"Nice to meet you, young people. I am your etiquette teacher, the second son of a viscount household, Clement von Werner. For the rest of the year, let's get along well. Okay?"
This was the class on manners, preparing tea parties, among other noble things.
The teacher in front of me was a tall, thin, well-dressed man with a kind of scarf on his shirt and sleeves. His hair was wavy black and completely covered his right eye; so we could only see his left eye, which was yellow.
He smiled at us with the grace and kindness of a good teacher; there was nothing wrong with that. The problem with him was that his face scared us.
His face was almost transparent and his cheeks showed the shape of his teeth. His yellow eye gave off bad vibes, and his rough, gloomy voice didn't help at all.
One girl couldn't stand the way he smiled at us; it looked like a horror movie. When a killer is ready to reveal his motives to the poor victim.
"Professor, I'm sorry. But you're really scary!"
She said what we were all thinking.
The scary teacher heard her say that and then...
"I'm so sorry!"
His smile was wiped away by tears as he sat in a fetal position and an aura of depression surrounded him.
"I always try to get along with the students, but everyone always ends up saying the same thing! I should quit as a teacher and go live in the mountains since I can't even get a fiancée!"
The girl who told the truth immediately apologized.
I don't know what household she was from, but it seems that everyone, like her, stood up to apologize.
(The power of a pathetic man certainly moves mountains.)
After he stopped crying, I said.
"Professor, I'm sorry I'm late and I don't know where to sit."
The etiquette class was divided into an exact number of boys and girls.
The teacher paired them depending on their status.
Even my friends were sitting with girls. I wasn't, since I came in late because I released a brown baby.
"Oh, right, umm... is there anyone without a partner?"
Etiquette classes will be with their respective partner for a whole year, so the girl left over will be my partner until the last month of classes.
"Me."
A girl raised her hand from the back; the teacher told me. "Very well, from now on she will be your partner. You can't change it, by the way."
I walked to the back while the teacher explained what we would do.
Just as I was within reach, I saw her.
The girl who would be my partner until December was in front of me.
"Nice to meet you."
She said with a smile.
There was nothing wrong with that.
Except for one, and only one.
(Why?)
(Why precisely her?)
(Is the power of the cliché scenario interfering with my background character life?!)
At a table decorated with snacks, first-class tea leaves, expensive ornaments, silver and gold cutlery, and a swan-shaped tea set.
A beautiful girl with light blonde hair tied in two small ponytails from her neck and reaching her back was sitting.
Her eyes were a beautiful aquamarine, a color resembling crystalline green.
She showed a charming smile that could captivate anyone.
(This girl is not just any girl; she is none other than the protagonist of this Otome game.)
"Uhm... Are you going to sit down?"
"Eh! ... Yes."
The class had already started.
(My experience as a background character was deviating by interacting with the game's characters.)
◇
"You are organizing a meeting for an important person. That person, whether male or female, will observe your decoration of both the interior of the room and the tea set you have prepared, and even the snacks you serve. Appearance is very important, remember that well."
The scary teacher taught us the basics of etiquette, how to serve tea and drink it in an elegant manner.
Everyone practiced how to decorate our tables and serve our partner as if they were an important person.
(This would be useful for the future of many, but not for a few.)
(I, as always, didn't care about any of it.)
But I couldn't concentrate.
"Is there a problem?"
My tea partner asked me why I was taking so long to pour a simple cup of tea.
(The problem is that.)
(I don't understand why we ended up together!)
(Your entrance scores are high, right? What are you doing here?)
(You should be at the first encounter with the capture targets.)
"N-No. It's just that I'm nervous."
I poured the liquid into the cup just as the professor said.
Now it was time to chat about any topic as if it were important.
"S-Since we'll be partners, I think it would be good to get to know each other better, don't you think?"
The protagonist said. "Yes, I'd love to." With a sweet smile.
She started first.
"Actually, I'm still a little scared. I had my doubts about whether it was okay or not to come study at the imperial capital's academy."
(I want to get personal information from her, for future investigations to prevent the annoying non-romantic events from happening to her.)
"Is that so? But it's normal for nobles to attend the academy."
Her smile faded, her eyes lowered to the table, and after waiting quietly for a while, she said.
"I'm not a noble. I'm not the illegitimate daughter of some noble, nor do I belong to a knight household."
(I already knew that, but it's better that she says it herself.)
"What do you mean?"
(Now I imitated the conversations of romantic comedy protagonists at an important moment to learn about some girl's past.)
(I had never spoken to a girl who wasn't Amy or my family, so I have zero experience in that. For that reason, I'll use my knowledge of manly characters so no one realizes I'm scared to talk to a real girl.)
