Chapter 12

……

Every time I remember it, I get dizzy at my own wickedness.

Exploring every possible means to fulfill one’s own desires—that much is fine.

But using that to drag people down is completely unforgivable!

And on top of that, beating them down more than necessary and completely shattering their lives shouldn’t be done either!?

What on earth did Lady Adelina ever do to me?

Granted, she was born blessed with an immense amount of magical power. In a sense, the polar opposite of me.

That didn’t mean she had given me even the slightest reason to hold a grudge against her.

She hadn’t found happiness simply because she was blessed with magical power, either. If anything, it invited excessive expectations from her parents, leaving her troubled by the fact that she could not unite with the man she desired.

Using that dilemma to cause her to drop out of the Crown Princess candidates…

And in the end, she couldn’t even marry the man she desired.

The two of them, having been caught red-handed in a secret tryst right there at the venue of the Crown Princess selection, were condemned as immoral; the woman was sent off to a monastery, while the man was disowned and his whereabouts became unknown.

And all of that was because I deliberately targeted the absolute worst possible timing.

How truly wicked my past life self was!

In the first place, participating in the Crown Princess selection was a mandatory obligation for all noble ladies of eligible age.

In contrast, the only permissible reason to decline was if one was already married to another man… or at the very least, formally engaged.

Naturally, the royal family could not welcome a woman who might possibly be carrying another man’s seed.

Even so, it was said that in the kingdom’s long history, there had been cases of a once-divorced queen who was forcibly made to divorce due to possessing an overwhelmingly massive amount of magical power.

In the present era, however, methods to accurately predict individuals’ absolute quantities of magic had been established; by measuring the magic that began manifesting around age two to three, tracking the growth pace, and gathering data up to around age ten, it was now possible to roughly estimate just how high their final magic reserves would reach.

Because of this, young ladies whom the royal family judged unworthy of attention were given the system of having their engagements approved simply through notification.

Me?

From birth until this very day, my magical reserves have been zero. Calculating my growth pace must have been the easiest thing in the world.

Lady Adelina, the person in question, had also shown her promising potential from early childhood, and it had been clear from an early stage that she would become one of the country’s top magic holders.

That was why her parents held towering expectations for her, and even if she had requested an engagement with someone, permission from the royal family likely never would have been granted.

It was only natural that Lady Adelina felt suffocated by the circumstances placed upon her.

Consequently, it was perhaps inevitable that she would find herself drawn to a man bound by circumstances in a different sense than her—the third son of a marquis family.

In this life, there was no demon around to trap those two.

They would surely avoid the tragic fates of being sent to a monastery or disappearing without a trace.

But was that truly all?

Even if my evil plotting was gone, that did not mean their path of love would suddenly come to fruition.

Lady Adelina would still likely continue striving for the unwanted position of Crown Princess, driven by her parents’ unyielding expectations.

And the man she loved would undoubtedly suffer in anguish, with no choice left but to watch over her.

“…”

Getting lost in thought like this, I started to grow concerned.

Leaving the male lover aside, Lady Adelina herself should definitely be attending this evening party.

While I had sworn never to trap her in this life, stealing a brief glance at how she was doing should be fine, right?

Thinking that, I decided to search for her whereabouts.

Before long, I spotted Countess Adelina.

Ah, she looked exactly as she had in my past life.

Her golden hair, the color of ripened wheat ears, was neatly cropped short at shoulder length.

Her facial features still retained an innocent charm, perhaps lacking a bit of the dazzling glamour seen in other ladies.

Well, compared to the amount of magical power one possessed, physical beauty was barely even a factor in evaluating a Crown Princess.

The dress she wore also featured magical decorations, though it looked somewhat plainer compared to the other ladies.

The Count of Fwanze family into which she was born wasn’t particularly wealthy among peers holding the rank of count, or so I had heard.

Despite that, they pinned excessive hopes on their beloved daughter Adelina, pinching pennies from their meager household assets to fund an education designed to train her magical prowess.

If the result of all that was being sent off to a monastery (in my past life), her parents’ efforts truly went unrewarded.

From the looks of it, Lady Adelina seemed to be doing well, and my goal of simply checking up on her had been achieved, but…

What should I do from here?

