The Duke's Daughter Goes Her Own Way
[Her Name is Ellie-chan, the Great Detective!]
Translated by: ME
It's been a month since the Everton family's demotion.
The aristocratic circles seemed quite stirred up, but that has also settled down.
Although the demotion from Marquis to Viscount was quite a severe punishment, when the truth came out, people understood the miserable state of their house, thinking, [Well, that figures]. However, since the Crown Prince was the one leading this, there seem to be voices fearing that His Highness's reign will be a harsh one...
Just don't do anything shady in the first place!
And as for His Highness, who was under suspicion of being a lolicon, the rumors have now changed to [He dotes excessively on his fiancée]. Incidentally, the lolicon suspicion hasn't been completely dispelled.
Dote... Doting, not 'dating'.
Even for someone like me, who's only familiar with the former, it's bewildering, but I believe His Highness isn't the type to be swept away and 'drown' in it.
...Although he does like affogatos. If I'm going to 'drown' in anything, I'd rather it be in delicious food, not love. Not that I dislike His Highness's affection. I just don't need enough to drown in, Your Highness.
***
The members of the Everton family, confined to their royal capital mansion under strict surveillance, have already had the Lady of the House cause trouble and get imprisoned. Unable to shake her habit of extravagance, she went to a high-end jewelry store to shop, but it seemed the store's credit limit for her had already been maxed out. The credit limit for customers varies by store and changes significantly based on the customer's rank. The amount available as a Marquis and the amount available as a Viscount are worlds apart. Moreover, it appeared she had hardly paid any of her previous bills. The amount was something a Viscount without a territory couldn't possibly pay off. For the store, it was a confirmed bad debt.
Well, the store wouldn't want to sell to such a customer either.
When a clerk refused her purchase, saying [We cannot sell to you], she threw a fit, yelling, [Haven't I favored you immensely until now?!]
...She must have been under a lot of stress, I guess. Serves her right, though.
She was restrained by knights while having her hysterical fit in the store, and because the store sued for damages, she was temporarily detained. However, afterward, jewelry that should have been the store's merchandise came tumbling out of her clothes.
Shoplifting?! What a pathetic thing to do! And you were a former Marchioness!
And so, ['Theft'] was duly added to her charges, and she was imprisoned until her sentencing.
***
Next, the son caused trouble at a club frequented by noble sons. He was told [Your seat, it ain't here] at a table where high-ranking nobles were gathered, and he completely lost his temper. I mean, you have no right to get angry, do you?
...I mean, the people from that house have *incredibly* little social standing, don't they...?
No one lifted a finger to help him. On the contrary, everyone around him backed away as if to say they wanted no part in a sinking mud-barge. Frankly, it's surprising they managed to remain Marquises for as long as they did!
***
With the madam causing trouble, the son causing trouble, and their position in the royal capital becoming too untenable, they apparently let go of the capital mansion and retreated to some countryside location.
Of course, the surveillance remains.
Their resentment towards our Macnagan family is so intense that they are banned from entering Macnagan territory. The surveillance team seems to be keeping an eye on that.
...I mean, *we* haven't done anything...
They were apparently saying things like *we* had siphoned off their profits, but judging from the tax revenue reports, your house wasn't even making a 'profit' to begin with! There were much better ways to manage things, but you left everything—people, land, mines—pretty much neglected! Frankly, I've come to understand they're just people you shouldn't get involved with.
His Highness also said, [You probably won't see them again, so it's fine to forget about them], so I'll gratefully do just that.Because the way they messed up was so extreme, it seems there's now talk of stripping them of their title entirely.
They're just falling all on their own. It's scary.
***
[Lady Elizabeth! A reply has come!!]
In the morning, as soon as I entered the classroom at school, Marie-san said this.
She was waving a letter-like object in her hand, swinging it wildly over her head.
[Good morning, Marie-san.]
[Ah! Good morning! Good morning to you too, Your Highness.]
She seemed to be making some effort to be mindful of His Highness, bowing her head demurely.
But Your Highness already knows about your unrefined nature! Please, live your life unrefinedly without reservation!
***
We receive regular reports from the observers on the Everton family.
In one of those reports, there was something that caught my attention.
It was that Lady Ingrid was muttering incomprehensible things.
The observer didn't seem to be able to make out what she was saying, so I secretly dispatched a servant from the Macnagan Ducal house, one who boasts a mysterious background and mysterious skills.
