Chapter 40: 15

Volume 2 Chapter 15: The Witch of Envy Incident

Another month of classes quickly passed, and it was now the seventh month.

In that time, Luciana had naturally fit herself in with the rest of her class thanks to her bright and cheerful personality. As it stood now, there was hardly anyone that would gossip about or look down on her circumstances.

She had even begun to maintain a normal relationship with Olivia, although the duke’s daughter still occasional sent sharp glares in her direction. Even so, Luciana still wanted to get to know her better, but it seemed there was still distance to close between the two.

And on the other hand, Luciana was closer than ever with Luna, and it was well-known within the class that the two were the best of friends.

Her only frustration now was her lack of progress in magic, but it seemed Luciana was truly enjoying a fulfilling student life.

As for Melody, she had kept busy as well, spending her mornings with her usual maid work while continuing her job as Lect’s assistant in the afternoon and – depending on who was asking – now every day, even. Indeed, despite the class occurring only twice a week, Melody has been helping Lect with the paperwork and preparations on a daily basis.

For Lect, this was a wonderful opportunity… but, of course, their relationship had not progressed in the slightest…

“Huh? You lost your pencil?”

Then one day, at dinnertime, Melody was listening to Luciana’s recounting of the day’s events at the Royal Academy.

“I think so. I was stil using it during morning classes, but then I couldn’t find it during afternoon classes. It wasn’t where I usually put it… Luna helped me look for it, but we still couldn’t find it.”

“And I believe my lady only carries a single pencil. Were there any problems?”

“It was fine. Luna lent one to me.”

“What a close friend you have made, my lady. In any case, I shall prepare a replacement pencil for you later.”

“Thanks Melody. Ugh, losing the pencil was a waste of money… I’m so sorry, father.”

In this world, pencils were important for taking lecture notes, but although they were not particularly expensive, they were also not cheap either. Luciana felt frustration over having to replace her pencil so soon, when the one she lost was still quite usable.

Back on Earth, pencils were becoming less common in some western countries, but it seemed because this was a Japanese game, the Royal Academy adopted Japanese school practices. Well, this was not a detail Luciana would be aware of, and Melody had already accepted this was a different world in the first place and was not concerned with the details.

As for the missing pencil, there was not much more to talk about; it was simply a minor mishap. The two smiled at one another as their conversation continued…

The very next day, after Luciana had returned from classes, Melody was sorting the laundry when she noticed another oddity.

“Huh? Where is my lady’s handkerchief?”

Luciana’s handkerchief was, strangely enough, not in its usual place inside the skirt pocket. Melody looked around, wondering if she had somehow dropped it, but it seemed to have disappeared.

“My handkerchief? Is it not in my skirt pocket?”

“It was not there, my lady. Would you happen to remember where you may have put it?”

“That’s weird… Maybe I put it inside my bag?”

Luciana emptied the contents of her bag, sorting through the items, but still she could not find her handkerchief.

“Ugh, that’s the second thing I’ve lost this week. When did I become so careless?”

“If I recall, the elective course you attended today was dance? Perhaps it had been lost there.”

“Hmm, I’m not sure. I know I changed into the dance uniform, but I’m sure the handkerchief had still been in my pocket at the time. Where could I have lost it? I really liked that one, too.”

“I believe we still have some of the same material at the mansion, so I can make another when we return.”

“I’m sorry for the trouble, Melody…”

“Fufufu, it is no trouble at all, my lady, but please do be a little more careful in the future.”

And from that day, Luciana began constantly checking over her belongings, making sure everything was still in its place. For a time, it seemed to be working, as she no longer shared any stories of lost items.

It should have ended peacefully there, but… another incident came to pass.

It was the now the second week of the seventh month. Luciana and Melody once again returned to the Royal Academy from the Luthorburg estate, and Melody was working through her chores.

In the laundry room, Melody was chatting away with Annemarie’s maid, Meliane, when another maid suddenly burst in.

“Melody! Did you hear what happened?!”

“Oh, Miss Sasha. What happened for you to be in such a rush?”

“Oh my, and who might you be?”

“Oh, Miss Meliane, allow me to introduce to you Miss Sasha, the maid of House Invidia. Miss Sasha, this is Miss Meliane, the maid of House Victirium.”

“Huh? Oh, of course, it is a pleasure to meet you. My name is Sasha.”

“Oh my, ufufu. My name is Meliane. Likewise, it is a pleasure to meet you.”

The two finished their greetings with a bow, filling the room with a gentle atmosphere. But Sasha quickly returned to her senses and began explaining why she had come to the laundry room.

“Wait, that’s not why I came! Melody, have you heard anything about what happened at the Academy today?”

“About the Academy? No, I have not heard anything. Did something happen?”

