Julien woke up to a strange warmth around himself. It wasn't unpleasant, rather it was quite reassuring and familiar. Opening his eyes, he was met with the bright red hair of a certain villainess… or at least, supposed-to-be villainess, Valerie. Who also happened to be his fiancee. Somehow they were sleeping together, making him stiffen for a moment before remembering the events that had taken place before he fell unconscious, explaining why they were together in the first place.

The question now was, how? Then again, it might have just been that she procured some pillows and a blanket after he fell asleep. At least this carriage was spacious enough to extend the seats into a bed like this… though she wrapped herself around him quite tightly.

"Mm… no… I don't want to work todayyyyy…" Valerie seemed to be mumbling something to herself in her sleep. Work? Hmm, she was a researcher in the past after all, it only made sense that she'd be ridden with work. "Nooooo… Leone, not theeeereeee…" she mumbled squirming with a small smile on her face.

"What the hell are you dreaming now?" Julien couldn't help but mutter as he narrowed his eyes at her. She seemed to be holding him in quite a tight grip, and to make it worse, with her being a swordsman, it was quite difficult for him, a mage, to get out of her arms. Basically, he was trapped. Resigning himself to his fate, he sighed.

He heard a chuckle coming from the other side of the carriage, making him turn his head to look past Valerie. It seems that her mother was here as well. "Oh please don't mind me. Do continue, your highness." Nora Darnum said with a smirk,

Julien laughed nervously, "Truth be told, Lady Darnum, I can hardly move with Valerie gripping me tightly here…"

"I'm afraid I can't help you with that, your highness, she's quite strong, after all." Nora replied with a smile, "Though, if it's you, you might be able to get yourself out of there."

Oh he definitely can. It would just not be pleasant for either him or Valerie. So he didn't say anything and instead looked back to staring at Valerie's sleeping face which had a cute little smile.

… Yes, he's definitely not going to let her go if she continues being like this. Not that she'd let him go either, it seems.

Though, ignoring that, "Nora… Valerie—no, Alicia has already told you about our situation, hasn't she?" he asked, looking to Nora again.

Nora nodded, "It's hardly believable for me, even now, but after everything… at least it makes some sense. Though how you two called this world a 'visual novel' or 'otome game' still doesn't quite make sense to us." That 'us' most likely referring to Elise as well.

"It's not exactly easy to explain either. The best way to explain it, we suppose, would be as a set number of possibilities. Or, rather, a branching story of sorts." Julien explained that way. After having deliberated on it for a while, it seemed like the simplest explanation for them to understand. "The setting stays the same, however the events or rather the plot changes depending on the actions of the main character that you control."

"Ah… I think I understand it somewhat." Nora said, "Rather than that, the history between the two of you—should I call you Leone?"

"I don't mind. Though I've mostly accepted my life as Julien now."

"I see. Well, the history between you and Valerie from your past life on Earth, it seems that you were very close friends in your childhood? From how it looks to me, it seems to be a lot more than that." Nora said, pointing out her observation, "Though, neither I nor your mother mind here, so you have nothing to worry about."

Julien laughed at that, "I'm not really worried about that. In the first place, neither I nor Alicia had ever made it concrete back then." he then let out a breath, "We only planned to settle it once and for all when and if we ever meet each other again."

"And now you're here."

"And now we're here." he nodded, "Well, whatever the case, neither of us mind the engagement, and it's rather unlikely that we'll change our mind on that ever. After all, neither of us are planning to let the other go this time." he smiled, "Isn't that right, Valerie?" he said, looking at Valerie who twitched for a moment. "Come on, I know you're awake, let me get up at least."

Valerie opened her eyes and pouted at him, "Fine." she grumbled, "And, yes, I'm not planning to let go of him now that he's here. Though I'm hurt since he's asking me to let go of him now."

"I'm beside you though?"

"Semantics, Julien, semantics."

At their banter, Nora laughed. "Well, I suppose I have nothing to worry about with either of you like this. I still have a lot of questions, but… we can leave that for later." she said, glancing out the window for a moment pulling back the curtain slightly, "We've just arrived in the capital, after all."

Julien blinked at that, sitting up after Valerie finally let go of him. He opened the curtain a bit as well, looking out the window while Valerie followed right after him, looking out with her face right next to his. "So we have."

"Huh… this is the capital of Corven." Valerie muttered, "It looks so different from the game."

"That's what happens when fiction becomes reality, I suppose." Julien replied, closing the curtain before someone saw them. That would be quite a headache to deal with later on if he wasn't careful.

Julien turned to Valerie and her to him, "We should clean this up."

"I doubt they would mind though?" Valerie tilted her head,

"They won't. Even if it's his highness." Nora supported,

"But wouldn't there be some strange rumours running about if we're not careful?" Julien asked in turn, making Valerie pause.

