Chapter 55

Ｒ​ｅａｄ ｏｎ ＫａｔＲｅａｄｉｎｇＣａｆｅ​

The sound of soft, rhythmic breathing.

The small, warm sensation brought an indescribable sense of comfort.

Though awake, she didn’t want to open her eyes. She wanted to stay wrapped in that gentle warmth, relishing in the comfort a little longer.

Curling up, she pulled her arms inward, drawing the warmth closer.

Her half-asleep consciousness was quickly swallowed again by the lull of slumber.

She started drifting back into the world of dreams, smiling foolishly as she savored the soft sensation.

…Wait.

But what exactly am I holding right now?

The sudden question snapped her out of her hazy state, forcing her heavy eyelids open.

With sleepy eyes, she looked down.

There, a girl with dark blue hair was sound asleep.

“…Alice?”

Hehe, how adorable.

The thing I was touching just now was Alice’s cheek.

Soft and squishy.

I could probably poke at this all day and not get tired of it.

‘Wait a minute…’

But why is Alice sleeping beside me?

I frowned, trying to piece things together, but no matter how hard I thought, I couldn’t figure it out.

What had happened before I fell asleep?

Wait, why can’t I remember?

I recalled getting discharged from the hospital and returning to the dorm, but everything after that was hazy, like a dream shrouded in fog.

Had I met someone?

Did I dream about it?

Ugh, I couldn’t remember anything clearly.

Alice, meanwhile, was breathing steadily, soundlessly, her sleep undisturbed.

Her hair tickled the tip of Lucia’s nose, shimmering as it caught the sunlight streaming through the open window.

Rather than calling her beautiful, the word “adorable” suited her much better.

Lucia unconsciously pressed her fingers into Alice’s soft cheeks.

Hehe, so squishy.

How is she allowed to be this cute without permission?

No wonder Eugene’s completely smitten with her.

Although the two haven’t had much interaction yet, one day they’re bound to become a sweet, inseparable couple.

Of course, they’re the protagonist and the main heroine, after all.

“Hmm?”

The remnants of drowsiness faded away completely.

Lucia smiled as she rubbed her hand against Alice’s squishy cheeks but suddenly noticed something—Alice’s eyes looked a little puffy.

…Wait.

Alice, were you crying?

Why?

Did someone upset her?

No, that couldn’t be it.

If someone had dared to hurt Alice, Frey wouldn’t have stayed quiet.

In that case, it’s not Alice people should be worried about—it’s the person who dared to cross her.

Alice wasn’t particularly strong except for her fiery ability.

Her destructive power was immense, but outside of that, she often struggled.

Frey, however, was different.

She had complete control over her thermal abilities and possessed an innate sense for battle.

On top of that, while Alice could only use one supernatural ability at a time, Frey wielded two with ease.

It wasn’t for nothing that Frey was considered the strongest among the first-years, aside from Eugene.

If Eugene was a master honed through effort, Frey was a born prodigy.

If someone with malicious intent had laid a hand on Alice, they’d be facing the wrath of a very dangerous little devil.

Lucia gently brushed her fingers across Alice’s swollen eyes.

Looking closer, Alice’s face seemed a bit thinner than usual.

…And her hands? Why are they wrapped in bandages?

“What in the world happened…”

I think Alice appeared in my dream…

She seemed to be crying there too, didn’t she?

Although, honestly, my memory of it is pretty fuzzy.

I should get up now.

I’m wide awake, and I can’t just lie around all morning.

The sun is still low—it was early morning.

Lucia’s stomach growled.

Maybe I should make breakfast.

When Alice wakes up, we can eat togethe—huh?

“Ugh…”

Lucia carefully moved Alice out of her arms so as not to wake her, but Alice stirred, letting out a small, pained noise.

She’d been so still and quiet, breathing softly just moments ago—was she having a nightmare?

Caught between standing and sitting, Lucia hesitated before lying back down and gently patting Alice’s back, pulling her close again.

The distressed noises stopped, replaced once more by peaceful breathing.

When Alice wakes up, I’ll have to ask her what’s been going on.

◈

30 minutes later.

“Frey…?”

