous for a different reason. After all, it would be my first time properly speaking with the king. We had greeted each other during balls and the like, but all I had been doing then was mostly standing by Jeord’s side and smiling.

I didn’t know much about the kings of other countries, but I’d heard that ours was always busy. The queen was apparently also just as involved in diplomacy, as were their four sons, but even with all this help the king still had so much work to do that getting to see him was extremely difficult. How could I not get nervous being summoned by someone like that, even if it wasn’t a public audience?

I sighed and looked in front of me, where Maria was sitting with a dreadful look on her face. “Are you okay, Maria?”

“I am rather nervous about meeting His Majesty...” Her voice was down to a whisper.

I realized something that should have been obvious right from the start: if a noble lady like me was nervous about meeting the king, whose son I was even engaged to, a commoner like Maria was probably just as nervous—scratch that, she probably was much more nervous.

Maria wielded the rare Light Magic, she worked in the most prestigious department of the Magical Ministry, and in general was extremely talented...but she still was a girl my age, and she experienced fear and anxiety just as I did.

I took her hands into mine. They were cold and shaking.

“I know, right? Me too,” I told her, and she looked at me, surprised.

“You are nervous too?”

“Yes, of course. We’ve been summoned by the most important person in the whole kingdom after all,” I continued, deliberately exaggerating the gravity of the situation, and Maria’s face showed the hint of a smile.

“I guess that is true.” She giggled. Her hands had stopped shaking, and I could feel that some warmth had flowed back into them. This, in turn, made me feel less worried about the whole thing.

The carriage kept moving, and by the point that I’d started saying things like, “Just imagine His Majesty as a potato. Imagine speaking to a big potato,” which was...possibly treason, we reached the castle.

I thought that Jeord would be there waiting for us, since he was my cover for leaving the Ministry early, but I couldn’t see the prince anywhere. Instead we were met by a servant who showed us into a drawing room, where we were told to wait. It was an average, not particularly big room—any noble could actually ask to use it, as long as they had been granted access to the castle.

I expected that we would be called for when the king was ready to receive us, but I suddenly realized I had an urgent problem to attend to: I needed to go to the toilet. In hindsight, eating a very hefty lunch to pump me up for the summons hadn’t been the best idea. I informed Maria of my predicament and sprinted out of the drawing room. I knew where the closest toilet was, so I reached it in time, without any accidents.

I was ready to go back to the drawing room when... Suddenly, Pochi jumped out of my shadow and started running. I ran after him, leaving the building I was in and reaching a place I’d already been to before—the entrance to the forbidden area where, as far as I knew, Jeord’s uncle had shut himself in after the dispute for the throne.

For some reason, this was the third time that Pochi had led me to this place. Maybe he liked it because it was always dark, even during the day. This time he had brought me even closer to the building where the king’s brother allegedly lived. Since access to the whole area was forbidden, I started getting worried.

“Come on, Pochi, get back into my shadow!” I ordered. He gave me a displeased look, but the serious face I was making eventually convinced him to obey.

Just as I started heading back to where I was actually supposed to be, a window right next to me opened with a click. Inside, a young man with golden hair and black eyes was standing by himself. Being surrounded by handsome friends all my life had granted me a certain immunity to attractive people, but this particular young man was so impressive in his beauty that I couldn’t help but stare at him. I stared for so long, in fact, that he noticed me.

His black eyes looked into mine, and he furrowed his brow.

“Why are you here?” he asked in a terribly cold voice. Between that and the intensity of his stare, I felt a chill run down my spine. He was probably mad because I had stepped inside a forbidden area.

“S-Sorry, I got lost and ended up here. I’ll leave immediately!” I obviously couldn’t tell him about Pochi.

“Yes, please do that and leave my sight already, Katarina Claes, you villainess,” he replied.

I was so shocked I couldn’t move even a step. “You know about me? And what do you mean ‘villainess’?”

This was probably the shut-in prince I had heard about, but why would he know about me, and more importantly, why would he call me a villainess?

“You’re quite famous,” he smirked, “for being a villainess who plays with the hearts of princes.”

“I’m not playing with anybody’s heart!” I could get behind it when people told me that I wasn’t a good fit for Jeord, but I certainly wasn’t playing with his heart.

“You continuously ignore his romantic advances, hurt him by doing so, and you don’t even realize it? You truly are despicable,” he laughed.

“B-But I...”

I didn’t know how to respond. Truth to be told, I still hadn’t given an answer to Jeord’s confession of love. Even father had told me to think about that.

“Now leave! At once!” the young man demanded, slamming the window shut.

I hadn’t even managed to learn this person’s name, but I clearly understood that he hated me. I was shocked by what he’d told me, but I had the summons to think about, so I tried to forget about it and hurried back to the drawing room.

“I got lost on my way to the toilet,” I explained to a worried Maria, laughing to diffuse any suspicion.

I felt that I shouldn’t talk about meeting that man, and I shoved the thought of him into the back of my mind so that I could think about it later.

After a while, someone knocked on the door. I expected it’d be a servant, telling us that the king was ready to see us. When my expectations were proved wrong, and I saw who was actually walking into the room, I immediately bowed down my head as deep as I could. Maria, seeing what I was doing, did the same. My etiquette training had finally come in handy.

“Raise your heads,” he said, and we nervously complied.

The silver-haired man standing in front of us, whose mere presence in the room was enough to be imposing, looked very similar to Jeord, and he even had the same blue eyes. This was natural, since he was Jeord’s father: Orwen Stuart, King of Sorcié.

I couldn’t imagine that the king himself would come to see us—and in this unassuming drawing room, no less—instead of us having to go to him.

