[The Oath of Chivalry has not been fully fulfilled.]
[Numerous Stars of Knights express dissatisfaction with your chivalry.]
You sons of bitches—!!!
Those voyeuristic bastards up there had started raining on the parade, even with everyone satisfied by this outcome.
Then what the fuck.
Was I supposed to put a sword through the Second Prince’s head?
Hey, I’m not doing this.
If you don’t like it, get down here and do it yourselves.
Seeing those bastards, who only stood up there staring blankly, complain that they did not like it...
My biceps nearly reacted and tore this tuxedo apart.
Then I’d get slapped with an additional charge of public indecency.
Goddamn it.
I had just found a reason why I absolutely had to reach the stars.
I would grow bigger and stronger, then put a sword through every last one of their faces.
[Numerous Stars of Knights acknowledge your chivalry.]
But.
It seemed there were some truly knightly knights among those countless stars.
[The Star of Knights, the Lionheart Knight, expresses dissatisfaction with your actions.]
[The Star of Knights, the Nine Swords Knight, acknowledges that a sword match can also be an honorable duel.]
[The Star of Knights, the Indestructible Knight, expresses dissatisfaction, claiming that a sword match cannot be a proper duel.]
[The Star of Knights, the Holy Maiden Knight, asks whether there could have been a better outcome than this.]
[The Star of Knights, the Crossdressing Knight...]
A feast of notifications kept appearing.
The Stars of Knights had split into factions before I knew it and were fighting among themselves through messages.
To summarize.
There was the old-fogey faction, which insisted that a mere sword match could not be accepted in a sacred duel.
And there were the real knights, who argued that a duel was still a duel even if it was a sword match, and that since I had won, they ought to acknowledge it.
Ding!
Ding!
Ding!
Their argument grew increasingly heated.
[The Star of Knights, the Lionheart Knight, raises his axe.]
[The Star of Knights, the Sun Knight, raises his holy sword.]
Had they decided to settle it with a duel among themselves? They were now drawing their weapons at each other.
They should just settle the damn thing already.
Though could those things even fight?
And then.
Bzzzt!
The overheated notification windows suddenly shut down.
Ding!
Two notification windows reappeared in midair.
[The Oath of Chivalry is not yet over.]
[Prove your chivalry to the Stars of Knights.]
Fuck that. I’m not doing it.
Why should I?
What, should I throw another glove?
I think I had done enough after defying a prince.
I did what you wanted and made sure Isabella did not get slapped.
I even dueled the prince.
I did everything!
I don’t know. Give me a penalty or don’t.
Let’s get hit with that precious penalty of yours, fuck it.
"Ian de Logres."
The Second Prince spoke to me.
I lowered my head at his words, and he looked up at me with a relieved expression.
While I was burning up inside.
He looked like he was having the time of his life.
Just as I was mentally cursing everything in this world.
"After taking blows this far, I have felt it clearly enough, Ian de Logres."
The Second Prince suddenly adopted the sort of courteous manner befitting a romance-fantasy male lead.
Angelica and Isabella both reacted with surprise at his changed attitude.
Why was he suddenly being so oily and formal?
Speak casually like before...
"You know the future, do you not?"
Excuse me?
The dagger the prince had thrown lodged itself in my chest.
Angelica’s eyes widened slightly.
Isabella’s eyes flew open as her body trembled.
No, how did he reach that conclusion?
He was close, but...
When I merely kept my mouth shut in response to his deduction, the prince continued laying out his reasoning.
"During our sword match, you responded as though you knew every one of my moves."
"That would be because I am a genius."
"No matter how much of a genius one may be, it is impossible to counter those moves without a moment’s thought. But you had no hesitation."
He narrowed his eyes and elaborated on his deduction.
The fact that half his deduction was right sent chills down my spine.
The premise was right, but the conclusion was wrong.
Should I have put on a performance of being slightly overwhelmed?
My head hurt. That was all.
Because this pattern had never appeared in the game.
But whether or not the prince knew how nervous I was...
"I am joking. I merely thought I would say it, Ian."
He smiled, claiming it was a joke.
Picking me up and putting me down. Picking me up and putting me down.
He truly was the very incarnation of push and pull.
Fuck, but what was I supposed to do?
Depending on that bastard’s mood, I could end up dead or not dead.
Was this how a fish on a cutting board felt?
Still, could he stop speaking formally?
It was so damn greasy.
"Whether you can see the future or not no longer matters. I simply have something I wish to ask you. Please answer only that."
Then the prince’s expression hardened.
I’m fucked!
Now he was going to summon the Imperial Guard!
"If someone has lost their way—if they cannot find it no matter how hard they try—what would Sir Ian do?"
What was that supposed to mean?
"Then they must keep poking around until they find it."
"What if someone is unable to find it despite being given countless opportunities by countless people? What if they learn that there is someone who could make better use of it than they could?"
...
"Then would that person have any use at all?"
This was a pattern I had never heard before.
