7 Years Old – Q of Hearts

I, who was a high schooler, was constantly controlled by the gazes and opinions of those around me, skilfully went with the flow, and lived however it led me.
So that I could look even a little better to others, I paid attention to nothing but the eyes of others, and did nothing but keep up appearances.
But what meaning did that have?
In this world, there was no meaning in being ‘reasonably good’.
From when I was three years old until I was five, I averted my eyes from reality, and lived by nothing but my desires and whims.
Were I to accept this world in the true sense of the word, there was no way that it would be alright to stay that way.

I’m reflecting on my actions.
The way I’ve been up until now is no good.
If I don’t change myself, my wishes won’t come true.

Up until now, have I ever devoted my body and soul to anything?
Paying no heed to flattery from others, and earnestly facing reality without running away…

Right now, I’m wholeheartedly studying magic. The amount of study is incomparable to any I’ve done before.
I don’t want to feel that way again. I don’t want to despair due to my lack of power.
Without being content with only the tasks given by my tutor, wholeheartedly reading magic textbooks from morning until night, and occasionally showing up at the Magic Building…
Aimée and the other servants backed away from me due to my enthusiasm.
But I don’t mind if people back away from me. I’ve decided not to worry about the eyes of others anymore.
If I don’t, let alone Royce-sama, I won’t even be able to protect myself.

In the incident that happened in the castle town last year, had I messed up, Royce-sama, Achille and I would have died. I won’t let something like that happend again.
If I don’t master magic more than anyone… If I don’t become strong enough to protect my loved ones from everybody else…
Even though this is supposed to be the world of an otome game, there’s no saving, loading or resetting.

――――This world is my reality.

I felt impatient.
Protecting Royce-sama from destruction was not something so simple.

I’m not certain if they could understand my zeal, but when I turned seven I was allowed some work at the Magic Building.
My job at the Magic Building was to be an apprentice “Red”. It was a job within the red robed magician group that I saw at the castle before.
The colour of the clothing worn by magicians working at the castle depended on their jobs.
“Blue” was a magical research job, involving the development of new varieties of magic, items or medicine.
“Black” worked as the guards of people of influence.
“Red” had the most personnel, and were responsible for all of the work not covered by “Blue” or “Black”.
Doing things like solving problems that arose in the country’s cities and villages, heading to certain places to do magic inspections, eliminating monsters that troubled the citizens; it was a pretty hectic job.

It seems that even monsters appear in this world. It’s seriously too “fantasy”.
They mostly live deep in the forest or in caves; dark places with no human presence, and if you lived normally in a town, you would almost never see one.
They didn’t appear in the setting of the otome game.
If something like monsters appeared in the academy, it would be undoubtedly a major incident, so that’s basically the end of the story, but…

Starting from simple inspections, then eventually making my way to exterminations of lower class monsters, I would be learning the jobs of “Red”, little by little.
During this time, it was made sure that Royce-sama had capable adult guards with him.
As expected, guarding the prince wasn’t a job you could leave to a little six year old, so until we entered the academy, there was no need for me to stick to Royce-sama. My contact with him was limited to visiting a few times a week.
It seems that Achille was also working a simple administration/odd-jobs job. That was because he was an apprentice like me, though.

While living like this, one day, I had an encounter.
An encounter with the enemy of Royce-sama that would appear during the K of Spades route; the heroine’s rival, the Q of Spades.

Mei Zakro, the Q of Spades, was the loyal servant of the son of the king’s younger brother, the K of Spades.
She and her younger twin brother served as the guards of the K of Spades.

Mei was a taciturn woman who loyally followed her orders, clad in a mysterious aura, and amongst the rivals she was the one with the best personality. Incidentally, the one with the worst personality was Camille.
After all, Camille was jealous towards the heroine who was growing close to the K of Hearts that she was one-sidedly in love with, and was a rival who harassed the heroine as much as possible.

However, when it came to Mei, because her love for her lord was too strong, she ran wild and persistently tried to get rid of the heroine who was deceiving her lord.
Once the heroine cleared the K of Spades route, the fact that Mei tried to harm the heroine was revealed and she was fired, and like that it became unknown what happened to her.
…Up until the end, she remained a somewhat mysterious rival.

That Mei Zakro was now bawling in the middle of the corridor.

“FUAAAAAAAAAH, NOOOOOOO! WHERE AREEE YOUUUUU?”

That mysterious, devoted-to-her-duties, silent beauty is also the same age as me right now. There’s not a trace of mysteriousness here.

“So Mei was working from such a young age too, huh…”

Her deep blue hair and dark skin were just like in the game, and tears overflowed endlessly from her golden eyes.

The enemy was a little girl… It might get annoying to get involved.
I have no idea what to do with crying children.
But I’ll feel guilty leaving her alone too. And I look like a child too, right now…

“What’s wrong? Are you looking for someone?”

“WAAAAAAAAAH!”

Just like Achille did to me recently, I tried patting her on the head.
It seems that it was effective, and the girl’s sobbing receded just a little.
Just by knowing her future self, seeing her crying face feels plenty wrong.

“Wheresss, Raiga-sama?”

“Ehh…”

It seems like she’s looking for her master Raiga Transbaal; in other words the K of Spades.
Was Mei all LOVE♥Master at this young an age?
But wow, it really is too weird seeing this gap between the always calm, mysterious Mei from the game, and the Mei right now.

“You’re looking for Raiga-sama?”

“Uuu… I had an afternoon nap, and then Raiga-sama was gone… (sob)”

Mei and afternoon naps… It really is a mismatched combo.
I stayed by her side for a while comforting her, so her crying calmed down a lot.

After a while came the pitter patter sounds of multiple people coming down the other end of the hallway.

“Meii!”

In an instant, I could tell who the owner of those footsteps were… How troubling.

“Raiga-sama!”

Before my eyes stood the K of Spades, Royce-sama’s enemy, Raiga Transbaal.
Because he’s Royce-sama’s cousin, he’s an ikemen as well, but that overpowering atmosphere of his has not a smidgen of friendliness.
Behind him was Mei’s younger twin brother, J of Spades Kai Zakro, standing there inconspicuous as the air.
Her face still dirtied from crying, Mei reached her hand out to him.

“Why are you in a place like this…? I told you not to leave the room, didn’t I”

“Fueeh, because, when I woke up Raiga-sama wasn’t there.”

“Mei… You musn’t… bother Raiga-sama…”

Ah! Even though he’s young, the little brother is speaking just like in the game.
Kai the little brother was taciturn and mysterious just like his older sister.

“You. What did you do to Mei?”

Raiga glared at I, who had been reduced to decoration.
When he did, Mei grabbed Raiga’s arm and shook her head side to side in protest.

“The pink Oneechan didn’t do anything wrong!”

Hang on, is ‘the pink Oneechan’ referring to me? Certainly I didn’t give my name, but…

“She listened to me when I was crying!”

“Is that so…?”

Raiga made a complicated expression. He was clad in a difficult-to-approach aura, but this expression of his held some amity.

“You’re… Royce’s hanger-on-er, right?”

He knows about me? The information network of the royal prince’s son sure is amazing, huh…
It’s still better than being called a flunky, I guess.

“I’m not a hanger-on-er; I’m his future guard, you know.”

“Like I care… Oi, Mei! Don’t wipe your snot on my clothes!”

The dignity of the royal prince’s son is being ruined.
As I thought, I feel like I don’t really understand their relationship.

“Did Mei-chan always have this kind of personality? At a glance she looks like the calm type, but…”

‘Could it be…?’ I wondered about a certain possibility in my heart.
Raiga might know something about it.

The one who reacted to my worsd wasn’t Raiga, but surprisingly Kai.

“You… What… do you know… about Mei?”

I don’t know where he got it from, but he was holding a long needle in one hand.
Oi, oi, are you trying to threaten me with a deadly weapon? We’re in a corridor used by other people, you know?
The twins Mei and Kai were characters that looked docile, but were prone to quickly resorting to violence.

“Stop it, Kai.”

Held in check by his lord, Kai readily withdrew. He really does feel like the “by my lord’s orders” type, huh.
After making sure that Kai sheathed his weapon, Raiga turned to me and spoke.

“Mei has been like this since I met her. Don’t make weird complaints.”

“…I’m sorry. I was just thinking that they weren’t a very similar pair of twins.”

“Just because they’re twins, doesn’t mean their personalities have to be the same, right?”

“You are… right…”

“We’re heading back.”

” “Yes!” ”

Leaving the frozen me behind, Raiga left with the twins in tow.

Does Raiga not know, or was that acting?
But Kai knows something for sure.
I can’t say anything since I only know how she was in the future, but perhaps Mei is a human from the same place as me…
I don’t have any confidence in that though…

---

‘persistently tried to get rid of‘ is ‘排除’. Since I mostly read action fantasy, it almost always means ‘kill‘, but I’m hoping that’s not the case here. ><

‘(sob)‘ → ‘gusu‘ which is a sobbing noise

‘her crying calmed down a lot‘ → ‘her style of crying mostly became less extravagant (i.e. less bawling more sniffling)‘

‘
“You’re… Royce’s hanger-on-er, right?”
[…]
It’s still better than being called a flunky, I guess. There’s a world of difference between a pouch and poop.‘
‘Hanger-on-er‘ is ‘hang-on pouch‘, whereas ‘flunky‘ is actually ‘goldfish poop‘. Both refer to people who follow another around like a sycophant. I omitted the last line, since it wasn’t significant, and would be like impossible to translate anyway. Ruins the flow to leave it in with an explanation, but fyi, there was such a joke present.

Also there’s no ♥ but it’s like a set phrase thing in JP
(___LOVE or ____ラブ)
so I had to try and find a way in Eng that wouldn’t just look like two words awkwardly stuck next to each other.

*imouto*

*imouto*

*imouto*

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<Previous Chapter | Imouto | Next Chapter>

6 Years Old – Q of Hearts (Part 2)

The second guard fell to the ground without a sound. Protruding from his back was a large knife.
A red stain was spreading across his clothing.

“Wha-!”

Royce-sama flusteredly took some distance from the first guard. I stepped out in front of Royce-sama in a panic.

“It’ll be okay, the other guards should be here any minute…”

“Unfortunately for you… help won’t be coming.”

While suppressing the terror that rose up in my body, I tried to soothe the prince, but the first guard cut in.
In that instant, I recognised this man as an enemy.
Grasped in his hand was a knife just like the one protruding from the second guard’s back.
This guy isn’t a guard; he’s a villain aiming for Royce-sama!

“All of them are probably already dead, you know.”

The villain smiled inappropriately.

“Royce-sama! Please es…”

Once again, the villain cut off my words. This time not with words, but with an attack.
I immediately blocked the swing of his blade with defensive magic. If there’s only one of them, then we might be able to get away somehow.

However, that faint hope of mine easily disappeared with the appearance of the villain’s comrades, coming one after another out of hiding.
In total there were five of them, and including the guy with the blade, there were six.
Probably because they had defeated the guards in hiding, a number of them were covered in blood spray.
These villains might have been mixed in amongst the guards as well.
Three six year old children, versus a total of six of these villains.
We were at an overwhelming disadvantage. For some reason I recalled the time I was cornered by the gyaru group in the world outside this dream. Is this my life flashing before my eyes?

If I die here, would I wake up from this dream…? Would it be fine if I got stabbed just a little?

…As if, right?…

I laughed dryly at my stubbornness in still supporting myself with the idea that this is a dream after all this time.
If I’m killed here, I’ll probably die for real. Probably, dying without being able to return to being a high schooler… Without having protected Royce-sama…
I’ve been averting my eyes all this time, but somewhere in my heart, I actually knew.

…I’ve been running away.
This world… and my circumstances… I’ve been putting off actually thinking about them properly.

I mean… if I didn’t think of this world as a dream, it was just filled with things that I couldn’t accept, after all…
I want to see my parents, I want to see my friends, I want to pass on being a villain… I want to go home…

If it was a dream, then I could just enjoy things however I wanted, but if it was a real then I couldn’t just have fun without thinking, right?

…I …don’t want that…

“Camille!”

At Achille’s voice, my consciousness kicked back in. And at the same time, I felt a pain in my left arm.
The villain’s blade had cut apart my skin. They had broken through my defensive wall using magic.
Being immersed in my thoughts in this situation was stupid of me.
Right now I had to let Royce-sama, and while I was at it, Achille, escape safely… Of course, I planned on returning alive as well.