He started speaking in a low, calm voice. “Thank you for coming all the way here. I have wanted to speak with you for quite a while, and today a sudden change in plans gave me the time to do so. Please excuse the sudden nature of it all.”

“Not at all, Your Majesty. It is an honor,” I replied with a curtsy.

His eyes widened slightly as he replied.

“I privately summoned you as Orwen Stuart, not as the king. There is no need for such formalities. Feel free to speak to me as you would to my sons.”

This explained why he wasn’t seeing us in the throne room. If he’d been talking to us in his capacity as king, he wouldn’t have been here with just a few servants by his side.

However, even if he said that we didn’t need to be formal, I couldn’t be as casual with a king as I was with Jeord and Alan. This also made me think that maybe I was a bit too casual with those two as well. We’d been friends for so long that I’d almost forgotten that they were still princes.

The king then told us to sit down, and, after we did, he sat down himself.

“Now, let us start. I would like to see your covenants.”

I looked at the servants in the room. The covenants were supposed to be secret to all but a handful of people, so I was surprised that he would talk about them in front of this audience.

Realizing my concern, he spoke again. “Worry not. These are all trusted individuals who are very close to me. They already know about the covenants and about Dark Magic.”

The servants gave a small nod of agreement, and, knowing that I didn’t have to worry about keeping secrets anymore, I opened my bag to take out the Dark Covenant, which I put on the table in front of me. Maria did the same with her Light Covenant.

“So this is what they look like,” the king said, first taking the Light Covenant into his hands, looking at it from all angles and then opening it and flipping through its pages.

The covenants were enchanted in such a way that only their owner could read them, and other people could only see a bunch of blank pages. The king didn’t seem in the least surprised about this—he probably already knew about it. After flipping through the whole book, he put it back on the table and started looking at the Dark Covenant instead. I was positive that he was being more careful about how we took it in his hands than he had been with the Light one.

I guess something called the “Dark Covenant” is self-evidently scary...

He flipped through this book too, and then put it back on the table.

“Just as I was told, I cannot see anything on the covenants’ pages.” This confirmed that he already knew about how they worked.

He then asked me and Maria several questions about how we had found the covenants, how far we were in deciphering them, and so on.

“Very well. That is enough about the covenants,” he declared after we had given him enough answers.

I was surprised—let down, almost—by how little time we had spent discussing the books.

“Now we shall discuss the reason why I summoned you two here.”

What? Weren’t the covenants the reason?! Did he really want to scold me for something I did?! I thought, worried, but what the king said next surprised me even more.

“We need to talk about Dark Magic.”

Dark Magic...?

“You have both had your share of trouble because of Dark Magic. Especially you, I understand.” He looked right at me as he spoke.

He was technically right, but that was probably just because I was the game’s villainess.

“Knowledge of this forbidden magic was supposed to be an exclusive prerogative of the royal family, but this is no longer the case. It is best that you two know why this is,” he continued with a distressed look on his face.

Indeed, all we knew right now was that the family of Marquis Dieke had gotten their hands on Dark Magic, which then spread to other people including that Sarah woman.

“I assume that you already know about how my predecessor suddenly died before settling on an heir, and how this led to severe infighting among the royal family,” the king slowly started explaining.

“Yes,” I replied. I’d known about that for a while, and I’d even heard from Jeord that some people had died and others had been exiled in the fight for the crown. However, hearing it straight from the current king made it all the more shocking.

“You may also know that some lost their lives during this time. That was the result of murders within the royal family,” he continued without batting an eye despite the terrifying things he was saying. “Of course, the secret of these heinous killings was mostly kept within the castle walls. One of the killers poisoned his stepbrother, laughing at the sight of his painful death. Another threw his stepbrother off a tower, pretending it was an accident. Those were days of blood and madness. Men, overtaken by murderous rage, killed the brothers they once loved.”

The fight for the crown makes people kill each other? It’s way worse than I thought...

“Amid that chaos, it is now impossible to say who first resorted to the use of Dark Magic to gain an advantage. What we know is that the secret leaked to other nobles, eventually reaching the Dieke family.” He then stood up from his seat. “The responsibility lies with us, the royal family. It was our foolishness that let Dark Magic spread. I apologize for all the trouble that this has caused you,” he said, lowering his head toward us.

I was too shocked by all that was going on to even move at all, but Maria immediately stood up and started talking.

“You deserve no blame and owe no apology, Your Majesty,” she stated.

His Majesty, hearing this, looked at Maria, and a faint smile appeared on his face.

Personally, I also agreed with Maria. If anything, we should have thanked the king for having stopped that whole fight.

“Still, as I was born in this royal family, it is my duty to offer you this apology, and I beg you to accept it.”

The thought of a responsibility given to you by birth really resonated with me. As a noble lady, I’d had to hear a lot about that.

“I understand,” I responded, standing up, “and we accept your apology. Please raise your head now, Your Majesty.”

Maria also nodded, and the king raised his head and sat down again.

“Thank you. My wish is to capture those who wield Dark Magic, so that we may prevent the abuse of this dreadful tool. Will you lend me your help when I need it?”

Being the king, he could have just ordered us to lend him our help, and we would have obliged. But instead, he had asked us—I appreciated that.

“Of course. Whatever I may be able to help with,” I replied, looking him in the eye.

“Thank you.” For the first time, his face didn’t show any concern. He was simply smiling.

So, the reason he had summoned us was actually to apologize and ask for our help. Once he had done those two things, he quickly left, taking his servants with him. He really was as busy as they said.

“That was something, huh?” I told Maria as soon as we were alone.

“Most definitely, yes,” she agreed. We then looked at each other and shared a tired laugh.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t talk to anyone else about it, but my meeting with the king had been very surprising. He was a very easy person to talk to, and all my nervousness had proven unnecessary.