“My lady’s classroom, that is, the classroom of first-year, Class A, was vandalized!”

In other words, it involved the classroom of the young ladies that these maids were serving.

“What?!”

“My goodness!”

The maids’ eyes widened in shock as they took in Sasha’s words.

And there was still more news to come: while morning classes would be held as usual, the afternoon elective courses would be canceled for the day, including Lect’s own class. In other words, there was not much for Melody to do after her morning chores but to wait for Luciana’s return after lunch.

“So paint had been splashed all over the classroom? On the walls and the floor, the blackboard, and even the ceiling?”

“Yeah, it was everywhere. It was like someone had thrown buckets of paint all over everything…”

When Luciana finally returned, she began explaining what had happened as she worked on an assignment in the study room. Melody listened from another room as she carefully prepared the tea.

“How horrible. Who would do such a thing…”

“There was paint all over the desks and chairs, too, but thankfully nothing inside the desks was ruined.”

Luciana gave a tired sigh as she twirled the pencil in her hand; any damage was still damage, after all, and it was nothing anybody could be happy about. Meanwhile Melody, hearing this new development, tilted her head in curiosity.

“Everything inside the desks was fine? Despite how haphazardly thrown about the room the paint was?”

(Could it be that avoiding the insides of the desks was intentional? Why would they do that…)

Melody wondered about the implications behind it, but, unable to puzzle out an explanation, she dipped her head forward, deeper in thought.

“Then, what shall the Academy be doing, moving forward from this?”

“They said it would take a few days to clean up the paint, so for a time we’ll be using another classroom while resuming our usual schedule.”

“I see. However, it is rather surprising they did not close the Academy again, especially since this had happened to the classroom with the Crown Prince in attendance.”

“They did consider doing that, but the Crown Prince himself said it wouldn’t be good to fall further behind by delaying their education for longer.”

Melody’s eyes widened with surprise as she heard Luciana’s explanation.

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“He said that? Even knowing it was his class that was targeted?”

“He looked really cool when he was saying it, too. And Lady Annemarie was also amazing. You could tell she knew what she was doing as part of the student council by how she kept all the other students from panicking. I just stood there staring absentmindedly… I have a lot ot learn from those two.”

Although Luciana seemed to have regrets about what happened, there was a hint of pride in her voice as well — perhaps she was proud to able to call people as dependable as those two her friends. And with that, Luciana gave her pencil another spin, a beaming smile on her face.

“My lady, it is bad manners to twirl your pencil as you study, so please refrain from doing so. Where did you even learn to do such a… Hm? My lady, is that pencil..”

“Oh, this one? It’s the pencil I thought I lost the other day.”

“You found it? Where did you find it?”

“The instructor who was inspecting the vandalism found it on the floor near the teacher’s desk.”

“Did it somehow roll over there? But if I recall correctly, the room are always cleaned after classes have finished for the day.”

“They must have missed it while cleaning, but anyway, I’m glad I found it.”

“…Is that really how it is?”

(Hmm, for the cleaners to have missed something in the classroom the Crown Prince uses… Is that possible?)

Melody felt something was not quite right as she watched Luciana continue studying with her found pencil. She could not quite pinpoint the feeling, so all she could do now was hope the matter was resolved without further incident…

“Keep calm and stay quiet, StillnessSilence.”

Meanwhile, in her room within the same dormitory, Annemarie had ordered Clarisse, her lady-in-waiting, to leave the room, and she cast a spell of soundproofing after confirming she was alone. Well, alone except for…

“We’re clear.”

A person emerged from under the bed.

“Phew, I wouldn’t have guessed I’d ever have to use this hidden passage.”

It was none other than Crown Prince Christopher, who dusted himself off as he got to his feet while looking at the ceiling.

“You know I shouldn’t be here, right, Anna? So why couldn’t you be the one to come over to my room?”

“It doesn’t matter who goes where when we’ll just be forced into a marriage if anyone finds out we’re meeting like this.”

“Tch…”

While the dorms were interconnected via underground passageways, there were still security measures in place to prevent people from secretly moving as they pleased. However, Annemarie and Christopher had already added secret passages of their own in the building layout so they could meet up in case of emergencies. They could also seal off these secret passages once they were done, so these blindspots should not be a security risk for future generations… probably.

“Since you asked me to sneak in and all, that must mean whatever’s happening has to do with the game, right?”

Christopher looked over at Annemarie after he settled onto a nearby sofa. Annemarie nodded as she sat on her bed.

“It’s something like that, yes. Right now, it’s safe to assume that the first major event, the ‘Witch of Envy Incident’, has already begun.”

“You mean because of what happened in the classroom this morning?”

