Thought It Was 'The End', Only to Return to a Changed Genre - Chapter 5
The day Adeline first felt something was amiss was when she turned nine.
She was spending a quaint time with her fiancé.
‘To think a child already has a fiancé,’ she thought. Though it was a common thing in this world, it still felt unfamiliar to her.
It might not seem odd to consider him a childhood friend, but the thought of marrying him one day felt strange.
‘A fiancé who’s a Young Duke, talk about silver spoon class…’
In a past life, some duke inherited a fortune at 25 and became the wealthiest twenty-something on Earth. This ducal heir here probably wouldn’t do any worse.
Up to this point, Adeline still didn’t quite understand the world she had been reborn into.
She thought it was quite fantastical, but hadn’t really considered that it could actually be a world out of a novel. It was certainly a direction difficult to imagine.
‘Had it been my previous life, he would have made it big as a model.’
His beauty alone, capable of becoming a picture with just a blink, would have succeeded in any media.
The angelically handsome boy’s name was Shane Blanchard.
His sleek black hair and the sharp, crescent shape of his eyes, housing jewel-like blue pupils, gave him a striking appearance. His skin was porcelain-like, flawless, and he had long and slender limbs.
Being a full thirteen, he already had quite the air of a youth.
Adeline was only nine, so despite their four-year age difference, he was a good fiancé who never showed boredom when with her.
‘It’s mostly his face that’s good.’
To Adeline, Shane seemed too much of a goody-two-shoes.
Too smart for his own good, almost adult-like.
‘Maybe it’s because he was brought up with strict education, he doesn’t even cry like a kid. He’s not straightforward either…’
Not long after they got engaged, Adeline was dragged to the funeral of Shane’s mother.
She was shocked to learn that the adults had taken her to a funeral, and even more so to see the pale young boy standing there motionlessly.
He had lost his mother, but the adults left him alone as if he were one of them.
A child who only learned to suppress his emotions, not knowing how to express them.
It was impossible not to feel pity and hug him.
“I’ll be here for you. Don’t worry. You can cry, just in front of me.”
“I can’t cry.”
“Try crying.”
“You like it when I cry?”
“Yes.”
“Then I’ll try.”
Despite not shedding tears, the willingness to cry at his fiancée’s request showed how kind he was. She thought she should take good care of him, to ensure he doesn’t become anyone’s fool.
After that, she grew more concerned and visited him often, playing together.
It seemed Shane appreciated Adeline’s feelings, as he would visit her once a month outside their scheduled meetings.
Though Shane was older, it was less about following and more about becoming closer.
“Visiting again? Do you have a lot of free time?” she teased.
“What’s more important than spending time with my fiancée?”
“Is that so?”
Maybe he was using it as an excuse to avoid studying.
She felt like she was being used as a legitimate excuse for idleness, but it was okay since time flew by pleasantly as she admired his handsome face.
“If only the Saintess would appear soon.”
“Huh?”
“Weren’t you reading the newspaper?”
Adeline was just holding the newspaper as a pretense, actually admiring Shane’s face. Realizing the foolishness of her remark, her cheeks flushed with embarrassment.
She couldn’t very well admit that she had been gazing at his face.
“Saintess?”
What saintess?
Adeline read the newspaper headline.
It was an article about the difficulty of not having a new saintess appear 102 years after the last one died.
‘What kind of novel-like setting is this… Huh?’
A novel?
‘Wait?’
And then it struck her—the surname of her fiancé in front of her was Blanchard…
A saintess that appears once every hundred or so years.
Blanchard, the eldest son of a ducal family, a handsome young man with black hair and a fair complexion…?
A name and setting she felt she had heard many times before…
‘Ah, sh-t! He’s the male lead!’
The word ‘male lead’ popped up over the angelic face of the boy, and the forgotten plot quickly dominated her thoughts.
‘It wasn’t just a fantasy world. It’s really a world from a novel!’
And she quickly grasped the situation.
‘No wonder he had it all!’
The male lead of a healing romance novel, devoted to the female protagonist with his evenly matched talents in arts and arms, and perfect status and appearance.
‘I just called him Shane, so I never thought twice about his last name, and I never thought to apply the setting of a handsome young man with black hair and fair complexion to a child… I had no idea.’