“Get away from us!”

I immediately let out a wind attack from my hand, and sent the villain flying. A few companions of his who were dragged into it tumbled about.
Right now the magic I could use were limited. Because I was six, they hadn’t taught me any offensive magic that might have been dangerous.
With a magic of this level, I couldn’t expect anything more than putting some distance between us.

I immediately put a barrier back up, and used magic that called for aid.
Countless butterflies flew out from my hand, and headed towards the castle at the speed of light. It’s the most common communication spell.
With this, I should be able to get into contact with my father immediately. Father[/Otousama]… Please hurry!
Even while I did that, I continued firing magic at the villains without rest.

“Camilla, can you use any offensive magic besides the one just now?”

Achille’s quiet voice reached my ear.

“Fire, water, lightning, wood, …I can use a bunch, but their power is only the same as that one, so… Ah!”

I see. It wasn’t working because I was sticking to attacking. I can just buy time or escape.

“The air! If I thin the air, I might be able to buy time… If I reduce the oxygen concentration…”

I focused my mind.

After changing the barrier into a dome, I reduced the oxygen in the area around the villains. Magic to manipulate the atmosphere was difficult so concentration was required.
The villains had probably noticed that the oxygen had thinned, because unrest ran through them.
But it wasn’t perfect. If they went out of the area that I designated, then they could breathe in as much oxygen as they wanted.
We were still at the end of the market, so I couldn’t apply the magic over a large area without getting bystanders involved.

“It’s alright, I’ll help.”

Suddenly, I felt the flow of mana from Achille.

“Achille?”

“I learned a little from father… It seems that I have some talent for magic, after all.”

When did he…? He’s never mentioned this even once before, right? Or more like, Achille wasn’t a character who could just easily fire off magic like that, right?

The Achille in the game acted as the prince’s brain, and while he was in the magic academy, I never got the impression that he was that good with magic.
Rather than learning magic properly, he was the type who was better with creating magic tools or magic medicines, and he kept his position as J by compensating almost completely through studies.
Was it because this was a situation he didn’t expect?

Achille placed a barrier around the villains. With this, they wouldn’t be able to escape from the low oxygen area. The fact that my inability prevented me from removing all oxygen completely made the situation harsh for us.
The villains who had underestimated some six year olds fell into chaos, and gasped at the lack of oxygen.
Three of them collapsed unconscious due to trouble breathing. …I’m grateful that some weaklings were mixed in with them.
However, amongst the villains was one who lightly waved his hand, and the moment he did, the flow of the air changed. My magic was cancelled.
It seems that there was a magician in their group. He spoke in a displeased voice.

“What a conceited brat.”

While Achille’s barrier magic still held, I took out a paintbrush from my pocket and quickly turned it huge with magic.
My simply made pseudo-broom was complete. Because it was a magic I came up with just recently, the feeling of riding it was inferior to a normal broom, but it was still fast.
I filled the pseudo-broom with my mana and set a location for it to automatically head to.

“Royce-sama, this seats one, but please get on. It will take you directly to the castle!”

At least he who was the prince needed to get away.
However, Royce-sama refused in a loud voice that he had never used before.

“No! Are you telling me to abandon you two?”

“Their target is you. Hurry and get on!”

Following that, Achille’s magic barrier was also dispelled.
Because of my wind magic they couldn’t easily come near us, but the villains were free to move now.
Because of that, one of the knives they threw bounced off my barrier, and another person’s arrow stuck into it.
From behind, the magician was working to dispel my barrier. We were done for.

“Royce-sama!”

By now, I was shrieking at him.
Achille changed to attack magic, and fired off some ice.
However, because it was as small as a pebble, it only had the might of a hailball. While I maintained my barrier, I fired off the same magic.
With Royce-sama in the middle, I was in front, Achille was behind, and the two of us fired off magic.

Finally, the enemy magician’s magic dispelled my barrier.
It’s over!
I lost myself in firing off ice to the limits of my mana. I increased the force of the ice with wind magic.
By now I was just a mess, and firing off magic without worrying about how I looked.
It felt like there was rock, or wood, or metal or something mixed in with the ice, but it wasn’t the time to be worrying about that. At any rate, I just fired stuff off at them.
Thankfully, the magic tattoo was useful in preventing me from running out of mana.
A villain’s knife grazed my cheek. Achille had countless wounds on his arms and legs too.
…But despite that, Royce-sama still wouldn’t fly away for us.

The magician let off some purple smoke… It was probably poison.
I’m already super at my limits, so please stop! I let out a scream in my mind.
I changed from ice to fire and desperately burnt the gas. I wonder if this gas is inflammable…
Even though I said I would protect Royce-sama, would I be unable to do a thing in the end? Everything I do is half-baked.
I could feel Achille manipulating the air from behind me.
At that moment, something exploded near us, and an unmanned stall flew into two of them and blew them away.

But taking that moment to act, a man holding a knife leapt towards us.

“Stay awayy!”

I turned a ball of flame his way, but the guy’s knife passed through the flames, drew near us… and a shock ran through my stomach.
My vision turned white from the pain――――

“UWAHHHH”

For some reason the man that stabbed me let out a scream…
Why the hell are you screaming, the one who got stabbed was me…

“Royce-sama… Ru…”

My consciousness went out just like that.

※

“Camille, Camille…”

So annoyingg. Let me sleep a bit more.

“…Cut it out… Get up.”

I don’t wanna. My body is kinda heavy.

“If you don’t get up, I’ll kiss you, you know?”

“Fugah-!”

Even though you’re just a kid, what a joke to make!
I sat up with a start. A sharp pain ran through my abdomen.

“Like I thought… It felt like your sleep was getting shallow.”

At my bedside was Achille.

“Ach…ille… Huh? Why? I’m… alive?”

I was sleeping on a plain bed.
Is this, inside the castle? I’m…

I remembered the horrible memory from just before, and checked my abdomen, but the deep wound stab wound that should have been there was gone.
It seems somebody used healing magic, but even then, a little pain remains.
Ahh, as expected it’s not at the level of ‘a little’… I can feel a level of pain impossible for a dream, throbbing through my body. It seems that completely recovering will take a little.

“You were saved.”

“And Royce-sama?”

“…He’s safe. He made it into the marquis’ care uninjured. Since he had just gone through something dangerous, right now he’s locked up in his room.”

“Thank goodness…”

It looks like the thin wounds that Achille suffered are healed as well.
It seems that my father and Soleil are busy dealing with the aftermath.

“Hey, what happened after that? After that, I collapsed and don’t remember a thing…”

“…You don’t remember? Anything?”

“Mn, I don’t remember anything from after I got stabbed…”

Achille looked at me in wonder.

“The guy who stabbed you… got burned, you see…”

“Eh?”

Burned… he says?

“Like I was saying, the moment you got stabbed, the man burned. The knife he was holding melted in an instant too… Wasn’t it something you did, Camille?”

“…You’re kidding…”

“…Could it be, that it was unconscious?”

According to Achille, I emitted a flame that burnt the man who stabbed me into a crisp, and the blade he was holding literally melted in an instant.
I don’t remember this at all… Maybe I made a mistake in the moderation of my magic because of the pain.
Maybe only the temperature rose to an abnormal level… Or maybe the moment I used flame magic, my mana poured into his knife and turned into heat… The latter sounds like it might be possible…
It seems that immediately after that, my father and the magicians of the Magic Building came running. All of the criminals except for the blackened man were caught.

The ones that attacked us were small fry of the lowest among the lowest ranks.
However, because they blended in skilfully with the real guards, the real guards didn’t notice the villains either. They had been hiding as guard soldiers over the span of years.
The result was that negligence was born amongst the guards.
But, even though they were the prince’s guards… weren’t they too weak? Even though they’re the guards for the next king, this was really too shabby an outcome.
It looked like the villains were probably employed by the Royal Prince Faction, but they were skilfully untraceable, so it was difficult to determine who the culprit was.
Because the attackers themselves were too far down, they couldn’t teach us anything either. It seems like it’ll take time to determine the culprit.
To be done in by such small fry… I’m still too inexperienced. How pathetic…

“…-”

At this point, the trembling came.
I steeled my nerves because I had to protect Royce-sama, but it was actually very scary.
I’ve never had a knife turned towards me before, to say nothing of being stabbed…
When we faced off against the attackers, I was anxiously wondering if we would just end up being killed there, so it can’t be helped.

“Camille… It’s okay now. The rest of them were caught as well, after all.”

Even though Achille looks like he doesn’t care about the feelings of people he has no vested interests in, he’s been watching me properly.
He’s probably noticed that my feelings of terror have returned too.
Even though he should be scared too, he tried his best to sooth me.

“I… burned somebody… and killed them?”

A different feeling of terror began to well up.
After turning into a black lump, no human would survive.
Unconsciously burning a person to cinders… is too terrifying.

“You protected His Highness and I, Camille. If that guy lived, all of us would have been killed.”

Guarding somebody meant… becoming a magician that would protect Royce-sama meant… this kind of thing.
It wasn’t just something you just declared on a whim. To be realising it only now, what an incredible idiot I am.

“Huh…?”

Tears were dropping onto the back of my clenched hands.
Crap, am I, crying? You’re kidding, what do I do? It won’t stop…
The more impatient I got, the more tears began to overflow, dropping again and again.
Ah, Achille is visibly shaken. To be troubling a six year old like this, I’m really too miserable…
No matter how bad things have gotten, hasn’t my mental age regressed too much?

“Uuu, …hic…”

Aahh, Achille… Could you perhaps pretend you didn’t see this, and leave the room?
My sobbing…

“It’s okay now… You haven’t done anything wrong, Camille.”

Far from leaving, he instead closed the distance. He softly and soothingly stroked me on the head.
The movements were clumsy, but was he trying to comfort me? …Even though he’s Achile, for him to be treating me kindly.
Isn’t it because I’m overcome with emotion that I ended up crying this much? My mind is in chaos.

“For someone who’s going to ruin me… Don’t treat me so kindly… hic…”

“…I don’t really understand what you’re saying.”

After that, Achille continued to stay with me until my tears stopped.
Surprisingly, he can take action even without it being calculated, and it seems that he has some kind parts to him too.

*imouto*

*imouto*

*imouto*

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<Previous Chapter | Imouto | Next Chapter>

6 Years Old – Q of Hearts (Part 1)

“Look, look~!”

Seeing me throw off my outerwear in a good mood, Achille startledly averted his eyes.

“Hey, what the heck is a lady doing!”

He flusteredly picked up my outerwear, and draped it over my shoulders. Achille’s face is kinda red.

“Geez, it’s not like I was naked. You sure like to exaggerate, huh~”

Even though I was properly wearing a pseudo sleeveless maxi dress under my outerwear, too.

“I’m begging you, don’t show me something like your naked body.”

He looks super unhappy about it.

Stop looking at me like you’re seeing something filthy, okay? To be treating me like some sexual deviant, how rude!

“It’s not like I’m being an exhibitionist or anything. I got matching magic tattoos with my father[/otousama] so I just wanted to show it off, that’s all.”

On my left shoulder was a blue ivy pattern.
It was a tattoo for automatic mana restoration, and after my father taught me, I drew it on with my own mana.

Magic tattoos are the inscription of a pattern that holds a certain magical function onto human skin.
Through these patterns, you can strengthen your mana and recover your mana. In the end they just act as support, though.

You can apply these magic tattoos yourself, but to draw them requires a certain magic technique.
Depending on whether you can draw it well or not, the effectiveness varies too.
Right now I can only do ivy magic tattoos.
I want to hurry up and be able to do flower magic tattos already. They’re cute, after all.
By the way, the flower tattoos have the effect of mana amplification.
And also, unlike real tattoos, magic tattoos are an extraordinary thing that can be easily drawn and erased with just magic, and they’re gentle on the skin too.

“Come on, looook.”

“Stay away! Pervert!”

We began a pointless game of tag.

“Camille, Achille, what are you doing?”

Just when it seemed like I would almost be able to catch him, the one who called out to us, Royce-sama, showed up at the door.
Right now, Achille and I are at the castle to play, at Royce-sama’s invitation.
The two of us come to visit him quite often.

