Episode 26

Anastasia left with Aiden, telling me to rest comfortably, and afterward I scraped up and ate every last bit of the thin rice gruel that was hardly enough to fill my stomach.

Then, after taking my medicine, I had a mission to trip a maid, but when I ended up tripping over my own foot instead, energy came surging back into me. Because everything I had to do today was finished.

So when Leden came to see me, I asked brightly.

“Can I go home now?”

“No. Stay for another week.”

“It’s too much pressure for me. How am I supposed to stay in the royal palace of all places?”

“I’m here, so it’s fine.”

He said it indifferently and sat in the chair Aiden had occupied a short while ago, opening a thick book. Come to think of it, when I first saw Leden, he had been reading a book just like that too.

“Hey, Aiden wouldn’t tell me everything, so... how did I get better?”

“You’re not curious about how you got hurt?”

“...Uh, um...”

“I wondered if that was the case. You know the reason, don’t you? Why it suddenly happened.”

I shouldn’t have brought it up. Leden even closed his book, as if he meant to have a proper conversation, and I quietly lay down on the bed and turned my back to him.

“Keeping your mouth shut like that won’t do any good. Or was it really something those two did?”

At Leden’s words, I immediately turned back to look at him.

“Oh, right! I heard those two had a complaint filed against them. Was that you, Leden?”

“Who else would it be?”

“Why? Why did you do that? You know it wasn’t them. I was fine even when I met you, Leden. It’s true I was in the subspace with those two, but I got hurt after the subspace disappeared. You know all that, so why are you framing them?”

“That’s why I’m asking. Who made you like that?”

At Leden’s tone, as if he were grinding out the words, I blinked rapidly in surprise. What? Is Leden angry right now?

“Leden, are you angry?”

“Don’t change the subject.”

“Don’t be too angry. I’m perfectly fine now, so it’s all right.”

“Haa...”

At my words, he let out an openly exhausted sigh and rubbed between his brows with his eyes closed. The sight felt unfamiliar. Why was he angry?

Soon after, he opened his eyes. He looked tired somehow. Like someone who hadn’t slept for days.

“You seem to be misunderstanding something. You almost died.”

“...”

“Your stomach was split open. It’s not something to brush off lightly. Do you not understand what I’m saying?”

“Leden, I...”

“You’re fine now, so it’s all right? It might be all right for you, but it isn’t for me.”

As he spoke, his head gradually lowered. When I could no longer see his face, I murmured, no way, and carefully climbed down from the bed.

After hesitating, and hesitating again, I quietly put both knees on the floor and looked up at his face. Naturally, our eyes met. At the same time, he murmured as if he couldn’t understand it.

“For ten years, you tormented me by causing trouble. And now you’re going to torment me by being sick and getting hurt?”

I couldn’t answer at all and carefully cupped his cheek. Sunset-colored drops were beading in his eyes and falling.

I was so flustered that I couldn’t say anything. Only the word why spun dizzily through my head.

You... You didn’t cry even when Rene died. You never cried to the very end. So why...

“You asked if I was angry? Yes, I was angry. Because you were dying right in front of me, and there was nothing I could do.”

“...”

“Worried? Yes, damn it, I was worried.”

Every time he blinked, sunset light fell.

Yes, he was crying. As if he were truly upset, as if the fact that I had been hurt made him sad. And that was why I couldn’t understand it.

Didn’t you hate me? Hadn’t you given up on me, on Rene, so completely that you wouldn’t shed a single tear even if I died?

There was one thing I knew. When he, who was blunt and always so sharp with me, shed tears, strangely, truly inexplicably, I felt as if I might cry too.

As if he really were my family. As if he really were my own brother. Seeing him cry made my heart ache. And I was curious.

Had Leden cherished Rene Blair from the very beginning, or had his thoughts changed because of me?

Who was he crying for right now? For Rene Blair, whom he had lived with his entire life? Or for me, who had only spent a little over a month with him?

“I was scared you would die too.”

“...”

“Even someone like you is family... my younger sibling... Ridiculously enough. Ridiculously...”

“...”

“What exactly is all right about this? When I think about you dying, even now I still...”

Leden placed his hand over the back of mine as it cupped his cheek. His hand was colder than usual. Only then did I remember. When he became extremely tense, his hands grew cold.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, Leden. I wasn’t thinking... Don’t cry, okay? I’m sorry...”

When he said he had been worried about me, that he had been scared I would die, that he had been angry because there had been nothing he could do back then, the only thing I could say was an apology: I’m sorry.

But Leden’s tears didn’t stop. It seemed that once someone who didn’t cry easily broke down, he didn’t know how to stop.

Ah, why am I so bad at comforting someone who’s crying?

Having always been clumsy at comforting and soothing others since I was young, I pressed my lips together and moved my hand.

I pulled down his soft, fluttering sleeve with my palm and wiped around Leden’s eyes with it. When the area around his eyes eventually turned red, as if stained with flower dye, I smiled as though I might cry.

“Crybaby. Such a crybaby.”

“...”

“I won’t say things like that anymore. I... I didn’t know you would worry about me, Leden. If I’d known you were worried... I wouldn’t have spoken so lightly. I’m sorry, okay?”

“...”

“...You’re still angry, aren’t you? Uh, what do you think would make you feel better? Should I write, um, a written pledge that I won’t speak carelessly anymore...”

When I hesitantly asked him that, he firmly pushed my shoulder. Thanks to that, I could no longer see his face. All I could see were tears sparkling as they fell from the recoil of pushing me away.