Nora just shrugged however, "There already are. Valerie wasn't subtle when she slept together with you here, after all."

At that, Valerie's face flushed red, "W-Wait, but it's just—"

"It's fine, it's fine~ You don't have to worry about it since you're his fiancee after all. The engagement plan doesn't look like it's going to change anytime soon. Unless…?" Nora said, pausing to look at them at the end.

"No complaints from me." Julien said, shrugging.

"He's the boss here." Valerie nodded with a smile. "Now, Julien, please teach me magic." she said, looking at him excitedly with a grin, practically jumping up and down.

Julien just laughed, "Later, Valerie. Or rather tomorrow, it's almost evening and for all the mana that I may have in this body, I'm quite tired."

Valerie pouted for a moment before sighing and nodding. "Right… you did save our lives after all." she then got up from their makeshift bed, Julien following her lead as they started to tidy it up. "Though, I am rather worried… what were those two doing there?" she murmured,

Julien knew that she was talking about Johann and Lilith, but even then he didn't know, they didn't really have much to go off of right now. "I don't know either. At this point I don't really remember the events of the game much—other than the fact that most of the events would take place within the Lenoria Academy, and the names of a bunch of the characters. The main character was… Marie Lazerun right?"

"Yes. Though… perhaps we'll have to talk about this later. There's still much we need to recall of the game's events after all." Valerie said, they were now back on their seat, having cleaned up the makeshift bed and turning it back into a seat once more for the most part. Julien had his eyes closed as he surveyed the area around the capital as they were on their way to the castle.

He opened his eyes with a small sigh, "I'm going to have so many social gatherings to attend to after this…"

"Oh? Why's that?" Valerie asked, seemingly confused. For a moment, he wondered why she would be unfamiliar with this, then he was reminded that her life took a huge turn after they were separated back then. At least she escaped high society, he supposed.

"He's a prince, much more than that, he's the crown prince so he'll need to start meeting many nobles and other children as well. Though you may have forgotten since you've been training your sword non-stop for many years, children of nobility have to attend many social gatherings around the age of 10 or 12. In your case, the last one you've been to had been from when you were 8 years old, 4 years ago as you're both 12 years old currently. This is in order to build connections with other nobles and potentially find or recruit some retainers, in the case of his highness here." Nora explained to Valerie, who had a surprised look on her face, "... Of course, please don't forget that you are to attend many of them from now on as well, starting from the engagement party that you'll both be a part of. For that, you will have to make sure that you're in your best behavior, are we clear?"

Valerie seemed to have an embarrassed look on her face at that. "M-Mother… I'm not that uncouth."

Nora sighed, "Perhaps, but when it's been so long, I can't be quite sure of that. Even right now I have to wonder if you'll be able to introduce yourself properly to his majesty the king later."

"T-The King?!" Valerie's eyes were wide at that,

Julien rolled his eyes, "He's rather eccentric. Especially when it comes to me. Just… try not to be surprised, I suppose."

"I'll keep that in mind…" Valerie said, looking at him nervously, "Oh, speaking of social gatherings, you're not going to go with the same characters that Prince Julien from the game were closely acquainted with are you?"

"That… I'm not actually sure about." Julien said after a moment of thought, "While it would make sense to avoid certain people considering what we know from the game, we can't fully rely on that. After all, didn't we just have that weird encounter with Johann before? Lilith was understandable, but Johann… that just kinda came out of nowhere."

"We know too little of them right now, is what you're saying?"

"Exactly. I'll just tread carefully as usual. You should do so as well, considering… hmm, I should start thinking about that." Julien suddenly interrupted himself as he was talking, narrowing his eyes in thought, "We'll definitely have to make sure you're proficient in magic at least. Wasn't Valerie hated because of her lack of magic talent?"

Valerie was about to reply to that before the carriage door suddenly opened by a knight, prompting Nora to go down first.

Julien went down next and held Valerie's hand as she stepped off the carriage. They shared a smile as they walked together towards the castle, hand in hand.

"Guess we're going to be changing a lot of things from now on, huh?" Valerie muttered, Julien nodding at that.

He was about to reply to her, before he paused as he suddenly felt a presence. It was faint… and dark.

He stared at where he'd felt it, one of the spires by the cathedral, there was nothing there, but he was rather sure that he felt something from there.

"Julien?" Valerie called out to him, "You okay?" she had a worried look on her face as she touched his arm.

He was about to ask if she felt something, but he decided against it as he smiled, "Yeah, I think I'm just a little tired."

Unbeknownst to him, however, a black feather that seemed to glow a dark obsidian color fell to the ground just where he'd stared at before.

"Oh dear… it seems our visitors have finally linked up." an unsettling and dark smile, a smooth silky voice, an ominous line… and they were none the wiser.

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