Suddenly, we heard another knock on the door. We thought that a servant had come to inform us that our carriage was ready to leave, but we were in for another surprise.

“Jeord and Alan!” I cried, seeing the familiar faces at the door. I had thought we wouldn’t be able to see the two princes today.

“Thank you for coming to the castle,” Jeord greeted us. His smile didn’t look as confident as usual—it almost looked painful. Alan also looked as if he was in pain...

Do they have a stomachache? I asked myself, but my question was quickly answered when Jeord’s smile disappeared entirely, replaced by a serious stare.

“We heard that the king wanted to talk to you about the details of the succession fight today.”

So they know about all that happened too... And their father told them about what we were going to discuss today.

“We really want to apologize too as members of the royal family. You have gone through so much trouble because of Dark Magic.” Jeord bowed low.

“We’re sorry,” Alan added, bowing as well.

I couldn’t believe that they would apologize about something that happened so long ago that they couldn’t even remember it themselves. That, too, must have been the responsibility they had to shoulder as royals.

There’s only one thing I can say then...

“I accept your apology.”

“I do too,” Maria agreed.

“Thank you,” the princes responded in unison. They looked like proper members of the royal family, but in a different way than they usually did.

“So, what did you make of it?” Jeord asked, once again looking very concerned.

I wasn’t sure of what he meant, but thankfully Alan followed up with an explanation.

“You heard the story from our father. It was dreadful, right? So, do you look down on us now, too?” he asked. He looked to be genuinely in pain as he spoke.

Oh, that’s why they looked so concerned... They’re worried that we’ll think less of them because of what their relatives did. I remember being asked the same thing after hearing about their granddad, the previous king...but my answer stays the same.

“Just as I said when I heard about your grandfather, you weren’t the ones to do those heinous things. I know both of you well, and my opinion of you won’t change just because of what I heard today,” I answered while looking straight at them.

The people I heard about today were some old royals I don’t even know. The two people in front of me are my friends that I’ve known for a long time. I’d never even try to compare them.

“I agree with Lady Katarina. The facts we learned today will not change the way we think of you,” Maria joined in.

Jeord and Alan looked extremely relieved.

“Thank you, both of you.” Jeord spoke with a real, genuine smile.

“Thanks...” Alan followed somewhat shyly.

Now they both looked like my friends again.

They had also come there to tell us that our carriage was indeed ready, and they walked us all the way there. Jeord escorted me, and his brother escorted Maria.

I looked at Alan, walking in front of me and Jeord, and wondered how things were going between him and Mary. According to the game’s plot, if he was chosen as the character to pursue, he was supposed to fall in love with Maria while at the academy, but that never happened. If he wasn’t, he ended up happily married to Mary...but those two didn’t seem to be particularly in love with each other.

Maybe he’ll fall in love with Maria during the events of FL2...

“Katarina,” Jeord asked me out of the blue, “did you not forget your bag in the drawing room?”

Much to my dismay and surprise, he was right. I had forgotten my very important bag which contained the very important Dark Covenant.

“It would seem so...” I replied sadly, and Alan gave me a look that felt like a thousand exasperated sighs compressed together.

I was released from all that tension and I just kind of...forgot...

“Let’s go to retrieve it then. Wait for us at the carriage, Alan, Maria,” Jeord said, and we went back to the drawing room.

I said that I would go by myself, since forgetting the bag was entirely my fault, but Jeord insisted on escorting me and walked alongside me all the way back there with a smile. Thankfully, my bag was still where I’d left it, and the Dark Covenant was still inside it.

“It’s here! Thank you for coming with me,” I spoke, relieved.

“Oh, don’t mention it. It was on purpose, after all,” he replied.

Huh? On purpose...?

The smile on Jeord’s face now seemed to hide some deeper meaning.

“I had noticed that you had forgotten your bag, but I said nothing so that I could spend a little time alone with you,” he explained.

Whoa! What a mastermind! I thought, with my jaw literally open from the surprise.

“And also,” he continued with a giggle, “thank you for your words earlier. I expected that you would be understanding even after hearing those dreadful tales, but the way you spoke made me truly happy.”

He looked happy too—just a normal smile with no dark undertones.

Oh, so he just wanted to thank me for that?

“I’m afraid I fell in even deeper love with you,” he added before swiftly moving dangerously close to me and grasping my hips.

“Gah?!” was the only sound I managed to make. Jeord didn’t seem to be bothered by it, and kept on staring at me with his sparkly, princely smile.

“You are the best fiancée a man could wish for. I want to marry you as soon as possible.”

I could feel my face getting warmer and warmer...and then I remembered what my father had told me not long ago.

I have to think about my own feelings... But...

“Prince Jeord, I... Well...” I started speaking, grasping for words.

“Are you scared?”

“What?” I asked back, confused. The aforementioned sparkly smile had disappeared from Jeord’s face, and now he looked somewhat melancholic.

“When I approach you like this, does it scare you? The way you draw back from me... It took me a while to realize, but is it fear that moves you so? It is, isn’t it?”

I didn’t know what to say. Fear... That word made something move deep inside my heart.

Seeing my reaction—or rather, lack thereof, Jeord spoke again.

“It seems that I was right. I was scaring you... I’m sorry for not realizing this sooner.” He looked like he was on the verge of tears.

The words of the young man I’d met earlier that day echoed through my head. I was hurting Jeord. I needed to do something. I mustered up my courage and tried to explain what I’d kept hidden inside my heart for so long.

“No, I’m not scared. Well, I am...but not of you. I’m...scared of falling in love.”