“Ah, Royce-sama! Look, look… ugu-”

When I was about to show off my magic tattoo to Royce-sama, Achille pinned my arms behind my back from behind.

“What on earth are you planning to show His Highness!”

“The magic tattoo that I drew myself…”

“I told you, don’t strip!”

Damn you, Achille… Don’t get in my way.
Isn’t Royce-sama laughing at me now?

“Camille, you got a magic tattoo?”

“Yes!”

“Isn’t it bad for a girl to get a magic tattoo?”

Hauuun~ Royce-sama is such a gentleman.

Certainly, even if they’re magicians, not many women get magic tattoos.
Women with patterns on their skin are avoided by men, after all. If you have a magic tattoo, you’d be at an overwhelming disadvantage when it came to marriage prospects.
As for the Rhodolite Marquis family, since father is like that, I can get as many magic tattoos as I want, but normally a family wouldn’t allow it. Even more so if you were a noble.

“I don’t mind. I’m not aiming to be popular with men, and I don’t mind sacrificing my springtime of youth to protect you, Royce-sama!”

If magic tattoos are necessary to master magic, then I’ll draw as many as it takes.
And during times when I can’t have magic tattoos no matter what, isn’t there no problem if I just erase them in a flash with magic?
Hmm?[Are?] It looks like Royce-sama is backing away a little, but that’s just my imagination, right?

※

“…And so, I want to have a look at the castle town. Of course there’ll be bodyguards, and I have permission from my dad as well.”

It seems that the reason we were called out today was to accompany Royce-sama on his incognito visit to the castle town.
Achille looked at at Royce-sama in disbelief.
He was probably worried about the kind of dangers that could befall Royce-sama if he left the castle.

“It’s already decided, huh. Then the two of us have no choice but to follow you.”

A date in the castle town with Royce-sama! Yahooo!

“Please allow me to show you around. I’ve snuck out into town countless times in secret from my dad or the servants, so I’ve already checked all of the famous stores!”

When I declared this with pride, Royce-sama looked at me with eyes tinged with misgivings.

“Ummm… I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that, okay?”

“When I go out, I aim for when my father is away, and I leave an ‘afternoon nap’ version of a body double doll in my room, so even now, the servants still don’t know, you know?”

The castle town during the day was very lively.
We headed down into town, incognito.
Me, Achille, Royce-sama, as well as two of Royce-sama’s bodyguards were travelling together.
The remaining guards were watching over us from in hiding.

“Is there anywhere that you’d like to go, Royce-sama?”

I spread open a map of the castle town that I obtained beforehand.

“This is a pseudo-pancake shop with lines of customers.
This is a pseudo-popcorn shop with lines of customers.
This is my favourite shop for magic books.
This is my favourite shop for dried lizards.”

“Hang on, the second half is clearly weird, you know.”

Achille made fun of me.

“Your Highness, where do you want to go? It’s dangerous to leave things to Camille.”

“Mmmn… I guess I just want to look around the marketplace normally.”

“That’s an excellent idea!”

One of the guards immediately cut into the conversation.

“There are a lot of shops gathered in the marketplace, and it’d probably be easy to understand each person’s livelihood… Please be wary of pickpockets and purse snatchers.”

With that one splendid introduction by the first guard who had suddenly become enthusiastic, we ended up heading towards the marketplace.

The marketplace was quite prosperous. Because it was still midday, it wasn’t that crowded, but once the night fell, more people would gather.
Royce-sama was curiously turning this way and that. He looked like he was having a lot of fun.

“This is?”

“Ahh, the Gerugero nut? It has use in digestive medicine.”

“Then what’s this?”

“It is Gangrou meat. It’s hard and not very delicious… Ahh, there seems to be interesting things further down.”

The first guard who had completely taken the initiative continued to guide us through the town at his own discretion and bias.
Well, whatever. Royce-sama seems to be having fun too, after all.
Achille and I quietly followed after them.

“I wonder if this is far enough…”

Suddenly, the first guard stopped still.

“What’s wrong?”

Called out Royce-sama, in wonder.

We had come to a street a little distance away from the marketplace. There was nobody here.
Normally there should have been stores selling weapons or magical items, but it seems it was empty today.

“Oi, oi… There’s nothing here, you know? Should we go back the way we came?”

The second guard was about to lead Royce-sama back the way we came, when it happened.

Something that shone silver came flying, and pierced into the second guard’s back.

*imouto*

*imouto*

*imouto*

---

<Previous Chapter | Imouto | Next Chapter>

5 Years Old – J of Hearts (Part 2)

By the way, the ‘disappointing/unfortunate‘ used to describe Camille is sort of like the disappointment or regret of having somebody who is attractive, intelligent and professional, but is unfortunately a massive masochist.
It’s that kind of ‘unfortunate‘.

Like a 残念な夫(disappointing/unfortunate husband) is basically a bum of a husband, or a husband that has one or more majorly bum-like qualities about him. Or is majorly hopeless or something.

A 残念な美人(zannen na bijin) is a beauty that happens to have an aspect of her that just ruins the image completely. Like she’s actually a complete slob at home. Or she has a massive and uncontrollable train fetish. Or she’s an insufferable shotacon.

---

There was a beautiful garden, and in the centre was a white fountain surrounded by roses in full bloom.
We might be getting close to the inner palace.

Suddenly, I felt like I heard a voice, so I looked down, and when I did, I saw the figure of a child about our age.
A small boy with beautiful golden hair was being surrounded by some slightly older looking kids.
However, it seemed that they weren’t playing together.

When I looked in front, I found that Camille was frowning a little.
She’s an oddball, but it seems she has a strong sense of justice.

“Will you save that boy?”

When I spoke into her ear on purpose, Camille was startled enough that it was funny.
Oh shit, I’ve found a surprising weakness of hers. It seems that this is a bit of a habit.

“Is it okay to go down? Won’t I get you mixed up in it, Achille?”

“It’s fine, but? That blondie is probably a kid from the royal family… It might be a good chance for me to establish contact with him.”

He’s wearing clothing that’s obviously higher class than the other children, and if I remember correctly, the first prince was a blonde kid of about that age.
Even if we save him, there’s no loss to us.
Also, the one who’s getting ‘wrapped up‘ isn’t me, but Camille. I’m already resolved.
If she saves the prince, she’ll make enemies of the Royal Prince Faction.
Even a kid knows about the issue of the two great powers in this country.
…It looks like Camille isn’t thinking about a thing, though.

The very moment Camille heard my reply, she thrust the broom at the noble kid who was mounting the prince.

“Heyy! Stop thaat!”

The end of the broom stabbed the guy in the arse. …Looks painful.
While Camille was arguing with the children of the Royal Prince Faction, I ran over to the prince.

“Can you stand?”

“Mn, I can… Thanks.”

I helped the prince up, and took a distance from the kids.

At that moment, one of the kids tried to hit Camille.
Even if I tried to save her, I wouldn’t make it in time from here… or so I thought, when Camille easily repelled it with defensive magic.
It was a perfect defensive wall. On top of that, it seems she was planning on going as far as counterattacking.

“Take thiiis!”

However, there’s supposed to be a strong magic prevention barrier cast on the castle.

“Oh?[/Are?] My magic won’t come out…”

Obviously. As expected, Camille’s offensive magic turned into smoke and disappeared.

“Except for those in security, nobody can use offensive class magic without permission here.”

The prince thoughtfully explained to Camille. This much is common sense, though.

The children of the Royal Prince Faction who were stunned by the defensive magic gradually recovered, and seeing them approach us in the corner of my eye, I called out to Camille to ride the broom.
After a quick gasp, Camille came running over. She quickly had the prince straddle the broom.

“We’re ready!”

“Alright!”

Camille had us rise quickly into the air, and we distanced ourselves from the noble children.
I guided Camille who was flying a lap above their heads while laughing provocatively.

“Let’s return to the Magician’s Building… Father might have returned.”

Camille has an immature part to her, so had I left her be, she might have continued taunting them forever.
We have to leave here before anybody else from the Royal Prince Faction arrive.

“Yeah.”

She obediently listened to me, and headed back to the Magician’s Building.

※

“Ahhh, I’m tired. That was heavy.”

According to Camille, carrying three people on a broom was tiring.
Even though we’re in front of the prince, she paid it no heed and dived onto the sofa.
Even though we even got to gallantly save the prince, at the very, very end she showed some seriously disappointing sides of her.
My impression of Camille has taken an 180 degree turn from the one I had at our first meeting, plus another 45 degrees. She(This) is not someone(something) you can expect a normal response from.

Fortunately, it seems that the prince had no intent of finding fault with Camille’s irreverence.
He looked in on her worriedly.

“Thank you for saving me, you two. I’m Royce Garnet, the first prince of this country.”

“…Prince? Roiss?”

It looks like Camille has finally realised the prince’s identity.
It seems she really wasn’t thinking about a thing.
It had absolutely nothing to do with who the bullied child was, and she saved him purely due to her sense of justice, it seems.
She really is a young lady that’s nothing like a noble. I became even more interested in this girl who had a way of thinking that I didn’t.

“I-, I am Camille Rhodolite.”

“Ahh, Marquis Rhodolite’s… I’m glad that we met.”

Camille was shaken by each one of the prince’s words, making a hundred different expressions. For some reason I feel it unamusing, and I feel sick near my chest. Acting like this, even though she snorted during my introduction.

After that, I finished my introduction without delay.

“Huhu… For you two to have been the son and daughter of the Magician Building’s number one and two… You two really saved me. I got seen being pathetic though, haha…”

The prince smiled contentedly. Well yeah, of course he would be, since he basically gained the higher ups of the Magician Building as allies through Camille and I. …Good work in stealing allies for yourself.

“No, we just happened to be passing by, but I am glad that we were of use to you, Your Highness. What is most important is that you are safe.”

“You don’t need to be so formal, you know? Our age is close, and I’d be happy if we could get along from now on as well. Unfortunately there aren’t many people in the castle that I’m close to, you see…”

Hearing the prince’s words, Camille’s face shone.

“Royce-sama… In that case, I shall ask my father[/otousama] for permission and bring Achille again to play.”

I got dragged into it too, for some reason…
Well, that’s fine. I get to leave that house, and increasing my contact with the prince is something to be thankful for.

“Really?”

The prince seems happy too.

“Of course! If my father allows, though.”

“I’ll have it arranged.”

While this was happening, Marquis Rhodolite and father came into the room.
Father was stunned upon seeing the prince, but the marquis didn’t seem to be interested in the prince.
The prince told the two of them about what happened outside, and hearing this, the marquis scolded Camille.
The marquis was indifferent towards the prince, but once it involved Camille, his reaction became excessive. The marquis might also be an overly doting, idiot parent like my father.

However, there’s no reason to blame Camille.
Certainly I was shocked by her audacity in flying above the castle without permission, but thanks to that, we were able to save the prince.

“Marquis-sama, if you are going to blame Camille, then I am guilty as well.”

Surprised that I was covering for her, Camille’s eyes widened. She really is a easy to read fellow.
She probably thought that it wasn’t like me. Somehow I feel that she knows about my true personality…

“Mn, Camille hasn’t done anything bad. Thanks to her, I was saved.”

The prince took advantage of my words to cover for Camille as well, so she wasn’t scolded any further.

A butler-like man appeared to meet the prince, and the prince and the adults left the room.
They’re probably talking about Camille and I… as well as what they’ll be doing themselves from now on.

“Are you okay with that, Camille? Getting close to Prince Royce means that you’ll be making enemies of the Royal Prince(King’s Younger Brother) Faction, you know?”

“Mn? What’s that?”

This girl really doesn’t know a thing after all.

“Today you made enemies of the son of His Majesty’s younger brother, you know… I did too, though. That’s why from now on, whether you like it or not, you’ll be seen as part of the King’s Faction.”

“Ahh… So that’s how it is.”

Not, ‘so that’s how it is‘…
Even though she’s the daughter of the marquis, are things going to be alright like this?
It’s gone past just shock; I’m worried now.

“Mn, they might be talking about the same thing outside, huh…”

Both the Rhodolite Marquis family and the Jade Viscount family will probably be seen as the King’s Faction from now on.

“I’m fine… After all, one day I’d have to choose which faction to fall under after all, and I like Royce-sama too…”

“Eh, ‘like’!? …Camille …Are you aiming to marry into power?”