"You see... I'm a commoner."
I pretended to open my eyes in surprise.
(Now, any noble who heard that would look at her with disdain.)
(But I really didn't care. You'll save the world, so your origin won't matter in the future.)
(Time to act like an understanding and nice guy! Although I'm not really one.)
"And does that really matter?"
"Huh?"
"It's just that what you're saying is absurd to me. I mean, you're a commoner, so what? I'm the son of an upstart noble without territory. The only difference between us two is that you don't have a surname, but I do. And even so, I'm not recognized by other nobles, so, for them, we're both worms, hahaha."
(What I said was truth and lies. The truth was everything and the lie was that, even being an upstart noble, they would look down on her.)
(It's because of her status that the duke's villainess daughter would harass her to leave the academy.)
(If I can guarantee that she at least doesn't give in or succumb to a psychological problem, so as not to have to endure more annoyances about not being worthy of being here, I wouldn't mind advising her.)
"I'm Razel, nice to meet you."
I introduced myself to show how reliable I am.
Her eyes were wide open, then she smiled and said.
"Nice to meet you, Razel-kun! I'm Lily. Let's get along from today on."
(Lily, huh?)
(If I remember correctly, in one of those forums where they wrote super-secret things that only developers should know, it was mentioned that the protagonist's real name was inspired by a beautiful flower.)
(The idea of introducing that information was discarded since that other game had beaten them to it.)
(Apparently the name of that heroine was also similar to Lily, a beautiful flower, maybe it should have been rose, violet or... iris perhaps.)
(The truth is, I didn't care, I just mentioned it out of curiosity.)
Lily told me that she lived her whole life in a convent with other children and many nuns.
She doesn't know who her parents were since they abandoned her as a baby at the convent doors at midnight. That's what the mother superior told her.
She told me interesting things like that she could use healing magic.
(Healing magic is part of light magic, a rare type of magical attribute to obtain or use in spells.)
(That was because no one cared about light magic or healing magic.)
(A firearm can do the same as light magic.)
(On the other hand, healing magic only served to heal, nothing more. But when she reveals her powers as the saint, the woman who hears the voice of the goddess Alexia, only then will they learn to value her.)
She also told me that an official came to the convent; the reason is unknown.
What does matter is that he gave her a test and discovered her magical attribute.
That's how she took the test and then prepared for the next year at the academy.
(That information was never revealed in the game.)
(They only said she had no parents and that was it.)
(Lazy damn developers.)
"Alright, that's all. See you on Thursday, kids."
The scary teacher said goodbye with much sadness, but excited to see us soon; he was still scary.
My friends left before I could call them; apparently, they wanted to try flirting with their partners outside the table.
Time to go.
But someone tugged on my sleeve while I was cleaning the table.
It was Lily.
"Is something wrong?"
I asked her; she gave embarrassed glances between the table and me.
(Was she afraid of my face perhaps?)
"Uhm... Razel-kun."
"Yes?"
"I know we'll always see each other in this class, and there's no other class we have together, although I don't really know that for sure either? But, here goes."
Lily took a deep breath and then said.
"Would you like us to be friends even outside this class?!"
"Sure."
Lily was surprised by my quick response.
(I didn't mind being her friend, since she'll still fall in love with one or all of the game's handsome men.)
(So, if we're friends, I'll be able to be close to them in an unsuspicious way.)
Lily told me she'd like to meet me at noon, which was lunchtime for everyone.
"No problem."
She left with a smile on her face.
I did too, while walking, I watched her checkered mini skirt, the same color as my pants, sway.
(It was a beautiful world where teenage girls wore short skirts that showed their legs and plump thighs.)
(Thank you very much, Lily, for wearing your white thigh-high stockings.)
Walking to my next class, I glimpsed in the distance the place where the encounter between Lily and Prince Regulux took place.
It was a statue found in different areas of the empire.
They represented both our religion and the symbol of the academy.
The empire's flag was a golden winged lion. It represented the last king, who managed to unite seven other kingdoms under one banner.
By its side was the academy's flag, three beautiful crossed swords representing exactly the three gods.
On the left, an old man holding a grimoire, that was Eibos, the god of knowledge.
On his right was an older man named Kalys, the god of crafts.
And in the center lies the main figure.
A beautiful woman with long hair holding a large spear with both hands, she was the goddess Alexia, goddess of life, mana, and victory.
We pray to her as the central figure.
(In the game, nothing was explained about her; apparently she had her own event, but the developers said there was an error when introducing it and it couldn't be fixed.)
(They left it for a possible sequel that never came.)
(Enough of this waste of time; it's still early and I want to finish this day to go eat something.)
◇◇◇
The next class was fencing.
