WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Potter
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ The Protagonist of a Romance Fantasy Only Likes Me ◈
Chapter 3: Because It’s More Fun. (2)
──────
3.
‘My thinking was naive.’
Lancel swallowed the bitter taste rising in his throat at the ten-odd years he had thrown away for nothing.
Thinking about it, it made sense.
Rodnis was a thriving metropolis, but the world was not kind enough for a fifteen-year-old girl to survive alone.
Pina, the spirit visible only to Marigold, was probably nothing more than a flying nag. Pina probably could not have offered any direct help.
His head throbbed. Better for everything to go to ruin than for him to waste another ten years like this.
As he thought that, a familiar birthday feast had already been laid out before him.
“Congratulations on your eighteenth birthday, Lancel Dan...”
“I’m going to the capital. Since I know you’ll try to stop me, hurry up, grab a sword, and come outside. We don’t have time.”
“Huh?”
He was in a hurry.
If he cut out every unnecessary delay, he could reduce the journey to the capital to about two weeks.
With only the fastest horse and one servant in tow, Lancel arrived in the capital as though something were chasing him.
It was exactly the nineteenth day.
“Still nothing?”
“Pardon?”
The servant looked puzzled as Lancel, wearing a forlorn expression, flipped through empty air.
Once again, the game system screen did not appear before him.
Another ten years passed.
[Play Time: 0 Years, 16 Days]
- Marigold has died.
- There is no marriage partner.
- There are no achievements.
[Bad Ending 2. Marigold, the Pitiful Fallen Lady]
- The ending has been added to the Album of Memories.
- Would you like to restart the game?
“This is driving me mad.”
At this point, Lancel became certain.
The fact that no game screen had appeared when he first entered the capital was practically proof that the ending had already been decided by then. The game had already ended.
Death endings were the clearest example.
All that remained afterward was a world where the protagonist had vanished.
The imperial capital, Rodnis, was needlessly lively every day, with incidents and accidents never ceasing. Yet Marigold, who was meant to live in that city, was already gone.
Then again, if the game system remained perfectly intact after the protagonist Marigold died, that would be strange too.
‘Hah.’
Honestly, it was a shock.
When he had first opened his eyes as Lancel Dante, he had assumed that he was the protagonist.
Was that excessive self-importance?
Wouldn’t anyone who had transmigrated from the twenty-first century into a medieval world of swords and magic think as much?
‘But I’m an extra? Me?’
What, exactly, had he lived for over the past hundred years?
From the beginning, he had neither a grand mission to fulfill nor a great evil to defeat. There had only ever been Lancel Dante, who was nothing special.
Because he was a supporting character.
Because he was an extra.
‘Was that it? Right. Of course it was. I knew something felt strange. There really was too little to do. There was so little to do that I even wrote a seafood travelogue.’
Oddly enough, he felt relieved.
The endlessly repeating regressions, the shitty Empire, the damned imperial family, war, crime, madness, revelry, famine, tragedy, and anguish were none of his problems. He was not the one doing things wrong. They were not his problems to solve.
Because the protagonist of this world was...
‘Marigold.’
What did she look like again?
Even his memories had grown hazy by now.
He would know when he met her.
.
.
.
“Congratulations on your eighteenth birthday, Lancel Dante! On such a fine day, why does your face look so damn unpleasant?”
“It’s a face I inherited from my parents.”
“Come to think of it, your mother did have an affair once.”
“I heard her affair partner was a eunuch.”
“...Did I tell you that?”
“Who knows.”
Having witnessed the exact same death ending twice, Lancel was not particularly rushed this time. Nor was he frustrated or disappointed.
He decided to consider it a ward against bad luck and take things easy. After all, he had an infinite amount of time.
‘And she’s already died twice. There’s no way it’ll happen again, right? Let’s just take it slow. Nice and slow.’
.
.
.
[Play Time: 0 Years, 52 Days]
- Marigold has died.
- There is no marriage partner.
- There are no achievements.
[Bad Ending 7. Overwork Is Bad for You, Marigold]
- The ending has been added to the Album of Memories.
- Would you like to restart the game?
“...”
Marigold, a fifteen-year-old girl.
Had died again.
4.
Having returned to the age of eighteen, Lancel Dante asked the elderly man before him.
“Head Butler, have you ever heard of a family named Marigold?”
“House Marigold...”
“The count’s family from the eastern Empire that no longer exists. House Marigold.”
On the balcony of the estate as evening deepened, Lancel was sharing a bottle of liquor with the head butler of House Dante.
“...”
Lancel, his face faintly flushed with drink, asked offhandedly. The head butler fell silent for a moment.
“A name I have not heard in a long time.”
When he spoke again, a bitter smile touched his face.
“Do not ask too much about that family, young master. It should be enough for you to know that it was a noble house that disappeared in disgrace.”
“In disgrace?”
“Yes. In disgrace.”
Lancel spoke without taking his eyes off his glass.
“So it was not simply a family that burned away in war.”
“That is what the public believes.”
“How much do you know, Head Butler?”
“No one, not merely I, would know more than what I have just told you. That includes the fact that no good would come from learning more.”
