I'm halfway there, now I truly see things working out in life. Honestly, it feels strange acting in Darius's body, or is it correct to call it "my body"? Classic reincarnation dilemma.
Anyway, it's weird. A moment ago, I was going home and...
Ah, now it hits me.
I probably died in that accident; there's no way I could survived, and this isn't some kind of coma hallucination. While I'm here, messing around and doing whatever I feel like, they're still grinding away on the other side.
How should I feel...?
. . .
Better not to think about it.
Let's just wait until tomorrow, a simple thing for many people. The instant I stepped out of the Café, a carriage passed by in the middle of the street and almost crushed my dear little feet.
Sometimes, fate plays tricks on you in a way that makes you question if the universe is plotting against your progress, just like this moment.
The black crescent-shaped crest passes before my eyes, highlighting the carriage's luxurious design as if to say "Look at me" for half the world to hear.
I should have been faster, now I'm really screwed...
The door doesn't even open, instead it's propelled over my head with an explosive bang. He's pissed, and not just a little!
I fall to the ground to avoid losing my skull in the process, and as soon as I lift my chin, I only notice a huge shadow blocking the sun. The person in front of me is none other than a bear in human form, a man so big that you would never pick a fight, no matter what he tried.
Dark hair with graying tones adorns the masculine face of the human epitome I see, while his purplish irises suck any color from the sky. A blue cloak is draped over his broad shoulders, with a crest on his chest and that expensive perfume capable of tearing your nose, emanating from every inch of the fabric of his clothes.
This man... is my father.
"H-Hi, Duke..."
Worst possible answer. He wants to kill me, he definitely wants to rip my head off! The murderous intent is strong enough to make the air thin, damn it! Please, don't send me to a third life now, I beg you!
"I sent a carriage to pick you up this morning..."
His voice weighs as his feet crush the carriage steps. I'm dead.
"Why didn't you come?"
"I-I-I-I-I-I-I had something very important before!"
"What's more important than meeting your future wife?"
Damn, damn, damn! What's more important? Come on, think, use that two-neuron brain of yours to work! There has to be a good enough reason!
If I... yeah, Ravenna, I'm going to have to drag you into the mud with me to get out of this in one piece.
"Witch..."
"What did you say? Speak louder, I can't..."
"It was the witch! Ravenna, that's why I didn't go!"
"What nonsense are you saying, boy? Do you want to blame a madwoman now?"
Act and shine, Darius!
"No, you don't understand! She enchanted me and I... I'm in love with her!"
Yes, perfect. I think this should work to get me out of trouble... In reality, no. The Duke looks at me with such a withered look of pity that I actually shrink back and he raises his fist. Well, this is where my life ends. I close my eyes, I already know what happens next.
AHHHHH! THAT HURTS, HELL!
Why, of all possible punishments, does he always have to go for a punch to my stomach? My body doubles forward, as it wouldn't after taking a hard hit like that from the big-shot Moonlight?
The air even disappears, and suddenly the ground leaves my feet. No joke, he's going to carry me over his shoulder and take me to the palace on foot. The carriage is ruined anyway, he'd never have the nerve to use it to parade around the city.
My dignity, if it ever existed, is gone.
The people... they're staring. They really are staring. Each step this brute of a Duke takes shakes my stomach more than the punch he gave me.
Upside down, I only see the cobblestones of the street and the astonished faces of the aristocratic ladies going "oh!" with their fans covering half their faces. Some young men try to pretend they didn't see anything, but I know they did. One of them even let out a little laugh. Damn him.
"F-Father... Duke... please, can you put me down? My spine is still intact."
"Quiet."
His voice vibrates through my body. I try to squirm, but he squeezes my waist with his forearm as if he were carrying a sack of flour. A sack of flour made of humiliation, in this case.
"Everyone's looking..."
"Let them look."
"I can walk! Seriously, my knees are fine!"
"You had your chance to walk. You wasted it by running off to a brothel."
"Hey! That was a technical brothel! And I was investigating!"
"Investigating what?"
"True love! Justice! Corruption! All at once!"
He doesn't respond. He just takes a deep breath, which is worse, because his silence weighs more than any insult. We pass a corner and the sun hits my upside-down face. Sweat begins to trickle from my forehead straight into my eyes, which makes me look even more miserable.
Great. A dehydrated bastard on the shoulder of an furious father. Nothing could be more normal.
"This isn't the first time you've done this, you know?"
"I know..."
"And yet you still seem surprised by the consequences."
"It's just... I thought you were in a good mood today."
"I was."
The moral pain is worse than the physical.
After a while that honestly felt like a thousand-year journey through the desert of shame, the sound of the wheels of the new replacement carriage echoes ahead. Of course, the aristocracy never travels without a Plan B. When he throws me into the cabin like a poorly packed sack of potatoes, I end up falling seated with my legs up in the air.
"You will attend dinner with the royal family tonight."
"Huh?! Why?! I won't...!"
"Quiet. The king wishes to see you regardless, you have no right to refuse."
He slams the door shut and gives the order to depart. The carriage starts with a jolt, and in the silence of the padded interior, I allow myself to slump to the side, crumpled, with my knees drawn up and my pride shattered.
My God... I just wanted to get an illegal record from the count, save a witch, live a forbidden romance, and maybe get laid again. Was that too much to ask?
Apparently, yes.
I wasn't necessarily going to marry a baroness. The Duke is too smart to use me with someone so low in the hierarchy. The real problem is who he wants to set me up with.
The Moonlight family's biggest crisis is the lack of a legitimate male heir. Madame Leliana, the stepmother from hell, couldn't get the job done. Only Kristia came out of that, who, however adorable she may seem to the subjects, cannot inherit the family's legacy.
As for me... well, I'm a bastard, raised far from court, ignored for most of my life, and now suddenly I've become the clan's only viable sperm.
The Duke's solution? Stick me on some pretty, fertile noblewoman and wait for a grandchild to sprout from there like a magical beanstalk. That way he could adopt him as heir, keep the surname intact, and continue maintaining the family's weird traditions.
All of this is extremely patriarchal, antiquated, and disgusting, but from his point of view, it makes perfect sense. After all, if I weren't a ticking time bomb about to socially explode at any moment, the Duke's job would even be easy.
Because of my brilliant escape to the brothel and my splendid performance concerning Ravenna, here I go, attending the most feared dinner in the history of humanity: the Royal Dinner.
With the King.
With the Queen.
With the Stepmother.
With the Prince.
With the Princess.
With my half-sister.
And with the Duke.
All seated at the same table, looking at me as if I were a mutant insect that fell into their gold-flecked soup.
That's it. Demons don't have horns, red skin, a pointy tail, and a trident in hand to poke the butts of the smart-asses who fell into the fire; it has silver cutlery of different sizes for dessert, forced laughs, and an annoying uncle telling dad jokes.
And me? I just wanted to sleep. Instead, I have to put lipstick on the clan's bankrupt reputation.
Wonderful.