I’m Not Even an Otome Game Mob Character

d when the other person asks to be able to be with someone else, let’s keep that part a secret, yes?」

「I understand…… but, does Roy-sama have that kind of person?」

At the way of speaking with a condition in regards to the other person, when Lydia asks, Roy sincerely smiles.

「I don’t know yet.」

「Huh?」

「It’s because I haven’t met them yet.」

It seems meeting them is a settled manner.
She doesn’t understand how he is so sure, and Lydia tilts her head in doubt.
With how Roy only smiles back, it doesn’t seem like he wants to talk about the reason.
Then, Roy presents a situation that is likely there.

「Maybe it was when I met Miss Lydia before, huh?」

「Me……?」

Neither denial nor affirmation leaves Lydia who is at a loss for words.
Just what in the world is caught in her throat?
At her hesitating reply, when Lydia is having great difficulty, she can hear a voice of stifled laughter, and in her line of sight is a Roy who is smiling with amusement.

「Roy-sama?」

「No…… if we don’t take notice of each other, isn’t that somewhat strange……?」

When Roy said that to her, she noticed it for the first time.
He was talking about how if Lydia and Roy both became engaged to each other, they completely hadn’t considered the potential that they would end up liking each other.
Of course, it isn’t disagreeable and a feeling of favor for the other is there, but to the end, they’re a friend.

「Now that you mention it, that is true.」

It was a funny story when she ended up realizing it: an engagement where absolutely, they wouldn’t want the other person to fall in love with them.
Lydia also felt a smile come up, and they laughed together.
After laughing for a while, their eyes mutually met.

「I like Roy-sama.」

「I also like Miss Lydia.」

It’s the feeling of smoothly exchanging communication.

With how they absolutely wouldn’t come to fall in love with the other person, for this reason the other person was someone they absolutely wouldn’t come to hate.
Certainly, it was a big decision, Lydia thinks in the corner of her mind.
But, because she feels as if it’s not a big deal that he is her accomplice, it’s strange.

Would the day she comes to regret the decision that day come, she wonders.

Thinking about that, she immediately shakes her head.
Certainly, she had a premonition that if she didn’t regret it, she would be proud of it. 

During the new year, at the new year’s celebration party, Roy and Lydia’s engagement was officially announced.
Several days after that, Lydia was strolling through her residence’s garden by herself.
At the party, many people had made noise about the engagement, but if she is in her own house’s garden, there is an unbelievable silence.
Only the short sounds of Lydia’s footsteps in the winter garden make noise.
She follows a road she doesn’t frequently travel.
If she notices that even by herself, she became able to reach the destination.
This growth is fine, isn’t it, Lydia thought to herself.
Because usually he’s guiding her, unconsciously she starts humming.
Then, she puts on a hood and ducks underneath the hedges she saw.
In her field of vision that opened up, at the place clear white sunshine fell, ivy enshrined the fountain like battle standards.
The ivy didn’t immediately put its root in the fountain, but a fence of wood was used to encircle it, and that ivy twisted around the fence.
The perpetrator who arranged the water fountain is crouching at its side, doing work.

「Hm? Ojou.」 

When seeing her, the boy who is a gardener’s apprentice lifted his head.
Maybe as a result of using his cotton gloves as they are to wipe sweat, there is dirt on his cheeks.
At that dirt he doesn’t realize, Lydia spills out a smile.

「Although, I can’t do it yet.」

He mumbles as if seeming to regret how he can’t show her its perfected state.
Lydia moves until she is next to the boy who is a gardener’s apprentice and looks at what he’s working on.

「A rabbit?」

There was a rabbit with white hairs made of chrysanthemums and red eyes.

「This one, rather than a mountain hair, would you hold it?」

It’s only one rabbit that was drawn by the side of the water fountain, but because he said it was still incomplete, from here, they’d multiply, perhaps.

「It’s cute.」  

He doesn’t have any confidence in his artistic taste, does he, Lydia thought, and at Lydia’s impressions, the boy who is a gardener’s apprentice let out a sigh of relief.
At how she appeared to regret the dissolving of her rabbit last year, she remembered the magic her father Geordo used for her.
When she faces the reality of remembering all of those trivial memories one by one, at that tenderness, her heart fills with warmth.

「When it’s complete, I want to show Flora as well.」

「Mhm, that’s fine.」

When she says that her sister would also be delighted, he acknowledged it with a smile.
Standing up their next plan was looking forward to the near future.
Towards the boy who went back to his work, Lydia calls him.

「Zack.」

「What is it?」

While tilting his head to the side, he looks at her, and the boy sho is a gardener’s apprentice continues to wait for her words.
Inhaling the air that had become cold, Lydia told him.

「I don’t need a dance substitute anymore.」

「Eh?」

「I was engaged to Roy-sama.」

She remembered the optical illusion as if her heart had grown cold with the inhaled air.
Even though all she did was tell him the ordinary truth.
The eyes of the boy who is a gardener’s apprentice went wide, and clapped as if understanding.

「Is it okay to congratulate you?」

When she was asked anxiously, Lydia ended up smiling.
At the beginning, he was worried about Lydia’s feelings.
He really did prioritize her too much.

「I don’t understand.」

「Ha?」

「It’s that, I, while I like Roy-sama, I don’t like him romantically.」

He’s the lovable prince that came out of a picture book himself.
He’s the best partner for some of the Ernest house.
The way she can’t come to like him is strange.
However, because that strange thing actually ended up happening, there’s no helping it.
The boy who is a gardener’s apprentice shows an appearance of firmly thinking.

「……Ojou, do you hate it?」

Asked with a final confirmation, Lydia tried to cheerfully smile.

「I decided it.」

「I see.
Ojou is cool, huh?」

It isn’t either good or bad, but she receives the highest grade of compliment from him.
He sees her quietly smile, and feels like she’s grown up a bit.

「I’m not happy, you know.」

「Even though you were praised?」

「You are not praising me.」 [T/N: God, these two are so precious.]

When she deliberately looks angry, she turned towards a proud looking face.
When she’s smiled at just like that, she ended up thinking of the self he believed in.

「Will you be my partner for one last song?」

When Lydia lightly lifts her hand up, the boy who is a gardener’s apprentice understands, puts his cotton gloves into his pockets, and politely takes her hand.

「With pleasure.」

Each humming a waltz rhythm, they dance around the water fountain.
Lydia suddenly straightens her spine.
Because that was his highest grade of compliment from the beginning.

No matter what the future held from here, she would keep her head up.