For this weird girl who knows nothing about anything to be aiming for the seat of the queen…
Was all of the stupid behaviour up until now, camouflage to deceive her surroundings?

However, she looked at me as though she was seeing something strange.

“Huhh…? What are you on about?”

“I’m hoping that Prince Royce will become my patron, but I was wondering if you were aiming for the seat of the Queen, you see… Unexpected, ambitious?”

“‘Sif I am!”

I was negated with all her strength, but hearing this, I felt relieved somewhere inside.
Why? I don’t really get it myself.
When I’m with Camille, nothing goes as I expect. I end up being led around the nose by her at every turn.

For some reason Camille was looking my way in indignation for some reason. It seems that she was dissatisfied with my “marry into power” remark.

“That’s true. Right now you’re the only daughter of Marquis Rhodolite after all, so you have to find a husband and succeed your family, right?”

Marquis Rhodolite is unmarried, and his only child is Camille.
She probably understands her position as well, in her own weirdo way.

But even though there’s nothing to complain about when it comes to her appearance and status, why on earth are the contents this?
It’s seriously unfortunate.
At this rate, won’t a husband candidate never show up? Having the number of rivals decrease is convenient for me, but…

“I’ll become a magician that protects Royce-sama.”

Completely cutting off the flow of conversation up until now, Camille suddenly declared this. What is she planning to do this time?
I really can’t take my eye of her. If I don’t take responsibility and stop her before she does something problematic… the prince is absolutely going to meet with some harm.

“Then I’ll become an aide that can help Royce-sama.”

I took Camille’s hand. She looked at me in wonder.

“You’ll become a knight?”

I have no intention of becoming anything like a knight. If I’m going to do something, I want a smarter job.

“Nope, an aide.”

One day I’ll become the prime minister or something too. I’ve decided on my goal.

“I see! Then let’s try our best together.”

Camille who probably isn’t thinking about a thing, was just simply happy about having her comrades increase.

But I didn’t overlook the fact that her eyes looked in bewilderment at the hands I was holding.
I was elated by some feeling I didn’t know welling up inside me, upon seeing Camille looking shaken for the first time.

What is this feeling, anyway? …It’s probably, the feeling of accomplishment.

From then on, my father would occasionally bring me to Camille’s house, or the castle where the prince lived.

*imouto*

*imouto*

*imouto*

---

<Previous Chapter | Imouto | Next Chapter>

5 Years Old – J of Hearts (Part 1)

I don’t remember my mother’s face. When I was old enough to understand things, I was already in an orphanage.
Even if I say an orphanage, the environment was shit.
Despite there being lots of children, the facilities and goods were both poor, and it was constantly a scramble for food and utensils.
The only thing that went well in such a place was that I was good at stealing a march on and using others.

Living like that, one day a turning point appeared to me.
A man calling himself my father came to the orphanage. He said he wanted to take custody of me.
That guy who was clothed in beautiful garments smiled at I who was just skin and bones, covered in dust and rags.

“What the hell are you doing after all this time…” wasn’t something I thought, and neither was I angry nor hurt.
That kind of cute and clean spirit had probably died somewhere and become a star, long ago.
‘Aahh, I can finally escape from this shithole…‘
This was mostly what occupied my mind.

I rode a carriage for the first time in my life, and headed together with the man who called himself my father, to his home. Inside the carriage, the man started talking about his job.
Shockingly, it seems that the guy who came to get me was a noble. Even if you say “Viscount Jade”, to someone like me who’s completely unrelated, I have absolutely no idea who that’s supposed to be, though.
My father, Mr. Noble, had in the past hid his status and dated my mother, a bar wench in the outskirts of town.
And then, my mother got pregnant and gave birth to me, but because of his position, father couldn’t stay by our side.
Even bringing us into the estate was opposed by father’s mother, in other words my grandmother, and in the end things ended without him actually doing it. On top of that, father already had a legal wife and other children. Despite his beautiful appearance, he’s loose in that area, huh.
Before long, my mother fell ill and passed away, and I who was a dependent was left in the care of the orphanage, in other words.

What happened just now was that at the same time my grandmother left this world, father came to bring me back from the orphanage.
It seems I’ll be raised in the viscount’s estate.
This guy’s wishes aside, to me, being able to move from that run-down orphanage into the house of a noble is cause for huge celebration.

“Goodness! What a squalid child!”

The moment father brought me into the estate, a flashy looking woman came running. She’s probably the legal wife that he mentioned.
Well, I can’t deny being dirty though. I mean, I couldn’t enter the likes of a bath that often in the orphanage.
I was brought to the bath in the estate.

After getting out fo the bath, I was made to change into some expensive, intensely decorated clothes, and brought to the other residents of this house.
Father, the flashy looking woman from earlier, and three children. Breaking them down, they were a boy and girl a little older than me, and a girl slightly younger.

“Let me introduce you. This is your new family, Achille.”

Father called me name.

“This is my wife Adélaïde, my son Dominique, and my daughters Déborah and Désirée.”

Adélaïde and Dominique were glaring at me with eyes filled with disgust.
Unlike father, Dominique was quite fat. I’m sure it’s because he has plenty of food to eat each day.
Though there was disdain apparent in with Déborah and Désirée’s gazes, they seemed deeply curious about me.
When I tried giving them an amiable smile, the two of them turned red, and averted their eyes. I see. It seems like I can use these two, huh.
Even in the orphanage I was ones of the more popular among women, so I was able to freely use both children and adults.
I can’t say that it’s comfortable, but this place is much better than the orphanage.
I gratefully accepted my new surroundings.

※

Father trained my step-brother and I equally.
Being nagged about these manners I wasn’t used to, or my choice in words made me honestly think that it was a crock of shit, but it’d be a piss off to be made fun of by my step-mother and step-brother, so I earnestly memorised it.
Unsatisfied with just that, they were even thoughtful enough to give me a private tutor. History, letters, management and the like were thoroughly driven into me.
What I needed to study was simpler than expected, so within a few months, I caught up to what Dominique was learning without a problem. For some reason my tutors were shocked though.
But just when am I going to use this stuff?
Or more like, what am I supposed to do from now on?
This family is going to be succeeded by Dominique, and Déborah and Désirée are going to marry out.
Then what position am I in? Since I finally got to live somewhere good, I’d like to be able to continue living somewhere good, though.

“Goodness, is that what you were worried about? …Achille sure is cute.”

After being called to Déborah’s room, I tried speaking my mind, and my older sister smiled proudly.
Using that nasty secret of flutteringly covering her mouth with her hand, she looked at me with a gaze that fawned on me.

“Goodness, Achille, you have nothing to worry about, you know.”

Wearing an intense perfume despite being a child, Désirée snuggled up against me as well. The scent floats around, so I honestly wish she would stop.
The only thing they inherited from father was their hair colour, and they were similar to my step-mother. They weren’t beauties, and their personalities were bad too.
But they’ll basically listen to whatever I say.

“Right. The second and third sons of nobles become bureaucrats, enter the knighthood, or marry into families without sons.”

“Well, marrying into the wife’s family and being adopted by them would be the best, wouldn’t it? I dream of marrying into power as well…”

Hmmm, so that’s how it is.

“Hey, Achille. I’ve secretly gathered some sweets without mother[/okaasama] knowing, so let’s eat them together.”

“I have a present for you too, Achille.”

“Thank you, Déborah-oneesama, Désirée.”

Déborah and Désirée blushed happily at me when I thanked them with a smile plastered on my face.
Honestly, what you really ought to have are convenient stepsisters, huh.

Mn, getting ahead in life and climbing the ranks sounds interesting too. It’d be nice to see how far I can go, and I also want to see my arrogant step-mother and step-brother’s faces warp in frustration when I rise above my current position.
For now, I’ll try my best to study what I can.

※

“There’s a girl that I want you to meet, Achille.”

One day, after I had been taken into the viscount’s family for a while, father suddenly said this to me after coming home from work.

“She’s the daughter of my boss, Marquis Rhodolite, but she’s good with magic and is a very smart girl. I think you’ll like her too, Achille.”

According to my father, she’s the young lady of the marquis family and their only daughter, and there doesn’t seem to be any indication of any brothers being born from now on.
This might be somebody whose family I can marry into, like Désirée mentioned.
Moreover, it seems that I’ll be meeting her at the castle. If I lead that young lady around by the nose, and find somebody in the castle as a connection for my future job, it’d be killing two birds with one stone.

“I’m looking very forward to it, Father[/Chichiue].”

Happy with my answer, father smiled. Honestly, in my whole family, this guy is the simplest to deal with.

What awaited me in the break room of the castle’s Magic Building was a small girl with hair, pink like a field of flowers.
I’m sure it’s just a field of flowers in her mind too, like Adélaïde, Déborah or the girls that hang around them.

“It is nice to meet you, Camille-sama. My name is Achille Jade.”

When our eyes met, I gave the same sweet smile that I flashed when I first met my step-sisters.
Compared to those girls, Camille is definitely the more beautiful, and if she seems useful, I wouldn’t mind spending time with her.
And moreover, if we get along, then I might be able to succeed the marquis family in the future.

But despite that…
Far from turning red, the girl before my eyes was observing me with great interest.
Moreover, she even freaking snorted “Hmph!” along the way. What’s with this girl?

“It’s nice to meet you. My name is Camille Rhodolite.”

As though nothing had happened, she pinched her skirt and gave a small curtsey, and I found that I had my interest drawn a little.

I was told to play with Camille while father and the marquis went to work.
Since we’re already here, I’ll take this chance to chat a little.

“I have heard from my father that you are skilled in magic, Camille-sama. That you have already progressed to intermediate magic, for example…”

For now, I guess I’ll start with flattery. There’s no such thing as a human who gets upset at praise.
However, she avoided it and countered.

“Just Camilla is fine. I mean we are the same age for once, and I’m not going to kick up a fuss about your manners, so don’t worry about it…”

Camille immediately started speaking casually, and wanted me to do so as well.
Honestly, I hate formalities so I’m thankful for it, but… I was surprised that a lady of a marquis family like her prefers to speak casually like this.
I thought that the daughters of noble families were more pretentious, like my step-sisters.

“I heard from Soleil that you’re really smart, Achille. Do you like studying?”

Did that father of mine go as far as saying that to the little kids of other families!? It’s so embarrassing that I can’t bear it.
So that my unrest wouldn’t show on my face, I stiffed my muscles.

“Yeah, I basically do nothing but study. I was told not to come out of my room too much, so…”

Primarily by my step-mother.
Will Camille sympathise with my circumstances? If she sympathises and is willing to lend me a hand, then… it’s my win.

But she didn’t move like I expected. Why!

“Since it’s been so long since you’ve been allowed outside, wanna go all out and play?”

I don’t know she was thinking but she suddenly straddled a broom that was left in the room, and told me to get on behind her.
I’m having trouble understanding her thought process.

“Get on.”

When I hesitated, she forcefully made me get on. And the very moment I straddled it, the broom began to lightly float.
Like that, the two of us vigorously flew out the window. Camille flew higher and higher without any hesitation.
It seems that she really is good with magic.
I’d like it if she didn’t get me wrapped up in it, though. I’m at a loss at this unfamiliar sense of floating.

“Achille, hold onto the broom tightly!”

Camille told me to hold onto the broom, but doubling as a little bit of revenge against Camille who just started flying all of a sudden, I wrapped my arms around her waist. It’s not really weird, right? I wonder if she’ll turn red in embarrassment…
I looked forward and waited for her reaction, but unfortunately it seems like she wasn’t discomposed in the slightest… How boring.

The castle was incomparably huge compared to the likes of a viscount estate. The scenery from high in the sky is also incredibly interesting.

“Camille… Where are you planning on heading?”

“Mn~, I haven’t decided. For now, maybe we should fly a wide lap around the castle.”

You didn’t plan anything? …Even though you flew out the window that enthusiastically, what the hell…?
Since we were already out here though, I decided to try telling her my wish.

“I see. Then let’s try going near where the important people live. If we come too close it feels like we’ll be targeted by the people guarding, so let’s fly a little distance away, okay?”

“That sounds interesting… But just where is it?”

“Isn’t it further in?”

We headed towards where we thought people with authority might be.