It was the first time I’d ever revealed this to anyone, and Jeord looked shocked by the revelation.

No wonder he’s shocked. It probably doesn’t make sense to him, but it’s the truth.

When I realized that I had reincarnated into Katarina Claes, I also knew that the reason behind her doom was love. She fell in love with Jeord, and the jealousy of seeing him love another girl—the protagonist, that is—led her to catastrophic results.

I knew that Katarina Claes couldn’t fall in love. I knew that I couldn’t fall in love. If I did, I risked going mad because of it, and that would be the end for me. Even before I understood these feelings, they were subconsciously keeping me from loving anyway. I could help others find love, but I couldn’t do the same thing myself. I wasn’t allowed to.

Despite all this, however, Jeord had confessed his love to me. I’d had feelings for him since before regaining the memories of my past life, but the fear of doom kept me from reciprocating. That was why I had tried to forget about Jeord’s confession, eventually succeeding.

I was scared of falling in love, and, as a result, I ended up hurting Jeord. It was just as that man had told me: I was despicable. I had run away for long enough, and now it was time to be honest with Jeord. Seeing him so saddened was what gave me the resolve to speak from the heart.

“I have always worried that I would be doomed if I ever fell in love,” I admitted. Jeord looked surprised, but he let me go on. “I still am. That is why I kept dodging your feelings. I’m really sorry.”

Of course, I couldn’t talk about Fortune Lover, but my abstract explanation seemed to be good enough for Jeord.

“Thank you for being open with me. I am very relieved to know that you were not simply scared of me,” he told me with a smile. “However, I wish there was a way to relieve you of this fear. Having you scared of romance would make things quite difficult.”

He was right. Despite all that happened, even despite all that my father had told me, I ended up giving in to fear. The thought that love would destroy me took precedence over everything else. But now that Jeord had helped me realize why I couldn’t keep being so weak, I thought that I wanted to change.

“I’ve kept my eyes shut because of fear all this time, but I won’t do so anymore. I want to take my feelings in my own hands...and yours too.”

Jeord’s face as he listened to me was now so happy that I suddenly felt embarrassed. Even if I could have worked a bit more on the delivery, at least I’d finally thought and spoken about my feelings, like father had encouraged me to do.

That being said, there was still a problem. Doom was still there, waiting for me, and it was closer than ever. Being honest about my feelings would do me no good if I were dead, and I was the type of person who could only concentrate on one thing at a time.

“I-I’m sorry if this sounds like I’m taking back what I just said, but I can’t accept your feelings right now. I’m currently struggling with an urgent problem, you see, and until I’m done with that I don’t really have, you know...the mental capacity...”

I felt a bit bad about letting Jeord down while he looked so happy, but he just grinned, unsurprised.

“You have looked very concerned since you started working at the Magical Ministry. Don’t worry. I will wait. I have waited long enough that a little more time will hardly make a difference. But if you ever need some support, please do rely on me,” he declared, much to my relief.

I was also honestly surprised that he’d noticed how concerned I’d been since starting my job at the Ministry. He’d even noticed how frightened I was, even though he had guessed the wrong reason for it. Jeord was always looking out for me, and he always noticed when something was wrong.

We had known each other since I was eight years old, and he was always there when I needed him. I didn’t understand my feelings completely yet, and I was still fearful and bewildered. But I knew that Jeord was very important to me. As embarrassing as it was, I wanted to tell him about how I really felt. Once again, I gathered my courage and started speaking.

“Love still leaves me confused, and a bit scared, but when you said that you loved me, that made me very, very happy. I could only be happy hearing something like that coming from a person as wonderful as you are.”

Jeord was a handsome, talented, and kind prince. How could I not be happy? But I had been so scared that I had tried to forget that happiness for the longest time.

At this point, the piled-up embarrassment from the whole conversation got to me, and I couldn’t stand it anymore. I ran away from the drawing room, leaving Jeord behind.

I really need to do something about my philophobia...and possibly about the awkwardness that comes with it too.

My face felt like it was burning, and I imagined it was bright red. Thankfully, since I’d sprinted all the way to the carriage, Maria and Alan thought that I was blushing because of the exertion.

When Alan asked where his brother had gone, I lied and told him that he had to leave because of an urgent matter. After all that I’d told Jeord that day, just being in the same room as him would kill me from sheer embarrassment.

Maria and I rode on the carriage and left the castle to go back to the Ministry.

Jeord’s words had helped me realize my true feelings...but there was one more person that I had to relay them to.

Will I manage to do it? Any more awkwardness today and I think I’m going to pass out...

★★★★★★

My father, Orwen Stuart, King of Sorcié, summoned me.

He told me that he would be speaking with my fiancée, Katarina Claes, and the Wielder of Light, Maria Campbell, about the struggle for the crown and how this led to the spread of Dark Magic.

I myself had only learned of these facts recently, as they had happened when I was still too young to have any memories of them. I remember being surprised, ashamed on behalf of the whole royal family, and sorry toward Katarina.

I have always respected my father’s efforts to be a fair ruler, and, as a prince, I believed that what he was going to do was worthy of praise. As a man, however, the matter was not quite as straightforward. My fear was that upon learning the shameful past of my relatives, Katarina would start thinking less of me.

Previously, I had told her that people had died as a result of royal infighting. I feared that would be enough to warrant her distrust, but instead she replied that, no matter how related we were, she knew that the previous king and I were different people, and that the actions of the former would not inform her opinion on the latter.

Her words had made me happy upon hearing them and hopeful now—hopeful that she would react in the same way after listening to father’s recounting.

But would she? That story was one covered in blood. I would certainly start seeing someone in a different light, if only slightly so, after learning that their relatives had committed such horrible deeds. This thought, in turn, made me wince.

