First (2)
First (2)
The acrid smoke of cheap tobacco stabbed deep into my lungs.
The pale smoke mingling with my exhaled breath brushed past a faint beam of light in the room, then scattered into the air as if it had never been there.
Everything was like that.
Things flickered before my eyes and then disappeared.
Or I thought they'd disappeared, only to find them right back where they'd started.
Neither was a pleasant experience.
Because everything I'd done over the past three years living as Ravin now looked like nothing but futile effort and mirages.
My temples throbbed.
I could still feel the cold touch of the trigger just before I pulled it, and the roar that followed still rang in my ears.
In this room, the sense of time didn't work very clearly.
I died. Definitely.
My consciousness blacked out along with the sensation of my head blowing apart.
So why was I still, still sitting in the creaky chair of this goddamn room?
I should have ended up dumped somewhere else—hell, heaven, or at least purgatory.
Before my eyes, the system message still hovered clearly, nauseating to even look at now.
[Collect the Endings. 1/?]
[Reward: Return to the Original World.]
She might have acted like she could kill me, but apparently the sight of me bleeding out right in front of her was too repulsive to bear.
Of course, the noble and elegant young lady of Edelgard would feel that way.
Continuing these pointless thoughts didn't make anything better.
I rummaged through the crumpled cigarette pack in my pocket, pulled out the last remaining one, and put it to my lips.
The one already in my hand had burned down to the filter and was hot enough to scald my fingers.
With a soft click, a new ember flared up.
No matter how much smoke I inhaled and exhaled, my restless mind refused to settle.
Just then, my eyes caught the familiar envelope on the table.
High-quality parchment I'd picked out myself, carrying a faint, pleasant fragrance.
A small lilac pattern—the only flower Serepina had once said she liked—was engraved in the corner of the envelope.
Letters I used to write at least once a week, sometimes every three days.
This was definitely one of those she had burned to ashes right before my eyes just a few days ago.
With her ice-cold voice saying, Anything you give me now is just disgusting.
The memory was vivid.
The blazing flames, and my expressionless face as I stared at them.
And her voice.
Everything was as clear as if it had just happened, yet here the letter sat intact before me, as if nothing had happened.
I stubbed out the cigarette I was smoking right onto the lilac pattern of the envelope.
Pale smoke rose from the cherished letter.
Black soot stained the purple petals.
Expulsion from the family, the breaking of the engagement, and an impulsive suicide.
That was the ending I had worked so hard to achieve.
Maybe my effort was lacking.
Or maybe it was my fault for overlooking the fact that this world is far more unkind than any place I've ever known.
Thinking I could use that so-called original knowledge and have everything go smoothly was just complacent greed.
This world didn't seem to want me to become a decent, okay person.
The more I struggled to keep my head above water, the more an invisible hand grabbed my hair and pushed me deeper into the mire.
What was my original role again?
Right. I was supposed to cause every kind of trouble imaginable, pick a fight with a complete stranger—the original protagonist—get publicly humiliated, and then harbor a petty grudge.
And as the price for the clumsy schemes born of that grudge, my fiancée—just one of the heroines in the original—would leave me, fall into the arms of that fine protagonist, and I would be expelled from both the family and the academy, wander the streets, and end up stabbed to death by some nameless thug.
Probably not a thug but an assassin sent by the family, but what does that matter now?
I hated that kind of ending, so I lived diligently.
Though all I realized was that no matter how much a scoundrel reforms overnight and behaves properly, people's gazes don't change.
Should I try begging Serepina again, baring my belly like a dog, pleading for her love, begging her not to abandon me?
Holding onto a stupid expectation like I'm back, so this time will be different?
As if. If that were the case, my situation should have improved at least a little by now.
As thoughts chased their own tails, my heart, oddly, grew calm and settled.
It was more a peace akin to resignation than anger or sadness.
I stared blankly at the system message floating in the air, which might well be a hallucination my brain had conjured.
[Collect the Endings. 1/?]
[Reward: Return to the Original World.]
I suppose a suicide that was practically a drunken performance in front of my sister could be considered an ending, in its own way.
Or maybe after my death, everything in the world went smoothly and ended with a happy ending where everyone was happy.
Either way, it had nothing to do with me.
Far from returning, I was still stuck in this fucking world.
I stared blankly at the ash-streaked letter, then rose from my seat.
I walked over to an old lamp shoved in a corner, shook it to check for oil, and lit the wick.
A small, unsteady flame flickered to life, dimly illuminating the dark room.
Without hesitation, I held the soot-stained letter over the flame.
The edge of the parchment yellowed, then soon caught fire with a small flame.
Crackle, crackle...
The distinctive smell of parchment mixed with ash and rose in a foul cloud.
I gazed down at the burning letter.
But maybe that was the point of expensive parchment.
The flame lazily consumed about half of the letter, then, as if losing interest, slowly went out.
In the end, nothing worked out the way it should.