He is a former spy from another country. He was rotting away in a tree in our garden, having infiltrated our property, complaining about his previous job: [The work's rough, the pay's low, I can't take it anymore!] So I said, ["You, come work for us,"] and hired him. Now he bakes delicious bread for us every day. He says, [Being a baker is my true calling!] but if he's happy, then that's fine. It's true, his eyes are always lively when he's tending to the bread oven.
His characteristic is his very sharp hearing. And his special skill is lip-reading. He sees with his eyes, hears with his ears, and accurately records what the subject is saying.
...He was excellent as a spy. Well, his bread is delicious too. But please stop putting weird ingredients in it.
I asked him to try and pick up just the sounds for me, even if he couldn't understand what she was saying. Three days later, he brought me a report saying, [Somethin' like this, I guess.] I hurriedly showed it to Marie-san too. Even for him, who effortlessly handles several languages, it was noted as ['An unheard language. Unclear if it's even a meaningful language.'] That language was Japanese, which isn't used in this world.He seemed to have accurately captured the pronunciation. Accents and such were also meticulously noted with symbols.
Our servants are seriously, wastefully capable!
*Naze watashi ga konna me ni au no yo* (Why did I end up like this!?)
*Geeemu ja konna endingu janakatta janai* (There wasn't ending like this in the game.)
*Naze ibento ga okoranakatta no* (Why the 'event' didn't happen?)
[...And so on.]
I told the servant that further investigation was unnecessary, thanked him, and sent him back to the mansion.I asked if there were any other points of concern, but he was indignant, [That house's bread oven maintenance is terrible! That's an insult to bread! I thought they were pickin' a fight with me, it was hard to endure!]
...Yeah. You're a baker who wouldn't be a disgrace anywhere. Now, go back to the mansion and bake bread to your heart's content.
Goodbye, Baker. Forever, Baker.
After seeing the report, Marie-san muttered in a daze, [So Lady Ingrid was a reincarnator too...]
Then she looked at me and smiled with a terribly triumphant face, as if to say she'd been right all along.
[See?! I told you Lady Ingrid was pulling heroine moves, didn't I!]
...No, let's drop that now.
[But if that's the case, there's something I'd like to ask Lady Ingrid...]
Something you want to ask?
Well, I have a few things too, I suppose. But it's all in the past now, so it doesn't really matter.
[What is it?] I tilted my head, and Marie-san said with a very serious face:
[I was wondering what the title of that game was...]
Now that you mention it, you did say something before. What was it, let's see...
[It was a title with kanji and katakana, right?]
[Yes, probably. ...Even I think that's pretty empty information, huh?]
*That's* what you want to know *now*?!
[Why are you interested in the title?]
Does the title hold the key to the game or something? Was some world secret written in it?
[It's just, well, the title had absolutely nothing to do with the actual game... I just remember thinking, 'Is this title fraud?!' So, ironically, it's been bugging me ever since...]
I had a feeling it might be something like that, but what a stupid reason!
Marie-san, please change your title from 'Buried-Type Heroine' to 'Let-Down-Type Heroine'.
She asked if it would be okay to write a letter or something, so I replied that it should probably be fine. I also told her it would be better not to use Japanese or anything, as it might be censored.
[I'll let you know when I get a reply, Lady Elizabeth!] And we parted ways that day.
***
And now, the reply.
Hey, Marie-san... I wish you could have told me secretly, preferably somewhere His Highness wasn't present...
After somehow managing to evade His Highness's incessant questions about what the reply was, I opened the letter I had borrowed from Marie-san. Since I was a bit resistant to opening it in front of others, I'm now in my room at the castle. I asked Marina and Elsa to clear everyone out. Probably even the covert operatives have been shooed away. According to Marie-san, the letter's content was ['Eighty percent complaints about Lady Elizabeth'].
Upon opening and reading it, I found that was exactly true and couldn't help but sigh.
She had said proudly, ['I put red circles on the important parts!'] and indeed, on the second of the three sheets of letter paper, there was a rather crude red circle. Marie-san's handwriting said things like ['<- Here! Important!'] next to it.
Is this a reference book or something?
Inside the red circles were the game's title and the names of all the romanceable characters.
The title was 'The Fantasy Flower Garden'.
The romanceable characters were the six I had heard about from Marie-san before, plus Lord Hendrick, who is now His Highness's aide, making seven.