While I waited for my father to end his conversation with the two girls, time seemed to slow down to a painful extent. As soon as we saw him leave the room, my brother Alan and I quickly made our way toward Katarina and Maria.

Never before in my life had I been so nervous doing something so simple as knocking on a door. When Katarina’s familiar voice replied, we walked inside.

The girls were talking to each other, and, when they eventually noticed that it was us who had entered the room, they seemed surprised.

I smiled as I always did and greeted them, ready to fulfill my duty as a royal. I had to apologize, like my father had already done, for the results of my relatives’ fight for succession. Alan, who was of the same mind on this issue, lowered his head alongside mine.

Katarina quickly accepted our apology, and I found myself enamored with the resolve she was showing despite the circumstances. My brother and I thanked her for her kindness, and then I asked her about what I had been the most concerned about.

“So, what did you make of it?”

After I spoke, Alan did too.

“You heard the story from our father. It was dreadful, right? So, do you look down on us too now?”

Silence fell onto the room, and I could not bring myself to look Katarina in the face.

She told us that her opinion of us would never change because of the actions of somebody else. Her eyes showed no hint of lying, nor, as I had worried, hate toward us. Katarina really was the kind of woman I believed her to be.

Maria followed, agreeing with my fiancée and furthering my relief. We thanked both of them and walked them to the carriage that was to take them home.

I prepared to escort Katarina for the first time in a while, and I noticed that she had forgotten her bag. I could have taken it for her, but I realized that this could give me an opportunity to be alone with her.

My plan worked out, and when she thanked me for coming back all the way with her to retrieve her forgotten bag, I revealed that I had kept quiet about it on purpose. She seemed very surprised—a girl as innocent as her would probably never think of doing something like that. Her confused expression as she heard of my plan was lovely as well.

I thanked her again for accepting our apology, and her confusion seemed to disappear. She probably thought that I had wanted to be alone with her to simply state my gratitude again. That was one misunderstanding that I could not accept, so I moved closer to her, grabbing her sides. I told her that I wanted to marry her as soon as possible, and her face flushed. My real intentions had gotten through to her, but, much to my dismay, she started awkwardly mumbling as if to find an excuse to get away from me.

The thought had been on my mind for a very long time, and I finally confronted her about it. I asked her whether she was scared of me. Since I had confessed my love to her, approaching her like this would always lead to similar reactions. At first, I was happy that she had finally started seeing the advances I made toward her as such, but lately I had started to notice the look of fear that appeared on her face every single time.

I had tried to ignore that reality for a long time, but it was time to confirm my apprehensions. If she were scared of me, I would have to accept her and her fears all the same, just as she had accepted me after hearing the truth about the history of my family. With that said, her answer could very well be devastating for me.

Even before she answered, her silence informed me that my question had hit the mark. As I realized this, my heart burnt with pain. I must have looked pitiful, almost crying, as I apologized for being so slow to notice her fear.

But then she spoke again. She told me that she wasn’t scared of me. She was scared of love itself.

It was now my turn to be surprised. Katarina rarely ever showed any fear to begin with, and she often enjoyed reading romance novels. For the longest time, I had believed that she was simply too slow to understand and too shy to act when it came to love, much like her adoptive brother.

However, she kept talking. This time, she told me that she feared that falling in love could lead her to her doom. I did not understand how those two things could ever possibly be related, but she looked extremely serious, and I kept listening. She explained her fears to me, and while I was still very confused about her motivations, I was relieved to hear that she was not scared of me.

The issue that remained was how to fix this fear of hers, as it was effectively keeping me from romancing her. Just as I stated this, her response made me so happy that I could not keep a straight face. She told me that she wanted to take her feelings—as well as mine—in her own hands.

Despite being engaged to each other, my love for Katarina had been unrequited for a very long time. At first she did not understand my feelings, and after I clearly stated them for her, she seemed to forget about them. Nothing in the world could make me happier than if she was ready to accept them. It felt as if my love was going to be accepted for the first time, however slightly.

I was reveling in happiness, almost in awe, when Katarina told me something else—that she was now facing a personal hurdle that would temporarily keep her from focusing on romance. I remembered that she had seemed concerned about something since she had started her job at the Magical Ministry, just as she had when she had just joined the Academy of Magic. I knew that she was keeping some kind of secret from all of us, but I would not force her to speak about it if she did not want to. All that I cared about was always being ready to help her in any way I could.

The fact that she had spoken with me about this other concern of hers also made me happy, and I told her with a smile that I would gladly wait for her issues to be over. In response, she thanked me with a look of relief on her face. As for me, I was ready to wait longer. More importantly, what mattered to me was that Katarina had shared her true feelings with me. I could feel the warmth building up in my chest.

Then, all of a sudden, Katarina gave me another preoccupied look. Before I could even ask her what was wrong, she told me about how my confession to her had made her happy. As soon as she was done speaking, she sprinted out of the room, her face now bright red.

I was left there by myself, too shocked to move. Her words kept echoing in my head. I used to think that her reactions to me meant that she disliked me, or even that she feared me. I had assumed that to her, my confession of love had been a surprising thing but not a pleasant one.

“‘I could only be happy hearing something like that coming from a person as wonderful as you are...’” I repeated to myself, as if to make sure that I had not merely dreamed it.

I felt feverish, and I must have been so red in the face that one could see steam coming off it. I had loved her for so long. She was the special girl who had brought color into my boring gray life. Even after we grew into adults, this never changed. Thanks to her, I was able to experience emotions that I did not know I possessed.

On this day, I found out that too much happiness made me freeze in place.

