Chapter 1: An Unknown World
The first thing she saw when she opened her eyes was, an unfamiliar ceiling.
She looked around to find herself in an unknown room, lying on an canopied bed she did not recognize. Where in the world am I? Did I not take my own life after after the enemy had robbed me of everything? Leticiel’s mind was in chaos.
Restless, she sat up and looked down at her chest. There was no sign of the sword or the wound from her memories. The only things there were the frilly white negligee and her own smooth porcelain skin.
But Leticiel was certain that it had happened. The sensation of her own life fading away, she could still recall it even now. Leticiel had definitely died. She was supposed to be, without a doubt, dead.
Suddenly, the worst-case scenario came to her mind. Maybe, the neighboring kingdom had someone who was skilled enough to treat even Leticiel in that state. And maybe, she had been kept alive by the neighboring kingdom.
Her face turned completely pale. If her conjectures were correct, Leticiel had been saved by the despicable enemy that had destroyed her everything.
Leticiel gave up her own life so that things wouldn’t go the neighboring kingdom’s way, so that she could be with those she loved. And yet, everything ended up going according to their wishes.
Right now, the emotion controlling Leticiel was not sadness or despair, nor was it hatred. It was an intense anger towards the neighboring country that wouldn’t even allow her to die.
Leticiel pushed away the comforter and got out of the bed. At this rate, the neighboring kingdom would use her as a tool.
Her pride would never let that happen. Taking her revenge would be easy. But even if she did, what she had lost would never return; it would be a futile effort.
Certainly, this place was within enemy territory; she had searched for anything to use, but there were no tools she could take her own life with.
As she began to grow impatient, some small glass bottles on the desk entered her line of sight. Without any hesitation, Leticiel grabbed one of the bottles and threw it onto the floor.
The bottle shattered into pieces from the impact. Ignoring the fact that the glass could cut her hand, she grasped a large shard and pointed it toward her neck.
“What happened, my la…”
Just when Leticiel was about to slash her throat, a young man clad in a black tailcoat entered the room. He had heard the sound of glass breaking and had come to investigate the cause.
“…What!? What are you doing!!?”
As soon as Leticiel’s figure entered his eyes, his face changed color. He immediately raised his voice and ran towards her.
Unlike the throne room, this room was quite small. Before the shard could pierce Leticiel’s throat, the man had pinned her hands from behind.
“Please stop!! Let go of the thing in your hand right now!!”
“Let me go…! I will not allow it to go your way! If you stop me, then I’ll even bite my tongue if I have…”
“Please don’t act so rashly!! My lady!! Lady Drossel!!!”
Leticiel suddenly stopped when she heard the man’s desperate shout. It was not because the man’s command had resonated with her heart; it was because of the name she had never heard before.
“…Lady…Drossel…?”
Who on earth was that? Wasn’t she Leticiel, the princess of a remote kingdom?
The glass shard was taken away from her while she was befuddled, but Leticiel had no time to worry about that.
When she dropped her head down, her long hair flowed gently into the edge of her vision; it was a splendid silvery-white color that gave off the impression of being translucent. But it was an unfamiliar color. After all, Leticiel’s hair was a dark blonde.
As she raised her gaze, she found a small mirror before her. It was propped up against the wall right next to the small bottles, but she hadn’t noticed it at all earlier.
The thing reflected in the mirror was the face of a girl she had never seen before. Almost transparent and lustrous silver hair, smooth porcelain white skin, almond-shaped eyes with long eyelashes, and heterochromatic irises in each eye.
Overall, she was a beautiful girl with dignified facial features. Leticiel didn’t know how old the girl was; even though she seemed young, her features made her seemed more mature. Her lack of expression gave her the impression that she was a bit unfriendly.
(Who am I, right now…?)
When she tried blinking, both her red left eye and blue right eye were covered by her eyelids. The unknown girl in the mirror was without a doubt, herself.
That fact shook Leticiel to the core. Leticiel had golden blonde hair. Both of her eyes were lavender. And her past face had retained small traces of childish youthfulness, and was not as mature-looking as this.
Even though she had stabbed herself with a sword and died, when she came to, there was not a single wound on her body. And when she thought she had been captured by the enemy, she had instead become someone she didn’t know.
(I have no idea what’s going on. Am I inside a dream or something…?)
An absentminded Leticiel was led to her bed by the maids who entered the room. They then took out a first-aid kit from somewhere and started treating her.
The hand that she had used to grasp the glass shard was covered in cuts. Leticiel stared at the maids who were sterilizing and treating her wounds in wonder.
“…Why are you not using magecraft to heal it?”
“Magecraft…? Um, are you talking about magic?”
Her question was met with another question. Once again, she heard a word she didn’t know. Perhaps this country used the word “magic” to refer to magecraft.
“Even then, my lady, only a small portion of chosen people can use healing magic from the Light Element.”
“Haa….”
“That’s why using magic to heal a wound can’t be done at a moment’s notice.”
She had never heard anything like that before. At least when she still was a princess, almost every person that could use magecraft was able to use healing magecraft. It was an age where one would simply die if they couldn’t protect themselves.
After finishing Leticiel’s treatment, the maid tidied up the first-aid kit and disappeared toward the other door in the room.
Leticiel looked at her hand wrapped in bandages. Even though the maid said that healing magic was rare, Leticiel was certain that she had used it before. She invoked her magecraft to ascertain whether or not she could really use it.
Without delay, the Mana scattered about the atmosphere obediently followed her wishes and assembled in her hands. The flow of Mana created a breeze that caused her silver hair to gently sway.
(…Huh. I can still use it like usual, after all.)
She had prepared herself for the worst for naught.
Leticiel then tried to open and close her hand; the pain from before had vanished. Just like she thought, there was no way healing magecraft would be rare.
While she was thinking about that, the maid from before came out of the door and made a respectful bow.
“My lady, we will help you get ready, so please come over here.”
The maid led Leticiel to the room… No, to the walk-in closet next door. There were several maids waiting in the room, waiting to assist her.
When she was a princess, Leticiel had to do everything like this on her own. Royalty didn’t have this kind of luxury in that age of chaos.
If they had the money to hire servants, it would have been spent improving armaments instead. And if they had the money to buy a lot of dresses, they would have invested it into armaments instead. It was the most important thing. It was to the point where even the country’s flag had to show that it was run by a warmonger. If a country failed to do even that, it would be swallowed up by the surrounding countries.
As a result, she never had servants to assist her, nor a walk-in closet with a large amount of dresses. Leticiel unconsciously pulled on her cheek.
She began to worry about the state of this country that had this level of grandiose luxury. As a princess in a war-filled world, Leticiel couldn’t believe the scene she was seeing at all.
“That really suits you, my lady.”
“…Really, thank you.”
Leticiel came out of the walk-in closet while feeling conflicted. She was dressed in a lovely cream-colored dress and decorated with graceful-looking accessories.
“Hey, you there.”
“…Yes? Are you calling for me?”
“Yeah, that’s right. There’s no one else here right. Who are you? What are you to me?”
Leticiel inquired the man standing next to the door. He was the one who had stopped her from taking her own life earlier.
She had so little information to go with, that it could be safe to say she had no understanding of her current situation. She didn’t know who he was or what his upbringing was, and, of course, she didn’t know his name either.
“Um… What do you mean? My lady…?”
“Oh, sometimes you just feel like asking strange questions like this, right?”
“Y-yes…. My name is Ruvik, my lady’s exclusive butler.”
Even though his face seemed to say that he had no idea what was going on, the man still gave her a proper self-introduction.
“Ruvik… right, that’s right. My apologies, your name suddenly escaped my mind for some reason.”
She still had yet to get a good grasp of the situation, however, it was better for her to act like ‘Drossel’.
Even though she hadn’t said anything strange, Ruvik seemed to be surprised by her reply. Ignoring him, Leticiel tried to grab the doorknob. While she was still bewildered by the current situation, her body reminded her that it was hungry, so she decided to have breakfast or something in the dining hall.
However, she was suddenly stopped by Ruvik. Leticiel then looked up at him as if to ask him why.
“My lady, your hand is injured. Please leave it to me.”
Although it was fine since she had already healed it, Leticiel felt that it was better to not say unnecessary things, and withdrew her hand.
When Leticiel passed through the door opened by Ruvik, she was greeted with splendor similar to the room that made her stagger due to its radiance.
“My lady…? Is there something wrong?”
“…With this country being pointlessly lavish like this, I’m amazed that it has yet to fall to ruin…”
“Hah…? What are you talking about, my lady? Our Platina Kingdom has been at peace for a long time now…”
Leticiel’s eyes opened wide at Ruvik’s words.There was no such thing as peace in that age of unending bloodshed.
Furthermore, another unknown word came up again. She had never heard of the Platina Kingdom before. She compared it against the names of all the countries she knew, but was unable to come up with a match.
(…Well, in that world, it was an everyday occurrence for some unknown country to appear, and by the time you learned about it, it would already be enroute to destruction.)
Leticiel assumed this country had also been born that way, and stopped paying attention to that detail.
Leticiel walked down the long hallway with Ruvik by her side. On the way, she came across an older maid with a basket filled with laundry walking the opposite way. When their eyes met, the maid slightly lowered her head, but she didn’t even try to hide her frown.
It was likely that Leticiel… or rather, Drossel… was hated by the maid. Leticiel realized this, but she carried on walking as if it didn’t happen.
As someone who had tasted the depths of despair, and went as far as taking her own life, Leticiel could no longer consider negative feelings towards her as anything but a trifling matter.
To put it nicely, she was being prudent. To put it bluntly, she didn’t care what others thought of her at all. The once cheerful Leticiel had disappeared; the current girl was cold with a completely indifferent attitude. Perhaps human nature could completely change when faced with such an extreme situation, Leticiel mused to herself, as if she was thinking about someone else entirely.
While she was elegantly walking down the hallway, Leticiel came to a sudden stop when there were no other people around. Naturally, the butler who had been walking a bit behind his master’s side came to a stop as well, and made a puzzled face.
“…Say, Ruvik.”
“Yes, what is it, my lady?”
“…Where is the… dining hall…?”
“You’ve just been wandering about aimlessly!?”
Ruvik’s hysterical voice echoed through the residence in the early morning.
* * *
With Ruvik guiding her, Leticiel finally arrived at the dining hall. It seemed that this residence was a two-storied building and the dining hall was on the first story. Leticiel’s room was the furthest most interior room on the second story.
When she entered the dining hall, the gazes of the people who had arrived and had been seated before her mercilessly pierced into Leticiel.
The four people inside the dining hall must have been Drossel’s family members.
The silver-haired, blue-eyed man sitting at the head of the table seemed to be her father. The woman with red hair and purple eyes sitting to the right of him was her mother. Opposite of her mother was Drossel’s older brother, who had silver hair and light purple eyes. And next to him was a girl close to Leticiel’s age.
Of course those relationships were all just conjectures based on their outward appearances and could be incorrect. However, it would be resolved sooner or later.
Leticiel’s seat was the closest to the entrance. Even though there were six seats on both sides of the table, there was no one facing her. She was effectively sitting alone.
Position-wise, her seat was the lowest seat. It should have been taken as a cruel humiliation, but to the current Leticiel…
(Oh my, it’s close to the dining hall entrance, how convenient.)
Her attitude had changed to the point that she would rather have shops next to her house for convenience’s sake. Something like a seat position was irrelevant to Leticiel.
“…Hm? Diane, what happened to Sareenah?”
The man who appeared to be the father sitting at the head of the table asked the woman who seemed to be the mother… Diane.
“It’s truly weird for that girl to not be here by now. Fried, do you happen to know why?”
“No, not at all.”
When asked by Diane, the silver-haired young man called Fried spat out a short reply while shutting his eyes.
“Um, Mother. Elder Sister Saree said that she’s busy with preparations for her departure, so she’ll be having breakfast in her own room.”
The other girl at the table raised her hand and timidly opened her mouth.