“That’s right. I’m not Alice.”

Alice—no, Frey—spoke with a serious expression.

Her eyes carried a hint of unease, as though she was worried Lucia might not believe her.

Her sudden confession left me feeling conflicted.

Well, yeah. Normally, no one would believe something like this.

If someone suddenly claimed they were a different personality, most people would just give them a strange look.

But I wasn’t most people.

I already knew Alice’s hidden secret.

That she had two personalities, something I’d been aware of even before meeting her.

Even though I’d known about it beforehand, I still found it difficult to hide my discomfort.

Not because of what Frey had just confessed, but because of the situation itself—her revealing her true identity.

Frey was extremely reluctant to reveal her existence to others.

Her condition—dissociative identity disorder—could be seen as a mental illness, and more than that, Frey didn’t even regard herself as equal to Alice.

She considered herself a derivative of Alice, an auxiliary personality.

To Frey, she was simply a temporary existence created to protect and support Alice, someone who would eventually disappear once she was no longer needed.

Because of this, Frey despised the idea of Alice being treated like a mentally ill person because of her.

Thus, she had no intention of ever revealing her existence to anyone.

Even when Frey was in control of their body, she meticulously pretended to be Alice, concealing herself completely.

For her to reveal her identity like this… was exceedingly rare.

“I know this sounds strange. I know it’s hard to believe. But please, just listen to what I have to say first.”

Frey quickly summarized the current situation.

She skipped over trivial details, focusing only on the critical points.

Her message was straightforward:

Alice was missing.

And Frey, unsure of what to do, had come to me because she thought I might have some connection to Alice’s disappearance.

Was this all because of the traumatic bus incident?

I mean… it was shocking. I literally had my head cut off and watched it roll away.

“Sometimes Alice hides deep within her mind, but this time it’s different. I can’t feel her at all. It’s not like she’s hiding—it’s like she’s… gone. No matter how much I call for her, she doesn’t respond. I can’t feel her emotions, her thoughts… nothing.”

The disappearance of Alice, who had always been there, filled Frey with fear and desperation.

The fact that she was revealing her long-concealed existence to me, a friend of Alice but still an outsider, was a testament to how dire the situation was.

During the few days I’d been hospitalized, Frey had been consumed by a terrifying thought:

What if Alice never came back?

What if she was gone forever?

“This has never happened before. Even if she hid deep within herself, I could always feel her presence. But this time… I can’t.”

Frey’s face was desperate.

She looked up at me, clinging to a fragile shred of hope.

“I know this might sound sudden. Maybe even absurd. But… please, help me. I can’t do this alone. I can’t bring Alice back by myself. So, please… I’m begging you… help me.”

Her swollen eyes filled with tears again, shimmering as they threatened to spill over.

But I couldn’t even think of wiping them away.

Even though I was looking right at her, my mind was racing in a completely different direction.

‘…This is that moment, isn’t it?’

I knew what this was.

Or at least, I recognized something similar.

I’d read about it in the novel.

‘Winter break. On that snowy Christmas day…’

A white Christmas, where snow blanketed the world in pure white.

Eugene and Alice had gone on what could only loosely be called a date.

At the time, they weren’t officially a couple, just endlessly circling each other in that awkward stage.

They’d spent their first year enduring trials and hardships together, slowly building their bond.

They’d even slain the seventh high rank monster to ever appear in history, nurturing their love in the process.

By that point, they’d reached a stage where either of them could have asked the other out, and they’d have started dating immediately.

But then, the first Devil appeared.

Astaroth.

The pure, snowy world turned blood red.

Eugene stood against Astaroth.

Even though Eugene had already awakened and was recognized as one of the strongest heroes, challenging a Devil was still far too early for him.

As Astaroth unleashed a massacre, Eugene fought desperately to stop it.

Alice, too, stood alongside him, opposing Astaroth.

At the climax of their fierce battle, Eugene threw himself in front of Alice to protect her.

Blood splattered everywhere, and Eugene’s right arm was severed.

His neck was half-torn, his cervical vertebrae exposed, and his left eye burst apart.

His heart was pierced by a spear of darkness.