It sounded as though he was leaving much unsaid, but Lancel chose to believe the head butler. He was not a man who would lie about something like this.
“I only asked because it came to mind. Pretend I never did.”
“Of course, young master.”
Lancel gave up on questioning him further and raised his glass.
‘That figures. Even in the game, the circumstances of House Marigold were never explained in detail.’
Other than the occasional childhood memories recalled by Lady Marigold, there had not been much information about it in Fallen Noble Lady Simulation.
Only that it had been a prosperous count’s family in the eastern Empire, and that it had been annihilated in a single war.
Lancel set down his glass.
“I will leave for the capital tomorrow.”
“The head of the house will oppose you.”
“There is no problem. I knocked him down in the training grounds, and he gave permission.”
“...I will have the preparations made.”
“Aren’t you going to ask why I’m leaving?”
“Every fine knight dreams of living in Rodnis.”
The head butler smiled warmly, then added, “A capital-bound train will pass through this area in two days. It may take a roundabout route, but if you are not in a hurry, perhaps you could board it.”
“A train... How long would it take to reach the capital?”
“With the train coming now, would it not take roughly four months?”
“Four months?”
Of course he was in a hurry. Given that the sunfish of a young lady could die any day now, there was no harm in getting there sooner.
But perhaps it was because he had rushed about and come up empty-handed several times already. Lancel was remarkably calm instead.
It seemed to be the learned helplessness brought on by three attempts in which nothing had changed, whether he hurried or took his time.
“A train does sound comfortable.”
“I will arrange a compartment for you. Leave it to me.”
5.
A capital-bound train pulled into the station in the middle of the fields.
It was a technological creation somewhat too advanced for a medieval setting, but after seeing it so often, it no longer felt particularly strange.
The older sister who had made the game used to brush aside objections about historical accuracy, saying, “Romance fantasy can have trains!” And she was not exactly wrong.
If it existed, it existed. That was that.
“Have you been waiting long?”
A man in uniform stepped down from the first carriage. He was a middle-aged man with an impressive mustache.
“I am Baron Roct of the Imperial Railway Company. I heard House Dante had a son who had just come of age. You certainly look dependable.”
“I am Lancel Dante.”
“Lancel, a fine name. It is a long journey, so get aboard. The second room in the second carriage is yours. If anything happens, inform a train guard immediately. They will grant most reasonable requests.”
He pointed toward the sleeper carriage reserved for nobles.
Inside were lavish decorations, liquor, fruit, and a bedroom spacious enough to be extravagant for one person.
For various reasons, it was slower than traveling by horse, but it was certainly comfortable.
“This is nice.”
Lancel roughly unpacked his belongings and threw himself onto the bed. The facilities were excellent, but he would have to remain here for four whole months. Spending such a long time doing nothing but eating the meals provided would become an ordeal eventually.
If he did not have so much time to waste, he never would have taken a train.
Put kindly, it was a wandering train. Put poorly, it was a damn slow snail of a train.
The biggest reason was that it had few routes, and the priority to pass through them was divided by rank.
No train could ever travel ahead of an imperial train.
Next came the Church’s trains, then the Imperial Army’s trains, and only after all of those came the train of the Imperial Railway Company that Lancel was currently riding.
Most people in the regular carriages were traveling merchants who went from town to town with stations, or people who needed a carriage and guards to travel far but lacked the money for them.
The only people riding in the noble carriage were idle nobles like Lancel, with time to rot away.
‘At this rate, I’ll only learn how to waste my life. I do have time to spare, but...’
He closed his eyes on the bed.
He felt the train leave the station.
============
- June 21, Imperial Year 816. Clear weather.
- Travel event in progress. “I’ll Come Along for a While!”
============
“...!”
Lancel felt his entire body go rigid.
What was happening? Had his ability to waste time truly reached superhuman heights, so that four months had passed in the instant he closed his eyes?
That could not be it.
Lancel held his breath at the scene that appeared before him.
-------
[Fallen Noble Lady Simulation]
Set the schedule for the third week of June.
Mon. - Find work on the train.
Tue. - Find work on the train.
Wed. - Find work on the train.
Thu. - Find work on the train.
Fri. - Find work on the train.
Sat. - Rest on the train.
Sun. - Rest on the train.
※105 days remain until arrival in Rodnis.
※You are short on travel funds. Let us find a part-time job.
-------
‘She’s here.’
His scalp prickled.
Marigold. He did not know why she was on a capital-bound train. The only thing he knew for certain was that she was here.
Thirty years.
It had taken a full thirty years to see this screen, and to be in the same place as Marigold.
Lancel sprang to his feet and left the room.
Marigold would likely be living under the status of a commoner right now. Which meant she was surely in the regular carriages.
“Sir Lancel? Do you need something...?”
“Move.”
“Ah! Yes, sir...”
Lancel shoved past the guards who tried to stop him and forced his way through the train cars.
“Sir Lancel, beyond here is no longer the nobles-only section...”
“Do not interfere.”
Without hesitation, he opened the door to the regular carriage.
Footnotes:
“Sunfish” is a Korean internet joke comparing someone comically prone to collapsing or dying to an unusually fragile fish.
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