She had blonde hair with a red hue, and her big round light-purple eyes oozed with the type of cuteness that would stir up one’s protective instincts
”My, now that you’ve mentioned it. Today’s the day Saree will be going to her fiancé’s family territory. Thank you very much, I really appreciate it.”
“No… It was nothing at all, Mother.”
The mother praised the daughter who was acting bashful while looking delighted. In this dining hall illuminated by the morning sun, a truly beautiful picture of a harmonious family was painted.
(…We still can’t start eating? I’m really hungry.)
As one would expect, Leticiel had no interest in that happy family scene and was thinking about something completely unrelated.
For her, the concept of waiting for every family member to start a meal didn’t exist. When she was a princess, it was normal for everyone present at meal time to just start eating; an attitude of ‘if you want to wait, then wait’.
Even though not everybody was present, the father’s greeting prompted the start of the long-awaited breakfast. The four people sitting on the other side of the table started their quality family time while having their meal. The servants waiting behind them would sometimes join in on the conversation.
While that was happening, there was one person silently moving food into their mouth. That person was Leticiel.
Leticiel was staring intently at the breakfast dishes lined up before her very eyes. Mysterious crescent-shaped bread, thickly sliced bacon… she was at least able to recognize that. However, she had no idea about the yellowy object accompanying them.
In her mind, she could only think of bread as something round with a fluffy but slightly dry texture. Not to mention it was a luxury item in her former country.
“Ruvik, what in the world is this mysterious bread?”
“Mysterious… It’s just atypical croissants, my lady…”
“Oh. Then what is this runny yellow thing?”
“Y-yellow thing… That’s also just a typical scrambled egg, my lady…”
“I see. Ah, don’t mind me. I only felt like asking you that.”
Leticiel gave an arbitrary reason and ended the conversation with Ruvik, who was shaken to the core by her nonchalant nonchalant questions against common sense.
If he had to be honest, Ruvik would describe his master, Drossel, as an extremely moody person. When she got angry for no reason, she would lash out at her servants. When she cried, she would have them spoil her. As the one who had been serving as her exclusive butler for years, Ruvik understood Drossel the most.
However, even if she had been a moody person, she had been acting extremely strange today. When the scene of her sudden attempt on her own life came to his mind, it was as if a light bulb went off in his head; Ruvik realized that her speech and behavior had completely changed. He felt that she had become cold and started doing everything at her own pace.
Ruvik had no idea why Drossel’s words and actions had suddenly become incomprehensible. Maybe she had some screws go loose because of the harsh treatment she received from her surroundings?
“Ruvik, where did this bacon come from?”
“Because the Master likes their taste, we stock them from a southern merchant who has been in our favor.”
“Hmmm… I can’t get over this translucence. It tastes normal like I thought.”
“…Huh? Nooor….m-mal…?”
“That’s right. Bacon with fat being translucent like this is delicious… I think”
“You… think…”
“I’ve never eaten it before after all.”
In that age, having meat in a meal was already too much of a luxury. Besides royalty, everyone would have been content with having meat once every three days. High quality bacon was something that only existed in dreams.
Recalling that, Leticiel stuffed her mouth with the thickly-sliced bacon.
Finishing her breakfast in a flash, Leticiel promptly withdrew from the dining hall. She returned to her room and collapsed face up onto the bed, and gazed at the ceiling.
There had been too many unexpected events today. Even though she had gone with the flow and had gotten through them all somehow, she needed to carefully sort through all the information.
First, Leticiel was a princess, the princess of a remote kingdom in a war-filled world. Then, she lost everything because of the neighboring country’s invasion. With no reason left to live, she took her own life.
However, for some unknown reason, Leticiel had been granted a new life as an unknown girl named Drossel. The girl seemed to be a daughter of a family of considerably high status.
Leticiel was a realist. She neither spoke of nor believed in baseless supernatural things; however, it was impossible for her to deny it this time.
(…It’s like I’ve been transmigrated.)
Metempsychosis. The concept of transmigration of soul to another body after death.
In that cruel world, this concept of salvation was wildly welcomed. And with that as the slogan, people came together to create a new religion of sorts. Of course, Leticiel didn’t believe in it, but with her current situation, it was the only possible explanation.
As for Drossel’s family, it was more or less made up of her parents, a pair that seemed to be her siblings and another either older or younger sister. However, it seemed that they disliked Drossel.
Out of everyone, the only two who she had yet to confirm the names of were those of the father and the unknown sister. Beyond that, the only other name she knew was that of her exclusive butler, Ruvik.
Furthermore, Leticiel was currently in a country called the Platina Kingdom, which seemed to be at peace. From the perspective of the Princess of War, it was something that would make her eyes open wide while thinking it as some sort of a joke. But after observing the situation of this residence, it was really the truth.
For Leticiel, it would have been ordinary for at least three reports relating to disputes to be brought up during breakfast. In addition, food being poisoned was so commonplace that having poison tasters was indispensable.
Above all, their extravagant and luxurious life showed that the family had too much money. It showed that they weren’t spending money on armaments to solidify their power. In conclusion, this country was not in a situation where they had to spend everything on armaments to survive.
(…How long has it been since the age I lived in?)
Leticiel concluded that this time period was completely different to the one she used to live in. But, the only way to find out when it ended and how many months and years had passed was through history books.
When Leticiel thought about going to the archives or something and got up, she heard a knock from outside of the room. After getting her permission, Ruvik entered the room.
“What is it?”
“My lady, it’s time for you to head to the academy.”
Leticiel stared blankly at Ruvik with that announcement. Academy… a word referring to an ancient garden. It should be a place to study something.
“Academy…?”
“Huh? Yes… the academy.”
“…”
“…My lady… Are you really okay?”
“Why are you worrying about me?”
The words, ‘because you have been acting weird since morning,’ went up to Ruvik’s throat, but due to his astounding force of will, they were caught in there.
In the Platina Kingdom, education at the academy was compulsory for aristocrats’ heirs and daughters when they turned 16. It was no exception for Drossel, who had turned 16 this year; The entrance ceremony for Lucrezia Academy was just about a month ago.
This is common sense for everyone in this kingdom, why does she look so confused? Ruvik, who had been at her mercy since morning, gradually began to feel a sharp pain in his stomach.
Oblivious to his pain, Leticiel started to think about the place called “academy.”
In her time, the thing called academy didn’t exist. Knowledge was something that was passed down from generation to generation through word of mouth. There was no need to ask a stranger to teach you.
If it was history, you just needed to ask your grandparents, and they would tell you as much as you wanted. If it was the way to use magecraft, you just needed to ask adults with more experience to go into detail, and you would be able to use it in the blink of an eye. Even etiquette, reading, writing, mathematics, everything else was just like that.
Or rather, building a school and gathering the future of your country in a single place would be the same thing as telling your enemies, ‘please kill them’.
Why does this country have an academy? Perhaps the act of orally passing down information through your family was not common practice in this country. Isn’t it inefficient having strangers teach you things when you could just ask your relatives instead…? Despite those questions running through Leticiel’s head, the fact remained that she was to go to the academy.
“Well that’s fine. The academy right, I got it.”
“…Uh… Please wait a moment, my lady!”
As she got out of bed and headed for the door just like that, Ruvik stopped Leticiel once again.
“What now?”
“N-no… My Lady, uniforms are mandatory at the academy so you need to change…”
“Oh… right…”
“Also, are you not going to bring your bag…? You would be in trouble without your textbooks…”
“…Bag…”
Leticiel looked up at Ruvik, who was making a very rude face for some reason.
An awkward silence settled into the room, and in the end, Leticiel lowered her gaze and started looking around the room.
On the shelf of something that looked like a desk, there was a bag with a shoulder strap made out of high-quality leather. That sense of useless luxury again… Wait, so ‘bag’ should be referring to that thing, but…
“…Uniform?”
“My lady… Had you not been wearing it until yesterday…?”
Ruvik’s gaze pointed to the basket next to the entrance of the walk-in closet. Some clothing was neatly folded inside the basket.
A short back-length black jacket, a white shirt with two incisions on the shirttail, and a checkered skirt. Next to the basket was a pair of brown lace-up boots. Perhaps they were meant to be worn together.
(…What is this black thing that looks like a pair of pants?)
There were things like a ribbon and a badge placed inside the basket alongside the jacket and the shirt, and among them was a black article of clothing that intrigued her. Its shape was similar to a pair of pants, but the fabric was too thin and its size was too small.
Without dwelling on why Ruvik was making a baffled face, Leticiel decided to enter the walk-in closet to change for the time being.
Leaving the pants-like article of unknown function aside, Leticiel put on the so-called uniform. After she finished changing, she promptly returned to her room and stared intently at the unknown object that was referred to as ‘bag’. She then grabbed it and headed out of her room as if nothing had happened.
“Well then.. Ruvik.”
“…Yes…”
“What is the way to the entrance?”
“My lady! Are you being serious!?”
Leticiel tilted her head while looking at Ruvik, who was holding his head in his hands. He has been shouting a lot since this morning, maybe he just likes to raise his voice?
Even though it was a refreshing morning, Ruvik looked haggard, as if he had not been sleeping for an entire week, as he guided Leticiel to the entrance hall.
Just beyond the doors was the sight of three horse-drawn carriages stopping before the entrance. And before them was the girl from the dining hall, who was having a friendly chat with another silver-haired woman.
“…Ah! Elder Sister Drossel, good morning.”
When she noticed Drossel’s figure, the red-haired girl greeted her with a smile as lovely and as bright as a flower in full-bloom. Through her greeting, Leticiel confirmed that the girl was her younger sister in this world.
“…Oh, it’s already this late. Christa, I’ll be going now. You should be leaving soon as well, or you’ll be late to the academy.”
“Okay. Have a safe trip, Elder Sister Saree.”
Christa had also referred to the woman as her older sister, which meant that this person was also ‘Drossel’’s older sister.
Opposed to her treatment toward Christa, Sareenah only spared Leticiel an uninterested glance before boarding her carriage. While gazing at the departing carriage, Leticiel surmised that this person also disliked her, but in the end, she decided it wasn’t worth her attention.
Leticiel boarded her own… or rather, the carriage Christa didn’t use, and the two were sent off by Ruvik.
“Please take care, and have a safe trip.”
For a moment, Leticiel looked back at the figure of Ruvik sending them off, but once the carriage had left the grounds of the residence, she rested her chin on her hand and gazed out the window.
On the other side of the window was the scene of a bustling town in the morning. The streets were filled with women doing morning groceries while stores along the street began to open for business, one by one. On the sides of the street, figures of men setting up their stands could also be seen. The town was calmly waking up under the morning sun.
A beautiful town that had not experienced war, filled with gentle faces that held no interest in conflict. This country was truly at peace.
(…Now that I think about it, didn’t I wish for a more comfortable life before I died?)
She had no idea why she had transmigrated, but she was sure that the gods had granted her wish. Leticiel summed up her own circumstances in a optimistically.
Suddenly, the carriage shook greatly. The high-pitched neigh of a horse was heard as the carriage came to a stop. A confused Leticiel alighted the carriage, wondering what had happened. She found the coachman crouching down by the wheel in the mud ditch beside the stone-paved road.
“What happened?”
“…Ah, my lady… Um, it seems like the wheel is broken…”
The coachman faltered as he gave his answer. He seemed to be frightened when he saw Leticiel, perhaps fearing her anger/wrath/temper.
“Oh my. In that case, let me see it for a bit.”
Leticiel motioned for the coachman to step back as she said that, and touched the wheel to examine the damage. The wood of the wheel had a crack running through it.
“Elder Sister Drossel? What happened?”
The carriage that had been running next to Leticiel’s came to a stop, and Christa peeked out of the window with an inquisitive look on her face.
“It’s only a small problem with the wheel. I’ll follow as soon as it’s fixed, so you can just go on ahead.”
“Is that so? Okay then, I’ll wait for you at the academy.”
Christa worriedly stared at Leticiel, but in the end she gave a small nod and instructed her coachman to continue. The sound of a whip cracking could be heard as Christa’s carriage began to leave.
“My, my lady! I, I will return to the residence at once to contact….”
“That will not be necessary.”