Serepina's contemptuous face, Levina's disgusted expression, the cold stares of the family people.
No matter what I did, they would only see me as 'the Edelgard scoundrel.'
In truth, they probably called me a 'scoundrel' as a watered-down insult because they were too afraid of the Edelgard name to call me a revolting bastard. Not that I cared.
It seems I don't really like the genre of regression stories.
Maybe because it feels like being branded a failure who can't change anything despite being given a second chance.
"When did you ever call for me? Are you just smoking the cigarettes you said you'd quit?"
A cold voice came from behind me.
It was Serepina.
I didn't know when she had come in, but she stood leaning against the door, arms crossed, glaring at me.
Instead of answering, I stubbed out the cigarette I was smoking onto the pile of butts in the ashtray.
"The wall looks bare."
She said, looking around the room.
Once, a landscape painting by some unknown artist—a birthday gift she had tossed my way—had hung there.
I had liked that painting quite a bit, but she probably didn't know that.
Now, only nail marks remained like scars.
"I don't have anything to hang there."
At that, Serepina bit her lower lip slightly.
It was a habit she had whenever she was holding back irritation.
"That... you said you had quit."
Serepina jerked her chin toward the mountain of cigarette butts piled on the table.
Her gaze paused briefly on the half-burned letter, the one I had just failed to set alight.
"Ah, well. It seemed like nothing ever changed."
I answered with a shrug.
She probably wouldn't understand what I meant.
Looks like I really came back after all.
Considering the words she said were exactly the same as that day, not a single one changed.
Serepina let out a sigh.
That sigh held a great many things: disappointment, fatigue, and a touch of resignation.
"You said to meet today. Ravin."
"I did, though I wonder if it still matters now."
I nudged a piece of the letter that had fallen to the floor with the tip of my shoe.
"Well, whatever. I have something to say today as well."
"Ravin, I heard the story.
I heard you caused trouble at the Forbidden Archive this time."
"Then you must have heard the outcome as well. That it was cleanly settled with no grounds for suspicion."
"Monsters sealed in the Forbidden Archive were released that day. And you, who just so happened to force your way in there by invoking the family name that very day, are completely free of suspicion? Do you think that makes sense?"
It didn't make sense, to be fair.
Though my entire situation doesn't make sense to begin with.
Maybe it's my fault for not memorizing every little detail of a game I didn't even particularly enjoy.
The fact that no one, not even a single person, would believe anything I said, had stopped hurting long ago. It just was what it was.
Whether I did it or not, at some point I began to think maybe they just needed someone to point fingers at and blame.
"You might not care, but someone died. One of your classmates died."
"I know."
"That's it?"
"Enough. How far am I supposed to care? It's not my doing, and it's not my problem."
Even as I said that, her eyes didn't waver in the slightest.
They seemed to say, You really are that kind of guy after all.
Because no matter what happened, in this fine fiancée's head, every incident started from the premise that 'Ravin did it.'
Serepina ground her teeth and spoke in a low voice.
"......It's a problem that involves you, Ravin."
She sighed, walked over to me, roughly pulled back the curtains, and threw the window wide open.
Afternoon sunlight flooded into the dusty room.
As if it were her own room, she casually kicked aside a bottle rolling on the floor and started roughly folding the clothes strewn over a chair.
"I guess I always thought you might be like this from the beginning."
"Of course you did, since you always act like you know everything."
"Yeah. We grew up together since we were kids, after all."
Serepina answered, biting her lip slightly.
Her hands were folding the clothes, but her gaze was fixed somewhere in the air.
She picked up the half-burned letter that had fallen to the floor.
After staring at it blankly for a long moment, she finally spoke.
Her voice was strangely calm.
And the words that followed were no different from that day.
"I told Father that I really should break off the engagement.
He readily accepted, and probably soon the families will pick a suitable date to formalize it."
She carefully placed the singed letter on top of the other, intact letters on the table.
It was a detached, mechanical gesture, as if she were sorting condolence cards.
A few days ago, when I had the exact same conversation with Serepina, I had gotten unexpectedly emotional and we ended up arguing.
What came of it was the letter burning brilliantly before my eyes, but today, maybe because I had already burned it first, Serepina didn't set it on fire.
"Alright, then. Goodbye, Serepina.
Not sure if we'll see each other again."
I answered with a shrug.
Her eyes widened as if she couldn't believe it.
"...That's all you have to say?"
"Or would you prefer I kneel at your feet right now and beg for forgiveness? Promise I'll never do it again, please give me just one more chance?"
"No! At least... at least say something! Try to make an excuse!"
She wouldn't listen even if I did.
"Fine, talk. Since you're asking, I'll talk."
I looked at her squarely.
For a very long time, maybe three minutes, a suffocating silence stretched between us, filled only with the sound of our breathing.
We merely exchanged glances in silence.
I was the first to speak.
"Though I don't know where to begin. You already made up your mind before coming here, didn't you?"