“That’s right. From what I remember, a certain student gets manipulated by the Demon King and becomes the Witch of Envy in order to frame the heroine and cause her to despair. There are three things that happen; the first was this morning’s ‘Classroom Repainting’, the second will be the ‘Desk Defacement’ targeting commoner students with excellent grades, and finally the third will be the ‘Surprise Shower’, where a certain female student gets drenched after a bucket of water is empted over them.”

“All of that… sounds like a few childish pranks. I was expecting something nastier, something more hurtful than just harassment.”

“Could you say the same if you were the one being harassed? Besides, today’s incident didn’t target anyone specific, but it still caused a lot of trouble for everyone.”

“Well, I guess that is true…”

Christopher made a troubled face as he scratched his head. It all seemed like something a bully would typically do in manga, but that wouldn’t make being the victim any less awful. Remember: bullying is bad, okay?

“So I wanted to talk about what we’ll be doing about it, but… Haa…”

Annemarie let out a heavy sigh; although she retained much of her memory about the game, she was at an impasse, wavering at the first step. This was because…

“…Because Heroine-chan isn’t present, it’s going to be hard to tell who will be involved in this event now, right? I was hoping since Heroine-chan isn’t around, this entire event wouldn’t happen.”

“If the Witch of Envy Incident is still happening, surely that means there’s something like plot correction going on to make sure events from the game still happen… So why couldn’t it also bring the heroine to the Royal Academy too, ugh!”

“We don’t even know who the Witch of Envy is going to be either… It could be anyone. I think your game knowledge might just be completely useless this time.”

“Grrr…”

Back in the game, Luciana Luthorburg was the one to become the Witch of Envy; she held a deep-seated jealousy for the heroine’s apparently blessed and privileged life, and the Demon King had seized that emotional fragility to manipulate her. However, because of Melody, the current Luciana held no such feelings, and she was even living a happy comfortable life now. In that case, who could possibly be holding such jealousy?

But more importantly…

“And the substitute heroine for this event should be Luciana-chan, right?”

Annemarie sighed once more.

“Is it because of that pencil?”

Christopher recalled what had happened in the temporary classroom earlier this morning: Instructor Regis, upon returning from the vandalized classroom, held up a pencil and asked if it belonged to anyway. Nobody responded, but after he mentioned there was an ‘L’ engraving, Luciana had raised her hand and claimed ownership of it.

“Luciana-chan said she lost it a few days ago, but…”

“It’s a pretty common trope, right? The perpetrator leaving behind their victim’s belongings at the scene of a crime in order to frame them?”

“The same thing happened in the game, except it was the heroine who raised her hand.”

“Oof, so the former midboss is the heroine now? I guess the same thing happened at the Spring Ball, but wow, it’s like the world is just a bugged version of the game. What even happened? Wait… It must have been us…”

Christopher slumped in his seat, having remembered the characters he and Anna were supposed to be had become completely different people because of their reincarnation.

Just to be clear, that self-blame was actually incorrect; everything now was actually the fault of a certain maid junkie who knew absolutely nothing about the game.

“It’s not entirely our fault, but I’m certain we’re one of the main causes for the divergence. But enough about that, there are more important things we need to focus on. The fact that the Witch of Envy Incident is still happening means the Demon King is still alive after escaping from the Spring Ball. More importantly, even though Luciana is the substitute heroine, she doesn’t have the power of the Saint at all.”

“So that’s what it comes down to, huh? Nobody can actually replace the heroine because she’s the only one with the power of the Saint.”

“That’s why it’s up to us to solve this case in place of the heroine. If we screw this up and get the event’s Bad End, the Demon King will only get stronger for it later.”

“I don’t want to see Luciana get hurt either. So do you have any idea who the culprit could be?”

“I have a few guesses, but…”

“Oh? Who?”

Olivia Rankdol immediately came to Annemarie’s mind, but she shook her head to clear her thoughts.

“I don’t have any proof, so I shouldn’t be giving you any ideas. Besides, if you’re going to search for the culprit as well, you’ll need to do it without any biases.”

“Hmm, okay, if you say so… Oh, and who is supposed to be the victim of the third incident, the Surprise Shower?”

“Ah… Right, that should be… Olivia Rankdol.”

It was because Olivia was the third victim that Annemarie could not be sure who the perpetrator could be. It would make sense for Olivia to be it, given her hostility towards Luciana, but since she would also be a victim later in the event…

But given their current situation, it was likely the characters involved in this Witch of Envy Incident would be completely different compared to the game. And with that in mind, if Olivia Rankdol was now the true perpetrator, then the victim of the third incident should be someone else entirely.

In the end, their discussion yielded no further clues on who the perpetrator could be, not without another incident happening, at least.

(So who became the Witch of Envy…)

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