---

“This might be somebody whose family I can marry into, like Désirée mentioned.”
It’s actually “This might be somebody who I can get ‘tama no koshi’ with (is it the reverse in this case?), like Désirée mentioned.”
‘玉の輿’ → a common term that refers to a woman marrying into riches and power. But obviously I can’t write that, so I had to cut out Achille’s little note about it being the reverse.

‘young lady‘ 令嬢(reijou) refers to like, a young-ish (non-obasan) daughter of a good family. Would usually have written ‘lady’, but she’s like 5 so that sounds a little weirder in English, so in the end was forced to stick ‘young’ in front of it each time. Sorry if it sounded a little awks.

‘thought process‘ is 思考回路(shikou kairo) or ‘thought circuits‘. I think it’s figurative circuits, like the way the insides of an electric appliance works, so I just wrote thought process.

*imouto*

*imouto*

*imouto*

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<Previous Chapter | Imouto | Next Chapter>

5 Years Old – Q of Hearts (Part 2)

After flying about for a while, we could see a beautiful garden.
Somehow there was this high class feeling about it, so the important people might be there.
I headed in the direction of the garden.
In the centre of the garden was a white fountain surrounded by roses in full bloom. Red, white, pink – flowers of beautiful colours were mixed together.

Suddenly, I felt like I heard a voice, so I looked down, and when I did, I saw the figure of a child about our age.
They were a small boy with beautiful blonde hair, and surrounding him were a group of boys dressed like nobles.
The boys surrounding him might be a little older.
But for a group of children playing together, things looked a little strange.

“Is that, bullying”

One of the children grabbed the small blonde boy by the collar, and the other boys started cackling.
It was a revolting scene.
Before long, the surrounding boys began to push the blonde child around.
…I can’t watch this.

“Will you save that boy?”

As though he was waiting for this timing, Achille whispered in my ear. I reflexively got goosebumps.
This kid aimed for my ear on purpose, didn’t he?
But I can’t object to his words. I’m anti-bullying!

“Is it okay to go down? Won’t I get you mixed up in it, Achille?”

“It’s fine, but? That blondie is probably a kid from the royal family… It might be a good chance for me to establish contact with him.”

What a mercenary child! I’ve misjudged him.
But now is not the time to be stunned at Achille. I have to save that child.

The blonde child accidentally fell on his butt.
At this rate, he might start getting hit or kicked.
As one of the children was about to try and mount him, I got in their way, still on the broom.

“Heyy! Stop thaat!”

The child who was trying to mount him got hit in the butt by the broom handle.
Because of the impact, the bully fell over.
He immediately got back up, red faced and rubbing his butt painfully.

“What the heck is with you!? Where’d you come from!?”

“That’s my line, you damned brat! Ganging up on a little kid to bully him. Don’t you feel embarrassed!?”

While I replied sharply, Achille helped the blonde child up.

“Shaddup! Stop meddling, you bitch!”

“Yeah! Yeah!”

One of the large kids near me turned my way and tried to hit me.

“Geh-”

Right now I’m a feeble little five year old. Close combat isn’t my thing. I immediately used magic to defend.
At my actions, the surrounding kids widened their eyes in surprise.
It seems that children who can use magic at my age are rare.

“Take thiiis!”

I tried to use some light offensive magic, but for some reason smoke came out of my hands and just disappeared. Did I fail?

“Oh?[/Are?] My magic won’t come out…”

“Except for those in security, nobody can use offensive class magic without permission here.”

The one who spoke was the blonde child. What the heck? That’s super inconvenient. Is it because it’s the castle?

“Camille, the broom!”

I came back to my senses at Achille’s voice.
While stopping the children with defensive magic, I straddled the broom. Right now the priority is to get away from here.
While urging the blonde child to get on the broom, Achille got on as well behind him.

“We’re ready!”

“Alright!”

With Achille’s voice as the sign, I levitated the broom, and steadily rose at a fast speed.
The dumbfounded bullies gazed up vacantly. What stupid expressions. Serves you right.
While laughing, “Kekeke,” I flew a lap above their heads to provoke them.

“Let’s return to the Magician’s Building… Father might have returned.”

“Yeah.”

I turned around, and headed back to the Magic Building.
But still, the broom has gotten slow. Three people are riding on it, so that’s natural though.
It’s like when the basket on your bicycle has a lot of drinks packed into it.

We could see the window of the Magic Building now. I’m glad that it wasn’t too far. Having 3 people ride this is a little bit much…
It might be necessary to have more practice, and further improvements to the broom.
We unsteadily entered through the target window, and landed.

“Ahhh, I’m tired. That was heavy.”

After returning the broom to where I found it, I collapsed on the sofa.
Achille was looking my way with an astonished expression, but I’m tired so it can’t be helped.

“Are you okay?”

The blonde child peered in on my face. Uwahh, he’s a bishounen too.
A bishounen with the sure-fire combo of blonde hair and green eyes, he’s like a prince.

“Thank you for saving me, you two. I’m Royce Garnet, the first prince of this country.”

“…Prince? Roiss?”

Royce Garnet he said? That moment, all the blood in my body boiled.
Royce-sama… ROYCE-SAMAAAAAAAAAAA!?

Speaking frankly, I’m a huge fan of his.

He’s one of the love interests in 『Carte à Jouer』, the future K of Hearts.
And he was the love interest character that I adored the most.

Royce’s route was standard among standard routes, but while I was playing the game, my heart was struck countless times by his smile.
Royce who shouldered the pressure of being the first prince as he entered the Magic School…
He who held no confidence in anything was encouraged by the heroine, and before he knew it, he had ended up with romantic feelings for her.
After overcoming numerous ordeals (obviously including the Q of Heart’s interference), in the end the admirable two ended up married.
The commoner heroine, who despite being a commoner had hidden potential, in the end even became the queen of this country.
‘She got the beloved prince, and even succeeded in rising in ranks!’ in other words.

When I had a look at Achille, he was smirking.
A person of influence = royalty. Getting close to him means that Achille’s goal was achieved. Good for you.
Speaking of which, just as I feared earlier, as expected, isn’t Achille also a character from the game?
There was certainly a character with his upbringing in the game.

With Royce and Achille together, my memories are gradually becoming clearer.
Achille was something who had nothing but a friendship route, so I was beginning to forget him but…
As expected, he was a character that thoroughly crushed the Q of Hearts, and was the close aide of the K of Hearts, the J of Hearts! Scary-!

Aahh… Perhaps I’m headed down the same path as the original story.

No, this is a dream. A dream. …That I’ll be socially exterminated is, impossible…
It’s impossible, right…?
This world that’s progressing just like the original story is getting scarier and scarier.

※

After that, we introduced ourselves to him, and chatted with Royce in the break room of the Magician’s Building.
It’s like a dream… No, it is a dream, though!

“You two really saved me. I got seen being pathetic though, haha…”

While being a little shy, Royce-sama thanked the two of us.
As expected of Royce-sama, even when he’s very young he has this refinement about him.

“No, we just happened to be passing by, but I am glad that we were of use to you, Your Highness. What is most important is that you are safe.”

Oooh, that smiling Achille has completely entered his sales mode.
Unlike Royce-sama, Achille is really an uncute kid.

“You don’t need to be so formal, you know? Our age is close, and I’d be happy if we could get along from now on as well. Unfortunately there aren’t many people in the castle that I’m close to, you see…”

After saying this, Royce-sama made a slightly sad expression. Even his sad expression is beautiful!
I didn’t notice while I was playing the game, but did Royce-sama grow up in a pretty lonely environment?

“Royce-sama… In that case, I shall ask my father[/otousama] for permission and bring Achille again to play.”

I can meet Royce-sama, and it gives Achille an excuse to leave the house too. A good idea, if I do say so myself.

“Really?”

His beautiful blue eyes narrowed, and Royce-sama happily took my hand.

“Of course! If my father allows, though.”

“I’ll have it arranged.”

As expected of a prince! Even at a young age, his authority sure is effective, huh.
But if I can meet with Royce-sama, then I have no complaints.

“Camille, I’ve kept you waiting.”

“Ah, Father[/Otousama].”

I ran over to greet my father who had just entered the break room.
Soleil came in as well, behind father.
Soleil saw Royce-sama who was sitting with us, and stiffened.

“Y-, Your Highness!?”

After that, Royce-sama spoke about everything that happened, and hearing that, I was ended up scolded by father.
Well, Royce-sama stopped him halfway, though… Surprisingly, Achille did too.
Soleil contacted the castle to let them know that the prince was here, and somebody immediately came for Royce-sama.

“Your Highness, it is good that you are safe.”

A prim gentleman with the air of a butler appeared in front of the door.
His age might have been between forty and fifty. His monocle flashed in the light, and gave off the feeling of being a very adequate chamberlain.

“Henri, I’ve worried you haven’t I? When I was surrounded by my cousin’s group, these two saved me, you know?”

Henri nodded understandingly, and turned to look at our faces.

“Very good.”

What is? I don’t really get this Henri person.
After telling Achille and I to wait here, he left with father, Soleil and Royce-sama.

Left here, as expected I couldn’t comprehend what was going on, and stared towards the door.
Perhaps because he couldn’t pretend he didn’t see, Achille spoke to me.

“Are you okay with that, Camille? Getting close to Prince Royce means that you’ll be making enemies of the Royal Prince(King’s Younger Brother) Faction, you know?”

“Mn? What’s that?”

Why did the conversation suddenly turn into this

“Today you made enemies of the son of His Majesty’s younger brother, you know… I did too, though. That’s why from now on, whether you like it or not, you’ll be seen as part of the King’s Faction.”

As expected, I don’t really get what he’s talking about.
Speaking of which, the game had a setting like what he just mentioned… or so I felt.

“Ahh… So that’s how it is.”

I suddenly understood what Achille meant.

The current king――――Royce’s father, and his younger brother were presently on bad terms.
His Highness the Royal Prince was blatantly aiming for the throne.
Right now the nobles were split in two between those who supported His Majesty, the King Faction, and those who supported his brother, the Royal Prince Faction.

One day their conflict would spread to their children, and the confrontation between their children was one of the scenes in the game.
It might be that Royce-sama was thinking about quickly finding reliable allies, and bringing them to his side.
And today, we who happened upon him by chance became those allies… in other words.
He was properly thinking about his own future as well.
That’s why he immediately revealed his position to us when we first met. So that he could guarantee his allies, and absolutely not let us go.

“Mn, they might be talking about the same thing outside, huh…”

By the way, father’s life is magic, so he hasn’t been getting involved in annoying political struggles, but because of my actions today, he might end up being labelled as part of the King Faction.
I feel a little guilty…

It seems that the ones bullying Royce-sama were the children of nobles in the Royal Prince Faction.

“I’m fine… After all, one day I’d have to choose which faction to fall under after all, and I like Royce-sama too…”

“Eh, ‘like’!? …Camille …Are you aiming to marry into power?”

Achille turned my way in shock.

“Huhh…? What are you on about?”

“I’m hoping that Prince Royce will become my patron, but I was wondering if you were aiming for the seat of the Queen, you see… Unexpected, ambitious?”

“‘Sif I am!”

That’s probably impossible. After I said that, Achille smiled happily for some reason.
He’s probably thinking ‘being Queen is impossible for someone like you‘ anyway… That I’m not suitable for Royce-sama! I know that even if you don’t tell me.

Royce-sama is somebody that I long for.
I want to get closer to him, but I’m not thinking of something presumptuous like becoming his partner.
After all, Camille was a character that couldn’t end up with Royce-sama. The Royce-sama in the game also cringed at being relentlessly stalked by Camille.
Even while I think that this world is a dream, it’d be painful to be avoided by Royce-sama. I don’t want to be hated by him.

“That’s true. Right now you’re the only daughter of Marquis Rhodolite after all, so you have to find a husband and succeed your family, right?”

It seems that Achille who didn’t know what I was feeling assented to my answer.

“But Royce-sama being the first prince means that he has a lot of enemies, huh…”

And then, I suddenly realised.
With Royce-sama, apart from the other rival girls, there were many other flags for downfall.

His ‘downfall level’ was incomparable to that of I who was just a rival character.
For Royce, if the heroine chose any K other than him, then his life would automatically head full throttle towards destruction.

For example if the heroine chose the son of the Royal Prince, Roice’s cousin the K of Spades, then Royce-sama would be overthrown in a coup d’etat.
If she chose the prince of the neighbouring nation, the K of Diamonds, then a war would begin and our nation would lose, with Royce-sama being placed under house arrest.
The she chose her commoner childhood friend, the K of Clovers, then a revolution would begin and the royal family would be destroyed, with Royce-sama executed.