Halting the coachman who had started walking, Leticiel held her right hand over the damaged wheel.
Lights of various colors began to converge in her palm. Verdant, gold, and silver, the lights blended into one and penetrated the wheel. And then, a ripple of light spread through the carriage, even reaching the horse.
Once the light dissipated, an undamaged wheel had taken the place of where the damaged one once was.
“…Hah?…huh?”
“There won’t be any problem with this. Well then, can you head towards the academy?”
With those words, Leticiel promptly returned to the carriage.
“Huh? Er, ah, yes, understood.”
Left behind, the coachman could only stare back and forth between the wheel and the closed door in disbelief. However, because he could not afford to let the daughter of the family he was serving to be late, so he reluctantly returned to the box seat.
With a swing of the coachman’s whip, the carriage started to move. However, the wheels were turning remarkably faster than before.
It was natural, after all. While she was repairing the wheel, Leticiel had also used strengthening magecraft on both the carriage and the horse. That was why the magecraft from before had multiple colors of light blending together.
The magecraft-strengthened carriage gallantly ran through the main street. The carriage caught up to Christa’s in just an instant before leaving it behind in the dust.
“…What?…What??”
Christa’s coachman couldn’t believe the sight of a carriage moving at twice the speed to that of a normal one. Dumbfounded, he rubbed his eyes until it was out of sight.
* * *
The carriage continued to advance along the stone-paved road. Before long, it reached a vast ground with magnificent buildings. An elegant main entrance, majestic buildings, and a beautiful garden. This must be Lucrezia Academy.
(That sense of wasteful extravagance again… Well, I give up.)
As she descended from the carriage, which had stopped before the entrance hall of the frontmost building, she couldn’t help but make such a remark to herself.
“Well then… I’m in the academy, but now…”
Lucrezia Academy’s entrance hall was decorated with chandeliers hanging down from its high ceiling, a carpet covering its marble floor, and several beautiful flags on its walls.
Standing imposingly in that entrance hall was an expressionless Leticiel muttering something. To others, she looked like an unapproachable cold lady standing there calmly, but in reality, she was simply at a loss.
Leticiel didn’t have a single memory as Drossel. In other words, this was her first time coming to this academy. There was no way for her to know where to go in order to take lessons.
(…? Those people are…?)
Looking around restlessly, she found a group of adult males with attires different from the other students’ at the corner of the hall. Unable to contain her curiosity, she began observing the group. She then noticed that, for some reason, every student would greet the group when passing by.
(All the students here are children of aristocrats. For these students to greet them meant that they were all people in high positions.)
Leticiel thought that they would be able to tell her the location of her classroom if she asked them and ran up to the group.
“…Hm? You are…”
“Good morning. I just wanted to ask you a question, where should I go now?”
Leticiel was standing next to a brown-skinned muscular man with short blond hair who was standing in the center of the group. He turned toward her and knit his brows at her question.
“Huh? You’re in Elementary 2, right? Just go there, then.”
“…”
Leticiel stared blankly at the astonished man after he answered.
She really wanted to say ‘I’m asking you because I don’t know where the classroom is in the first place,’ but held back, knowing it would be impossible to get an answer with this mood. Leticiel then walked towards the school map on the wall.
It appeared that the school building was three stories high, and formed a quadrangle around an enclosed courtyard. Seeing a list with names of classrooms she had never seen before on each story, Leticiel started blinking.
“…Hey, don’t tell me you really don’t know where your own classroom is. It was supposed to be just a prank, right?”
“And what if I told you that I really don’t know?”
“…”
As Leticiel zealously studied the map, the man’s patience had begun to run thin. With an irritated tone, he shot her a question to which she replied without hesitation, as if questioning why he would even assume that. The entire group was taken aback with dumbfounded looks on their faces from her reply.
“…Your younger sister is in the same class, so you can just go with her, right?”
“…Oh my, that is a splendid idea.”
Ignoring his considerably astounded tone, Leticiel nonchalantly clapped after hearing his suggestion.
“…Ah! Elder Sister Drossel!”
As if on cue, Christa frantically ran up to Leticiel from the front entrance. Since Leticiel’s carriage had passed her earlier, she had arrived after her older sister.
“What in the world was with that carriage earlier? I have never seen one moving that fast…”
“Perfect timing, Christa. For some reason, I’ve forgotten the way to the classroom. Could you go together with me?”
After making a slight bow toward the man who gave her the suggestion, Leticiel briskly walked away from the scene without waiting for Christa’s answer.
Although Christa was in a fluster after having her words cut off, she made a similar bow to the man and chased after her older sister’s figure.
Having missed the timing to ask anything by the time she caught up, Christa was walking slightly ahead while taking a glance back once in a while. All she saw was Leticiel acting as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.
Leticiel decided not to talk about the incident with the carriage from the morning. Since she still didn’t have a solid grasp of the current situation, she couldn’t afford to let anything slip through careless mistakes.
“…Um, this is our classroom…”
Christa announced that while looking at Leticiel with a frightened and bewildered gaze. In front of the two was a door with a plate that said “Elementary 2.”
Standing before the classroom, they looked at each other in awkward silence. This sensation… it resembles the silent moment I had with Ruvik back at the residence.
“Uh, Drossel. Why…?”
“I just forgot it for some reason. Please don’t mind me.”
“O-okay…?”
After insisting on her excuse, Leticiel opened the door without any hesitation.
Countless gazes inside the classroom focused on the door. However, once they saw the figure of Leticiel, they all instantly vanished, replaced by countless whispers.
“Hey… the Ice Demon is here.”
“That appearance, that ice cold expression… How ominous.”
Some looked away, as if to not meet her eyes. Some stared at her, as if to insult and belittle her. Some glared at her, as if she was the sworn enemy of their parents.
Leticiel nonchalantly entered the classroom under all those hostile reactions. For the current Leticiel, the emotion called sadness had disappeared somewhere, she could only brush it off with a simple musing along the lines of “Geez, why is everyone looking at me?”. Her carefree mindset had become terminal.
“Good morning, everyone.”
Unlike Leticiel who was wondering what should she do after entering the room, Christa greeted her classmates with a lovely smile.
Now that I think about it, although she is my little sister, why is Christa in the same class? Perhaps we are twins? Or we were born in the same year? Well, it does not matter.
“…Hey, Drossel Noa Filiaregis.”
Leticiel was blankly staring at Christa but shifted her gaze to the unamused voice from behind her younger sister.
The source of that voice was a youth with mint-colored hair and crimson eyes that seemed to be burning. Those razor-sharp eyes mixed with scorn gave off an air of being strong-willed.
“Thank you for your politeness.”
She was genuinely thanking him for telling her her full name. However, the boy made a foolish face when he was thanked out of the blue.
“Y-your Highness Rochefort…”
Although she was a bit surprised with his sudden appearance, Christa called out to the boy.
Having the title ‘Your Highness’ attached to his name must mean that this impertinent person is the prince of this country. Leticiel silently promoted Rochefort from ‘annoying person’ to ‘troublesome person’ in her mind.
She then realized that there were several boys standing behind Rochefort. Since they’re also glaring over here, they’re probably the prince’s followers.
In other words, they must have high status as well. There’s only trouble getting involved with them, so I should try my best to not…
“…ey…! Hey…! You! Are you listening?”
Since Rochefort’s deep voice had interrupted her train of thought, Leticiel slightly knitted her brows and looked at him.
“My apologies, I was not paying attention.”
“Wha…!? You, you dare act like that in front of me, your fiancé!”
Leticiel was amazed from the bottom of her heart that Rochefort would be so furious even though she had given a proper apology. However, of all his words there was one that caught her attention more than his anger. Fiancé. He really did say that.
“You Highness, please give it a rest!”
“…Christa. Sorry, I lost my cool there. But when I hear your beautiful and gentle voice, even my anger clears away.”
“Geez… Please don’t put it like that, Your Highness.”
“Christa…”
Before Leticiel’s very eyes, Rochefort was looking at her younger sister with an enraptured gaze while Christa’s cheeks were dyed red with embarrassment. He was clearly showing animosity towards Drossel while showering Christa with affection. And on top of that, Christa didn’t seem to dislike it herself.
(He is brazenly having an affair right in front of his fiancée. This is my, the current me’s fiancé…?)
Leticiel’s previous partner had been a kind man who only loved her. But it seemed like she had no luck with both her family and partner in her current life.
(Oh well, I don’t care about it, so let’s just not get involved.)
Although she should deal with the fact that Rochefort and Christa were still lost in each other’s eyes, Leticiel ignored them to look for an empty seat and found one in the very last row.
“Is this seat empty?”
“Y-yes!”
Leticiel’s question made the brown-haired girl sitting next to the empty seat jump and let out a shrill voice. She wondered why the girl was so scared of “Drossel”, but immediately lost her interest.
Leticiel then sat down and faced the front of the room, but for some reason Rochefort and his followers were glaring straight at her.
She became very confused as she had the courtesy to ignore the fact that he and Christa had been in their own world, but his group were still dissatisfied for some reason.
However, even then, she immediately lost interest and looked away from Rochefort’s group.
* * *
Shortly after the sound of a bell echoed through the academy, the teacher for the first period entered the classroom. His belly jiggled as he walked into the room, the middle-aged teacher with a shining scalp stood before the podium.
“History class will now begin.”
It seemed that first period is History. Since she didn’t know the exact time period she was in, Leticiel silently opened her textbook and started reading while ignoring the teacher’s lesson.
The girl sitting next to her was looking at her with a dubious face as ‘Drossel’ had not even once opened the textbook during history class. But Leticiel, who was rummaging through the textbook in earnest, didn’t notice that.
“Then, please open the textbook to page 6…”
Ignoring the teacher’s voice and the sound of pen from around her, Leticiel was completely absorbed in her textbook.
The Platina Kingdom was the third most powerful country in the Astraea continent. Leticiel secretly breathed a sigh of relief after finding out that it was the same continent as the one she lived in.
The kingdom’s history spanned over a thousand years, and it was currently in an alliance with its neighboring country, the Iris Empire. Back in Leticiel’s age, the average life of a country was around 60 to 70 years, only powerful countries lasted longer than 100 years. This meant that the world had become peaceful.
Before the founding of the Platina Kingdom, countless countries had continued to wage bloody wars to unite the Astraea continent. Perhaps that was the age that Leticiel had lived in.
This long warring period was called the Astraea Continental War. And, as a reference to when it had started, and how long it had lasted, it was also called the Thousand Year War…
Leticiel suddenly felt something on her shoulder. When she looked up from the textbook and to her side, she saw the girl sitting next to her tapping on it.
“Miss Drossel, did you hear what I was saying?”
Reacting to that voice, Leticiel looked forward to find the teacher who was holding his textbook with one hand looking at her. From her angle, his head was shining brilliantly due to the classroom’s lighti… no, it was better to not go beyond this point.
“…I’m very sorry. Could you please repeat the question again?”
“Fine. Can you name the major powers during the Astraea Continental War?”
“Hmm… If we’re talking about the major powers, then the first country to come to mind would be the Dransall Empire, the most powerful country. But we also can’t leave out its neighbor who could match its might, the Sephiroth Kingdom. In terms of countries that all of its neighbors had to be wary of, there was the Holy Walpurgis Empire. This was the only country without its own army as all of its citizens were black-hearted. On the other hand, if we’re talking about countries that specialized in their military, there were the Heltcutale Republic and the Fornande Kingdom. In particular, the latter was also referred to as the Overnight Kingdom, as it was founded by building a castle in a single night.”
“Huh…? W-wow… How strange, you even listed countries that were not in the textbook…”
The teacher muttered something under his breath that didn’t reach the students’ ears.
On the other hand, Leticiel was simply reciting information she saw and heard during her previous life. After all, she lived during the Astraea Continental War. There was nobody more knowledgeable about that time period than her in the room.
All the countries she had listed just now were ones that had held real power in the central region; she hadn’t included any countries from the remote regions. While most of the countries listed were around for a long time, there were cases of countries like the Fornande Kingdom, which were crushed within ten years of its founding by an alliance of major powers. It was natural that countries like these didn’t remain in history.