There was zero chance I would try to ensnare her in this life, so I figured I should keep as much distance from her as possible.

Yet, for some reason, I just couldn’t shake my curiosity…

What was I curious about, you ask?

Lady Adelina was heading somewhere.

To a different area, away from the evening party hall.

“No way…”

Even though my head told me I shouldn’t get involved, I picked up my pace and ended up following her back.

Lady Adelina marched steadily onward and eventually walked straight out of the evening party venue.

“Where on earth is she going? If she isn’t at the evening party, she’ll never catch the Crown Prince’s eye, you know?”

No matter how high one’s magical power, the position of Crown Princess wasn’t so easily won on that alone.

There were simply at least three other young ladies who rivaled her in raw magical power, and to compete and win against them, it was still necessary to flirt a little and curry favor with the Crown Prince himself.

Tonight’s evening party was the absolute prime opportunity for that.

“The battle has already begun…!”

If one genuinely wished to stand at the apex of the nation.

…Ah, she didn’t actually wish for it at all, did she?

Just like me in this life, my past life self had desired nothing more than to become Crown Princess. To prove my own worth.

This lingering frustration was probably just a remnant of that…

Feeling bewildered by the emotional turbulence within myself, I felt a growing premonition as Lady Adelina walked somewhere without a single trace of hesitation.

A bad premonition, as far as I was concerned.

Lady Adelina finally stepped out of the royal castle’s building as well, venturing beneath the night sky.

This was the inner courtyard of the royal castle.

Amidst meticulously manicured shrubberies maintained by the gardeners, a single man was waiting ahead for Lady Adelina as she continued onward.

…Just as I thought!

That right there was Lady Adelina’s lover, the marquis’s third son!

In my previous life, I had orchestrated his entry into the royal castle, but in this life, he had sneaked in entirely under his own power!

Did that mean his feelings for his beloved were that strong?

With me hiding and panicking just out of sight, the lovers began whispering sweet nothings to each other under the moonlight.

“Oh, Berem… to think you really came. When your magical message arrived, I thought I must be dreaming…!”

Ah, so her lover’s name was Berem… that was the first time I’d learned it in this life… and since he was a noble of this country as well, he was a mages.

I didn’t know the extent of his skill, but he had used a type of magic that transmitted intent from a distance.

That was why Lady Adelina had rushed out without a moment’s hesitation.

“Adelina, you are undoubtedly the finest female mage in the entire kingdom. Not only that, you are radiantly beautiful. Like a goddess shimmering in spring.”

No, I didn’t think she was quite that much.

“With your ability, you could truly become Crown Princess. I understand why your father thinks so. A dead-end spare noble like me is no match for you. I thought of stepping aside then… but I couldn’t.”

“Berem…!”

“Let’s run away together. At this rate, who cares about our families? You are all that matters to me. Let’s run away together and live just the two of us in some place where no one knows our names.”

“If it’s with you, I will go anywhere!”

Wait just a minute!

Why on earth would you make a decision like that now of all times?!

Any time before today would have been fine, so why right now?!

No matter how deeply the two of you love each other, the moment Adelina attended this evening party, she became a full-fledged Crown Princess candidate!

If you run away taking Adelina with you, it’s tantamount to abducting the future Crown Princess.

Even the royal family wouldn’t let their face be trampled like that and would launch a manhunt. They would pursue you relentlessly until you were caught.

Because, after all, they are the royal family.

I couldn’t possibly imagine two sheltered aristocrats holding hands and successfully making a clean getaway.

And once caught, the fate awaiting them would be the exact same as in my past life…

A monastery, or disownment.

Ah, I hadn’t plotted a single wicked scheme in this life.

Why were things hurtling toward the exact same tragic conclusion as my past life?!

And what on earth was I supposed to do, having accidentally stumbled right into the middle of this straight shot toward a bad end?!

Pretend I didn’t see anything?

I was the one who had engineered that exact path in my past life and pushed the two of them off the cliff.

If I just let them die here, wouldn’t that mean I was no different from the wicked woman of my past life after all?

What on earth am I supposed to do?!