Even someone who was “close to godhood” couldn’t survive such fatal wounds.

Eugene died protecting Alice.

At least, that’s what Alice believed.

Fortunately, Eugene survived, and his broken body was somehow restored. But Alice was convinced he had died.

That he had died protecting her.

Because of her.

And then, Alice disappeared.

Her mind sank to the deepest depths of the ocean—into a part of her subconscious that even Frey couldn’t reach.

Consumed by despair, Alice fell into an unending nightmare, as if dead to the world.

‘Was it really that traumatic…?’

Alice thought I had died, and so she retreated deep into the recesses of her mind.

She was so heartbroken that she couldn’t accept reality, so devastated that she abandoned everything and fled.

Honestly, I was a little taken aback.

Eugene’s death, in their sweet-but-undefined relationship, and my death, after only knowing her for a month.

They weren’t on the same level at all.

Yet her reaction was the same?

‘Depending on her perspective… I guess that could make sense?’

Now that I think about it, the Alice in the novel was at a different stage in her life—during winter break.

She’d already matured emotionally by then, having endured countless trials and tribulations.

But right now, it’s only been a month since she entered the academy.

This was during the time of her field training.

Alice, still emotionally immature, could very well be so devastated by a friend’s death that she couldn’t recover.

To the point where she chose to pass the burden onto Frey and fall into a deep sleep.

I knew the solution.

I’d read about it in the “original story”.

If this situation was anything like the novel, then… maybe I just needed to do what Eugene had done.

Frey, overwhelmed with anxiety and desperation, clung to Eugene for help back then.

Just as she was now clinging to me.

Eugene had agonized over it for a long time, racking his brain for a solution, and then… he came up with a bold plan.

Yes, that method could wake Alice.

I couldn’t be certain, but the chances were pretty high.

The problem was… it wasn’t something I could pull off.

It was a plan only Eugene could dare to attempt.

A forbidden act that only someone like Eugene, who had built a bond akin to a romantic relationship with Alice, could carry out.

I was at a loss for words.

I knew the solution.

I definitely knew it… but still…

“…You don’t believe me, do you?”

Seeing my frozen expression, Frey wiped her tears and spoke.

Her eyes, once glimmering with faint hope, had turned dark and lifeless.

Instinctively, I reached out and gripped her shoulders.

“I believe you.”

“…What?”

“I said, I believe you, Frey.”

Right now, Frey was at her wit’s end.

She was standing at the edge of a cliff, so close to falling that a single push would send her plummeting.

Frey, usually so proud and strong-willed, showing tears in front of someone else—this was something that would never happen under normal circumstances.

Alice was her hope. Her dream. Her future.

Alice was Frey’s reason for living.

Without Alice, Frey had lost her drive to continue.

Her once lively and adorable face was now clouded by dark despair, devoid of its former brilliance.

That’s why I wanted to help.

Alice and Frey both deserved to smile.

“I’ve been thinking about it. About how I can bring Alice back.”

Frey’s trembling pupils reflected my deeply troubled expression.

Facing her face, which was gradually turning red, I swallowed hard.

Should I say it?

Should I really try it?

But I’m not Eugene.

Maybe I should bring Eugene… No, Alice and Eugene haven’t formed any bond yet.

Even if I brought Eugene, it wouldn’t work.

Right now, the only person close to Alice is me.

Her one and only friend.

Other than Frey, I’m the one she’s closest to in this world.

Alright, let’s give it a shot.

It’s all or nothing.

Whether it works or not, I have to try.

I slowly lowered my hands from Frey’s shoulders.

Sliding down her arms, my hands reached hers, intertwining my fingers with hers.

Her trembling hands shook violently.

Holding her clasped hands tightly, I softly opened my mouth.

“Frey.”

“Y-Yeah…?”

“Would you… kiss me?”

“…What?”

After all, there’s only one way to wake a sleeping princess.

A prince’s kiss.

And while I may not be a prince, I could at least play the role, right?

 

Author Note

A/N (Author’s note):
Lucia was actually a prince.

Alice was a princess.

Translator Note

T/N (Translator’s note):
Going for the double trouble, heh.