Waking to the Aftermath
“Hah…!”
I opened my eyes with a ragged gasp.
A familiar ceiling filled my vision. After a few blinks I realized I was lying in my dormitory room. The scene was so ordinary, so peaceful, that I nearly convinced myself everything from the day before had been a dream.
If not for the tight pressure bandage wrapped firmly around my abdomen and the splint locking my left hand from fingers to wrist, I might have believed it.
I tried to sit up a little. Something twisted deep inside my stomach.
“Ngh…”
I immediately scowled and sank back onto the pillow.
Yesterday’s memories returned with the pain, sharp and vivid. The fist that had driven into my gut without warning. The moment I had collapsed on the floor, unable even to breathe. The stares of countless students looking down at me, and Terren’s face—expressionless to the very end.
Shock, agony, terror, and humiliation mixed together and pressed heavily against my chest. I clenched the blanket in my fist. The moment my splinted left hand throbbed, I let go at once.
The academy must have finished emergency treatment and carried me back to my room. Even if everyone was equal as students inside these walls, leaving the young lady of a ducal house lying in the infirmary would have been an awkward burden.
Still—if they had the skill to treat me this quickly, wouldn’t it have been better to stop the spar the first time I was hit?
“What good is excellent treatment after you’ve already been beaten…”
The voice that left my lips was quieter than I expected.
The instructors must have been just as stunned. No one could have predicted that the great Serena Ardel would be one-sidedly thrashed by early-story Terren. I hadn’t predicted it either.
I slowly exhaled and closed my eyes.
This place did not seem to be exactly the same world as the novel I had read. More precisely—Terren was different.
The Terren I remembered had a strong sense of justice. Even if his opponent was a villain, he was never cruel enough to keep attacking someone who had already surrendered. Yet the moment the spar began, he had branded me the mastermind behind the black-magic incident—as if he already knew about an event that had not even happened yet.
Regression. Possession. Foresight.
The traits a novel’s protagonist could receive were many. I had never thought much of them while simply reading. Now that someone with such an ability could become my enemy, I felt a little afraid. No—were we already almost enemies…?
Either way, it was unfair. I remembered only the hazy early chapters of the novel, while Terren seemed to know a far more concrete future. And in the future he knew, Serena Ardel had clearly not played a good role. There was no other reason for him to hate me this much.
While I was lost in thought, my abdomen throbbed again. Without meaning to, I laid a hand over the bandage. The image of Terren raising his fist flashed through my mind, and my shoulder gave a small flinch. I slowly uncurled my stiffened fingers and forced myself to breathe evenly.
“…It’s fine.”
I muttered the words into the empty room where no one could hear. I had no intention of being cowed by a single beating. At least, that was what I wanted to believe.
But when I looked down at the left hand fixed in its splint, my fingertips trembled faintly. I stared at them for a moment, then covered the hand with the blanket.
“Haa… Still, I should at least wash.”
I could not stay in bed forever. Carefully, I pushed myself up. Simply setting both feet on the floor sent a heavy ache spreading through my stomach. Only after gripping the bedpost and steadying my breath for a long while was I able to stand.
With every step, my long silver hair—loosened and free—slid over my shoulders. Hair that normally felt merely bothersome felt especially heavy today. Supporting myself with one hand against the wall, I made my slow way to the bathroom.
When I stood before the mirror, a girl whose face was rigid with suppressed pain stared back at me. Silver hair that fell past her waist was a tangled mess; her vivid red eyes looked hazy, like those of someone who had not slept properly. Her skin had always been pale, but today even the color had drained from it, leaving her unnaturally white.
And yet, even in that state, her face itself was unbelievably beautiful. The slender jawline, the high bridge of her nose, the long lashes that cast soft shadows—even with her eyes narrowed against the pain, she looked like a tragic noble heroine from a painting.
I raised my uninjured right hand and lightly touched my cheek. The girl in the mirror lifted her small hand in the same way. When I forced the corners of my mouth upward, she too formed an awkward smile.
“This is really me…?”
Three days had already passed, and I still could not get used to it. My wrists, my shoulders, my waist—everything about me now belonged to a slender girl. Serena’s magic was exceptional, but her body itself was far frailer than I had imagined. Simply lifting my left arm a little made my shoulder tremble; tensing my abdomen immediately stole my breath.
I looked at the splint reflected in the mirror. He really had beaten me thoroughly. Worse, Terren had deliberately tried to ruin Serena’s left hand—the hand she used for magic. It had not been a simple act of anger. He had been certain that the future Serena would commit some terrible act with that left hand.
“Just what did you do…?”
I could not remember what Serena had done in the later chapters. I had only read the beginning of the novel, so there was no way to know. All that remained in my memory were a few characters, the early incidents, and the fact that Serena had been a classic villainess.
I rested my right hand on the washbasin and thought for a long time. No matter how hard I dug through my memories, I could not recall any event that would justify Terren’s hatred. In the end, only a sense of helplessness remained.
I sighed and carefully checked the bandage around my abdomen. Dark bruising had spread beneath it; even the lightest touch of my fingertips sent a sharp pain racing outward. A bath was out of the question. Soaking the wounds would only make them worse. In the end I carefully wiped only my face and the area around my neck with a towel soaked in warm water. When the warmth touched my chilled skin, a little of the tension left my stiff shoulders.
I looked in the mirror again. The pale face, the disheveled silver hair, the left hand locked in its splint. As I stared, the moment I had lain collapsed on the floor yesterday returned. Terren’s fist descending, my body refusing to move no matter how desperately I tried to flee. My vision blurred; moisture gathered in the red eyes in the mirror.
Startled, I immediately wiped the corners of my eyes.
“Why am I doing this again…?”
I had not wanted to cry. The emotions had simply arrived later than my body when the memory surfaced. This body was more sentimental than I had expected, and clumsy at hiding its feelings. The slightest shock stiffened my face; merely recalling an injustice was enough to make my eyes heat up.
I blinked several times, then roughly wiped away the remaining moisture with the back of my hand. This was not the time for tears.
Terren was the protagonist this world needed in order to survive. Everyone who became his enemy had fallen before the luck and talent unique to a main character. I had no intention of becoming one of them. Of course, I had been beaten half to death before I could even get the word “surrender” out of my mouth.
“He really is impatient…”
I grumbled quietly, but there was no strength in my voice. In any case, if I wanted to survive from now on, there was only one path. I had to cooperate with Terren—or at least prove that I was harmless.
Fortunately, having read the early part of the novel meant I knew a few of the incidents that would soon unfold. I could not recall exact dates or every detail of the process, but I could remember the locations and the main victims. If I helped prevent those events, Terren would eventually stop suspecting me. Or I could move first and keep the incidents from happening at all.
The problem was that the things Serena had already done were spectacularly flashy—and this body could not speak the way Serena would not, or perform words and actions that deeply wounded her pride. No. It was not that I could not. I simply did not want to. Haa… Was this also because it was Serena’s body…?
A few quiet days would not suddenly make everyone trust me. Least of all Terren, who had no idea what the future me had done to him.
I met the eyes of the girl in the mirror for a long moment. Her bloodless lips slowly set into a firm line.
“Still, I have to do it.”
Simply saying “trust me” would never be enough. Then I would have to show him myself—that at the very least I was different from the future Serena he knew.
Yet contrary to my resolve, the left hand fixed in its splint began to tremble finely again. I covered that tremor with my right hand and hid it. No one was watching, but I did not want anyone to know I was afraid.
Even so, the moment Terren’s face rose in my mind, my abdomen seemed to throb once more. Without meaning to, my shoulders drew in.