Interlude: A Love Story Repainted as Crossdresser and Gay Prince
The love story between Sophia and Schwald, which the original work hailed as the romance of the century, has been completely repainted as the tale of a crossdressing man and a gay prince. In effect, it has become a story that I genuinely created myself. It means that, unlike the original plagiarist author’s plot, this has turned into one complete work of my own making. And none of it was even something I particularly intended.
If I had intended anything, it was only to stay within the original framework. “Who would have thought their intelligence was that pathetic?” At the very least, if the plagiarist author had made those two even slightly smarter… No, that would probably be dangerous too. A foreboding feeling washed over me. Precisely, a voice I had heard once before rang in my ears.
“Wow, you finally decided to show up.”
Calling me a character in a story? Who does this bastard think is the reason I’m even here?
“Who the hell do you think put me in this mess to be spouting that bullshit?”
“The Demon King?”
With those final words, the voice vanished.
Thinking about the original work’s Demon King, I wondered if there was even a problem. In the first place, there hadn’t been that big of a battle at the end. Looking at how pathetic both Schwald and Sophia turned out, it meant the Demon King had been crushed by such pathetic opponents. It might actually be a stroke of luck. Or, if I wanted to force the blame, it was the plagiarist author’s fault. But now that Schwald and Sophia had been dealt with, how would the butterfly effect play out?
For the time being, I could only watch. Besides, my master was currently training the kingdom’s army.
The head of House Holpert had flown into a rage from the moment he woke up. That damned girl of Roen blood, Milene, had finally rejected his hand. Fine. Let’s say that couldn’t be helped. She was being called the prospective hero, so it wasn’t as if she had grown arrogant and started acting like she was something special.
But the royal order for the Holpert family head himself to deal with Sophia? That was utter nonsense. Send his lovely and precious daughter Sophia to a monastery? No matter if he was the king, he could not say such a thing. In the current situation where she had been branded a villainess, sending her to a monastery essentially meant ending her life as a noble lady.
That could not happen. Wasn’t it too cruel to shove a child of such tender age into a monastery?
“Sending Sophia to a monastery? Over my dead body!”
“There is no other way. Or do you intend to rebel?”
“If the royal family dares look down on us, then we shall!”
Jeo and Sein simply shook their heads. It seemed their father had truly gone mad for his daughter. Only now did it become clear to both of them. The man before their eyes was completely insane when it came to his daughter.
If things had reached this point, they had to face the problem head-on. This so-called father had pulled every dirty trick imaginable to bring Milene down, all so he could view only Sophia as his true daughter. The man who had once led the great House Holpert was not a figure worthy of respect, but a pathetic fool who would drag the entire family into ruin.
The only reason they had endured until now was the accumulated power of the family itself.
“Will you really risk the fate of the entire family for a daughter who is already infamous as a villainess?”
“Hmph. It’s not as if we cannot fight. Is Sophia merely some daughter?”
She was exactly that—just some daughter. To be blunt, half her blood came from a whore. Compared to Milene, it was an infinitely filthier lineage. Of course, the brothers had no intention of caring about such bloodlines, but it at least gave them the right to talk back to a father who spoke like that.
“Then let’s at least make it look proper. Pretend to send Sophia away while secretly paying people to arrange something else—”
“Wouldn’t her name still reach the monastery in the end? That cannot be allowed. My most cherished child receiving such punishment makes no sense, and a daughter of Holpert blood in a monastery? Never!”
Jeo and Sein shook their heads again. It seemed there would be no reasoning with him. Unless Milene suddenly decided to take pity on this pathetic biological father, which she clearly had no intention of doing. Then there was only one answer left.
He had clearly told them to overthrow the man. Since this father had already exiled his own daughter, there was no reason they couldn’t do the reverse. Above all, ignoring the words Milene had casually thrown out left them with no other visible options. After the close House Roen had already used Milene’s exile as an excuse to cut ties, they risked being literally branded as rebels.
Jeo and Sein could not accept that. Sophia had to be sent away somehow, and this father standing in the way was the biggest problem. Then they simply had to do it.
“This is your own fault, Father.”
“Still, at least Rion said he would serve you until the end.”
“What is this, all of a sudden—mmph?”
Before anyone realized, the household servants had swarmed in and restrained the Holpert family head. He couldn’t utter another word; his mouth was covered as he was dragged away. The head would now be confined to the detached villa, and Sophia would be sent to the monastery as planned.
Fearing their father might try something, the brothers immediately shoved Sophia into the carriage bound for the monastery.
“Brother! Brothers! Why?! I don’t want to go to the monastery!”
“To ensure our family survives, it cannot be helped.”
Jeo sent Sophia off to the monastery with even the most trustworthy knights from House Holpert accompanying her. Whether this would truly end Holpert’s nightmare remained to be seen.
The day is warm and the sky is blue. On a day like this, the best possible activity is lazing around in a corner of the room taking a nap while playing console games. I can’t even remember the last time I sprawled out and played games. Developing games or building computers in this world would be impossible within Milene’s lifetime, even if I possessed all the necessary knowledge. At least magic is quite entertaining in many different ways.
“My lady. Today’s newspaper has arrived.”
Ritz brought the morning paper.
“And?”
For some reason, Ritz’s face looked completely rotten. Yep, that was the exact expression she made whenever she was about to curse. It seemed the newspaper contained some truly worthless garbage.
“Some fucking bullshit seems to have happened.”
“What is it? Don’t tell me it’s the gay prince story again?”