It’s impossible… Royce-sama…
Even if this is a dream world, I don’t want my beloved Royce-sama to head towards ruin.
Even if it’s impossible for us to become a couple, I want to protect him.
Just by myself, I might not become very helpful to him. I’m just an otaku girl after all.
However, it would be better to have even one more person to protect him.
Fortunately, I know the contents of the game, so I should be able to at least him keep away from danger.
…I’ve made my decision.

“I’ll become a magician that protects Royce-sama.”

I’ll study magic even more than I already am, so that I’ll be able to protect him, no matter who the enemy.
Achille looked at me in astonishment, and after looking like he was thinking for a little, he took my hand.

“Then I’ll become an aide that can help Royce-sama.”

“You’ll become a knight?”

“Nope, an aide.”

Thinking about it, Achille had that kind of position even in the game, huh. He’s a character who’s brains over brawn.

“I see! Then let’s try our best together.”

After I said that, Achille smiled like he was truly enjoying himself.
Like a child who had found an interesting game. …Well, he is a child though.

More importantly, I wonder if he could hurry up and let go of my hand.
Just how long is Achille planning on holding my hand for?

---

‘flags for downfall‘ → have stated this earlier, but I am writing under the assumption that you’re familiar with ADV lingo. Think of a flag, as in programming flag, because that’s more or less what ‘flag’ means in visual novels. Raising a death flag etc. yeah?

Rather than ‘dignified gentleman‘, the text said キリリとした, but there’s no word that I can think of for this. It’s like, pulled tightly, sort of. Like a person who is proper in posture, smartly dressed, professional, proper, and un-relaxed. Like a super-butler character would be.
EDIT: After many long years, snowcicada has graciously reminded me that the word I was looking for was prim.

王弟(outei) means king’s younger brother. Apparently that’s still just ‘prince’ in English though, cause we don’t have a word for it.

Also, perhaps you’ve already realised, but everyone in this series has a French-ass name. Well, I don’t speak French, but going by the names in Japanese, they’re supposed to be the French versions of these names (for those that have equivalents in other languages). Now again, I don’t actually speak French, but I can tell you something that approximates the sounds, based on the Japanese. So yeah, if there are people who speak French, don’t get pissed. These names aren’t actually French. They’re Japanese appropriations/approximations of French names, so yeah. And ain’t nobody can pronounce your ‘mille’ sounds anyway.

Camille (kah-mii-yyh)
Charles (sharl)
Soleil (soh-lei-yyh)
Achille (ah-shil)
Aimée Afriat (eh-mehh ah-free-ah)

*imouto*

*imouto*

*imouto*

---

<Previous Chapter | Imouto | Next Chapter>

When I woke up, I was in a white building I didn’t know.
The bed is white, the ceiling is white, the curtains are white…
Everywhere I look, it’s white, white, white.
It’s really quiet, but I can hear the pitter-patter of someone walking, and sometimes I can hear an unnatural zzzzzzz sound.

This isn’t my house.
That’s all I know.

“Mn…? …Mmn?

When I tried making a sound, my voice was a little bit lower than normal.
My body hurts…

I was supposed to be going boing boing on the bed in my house.
My naggy maid Aimer warned me again and again, but I don’t care. I mean, I have nothing else to do.

————Ojousama, please be quiet————
————Ojousama, that is immodest————
————Ojousama, Ojousama, Ojousama————

She’s always telling me not to do what I like. I hardly ever get to leave my room.
That’s why I play trampoline on my bed. I don’t care if you get mad!
And unluckily, I lost my balance and hit my head against the wall and fainted, and then I woke up just now.

“Ahh, Manami! Thank goodness. You’ve woken up.”

After a little bit, a black haired woman I didn’t know opened the curtains and looked towards me.

“Manami, I was so worried! I heard that you fell down the emergency stairs at school, and…”

“Manami? School? …Imurgensee sters? What’s that?”

When I asked her back, the woman was speechless. Did I perhaps say something strange?
This time, an uneasy looking man stepped out from behind her. He had black hair just like the woman.

“Manami? Do you recognise Dad[/Otousan]?”

Father?[/Otousama?] That can’t be. This man isn’t my father[/otousama].
Father is a man who is always working, and wouldn’t be worried about his daughter like this.
And also, if he was my father then he’d have the same light pink hair as me. Pink hair like this…
I touched my own hair, and realised something was wrong.

“Curled hair?”

I wouldn’t do something like curl my hair. My straight and silky hair is my pride.
Shocked, I took my hair into my hands.

“Black?”

My hair wasn’t pink coloured.
It was a black, close to brown. A colour like the man and woman in front of me… Also, I realised just now that my hand was…

“Big… Why?”

Why did my hand turn big like an grown up woman’s?
I’m a three-year-old, so why?

I’m meant to be Camille Rhodolite, the only daughter of the Rhodolite Marquis family.
Because of that, I’m treasured more than necessary and I’ve always thought it was stiff.
Playing trampoline was necessary fun for me to blow off those gloomy thoughts. I didn’t think this would happen though.

I’ve always wanted to go to some other world that was different… Did my wish get granted?
If I was a grown up, then I’d be more free than right now… Was that wish granted too?
I couldn’t stop myself from smiling.

※

This is a world completely different to the one I lived in.

I turned into a girl called Aizawa Manami.
I’m not an adult yet, but because I turned into somebody older than I was before, I’m quite happy.
It seems that Manami goes to a school named “Hai Skuul“. It sounds so interesting!

The building with that white room in it was the hospital, and the black haired man and woman were Manami’s parents.
I don’t have a mother, so I’m happy that I got a new mum.
And also, even though my new father goes to work in the morning, when he comes home he pays attention to me so he’s the ideal father.
The injuries from falling down the stairs have healed, so I was quickly discharged.

It looks like they haven’t noticed that Camille turned into Manami.
They think that it was memory loss because of the fall down the stairs.
Even though I have all my memories as Camille… How weird.
Speaking of which, what happened to the original Manami?
Is she inside me? Did she disappear? Or did she swap bodies with me?
I’d feel guilty if I made some other personality disappear, so it’d be nice if she swapped bodies.

If there’s something I’m a little unhappy about in my life right now, it’s that the new house is small.
When I found out that it was smaller than the storage room at my old house, I was surprised.
But in return, there’s lots of interesting stuff.

In this world, you can’t use magic like where I used to be.
Even I who could use magic before can’t use magic in this world.
But even without using magic, there are lots of wonderful tools that make it okay.
A box that cools food even without ice magic! A lamp that shines bright even without light magic! Even a steel carriage!
It’s so interesting!
Even in my small house I wasn’t bored at all.

One day when the pain in my body was mostly gone, my parents told me to go to school.
I’ve been waiting for this!
Because I didn’t have memories, mum dropped me off in a steel carriage called a car.
There are no servants in this world like Aimer, so I’m grateful that my parents help me with transport too.
But I’ve never been to school before, huh.
In my old world, there were schools too, but you went when you were older, so a three year old couldn’t go.
I’m kind of really excited.

※

In the classroom, a boy called out to me. An earnest looking young man with a masculine face.

“I’m sorry. Because I blurted out something unnecessarily, they misunderstood and pushed you, Aizawa-san… I didn’t think things would turn out that way…”

Was it this man’s fault that the original Manami fell down the stairs?
In that case, it’s because of him that I was able to come to this world, isn’t it?

“It’s fine. I’m not angry.”

On the contrary, I’m grateful. When I told him that I wasn’t angry, he started tearing up and trembling.

“Thank you… but I heard that you went through a terrible time because you lost your memories… I don’t know if this will make up for it, but if anything troubles you at school, I promise to become your strength.”

It seems his name is Yasui Makoto.
The one who pushed the original Aizawa Manami down the stairs was a girl who loved him and had a misunderstanding like “Manami is going after him” so she turned her hand against Manami, so he’s been worrying the whole time.

“That really helps. I’ll be in your care, Makoto, okay?”

When I said this, for some reason he turned red.
I don’t understand the schoolwork at all, but because I’ve lost my memories, nobody really blamed me.
Because this country hates discrimination, I was able to continue going to this school without any problems.
The fact is Makoto supports me in all areas of school life is also a big reason.
Makoto is a wonderful person like the knights in the stories that my maid Aimer read to me.
A year later, Makoto and I became lovers.

Aahh, thank you for bringing me to this world.
I was able to escape from that cramped world, and I got wonderful parents and a lover…

I’ve stolen everything away from the old Aizawa Manami, but I don’t regret it.
Please, please let the real Aizawa Manami be happy wherever she is…

Today as well, I smile inside while surrounded by wonderful people in this wonderful world.

---

Author’s Note: She’s quite the precocious three year old.

5 Years Old – Q of Hearts (Part 1)

“…How weeeeird~”

I turned five. In other words, two years have passed since then.
But despite that, I still haven’t woken up from my dream.
Since it can’t be helped, I’ve been continually enjoying and experiencing this world. At the end of the day, it’s a place like the country of magic that I’ve longed for.
It’s a dream, so no time will have passed when I wake up… right…?

Camille’s father’s, the Marquis Rhodolite’s, love for magic has been growing more intense, and he’s been working at his current job.
But because he’s a genius, he pays no attention to things outside his interests(magic).
I can understand the feeling of being uninterested in what doesn’t interest you, but… it’s a situation where he really is neglecting the matters of his household.
It seems his daughter Camille had a lonely childhood.

Up until now he’s been immersing himself in his beloved magic, and was a marquis who was completely ignoring his family and was unqualified as a father, but lately his daughter has started to show interest in magic, so he occasionally comes home.
Their parent-child relationship has been changing for the better… At least that’s the rumour that’s been whispered amongst the servants lately.

Now, when the marquis isn’t busy with his job, he teaches magic to his daughter Camille.
It’s one of the few times that the parent and child come into contact with each other.
As for things unrelated to magic, he’s still the same as ever, though…
Rather than being indifferent to his daughter, it feels more like he doesn’t know how he’s supposed to deal with things outside of magic.
When he actually does teach magic, he’s a very kind father. He’s probably a clumsy person.
By the way, when he’s busy with his jobs as the marquis, he even sends his subordinates to the estate to teach magic.
Despite being five, I’m receiving a gifted education.
Fortunately it seems that I’ve inherited my father’s ability in magic.
As expected of my dream; the setting is really convenient.

Now then, today I’ll be asking a question that I’ve been wondering about for a while now.

“Father[/Otousama], is there a magic for straddling a broom to fly, or a magic for riding a broom to fly, or a magic for hanging off a broom to fly?”

“It’s all brooms, huh… There’s magic to fly… but, why brooms?”

It seems that even the idea of flying on a broom doesn’t exist in this world.
Speaking of which, even in games there’s nothing but cool spells for attack and defence, huh. Is it a matter of appearance?

“Wouldn’t flying on a broom be cool?”

“That’s an amusing way of thinking, isn’t it? …If you used a spell that made things float, you could probably do it… But… doesn’t a broom look too shabby?”

My father answers even my foolish questions seriously, so I love him.

“I’m shocked by your growth in magic, Camille. As expected of my daughter.”

At this rate, won’t I be able to go to a magic school like the protagonist of that certain film?
●●●warts, I’m always ready for your invitation.

＊

“Camille-sama, it’s about time to get down.”

In one corner of the marquis residence, father’s subordinate Viscount Soleil Jade, called out for me from below.
With long, light blue hair and a gentle demeanour, he’s a man of about father’s age.
With a kind looking face, and a slim figure, though it isn’t as much as father, he’s my type. Guhehe.

Soleil teaches me magic when father is busy, and acts as my private tutor(magic coach).
Right now I’m taking his class, and in the middle of flying above the estate on a broom.
Thanks to father and Soleil, I’m able to fly quite stably.
Even when I’m by myself, I straddle my broom and fly about the garden.
Once I went outside the estate, but father got angry at me super seriously.
I guess it can’t be helped that as a five year old, my actions are limited, huh…

“Okay, I’m coming downnn!”

The broom slowly descended, and I landed on the ground.

“Still, you’ve really been thinking, haven’t you? Using a broom as a intermediary makes it easy to handle, and most importantly, you can fly quickly while stable, huh.”

