[Episode 10] — I Hope We Get Along (3)
Marchioness Lorenzo.
In terms of the game’s story, she had once been the First Queen’s “godmother,” and the queen’s “guardian,” the one who had overseen her education since the days when the First Queen was merely a noble young lady, before she ascended to the position of queen.
And now, she was one of the NPCs in charge of being the princess’s “educator.”
If, while raising the princess, you assigned Marchioness Lorenzo as her educator, you could secure a fairly high “Knowledge” stat early on.
With the outrageous performance of giving 1.5 times more “Knowledge” than other educators, I, too, had naturally been won over by that performance at first and entrusted the princess’s education to Marchioness Lorenzo.
If there was a downside, it was that the princess suffered a great deal of stress from the lessons. But even taking the princess’s stress into account, Marchioness Lorenzo’s performance had looked extremely appealing.
Back then, I had been quite pleased.
After all, the princess, who kept dying because of the witch, was receiving the marchioness’s education, raising her stats, and overwhelmingly clearing the story. I had felt a thrill from watching it.
So naturally, I left the princess’s “Knowledge” stat entirely to Marchioness Lorenzo. I was certain that this time, I would finally see the happy ending…
Back then, I had no way of knowing.
That Marchioness Lorenzo was, in truth, a trap NPC.
That if the princess became entangled with her for too long, she would head straight for a “bad ending.”
The me of that time could not have known.
*
“What brings the First Queen’s dog here?”
I tilted my head slightly to the side and, lowering only my eyes, glanced down at the marchioness. The key to this pose was to never lower my head. If I crossed my arms on top of that, it would be the icing on the cake.
Looking down at the other person by rudely moving only my eyes.
This was Vivian’s basic posture when looking at someone.
Perhaps displeased by my attitude, the marchioness narrowed her eyes and glared at me. I smirked as if to say, So what are you going to do about it? and provoked her even further.
The reason I was hostile toward Marchioness Lorenzo was simple.
Because the princess was receiving the marchioness’s education.
Because I knew very well what would happen if she stayed by that woman’s side for too long. Therefore, if I wanted to separate the princess from her no matter what, I had no choice but to antagonize the marchioness.
As if exhausted from our battle of wills, the marchioness let out a sigh and turned her head to look down at the princess. The princess flinched at that gaze and gave a small tremble of her shoulders.
“As Your Majesty the Queen is aware, I have been appointed by His Majesty to be Her Highness the Princess’s ‘education supervisor.’ It will soon be time to begin lessons, so I merely came to escort Her Highness.”
The marchioness spoke to me politely, using honorifics, but her tone and behavior suggested that I was not worth another word. I turned my head slightly and looked at the princess.
I was certain the princess had said earlier…
“The princess said it isn’t time for class yet.”
“…Is there truly a set time for studying? Her Highness must become an excellent person in the future. The more time she devotes to her studies, the better, would you not agree?”
“Isn’t it the class time you set? Then why don’t you at least keep to that time?”
“It is only natural to adjust the time according to the lesson. Surely, when Your Majesty was young, such things must have happened often as well?”
…She really won’t lose a single exchange, will she?
For some reason, I felt as though I could interpret what the marchioness was saying. In other words, she had definitely just said to me, “Were you not educated properly as a child?”
So this was an elegant war of words between nobles?
I remained with my arms crossed, tapping my fingers against my forearm as I fell into thought. What should I do about the marchioness? No matter how much I was the Second Queen, I couldn’t very well defy the king’s order.
In other words, I was in no position to do anything right now about the marchioness, who had become the education supervisor under His Majesty’s command. Even if I told her to stop, His Majesty’s order would take priority for her…
‘…Should I just overturn everything, the way Vivian would?’
…Even if I caused a scene with the marchioness here, it probably wouldn’t become much of a problem. To everyone watching, it would simply seem like, “Vivian is being Vivian again,” and they would think nothing of it.
However…
I lowered my gaze slightly and looked at the princess and Ellie. The princess was at a loss between the marchioness and me, busily swinging her head left and right.