Incidentally, Leticiel’s Rizenrose Kingdom was also quite a powerful kingdom in the remote regions, or at least it was comparable to the neighboring Gelrald Kingdom.
“…Ah, um, I think your explanation was a bit too detailed, but it seems that you’ve prepared for the lesson properly. Well then, please turn to the next page.”
The teacher returned to the lesson while quizzically scratching his neck. Leticiel once again lowered her gaze back to the textbook. There was too much history and information she didn’t know about in this age.
It seemed like there were still mountains of things she needed to investigate.
* * *
After the break was the second period, which seemed to be about Magic Formula.
The teacher standing before the podium was doing things like reviewing the previous lesson and reading the textbook out loud.
Leticiel took a sidelong glance at the textbook the brown-haired girl sitting next to her had taken out. Mimicking her, Leticiel placed the same textbook on top of her table, as well as a notebook, though she doubted she would write anything down.
Magic Formula… Leticiel knew it under the name of Sorcery Formula. It was something used to introduce beginners to magecraft.
The strength and scope of magecraft was determined by the practitioner’s imagination as well as their calculation-information processing ability. However, asking a beginner to invoke magecraft out of the blue would only produce unsuccessful results.
Sorcery Formulas were developed to make up for that. By using formulas over and over again, once one became familiar with magecraft’s calculation processing step, formulas would no longer be needed. In fact, in order to get to the level where magecraft could be used through imagination alone, it would be much easier and more efficient to do the calculations subconsciously on their own rather than going through the formulas.
Due to that fact, sorcery formulas for beginners would be of no use for Leticiel, who had been the kingdom’s best mage in her previous life. Frankly speaking, this class would only be free time for Leticiel.
“…sel, Miss Drossel.”
Leticiel, who had been recalling about the past, was pulled back to reality by the voice calling her name.
“…It looked like you weren’t paying attention just now… Are you planning to answer my question…?”
The teacher was looking at Leticiel with a sullen face. After staring blankly at that expression for a few moments, she realized that her own name had been called.
“I’m very sorry. I didn’t hear the question, could you please repeat it again?”
“…O-okay. Please overwrite the basic Fire formula on this black board with the basic Wind formula.”
After hearing his question, Leticiel looked at the formula written on the blackboard. She then opened her eyes wide in shock.
The basic Fire formula had been written there. Or to be more accurate, something that greatly resembled the basic Fire formula had been written there.
Leticiel understood that the formula was from the Fire System. However, the difference between the basic formula she knew and the one on the board was heaven and hell.
To start with, the formula’s scope had been expanded too far. Since basic formulas were the very foundation of magecraft, they had to keep the amount of waste to a bare minimum. Nevertheless, a scope of this size would put needless load on the information processing circuit.
In addition, there were too many pointless variables for Target Control. It was unthinkable that anyone would use a formula with these variables as a base to create others for practical use. The variables would cancel each other out and the desired result would not be achieved.
Even from her previous life, Leticiel had never seen a formula this horrible. It was filled with pointlessness. The Mana consumption was terrible, and the conversion efficiency was the worst.
It would be impossible to use a formula with this level of inefficiency for magecraft in the first place, let alone overwriting it with the basic wind formula. What in the world happened to the magecraft… the magic level of this world?
As Drossel was staring blankly at the blackboard, her teacher and classmates assumed that her silence was due to her not knowing the answer.
Snickers started to fill the classroom, Rochefort and his followers were among them. The teacher let out a sigh while staring at Drossel after seeing the state of the class.
“…So you don’t understand it, like I thought. Well then…”
His words were cut off by the loud sound of Leticiel kicking her chair as she stood up.
Leticiel started walking down to the podium. The classroom started to quiet down as the students stared at Leticiel while wondering what was she doing. Once she reached the podium, she snatched the piece of chalk out of the teacher’s hand and began writing a new formula next to the one on the blackboard.
The snickers disappeared in an instant as the classroom fell into complete silence. Everyone in the room was dumbfounded by Drossel’s unexpected behavior. They wondered what in the world was happening as they held their breath staring at her.
Leticiel was livid. Perhaps, if there was anyone who knew about sorcery formula from her previous life in this room, they would surely agree with her reaction.
Leticiel had not been called Rizenrose’s number one mage without a reason. She was a magecraft maniac through and through. While she put the people and her family first, outside of the time spent on the battlefield, she would invest the rest of it into formula research.
Her focus was on reducing the complexity and burden on the practitioner without having to compensate on the magecraft’s power. As someone who strove to trim down those two factors for Sorcery Formulas, she had been able to achieve that goal.
Yes, she had already discovered the limit of sorcery formulas before she died. Leticiel had knowledge of the most beautiful and efficient formulas.
From the viewpoint of a girl like her, it was no exaggeration to call the thing written before her eyes, that rubbish formula, a blasphemy against magecraft itself.
Although she didn’t know how much time had passed since her death, Leticiel wondered when and how it had all gone so wrong that this kind of shitty formula and theory had become so widespread. She wanted to grab the person who had propagated this by the neck and interrogate them for about an hour.
An ominous laugh could be heard inside the classroom.
For some reason, a pitch black aura sprouted from the figure of the female student holding a piece of chalk with her back to the rest of the class. The figure that even made a few students shriek out of fright was one that could truly be called ‘Ice Demon’. Even the teacher had to retreat with a pale face. Before anyone had realized it, an invisible blizzard had started blowing violently through the classroom; there were even some who fainted out of dread.
Before long, the formula on the blackboard had been completed. Leticiel wholeheartedly smiled at the perfect formula she had written. Her profile was the manifestation of ecstasy itself.
When she put down the piece of chalk, the blizzard that had been assaulting the classroom simultaneously dispersed.
On the blackboard was a formula that was more than a level smaller than the one the teacher had written.
Any segment that could have been removed had been completely stripped away, pointless variables replaced by specific ones, and functions had been added into the freed up space, this was the the sorcery formula that Leticiel was familiar with.
Leticiel gazed at it with enraptured eyes. While her interest in others had vanished, her passion and tenacity for magecraft had increased even further, rather than vanishing along with it.
“This is the correct basic Fire formula. To answer your question, I have overwritten it with the basic Wind formula. Please feel free to use it for the lesson.”
She turned to face the teacher, and on her face was the finest quality smile that anyone could imagine. Even the teacher who had been filled with dread until now was greatly shaken.
So even that Ice Demon can make this kind of smile, huh. It’s not her usual condescending smile nor is it that ominous, scornful laugh from earlier. It’s a smile straight from her heart.
By the time the other students had blinked their eyes, Leticiel had already returned to her signature expressionless face. While he still had a blank look, she made a bow and returned to her seat.
“….U-uuum! Just now, what…”
As soon as Leticiel sat down, a timid voice escaped from the girl sitting next to her.
For some reason, the girl’s complexion had gotten even worse since this morning. It was no longer white or blue, but deathly pale instead.
“Are you okay? It’s better to rest if you don’t feel well.”
“A-and you’re the one to talk…!?”
Although Leticiel was worried about her condition, the girl let out a hysterical shout that cracked with falsetto for some reason.
The surrounding classmates turned toward Leticiel. Among them were criticizing glares, while some others frightfully peeked at her.
“Um… Did I do something wrong?”
“Huh….!? You really didn’t notice it!?”
“Uh… What did you mean by… ‘it’?”
“Are you serious!? What else could it be, if not the blizzard that laid waste to this room just now!?”
“Blizzard…?”
The girl explained to Leticiel in detail what had happened in the classroom while she had been facing the blackboard.
According to her, a black aura had risen up from Leticiel’s back while she was making some extremely ominous noises. Furthermore, for some unknown reason, something akin to a snow storm suddenly assaulted the classroom and caused many people to faint.
If the girl’s words were true, then Leticiel really had caused trouble for everyone. While she was apologetic, there was also one thing she wanted to say before that.
“Thank you very much, I got to hear something nice.”
“There was nothing nice about that at all!! How did you even get “something nice” from our talk just now!? Only a nightmare, it could have only been a nightmare!!”
“I know I’ve caused trouble for everyone. I’m very sorry about that.”
“…Why are you apologizing like normal now…!”
The girl then mumbled that she had nothing to complain or talk about anymore with teary eyes. Leticiel thought that she had perhaps said something to irritate the girl.
The ‘something nice’ that Leticiel mentioned was the invisible blizzard that had assaulted the classroom.
Magecraft. An art that collects Mana from the atmosphere and uses the practitioner’s body as a medium to alter phenomenon. The resulting phenomenon and its scope could be adjusted to the practitioner’s will. However, the higher the complexity or the scale, the higher the burden on the practitioner.
The nightmarish blizzard her classmates saw was likely the result of the Mana in the classroom conforming to Leticiel’s anger. Her fury had been projected into the physical world and rampaged throughout the room. Although practitioners should only be able to use magecraft consciously, being able to wield it subconsciously was proof of how strong her Phenomenon Interference power was.
Moreover, it had engulfed the entire classroom without Leticiel breaking a sweat. The blizzard from before hadn’t been a burden on her body at all.
(This body, perhaps it’s outrageously compatible with magecraft?)
Noticing that possibility, Leticiel let out a chuckle.
Even with her previous body, Leticiel hadn’t been able to cause magecraft phenomenon to manifest subconsciously. But this body was able to do it. With enough practice, she could become an even greater mage than before.
The students who were eyeing her suspiciously were unaware that the door to the next stage had opened inside Leticiel.
By chance, Leticiel caught Christa’s gaze. She was sitting at the front of the class. Her face was a little pale, however, she was glaring at Leticiel with eyes so sharp, it was as if she was staring at her parents’ sworn enemy.
Although she had been wearing a lovely face since the morning, her current look was that of a Hannya. As nobody else was looking at Christa, that glare of a woman going mad with envy went unnoticed.
Leticiel had thought her little sister’s personality was consistent with her appearance, but even if she realized that wasn’t true, the fact that Leticiel had no interest in Christa didn’t change.
Leticiel decided to ignore Christa, who was glaring at her still.
(…I have to say, it’s been only a few hours since I transmigrated, but I’m already tired from everything that’s happened so far.)
To distance herself from the noisy classroom, Leticiel plopped down on top of her desk.
A new environment, a new society, a new common sense, a new world. Unfamiliar knowledge and information had been pouring non-stop into Leticiel like a waterfall; it was no surprise that even she would be tired.
Leticiel’s eyelids slowly closed as she vaguely suggested to herself that writing down and organizing what she’d learned so far would be good to spare herself from confusion in the future.
* * *
She was supposed to have no magic power at all, how did Drossel manage to do that?
Without caring about the commotion in the classroom or the gazes of her classmates, Drossel was lying face-down on her desk, sleeping. The girl sitting next to her… Mirandalette Lulu Wald was staring at her slumbering form in bewilderment.
To be frank, Mirandalette was afraid of Drossel and didn’t want to get involved with her. Not only did Drossel have no magic power at all, she was short-tempered and hard to get along with.
On the day of the entrance ceremony, she had hit her own sister out of anger. That rumor soon spread throughout the academy and she was shunned upon enrolment. Because of that, Drossel was someone who Mirandalette didn’t want to get involved with.
(…But, had Drossel… always been this kind of person…?)
From history class to formula class and even now, the classroom had been murmuring about Drossel, whose actions and speech were completely different to her usual self.
Because she had been scared by the rumors, she had only looked at Drossel from a distance. However, the carefree and gentle sleeping face before Mirandalette’s very eyes had thrown her for a loop. The Drossel sitting next to her was far from the one she had heard from the rumors.
While Mirandalette was being bewildered, the commotion in the classroom continued on.
The Formula Studies teacher, who had been staring petrified at the formula written on the blackboard for some time now, suddenly returned to his senses. He immediately took out a memo pad from his pocket and started to rapidly write down something.
“Everyone, the rest of today’s class will be self-study…!”
While still holding the memo pad that he just finished writing on, the teacher made a brief announcement before dashing out of the classroom.
