October was busy from the start.
It wasn’t because of the academy schedule. The main reason for my busyness was my personal goal.
The goal to prevent war.
I don’t know if I should say it’s a relief, but the academy was located in the Imperial Capital, near the Imperial Palace, which could be considered the heart of the Empire. It was a bit far to walk, but not impossible. Especially for someone like me who seemed to have infinite time, that distance was hardly a problem.
In other words, I could roam around the Imperial Palace at night, gathering information without any issues.
I didn’t even need to secure an escape route. Once I saw what I wanted, I could just rewind time. If I rewound time to just the moment I entered the same place, I could minimize my movement routes and secure even more time.
War does not just break out overnight.
Currently, there weren’t any big changes at the border, but to stab at the opponent’s intentions, I had to make plans long in advance.
The problem was, no matter how much I looked, I couldn’t find any evidence of that war.
The defense budget hadn’t changed much from previous years. It had increased, but most of it was just money spent on producing new weapons, which was a different story from directly deploying them to the battlefield.
While the monitor ships were being heavily constructed, they had moved back to the satellite city near the Imperial Capital after annihilating the warlord faction near the northern border last time. Some ships had gone into repairs and inspections due to excessive recoil compared to their hulls, and naturally, similar types of ships had also entered indefinite standby status.
There were no additional construction plans for battleships. Even for an Empire, building extra battleships takes a long time. And to not even have that plan in the Imperial Palace…
…Could it be hidden in another region? Had the Emperor noticed my abilities and scattered the information so far away that I couldn’t find it physically?
I thought it was a very likely story.
“Oho.”
After collecting various bits of information and failing to find anything decent, what I chose to do was visit the Emperor.
“So you’re saying you tried to find ‘the information that I might have hidden’ by ‘asking me’?”
In response to my question, the Emperor returned it with a look of amusement.
“Yes.”
“Hmm.”
The Emperor stared at me quietly for a moment and then smiled slightly.
“Then let me ask you. What would you do if a being capable of killing you was watching you?”
“……”
“Wouldn’t you consider not doing anything that a being who could kill you would dislike? Of course, it might mean altering your lifelong goals. But that doesn’t mean your life loses all meaning, does it? A goal is something you can lose one of and find a new one.”
“…So, Your Majesty is saying that because you realized I hoped for no war, you decided to give up on starting one?”
“You seem to think I was planning to start a war against the entire world.”
The Emperor said with a look of extreme interest.
“If you had thought that from the beginning, the assumption you held was shattered shortly after you assassinated the Count. If you still believed it until now… I see. I’ve already accomplished something greater than you think, haven’t I?”
“……”
“I wish you could know this fact after you return.”
Seeing the Emperor speak with a face that resembled a father enjoying a game of chess with his daughter, I was left speechless.
Again.
*
I can’t believe it.
Isn’t the opponent the Emperor? There’s a high possibility he never gave me proper information in the first place. Even though I hadn’t found anything substantial yet, I still had to prepare for the worst at all times.
Still, not everything was in vain. After wandering around the corridors of the Imperial Palace dozens, hundreds of times, I could remember them all by heart. Even the parts that didn’t appear in the game.
And the sewers leading from the Imperial Capital were the same. At the very least, I knew all the places that led to the Imperial Palace and could roughly calculate where to blow up what to cause a collapse. If something were to happen, I was already considering installing bombs in advance to bring the whole area down.
There would definitely be casualties in that process, but—
…That was talk for when the worst-case scenario happened.
And the more positive thing was, my stealth skills were improving with time.
The body of ‘Sylvia Black’ was actually quite similar to an ordinary person compared to the people in this world, but I could manage all the actions that regular soldiers could do, not needing to wield a sword or swing a weapon taller than myself. Rewinding time would cause my increased stamina to revert, but the sensations of those actions remained vividly in my memory.
If I focused hard enough, I could definitely follow someone secretly.
And soon enough, that opportunity came.
*
If there was any existence I was wary of, it would naturally be the Papal State.
The plot around the ‘Goddess’ was never resolved in the work I played. Details about the Papal State’s divine power were never clearly revealed, and whether that Goddess was a real being or, if she existed, whether she was truly benevolent was just speculation floating around among the fans. There were times I got caught posting that speculation as if it were an official translation, but that wasn’t really important now.
Anyway, it wasn’t strange that I sensed something highly suspicious when I saw the ‘Cathedral Knight’ Sophia secretly following behind Leo, the ‘male lead’ of the original work.
Since Claire and Leo were siblings, they often went around together, but as time passed and new friends were made, they sometimes ended up apart. Claire got along well with Alice or Charlotte, and she would follow me around too.
Since there weren’t many beings like that around, the time spent with friends of the same gender, sharing stories, lengthened, and that occasionally caused Leo to be left behind.
In fact, during those times, I was also part of that ‘girl group’, so I didn’t really know what Leo was doing all alone.
“……”
So, when I saw him sitting alone on a park bench filled with almost bare trees, I was quite shocked.
Thinking about it, having no close friends of the same gender despite being friendly with the surrounding girls was a more serious issue than I thought. Especially since Leo was out there mixing with the pretty girls, he inadvertently became a source of jealousy among the other boys in class, and I had no idea that it would manifest in this form of exclusion.
While it’s true that harem manga typically shows scenes of male leads being rejected by their male friends, it’s usually drawn in a playful, funny manner. Of course, portraying it in a serious form like this… was just too serious.
But seeing it with my own eyes—
“……Huh?”
And then, I saw it again.
From far away, in a corner well-separated from Leo, I caught a glimpse of the purple hair fluttering.
If it hadn’t been for the sudden strong wind, I might not have noticed it at all.
“……Sophia?”
My brows furrowed deeply.
Though her image was quite different from the Sophia of the original work, she was still the same essence of the character. Perhaps her behavior in front of me was also a perfect act, or maybe she hadn’t awakened that personality yet; she could be faithfully carrying out her duties as a Cathedral Knight.
No, she was definitely following those duties closely. It wasn’t something I had told her not to do, nor would she refrain just because I told her not to.
Was it possible she had discovered something happening to Leo? Perhaps she thought she could gain something regarding the Papal State.
“……”
As I was about to approach Leo and speak to him, I quickly turned my body and returned to my room.
Then I immediately prepared my gear.
Of course, it wasn’t a place where Leo could see me; I circled around the academy grounds so that he wouldn’t notice me at all.
At the same time, I ensured I could see where Sophia was hiding.
As I expected, it was Sophia.
Through the telescope, I could see Sophia intently watching Leo. Luckily, it seemed she hadn’t noticed my presence.
I adjusted the telescope’s angle again to watch Leo—
“……Sylvia?”
That pure voice came from behind me.
At that moment, I was proud of not screaming.
Though my shoulders shook significantly.
Carefully lifting my head, the person looking at me was none other than Charlotte.
Charlotte’s face was pale as she looked at me.
As if she were looking at a stalker.
…
No, it wasn’t like that.
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