‘I’ve only just started shedding Vivian’s infamy. I don’t want to add to it by doing more Vivian nonsense.’
Haa.
All I could do in this frustrating situation was sigh. If only the king weren’t in seclusion, I could somehow meet him and request that the marchioness be removed as the princess’s education supervisor.
But right now, the king was basically an unemployed shut-in…
In this situation, the only thing I could do was retreat for the moment and plan for the future. Still, simply backing down like this was rather irritating.
So—
“Princess.”
“Y-Yes…?”
I looked at the princess and asked with a bright smile.
“You decide. Will you play with Ellie and me until class time, or will you go take your lesson as you are? I’m sure the marchioness will also respect the princess’s choice.”
“Pardon?”
“What is it, Marchioness Lorenzo? Don’t tell me you intended to drag the princess to class by force? Without even asking for her opinion?”
“I-I am Her Highness the Princess’s education supervisor…! Therefore—”
“Therefore, since you are her education supervisor, you will ignore the princess’s opinion?”
The marchioness looked up at me as if she found me absurd.
So what? What can you do here?
No matter how much the marchioness was the princess’s “education supervisor,” this place was thoroughly a class society. Even an old marchioness could not disregard the opinion of a young princess. That was the kind of society this was.
When things did not go as she wanted, the marchioness’s pale face flushed red and white. Then she let out a sigh and looked at the princess with a kindly expression.
“Of course. I always respect Her Highness the Princess’s opinion.”
“That is something you ought to do as a vassal.”
The moment I finished speaking, I felt the marchioness’s gaze burn like fire, but I paid it no mind and looked down at the princess. The princess blinked as though she could not comprehend the current situation.
“Princess.”
“Your Highness.”
The marchioness and I called the princess at the same time. The princess’s eyes shook violently, as if an earthquake had struck them. As though she had no idea what she was supposed to do.
However, we did not have time to wait for the princess’s judgment. The marchioness and I stood on either side of the princess, then crouched as if calling a puppy and spread our arms wide.
“Come here! Princess!”
“No! Come this way! Your Highness!”
*
To state only the result, I was the loser.
Was it because I had known the princess for too short a time? The princess wavered back and forth as if agonizing over it, but in the end, she took the marchioness’s hand. It was a shame, but I supposed there was nothing I could do.
I returned to my room and rolled around on the bed, trying to soothe this complicated feeling. I had gone out for a walk because I wanted to feel refreshed, but in the end, I had come back feeling unpleasant.
“Haa—”
—Please cheer up already. It couldn’t be helped, could it? Vivian didn’t have a good relationship with Her Highness the Princess in the first place. Every time Vivian met Her Highness, she would hurl abuse at her…
“…Yeah. I guess it can’t be helped. In the first place, today was basically the first time I met the princess.”
Once I lay still and thought about it again, however, I still couldn’t help feeling irritated. All I could do was kick the blanket with my feet over and over to calm myself down.
“Whoo, whoo—”
—That temper of yours…
It was an irritating incident, but there were still things I had learned from it. First was what Marchioness Lorenzo had said, that she had become the princess’s education supervisor “by His Majesty’s command.” The moment I heard those words, I knew for certain.
‘Ah, the “king” isn’t a “possessor” like me.’
Honestly, after I possessed Vivian’s body, the thing I had been most worried about was the possibility that the “king” was a possessor like me. His seclusion—well, I had thought he might have shut himself away to escape reality after being possessed.
However, any user who had played even a little of that game would never appoint Marchioness Lorenzo, a trap NPC, as the princess’s education supervisor.
If someone saw that ending and still appointed the marchioness as education supervisor, that person wouldn’t be human. Therefore, the king definitely could not be a possessor.
In the first place, if the king had been possessed by someone like me, he would have thoroughly driven “Vivian” out of the royal castle first, or killed her. I hadn’t been certain until now, but the marchioness’s words had given me confirmation.
Then why on earth had the king gone into seclusion? Vinchaud, Ainsel—both of them said they didn’t really know why the king had shut himself away… Could something have happened between the king and the First Queen?