The gay prince rumors hadn’t changed even after Schwald became Count Ron. Unexpectedly, that very rumor had given Schwald a massive number of fans in an entirely different sense. Yeah. This was the birth of fujoshi culture. Fanfiction about Schwald had already started circulating. Originally the royal family should have stepped in to stop it, but since he had already been stripped of his prince status, it seemed they couldn’t.
Boys’ love. BL. Female otaku. This might be one of the biggest mistakes I’ve made.
“They say the Holpert family head has been confined?”
“The head?”
Oh dear God. These crazy bastards. I knew that father was off his rocker the moment he exiled his own daughter, but the sons went and confined their father. Truly impressive. So what happens to that family now? In the original story, thanks to Sophia and Schwald, House Holpert would have become an untouchable powerhouse. But if they’re tearing each other apart like this, it’s a bit much.
Still… what does any of that mean to me now? Those worms have destroyed themselves. Sophia. Given her personality, she isn’t the type to quietly rot away in a monastery. Even so, now that she’s been completely cut off, what could she possibly do? The newspaper mentioned at the end that they had sent her to the monastery. Hmm. This matter is no longer my concern.
“But this is strangely similar to your novel, my lady?”
“Oh… fuck, it really is.”
In The Villainess’s Circumstances, Villia ends up suffering something similar later on. The difference is that Villia was originally a commoner adopted into the noble family, and she had been scheming with the family head the entire time, so he couldn’t abandon her. Then the child forcibly confined the father and sent Villia away. No matter how big a fan they were, they probably hadn’t intended it to go this far. Well, it’s all over now anyway.
“It’s not my business, but it doesn’t exactly feel good either.”
“Because of Sophia?”
“Yeah. Just… I feel a little sorry for how she ended up like that.”
I usually have no interest in calling someone’s parents lowly, but she really was born with the vulgar traits passed down from her mother. Honestly, it doesn’t mean anything anymore. It has nothing to do with me now. Whether she lives or dies is none of my concern.
Besides, until now House Holpert had pushed the broken engagement however they pleased despite the king’s presence, forcing Sophia as the prince’s fiancée under the excuse that she was the Holpert duke’s daughter anyway. In short, while it was technically a broken engagement, they had tried to gloss it over by simply swapping the character. The king had every right to be furious. If the children took care of the culprit themselves, then from the king’s perspective he wouldn’t have to bother dealing with House Holpert directly.
And the hero had been announced.
At just the right time, the hero position had been completely settled on Heintz. The original story had been utterly distorted. The real question was what would happen from here on out. Still, I suspected Heintz would easily handle the Demon King. That was something to worry about later.
If there was a problem, it was me. Now that the Holpert matter had been settled, it was time for me to keep my promise.
I stared in horror at the massive pile of magic tomes in front of me. There were so many books stacked around me that even the king probably didn’t handle this much paperwork. I glared at the Magic Tower scholar who had kindly delivered all of this straight to my house. At least they had delivered it here instead of making me go to the tower and said I could study at home, which was somewhat appreciated. But still.
“Are you telling me to do all of this?”
I didn’t even study this much when preparing for the college entrance exam.
“Of course. Originally you would have to undergo closed-door training in the mirror world as well.”
“Closed… closed-door training?”
No, fuck that. If I tried closed-door training with all these books, I would actually lose my mind. No matter if I’m a saintess, closed training with this pile? Absolutely not. Besides, from these people’s perspective I’m just a noble lady. And they’re handing all this over to me? Are they insane?
“Yes. However, we have taken into consideration that you are the Twilight bloodline who has appeared after so long, as well as the fact that you are a noble young lady. Moreover, I heard you self-taught Dual-Element Magic.”
“That’s right.”
“That may have worked quite favorably. For now, if you learn ‘just these,’ you will have mastered the basics.”
The basics? This scholar. If he weren’t a scholar I would have grabbed him by the collar and thrown him across the room. Why the hell are they teaching something like this to a prospective hero in the first place? Twilight bloodline or whatever, I’m not a magician—I’m an author.
“What if I can’t do it properly?”
“Then you will have to undergo closed-door training. Inside the mirror world.”
The scholar pointed at the mirror on the wall. Why on earth had they installed that mirror in someone else’s house? It was obvious they planned to shove me inside it later. It looked like an ordinary mirror on the surface, but this was magic?
“Is the mirror world literally a world inside the mirror?”
“Only the space where the mirror has been installed is recreated as the world inside the mirror. Time barely passes there.”
That plagiarist author really mixed together all sorts of random settings. Wait, then wouldn’t anyone be able to become strong there?
“Then everyone would work hard to become strong in there.”
“Ah, it is only possible for the Twilight clan, I was told.”
The scholar said what he needed to say and left.
For now, I decided to do as I was told. Honestly, I had considered running away, but I already owed them a debt. The fact that House Holpert had simply watched Sophia’s interrogation was probably not without the Magic Tower’s influence. So whether I liked it or not, I had to repay that debt.
Morning training with Decaron, magic tomes at lunchtime, writing novels in the evening. Was this how it was supposed to be? At this rate I wouldn’t have a single moment of leisure. If my life was going to be this absurd, wouldn’t it have been better if I had simply been judged and sent to the monastery? Then there would have been no Twilight bloodline or any of this nonsense.
I had no choice but to work hard even if I was crying while eating mustard. I thought about asking Ritz for help, but she looked completely clueless, and it seemed the Magic Tower truly believed in my self-study. This Twilight clan thing was clearly an incredibly powerful existence. After all, they learned such gloomy magic. Shadow walking, dark ball. To think that was the magic of the Twilight bloodline. That plagiarist author must have been too lazy and just threw together this kind of magic. If that wasn’t the work of a chuunibyou author, what was?