Chapter 1: An Unknown World
The first thing she saw when she opened her eyes was, an unfamiliar ceiling.
She looked around to find herself in an unknown room, lying on an canopied bed she did not recognize. Where in the world am I? Did I not take my own life after after the enemy had robbed me of everything? Leticiel’s mind was in chaos.
Restless, she sat up and looked down at her chest. There was no sign of the sword or the wound from her memories. The only things there were the frilly white negligee and her own smooth porcelain skin.
But Leticiel was certain that it had happened. The sensation of her own life fading away, she could still recall it even now. Leticiel had definitely died. She was supposed to be, without a doubt, dead.
Suddenly, the worst-case scenario came to her mind. Maybe, the neighboring kingdom had someone who was skilled enough to treat even Leticiel in that state. And maybe, she had been kept alive by the neighboring kingdom.
Her face turned completely pale. If her conjectures were correct, Leticiel had been saved by the despicable enemy that had destroyed her everything.
Leticiel gave up her own life so that things wouldn’t go the neighboring kingdom’s way, so that she could be with those she loved. And yet, everything ended up going according to their wishes.
Right now, the emotion controlling Leticiel was not sadness or despair, nor was it hatred. It was an intense anger towards the neighboring country that wouldn’t even allow her to die.
Leticiel pushed away the comforter and got out of the bed. At this rate, the neighboring kingdom would use her as a tool.
Her pride would never let that happen. Taking her revenge would be easy. But even if she did, what she had lost would never return; it would be a futile effort.
Certainly, this place was within enemy territory; she had searched for anything to use, but there were no tools she could take her own life with.
As she began to grow impatient, some small glass bottles on the desk entered her line of sight. Without any hesitation, Leticiel grabbed one of the bottles and threw it onto the floor.
The bottle shattered into pieces from the impact. Ignoring the fact that the glass could cut her hand, she grasped a large shard and pointed it toward her neck.
“What happened, my la…”
Just when Leticiel was about to slash her throat, a young man clad in a black tailcoat entered the room. He had heard the sound of glass breaking and had come to investigate the cause.
“…What!? What are you doing!!?”
As soon as Leticiel’s figure entered his eyes, his face changed color. He immediately raised his voice and ran towards her.
Unlike the throne room, this room was quite small. Before the shard could pierce Leticiel’s throat, the man had pinned her hands from behind.
“Please stop!! Let go of the thing in your hand right now!!”
“Let me go…! I will not allow it to go your way! If you stop me, then I’ll even bite my tongue if I have…”
“Please don’t act so rashly!! My lady!! Lady Drossel!!!”
Leticiel suddenly stopped when she heard the man’s desperate shout. It was not because the man’s command had resonated with her heart; it was because of the name she had never heard before.
“…Lady…Drossel…?”
Who on earth was that? Wasn’t she Leticiel, the princess of a remote kingdom?
The glass shard was taken away from her while she was befuddled, but Leticiel had no time to worry about that.
When she dropped her head down, her long hair flowed gently into the edge of her vision; it was a splendid silvery-white color that gave off the impression of being translucent. But it was an unfamiliar color. After all, Leticiel’s hair was a dark blonde.
As she raised her gaze, she found a small mirror before her. It was propped up against the wall right next to the small bottles, but she hadn’t noticed it at all earlier.
The thing reflected in the mirror was the face of a girl she had never seen before. Almost transparent and lustrous silver hair, smooth porcelain white skin, almond-shaped eyes with long eyelashes, and heterochromatic irises in each eye.
Overall, she was a beautiful girl with dignified facial features. Leticiel didn’t know how old the girl was; even though she seemed young, her features made her seemed more mature. Her lack of expression gave her the impression that she was a bit unfriendly.
(Who am I, right now…?)
When she tried blinking, both her red left eye and blue right eye were covered by her eyelids. The unknown girl in the mirror was without a doubt, herself.
That fact shook Leticiel to the core. Leticiel had golden blonde hair. Both of her eyes were lavender. And her past face had retained small traces of childish youthfulness, and was not as mature-looking as this.
Even though she had stabbed herself with a sword and died, when she came to, there was not a single wound on her body. And when she thought she had been captured by the enemy, she had instead become someone she didn’t know.
(I have no idea what’s going on. Am I inside a dream or something…?)
An absentminded Leticiel was led to her bed by the maids who entered the room. They then took out a first-aid kit from somewhere and started treating her.
The hand that she had used to grasp the glass shard was covered in cuts. Leticiel stared at the maids who were sterilizing and treating her wounds in wonder.
“…Why are you not using magecraft to heal it?”
“Magecraft…? Um, are you talking about magic?”
Her question was met with another question. Once again, she heard a word she didn’t know. Perhaps this country used the word “magic” to refer to magecraft.
“Even then, my lady, only a small portion of chosen people can use healing magic from the Light Element.”
“Haa….”
“That’s why using magic to heal a wound can’t be done at a moment’s notice.”
She had never heard anything like that before. At least when she still was a princess, almost every person that could use magecraft was able to use healing magecraft. It was an age where one would simply die if they couldn’t protect themselves.
After finishing Leticiel’s treatment, the maid tidied up the first-aid kit and disappeared toward the other door in the room.
Leticiel looked at her hand wrapped in bandages. Even though the maid said that healing magic was rare, Leticiel was certain that she had used it before. She invoked her magecraft to ascertain whether or not she could really use it.
Without delay, the Mana scattered about the atmosphere obediently followed her wishes and assembled in her hands. The flow of Mana created a breeze that caused her silver hair to gently sway.
(…Huh. I can still use it like usual, after all.)
She had prepared herself for the worst for naught.
Leticiel then tried to open and close her hand; the pain from before had vanished. Just like she thought, there was no way healing magecraft would be rare.
While she was thinking about that, the maid from before came out of the door and made a respectful bow.
“My lady, we will help you get ready, so please come over here.”
The maid led Leticiel to the room… No, to the walk-in closet next door. There were several maids waiting in the room, waiting to assist her.
When she was a princess, Leticiel had to do everything like this on her own. Royalty didn’t have this kind of luxury in that age of chaos.
If they had the money to hire servants, it would have been spent improving armaments instead. And if they had the money to buy a lot of dresses, they would have invested it into armaments instead. It was the most important thing. It was to the point where even the country’s flag had to show that it was run by a warmonger. If a country failed to do even that, it would be swallowed up by the surrounding countries.
As a result, she never had servants to assist her, nor a walk-in closet with a large amount of dresses. Leticiel unconsciously pulled on her cheek.
She began to worry about the state of this country that had this level of grandiose luxury. As a princess in a war-filled world, Leticiel couldn’t believe the scene she was seeing at all.
“That really suits you, my lady.”
“…Really, thank you.”
Leticiel came out of the walk-in closet while feeling conflicted. She was dressed in a lovely cream-colored dress and decorated with graceful-looking accessories.
“Hey, you there.”
“…Yes? Are you calling for me?”
“Yeah, that’s right. There’s no one else here right. Who are you? What are you to me?”
Leticiel inquired the man standing next to the door. He was the one who had stopped her from taking her own life earlier.
She had so little information to go with, that it could be safe to say she had no understanding of her current situation. She didn’t know who he was or what his upbringing was, and, of course, she didn’t know his name either.
“Um… What do you mean? My lady…?”
“Oh, sometimes you just feel like asking strange questions like this, right?”
“Y-yes…. My name is Ruvik, my lady’s exclusive butler.”
Even though his face seemed to say that he had no idea what was going on, the man still gave her a proper self-introduction.
“Ruvik… right, that’s right. My apologies, your name suddenly escaped my mind for some reason.”
She still had yet to get a good grasp of the situation, however, it was better for her to act like ‘Drossel’.
Even though she hadn’t said anything strange, Ruvik seemed to be surprised by her reply. Ignoring him, Leticiel tried to grab the doorknob. While she was still bewildered by the current situation, her body reminded her that it was hungry, so she decided to have breakfast or something in the dining hall.
However, she was suddenly stopped by Ruvik. Leticiel then looked up at him as if to ask him why.
“My lady, your hand is injured. Please leave it to me.”
Although it was fine since she had already healed it, Leticiel felt that it was better to not say unnecessary things, and withdrew her hand.
When Leticiel passed through the door opened by Ruvik, she was greeted with splendor similar to the room that made her stagger due to its radiance.
“My lady…? Is there something wrong?”
“…With this country being pointlessly lavish like this, I’m amazed that it has yet to fall to ruin…”
“Hah…? What are you talking about, my lady? Our Platina Kingdom has been at peace for a long time now…”
Leticiel’s eyes opened wide at Ruvik’s words.There was no such thing as peace in that age of unending bloodshed.
Furthermore, another unknown word came up again. She had never heard of the Platina Kingdom before. She compared it against the names of all the countries she knew, but was unable to come up with a match.
(…Well, in that world, it was an everyday occurrence for some unknown country to appear, and by the time you learned about it, it would already be enroute to destruction.)
Leticiel assumed this country had also been born that way, and stopped paying attention to that detail.
Leticiel walked down the long hallway with Ruvik by her side. On the way, she came across an older maid with a basket filled with laundry walking the opposite way. When their eyes met, the maid slightly lowered her head, but she didn’t even try to hide her frown.
It was likely that Leticiel… or rather, Drossel… was hated by the maid. Leticiel realized this, but she carried on walking as if it didn’t happen.
As someone who had tasted the depths of despair, and went as far as taking her own life, Leticiel could no longer consider negative feelings towards her as anything but a trifling matter.
To put it nicely, she was being prudent. To put it bluntly, she didn’t care what others thought of her at all. The once cheerful Leticiel had disappeared; the current girl was cold with a completely indifferent attitude. Perhaps human nature could completely change when faced with such an extreme situation, Leticiel mused to herself, as if she was thinking about someone else entirely.
While she was elegantly walking down the hallway, Leticiel came to a sudden stop when there were no other people around. Naturally, the butler who had been walking a bit behind his master’s side came to a stop as well, and made a puzzled face.
“…Say, Ruvik.”
“Yes, what is it, my lady?”
“…Where is the… dining hall…?”
“You’ve just been wandering about aimlessly!?”
Ruvik’s hysterical voice echoed through the residence in the early morning.
* * *
With Ruvik guiding her, Leticiel finally arrived at the dining hall. It seemed that this residence was a two-storied building and the dining hall was on the first story. Leticiel’s room was the furthest most interior room on the second story.
When she entered the dining hall, the gazes of the people who had arrived and had been seated before her mercilessly pierced into Leticiel.
The four people inside the dining hall must have been Drossel’s family members.
The silver-haired, blue-eyed man sitting at the head of the table seemed to be her father. The woman with red hair and purple eyes sitting to the right of him was her mother. Opposite of her mother was Drossel’s older brother, who had silver hair and light purple eyes. And next to him was a girl close to Leticiel’s age.
Of course those relationships were all just conjectures based on their outward appearances and could be incorrect. However, it would be resolved sooner or later.
Leticiel’s seat was the closest to the entrance. Even though there were six seats on both sides of the table, there was no one facing her. She was effectively sitting alone.
Position-wise, her seat was the lowest seat. It should have been taken as a cruel humiliation, but to the current Leticiel…
(Oh my, it’s close to the dining hall entrance, how convenient.)
Her attitude had changed to the point that she would rather have shops next to her house for convenience’s sake. Something like a seat position was irrelevant to Leticiel.
“…Hm? Diane, what happened to Sareenah?”
The man who appeared to be the father sitting at the head of the table asked the woman who seemed to be the mother… Diane.
“It’s truly weird for that girl to not be here by now. Fried, do you happen to know why?”
“No, not at all.”
When asked by Diane, the silver-haired young man called Fried spat out a short reply while shutting his eyes.
“Um, Mother. Elder Sister Saree said that she’s busy with preparations for her departure, so she’ll be having breakfast in her own room.”
The other girl at the table raised her hand and timidly opened her mouth.
