I Start with a Bad Hand!

Someday, I feel like I’ve witnessed a similar scene before. Someone soaked and in a mess because of the rain.

Roxanne’s cold body was steaming as if she had run through the rain without an umbrella. Her crumpled eyes were either because of the water running down her head or because she genuinely wanted to glare at me. But one thing was clear, the thing pooling in her eyes wasn’t rainwater.

“Do you… want to come in?”

Both Roxanne and I knew we weren’t close enough for me to invite her into the dorm or for her to accept it. Despite the invitation, neither of us moved a step from where we stood.

“…I never intended to steal. No, I just,” 

“Okay, I get it. But at least come in and dry off a bit?”

At that moment, there was a thud from the bathroom as if someone had knocked something over. The someone I had forgotten due to the alien presence in front of me seemed to express dissatisfaction.

“…I can’t let you use the bathroom. But I can offer a towel.”

“I hate you.”

Roxanne’s small, soaked body was trembling, and her voice shook as it came out of her automatically. I turned my head to the cold words as I was glancing around the room, wondering what to clean up first.

Even while trembling all over, her glaring eyes remained steady. As I stood there, unable to respond to her desperate confession, Roxanne continued, seemingly irritated even by my silence.

“I hate your eyes, your voice, your actions, all of it.”

“Yeah. I know.”

“I hate the way you act like you know everything.”

“Yeah, that too…”

“The way you act as if nothing matters.”

She was incredibly detailed and specific about her hatred towards me…. For the first time, I felt a slight scratch on my heart. Roxanne seemed ready to hate every action I took, making it impossible for me to even try to respond.

I felt somewhat wronged. Although I eventually fell for Dietrich in the later part of the novel, the reason I read the novel in the first place was because of Roxanne. I liked your world, full of kind, gentle, and unwavering people.

I buried all those sincere feelings and said something else.

“I see. Just bear with it for a bit. I’m going to drop out.”

“…What?”

It was a bit amusing that Roxanne would be the first to hear this plan I had kept to myself.

I had decided to leave the academy a long time ago, but it was only a few days ago that I firmly solidified that decision. So, neither Agnes nor Irene, nor even the someone keenly listening from the bathroom knew about it.

‘I never thought Roxanne would be the first to hear it, but things turned out this way.’

But wouldn’t this be the best news to someone who seemed to despise me so much? And for me too, it was easier to confide in someone who would be happy about my decision rather than someone who would be sad about it. Yet, despite everything, Roxanne stood there with wide eyes, unmoving, and I too didn’t feel as relieved as I had hoped when I shared my plan.

“The worlds we live in are so different that we wouldn’t have met much anyway. Still, once this summer is over, we’ll never see each other again. You can endure that much, right?”

Is dropping out such a shocking thing to say? Roxanne is part of the student council, so she must have met people who quit school before.

Roxanne remained silent for a long time, and it was only when I started patting my aching legs out of exhaustion that she finally managed to speak.

“…Maybe.”

Avoiding my gaze that was waiting for her next words, Roxanne lowered her eyes. Her silver eyelashes trembled slightly. After biting and releasing her lips for a long time, Roxanne finally asked me, in a somewhat sorrowful tone, very slowly.

“Maybe… Cedric, I mean, Cedric-nim….”

The name Roxanne mentioned was Cedric. Not “brother,” nor just his name without any honorifics, but Cedric-nim. The subtle distance implied by that title made me sigh unconsciously.

Roxanne already knew. She knew the contents of those documents and the facts they proved.

‘Of course, if Roxanne stole those documents, she wouldn’t be unaware. But I didn’t want her to find out this way….’

Still, an inexplicable feeling welled up somewhere in my heart. Why was it so important to Roxanne whether my dropping out was because of Cedric? Despite the question, I answered straightforwardly.

“I can’t say it’s not because of him. But… he’s not the only reason. It’s just that I no longer need to be here.”

A major factor was that a few days ago, I finally learned about Dietrich’s last lingering attachment. The clue was very close. A rare book that contained Dietrich’s soul. Right in the middle of it was Dietrich’s heart, which I had been too afraid to read until now.

“Then… I want to hear your story now.”

“….”

“You came all the way here to confess that you stole those documents. I want to hear about that.”

When Roxanne finally shared that long story, after biting and releasing her lips again, I felt a thrilling shiver run down my spine.

As those aquamarine eyes flickered and reflected me, I instinctively knew.

The winning card was in my hands.

***

‘I’ve submitted my withdrawal form. I’ve gathered enough information about Lord Ferris. And I have enough medicine to last until early autumn.’

In this place where spring and flowers are late, the rain wasn’t so late. For some, it was late spring, but here it was a very short summer period. Summer in Heylem always brought long torrential rains. In the quietness of my room, the only sounds were the raindrops tapping on the window and the crackling of the firewood in the fireplace.

And still, within all that, I kept postponing the words I had wanted to say since the moment I first arrived here.

“…You need another notarized document?”

Just before the start of the vacation, I visited the cleric again. I went because my condition hadn’t improved much after Dietrich’s soul fragment in the necklace shattered, but my true purpose was different. The cleric, who was sitting at a distance watching my back as I browsed his bookshelf, raised his voice to ask clearly. Each syllable carried his reluctance.

“Yes. The same as you wrote before.”

“Wait, wait. I don’t quite understand… Are you talking about the notarized document from the other cleric…?”

“No, not that one. The same as the one given to the prince.”

The cleric let out a deep sigh. Even though he was quite far from me, the sigh was long and heavy enough to tickle the back of my head.

“A certificate proving that the owner of the body and soul are different.”

Behind his bookshelf were still rows of hidden liquor bottles. Most of them were ones I had seen before, but there were also many new ones. As I ran my hand over the half-empty bottles at the bottom, I answered nonchalantly.

“Yes.”

The cleric suddenly stood up from his seat and strode towards me. Beneath his bewildered expression seemed to be an unknown anger. There have been a lot of people getting angry at me lately. With a slightly indifferent mindset, I just watched the cleric approach.

“Why? Who are you giving it to this time? And more importantly, why do you keep revealing this to various people?”

“I had no choice back then… and this time, I really have no choice.”

“Who on earth is it that you’re willing to take such a risk for?”

Ting, ting. The bottles made a clear sound as I tapped them with my fingernails. The cleric frowned at my inattentive actions but soon stood in front of the bookshelf, crossing his arms as if to block my view. The firmness of his stance made me look up at him.

“To Dietrich’s parents.”

“…What?”

“Not his biological parents, but his adoptive parents.”

To be more precise, they were closer to being his “real” parents… actually, they were his true parents.

“I’m going to tell them. That I’m not their real daughter.”