CH 39

The first time I met you, you came down from above. You were beautiful, intelligent, strong, and above all, striking. You had something that I didn’t have. I wanted you. But already, you were already the prince’s, of all people.

But I couldn’t give up. Fortunately, I was good at magic. I searched for literature and attended classes sincerely in the beginning, thinking if there was any good way. However, I couldn’t find anything noteworthy.

In the summer, I started to help my father with his work without any reason. It was because I thought I could get confidential information.

That’s how I found [Ouka]. [Ouka] was the name of the man who had contact with you during the spring and summer vacation. From the report, I thought his magical talent was considerable. It also said that he was a spirit, so I used a spell to bring down his spirit. I didn’t expect it to work at all, because it is a magic that can only succeed if both parties are willing, but he did come down. It was on a day in October.

When I asked him how to increase my magical power, he asked me the reason. When I answered honestly that it was to get you, he taught me how to accumulate magic in objects and use it later. He also said that his hair and eyes were like that.

“Are you also [distorted]?”, he laughed, but I wonder what that meant.

In any case, I am convinced that thanks to him, I can now move forward with this plan. As a thank you, I told him about Emilia’s research for the [fall]. I had knowledge about its contents, so I thought about using it to revive the body. He simply said “Hmm, no.” But, is he sealed again? I found out when I helped with my father’s work the other day. I should have brought him back then.

…Oh, right, this pendant. Miss Rebecca, Ouka asked me to keep it for you. I’ll hand it over now.

So, where was I? Oh, [Winter] was perfect for what we were planning. If we replaced the image with magic, the teachers wouldn’t come right away and the more time we had, the more magic power we could accumulate.

I took documents and seals from my father’s place and forged special documents from the Prime Minister, and gave them to as many students as possible. The contents were to exile Miss Rebecca. That was my only hope, and the other contents were actually thought up by Ouka… Why exile? Because it was the most convenient way for me, someone like me, to get my hands on someone like you, who is the prince’s fiancee. I understood very well that His Highness loved you.

Oh, well. The reason why this plan ended in failure is probably because we couldn’t bring in the top three or top five. But it didn’t help that we couldn’t bring in anyone who would notice or people close to you.

Well, this is how the operation failed. Because of the magic jacking, we can’t use the banishment magic tools now and if I hadn’t jacked, I would have been defeated by those two top three strong.

Ah… I knew that eventually what I did would be found out. Even if it was found out later, it wouldn’t matter as long as you were exiled. Rather, I would also be exiled and be happy to go to your place.

But it’s impossible to exile you now. So, I want to say one thing. I really, Miss Rebecca, love you. If you have to become someone else’s, it’s a clichéd as it sounds, but I would rather kill you and die myself. That’s why, please close your eyes for a minute. It’s all right. It won’t take long.

***

The boy said that and formed an arrow with magic. And then he aimed the drawn arrow straight at the girl.

His sudden actions were too sudden and the girl didn’t know what he was saying, she just looked at the arrow that was aimed at her in confusion.

All of the people in the area were receiving magic jacking. They couldn’t use magic, not even defensive magic. The only one who could use magic was the boy, the user of magic. That meant that there was no way to defend against the arrow that was made of magic.

After a slight hesitation, the arrow left the boy’s hand. And it flew straight towards the girl’s chest.

The girl recognized that she would be impaled in her chest one second later, and she saw a slideshow of memories like time had stopped.

Her loved ones were surrounding her. Her mother embracing her, her brother pulling her hand, her father patting her head. Her two best friends who had always been with her.

And then, her dearest.

(I want to see His Highness.)

With that certain feeling as the last thing, the slideshow ended. The girl quietly closed her eyes, so she wouldn’t see the moment the arrow impaled her.

A few seconds passed like that.

Slowly opening her eyes, her dearest man, the one she had seen even in the slideshow, was in front of her, holding her. The girl thought that it was a happy dream.

Until something overflowed from the man’s mouth and it wet her shoulder.

The bright red thing was very vivid, and the heat that burned her shoulder brought the girl’s consciousness back to reality. The arrow that was deeply stabbed into the man’s back was piercing his heart.