She had blonde hair with a red hue, and her big round light-purple eyes oozed with the type of cuteness that would stir up one’s protective instincts
”My, now that you’ve mentioned it. Today’s the day Saree will be going to her fiancé’s family territory. Thank you very much, I really appreciate it.”
“No… It was nothing at all, Mother.”
The mother praised the daughter who was acting bashful while looking delighted. In this dining hall illuminated by the morning sun, a truly beautiful picture of a harmonious family was painted.
(…We still can’t start eating? I’m really hungry.)
As one would expect, Leticiel had no interest in that happy family scene and was thinking about something completely unrelated.
For her, the concept of waiting for every family member to start a meal didn’t exist. When she was a princess, it was normal for everyone present at meal time to just start eating; an attitude of ‘if you want to wait, then wait’.
Even though not everybody was present, the father’s greeting prompted the start of the long-awaited breakfast. The four people sitting on the other side of the table started their quality family time while having their meal. The servants waiting behind them would sometimes join in on the conversation.
While that was happening, there was one person silently moving food into their mouth. That person was Leticiel.
Leticiel was staring intently at the breakfast dishes lined up before her very eyes. Mysterious crescent-shaped bread, thickly sliced bacon… she was at least able to recognize that. However, she had no idea about the yellowy object accompanying them.
In her mind, she could only think of bread as something round with a fluffy but slightly dry texture. Not to mention it was a luxury item in her former country.
“Ruvik, what in the world is this mysterious bread?”
“Mysterious… It’s just atypical croissants, my lady…”
“Oh. Then what is this runny yellow thing?”
“Y-yellow thing… That’s also just a typical scrambled egg, my lady…”
“I see. Ah, don’t mind me. I only felt like asking you that.”
Leticiel gave an arbitrary reason and ended the conversation with Ruvik, who was shaken to the core by her nonchalant nonchalant questions against common sense.
If he had to be honest, Ruvik would describe his master, Drossel, as an extremely moody person. When she got angry for no reason, she would lash out at her servants. When she cried, she would have them spoil her. As the one who had been serving as her exclusive butler for years, Ruvik understood Drossel the most.
However, even if she had been a moody person, she had been acting extremely strange today. When the scene of her sudden attempt on her own life came to his mind, it was as if a light bulb went off in his head; Ruvik realized that her speech and behavior had completely changed. He felt that she had become cold and started doing everything at her own pace.
Ruvik had no idea why Drossel’s words and actions had suddenly become incomprehensible. Maybe she had some screws go loose because of the harsh treatment she received from her surroundings?
“Ruvik, where did this bacon come from?”
“Because the Master likes their taste, we stock them from a southern merchant who has been in our favor.”
“Hmmm… I can’t get over this translucence. It tastes normal like I thought.”
“…Huh? Nooor….m-mal…?”
“That’s right. Bacon with fat being translucent like this is delicious… I think”
“You… think…”
“I’ve never eaten it before after all.”
In that age, having meat in a meal was already too much of a luxury. Besides royalty, everyone would have been content with having meat once every three days. High quality bacon was something that only existed in dreams.
Recalling that, Leticiel stuffed her mouth with the thickly-sliced bacon.
Finishing her breakfast in a flash, Leticiel promptly withdrew from the dining hall. She returned to her room and collapsed face up onto the bed, and gazed at the ceiling.
There had been too many unexpected events today. Even though she had gone with the flow and had gotten through them all somehow, she needed to carefully sort through all the information.
First, Leticiel was a princess, the princess of a remote kingdom in a war-filled world. Then, she lost everything because of the neighboring country’s invasion. With no reason left to live, she took her own life.
However, for some unknown reason, Leticiel had been granted a new life as an unknown girl named Drossel. The girl seemed to be a daughter of a family of considerably high status.
Leticiel was a realist. She neither spoke of nor believed in baseless supernatural things; however, it was impossible for her to deny it this time.
(…It’s like I’ve been transmigrated.)
Metempsychosis. The concept of transmigration of soul to another body after death.
In that cruel world, this concept of salvation was wildly welcomed. And with that as the slogan, people came together to create a new religion of sorts. Of course, Leticiel didn’t believe in it, but with her current situation, it was the only possible explanation.
As for Drossel’s family, it was more or less made up of her parents, a pair that seemed to be her siblings and another either older or younger sister. However, it seemed that they disliked Drossel.
Out of everyone, the only two who she had yet to confirm the names of were those of the father and the unknown sister. Beyond that, the only other name she knew was that of her exclusive butler, Ruvik.
Furthermore, Leticiel was currently in a country called the Platina Kingdom, which seemed to be at peace. From the perspective of the Princess of War, it was something that would make her eyes open wide while thinking it as some sort of a joke. But after observing the situation of this residence, it was really the truth.
For Leticiel, it would have been ordinary for at least three reports relating to disputes to be brought up during breakfast. In addition, food being poisoned was so commonplace that having poison tasters was indispensable.
Above all, their extravagant and luxurious life showed that the family had too much money. It showed that they weren’t spending money on armaments to solidify their power. In conclusion, this country was not in a situation where they had to spend everything on armaments to survive.
(…How long has it been since the age I lived in?)
Leticiel concluded that this time period was completely different to the one she used to live in. But, the only way to find out when it ended and how many months and years had passed was through history books.
When Leticiel thought about going to the archives or something and got up, she heard a knock from outside of the room. After getting her permission, Ruvik entered the room.
“What is it?”
“My lady, it’s time for you to head to the academy.”
Leticiel stared blankly at Ruvik with that announcement. Academy… a word referring to an ancient garden. It should be a place to study something.
“Academy…?”
“Huh? Yes… the academy.”
“…”
“…My lady… Are you really okay?”
“Why are you worrying about me?”
The words, ‘because you have been acting weird since morning,’ went up to Ruvik’s throat, but due to his astounding force of will, they were caught in there.
In the Platina Kingdom, education at the academy was compulsory for aristocrats’ heirs and daughters when they turned 16. It was no exception for Drossel, who had turned 16 this year; The entrance ceremony for Lucrezia Academy was just about a month ago.
This is common sense for everyone in this kingdom, why does she look so confused? Ruvik, who had been at her mercy since morning, gradually began to feel a sharp pain in his stomach.
Oblivious to his pain, Leticiel started to think about the place called “academy.”
In her time, the thing called academy didn’t exist. Knowledge was something that was passed down from generation to generation through word of mouth. There was no need to ask a stranger to teach you.
If it was history, you just needed to ask your grandparents, and they would tell you as much as you wanted. If it was the way to use magecraft, you just needed to ask adults with more experience to go into detail, and you would be able to use it in the blink of an eye. Even etiquette, reading, writing, mathematics, everything else was just like that.
Or rather, building a school and gathering the future of your country in a single place would be the same thing as telling your enemies, ‘please kill them’.
Why does this country have an academy? Perhaps the act of orally passing down information through your family was not common practice in this country. Isn’t it inefficient having strangers teach you things when you could just ask your relatives instead…? Despite those questions running through Leticiel’s head, the fact remained that she was to go to the academy.
“Well that’s fine. The academy right, I got it.”
“…Uh… Please wait a moment, my lady!”
As she got out of bed and headed for the door just like that, Ruvik stopped Leticiel once again.
“What now?”
“N-no… My Lady, uniforms are mandatory at the academy so you need to change…”
“Oh… right…”
“Also, are you not going to bring your bag…? You would be in trouble without your textbooks…”
“…Bag…”
Leticiel looked up at Ruvik, who was making a very rude face for some reason.
An awkward silence settled into the room, and in the end, Leticiel lowered her gaze and started looking around the room.
On the shelf of something that looked like a desk, there was a bag with a shoulder strap made out of high-quality leather. That sense of useless luxury again… Wait, so ‘bag’ should be referring to that thing, but…
“…Uniform?”
“My lady… Had you not been wearing it until yesterday…?”
Ruvik’s gaze pointed to the basket next to the entrance of the walk-in closet. Some clothing was neatly folded inside the basket.
A short back-length black jacket, a white shirt with two incisions on the shirttail, and a checkered skirt. Next to the basket was a pair of brown lace-up boots. Perhaps they were meant to be worn together.
(…What is this black thing that looks like a pair of pants?)
There were things like a ribbon and a badge placed inside the basket alongside the jacket and the shirt, and among them was a black article of clothing that intrigued her. Its shape was similar to a pair of pants, but the fabric was too thin and its size was too small.
Without dwelling on why Ruvik was making a baffled face, Leticiel decided to enter the walk-in closet to change for the time being.
Leaving the pants-like article of unknown function aside, Leticiel put on the so-called uniform. After she finished changing, she promptly returned to her room and stared intently at the unknown object that was referred to as ‘bag’. She then grabbed it and headed out of her room as if nothing had happened.
“Well then.. Ruvik.”
“…Yes…”
“What is the way to the entrance?”
“My lady! Are you being serious!?”
Leticiel tilted her head while looking at Ruvik, who was holding his head in his hands. He has been shouting a lot since this morning, maybe he just likes to raise his voice?
Even though it was a refreshing morning, Ruvik looked haggard, as if he had not been sleeping for an entire week, as he guided Leticiel to the entrance hall.
Just beyond the doors was the sight of three horse-drawn carriages stopping before the entrance. And before them was the girl from the dining hall, who was having a friendly chat with another silver-haired woman.
“…Ah! Elder Sister Drossel, good morning.”
When she noticed Drossel’s figure, the red-haired girl greeted her with a smile as lovely and as bright as a flower in full-bloom. Through her greeting, Leticiel confirmed that the girl was her younger sister in this world.
“…Oh, it’s already this late. Christa, I’ll be going now. You should be leaving soon as well, or you’ll be late to the academy.”
“Okay. Have a safe trip, Elder Sister Saree.”
Christa had also referred to the woman as her older sister, which meant that this person was also ‘Drossel’’s older sister.
Opposed to her treatment toward Christa, Sareenah only spared Leticiel an uninterested glance before boarding her carriage. While gazing at the departing carriage, Leticiel surmised that this person also disliked her, but in the end, she decided it wasn’t worth her attention.
Leticiel boarded her own… or rather, the carriage Christa didn’t use, and the two were sent off by Ruvik.
“Please take care, and have a safe trip.”
For a moment, Leticiel looked back at the figure of Ruvik sending them off, but once the carriage had left the grounds of the residence, she rested her chin on her hand and gazed out the window.
On the other side of the window was the scene of a bustling town in the morning. The streets were filled with women doing morning groceries while stores along the street began to open for business, one by one. On the sides of the street, figures of men setting up their stands could also be seen. The town was calmly waking up under the morning sun.
A beautiful town that had not experienced war, filled with gentle faces that held no interest in conflict. This country was truly at peace.
(…Now that I think about it, didn’t I wish for a more comfortable life before I died?)
She had no idea why she had transmigrated, but she was sure that the gods had granted her wish. Leticiel summed up her own circumstances in a optimistically.
Suddenly, the carriage shook greatly. The high-pitched neigh of a horse was heard as the carriage came to a stop. A confused Leticiel alighted the carriage, wondering what had happened. She found the coachman crouching down by the wheel in the mud ditch beside the stone-paved road.
“What happened?”
“…Ah, my lady… Um, it seems like the wheel is broken…”
The coachman faltered as he gave his answer. He seemed to be frightened when he saw Leticiel, perhaps fearing her anger/wrath/temper.
“Oh my. In that case, let me see it for a bit.”
Leticiel motioned for the coachman to step back as she said that, and touched the wheel to examine the damage. The wood of the wheel had a crack running through it.
“Elder Sister Drossel? What happened?”
The carriage that had been running next to Leticiel’s came to a stop, and Christa peeked out of the window with an inquisitive look on her face.
“It’s only a small problem with the wheel. I’ll follow as soon as it’s fixed, so you can just go on ahead.”
“Is that so? Okay then, I’ll wait for you at the academy.”
Christa worriedly stared at Leticiel, but in the end she gave a small nod and instructed her coachman to continue. The sound of a whip cracking could be heard as Christa’s carriage began to leave.
“My, my lady! I, I will return to the residence at once to contact….”
“That will not be necessary.”