Even when I played the female protagonist, I had never seen the prince like this.
Of course, I had only played through twenty-nine times, so this might be another hidden piece...
Still, I had never expected to come to this world and end up listening to the male lead’s troubles.
Was I supposed to film some "Our Prince Has Changed" show or something?
#
The world would perish.
It was no coincidence, but an inevitability that would absolutely come to pass in the future.
I had returned with the destruction etched into my eyes.
The day knights who had seemed as though they would gallop forever fell futilely.
The day mages who had built towers of arrogance gave up on this world.
The day priests who had praised the gods resented gods who gave them no answer.
The one who was to become the new dawn was buried in the night for no reason at all.
And by the time I was shoved into that seat as though pushed from behind, it was already too late.
That seat I had once dreamed of, only to abandon because I thought it was more than I deserved.
Once an object of longing, it was now nothing but shackles.
It was not lofty glory, merely a target for blame.
But.
Even if I had been pushed into that seat by others, I had become the new dawn nonetheless.
Seated upon that hollow throne, I took in the eyes of my people one by one.
Steeling my wavering thoughts with the belief that if not me, what would become of this country?
I cast away sword matches, once my hobby, into that past.
As the world perished, sword matches that could not produce results were unnecessary.
I simply sat upon the throne I had been pushed into and tried to slow this empire’s march toward ruin, even by a little.
Believing that was what I had to do.
I confidently declared that I would stop the destruction.
An all-out war for humanity.
I united every race.
I united every nation.
I forged an alliance unlike any before it.
Waged a war unlike any before it.
And stood against a destruction unlike any before it.
But.
As the five pillars that had seemed least likely to break crumbled, everything began falling one after another, like dominoes.
Elves, beastfolk, dwarves—no one could stand against the destruction.
Some cried out for a hero.
But that was merely a delusion born from fairy tales.
There was no hero.
As they fell, they cried out to gods who would never answer.
And after meeting each of their resentful eyes, I eventually arrived here.
Just where.
Where had it all gone wrong?
No matter how late we had been, we had gathered an alliance unprecedented and one that would never be seen again.
Yet why did all of it simply collapse so futilely before destruction?
After watching destruction gradually approach for one hundred days.
After taking in each pair of eyes as they fell for one thousand days.
Only then did I finally realize.
From the very beginning.
From the very beginning.
I should never have sat here in the first place.
From the very beginning.
My younger brother should have sat in this seat.
My more capable brother should have led them.
Would he not have been able to delay the destruction a little longer?
As I vomited blood thinking that, while destruction drew right up to my nose...
I returned to my own room from the past, still unbroken.
I had returned—to before the destruction began.
I thought it must surely be a revelation from the gods.
Though the gods had never given a single answer no matter how many times I cried out to them.
What else could this be, if not a revelation from the gods?
What I learned after seeing destruction was that the future would be better served if I did not exist.
That if I were gone, things would somehow work out.
But.
That alone did not solve anything.
Though I had returned with destruction etched into my eyes.
I lacked the courage to die.
So I lived as a delinquent.
I threw away the resolve I once had to stop destruction once more, lacking even the courage to die.
I merely hoped that no one in the world would seek out Kyle, the Second Prince.
Isabella, who had approached me insisting that we become engaged, was the same.
So that she would lose all affection for me, I spoke cruel words.
When she slapped me and shoved a demand to break off our engagement in my face, I thought she would finally leave.
To make sure she lost all affection for me, I raised my hand too.
But someone grabbed my wrist.
A man who called himself Ian de Logres.
He suddenly stood in front of me and said we should have a sword match.
A sword match.
A relic of the past, a hobby I had cast aside.
Did that bastard who threw a glove at me know?
Did he know what it meant to bring up a sword match before me?
My interest piqued, I accepted his request.
I presented countless moves, yet he countered every one as though to show me.
As though he knew my future.
It had been a long time.
Since I had exchanged swordsmanship with someone and been countered without being able to make a single move of my own.
Was it not exactly like when I had stood against that destruction in my past life...?
Yet I felt no displeasure at all.
Facing a sequence where defeat was assured.
Made me feel as though I were seeing my younger self, running onward with hope.
At some point, I found myself taking that sword match, which I had started casually, seriously.
Was this why he had asked to test swords against me?
Even when I tried to strike Isabella, he had stopped me despite me being a prince. He had looked like a knight straight out of a fairy tale.
Perhaps he had requested a sword match in order to grant me enlightenment.
I wondered.
Could he, too, have come from the future like me?
That was why I was curious.
If this man from the future, like myself...
Had been in that position, what choice would he have made?
#
The Second Prince, Kyle de Astoria.
The delinquent act was only an act; in truth, he was a regressor from the future.
The reason he played at being a delinquent was also tied to his regression.
But as for that regression, the artbook had only stated, "He plays a delinquent because he regressed from a destroyed world."
It was never revealed in the game.
