I'm Here
It was empty. Utterly, desolately empty. Cecilia Roeyental sat upon a throne of eternal ice in a castle built from glacial walls, looking down with a frigid gaze upon those who dared lift their eyes to her without permission.
"What a rather farcical sight."
"...Lady Cecilia."
"Enough."
Boris shook his head at the blue haze of mana rolling off Cecilia's body.
"Her mind has been completely shattered by mana rampage. She's gone now."
"Cecilia."
"Yes, Your Majesty."
The golden-haired man she had once loved—or rather, the man she had believed she loved—looked up at her. And the sight of him was...
"Delightful. This entire situation."
Even though she had lost everything she once possessed, this single moment pleased her more than she could say.
Cecilia finished straightening her clothes and looked up at me with a dazed expression. Studying me, was she? She looked like a baby bird.
"Lord Victor."
"Yes, Cecilia."
"The lecture hall for the class you're supposed to be in right now is quite far from here, isn't it?"
"..."
"Class shouldn't be over yet."
"..."
"Lord Victor."
Those glittering violet eyes were fixed on me.
"Haa."
Lying to those eyes would have pricked my conscience.
"It was cancelled. Self-cancelled, really."
"Pardon?"
"Word of Cecilia's duel reached me."
"..."
"I was worried."
"That is..."
Cecilia swallowed whatever she had been about to say. Whatever words she had wanted to speak, she only flushed and shook her head vigorously from side to side.
"You were worried about me?"
"Yes."
"In what sense, exactly?"
"...Because you're my fiancée."
"That... is true."
Looking a little crestfallen, Cecilia lowered her head for a moment, then lifted it again with a soft smile curving her lips.
"Still, I'm glad. That you came running like this."
"Because you're someone precious to me."
"...Saying something like that is a little unfair."
"Is it?"
"I'm precious too, you know. So the next time something happens to you, Grand Duke, I might just skip class and come running myself."
"Haha. I'll look forward to it. Still, Cecilia, please don't."
"Hmm?"
Cecilia puffed her cheeks slightly and began to frown.
"Why not?"
"Because you're a proper young lady of high birth. Someone different from a defective product like me..."
"Don't say that."
"Pardon?"
"Never."
Cecilia's eyes wavered for a moment before settling back into calm.
"...I don't want to hear things like that."
"I'm sorry. Which part of it didn't sit well with you..."
"Lord Victor. From now on, never call yourself a defective product again."
"..."
"Don't... hurt yourself. No matter what the world says about you, I will never accept that judgment."
"..."
"Because you have to be my proud fiancé."
Hearing her words, a tear slipped from my eye before I even realized it. She was rejecting the wound I had believed would never heal for as long as I lived, and she was looking at me—at the person I was. I was so grateful for that, and so sorry.
"Thank you."
"..."
Looking up at the man who had just shed tears right before her eyes, Cecilia could not find any words. She simply waited in silence until he gathered his emotions and spoke. At last, he did.
"Thank you."
"..."
Cecilia met the red eyes of the man looking at her. She saw the eyes of a man who had never wavered as he walked toward his goal, who had endured without crumbling so that he could protect his people. Those eyes were trembling now. And that was far too...
"Victor."
He was so dear, so heartbreaking, so bittersweet that she wanted to protect him.
"It's okay."
"..."
"I'm right here."
"..."
She took out a handkerchief and gently wiped away his tears. She wanted to protect this frailty he had shown only to her. She alone wanted to cradle his pain and hide it from the world. Only her.
"There, good boy."
"Cecilia?"
"It's okay."
She wished desperately that he would keep looking at her. His hand reached out. When their hands met and warmth passed between them, the moment was so sweet she wished this dream would never end.
"..."
"...Um."
"I'm... sorry."
"No, I... well."
Sitting on the bench and replaying what had just happened, we both flushed crimson without either of us needing to start it.
"Um, Lord Victor."
Unlike earlier, she attached the honorific again. I nodded. She must have pushed herself just to comfort me.
"Yes, Cecilia."
"About my rudeness just now..."
"No."
I shook my head with a small smile.
"Thank you. I feel better because of you."
"...Is that so."
"Sometimes things like this are nice too. Being comforted by an older woman really is—"
"An older woman...?"
"Pardon?"
"...Lord Victor."
"Yes."
Cecilia's lips curved in a gentle smile, but her gaze had taken on the look of a predator locking onto its prey.
"Have you ever met other older women besides me?"
"Uh... I have run into some at the Walterheim estate, but."
"But?"
"...You're the first person who's ever comforted me, Cecilia. Haha... I've always admired that kind of thing."
"Ah."
Those damned household mates of mine were older, sure, but they spent every day hanging off me going "little brother~" until I wanted to scream. Compared to that, look at Cecilia. Only a single year older, yet the air she gave off was completely different.
"Whenever you want, Lord Victor."
"Haha... yes."
Whenever, she said—until the day the engagement was broken off, at least. Still.
Maybe this kind of thing isn't so bad either.
"I should head back to the lecture hall soon."
"Yes. Then I'll see you at dinner."
"Um, Lord Victor."
"Yes."
When I looked back at Cecilia, who had called out to stop me from leaving, her hand gently stroked my cheek.
"Do your best."
"..."
"Hehe."
Today, too, the "carry-her-off" stack was steadily accumulating.
"Grand Duke."
"What."
"Please stop dumping your escorts in the lecture hall and vanishing."
"I already said I was sorry."
Luche sighed and shook her head.
"I never want to experience the professor's panicked face again just because a graduate is sitting in on the class."
"Why? A reunion between master and disciple is a beautiful—"
"Shall I tell you about my grades when I was still at the Academy?"