The one who came up with it wasn’t me though~

For a five year old, I’m picking up magic exceptionally quickly.
Besides flying in the sky, I can create a light or fire, and I can blow leaves with wind.
If I put these to use, it feels like I can do even more. It’s incredibly interesting.

Soleil who was looking at the little me with eyes narrowed in affection has a son about my age.

“He’s a really intelligent kid, you know?” he always brags.

He’s a stupidly doting parent, but the way he is is very heartwarming.

“Is he that cute a kid? It sounds like he’d be a pleasure to meet~”

He’s probably like Soleil, huh~

“It’d be nice if I could show him to you. I’ll ask Marquis-sama.”

※

Soleil who had taken my half lip service “It sounds like he’d be a pleasure to meet~” seriously, had decided together with my father to let their children meet.
And so, today I’m at their workplace… I came to the royal castle.

I found out after I asked father about it later, but Soleil’s second son who I’m meeting today is actually the child of his mistress.
Geez, Soleil. Even though you have such a harmless looking face, you sure get busy, huh!
Right now he’s taken custody of that son from the mistress, and is raising him at his house though.
Since it’s Soleil, I think it’ll be fine, but it often happens that the son of a mistress feels ashamed, something like a template in stories, huh? I’m a little worried about that kid.

If I remember correctly, there was a character like that in the game too, huh~
A character who used his past of being oppressed as the son of a mistress, as mental fuel to climb up in the world, and was attending the same school as the heroine, as the right hand man of one of the love interests.
In the game, the heroine accepted that character’s past, and through consolation, a friendship budded between the two of them.
And then following the orders of the K of Hearts, he was the ringleader behind annihilating the Q of Hearts(right now, me).
It was horrible treatment, enough that you could say to him, “You didn’t have to go that far.”
The players who enjoyed the game through the heroine’s perspective were all cheering “Nicely done!” though…

But well, that has nothing, nothing~, to do with me, though~♪ …Probably.
I’ll probably wake up from this dream before that.

I entered the break room that my father uses during work.
A job being a job, the workplace isn’t somewhere a child can just wander about randomly.
Mn, I understand! I won’t do something so childish! I have the intellect of an adult, after all! (Even if my brains are chu2)

But I’m curious about what kind of job involves magic…
When I stealthily peeked outside the room, I saw some people who looked like magicians working at the castle.
Everyone’s walking around busily, but unfortunately they don’t seem to be using magic.
Perhaps it’s a magician’s uniform, but everybody is wearing a sleeveless robe thing.
The colours are varied, and at a glance, there seem to be three types; black, red and blue.

I’m curious about the clothing too, but what I’m even more curious about is that they have something like a tattoo running from their face to their arms.
In fact, my father the marquis has tattoos on his arm and back as well.
I accidentally saw them when he was changing. Let me just say that I was definitely not peeking!
At that time, I was like, ‘whoa, you sure can’t judge people by their looks‘… and backed away a little, but perhaps a magician is an occupation that requires tattoos. I’ll ask him next time!

And while all this was happening, father and Soleil brought a small boy into the room.
He has caramel brown hair and cobalt blue eyes, and is a bishounen with an insanely beautiful face. His kind features are a little bit similar to Soleil.
He’s dressed in navy blue clothes for going out, in the style of a young noble boy, and it suits him quite well.
And my clothes are similar; grape-coloured going out clothes for the daughter of a rich family[/an ojousama].
Reflecting my tastes, it’s a design with not too many frills, and is neat and cut knee-length.

Soleil pushed the boy forward.

“This is my son, Achille, the same age as you, Camille-sama.”

The boy met eyes with me and smiled.
But it seems that it wasn’t a smile from the heart.
It kind of feels like the kid in front of me is interested in my reaction. Even though he’s a little brat, he’s evaluating me? How cheeky…

“It is nice to meet you, Camille-sama. My name is Achille Jade.”

Ahh… I know those eyes…
They’re the eyes of a person who behaves with confidence that he has the good will of females.
Outrageously, an arrogance, of not believing there to be the slightest chance that a person of the opposite sex would hate him, is just barely hidden.

And right now he’s dealing with me in a way that he’s calculated to be the most attractive to me.
A little five year old girl with no resistance would probably be bewitched.
However, I can see through him. After all, there were men like this around me in the world outside of this dream as well.

Handsome men who were not only aware of their own facial skills while approaching you full of confidence, but egocentric as well.
They’d thoughtlessly call out to me, who was a not bad looking girl, and on top of that, treated me like a sitting duck; one in a line of convenient women who they could use to keep up their reputation.
For some reason I would often get approached condescendingly by flashy-looking, handsome boys.
But because I’m that on the inside, let me state that if they made me accompany them, I’d have suffered quite a bit.
To begin with, the moment they tried to pick me up as a candidate for casually playing around with, it was already compleeetely out of the question.
I’ll refrain from such fruitless relationships.

But still, this Achille boy… For him to be able to use his appearance to maximum effectiveness as a kid… He’s not going to grow up to be a decent adult you know!
However, I won’t be done in by the likes of a kid. Don’t look down on not-bad-looking high school girls!
Hmph!
And so, I got worked up about a five year old child.
Of course, I didn’t say any of this aloud.
Well, he’s still a five year old child, and the fact that he’s been seen through by the likes of a faker like me is kind of cute, though.

“It’s nice to meet you. My name is Camille Rhodolite.”

I pinched my skirt, and did a little curtsy.
However, I decided not to use the pretty face I have in this dream.
It’s a bother, and to begin with, I can’t do something so skilful.

“She’s an extremely lovely girl[/personage], isn’t she, father[/Otousama]?”

Achille looked up at Soleil and spoke. Soleil looked at his son fawningly.

“We’re going out for work, so please play together in this room.”

That’s right. Today was a day that Soleil was working, to say nothing of father who holds a supervisory position here.
He should be busy today as well.
Father and Soleil left the room side by side. Only me and this precocious brat were left in the room…

※

Being left in the room with only Achille, I was troubled.
In these situations, what am I supposed to talk about? …Honestly speaking, I’m bad with children.
Perhaps because he noticed I was fidgeting, Achille called out to me.
What are you gunna do if you make a five year old child be considerate for you, Me!?

“I have heard from my father that you are skilled in magic, Camille-sama. That you have already progressed to intermediate magic, for example…”

Achille talked to me with that affected smile from before.
He’s unnecessarily close, huh. As expected of a precocious brat.

“Just Camille is fine. I mean we are the same age for once, and I’m not going to kick up a fuss about your manners, so don’t worry about it…”

It’s a pain, so I asked to stop with the keigo.
I wonder if I’m acting unbefittingly for a lady.
But I don’t wanna be stiff and formal with a kid, and it’s just the two of us anyway, so it should be fine.

“I heard from Soleil that you’re really smart, Achille. Do you like studying?”

Achille looked a little troubled, but seemingly accepting my proposal, he immediately changed to an informal tone.

“Yeah, I basically do nothing but study. I was told not to come out of my room too much, so…”

As expected, it seems that as the child of a mistress, he can’t be too bold in doing what he wants.
Going out today might be an exception amongst exceptions.
If that’s the case, I want him to be able to enjoy himself a little…

I suddenly caught eye of a few brooms for cleaning in the corner of the room, and my worthless head came up with a stupid idea.

“Since it’s been so long since you’ve been allowed outside, wanna go all out and play?”

“Eh…?”

I straddled a broom, and beckoned for Achille to come over.
It’s just the sky, so they probably won’t blame us for anything, and even if they do find fault with me, we’re both children so it’ll probably end with just a light lecture.

Most importantly, it’s boring to just stay still in this room.
It feels like my mental age is steadily being pulled down to this body’s.

“Get on.”

I forced the bewildered Achille to sit behind me, and I kicked off the ground.
The broom lightly floated in the air, and moved towards the outside of the window. I could tell that Achille had caught his breath behind me.

The broom vigorously flew out the window. The speed is steadily increasing.

“Achille, hold onto the broom tightly!”

Unlike the marquis residence, the castle is wide so flying seems worthwhile.
You can see the Magician’s Building that my father works in below us. The Magician’s Building is something like a circular tower.
Behind the Magician’s Building, you can see lots of plants growing in the fields, and they seem to be growing medicinal herbs used for magic.

“Camille… Where are you planning on heading?”

Achille who had calmed down again called out to me.
Geez, it would have been nicer if he showed a more shocked expression. How uncute.
And even though I told him to hold onto the broom, why are his arms wrapped around my waist?

“Mn~, I haven’t decided. For now, maybe we should fly a wide lap around the castle.”

“I see. Then let’s try going near where the important people live. If we come too close it feels like we’ll be targeted by the people guarding, so let’s fly a little distance away, okay?”

“That sounds interesting… But just where is it?”

“Isn’t it further in?”

We headed towards where the living quarters for the important people seemed to be.

---

“It sounds like he’d be a pleasure to meet~” is actually “I want to meet him, huh.” except this is a very common phrase in Japanese. In Japanese, you’d recognise this as lip service, but in English it sounds like an actual request, so I had to make up something that sounded like lip service.

Soleil (soh-lei-yyh)
Achille (ah-shil)

Burikko refers to a girl who likes to act all cutesy or innocent, usually adult women who fawn on men affectedly and act like little girls. Additionally, it can occasionally refer to a girl who fakes being cute, sweet, innocent and nice, but is actually a bitch. The use of it in this series refers to the more popular usage (it’s just that the girl is coincidentally, also a bitch).
(There is no satisfactory English equivalent, and I don’t believe in hamfisting things just to seem like a ‘better translator’. And obviously people have been doing this for ages, otherwise we wouldn’t have the word ‘sushi’ or ‘keiretsu’ or ‘ninja’ in English. They’d just be ‘vinegared rice rolls’ and ‘Japonic Cartels’ and ‘Sengoku mercenary agents’ or something, so you can get off your slightly large-ish pony.)

Maiden Game → (乙女ゲーム)Otome Game

Will assume you know about adv/otomege/eroge in regards to terms like ‘route’, ‘capture’, ‘event’ etc.

Incidentally, tl-ing most incidences of ‘capture target‘ as ‘love interest’ for simplicity (and due to greater ubiquity of 攻略対象 in JP adv lingo).

Finally, you should know by now if you’ve been reading manga and the like, but Japanese people have this concept of ‘four people of power or influence’, described as the ‘Four Heavenly Kings’, a reference to the four guardian deities of the Buddhist faith. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Heavenly_Kings_%28disambiguation%29

---

3 Years Old – Q of Hearts

“You know… because of you, I got dumped by Makoto-kun. Mind not getting ahead of yourself?”

There, stood an emotional schoolgirl, spitting out abuse at me, and I, who was standing there dumbfounded.
A few other students who were walking past turned this way to see what was going on… But they probably realised it was something bothersome. Like that, they pretended nothing was going on and walked away.
Tsk… Cold bastards.

Right now I’m at school, standing at the landing of an emergency staircase, being cornered by a gyaru-type girl with flashy make-up from the class next door.

“I’m not used to this kind of love conflict, you know.”

Right now I’m at an overwhelming disadvantage of 1 vs 6, and have nowhere to escape to.
Because of the fake lashes and double-eyelid tape she was wearing, the eyes of the schoolgirl in question had swollen up to three times the size they were during the entrance ceremony. It’s super intense.

By the way, I’m not a gyaru.
I’m the neat and tidy type… at least I pretend to be, and I’m camouflaged as a fairly attractive school girl… but, inside I’m actually just an otaku girl with otome games as my hobby.

Otome games are romance games aimed towards females.
They’re games where the female protagonist, through various choices throughout the game, fall in love with various ikemen… Honestly, as long as I’m playing the part of a schoolgirl with a reasonably fulfilling life, it’s a hobby that I can’t tell anyone about.
That’s why I made up this character I play at school, the type that goes “I don’t play games or the like. I enjoy going with my friends to karaoke or shopping.” If I seem like a hikikomori girl, various things will become difficult as long as I’m going to school after all.

Comparatively speaking, I’m quite good with dealing with school.
I hide my true self as an otome game otaku, and even if I’m not part of the gyaru group that’s ranked high in the school, I’m part of a group that has more influence than average in my class.
I was maintaining a neutral position with the girls standing before my eyes, and was supposed to be on fairly good terms with them, and I was thinking that things were going quite well…

――――Up until today.