There had never been any explanation of that plot point—the reason that bastard had decided to become a delinquent.
It ended with, "He saw destruction and decided to become a delinquent."
It had seemed as though the plot point might be resolved in the IF DLC where the female protagonist did not appear, but he was still acting like a delinquent there too.
In short, while he had the trait of being a regressor, the reason he chose to become a delinquent was a MacGuffin.
Whether he became a delinquent because he was frightened of destruction.
Whether he had been cursed to play a delinquent just as I had been cursed to play a knight.
Or whether he truly had a reason he needed to become a delinquent.
In the end, I did not know what that bastard had experienced.
But it was true that Isabella had been poisoned to death because of his idiocy.
So it was difficult to look upon him kindly without reservation.
And so.
Since I did not know what to say.
"Why would he be useless?"
I decided to blurt out whatever came to mind.
"Pardon?"
"I said, why would he be useless? Do you think countless people gave him countless opportunities for no reason?"
If he were truly useless from the start.
If it would have been better if he did not exist.
Then neither opportunities nor people would have been given to him in the first place.
"How can you be certain there is someone who could make better use of it than he could?"
"That is because he is more capable—"
"He was not the one who gathered the people, was he?"
He said nothing after hearing my words.
"You simply do your best in the place where you stand."
"But what if it would have been the better choice for him, rather than me, to be in that position?"
"That is something no one can know."
Even if the Third Prince had sat in the Second Prince’s place.
He might have failed from the very start to unite the races and bring all nations together.
In the DLC, in the world that was destroyed because the female protagonist did not exist.
The Second Prince there was a delinquent just as he was in the main story.
But after he came to his senses later, he united every race and nation and stood against destruction.
Though he ultimately still lost, his younger brother, the Third Prince, took up his baton and slew the final boss in his stead.
That was the DLC’s story.
The prince thought of himself as a failure.
But whether it was the female protagonist or the Third Prince.
In the ending he did not know, someone who took up his baton was destined to defeat the destruction.
"Even if it is meaningless, meaning remains so long as there is someone to take up that baton. We simply need to keep running until we reach the stars."
Do not run away. Run forward.
Until you reach those distant stars.
Even if, as back then, you are overwhelmed and cannot reach them.
"If we cannot reach them, others will walk the road we paved and reach them for us."
We only needed to believe in those who would come after us.
So stop moping around like someone with main-character syndrome.
That was what I wanted to tell him.
"Is that so... the road we paved... the stars..."
As if he had realized something, the Second Prince murmured that.
"Why was something so simple..."
He gave a hollow laugh.
"What is your dream, Ian? As a prince, I wish to hear your dream."
He asked me about my dream.
Just as Alfred had back then.
Why were people who listened to my story so curious about my dream?
I did not know what that had to do with a prince, but.
"A dream? Well."
Still.
"I suppose I will become a knight."
"That should not be difficult for you."
"No, not that kind of knight."
"I know, Sir Ian."
Pointing to his own wrist, he answered with a smile.
"A man courageous enough to seize my wrist will surely reach it."
[Through your efforts, the fate of the protagonist, Kyle, is revised.]
[The current world slightly deviates from the route leading to the DLC, a world destined for destruction.]
#
"This is absurd, at this point..."
Isabella, who had watched the Second Prince’s reform from their sword match onward, appeared to have complicated feelings.
In the end, the Second Prince accepted her letter breaking off their engagement.
Along with an apology for everything until now.
But even after seeing that, Isabella did not seem inclined to forgive the prince.
She knew the Second Prince was going to stop acting like a delinquent, but regardless of what had prompted it, she had died because of those delinquent actions. She likely knew that in her heart, so it would be difficult for her to forgive him easily.
Once time passed, well, they would work it out themselves.
More importantly, too much time had passed while we were supposedly having a sword match.
It should be over around now.
And then.
[You have impressed your chivalry upon another.]
[A reward for the Oath of Chivalry is granted.]
It seemed the voyeurs above were satisfied too.
I would check the reward later.
We had to return to the banquet now, but.
"Let go of me already."
Isabella suddenly grabbed me by the collar and would not let me go.
If you keep holding on, my tuxedo is going to tear.
"How can I send the two of you into the banquet hall when I do not know what you might say inside?"
"I, Ian, can keep my mouth as tightly shut as my biceps."
Let go already. It is really going to tear.
No, you let the Second Prince go.
Why would you not let me go?
And why were you only holding me?
Angelica heard it too.
"Oh my, Ian."
A welcome voice came from somewhere.
It was Dolnesia.
I had never been so glad to hear her.
I felt even happier than when I had reunited with her in reality.
"You had been out of sight for so long that I was wondering where on earth you had gone."
I looked toward the source of Dolnesia’s voice.
There stood...
"I never thought I would find you loafing around in a place like this. With two ladies at your side, no less."
Dolnesia stood there with a shadowed face, smiling with her mouth alone.
Was she not my rescuer?
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