Three Years of My Life
Five years had not been an especially long time in my life. Yet it felt far too long. In any case, I had lived as Isaac Havertz, and not long after transmigrating into this world, I had come to accept it as real. It was simply too vividly alive to be anything but a created realm. Now, the memories of my former life were growing hazy. Precisely because these memories here were so intensely vivid.
In the end, I had fought with everything I had to save myself, and through that desperate struggle I had carved out a path to prevent Charlotte from falling into darkness. “Love is something that must form eventually, I suppose.” There was no way to stop it. I had known better than anyone that Charlotte would one day stand in the path of the main characters. At the time she had been nothing but my younger sister who had not yet committed any sin. So naturally I had chosen to break through the front lines without even planning for it. Facing Douglas Havertz head-on was, frankly, madness. Yet somehow fortune had smiled upon me, and I had managed to kill that monster. I had not neglected my magical training, but the gap in experience was still too vast to ignore. In reality I had nearly died. If Charlotte had not awakened her powers in time and rushed into the collapsing estate to save me… Well, that would have been it. I would have ended up nothing but ash, just like everyone else, cozying up with the Duke in the afterlife.
“……”
Thinking about it that way sent a dull ache through my head. I let out a quiet sigh and began buttoning up my shirt one by one.
“Could it really be that Lottie awakened her powers so early?”
The rumors circulating were all wildly exaggerated. If she had single-handedly repelled an imperial army, that was truly… It was not the right time, chronologically speaking. She had not even received the Duke’s magical experiments. From what I remembered, emotional triggers were required for blood magic to awaken. How on earth had the girl who had just escaped from a prison and fled undergone such a profound change of heart…?
“……This is a mess.”
Now I really had no idea what would happen next. Or rather, since the moment I killed Douglas, it was already too late to change course. At least I had secured the emperor’s restraint, and the Havertz Duchy had been completely secured. Under the assumption that Charlotte’s attitude remained hostile, that power was more reassuring than an army of ten thousand. The other concerns, however, were what truly worried me.
“Haa…”
What could I do? All I could do was pray that Lottie would not change for the worse. There was nothing else I could realistically do… Because in the original story the Blood Witch was a true catastrophe that could not even be compared to an 8th-circle mage.
It was not that I could not wield my powers yet, but that was something I could only wait and see. One moment she might leap forward several tiers at once and then suddenly turn on her heel. “I hope not. Please… not…”
At any rate.
After some time had passed, the condition that forced me to lie on a bed like an invalid had finally passed. I stretched my stiff limbs and looked out the window. Fresh, pure snow was falling. The first snow of the year. Staring blankly at the sight made my chest feel strangely warm.
No longer did I need to worry that my true feelings toward Douglas Havertz would be exposed. No longer did I have to dodge the remnants of that organization inside the estate, or engage in life-or-death battles with them every now and then. There might be another encounter someday, but not right now.
Perhaps I could finally relax a little. Perhaps… it was finally time to let my guard down.
‘Charlotte is safe too. At least for now there is no immediate crisis.’
I had protected my sister. Just that act alone left a strangely soft, warm feeling in my heart.
Just as I was beginning to sink into a strange, uncharacteristic emotional haze, —Bang!
“Big brother.”
The door opened and a sharp voice rang out. Startled, I turned around. Charlotte, arms crossed, stood on the threshold.
“Lottie…?”
For some reason her expression was unusually sulky. Was there something that displeased her?
As someone who had to stay on high alert—waiting for her to act rashly, explode, or do anything unpredictable—I had no choice but to swallow dryly.
‘Hold on. Hold on.’
But this did not seem important right now.
What had I just heard her say?
“……Big brother, you said…?”
“……”
The voice I had let out in disbelief made Lottie visibly jolt and freeze.
I had spoken too late, I thought, but—
“Lottie, you…”
I could not take it back. My expression twisted in complex emotion and my voice trembled.
“W-what? Why? What’s wrong? What happened?”
“……”
“Don’t give me that look. It’s annoying. No matter what I call you, it’s my heart.”
Her reaction was blunt, but I could only cover my mouth in overwhelming emotion, my chest tight.
“No way… are you… crying? Suddenly?”
Charlotte, clearly flustered, rushed into the room toward me. She reached out, then abruptly pulled her hand back—
“Hmph.”
Considering how coldly I had treated her for these five years and the reasons I had to, I had never once expected blood affection from Lottie. After all, I myself had shown none of it.
‘Yet part of me must have been hoping for it.’
Perhaps my inner thoughts were different. Only after hearing that single word—“big brother”—did I feel as if I had finally glimpsed her true feelings.
It had been five years of living only for her. For Lottie. To protect her…
Though the term “reward psychology” did not fit, a part of me had longed for the title of “big brother.” The moment I heard it, an overwhelming sense of fulfillment flooded me.
I let the tears blur my vision and lunged forward.
“Come here. Let me hold you. My little sister.”
“……?!”
I stepped forward and opened my arms wide toward her. As I drew closer I felt a strange impulse to think, “If only she would not hit me.” Yet—
“……No… eek…”
Even though we were now close enough that our breaths nearly touched, Lottie had not moved. She had not pushed me away, nor released her crimson aura in panic. Nothing.
‘Huh…?’
Instead her face had flushed bright red, her eyes shimmering with visible inner conflict as she looked up at me. Instinctively I sensed something was wrong.
“……”
Then my sister lowered her head, took a single step forward—toward the direction of my outstretched arm—and embraced me.
With a soft sound her small, light-blue-haired girl slipped into my arms. The warmth of her body was impossibly, unbearably real.
“?”
I was stunned into silence.
‘What…?’
I could not process the situation. Reality itself seemed to freeze.
Did Lottie really blush and hug me just now?
…Really?
For real?
“……Lottie?”
“W-why…”
“Ah, no.”
In my surprise I had spoken without thinking, and she answered in a tiny voice.
The embarrassment in her tone left me with no choice but to remain silent.
I did not know how this situation had come about, but—
‘This is dangerous.’
I had to keep my expression firm.
The moment was genuinely touching. The five years of hardship I had endured for her felt as if they had finally been rewarded, leaving me happier than I had ever imagined.
As a transmigrator, technically I was not her real big brother. Of course I had treated her like a sister, but—
“……”
Thud… thud…
The feelings I had hidden, or rather, the ones I had forcibly pushed away because acknowledging them would bring true disaster, were beginning to rise.
I bit my lip, realizing the gravity of the moment. And just as I was about to gently separate us, —Crack!
“……?”
Charlotte instead wrapped her arms tightly around my waist and pulled me in with overwhelming force.
I stared down at her in bewilderment, but her posture blocked any clear view of her expression.
“Lottie…”
“Big brother.”
The moment I tried to speak, the timing was stolen from me. Lottie buried her face against my chest and spoke again and again.
“According to what Himel said, the most reliable and legitimate way to stabilize our family’s current crisis is to marry you, big brother.”
“……?”
“So first I will succeed my father as head of the family, and I will support you. Therefore… um… in short.”
She suddenly lifted her head, and I asked in surprise.
“……In short, what?”
“Marry me, big brother.”
“?”