My Lord’s Engagement – Q of Hearts (Part 1)

Note: Please don’t read it in the little pop-up for the reader. For some reason it doesn’t reflect my later edits (which I often make a lot of after publishing), so please click ‘view original’.

One Day I Became a Burikko Villainess Noble Girl, out now.
Honto tutorial here.

Think of it as throwing money at the author and Alphapolis, and getting a book with squiggles and pretty pictures as a pleasant extra.

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Right now I’m in Beatrix’s room.

Trying my best with my unsteady legs, I had thankfully made it as far as in front of Royce-sama’s room, but I hit my limit and couldn’t stand anymore.
Achille happened to be there and carried me after I collapsed though. To begin with, it’s all Achille’s fault that I became like this.

It seems that the room next to Royce-sama’s was prepared for Beatrix, and by chance she was also standing there in front of her door.
I know now why husband and wife have rooms next to each other, so I’m not going to stick my nose in it.
After all, I get the feeling that if I cause trouble for myself, I’m going to go through a rough time at Achille’s hands again. Even though he’s got such a skinny body, to think he had that much endurance… It’s fraud.

“Um, M-… Camille-sama. If it pleases you, how about resting in my room?”

Beatrix gave me a much a much wanted suggestion, so I took her up on her offer.
Listening to Achille say this, and that, and “don’t stay out too late” was tiring though… I’m not a kid, so I know that much. Geez.

Ever since I got married to him, he’s been nagging me even more. He’s almost like a mother, warning me about thiss, and thatt.
But despite saying this and that, he definitely wouldn’t give up on me.
I’m aware that I’ve gone in some weird directions as a woman, so I want to treasure Achille who says that I’m fine like this anyway. I have no intention of changing the direction I’m heading in though.

And so, going back to my first topic, it was decided that I’d be passing the time in Beatrix’s room.

※

I had something I wanted to talk to Beatrix about as well after all, so it was a good chance.
I told Beatrix the rough details about what the Heroine and extremists had done, and how we would be catching them in the future.
She’s the person who might become our next queen, so I thought it would be better to tell her about to danger of the extremists.
At the same time, feelings of guilt about her marriage welled up in me.
According to what I heard from Achille, it was an engagement brought about by Royce-sama’s unrequited feelings, the situation with the Heroine hiding in Topageria, and various other things.
When I tried asking in further detail, for some reason Achille was evasive about it… Why?

Personally speaking, I’d like Beatrix to come to like Royce-sama.
In the past, I probably would have been jealous of her, but right now I already have Achille as a husband.
Although I still think of Royce-sama as wonderful, it isn’t a romantic feeling anymore.
In that cause, I’d like to cheer him on.

But. When I considered how I’d tell her about all this, a number of problems came up.
How should I explain this to her? I’m not entirely clear about the situation, so there are lots of parts that I can’t fully explain.

Royce-sama brought up the issue of the Heroine and said “Wed Beatrix to me and help me capture the Heroine and I’ll overlook some of Topageria’s responsibility in this to a degree. If you don’t, it’s war.” …It’s no good. If I said this, Royce-sama looks like a villain.
Then how about, “I’m making Miss Beatrix the queen of Garnet, so go help us out with catching the Heroine”? …This is no good either. It’s filled with Royce-sama’s self-interest.

Having only heard bits and pieces, there’s a limit to my ability to explain things.
It’s no good. I guess it might really be better to have Royce-sama explain things himself. He’s the one who chose her as a bride, after all.
I decided to pass all of the explaining to Royce-sama. I’ll leave the rest to you.

“Oh that’s right, I’ll call Mei-chan over as well next time. She’s here at the castle too, after all. She’s pregnant so she shouldn’t do anything strenuous though.”

“Eh-… pregnant?”

The surprised Beatrix rose her head, and stared right at me.

“Right, with Raiga-sama’s child.”

“-…I, see.”

Beatrix’s eyes were swimming. She was a Raiga fan, so she might have received quite a shock.

Looking out the window, I found that the sun had already set.
I’d feel bad about staying too long in Beatrix’s room, so I stood up. It can feel more power in my legs than before.

“It looks like you’re still struggling to stand up, but are you alright? Aren’t you feeling ill?”

“…I’m fine. This is, umm.”

The words were stuck in my throat. My cheeks immediately started to burn.
I-, I can’t say it…
Because Achille did this and that to me, I ended up unable to walk properly.

“Look now, it looks like you even have a fever.”

“T-, That’s not it. This is, I, just don’t have any strength in my legs… Umm, last night.”

“Eh-? Ehh-, could it be… Ah-, AHHH!”

It seems that Beatrix finally understood.
Her face also turned red in a flash. My face burned even hotter…
S-, So embarassing.
Because it was so embarassing, I couldn’t raise my head, and just flopped onto the couch. It’s a bit of a breach of manners, but it’s just us two here so there shouldn’t be a problem.

“…W-, Well, you’re newlyweds after all.”

Beatrix gave an odd follow-up.

“Uuu…”

“Achille is different than how he seems, huh!”

Please, just stop speaking…

“Uuuuu…”

After crouching for a few minutes, I somehow managed to get my blushing under control.
Alright. Time to withdraw.

“Beatrix, umm, that’s how it is, as far as its possible, I’d be happy if you cooperated with us. I know that it isn’t my place to say this after all that’s happened though.”

“Y-, Yeah. As long as it’s something I can do, I’ll cooperate with you, Miss Camille.”

“Thanks.”

Because a bit of the embarassment was left over from before, it’s still a little awkward.

“This is my personal opinion, but if you’re going to directly face the Heroine, then I think that in the end, pulling out the secret character would be effective.”

“Secret character?”

“You don’t know about him?”

I tried thinking back to the past. Speaking of which, the might have been something like that, but… I ended up here without finding out who it was. And I’d forgotten they existed all this time.
Even the walkthrough sites at the time still hadn’t uploaded any information on the secret character after all…

“Sorry, I ended up here while I was still playing the game, so… I only know about the four romance and friendship routes. Did you clear the route for the secret character, Beatrix?”

“Yeah, after you clear the four romance and friendship routes, as well as all the bad ends for the protagonist, he appears.”

Was that how it was? I ended up coming here while I was in the middle of clearing the bad ends after all.
The bad ends took an emotional toll after all, so they were really tough for weaklings like me, after all. So naturally my game clearing speed fell.
I mean, the Heroine just kept dying, and dying, and dying after all.

“And so, about that secret character… is he strong?”

“He has mana that compares to the Heroine.”

Was there such an amazing person around…? What a blindspot. As expected of Beatrix.

“By the way, what kind of person were they?”

“What kind of person, huh…? He’s just the school headmaster though.”

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“Beatrix gave an odd follow-up.”
The word ‘odd’ here is actually ‘bimyou’, and means um, like… Well, basically they’re saying that it’s ‘neither here nor there’ or ‘hard to make a judgement on’. When something is bimyou, it’s like, it’s not too bad, but not too good either. Or maybe, it’s not quite appropriate, but not exactly inappropriate either. Like, in general, things that are ‘bimyou’ are just things that are hard to give a straight judgement on. Like, if you eat something and it tastes ‘bimyou’, it’s sorta like ‘ehhhhh, not BAD, but like… not good either, sorta’.

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