Guilt pricked at my chest. I naturally placed both fists on top of my already kneeling knees. What could I do to make Leden feel better?

As I thought so hard my head felt hot, Leden, who still had his head lowered so that only the crown of his head was visible, spoke first.

“Then do just one favor for me.”

“A f-favor?”

To be honest, it was unexpected, so I was a little flustered, but I immediately nodded vigorously.

“A favor! A favor is easy enough...! What is it? I’ll do anything, if it makes you feel better, Leden!”

“You mean that.”

“Of course I do! Just say the word!”

I said it boastfully and nodded hard again.

He, who had been looking downward, took a long, deep breath and raised his head. At the same time, the tears that had been beading and falling stopped completely.

...Huh?

I stared blankly at him, stunned by the absurdly swift change in expression, as if he had taken off a mask. He wiped his cheek indifferently and opened his mouth.

“Then tell me right now. Who hurt you?”

“...Wh-what? Don’t tell me you just... cried aiming for this...?”

“That’s my favor.”

You’ll do it, won’t you? At Leden’s final question, I genuinely felt a strong sense of betrayal.

* * *

After agonizing over it for a long while, I began with, You have to believe me even if it’s hard to believe, and told Leden everything.

Of course, I left out the fact that I had possessed this body.

Even while I was telling him, and even now that I had told him everything, I wondered whether it had really been all right to tell him, but what was done was done.

I couldn’t predict how he would react. He might scathingly ask if I was lying because I had nothing better to do, or he might silently let it pass in one ear and out the other.

‘It feels like we’ve gotten a little closer, but what if he thinks I’m crazy and pulls away again?’

That was my only worry. Earlier, he had stopped crying as if nothing had happened, and although I found that absurd too, I dared say this: his tears had not been fake.

……I want to believe that.

I still didn’t know whether he had shed tears because of “me,” or because of “Rene Blair”…… but we had gotten closer. Surely.

But if confessing everything now sent us right back to where we started……

Having thought that far without meaning to, I felt relieved that I hadn’t revealed the fact that I was actually someone who had possessed this body and wasn’t Rene Blair.

He wouldn’t even believe the story about missions, so would he believe that I was actually a person from another world who had possessed someone inside a novel?

Even if he did believe me, that would be a problem. If he believed it, then instead of our current, slightly closer relationship returning to its starting point, it would probably become even worse.

Because I wasn’t his real younger sister.

I grew melancholy at the thought of Reuden becoming even colder to me than he was now and began biting my lip, but unexpectedly, he asked a question in a serious tone.

“If that’s true, since when did these missions start appearing?”

“…….”

“Since ten years ago? Since that was when you started acting like you’d gone mad.”

I couldn’t answer. That was something only the original Rene Blair would know.

At my silence, Reuden quietly furrowed his brow. Perhaps taking my silence as agreement, he didn’t ask further and moved on.

“Fine, then. What was today’s mission?”

“……Huh? Why are you curious about that?”

“Because from what I saw, you didn’t seem to do anything crazy today. If what you’re saying is true, you receive a penalty if you don’t complete the mission within the day. Physical pain, at that.”

“Oh, uh, right? But I already completed the mission. It was to trip a maid and make her fall…… so before you came, I tripped myself.”

At his look that seemed to ask what on earth I was talking about, I had to explain why I had asked him to hand over authority over the servants to me as well.

He nodded as if he understood.

“So that was why you slapped her recently.”

“Exactly!”

At my clear answer, he remained silent for a moment, then soon tapped the armrest of his chair with his finger. It was a habit that came out whenever he was lost in thought.

I wondered how long he stayed like that before he finally opened his mouth.

“As you said, it’s hard to believe. I’ve never heard of or seen such a case.”

“…….”

“But I’ll try to believe you. However, there’s something I don’t understand.”

“……What is it?”

“If everything you said is true…… then all this time, when you persistently tormented Sollen, or appeared at banquets and turned them into chaos…… and Duke Budwords……”

He paused for a moment before continuing.

“At any rate, if all of your insane actions were things you did because of missions, why did you suddenly change your mind?”

“Huh?”

“Even two months ago, you followed the missions as if it were nothing, so why are you only now trying not to follow them? And why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

Uh, that was……

I was being asked far too many questions today that left me flustered. I felt like my brain was going to go numb from working so hard.

Separately, his question was reasonable. I had also found it strange that Rene Blair had obediently followed the missions to the letter instead of using loopholes like I did.

If she had evaded them moderately and confessed everything to Reuden like I was doing now, she wouldn’t have been called a delinquent.

Had there been a reason? Or had it never even occurred to her to use loopholes?

When I couldn’t answer right away, Reuden sighed. I flinched guiltily.

“If you don’t want to say it, fine.”

“…….”

“Still, remember this one thing. What you’ve done all this time doesn’t disappear.”

He spoke indifferently.

“No matter how much it was because of the missions, you did a lot of things to people that you should never have done.”

“……That’s, true.”

“Whenever it may be, make sure you apologize. To the people you hurt.”

When he finished speaking, a heavy silence fell.

Reuden was right. Although they weren’t things I had done, if I wanted to build amicable relationships from now on, apologizing was absolutely necessary.

I still hadn’t even apologized for slapping Anastasia on the day I possessed this body. If I wanted to change people’s perceptions, the most basic thing was to apologize, and yet I hadn’t done it all this time.

It felt as though I had been struck hard on the back of the head.

Just then, Reuden broke the silence.