I Think I've Fallen Into a Trap!
I seemed to have fallen right into a trap.
“Oh. It looks like I’ve been caught.”
Even I had to admit it was a stupid response, but honestly, there wasn’t much else to say.
I didn’t know why I’d been grabbed, I had no idea what the current situation even was, and it wasn’t like I could fight back with magic. What else was there to say?
I flicked the fingers of the hand not holding the champagne flute, trying to release my mana, but only a tiny pink spark flickered to life. Nothing close to a meaningful attack or self-defense came out.
Elena refused to let go of my wrist, her gloved hand gripping it tightly, while her bare hand reached up to stroke my hair.
At first she lifted my golden curls with the careful reverence of someone handling a priceless treasure. Then, without warning, she buried her face in them and took a long, deep breath.
“Perfect. Every single strand has such strong character, yet when they coil together like this, the curls themselves become a work of art… Hair shouldn’t emit light at all, and yet it reflects the chandelier’s pale yellow glow better than polished metal. It gives off that metallic sheen precisely because of its rough texture. Ah, but when you actually touch it, it’s this smooth…”
“My wrist hurts.”
This woman was dangerous. It felt ridiculous to only realize it now, but she was definitely dangerous. Why, though? The original Elena Kerru wasn’t exactly sociable, but she wasn’t this insane either. So why…?
Could something strange have happened to her too, just like how I’d transmigrated?
“Don’t tell me you’re not actually the commoner special admission student Elena Kerru…”
“Don’t assume you know me. And don’t jump to conclusions.”
Elena pulled her hand from my hair, grabbed my chin, and spoke. Our eyes met directly. I could feel her gaze piercing straight into the deepest part of my irises.
“It’s my favorite color. Warm enough to be blue, cold enough to be blue. A sparkle that even the most precisely cut rare carbuncle couldn’t match. The fear and anxiety of the incomprehensible makes tears well up without me realizing it, and I feel like I’ll go mad wanting to drink them in. Earlier, when I held your hair and breathed in, I caught the scent of sweat rising from the nape of your neck. This is my first time seeing a chandelier, but I like the impression it gives. When heavenly light pours down and carries heat, even the most noble young lady like you will sweat simply by standing there.”
“Do all of you people have some kind of scent fetish?”
That included me, who had remembered Erika just by smelling her.
Elena smiled in a way that sent chills down my spine and finally released my wrist. While I slowly rubbed the freed wrist with my other hand, she suddenly snatched the glass from my fingers.
Thanks to that, I could finally take off my glove without trouble. Still, if I could use magic properly, escaping this incomprehensible situation would be easy.
Minimal mana discharge. Pink spark only. No viable attack or defense possible.
“I heard you come from a commoner family. Have you ever actually seen a finely cut rare carbuncle?”
“No. I’ve only read about them. About the world’s jewels, its treasures, all kinds of wonderful fragrances, and famous places across the globe. That’s how I decided. My favorite color is the hue of that blue gem.”
“So it’s praise without ever comparing it to the real thing. I can’t exactly be happy about that.”
“Is that so?”
Elena’s voice suddenly turned icy.
“I don’t think so. Because the real thing… is ultimately real, isn’t it? How could comparing something to the real thing ever be true praise? Lady Maria, the color of your eyes is exactly the light I imagined while reading about carbuncles. But if I were to see a real carbuncle, wouldn’t that only diminish its value? Think about it carefully.”
“Ah… I think I sort of get what you mean.”
I didn’t really understand, but it didn’t seem like the conversation would end easily unless I agreed.
I casually slipped the glove off one hand, secretly tucked it into my pocket, then pressed my palm against the door behind me and poured mana into it.
The moment the lock clicked open, the sound of shattering glass rang out right in front of me.
Elena Kerru had downed the champagne in the glass she’d taken from me in one gulp, then smashed it against her own head.
I couldn’t make sense of the situation. It clearly wasn’t an accident.
Blood dripping from her forehead, she glared at me with those glowing pink eyes. No matter how you looked at it, she had not hit herself by mistake.
I quickly turned the gears in my head.
In the original story, Maria von Letiaponk held intense hostility toward Elena Kerru and tried to have her expelled.
But… what if there was a hidden reason behind that?
What if the novel’s content, narrated from Elena’s perspective, had been completely fabricated?
Or what if this world only looked like the novel but was actually entirely different?
Either way, there was no evidence that the person in front of me was the Elena Kerru I knew.
And if that was the case, there was no guarantee I could avoid the villainess’s doomed fate no matter how hard I tried to steer clear of the original Maria’s actions.
I imagined what would happen if I opened the door right now and ran out, drawing everyone’s attention. I was the one who had walked out with a glass in hand.
Even though Elena had higher scores on the entrance exam, I held far more social power.
Inside the salon, Elena hadn’t done anything noticeable, while I had already drawn everyone’s eyes by dancing with Erika. Regardless of magic ability, the stronger one here was me. The weaker one was Elena.
Any reasonable person would conclude that I had thrown the glass and assaulted Elena, and that she hadn’t been able to fight back at all.
I decided I couldn’t open the door and leave the hall. Instead, I stretched out my now-bare hand.
“What the hell are you doing?”
I asked while using attraction magic to pull the shattered glass fragments toward me.
The pieces reassembled themselves into the rough shape of a glass on my palm, but unfortunately, while the form returned, my mana wasn’t strong enough to fully restore it.
“Tell me, Lady Maria. Are you truly a living person?”
“What the fuck are you talking about, you crazy bitch…”
Elena touched the wound on her head, then used magic to draw the blood out and send it floating into the broken glass in my hand.
The sight of red blood sloshing inside the shattered glass like unfinished wine made my skin crawl.
“Want to drink it? That’s proof that I’m alive. Now show me proof that this isn’t a dream.”
“You want my blood?”
“It’s not that simple. Well, never mind. There’s no way to prove it or disprove it right now. In that case…”
A sonic boom rang out. In an instant, Elena closed the distance between us. I threw the glass I was holding into the center of the hall to free my hands and immediately deployed a shield spell.
But Elena wasn’t aiming to attack me. Like a skilled pickpocket, she snatched the glove from my pocket and quickly retreated.
She casually tossed my glove onto the glass shards I had just thrown.
Before I could even realize what she was doing, a finger snap echoed, and the chandelier that had been lighting the hall came crashing down right in the middle of the floor.
With a tremendous crash of shattering crystal, the room plunged into darkness.
I hurriedly lit the torches hanging in each corner of the hall with flame magic and assessed the situation in front of me.
The sound of the falling chandelier must have reached the entrance ceremony ballroom, because I could hear hurried footsteps rushing behind me.
The door burst open at almost the exact moment I finally got a clear look at the scene before me.
“My lady, what’s going on… Huh…?”
The first one to rush in was Zophy. Both she and I froze, mouths agape, as we tried to process the sight before us.
The chandelier lying shattered in the middle of the hall. Right beside it, my glove.
Elena Kerru was slumped on the floor, trembling, blood streaming from her forehead. And both of her gloves… had somehow returned to her hands.
Soon after, Erika and the academy professors she had brought came pouring into the hall. Erika frowned at the scene, then looked at me.
“Did you challenge her to a duel, Maria?”
“That’s…”
“Why on earth?”
Yeah… it really did look that way.
A single glove thrown on the floor. A commoner special student sitting injured and bleeding. One of my hands already bare. And faint traces of mana still lingering in the air from when I had lit the torches.
No matter how you looked at it, it appeared as though I had taken off my glove to issue a formal duel challenge, then thrown a tantrum powerful enough to bring down the chandelier.
