Dumped
The capital of the Kingdom of Pallazinia was Gransen.
And in all of Gransen, the facility that stood second only to the royal palace in sheer scale was Gransen Academy.
I, Kyou Ventus — a first-year student at that very academy — was drowning in confusion.
The cause of it stood right in front of me: a girl with vivid blue hair. Liliana Edwin.
Why?
That single question had occupied every corner of my mind for the better part of a minute.
Things between Liliana and me were good. Or so I'd believed. In the years since our engagement, we'd built a solid relationship — a few little squabbles here and there, sure, but nothing that had ever turned into a real fight. We met two or three times a week, drank tea together, went on dates. Even among engaged couples, I was confident ours had been a particularly close one.
So was the problem me?
I wouldn't normally say this about myself, but I was fairly sure I looked decent. Even in the original novel, I'd warranted all of one line noting that I was handsome, at least in the face. My looks were fine. My grades weren't bad either — I'd studied myself half-blind and landed in the upper-middle ranks on the entrance exam. I'd trained in martial arts and magic too, enough to sit comfortably in the upper ranks even if I wasn't quite at the very top.
No matter how I turned it over — our relationship, my own shortcomings — I couldn't find an answer. And if thinking wouldn't give me one, I had no choice but to ask the person herself.
"Lili... did I do something to hurt you?"
Liliana said nothing. She just stared at me with those bright blue eyes.
A dozen seconds passed. Then her tightly closed lips finally opened.
"Kyou, you haven't done anything wrong."
Guilt lived in those blue eyes.
"This is entirely my own problem."
Another dozen seconds crawled by.
"I've fallen in love with someone."
My eyes went wide.
Liliana couldn't meet my gaze anymore. She was looking at the floor.
"I'm in love with someone who isn't you."
I was looking straight at her. She couldn't look at me.
"How could someone like me stay engaged to you?"
I couldn't say a word.
I had spent more than ten years with her. I had loved her. I had thought we loved each other.
She hadn't.
Unable to speak, I tipped my head back and looked at the sky. From the academy rooftop, the protective barrier that blanketed the capital glittered overhead.
Then a thought struck me like lightning. I turned back to her and opened my mouth.
"Alan..."
"...!"
Her head had been hanging low. Now she looked up at me, startled.
"Alan Ludwig, is it?"
"You already knew...?"
No. I hadn't known at all.
But thinking about the original novel — the one I'd read before coming to this world — the timing was perfect. In the two months since academy enrollment, Liliana had gone through a handful of rom-com mishaps with the protagonist, Alan, and gradually found herself drawn to him. She'd had a fiancé, though, and cowed by him, she'd half-given up on those feelings. Then Alan had happened to find her being mistreated by that fiancé, gotten involved, defeated him, and rescued her. And once she'd successfully broken off the engagement, Liliana had decided to be honest with her heart and gone to Alan.
Yeah. A thoroughly classic love story.
As long as you weren't the fiancé in question.
The difference from the original was that my relationship with Liliana had been perfectly fine. In other words, she'd had no reason to feel cowed by me. Drawn to Alan, she had immediately decided to be honest with her feelings and declared she was leaving me.
How honest of her.
And how selfish.
"Kyou, I... Alan..."
"Stop..."
"I love Alan."
"I said stop!"
The voice that tore out of me was louder, and more raw with fury, than even I had expected. But she kept talking. Something about her eyes as she spoke of him — they looked hollow, somehow, so unfamiliar, so frightening — that I had no choice but to snap at her. To shout.
"This is entirely my fault. You haven't done a single thing wrong."
"Lili... please...!"
"This is my selfishness. It doesn't matter what it does to me, or to Father."
What was that supposed to mean? A broken engagement was a pact between families. And Baron Edwin, her father, had nothing to do with it? So this was Lili's decision alone?
"Lili... what on earth are you thinking..."
"......"
She said nothing.
"Lili... this isn't right. We should at least report it to both our families first..."
"Even if we did... my decision wouldn't change."
It was insane. Completely insane — and she meant every word of it. A thought crossed my mind that I didn't want: was this even really Lili?
Liliana bent at the waist in a farewell bow.
"I'm sorry. And... thank you, for everything until now."
"Lili... wait...!"
"Goodbye."
Then she turned her back and walked away.