"Jester must have cried tears of blood."
"..."
"What."
"Sometimes I think the Grand Duke is a man who hurts women far too easily."
"What are you talking about."
"A bad man who's only kind to the Lady."
"...Isn't that a good thing?"
Looking only at one woman and putting up iron walls against every other—that sounded completely—
"You keep saying you're going to push her away."
"..."
"And yet the second you heard about the duel earlier, you shot out of your seat like the world was ending."
"Hey, hey, that was because Cecilia might have had a mana—"
"For someone making that excuse, the news that just came in says the Lady wiped the Grand Duke's tears while he was crying."
Just how thoroughly had Jester trained Luche that she already had her own information network?
"The young ladies are losing their minds calling it a scene straight out of a romance novel—the large dog of a male lead fretting over his master, and the heroine embracing him..."
"Ugh, romance-poisoned brains."
Kind Cecilia had simply comforted her fiancé, and they were making a whole production out of it.
"Why don't you just carry her off already."
"No."
"Aw, why not! The headmaster already certified that she's stabilizing!"
"...If it isn't certain, I can't."
"..."
"I don't want to see Cecilia get hurt."
"Aaaah."
"What."
"You're a terminal case. Seriously."
"You're getting a pay cut the moment we get back."
I entered the lecture hall and took a seat by the window. Outside, people were already bustling about busily.
...Ah. So that season is coming around again.
The Spring Festival—an exchange between freshmen and upperclassmen held before midterms. Everything from a hunting tournament to a dance party, every event an Academy youth could possibly love, all packed into one.
"The event where the heroine farms affection points off all the male leads."
A classroom door suddenly locking with no one knowing who was inside, forcing the male lead and heroine to get cozy together. The male lead wiping sauce from her lips. Nursing a wounded male lead after the hunting tournament. Winning first place at the dance party and stealing the spotlight.
"None of my business... wait... hang on."
For a split second I imagined every single one of those scenes with Cecilia, and immediately shut it down. No. That would be genuinely dangerous. It wouldn't end at carrying her off—I might cross the line entirely and want to hide her away in a separate wing of the Walterheim estate.
"Last year Senior Elysia was seriously—"
"Wow, really?"
I pricked up my ears at the female students gossiping about Elysia.
"I'm telling you! Last year she was running around like she had ten bodies, and now she's got all the seniors as captives—"
"Wow... maybe I should try that too?"
"Don't. That is not something a human being should do."
She cleared every event last year?
Impossible. In her first year, Elysia only showed up on the final day of the Spring Festival and barely managed to scrape together some affection points...
I shook my head. The Elysia of this world was a different person from the Elysia I had read about in the novel. It was easier to think of it that way. Otherwise, how else could you explain a woman who conquered every male lead in a single year and even forced the dissolution of Cecilia and Baron's engagement?
...Would a woman like that even have a reason to raise her affection points again this festival and parade around with her captured male leads?
She might go after the sub-male leads who entered this year instead.
No. Let's not overcomplicate it.
Rather than thinking about a woman like that, it would be better to figure out how Cecilia and I could enjoy the festival in a healthy way. In the novel, I had never once seen Cecilia properly enjoy a festival.
...I hope she likes it.
"Spring Festival: Fluttering Hearts Grand Operation!"
"Waaah..."
Cecilia offered an awkward smile as she watched Chloe barge into her room unannounced and spread open a notebook. Her roommate Lucille had stepped out for a while at Chloe's request.
"Ahem. So, Cecilia."
"Y-yes?"
"How far have you progressed with the Grand Duke?"
"P-progress? The Grand Duke and I are only in an engagement... a contractual relationship, so that kind of—"
"You came to me for advice because you wanted to smash that, didn't you?"
"Th-that is true, but."
"Huuuuh?"
"I-if it would put the Grand Duke in a difficult position..."
"Ahem! Sepippi!"
"Se...pippi?"
"Stop."
Faced with Chloe's relentless pressure, Cecilia could only stare in blank bewilderment.
"With that kind of weak heart, you'll never melt the Grand Duke who's slyly playing hard-to-get while holding up the contract as a shield!"
"Th-that is..."
"Haa... do you have any idea how annoyed I get every time I hear about it? The way he pretends to push you away while irritatingly reeling you back in."
"Yeah, yeah!"
"...What a fox. A total fox."
"He's soft about it, which makes it even more infuriating. Victor..."
"...Ohhh?"
"Wh-what?"
"You dropped the honorific? Ehehe..."
"Hic..."
Watching Cecilia's face explode into a deep red, Chloe grinned.
"Haa. Honestly, what are you going to do if the Grand Duke actually finds a woman he truly falls for?"
"Th-that is..."
"I told you, didn't I? There are plenty of female students whose eyes get weird when they look at the Grand Duke."
"Who?"
"Hm?"
"Who are they."
"Ce...Cecilia?"
"How dare they... how dare they."
Seeing the unfocused, sunken look in Cecilia's eyes, Chloe hurriedly changed the subject.
"Ahem! Anyway, this Spring Festival is our chance."
"Ch-chance?"
"To make the Grand Duke fall so hard for you that—"
"Fall so hard that?"
"It's no longer a contract. Real engagement. A fait accompli."
"...A fait... accompli?"
"That's what you're aiming for, isn't it? For an eternal promise that can never be broken..."
"That's... right."
Watching Cecilia bury her face, which had turned the color of a ripe tomato, Chloe nodded in satisfaction.
"This is the operation for that."
"Help me, Chloe. So I can make Victor mine forever."
Meeting the fire burning in Cecilia's eyes, Chloe nodded.