Halting the coachman who had started walking, Leticiel held her right hand over the damaged wheel.
Lights of various colors began to converge in her palm. Verdant, gold, and silver, the lights blended into one and penetrated the wheel. And then, a ripple of light spread through the carriage, even reaching the horse.
Once the light dissipated, an undamaged wheel had taken the place of where the damaged one once was.
“…Hah?…huh?”
“There won’t be any problem with this. Well then, can you head towards the academy?”
With those words, Leticiel promptly returned to the carriage.
“Huh? Er, ah, yes, understood.”
Left behind, the coachman could only stare back and forth between the wheel and the closed door in disbelief. However, because he could not afford to let the daughter of the family he was serving to be late, so he reluctantly returned to the box seat.
With a swing of the coachman’s whip, the carriage started to move. However, the wheels were turning remarkably faster than before.
It was natural, after all. While she was repairing the wheel, Leticiel had also used strengthening magecraft on both the carriage and the horse. That was why the magecraft from before had multiple colors of light blending together.
The magecraft-strengthened carriage gallantly ran through the main street. The carriage caught up to Christa’s in just an instant before leaving it behind in the dust.
“…What?…What??”
Christa’s coachman couldn’t believe the sight of a carriage moving at twice the speed to that of a normal one. Dumbfounded, he rubbed his eyes until it was out of sight.
* * *
The carriage continued to advance along the stone-paved road. Before long, it reached a vast ground with magnificent buildings. An elegant main entrance, majestic buildings, and a beautiful garden. This must be Lucrezia Academy.
(That sense of wasteful extravagance again… Well, I give up.)
As she descended from the carriage, which had stopped before the entrance hall of the frontmost building, she couldn’t help but make such a remark to herself.
“Well then… I’m in the academy, but now…”
Lucrezia Academy’s entrance hall was decorated with chandeliers hanging down from its high ceiling, a carpet covering its marble floor, and several beautiful flags on its walls.
Standing imposingly in that entrance hall was an expressionless Leticiel muttering something. To others, she looked like an unapproachable cold lady standing there calmly, but in reality, she was simply at a loss.
Leticiel didn’t have a single memory as Drossel. In other words, this was her first time coming to this academy. There was no way for her to know where to go in order to take lessons.
(…? Those people are…?)
Looking around restlessly, she found a group of adult males with attires different from the other students’ at the corner of the hall. Unable to contain her curiosity, she began observing the group. She then noticed that, for some reason, every student would greet the group when passing by.
(All the students here are children of aristocrats. For these students to greet them meant that they were all people in high positions.)
Leticiel thought that they would be able to tell her the location of her classroom if she asked them and ran up to the group.
“…Hm? You are…”
“Good morning. I just wanted to ask you a question, where should I go now?”
Leticiel was standing next to a brown-skinned muscular man with short blond hair who was standing in the center of the group. He turned toward her and knit his brows at her question.
“Huh? You’re in Elementary 2, right? Just go there, then.”
“…”
Leticiel stared blankly at the astonished man after he answered.
She really wanted to say ‘I’m asking you because I don’t know where the classroom is in the first place,’ but held back, knowing it would be impossible to get an answer with this mood. Leticiel then walked towards the school map on the wall.
It appeared that the school building was three stories high, and formed a quadrangle around an enclosed courtyard. Seeing a list with names of classrooms she had never seen before on each story, Leticiel started blinking.
“…Hey, don’t tell me you really don’t know where your own classroom is. It was supposed to be just a prank, right?”
“And what if I told you that I really don’t know?”
“…”
As Leticiel zealously studied the map, the man’s patience had begun to run thin. With an irritated tone, he shot her a question to which she replied without hesitation, as if questioning why he would even assume that. The entire group was taken aback with dumbfounded looks on their faces from her reply.
“…Your younger sister is in the same class, so you can just go with her, right?”
“…Oh my, that is a splendid idea.”
Ignoring his considerably astounded tone, Leticiel nonchalantly clapped after hearing his suggestion.
“…Ah! Elder Sister Drossel!”
As if on cue, Christa frantically ran up to Leticiel from the front entrance. Since Leticiel’s carriage had passed her earlier, she had arrived after her older sister.
“What in the world was with that carriage earlier? I have never seen one moving that fast…”
“Perfect timing, Christa. For some reason, I’ve forgotten the way to the classroom. Could you go together with me?”
After making a slight bow toward the man who gave her the suggestion, Leticiel briskly walked away from the scene without waiting for Christa’s answer.
Although Christa was in a fluster after having her words cut off, she made a similar bow to the man and chased after her older sister’s figure.
Having missed the timing to ask anything by the time she caught up, Christa was walking slightly ahead while taking a glance back once in a while. All she saw was Leticiel acting as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.
Leticiel decided not to talk about the incident with the carriage from the morning. Since she still didn’t have a solid grasp of the current situation, she couldn’t afford to let anything slip through careless mistakes.
“…Um, this is our classroom…”
Christa announced that while looking at Leticiel with a frightened and bewildered gaze. In front of the two was a door with a plate that said “Elementary 2.”
Standing before the classroom, they looked at each other in awkward silence. This sensation… it resembles the silent moment I had with Ruvik back at the residence.
“Uh, Drossel. Why…?”
“I just forgot it for some reason. Please don’t mind me.”
“O-okay…?”
After insisting on her excuse, Leticiel opened the door without any hesitation.
Countless gazes inside the classroom focused on the door. However, once they saw the figure of Leticiel, they all instantly vanished, replaced by countless whispers.
“Hey… the Ice Demon is here.”
“That appearance, that ice cold expression… How ominous.”
Some looked away, as if to not meet her eyes. Some stared at her, as if to insult and belittle her. Some glared at her, as if she was the sworn enemy of their parents.
Leticiel nonchalantly entered the classroom under all those hostile reactions. For the current Leticiel, the emotion called sadness had disappeared somewhere, she could only brush it off with a simple musing along the lines of “Geez, why is everyone looking at me?”. Her carefree mindset had become terminal.
“Good morning, everyone.”
Unlike Leticiel who was wondering what should she do after entering the room, Christa greeted her classmates with a lovely smile.
Now that I think about it, although she is my little sister, why is Christa in the same class? Perhaps we are twins? Or we were born in the same year? Well, it does not matter.
“…Hey, Drossel Noa Filiaregis.”
Leticiel was blankly staring at Christa but shifted her gaze to the unamused voice from behind her younger sister.
The source of that voice was a youth with mint-colored hair and crimson eyes that seemed to be burning. Those razor-sharp eyes mixed with scorn gave off an air of being strong-willed.
“Thank you for your politeness.”
She was genuinely thanking him for telling her her full name. However, the boy made a foolish face when he was thanked out of the blue.
“Y-your Highness Rochefort…”
Although she was a bit surprised with his sudden appearance, Christa called out to the boy.
Having the title ‘Your Highness’ attached to his name must mean that this impertinent person is the prince of this country. Leticiel silently promoted Rochefort from ‘annoying person’ to ‘troublesome person’ in her mind.
She then realized that there were several boys standing behind Rochefort. Since they’re also glaring over here, they’re probably the prince’s followers.
In other words, they must have high status as well. There’s only trouble getting involved with them, so I should try my best to not…
“…ey…! Hey…! You! Are you listening?”
Since Rochefort’s deep voice had interrupted her train of thought, Leticiel slightly knitted her brows and looked at him.
“My apologies, I was not paying attention.”
“Wha…!? You, you dare act like that in front of me, your fiancé!”
Leticiel was amazed from the bottom of her heart that Rochefort would be so furious even though she had given a proper apology. However, of all his words there was one that caught her attention more than his anger. Fiancé. He really did say that.
“You Highness, please give it a rest!”
“…Christa. Sorry, I lost my cool there. But when I hear your beautiful and gentle voice, even my anger clears away.”
“Geez… Please don’t put it like that, Your Highness.”
“Christa…”
Before Leticiel’s very eyes, Rochefort was looking at her younger sister with an enraptured gaze while Christa’s cheeks were dyed red with embarrassment. He was clearly showing animosity towards Drossel while showering Christa with affection. And on top of that, Christa didn’t seem to dislike it herself.
(He is brazenly having an affair right in front of his fiancée. This is my, the current me’s fiancé…?)
Leticiel’s previous partner had been a kind man who only loved her. But it seemed like she had no luck with both her family and partner in her current life.
(Oh well, I don’t care about it, so let’s just not get involved.)
Although she should deal with the fact that Rochefort and Christa were still lost in each other’s eyes, Leticiel ignored them to look for an empty seat and found one in the very last row.
“Is this seat empty?”
“Y-yes!”
Leticiel’s question made the brown-haired girl sitting next to the empty seat jump and let out a shrill voice. She wondered why the girl was so scared of “Drossel”, but immediately lost her interest.
Leticiel then sat down and faced the front of the room, but for some reason Rochefort and his followers were glaring straight at her.
She became very confused as she had the courtesy to ignore the fact that he and Christa had been in their own world, but his group were still dissatisfied for some reason.
However, even then, she immediately lost interest and looked away from Rochefort’s group.
* * *
Shortly after the sound of a bell echoed through the academy, the teacher for the first period entered the classroom. His belly jiggled as he walked into the room, the middle-aged teacher with a shining scalp stood before the podium.
“History class will now begin.”
It seemed that first period is History. Since she didn’t know the exact time period she was in, Leticiel silently opened her textbook and started reading while ignoring the teacher’s lesson.
The girl sitting next to her was looking at her with a dubious face as ‘Drossel’ had not even once opened the textbook during history class. But Leticiel, who was rummaging through the textbook in earnest, didn’t notice that.
“Then, please open the textbook to page 6…”
Ignoring the teacher’s voice and the sound of pen from around her, Leticiel was completely absorbed in her textbook.
The Platina Kingdom was the third most powerful country in the Astraea continent. Leticiel secretly breathed a sigh of relief after finding out that it was the same continent as the one she lived in.
The kingdom’s history spanned over a thousand years, and it was currently in an alliance with its neighboring country, the Iris Empire. Back in Leticiel’s age, the average life of a country was around 60 to 70 years, only powerful countries lasted longer than 100 years. This meant that the world had become peaceful.
Before the founding of the Platina Kingdom, countless countries had continued to wage bloody wars to unite the Astraea continent. Perhaps that was the age that Leticiel had lived in.
This long warring period was called the Astraea Continental War. And, as a reference to when it had started, and how long it had lasted, it was also called the Thousand Year War…
Leticiel suddenly felt something on her shoulder. When she looked up from the textbook and to her side, she saw the girl sitting next to her tapping on it.
“Miss Drossel, did you hear what I was saying?”
Reacting to that voice, Leticiel looked forward to find the teacher who was holding his textbook with one hand looking at her. From her angle, his head was shining brilliantly due to the classroom’s lighti… no, it was better to not go beyond this point.
“…I’m very sorry. Could you please repeat the question again?”
“Fine. Can you name the major powers during the Astraea Continental War?”
“Hmm… If we’re talking about the major powers, then the first country to come to mind would be the Dransall Empire, the most powerful country. But we also can’t leave out its neighbor who could match its might, the Sephiroth Kingdom. In terms of countries that all of its neighbors had to be wary of, there was the Holy Walpurgis Empire. This was the only country without its own army as all of its citizens were black-hearted. On the other hand, if we’re talking about countries that specialized in their military, there were the Heltcutale Republic and the Fornande Kingdom. In particular, the latter was also referred to as the Overnight Kingdom, as it was founded by building a castle in a single night.”
“Huh…? W-wow… How strange, you even listed countries that were not in the textbook…”
The teacher muttered something under his breath that didn’t reach the students’ ears.
On the other hand, Leticiel was simply reciting information she saw and heard during her previous life. After all, she lived during the Astraea Continental War. There was nobody more knowledgeable about that time period than her in the room.
All the countries she had listed just now were ones that had held real power in the central region; she hadn’t included any countries from the remote regions. While most of the countries listed were around for a long time, there were cases of countries like the Fornande Kingdom, which were crushed within ten years of its founding by an alliance of major powers. It was natural that countries like these didn’t remain in history.