★★★★★★

I had to insist that I was fine a few times to convince Maria that my red face wasn’t a problem, and by the time she had stopped worrying, our carriage had already reached the Ministry. The workday was also just about over.

Cyrus and Larna came to see us and asked about our summons, so we told them about how we’d shown the king the covenants and promised to help him. We didn’t tell them about the story of how Dark Magic spread though. Maria and I had decided that we would keep it a secret, even if it was possible that our two superiors already knew about it.

After talking for a short bit, it was time for everyone to leave and go home. I parted ways with Maria and headed toward the usual carriage for the Claes mansion. Sora walked me all the way there, as he always did—he claimed that it was just a meaningless habit for him.

While I was walking with my colleague, I thought back to Jeord and the conversation we’d had earlier. Just thinking about it was enough to make me blush again... I really needed to get used to romance at least a little bit.

Even in my past life, despite reaching high school, I’d never fallen in love with anyone. Maybe it would have happened eventually, but I died before that could happen. And now, in my new life, I’ve been subconsciously avoiding love out of fear, my only knowledge of it coming from romance novels.

In both lives, previous and current ones, none of the girls I was friends with seemed particularly interested in love either, so we never chatted about that sort of thing.

I must know someone who’s interested in that kind of thing...

I looked to my side and saw Sora, who had traveled through many countries enjoying the highs and lows of life. Surely, he’d had a relationship or two. Or ten.

“Say, Sora, how many girlfriends have you had so far?” I asked him.

“Huh? What’s this all of a sudden?” he replied, surprised by my sudden question.

Wait, we had pretty much this same conversation when I wanted to learn about escaping prison cells...

“I just wanted to, you know, learn more about romance. But pretty much none of my other friends have ever had girlfriends or boyfriends. What about you?”

“Go guess what’s going through her head this time...” he mumbled with a sigh, before replying to me, “I’ve had a few, yeah.”

“I knew it! Girls can’t look past a guy as attractive as you, huh!”

Sora fell silent for a moment. “Attractive?” he repeated to himself.

“And how did you end up being boyfriend and girlfriend? Was it, like, fate that brought you together?” I asked excitedly, thinking of how fateful all encounters were in the romance novels I read.

“Nothing like that,” he replied, kind of weirded out. “We’d just somehow end up dating and then break up when things stopped working out.”

This is the least romantic answer possible...

“What?! Are you serious?! Don’t you date because you love each other?! And isn’t breaking up something you do while crying and only because life has been so cruel in splitting you two apart?!”

“You really read too many romance novels. Real life doesn’t work that way,” he sighed, looking at me with pity.

That can’t be true. I know that romance novels exaggerate things a little bit, but those things do happen in real life...right? Why’s he looking at me like that?!

“B-But you do love each other, don’t you? And breaking up is still painful, isn’t it?”

“I just dated girls that I kind of liked, and then we’d naturally drift apart with no fuss,” he replied.

I was shocked by his definition of romance. I had thought that love and dating were sacred things that one had to put a lot of thought into.

“Well,” he then continued, seeing my disappointed reaction, “that could be just me though. Maybe some couples are just like the ones in your romance novels.”

Sora had always been living on the outskirts of society, so maybe his love life had been unusual as well.

“So, did that ever happen to you? Did you ever date a girl because you loved her?” I asked, and he started staring at me.

I was puzzling over whether that look was meant as a yes-stare or a no-stare, but before I could be certain, Sora sighed again.

“I never understood that kind of thing until recently,” he revealed.

“What kind of thing?”

“Love and such.”

So, does that mean that...Sora also has no experience with real romance? He’s just like Keith was originally supposed to be in the game then! He’s fooled around with a lot of girls, but he doesn’t know anything about true love!

“So we’re in the same boat. Neither of us knows anything about love.” I was happy to have someone to share my predicament with.

“Don’t you force people onto your boat. I said until recently. I understand it better now.”

If he understands it now...did he fall in love?! I thought he wasn’t that attracted to Maria, but I must’ve been wrong!

“When did you fall in love with Maria?! I didn’t notice at all!”

“Huh? What’s Campbell got to do with anything?” he asked, obviously confused.

But he’s a character from FL2... He’s supposed to fall in love with her...

“What?! It’s not her? Who is it then?” I inquired.

After staring at me silently for a second, he flicked my forehead with his finger.

“Ouch! What are you doing?!” I shouted. The pain in my forehead was enough to make me mad at him. Instead of addressing that, Sora looked away.

“What’s even the point in learning about romance?” he asked.

“I want to learn more so that I can experience it myself t—”

“You can’t get ready for romance just by learning about it from other people!”

“What? Really?”

“Let me give you some advice, since I have more experience than you. You can’t learn about romance, and you can’t learn about love. One day, you just fall in love and realize you can’t fight your own feelings, and that’s it.”

“That sounds so romantic!” I shrieked, impressed by Sora’s wonderful advice, and tried to jump toward him to express my deep respect with a hug...but he stopped me by pushing my head away.

Looking from between his fingers, I could see that he was blushing. Maybe he was embarrassed because he’d said something so emotional, just like what had happened to me with Jeord.

He then dragged me to the carriage and basically threw me into it.

On my way back home, I thought some more about Sora’s words about love, realizing that they sounded very true...and also very much like the lyrics to some generic pop love song from my previous world.

You can’t learn about love... But will I ever fall in love? I can’t even imagine that right now.

At least I had decided to face Jeord’s feelings for me, and I’d even told him about it. I also had to do the same with Keith. I knew that the more I waited, the more difficult it would be to bring it up, so I made up my mind to do it as soon as I reached home.

Just thinking about it is so embarrassing I can feel my face boiling... I have to do my best!