I see.
The sense of incongruity I felt when I heard about the game from Marie-san before. And now, this title.
I think I've probably figured out what's going on.
It was never destined to follow the game's storyline.
The characters' personalities should be different too.
Judging from the letter, Lady Ingrid still unquestioningly believes this world is 'the game world'.
But for her, reality has already become quite harsh.
Perhaps immersing herself in the dream is happier for her.
***
I decided to talk with Marie-san on one of His Highness's days off.
My house would be the safest, but I didn't have time for that today, so I decided to visit Marie-san's room in the dormitory.
[Come in, come in! I cleaned it up yesterday!]
Laughing with a [Ehehe], Marie-san welcomed me in.
Contrary to my expectations, it was a neatly tidied room. The window curtains were a pale blue check pattern, the bedcover was a floral patchwork—very girly. It's quite different from my room, which is full of practical, utilitarian items. She has such overflowing feminine taste in accessories... What a disappointing girl you are, Marie-san...
Marie-san offered me the chair at her desk and sat down on her bed herself.
[First, thank you for this. I've read it.]
I handed over the letter from Lady Ingrid, and Marie-san took it and placed it beside her.
[So, how was it? Was there anything interesting written?]
[You said the game title was 'title fraud,' right? Could you tell me more about that?]
Just looking at the title, it seems rather commonplace.
If it's a sparkling, heart-pounding youth story with handsome guys, this title wouldn't be strange.
[The title is 'The Fantasy Flower Garden', but there's no 'flower garden' or 'flower bed' anywhere in the story. The only time flowers appear is in Elrick's scenario, and it's just the school's shabby flowerbed. And all that's planted are a few tulips...]
Marie-san looked upwards as if remembering.
[There are no scenarios where 'flowers' are the key, and people on SNS and the net were saying things like 'What flower garden?!'. Also, 'fantasy' doesn't make sense either. It's not a world with magic or fairies; the fantasy element is just 'a Europe-like other world,' right?]
When she added, [Just like reality, I guess], I nodded.
This world has no magic. Although concepts like fairies, monsters, and gods exist, no one has 'seen' them.
The treatment of such spiritual and fantastical beings isn't much different here than on Earth.
[...I've been thinking about it since I heard the story from you before.]
As I began to speak, Marie-san leaned forward.
[Just as we were reincarnated from Earth to here, couldn't there also be people who are 'reincarnated from here to Earth'?]
[The 'Reincarnation from Another World to Modern Times' trope!?]
[Yes.]
I have no idea how reincarnation works.
My memories contain no 'God of Reincarnation'. I have no idea why I was born into this world.
But, consider this.
If there was some kind of passage from Earth to here.
It might not be one-way.
Conversely, couldn't there be those who die here and are born on Earth?
And if that person, like we have memories of Earth, had memories of this world?
[Could it be that such a person happened to get a job at a game company, happened to use their own memories as material for a draft proposal... I thought that might be possible.]
Marie-san was dumbfounded.
That's understandable. She was afraid of the 'game's compelling force'. That means she somewhere believed 'this world is the game world'.
[You said before, Marie-san. 'The voices of His Highness and Alphonse seem a bit different between the game and reality.']
You said that, prefacing it with [It might just be my imagination].
The voices I hear now seem a little different from the ones in the game... Well, of course, live voices and recordings are different.
[That might be because the game's producer, who has memories of this world, used 'voice actors with voices similar to their real ones'... The voices of the people before us now are not 'the voices acted by Japanese voice actors', but 'their own voices', don't you think?]
[Voice actors... with similar voices...]
[Yes. In other words, the 'original source material' was this world, and the game was a 'derivative work'...]
Thinking of it that way, many things fall into place.
[The reason I don't exist in the game is probably because having a fiancée for the archetypal romanceable 'Prince' would ruin the story, right? The characters' names and titles are almost identical to reality, but their personalities are vastly different. Couldn't that be because they *had* to be that way 'for the game' to create the scenarios?]
Probably, based on the producer's preferences or something, they selected characters to appear in the game and just slapped 'game-like' settings onto them.
His Highness's personality is the most drastically different between the game and reality because a His Highness true to reality wouldn't work in an otome game.
In fact, Lady Ingrid, who tried to replicate the otome game, was crushed within a few weeks.
