Disbelief
The Belmont ducal house ran on cold pragmatism. If someone was deemed a lost cause, they were severed without mercy—even if that person happened to be a scion of their own blood.
Even by the most generous of standards, it could never be called a kind family to Louis. He had tried to earn their approval, of course. Yet he lacked talent, and his intellect was far from sharp. Compared to the effort he poured in, the returns were pitifully meager. Perhaps out of quiet rebellion against such suffocating rigidity, he found solace in small acts of defiance from an early age. His favorite pastime had been slipping down into the village on the ducal estate and wandering aimlessly.
He must have been around eight years old when he met Leni for the first time.
His very first impression was that she was completely different from him. Radiant skin, soft brown hair fluttering in the breeze, and a pure, carefree smile as she strolled across the open clearing—that image remained vividly etched in Louis's memory to this day.
"Hello there."
She had been the one to approach first. They became fast friends, largely because Leni was sickly and had no companions of her own. Even when she found out he was the son of a duke, she treated him just as she always had. Louis loved her bright, cheerful spirit. When he was with Leni, he didn't have to agonize over what he needed to achieve or how well he had to perform.
One day, Leni asked him a question.
“What do you want to be when you grow up?”
Louis hesitated for a brief moment before answering.
“…A flower shop owner.”
The second son of a duke wanting to run a flower shop. He had braced himself for ridicule, naturally. It was a wish he had never confessed to anyone, yet around her, the words slipped out with effortless ease. He had startled even himself the second he spoke them.
“Hehe, that sounds lovely.”
“What kind of flower do you like the most?”
“I don't know. I just like all flowers.”
She had simply nodded, accepting it without question. Because her reaction had been so lighthearted and ordinary, the memory lingered with him all the longer.
Louis wanted to visit Leni every single day. In her presence, he felt he could truly be himself. Yet as his father's silent pressure grew heavier, the days Louis broke his promises multiplied, paralyzed by fear of the patriarch's watchful eye. He never explained his circumstances. He feared that if Leni knew he was walking on eggshells around his father, it would make her uncomfortable. He was terrified she might never ask to see him again.
And so, the days Leni stood waiting all alone, only to turn back in solitude, grew more frequent.
Then came the day Leni brought up moving away. Louis felt his heart drop straight into his stomach, but he forced himself to listen to her tearful words to the end. She asked if he could come tomorrow without fail. She wanted to see him before she left, crying that there was still so much she wanted to do together. Hooking their pinkies, he swore he would be there.
As cruel fate would have it, the patriarch cornered him that very evening, issuing a stern warning: "If you waste your time and attention on such worthless trifles one more time, you will find me deeply disappointed."
Louis was ignorant, but he wasn't an idiot. He knew precisely what lay behind the word disappointed.
He agonized through the night and into the morning, agonizing over and over. He resented the relentless passage of time and cursed the rising sun. Every passing second felt as though the world were flickering on the verge of extinction. Should I just sprint out right now?
In the end, it was ten at night by the time he finally bolted from the estate.
Though the pouring rain chilled him to the bone, he ran and ran without stopping. The thought of losing his first and only friend terrified him. But when he arrived, Leni was nowhere near the bench beneath the tree. Only a small, less-drenched patch on one corner remained to show that someone had been sitting there until moments ago. Resting there in the cold were two withered forget-me-nots, thoroughly beaten down by the rain.
He sprinted across the village searching for her, but soon halted, having no idea where to go. He had never even asked which house was hers. He didn't know what illness plagued her, how old she truly was, or where she was moving. Because they had always met at that same tree, he had foolishly assumed she would be waiting there forever whenever he decided to show up. He should have listened to her stories, too, but he had been the only one chattering away excitedly about finally having a friend.
When they reunited at the academy years later, she had smiled and greeted him with the exact same tone as before.
Those were the memories left behind in this body when I transmigrated into it. And alongside them lingered a faint sense of estrangement—the uncomfortable feeling that, beneath that identical smile, something was fundamentally different from the past. Louis had never asked why. Simply because she still smiled at his side, he had convinced himself that everything had long since been forgiven.
“Terminally ill…?” Leni asked, her voice faltering.
“Yeah.”
I had no particular desire to hide it. She had asked, so I simply answered. Leni studied my face for a fleeting moment before letting out a light chuckle.
“Come on, don't tell lies like that.”
“It's the truth.”
“Louis.”
Her voice carried a soothing, coaxing lilt, like someone dealing with a child who had already been caught in an obvious fabrication.
“I'm not lying.”
Normally, I would have laughed it off and smoothly changed the subject. Leni seemed to be waiting for whatever punchline or excuse I would offer next. But I didn't smile. I didn't lift the corners of my mouth at all.
After reuniting at the academy, I had tried to explain what happened that rainy night. It was convenient for the progression of the original story, if nothing else. But the Louis that Leni witnessed at the academy was a reckless scoundrel who threw his family's name around to indulge in whatever he pleased. Naturally, she hadn't believed a single word. Both of us wore masks; I played the role of an earnest honor student, and Leni played along with the rhythm. I could have easily brushed it aside today, just as we always did. But I was simply too exhausted to keep up the charade.
“It was the truth back then, and it's the truth now.”