It's totally different from the self-defense class of the dreadlock teacher.
For this class, they used B or A for rank adventurers, also retired knights.
(The reason? No idea?)
(I'm not going to explain every strange thing about this place.)
We were a large group of boys and girls.
They divided us before entering.
"I introduce myself, I'm Gladys Wolford, I'll be your instructor for the rest of the year. Greetings."
A beautiful woman with a slightly masculine tone and appearance introduced herself.
Her hair was styled to the sides and reached her ears because it was short.
The color was red like the wine served in fine restaurants; her eyes were dark amber.
Her chest seemed normal, but when she turned around to go see some wooden swords, I stared intently.
A large, round butt was visible.
It was so big that walking made it look very erotic.
Upon returning, she threw us the wooden swords.
In this country, only the "Lyonnet Style" is practiced and used, as that was the name of the empire's first sword saint.
It's an honor for everyone to learn it.
(But I don't see the big deal. I mean, you just put your right foot forward and the sword in a straight position!)
(Seriously, where the hell is the greatness in that?)
"You will be divided into pairs of two. Find someone who wants you."
(Just like in my previous life, there was no one who wanted to be my partner; it was a bit painful being marginalized in a world of magic and fantasy.)
Then, someone approached me.
"Hey, want to practice with me?"
Said a boy, a person I had to observe sooner or later.
That person was...
"Sure, Your Highness, Prince Cidfert?"
"There's no one else free."
(The fourth prince of the empire; in the game he was one of the extra capture characters.)
(When the developer released their first dating simulator, it wasn't a big deal.)
(It was bad in every aspect of the word.)
(What made it famous and interesting, despite being horrible games, was that they added a secret character that could only be unlocked by doing complex steps.)
(At first there were only three beautiful girls, then four; somehow they increased that number until it became ridiculous.)
(For that reason, when micro transactions came, they chose to add purchasable characters under the excuse of being extra characters.)
(Of these extra characters, which were many and even included teachers, there are only two that catch my attention for what they will do in the future.)
(One is a senior student.)
(The other was the rebel prince, Cidfert. A rebellious character who didn't respect the academy's laws and was a vandal.)
(A boy with a complex about how successful his half-brother, the third prince Regulux, would become.)
(In the future, that jealousy and hatred for being his brother's shadow would lead him to become the bearer of the sin of envy and turn into a horrible monster who would be killed by that brother.)
(The reason for giving him his own route was to understand his personality.)
(No one liked him even on his route; Lily ended his life on that route.)
(It is for that reason that I will find out enough about him. Then, I'll put him to sleep forever.)
(First, let's see his skills.)
"Thanks for being my duel partner."
And so, we fought for a while.
His movements were nothing out of this world.
In fact, I wasn't using any Lyonnet Style moves; I used my own sword style.
I call it. (Shadow Light Style!)
(It consists of going forward and charging with all your might against your enemy using only one hand.)
The prince really sucked.
(I'm being lazy, but he doesn't seem to take me seriously.)
I stopped to tell him.
"Your Highness, if you don't wish to fight me, I'm sure there must be someone better than me."
The prince looked at me with a strange face.
"You took the words right out of my mouth. That's not the capital's style; there's no other style like that. There's no crime in using another style, but it's very rare to see one."
This time he got serious.
"If you don't want to fight me, just say so and don't act like a fool."
(Now this bastard is annoying me.)
"I thought Your Highness was bored of fighting great opponents; after all, you are the prince of the empire."
I ran at great speed to hit him; it was then that he got serious.
He stopped my attack with a strange movement.
His sword seemed to move as if it were in a river.
"What makes you think that?"
He said annoyed; I, on the other hand, replied.
"Isn't it obvious? Someone born in the best cradle of the empire must have received not only food, luxurious clothes, but also top-notch training."
(I was annoying him for no reason. This person is someone I will eliminate sooner or later; I don't need to know how nice his life was.)
"You're wrong."
"Huh?"
"I said you're wroooooooooooooong!"
He used all his strength to push me while shouting things that were never mentioned in the game.
"So what if I'm the fourth prince? You don't know anything about me! You don't know what those people put me through! The title of prince for me is just an empty shell! If I died, no one in the palace would care at all!"
At that moment, a tear ran down his cheek; he stopped using force and left the place angrily.
◇◇◇
Class hadn't ended and Prince Cidfert left to go to the garden.
He was sitting near some flowers.
He remembered his past.
(My mother and I lived in peace alone.)
Cidfert was the son of a commoner.
They lived in the poorest part of the slums of the lawless city.
They barely had enough to eat; their clothes were dirty and covered in ticks, but they were still happy.
Until the day his mother got sick.