For some reason, the First Queen didn’t seem to be active either. Was the First Queen even alive in the first place? But Ainsel had clearly said that “Vivian performed the ritual to switch bodies with the First Queen”…
No matter how much I thought about it, I couldn’t find an answer. Regarding the First Queen, Vinchaud, Ainsel, and even Ellie the maid had told me nothing. They kept avoiding the subject.
“…Ainsel.”
—Yes?
…So, putting aside what I didn’t know, the most important thing right now was none other than the “princess.” The problem was how to drive out “Marchioness Lorenzo,” who was entangled with the princess.
The only thing I could do for the princess right now was—
“Tell me everything you know about the princess.”
—Y-Yes? All of a sudden?
“Even trivial things are fine. What she likes, what she dislikes, how old she is. In the first place, I don’t even know the princess’s name.”
It seemed the only method was to become as close to the princess as possible, then keep the marchioness in check. The best I could do was stop the marchioness’s filthy obsession.
—Uh… Do you really have to ask me about Her Highness the Princess? I-I don’t really know…
“…? You said you’d been in the royal castle for a long time…? Then you should at least know the princess’s age and name.”
—Th-That may be true, but… Ah! How about asking Ellie?
“…? Ainsel, don’t avoid my eyes.”
Ainsel, who kept avoiding my gaze whenever we talked about the princess, was suspicious.
Now that I thought about it, Ainsel called the princess in a slightly special way. She called the king and queen just as they were, yet with the princess, she always attached the honorific and called her “Her Highness the Princess.”
When I moved closer to the mirror and met her gaze, Ainsel’s eyes began darting in every direction. This was clearly the reaction of someone hiding something.
“You’re hiding something from me about the princess, aren’t you?”
—Uh, th-that is…
“Hurry up and tell me, before I smear fingerprints all over the mirror and don’t wipe them off.”
—Ah, d-don’t do that! That’s seriously filthy!
When I tried to bring my finger to the mirror, Ainsel shrieked in horror. Then, after lowering her head as if thinking for a moment, she let out a deep sigh and looked at me.
—I can’t tell you everything, but for now, I’ll tell you about Her Highness the Princess’s personal details.
“…Want a taste of my fingerprints?”
—Ah!! No—!! There’s nothing I can do about the things I can’t say! It would be the same even if you asked other fairies! This is something like a characteristic of our “race”!!
“…? Is that so?”
If she was going that far, then I supposed it couldn’t be helped.
I didn’t really understand, but because of what I had seen in the game, I didn’t press her any further. Perhaps it was about how the princess could also “see fairies”?
In the first place, the seven dwarfs were “fairies” too.
If I thought about it, it was only natural that the princess could see fairies.
—…Anyway, after you hear this, don’t get angry like you did in front of the marchioness earlier. First, Her Highness the Princess is six years old. Her birthday is coming up soon, so she’ll be seven.
“? Wait, why are you saying I’ll get angry?”
—And Her Highness the Princess’s name is…
*
The secluded room used for the princess’s lessons.
The moment they entered it, Marchioness Lorenzo’s complexion turned pitch-black. As though she had taken off the mask she had worn until now, her expression changed in an instant, and the princess swallowed dryly, tense.
The door closed, and the marchioness turned around and gripped the princess’s shoulders hard.
“Why were you with Her Majesty the Second Queen?”
“Th-That is… I was sleeping under a tree…”
Squeeze— as if wringing out a rag, the marchioness twisted the princess’s arm. The princess was about to scream in pain, but she bit her lower lip herself and held it in.
“Why do you insist on going around doing such vulgar things? Last time, you arbitrarily accepted candy from the maids, and this time, you slept under a tree? Why do you not understand your own worth?”
“Ugh, hng…!”
“Her Majesty the Queen, your mother, never once did such vulgar things in her entire life! So why do you!!”
To the princess, this much pain was something she could endure.
But the words that came from the marchioness’s mouth next caused pain as though a knife were gouging through her heart, and she could no longer bear it.
“Because Your Highness behaves like this, His Majesty must not have given Your Highness a name.”
Tears welled in her large eyes and soon silently rolled down her cheeks.
Drip. Drip.