★★★★★★

As I, Sora Smith, walked back to the dormitory, I was fanning my head as hard as I could, hoping that it would cool down. As usual, it was her fault—that dense Katarina Claes.

She started asking me about romance and love out of the blue. She’d always been so shy (and dense) about this kind of thing that she wouldn’t even talk about love when speaking of romance novels, so her question surprised me so much that I just ended up replying honestly. To top it all off, I even started spouting nonsense about how you can’t learn about love and this and that. I wished I could disappear from the face of the earth.

I wasn’t always like this. I used to be able to breeze through life without getting attached to anything. It all changed when I met her. She just had a way of messing me up and forcing me to do things at her pace. I was scared that her dumb trust and naivety had also infected me.

If somebody had told me I’d find myself having feelings this strong for a girl, I wouldn’t have believed them. I had my fair share of experience with girls, and romance had been a fun game for me... But now everything was different. I got excited just because she called me attractive and my heart started racing when she stared into my eyes. I was acting like a kid who’d never slept with a woman before.

What’s happened to me? I asked myself, and the worst part was that, whatever had happened, I was enjoying it.

★★★★★★

My carriage eventually reached home. Normally, at this point I would only have to eat dinner and go to bed—lovely, easy tasks. This time, however, I had something else that I needed to get done.

I gathered my courage and entered the manor, starting to walk to my room when, in the middle of a hallway, I ran into Keith.

“Welcome back... Is anything the matter? You are making quite the weird face,” he greeted me, noticing how nervous I was.

“It’s nothing! Don’t worry! By the way, there’s something that I want to talk to you about. Can I come to your room after dinner?”

“Of course. You can come in anytime,” he immediately replied with a smile.

He probably thought that I wanted to vent to him about something, as I had previously done many a time. I was grateful for this misunderstanding, since I didn’t want to tell him what I wanted to talk about yet. That would make for one awkward dinner.

Having set that up, I went back to my room and prepared for my meal. I was so nervous that I couldn’t eat as much as usual, and this ended up worrying Keith even more... Maybe I shouldn’t have waited until after dinner after all.

After we were done eating, I went to Keith’s room.

“So, what did you want to talk about?” he asked. He looked ready to help me let off some steam, and I felt blessed to have such a good brother. He was always there to comfort me through hard times and to help me solve my problems.

If I think about it, I really owe a lot to him. Nah, I don’t even need to think about it.

Keith and Jeord were both incredibly talented, handsome, and kind men. I couldn’t get my head around why they would fall in love with me. I knew both of them well enough to tell that they wouldn’t confess their love just as a prank or joke, but this only made it more confusing.

Why me?!

I wasn’t trying to be self-deprecating or modest. I just thought that I was a pretty average girl. I didn’t have any particular talent and I wasn’t exceptionally beautiful. The only remarkable thing about me was the rank of my family, which I had in common with the Katarina from the game. Unlike her, however, I had a lot of wonderful, smart, kind, and beautiful female friends—first and foremost, Maria. Both Jeord and Keith had a lot of interactions with these friends of mine, but instead of falling in love with them, they somehow ended up choosing me.

Could it be that they’re so used to beautiful girls that they grew bored of them and wanted someone a bit plainer for variety’s sake? Or maybe they’re just into villainess faces? To each their own, I guess.

“Big Sister? Is anything wrong?” Keith worriedly asked me, bringing me out of my train of thought and back down to earth.

I can’t make him worry even more! I’m here to tell him about my feelings and such!

“Keith...” I began, mustering up all of my courage, “it’s about when you confessed to me.”

“You didn’t forget about that?!”

Seeing his surprise made me feel sorry for him. He thought I’d forgotten about it...and, well, I had. Until today. I had forced myself to forget about it. I took a deep breath and spoke.

“I didn’t forget it, but I pushed the memory back into a corner of my mind,” I continued.

“So my feelings were a nuisance,” Keith murmured, and his face grew sadder and more tense.

I’m hurting him again... That’s not what I want to do!

“No! I’ve never thought that for a second. It’s just that I’m scared of romance, and I was running away from it without even realizing it,” I explained, raising my voice almost to the point of shouting.

“Scared of romance?” he asked, his eyes wide open.

“Yes. I’ve always thought that falling in love would lead me to my doom. That’s why. I was scared, but I never realized it, and just kept avoiding romance altogether, trying to forget about things like your confession. I’m sorry I did this to you after you told me about how you felt.”

I lowered my head, and he started gently patting it.

“Thank you for telling me honestly. And I’m sorry for not realizing that you felt that way,” he said.

I looked up and saw that he was awkwardly smiling.

No... That’s not how I want to make him feel!

“No, wait! I didn’t realize this myself either. Not until now at least. But now that I do, I want to change that,” I declared, looking him in the eye, “I want to take my feelings, and yours too, in my own hands.”

“Big Sis...”

Now he was really smiling. I was relieved to see that, but I knew that even though I’d managed to bring up this very difficult topic, I still had something left to say.

“It’s just that right now I’m struggling with some very important stuff, so... I’ll focus on all this once I’m done with that,” I promised, and he started giggling.

“I understand. Thank you. And if you ever need some help with that ‘very important stuff’ of yours, let me know.”

“Of course. Thank you, Keith. You’re always such a huge help.”

He looked very, very happy. This was the Keith I knew. He was always by my side, smiling.

But there’s one last thing I still need to tell him...

“I’m still very confused and scared about love. But I was happy to hear that you love me. I could only be happy hearing something like that coming from a person as wonderful as you are,” I said for the second time in a day, feeling my face getting hot once again.

“That’s it. Good night!” I concluded, rushing out of Keith’s room before he even had time to reply.