“You…”
She swallowed the rest of her sentence. I didn't linger to hear it.
“Forget it. Don't believe me if you don't want to.”
The moment I turned away, Leni grabbed my sleeve.
“You're acting strange today. Is this because of Chloe?”
Hearing that name brought my feet to a dead stop.
“Do you think I killed Chloe, too?”
It was born of genuine curiosity. Leni's reply came noticeably slower than usual.
“I wasn't there.” Flustered, she rushed to add, “So if you would just explain—”
“You wouldn't believe me anyway.”
“That's…”
Leni's lips parted, only to snap shut. Watching her struggle to select her words felt jarringly unfamiliar. Normally, no matter what I threw at her, she was the type to fire back a retort without missing a beat. She let out a shallow breath.
“Louis.”
“What.”
“…Why are you treating me like this right now?”
“So it's my fault now? Well… whatever. You're not going to believe anything I say anyway. Because I'm the Belmont family's good-for-nothing delinquent.”
Leni's mouth twitched as if trying to force another smile, but this time, the expression failed to hold.
“Do you really think…” She paused, her pitch dropping into a lower register. “Do you truly believe that's the only reason I can't trust you?”
She released my sleeve, her fingers dropping away.
“Do you honestly think I'm just judging you on some petty whim of my own?” She exhaled a heavy, ragged sigh before pressing on. “Louis, I was right there when you tried to steal my academic marks.”
It was a misunderstanding. I still genuinely cared for Leni as a person. I hadn't been trying to steal her grades; I had stepped in to stop another student who was attempting to take credit for them. But things had gotten twisted in the chaos, and Leni had slammed her ears shut before I could explain.
“And when you harassed me in front of everyone—”
That, too, was entirely different from what she thought. I had merely happened to be nearby and moved to confront the scoundrels who were mocking her. Unfortunately, the professor had swept the incident under the rug with a careless reprimand, lumping me in with the perpetrators. I had been framed.
“…And that night, I waited for you forever.”
To that, I had no defense whatsoever.
She fell silent for a beat. When she spoke again, her voice trembled with raw venom.
“Just because I was your childhood friend, people called me a whore behind my back.”
“…….”
I hadn't realized it had gone that far. The original Louis Belmont must have been an even viler piece of trash than I had imagined.
“Even at the academy, you kept trying to drag me close to you. Just… why? Why would you do that?”
Because you're necessary for the original plot to unfold. And… because I couldn't completely sever my lingering attachment to you.
“Look, I—” The words started out instinctively, only to lodge in my throat.
Leni's lips moved, attempting a sardonic smile, but the expression collapsed halfway.
“You're just like you were back then. You can't even offer a proper explanation, yet you're always overflowing with things to say. Only ever saying what you want to hear.”
I held my tongue. She wasn't wrong.
“I don't ever want to hear pathetic excuses like you being terminally ill again.” She spat out the final words she had been holding back, her gaze turning arctic. “Don't you dare dream of leaving until I've paid you back in full for every single thing you did to me.”
She turned on her heel and walked away. By the time she reached her circle of friends, she had already slipped her bright, cheerful mask back over her features, laughing as if nothing had happened.
The Leni that Louis remembered was nowhere to be found.
Just as Louis had changed, another face hid beneath her pleasant mask. Perhaps this bitter, hardened girl was her true self all along. To be honest, I didn't even understand why I was the one who had to shoulder all of her resentment. The fact that a corner of my chest still twinged with ache whenever I looked at her was sickeningly exhausting. I couldn't even tell anymore whether I was Louis or Louis was me.
None of it mattered anymore. I forced myself to push the churning emotions aside.
Leni had told me not to leave, but I directed my steps toward the dean's office anyway. Unfortunately, even dropping out wasn't something I could do on a whim. The administrative procedures were labyrinthine, requiring at least a week to process. I briefly debated just waiting out the week and vanishing, but realizing I had nowhere else to go, I simply agreed to accept the disciplinary suspension and leave afterward. A thirty-day confinement meant I would have nothing to do either way.
Returning to my dormitory, I locked the door behind me.
There was no longer any need to check the lecture schedule, no need to devise clever answers for the professors' inquiries, and no need to scour my notes searching for when the next catastrophic incident would occur. For a long while, I stood staring at the heavy, wooden door. In the dim, suffocating quiet of the room, time seemed to crawl by at an agonizing pace.
I set the liquor bottle on the table and gingerly peeled off my leather gloves. Loosening my outerwear, I unwound the tight bandages concealed beneath the cloth.
From the back of my right hand up past the wrist, the flesh was rotted pitch-black, seeping foul fluids.
If I had shoved this in her face, would she have believed me? Probably not. Pathetically enough, the original Louis seemed to have wanted to avoid worrying Leni to that extent. And for me, I saw no reason to go that far, not to mention there were reasons I couldn't freely expose it anyway. If she misunderstood, so be it.
“Cough.”
A thick splatter of dark blood hit the floorboards. I dragged my boot over it, casually smearing the dark crimson stain across the wood.
I wondered how Justina would react if she found out I was dying.
Would she scoff in disbelief, just like Leni?
Most likely.
Still, I found myself a little curious.