I was left sitting alone on the wide rooftop of Gransen Academy. Afternoon classes were about to start, but I couldn't bring myself to go. So this was my first skipped class since enrolling, I thought — some stupid little observation — and I lay down right where I was sitting.
I had done everything I could to prevent this. To stop losing Liliana. To stop my own ruin. I had genuinely loved her. I had built a real relationship with her. And this was how it ended.
I hadn't been ruined. But I hadn't been able to stop losing her. Just like in the original, she had gone to the protagonist. To Alan.
"Damn it..."
I swung my fist at the floor without getting up. All it did was hurt my hand. Everything was starting to feel like too much trouble. The only goal I'd set after falling into this world had been to live a sweet, ordinary life with the Liliana I loved. And that goal had just gone up in smoke.
"Um..."
I had a little brother who'd been trying to surpass me since we were children. Maybe I should just give up and hole up in the mountains.
"Hello? Can you hear me?"
I'd trained my skills reasonably well. Becoming an adventurer and wandering wherever the road took me might not be so bad. The original novel had only ever covered a handful of regions, the academy included. Seeing the unknown corners of the world for myself could be interesting.
"Hey!!"
"Wha—?!"
A sudden loud voice made me jump, and I bolted upright. My head turned toward the sound on instinct, and what filled my vision were two eyes as red as fire. When I focused and took in the rest of her, I saw hair of a similar crimson-scarlet — and I knew who it was.
"Riel Ignis...?"
"Oh, you know my name!"
Riel Ignis. The daughter of Duke Ignis, a prodigy who boasted both outstanding magical ability and the top grades in our year. And the main heroine of this world's original novel, Child of Yggdrasil.
Even as I said her name, I couldn't quite be sure, and it came out as a question. I couldn't help it. Riel Ignis, the main heroine of Child of Yggdrasil, was the protagonist Alan's childhood friend — a cool, quiet character who never showed her emotions and kept others at a distance. Yes. That was the Riel Ignis I knew. And for the past two months, the Riel Ignis I'd seen in class had been exactly the person from the original.
"We've never even talked, and you know my name! Don't tell me you've fallen for me or something."
I could only stare.
Then who on earth was this energetic girl chattering away in front of me?
"I was just kidding, of course. You've got Liliana, so there's no way, right?"
Was I seeing things from the shock of getting dumped? I tapped my toes against the floor just in case, but the Riel Ignis in front of me didn't vanish. Not a hallucination, then.
"Class is about to start and I couldn't find you. I thought I caught a glimpse of you heading to the rooftop at lunch, so I came up — and here you are."
"Uh..."
"Come on, let's go. You found out last month how scary Professor Hauser is when he's teaching history, didn't you?"
Riel grabbed my hand and started to lead the way. I still hadn't processed any of this. I stayed rooted to the spot. When I didn't move, she turned back.
"Kyou? We're going to be late."
"I... um... that's..."
"......"
As I stammered, she suddenly went quiet, and the strength went out of her hand. When I looked at her, she was looking straight into my eyes.
"Kyou? Were you crying?"
I froze. She must have seen the dried tear tracks. I tried to pull my hand free to wipe around my eyes, but she wouldn't let go.
"What happened?"
Maybe it was her earnest expression that did it. I found myself telling her everything that had just happened — to someone who had nothing whatsoever to do with any of it.
Riel sat down beside me and said nothing until I finished. She just listened. The bell for class rang somewhere in the middle, and she still didn't say a word. She just kept listening. When I was done, she took the hand she was already holding and wrapped her other hand around it too.
"That must have been really hard."
"..."
It was a stock phrase of comfort. Right now, it meant more than anything.
"Honestly, from what I could see, you and Liliana looked like a happy couple, so it doesn't quite click, but..."
Riel's eyes drifted into the air.
"Alan, though... Alan..."
Of course. Alan was the protagonist. Riel was the main heroine. Hearing that Liliana liked Alan couldn't possibly feel good. In the story, Alan loved Riel. He only had eyes for her. There were sub-heroines like Liliana who also gave him their hearts, and in the end he ended up with all of them — but Alan had looked only at Riel almost until the very last page. And Riel had been the same. Because of that quiet character of hers, she never made a direct confession of love until the mid-to-late parts of the novel, but she had always been with him. She had always been watching him.
I had no idea what to say to her. I just sat there staring at the floor. Then Riel's voice reached me.
"What the hell is so great about that awful guy that everyone goes crazy over him?"
...
......
Huh?