I ran into my room, where my bright red face ended up making Anne worry for me.

“I’m fine, I was just sprinting through the hallways.”

“You know that you should not do that, or your mother will be angry at you again,” she calmly responded.

“You’re right... I’ll be more careful,” I replied, grateful that mother hadn’t seen me run.

I drank some water and waited for my face to cool off before going to bed. I didn’t know that just telling someone that you were happy about their confession could be so painfully embarrassing. I was obviously still a rookie when it came to romance. However, I didn’t want to see Keith and Jeord making those sad faces anymore.

That’s one more reason to fight the game’s doom! I can’t just go and disappear after I’ve told those things to those two. I’ll survive FL2 and I’ll face my feelings. I’m not going to run away anymore.

I needed to think about my plans regarding the game and the doom it threatened me with, but today I’d done and said things that I’d never done and said ever before. I was exhausted.

I fell asleep within seconds and had a beautiful dream where I saw Keith and Jeord smiling happily.

I’m going to do my best.

★★★★★★

When I heard that my sister Katarina had come back home, I left my room to greet her and see how she was doing. I found her in the hallway and noticed that she seemed to be worried about something. I asked her what was wrong, but she nervously replied that she was fine and that she wanted to talk to me after dinner. She often asked me to listen to her troubles, and I imagined that something had recently happened to preoccupy her.

“Of course. You can come in anytime,” I replied, making sure to smile.

Katarina wasn’t her usual self during dinner—whatever was on her mind must have been rather serious. I prepared myself to lend her a shoulder to cry on and possibly make her feel better.

After dinner, as promised, she visited my room. She was wearing a serious expression on her face, and she didn’t even notice the tea and sweet treats I had prepared for her. Knowing her, this last part was most concerning, and it showed just how distressed she was.

When I took a better look at her to assess her situation, I noticed that she was spacing out. Worried about her, I asked if she was okay, and she looked back at me as if she’d just woken up. She then revealed the topic that she had come here to discuss: my confession of love to her.

I was honestly surprised to know that she even remembered that at all. It happened as I had been kidnapped by a Wielder of Darkness and I was left in a barely conscious state. I had revealed my feelings to Katarina, making it clear beyond any doubt that I loved her.

However, something—be it her shyness, be it her dullness when it came to romance—made her forget about it.

“I didn’t forget it, but I pushed the memory back into a corner of my mind,” she explained.

I understood this to mean that my love was nothing but a nuisance for her. After all, I knew that she saw me only as a brother, and as I disclosed my feelings, I was well aware that they were unlikely to be welcome. Nevertheless, having this truth relayed to me by Katarina in person was extremely painful...until she explained herself further.

Almost screaming, she explained that she was simply scared of love itself. I was once again surprised and confused by her words. She then said that she feared that love would lead her to doom, a notion that made absolutely no sense to me. Then again, since most other things that came out of my sister’s mouth made absolutely no sense either, I just silently kept listening. Katarina went on to elaborate, saying that her avoidance of love stemmed from a subconscious fear.

I blamed myself for not noticing that despite always being so close to her. To me she had been an always-smiling girl who didn’t have a fear in the world.

She lowered her head apologetically, and I patted it, thanking her for having honestly spoken to me and asking for forgiveness for how I never noticed how scared she was. She looked up at me, and I tried to smile at her, but maybe my expression wasn’t as reassuring as I thought.

After a moment of silence, she spoke again. “I didn’t realize this myself either. Not until now at least. But now that I do, I want to change that. I want to take my feelings, and yours too, in my own hands.”

How could I think that she’s a weak girl that I need to protect? Her honesty is commendable...

I wasn’t in pain anymore—I felt my chest fill up with warmth as my love for Katarina grew even stronger.

However, she awkwardly informed me that she had some pressing matters keeping her busy at the moment. I knew that she could only focus on one task at a time, and I could imagine that whatever was keeping her preoccupied had to do with her work at the Ministry.

She didn’t have to go so far as to mention that, but this hapless honesty was part of her charm, and I couldn’t help but smile at her. I told her that I understood and that she could rely on me if she needed help, and she seemed very happy about it.

“You’re always such a huge help,” she responded, as if it was the most natural thing in the world. Once again, I found myself smiling.

She wants to take my feelings into her own hands... After all those years of fearing that my love would forever be unrequited, that she would never look at me as a man, and that she would always forget my feelings as soon as I confessed to her, I never even dreamed that I would hear words like these coming from her.

Katarina quickly followed her tug at my heartstrings with another, even stronger one. “I was happy to hear that you love me. I could only be happy hearing something like that coming from a person as wonderful as you are,” she told me, blushing, before saying good night and literally running out of my room.

I stood there, dumbfounded, trying to process what I had just heard. I repeated what she had just said to myself, starting to wonder whether I was dreaming. I even tried pinching myself on the cheek just to be sure. It hurt. This was no dream—but it had to be. This could never happen in reality. I pinched my other cheek too. It also hurt. It was safe to assume that this was all real and that Katarina had told me that she was happy to hear me confess to her.

“Whaaat?!” I screamed, unable to contain myself.

“I-Is anything the matter, young master?” a servant, who was standing right outside my room, asked in surprise.

I nervously put a hand over my mouth to stop my excited shouting.

“I-I’m fine... I’m going to sleep now. Good night.”

I went to bed and pushed my face onto a pillow, trying to calm down...but to no avail. I was now rolling from side to side, unrestrained, as I had never done even as a child. I was so happy that I feared my heart could explode from the sheer joy.

She was happy to hear it... A person as wonderful as I am... And the way she blushed as she said those things...

I kept thinking back to that, still rolling in my bed almost until dawn.