A very deadly cough swept through the slums at that time.
His mother was a victim of it while he was saved.
Cidfert was in bed next to his mother.
"Mom, don't worry, I won't leave you. I'll find some way to get money and buy medicine."
The mother, who had a fatal look on her face, told him.
"Cid, I'm sorry."
"Don't say that, Mom! I'll find a way to help you!"
"That's not it."
At that moment, footsteps were heard outside the door, which was then forced open.
A group of men in elegant suits and gas masks came in.
"Who are you?"
The man in the center approached and asked the woman.
"It's a disgusting pleasure to see you in this situation."
"... I know, I also dislike seeing you, but I have no choice."
The woman started coughing so hard she spat blood.
The mother, with all her strength, told her son something that very few knew.
"Cid, I was one of the emperor's favorite mistresses. He held me in high regard; he took me out of this place and gave me a life of unimaginable luxury."
A tear ran down her cheek.
"But, one day I understood that the imperial palace is a horrible place where greed, ambition, hatred, and envy are the order of the day. I escaped from that place to return home, but it was too late; I discovered some time later that I had ended up pregnant."
Cidfert didn't understand what his mother was saying.
"That's why I lied to you by telling you your father had died. I didn't want you to get involved with the palace... forgive me, my little one, but the darkness of that place will consume you faster than paper in flames."
Cidfert approached his mother to hug her.
"Mom, I don't understand anything you're saying, but I don't care! I want to be with you!"
The mother hugged her son with all her might; then painful words came from her mouth.
"Take him away."
The men took the young boy and pulled him away from his mother.
He kicked and cried as he watched her say goodbye to him.
"Cid, be strong. One day you will find allies and friends who value you for who you are. Believe it; if you have the opportunity to change this country, use everything in your favor. The poor and oppressed people want to finally see that light from which the empire's name was inspired."
And so, the door closed.
The years passed and Cidfert was named the fourth prince, but he was not an heir. He was only a prince in name.
"How foolish."
Said the prince while looking at the sky; then, he heard footsteps approaching.
Getting up to see who it was, he found Razel standing near him.
"What do you want?"
Said Cidfert, annoyed.
The instant he said it, Razel made a dogeza pose to apologize.
"I'm so sorry!"
He shouted.
"I have no idea what bothered you, but that pain in your attacks showed that you went through something terrible, and I criticized you just because you were a prince!"
The prince didn't understand Razel's behavior.
Then, Razel seemed embarrassed.
"Leave it. I'm the one who got annoyed for no reason."
Said the prince, a little embarrassed.
"Please, allow me to invite you to lunch as an apology!"
Cidfert had mixed feelings about Razel's behavior.
But he also had no way of knowing how boys his age acted.
He lived taking care of and helping his mother and didn't play with other children. Even in the palace, he spent his days locked up.
"I accept."
Razel seemed happy.
"In that case, Prince Cidfert, let's—"
"Stop."
Said Cidfert to Razel.
"I hate being called that; honestly, it's embarrassing."
The prince blushed at being called that.
"In that case, how should I call you?"
"Cid. Just Cid is enough."
"Understood, Cid. Shall we go?"
"Sure."
For a moment, Cid seemed happy because, in some strange way, he had made a friend.
But if he had seen Razel's face, he would have recanted instantly.
(Hehehe, piece of cake. Now, to find an easy way to destroy you.)
◇◇◇
The academy cafeteria was a place resembling a huge high-class restaurant.
There were chandeliers and an orchestra.
The food was prestigious and very healthy.
Razel and Cid arrived late.
The most expensive food was gone.
Only economical meals for poor students remained.
It was roasted meat with vegetables and a noodle soup.
Razel drooled because, for him, that was a delicacy. Cid was used to eating things like that, so for him, this was normal.
After buying their food, they found a small empty table.
Lily was sitting at it; she saw him and greeted him.
"Razel-kun, here!"
The two went to sit down; Razel introduced Cid.
Lily, of course, was startled and her mouth made a strange awawawa sound.
Cid told her. "Please, don't treat me specially; I'm just a prince in title."
Lily was still nervous, but she tried not to show her fear.
Once they sat down, a long-haired girl passed near Razel and said.
"You're a vile liar."
Who clearly heard that was Cid; he looked at Razel and asked him.
"Do you know her?"
"Not at all, I don't even know who she is."
Razel was about to bring some meat to his mouth when Cid left him stunned.
"It seems to me that you do. Since it's rare for the daughter of the Rosenberg Household to speak to anyone."
Razel looked at Cid and let out an idiotic comment, fitting his face.
"... She is the daughter of the Rosenberg Household?"
Hearing that name, Razel watched the girl's back as she walked away.