Incidentally, Leticiel’s Rizenrose Kingdom was also quite a powerful kingdom in the remote regions, or at least it was comparable to the neighboring Gelrald Kingdom.
“…Ah, um, I think your explanation was a bit too detailed, but it seems that you’ve prepared for the lesson properly. Well then, please turn to the next page.”
The teacher returned to the lesson while quizzically scratching his neck. Leticiel once again lowered her gaze back to the textbook. There was too much history and information she didn’t know about in this age.
It seemed like there were still mountains of things she needed to investigate.
* * *
After the break was the second period, which seemed to be about Magic Formula.
The teacher standing before the podium was doing things like reviewing the previous lesson and reading the textbook out loud.
Leticiel took a sidelong glance at the textbook the brown-haired girl sitting next to her had taken out. Mimicking her, Leticiel placed the same textbook on top of her table, as well as a notebook, though she doubted she would write anything down.
Magic Formula… Leticiel knew it under the name of Sorcery Formula. It was something used to introduce beginners to magecraft.
The strength and scope of magecraft was determined by the practitioner’s imagination as well as their calculation-information processing ability. However, asking a beginner to invoke magecraft out of the blue would only produce unsuccessful results.
Sorcery Formulas were developed to make up for that. By using formulas over and over again, once one became familiar with magecraft’s calculation processing step, formulas would no longer be needed. In fact, in order to get to the level where magecraft could be used through imagination alone, it would be much easier and more efficient to do the calculations subconsciously on their own rather than going through the formulas.
Due to that fact, sorcery formulas for beginners would be of no use for Leticiel, who had been the kingdom’s best mage in her previous life. Frankly speaking, this class would only be free time for Leticiel.
“…sel, Miss Drossel.”
Leticiel, who had been recalling about the past, was pulled back to reality by the voice calling her name.
“…It looked like you weren’t paying attention just now… Are you planning to answer my question…?”
The teacher was looking at Leticiel with a sullen face. After staring blankly at that expression for a few moments, she realized that her own name had been called.
“I’m very sorry. I didn’t hear the question, could you please repeat it again?”
“…O-okay. Please overwrite the basic Fire formula on this black board with the basic Wind formula.”
After hearing his question, Leticiel looked at the formula written on the blackboard. She then opened her eyes wide in shock.
The basic Fire formula had been written there. Or to be more accurate, something that greatly resembled the basic Fire formula had been written there.
Leticiel understood that the formula was from the Fire System. However, the difference between the basic formula she knew and the one on the board was heaven and hell.
To start with, the formula’s scope had been expanded too far. Since basic formulas were the very foundation of magecraft, they had to keep the amount of waste to a bare minimum. Nevertheless, a scope of this size would put needless load on the information processing circuit.
In addition, there were too many pointless variables for Target Control. It was unthinkable that anyone would use a formula with these variables as a base to create others for practical use. The variables would cancel each other out and the desired result would not be achieved.
Even from her previous life, Leticiel had never seen a formula this horrible. It was filled with pointlessness. The Mana consumption was terrible, and the conversion efficiency was the worst.
It would be impossible to use a formula with this level of inefficiency for magecraft in the first place, let alone overwriting it with the basic wind formula. What in the world happened to the magecraft… the magic level of this world?
As Drossel was staring blankly at the blackboard, her teacher and classmates assumed that her silence was due to her not knowing the answer.
Snickers started to fill the classroom, Rochefort and his followers were among them. The teacher let out a sigh while staring at Drossel after seeing the state of the class.
“…So you don’t understand it, like I thought. Well then…”
His words were cut off by the loud sound of Leticiel kicking her chair as she stood up.
Leticiel started walking down to the podium. The classroom started to quiet down as the students stared at Leticiel while wondering what was she doing. Once she reached the podium, she snatched the piece of chalk out of the teacher’s hand and began writing a new formula next to the one on the blackboard.
The snickers disappeared in an instant as the classroom fell into complete silence. Everyone in the room was dumbfounded by Drossel’s unexpected behavior. They wondered what in the world was happening as they held their breath staring at her.
Leticiel was livid. Perhaps, if there was anyone who knew about sorcery formula from her previous life in this room, they would surely agree with her reaction.
Leticiel had not been called Rizenrose’s number one mage without a reason. She was a magecraft maniac through and through. While she put the people and her family first, outside of the time spent on the battlefield, she would invest the rest of it into formula research.
Her focus was on reducing the complexity and burden on the practitioner without having to compensate on the magecraft’s power. As someone who strove to trim down those two factors for Sorcery Formulas, she had been able to achieve that goal.
Yes, she had already discovered the limit of sorcery formulas before she died. Leticiel had knowledge of the most beautiful and efficient formulas.
From the viewpoint of a girl like her, it was no exaggeration to call the thing written before her eyes, that rubbish formula, a blasphemy against magecraft itself.
Although she didn’t know how much time had passed since her death, Leticiel wondered when and how it had all gone so wrong that this kind of shitty formula and theory had become so widespread. She wanted to grab the person who had propagated this by the neck and interrogate them for about an hour.
An ominous laugh could be heard inside the classroom.
For some reason, a pitch black aura sprouted from the figure of the female student holding a piece of chalk with her back to the rest of the class. The figure that even made a few students shriek out of fright was one that could truly be called ‘Ice Demon’. Even the teacher had to retreat with a pale face. Before anyone had realized it, an invisible blizzard had started blowing violently through the classroom; there were even some who fainted out of dread.
Before long, the formula on the blackboard had been completed. Leticiel wholeheartedly smiled at the perfect formula she had written. Her profile was the manifestation of ecstasy itself.
When she put down the piece of chalk, the blizzard that had been assaulting the classroom simultaneously dispersed.
On the blackboard was a formula that was more than a level smaller than the one the teacher had written.
Any segment that could have been removed had been completely stripped away, pointless variables replaced by specific ones, and functions had been added into the freed up space, this was the the sorcery formula that Leticiel was familiar with.
Leticiel gazed at it with enraptured eyes. While her interest in others had vanished, her passion and tenacity for magecraft had increased even further, rather than vanishing along with it.
“This is the correct basic Fire formula. To answer your question, I have overwritten it with the basic Wind formula. Please feel free to use it for the lesson.”
She turned to face the teacher, and on her face was the finest quality smile that anyone could imagine. Even the teacher who had been filled with dread until now was greatly shaken.
So even that Ice Demon can make this kind of smile, huh. It’s not her usual condescending smile nor is it that ominous, scornful laugh from earlier. It’s a smile straight from her heart.
By the time the other students had blinked their eyes, Leticiel had already returned to her signature expressionless face. While he still had a blank look, she made a bow and returned to her seat.
“….U-uuum! Just now, what…”
As soon as Leticiel sat down, a timid voice escaped from the girl sitting next to her.
For some reason, the girl’s complexion had gotten even worse since this morning. It was no longer white or blue, but deathly pale instead.
“Are you okay? It’s better to rest if you don’t feel well.”
“A-and you’re the one to talk…!?”
Although Leticiel was worried about her condition, the girl let out a hysterical shout that cracked with falsetto for some reason.
The surrounding classmates turned toward Leticiel. Among them were criticizing glares, while some others frightfully peeked at her.
“Um… Did I do something wrong?”
“Huh….!? You really didn’t notice it!?”
“Uh… What did you mean by… ‘it’?”
“Are you serious!? What else could it be, if not the blizzard that laid waste to this room just now!?”
“Blizzard…?”
The girl explained to Leticiel in detail what had happened in the classroom while she had been facing the blackboard.
According to her, a black aura had risen up from Leticiel’s back while she was making some extremely ominous noises. Furthermore, for some unknown reason, something akin to a snow storm suddenly assaulted the classroom and caused many people to faint.
If the girl’s words were true, then Leticiel really had caused trouble for everyone. While she was apologetic, there was also one thing she wanted to say before that.
“Thank you very much, I got to hear something nice.”
“There was nothing nice about that at all!! How did you even get “something nice” from our talk just now!? Only a nightmare, it could have only been a nightmare!!”
“I know I’ve caused trouble for everyone. I’m very sorry about that.”
“…Why are you apologizing like normal now…!”
The girl then mumbled that she had nothing to complain or talk about anymore with teary eyes. Leticiel thought that she had perhaps said something to irritate the girl.
The ‘something nice’ that Leticiel mentioned was the invisible blizzard that had assaulted the classroom.
Magecraft. An art that collects Mana from the atmosphere and uses the practitioner’s body as a medium to alter phenomenon. The resulting phenomenon and its scope could be adjusted to the practitioner’s will. However, the higher the complexity or the scale, the higher the burden on the practitioner.
The nightmarish blizzard her classmates saw was likely the result of the Mana in the classroom conforming to Leticiel’s anger. Her fury had been projected into the physical world and rampaged throughout the room. Although practitioners should only be able to use magecraft consciously, being able to wield it subconsciously was proof of how strong her Phenomenon Interference power was.
Moreover, it had engulfed the entire classroom without Leticiel breaking a sweat. The blizzard from before hadn’t been a burden on her body at all.
(This body, perhaps it’s outrageously compatible with magecraft?)
Noticing that possibility, Leticiel let out a chuckle.
Even with her previous body, Leticiel hadn’t been able to cause magecraft phenomenon to manifest subconsciously. But this body was able to do it. With enough practice, she could become an even greater mage than before.
The students who were eyeing her suspiciously were unaware that the door to the next stage had opened inside Leticiel.
By chance, Leticiel caught Christa’s gaze. She was sitting at the front of the class. Her face was a little pale, however, she was glaring at Leticiel with eyes so sharp, it was as if she was staring at her parents’ sworn enemy.
Although she had been wearing a lovely face since the morning, her current look was that of a Hannya. As nobody else was looking at Christa, that glare of a woman going mad with envy went unnoticed.
Leticiel had thought her little sister’s personality was consistent with her appearance, but even if she realized that wasn’t true, the fact that Leticiel had no interest in Christa didn’t change.
Leticiel decided to ignore Christa, who was glaring at her still.
(…I have to say, it’s been only a few hours since I transmigrated, but I’m already tired from everything that’s happened so far.)
To distance herself from the noisy classroom, Leticiel plopped down on top of her desk.
A new environment, a new society, a new common sense, a new world. Unfamiliar knowledge and information had been pouring non-stop into Leticiel like a waterfall; it was no surprise that even she would be tired.
Leticiel’s eyelids slowly closed as she vaguely suggested to herself that writing down and organizing what she’d learned so far would be good to spare herself from confusion in the future.
* * *
She was supposed to have no magic power at all, how did Drossel manage to do that?
Without caring about the commotion in the classroom or the gazes of her classmates, Drossel was lying face-down on her desk, sleeping. The girl sitting next to her… Mirandalette Lulu Wald was staring at her slumbering form in bewilderment.
To be frank, Mirandalette was afraid of Drossel and didn’t want to get involved with her. Not only did Drossel have no magic power at all, she was short-tempered and hard to get along with.
On the day of the entrance ceremony, she had hit her own sister out of anger. That rumor soon spread throughout the academy and she was shunned upon enrolment. Because of that, Drossel was someone who Mirandalette didn’t want to get involved with.
(…But, had Drossel… always been this kind of person…?)
From history class to formula class and even now, the classroom had been murmuring about Drossel, whose actions and speech were completely different to her usual self.
Because she had been scared by the rumors, she had only looked at Drossel from a distance. However, the carefree and gentle sleeping face before Mirandalette’s very eyes had thrown her for a loop. The Drossel sitting next to her was far from the one she had heard from the rumors.
While Mirandalette was being bewildered, the commotion in the classroom continued on.
The Formula Studies teacher, who had been staring petrified at the formula written on the blackboard for some time now, suddenly returned to his senses. He immediately took out a memo pad from his pocket and started to rapidly write down something.
“Everyone, the rest of today’s class will be self-study…!”
While still holding the memo pad that he just finished writing on, the teacher made a brief announcement before dashing out of the classroom.