My brother, whose personality is different from the game? I don't know about that. Maybe they thought he was usable because he's good-looking? Dunno.
[Probably, Producer P was a noble of considerable status here. If that's the case, all the characters are famous, so he should have at least conversed with them... Well, as for the muscle-brain, it's a mystery where he would have met him.]
[Speaking of which, it's a mystery where *I* would have met him too!]
Now that you mention it, yeah.
[I don't know any high-ranking nobles besides Lady Elizabeth! What was that P thinking, making someone like me the heroine!?]
How should I know?
[A game where Lady Elizabeth is the heroine and everyone adores her would definitely sell better!]
Shut up. What kind of game is that?
[I mean, *I* would buy it!]
Don't buy it.
[I'd pay up to 7,000 yen for it!]
That's surprisingly expensive!!
Due to game circumstances, Elizabeth was removed. Due to game circumstances, His Highness's (and the shitty bug/Elrick's) personalities were changed. Due to game circumstances, the setting became Cockford Academy.
[...So, in other words, even if Marie-san were to enroll at Cockford and pull off perfect heroine moves, she wouldn't be able to reach a Good End. The game is truly, after all, just a 'game', not 'reality'. Now, about this game's title...]
'The Fantasy Flower Garden'.
It might be a title completely unrelated to the game's actual scenario.
But probably, what P (Producer-san) meant to say was this:
[The game's content itself was a 'dream' and an 'illusion' for P, who had seen this reality. Things like 'Wouldn't it be nice if I could have a romance like this with this person?' or 'Wouldn't it be nice if this person were like this?...']
Yes. A kind, sister-loving older brother is a dream, an illusion. Reality is merciless.
[And 'Flower Garden'... meaning, the characters have been altered to be people with 'flower field'-like thinking. That's probably the meaning.]
I mean, there's no way His Highness would drown in love and abandon his right to the throne.
There's no room for flower fields to spread out in His Highness's head.
And as for the shitty bug's head, it's not flower fields but a Sea of Decay spreading in there.
Marie-san, who had let out a deflated sigh like [Fuwaa~], looked at me with sparkling eyes.
[Lady Elizabeth, that's amazing! It makes perfect sense! I'm mashing the confirm button!]
When you say things like that, I just hear 'Confirm! Confirm!' repeated in my head, so please stop.
[Amazing... This is 'A body of a child, the mind of an adult'!]
[Well, it's true that jii-chan's name is always the same, I suppose.]
[You're mixing references!]
...I'm surprised you caught that blend.
[So then, could it be that the P of that game or someone is still somewhere in this country?]
[They might be. ...Though there's no way to confirm it.]
After all, it involves 'dying and being reborn'. We don't know if they're still alive or already dead, and even if we asked them, ['Are you scheduled to be reincarnated on Earth?'] it would be confusing.
Just like it was for me, it probably wasn't something the person themselves desired.
[Haa... So I really don't have to become an 'otome game heroine' after all...]
I nodded at Marie-san, who spoke as if a great weight had been lifted.
[That's right. The 'game's heroine' is just a fictional character conceived by P, modeled after Marie-san.]
[Ahh, what a relief... No wonder I couldn't relate to the game's heroine! It wasn't me!]
No wonder Marie-san doesn't seem like an otome game heroine! Because she *isn't* the heroine!
***
A few days after that, Marie-san gave me a small box as ['a thank you for resolving my doubts'].
What could this be? I returned to the castle and opened the box. Inside was a set of women's underwear.
Marie-san's family now runs the top women's underwear manufacturer in the country... I'm a devoted user of their little girl bras.
What Marie-san gave me was a pure white bra with pretty lace and a matching design panty. A tag with the product name was included.
'Angel's Wings'
...Don't mix T***P and W***G!
Just because there are no trademarks, you're doing pretty much whatever you want, huh... I'll take it, though.
A note was also inside saying they accept size exchanges for unused items. How grateful.
His Highness asked, ['What did you get?'] but I couldn't answer... It's panties and a bra... I... can't say that...
When I vaguely answered, ['It's a product handled by Marie-san's family,'], His Highness seemed to have realized what it was, averted his gaze awkwardly, and simply said, ['I see...'].
Thank you for reading. If you want to help my hobby please download and install LDP9 with my link down below. Just Click the small yellow LDPlayer Banner.
OR
Subscribe to my YouTube Channel
-Horizontal.jpg)
No comments:
Post a Comment