Prologue: I've Been Caught
Ah, I’ve been caught.
“It would have been better if you had acted like this from the very beginning.”
“Ah… ugh, hic…”
“What’s the matter? Weren’t you the one who enjoyed suffering?”
If I had to summarize my current situation in a single line, it would be this: I was pinned beneath a furiously enraged man, his hands locked around my throat.
As a delicate young girl, I had no choice but to lie there gasping and choking beneath him.
To think my twentieth birthday gift would be death by suffocation. Even cruel jokes should know their limits….
“In your eyes, other people must all look like toys. Isn’t that right?”
“About half of that is correct, I suppose.”
“You can still smile even now.”
Ah, just as I thought—I really don’t want to die.
I didn’t possess any convenient regression ability like others, nor was I the sort to chase schadenfreude at the cost of my own life.
Sustainable schadenfreude. Moderate, manageable amounts. That was what I pursued.
It was my life’s motto and my driving force.
Well, mostly because I’m a coward and a relatively normal person.
I hated getting hurt. Any scar would blemish this perfect, beautiful-girl body.
I hated feeling pain. Tears and snot streaming down my face would be hideous.
I hated dying. Once dead, I could no longer enjoy any more schadenfreude.
I am not insane.
I am simply an ordinary human who wants to live while receiving a modest amount of attention from others.
When I die, I hope a crowd fills the funeral hall.
I hope people give me their attention.
Since I have become a beautiful girl, I hope others are shaken to their core because of me!
What could possibly be wrong with such a pure desire!
I simply could not understand the man straddling me, his fingers crushing my windpipe.
With his face twisted in a deep scowl, the man forced out a single sentence.
“I’ll make you reflect on what you’ve done.”
“…Reflect, you say.”
“Chloe Winterland. Apologize to me.”
“I’d rather not.”
If you’re the one asking for something, the least you could do is speak politely.
He lacked even the most basic courtesy.
As if that would ever put me in the mood to apologize!
Since I was going to die here anyway, I wanted to live forever in his memory. What sort of expression should I wear at the end?
It was a delightful dilemma.
This story is a record of the events leading up to the moment I came to reflect.