“It’s a misunderstanding, I said… I don’t know what you’re talking about. Even though I’ve almost never even spoken to this Makoto person…”

Honestly, why’d it turn into this…?
There’s too much I don’t understand, so I let out a sigh. There’s nothing more difficult to get through to than an emotional person who’s snapped.
She’s crying and lashing out in anger. I wonder if it’d be a good idea to let her know, “Your mascara and eyeliner are coming off, and you’re starting to look like a Jiangshi.”

This all began with that Makoto-kun or whatever’s remark.
Makoto-kun is a fairly popular, sporty boy in my class.
He was the boyfriend of the girl standing in front of me, but apparently, the other day he one-sidedly broke things off with her.
And he left some extremely bothersome words.

“I’ve, fallen in love with Aizawa-san…”

By the way, Aizawa is my name. It’s fine even if you don’t remember it though.
Because of those last words of his, right now I’m having a terrible time being magnificently cornered by these girls who have misunderstood.

Of course I don’t seduce other people’s boyfriends, and I don’t have any memory of being confessed to by him either.
On the contrary, I’ve hardly even spoken to him in class! I can say this for sure! I’m innocent!
But then why do I have to be criticised like this? It’s incredibly unreasonable.
Oi Makoto, explain things to them right this instant!

“Ahh, it’d be nice if I could just summon him with magic, huh…”

If I could, everything would turn out just fine! …My sense of reality would be pretty damaged though.
Meanwhile, the girl is still yelling on and on, with no sign of growing tired. Can’t you guys just leave already?

“Are you listening? Break up with Makoto-kun this instant! And don’t come near him again!”

It seems that she’s still continuing with her misunderstanding.

“Um, like I said, we’re not dating. I’ve never talked to him properly, so I really think this is some mistake.”

To begin with, it’s a mystery as to why my name came out of his mouth anyway.
Honestly, my contact with the Makoto-kun in question is limited to eye contact once in a while, and I really haven’t interacted with him at all.

“Stop lying-!”

Unfortunately my words weren’t reaching the frenzied girl.

In a fit of anger, the girl ended up shoving me. Her hands hit me perfectly in the stomach.

“Ah-…!”

When I realised that things were bad, my body was already hanging in the air. As I stumbled backwards, I lost my footing on the stairs.

————I’m falling————

The girl who pushed me, widened her eyes in shock. Even if she was condemning me, she probably didn’t plan on pushing me down the stairs, huh…
I wonder if she’ll be arrested for assault.
Even though it was the instant I was falling down the stairs, the things before my eyes were moving extremely slowly…
Without sensing the danger of the situation, my mind stayed carefree and continued to think normally.

※

Bang!!

“Uwahh!”

A shock hit my body.
However, it wasn’t as painful as I had prepared myself for.
Because I hit myself against something soft, things ended without pain.
What’s going on? There’s something fluffy under my back.

“Geez, Camille-sama. I’ve told you countless times that you can’t jump on the bed…”

“Who are you…?”

Before my eyes stood an obasan with a ‘full’ build wearing a maid outfit.
She’s probably in her fifties, huh… Honestly, I think it’s pushing it for her to cosplay a maid at that age. If my mother wore something like that, I’d hate it.

※

“Camille-sama! This is terrible! I thought it was some sort of joke, but have you truly lost your memories? That’s why I asked you time and time again not to do something so dangerous!”

An unknown room, furniture and world.
It seems I dived onto this bed I’ve never seen before. It’s a bed that looks somewhat high class.
I should have fallen from the emergency stairs in my school, but… Why? The surroundings have changed.
…In the first place, where is this? There are too many questions, so I’m sitting still here.

“Aahh! The master[/Danna-sama] will be here shortly, okay…!?”

The plump maid-outfit obasan paced around me nervously.
…This seems like something I’d see in a dream.

No, this is a dream. There’s no mistake. Or rather, please let it be a dream.

When there are people around more panicked than yourself, you calm down quite a bit.
Once I wake up from this dream, I’ll be on a bed in my house, or in the infirmary.
I mean, there’s no way any of this is possible.

“Camille.”

The door suddenly opened, and a man I’ve never seen before quietly entered.
He’s wearing odd clothing, like a European noble from the middle ages. He might be one of the maid obasan’s cosplay buddies…

“Are you all right? Do you know who I am?”

His appearance looked a little cold, but he was young and handsome. His face is exactly my type.
He’s probably… a young adult, in the first half of his twenties, so there’s probably no problem with dating him. Were his head not pink, that is.
Whether a miniskirt-maid-obasan, or this pink haired man, nobody decent comes out in my dreams, huh.
That in itself might be proof that I’m an otaku.

I answered the pink man.

“I don’t… I mean, this is our first meeting, right?”

There’s definitely no way I’d forget such a high impact person.

“Ahh…”

The pink man held his head in his arms and squatted. The obasan hurried to his side in a panic.

“Are you all right? Marquis-sama!”

“There’s no way I’d be all right! For my daughter to have lost her memories… All I did was work and I neglected my daughter…”

The two of them stayed crouched like that for a while. …What on earth is going on?

※

My name is Camille Rhodolite.
I’m the eldest daughter of the Rhodolite Marquis family, and shockingly, I’m three! …Or so I was told.
Speaking of which, my arms and legs have been abnormally small, and my clothes are fluttery children’s clothing too.
Even though I’m a sketchy person, for something that came out in my dream, the craftmanship of this clothing sure is detailed, huh…

At any rate, both Camille and Rhodolite are names I’ve heard somewhere before. As for just where I’ve heard them, I can’t remember at all.

“And I am your father, Charles Rhodolite.”

“I am the head maid of this residence, Aimée Afriat!”

What I understand from all this is that the maid obasan is a very energetic person.

It seems that this is the residence of Marquis Rhodolite, in other words, the residence of the pink headed man declaring himself as my father.
Because his wife passed away when Camille was born, it’s a motherless family.

“I showed her to the doctor too, but it seems that besides the loss in memory, she’s very healthy… It’d be nice if by some chance she remembered everything, but…”

I think that might be impossible. I had no memories of living as Camille to begin with, after all.

“Right now is rest time, Camille-sama. Please sleep on the bed.”

Then I’ll do so without reserve. And after that, everything will be back to normal once I wake up.
Ahh, but wow. That sure was a dream with impact.

※

…Odd.

For the dream to be continuing even after I wake up… When I woke up the next day, I was still in that room.
I woke up on the bed I mentioned earlier, and I got up and was about to check the surroundings when the door opened before I could.

“Ahh, Camille-sama. Have you memories not returned?”

“…It looks like it.”

My body remains that of a three year old, and my surroundings are still a place I don’t know. It might just be because I’m little, but I feel like this house is really big.
Did I fall into a coma because of the shock in the fall, and that’s why I can’t wake up from this dream?
I still have my life to live after I wake up, so if possible I hope this ends with just a minor injury.

“Well, can’t be helped.”

Even if I struggle about, it’s not like I’ll be able to wake up from the dream. Last night before I went to sleep, I tried kicking and squirming so I can declare this with proof. That! Which is impossible, remaaaains impossible.
I’ve decided to enjoy this dream. I mean, I finally became something as interesting as the young daughter of a rich marquis family after all.
I’m a person who’s good at going with the flow.

“The pink-… I mean, where is father[/Otousama]?”

When I looked in the mirror yesterday, I found to my shock that, like my pink father, I had the same hair colour as well.
I can no longer ignore my own shortcomings and continue calling him the pink man.

“Marquis-sama is currently doing his job.”

“…What is father[/Otousama]’s job?”

“The Marquis-sama is a high ranking magician at the castle. Each day he maintains the safety of the country.”

I don’t really get it, but it sounds like a pretty amazing job! I’m slightly re-examining my views of pink dad.
And there’s magic in this world? How cool!

“Magic? How nice. I wanna do it too!”

When I was little, I admired a certain film’s wizard protagonist.

It was my dream to go to a school of witchcraft and wizardry, but even when I entered high school, I didn’t get an invitation from the magic school in question.
Since there was no other choice, I entered a public school in the neighbourhood. I just lived by camouflaging and dealing with my surroundings, but I’m aware that I’m actually a pretty embarassing girl.
But it’s fine, this is a dream after all. Let me do as I please!

“…Hahh, once Marquis-sama returns, let us discuss it with him… But honestly, Camille-sama, you sure have changed, haven’t you…?”

There a rumour going around Aimée and the other servants that since I hit my head yesterday, I’ve become smarter. Inside I’m a high school girl, so that’s a given. I’m being praised a lot just because I stopped jumping on the bed.

“Really?”

I’m a three year old child, so there should be leeway for a little change in personality like this.

More importantly, it’s my dream, so there’s no problem! Everything’s fine!

But just when am I going to be able to wake up?
Aahh, there were heaps of things I still needed to do, though!
I still haven’t cleared the otome game I stealthily bought two weeks ago!

Because I knew how to deal with high school life, I’ve been living while concealing the truth that I’m an otome game otaku.
∴(therefore), I basically never game outside of the room in my house. I can’t take out my games to play on the train or at school, so the time I have to play is necessarily limited to the time I have after I’m back from school, and I’m not making much progress at all.
Not only that, to maintain my decent grades I spend half the time at home studying.
It’s because all of my playthroughs have been done with the help of walkthrough sites in order to save time, following the guidance of my predecessors, that I’ve been able to maintain my gaming life.
The game I mentioned a little earlier that I’ve been playing recently is also one that I’ve been playing sporadically since it came out, and I’ve been progressing while reading the walkthroughs.

Mn… Hang on… This world is…

※

This place is, kinda, pretty similar to the world of that otome game, huh.
Mn, right. There was a pink person called Camille Rhodolite.
For the game to even appear in my dreams… I really do have some lingering attachments to it, huh. As expected of me.

『Carte à Jouer』 (←It means playing cards in French)

This was the title of the last otome game I played, and it was a game set in a world similar to this one.
In a magic academy where the four factions, Hearts, Diamonds, Clovers and Spades vied for power, a commoner heroine had romances with ikemen in the school, and it was a game about rising status in the world.

The love interests were the top members of the four great powers that went to the same school as the protagonist.
The men were nicknamed K(King), and the protagonist would eventually fall in love with a K from one of the four powers.
They were amongst the elite, and were people who had the best grades and highest social positions. As expected of an otome game. The love interests are all high spec.

The person whose form I’m currently taking, Camille Rhodolite, was one of the rivals who got in the protagonist’s way, and was the antagonist that appeared during one of the romance events with the capture target from the Hearts faction (K of Hearts).
Four rival characters appear for each of the four powers.
By the way, amongst the players, the four rivals are known as the ‘Evil Four Heavenly Kings’.
Camille’s role was that of the heart faction’s rival, and is popularly known as the Q(Queen) of Hearts.
Q is a term that refers to the various rival girls.
The Q of Hearts was a selfish, can’t-take-a-hint burikko type rival character, and after she appeared during the K of Hearts route, she was an unmanageable person who would follow the K of Hearts around, and get in the way of the heroine’s romance at every turn.

Of course, each faction’s Q would get in the way of the romance with their faction’s king, but amongst them Camille was a particularly infuriating woman. She was like a figure that personified all the annoying parts of a woman’s stubbornness, combined.
I was a fan of the King of Hearts, so I found her extremely irritating.
Well, she was a villain so in the end she was destroyed socially, and I felt really refreshed though.

…Wai-…Right now I’m Camille, aren’t I?
But the thought that I’ll be ruined at this rate doesn’t come to mind.
∵(Because) this is a dream.
There’s no way, way~, that I’ll fall into ruin~♪

Since I’ve come all the way to a country with magic, I’ll do what I want! I’ve come all the way to a dream where I don’t have to worry about how others see me, after all.
I wonder if the magic of this country has a game where you chase around a golden ball with wings. I’d be really, really be interested in playing it.

---

Why are people named Makoto always stirring up trouble?

“Are you all right? Marquis-sama!” ← I’m aware that it sounds a little awkward, but didn’t tl ‘-sama’ as ‘lord’ since I prefer to reserve that for 卿. Please bear with it.

Camille (kah-mii-yyh)
Charles (sharl)
Aimée Afriat (eh-mehh ah-free-ah)

*imouto*

*imouto*

*imouto*

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