CUBE 1

chapter 01…

I got engaged to the person I had secretly loved for five years.

Isn’t that something to celebrate? Well… maybe.

When Tislin heard the news of her engagement from her parents, she burst into tears.

“I think you’re the strange one.”

Sierra Fontaineer said that firmly. She was sitting crumpled in one corner of the dorm lounge sofa, holding a large mug with both hands, staring blankly into the air. She looked at Tislin as if she were crazy.

Tislin barely listened.

“How can they just decide something like this without even asking me? They could have asked at least once!”

“I get that you might feel upset, but is it really something to cry that much about? Most engagements are like that.”

That was true. How often does the person involved actually get a say in their own engagement? Adults usually weigh everything carefully and decide for them.

And if, after all that consideration, the groom chosen is someone like him, she should be bowing in gratitude to her parents—not crying.

“Objectively speaking, there’s nothing lacking about him. It’s not like you’re in love with someone else.”

“There is something like that…”

“Did you confess and get rejected?”

Sierra said it as a joke.

But Tislin didn’t answer.

Sierra’s eyes sparkled. Just then, students started coming into the lounge one by one, as the last class of the day had ended. Sierra grabbed Tislin’s arm.

“We can’t talk here. Let’s go to your room.”

With dull eyes, Tislin let herself be dragged along like a loose piece of paper.

“Tislin, are you sick?”

A classmate who had just entered the lounge suddenly asked.

“You look terrible. Your eyes are really swollen.”

“She ate a late-night snack last night.”

Sierra cut in quickly and pulled Tislin away. The classmate tilted her head in confusion at the sight of Tislin being dragged off, but when her friends called her, she ran over to them.

By the time the sofas were full of students chatting idly, the sound of hard military boots stepped into the lounge.

It was a heavy, unfamiliar sound rarely heard in the Administration Department lounge. Students who had been focused on chessboards, newspapers, and thick books slowly looked up.

“Oh, Senior Ksanov?”

“Do we know each other?”

The tall young man tilted his head slightly.

The student who had spoken gasped when their eyes met his bright blue ones. Of course, it was a one-sided acquaintance.

The young man, wearing the perfectly fitted uniform of the Knight Department, was one of the most famous figures in the entire school. When upperclassmen told the wide-eyed freshmen his name, they gasped as well.

“Is that really Sir Ksanov? For real?”

“I told you. He looks exactly like he does in the newspaper.”

Damian Ksanov.

A disciple of the Grand Duke of Luxen, he was not someone who would normally still be attending school if it weren’t for a royal order.

At sixteen, he had gone to the Great Parfanan War. After earning merit in pacifying southern Parfanan, he received the highest-class medal from the king. In fact, students outside the Knight Department saw him more often in newspapers than at school.

“I’m looking for Tislin Hermiz.”

He waved a letter held between his fingers. He looked around the lounge, but the person he was looking for was nowhere to be seen.

“Um, Tislin went up to her room.”

“…Already?”

It was four in the afternoon. It wasn’t even dinner time yet, and she had already gone back to the dorm?

Under everyone’s curious gaze, the classmate twisted nervously.

“Sh-she didn’t seem to be feeling well. Her eyes were swollen.”

Oh right. Because of the late-night snack.

The excuse Sierra had given came to mind too late.

Damian Ksanov nodded slightly, his expression stiff.

“If she’s not here, that’s fine.”

With that, he turned and left.

As the sound of his boots faded away, the students who had been silently watching suddenly exploded into chatter.

“Wow, that was really Damian Ksanov.”

“I’ve been at this school for three years, and it’s my first time seeing him in person. So he really does attend here.”

“Is he that rare? Doesn’t he come often?”

“My younger brother’s in the Knight Department. Apparently, he hardly comes. Something about Royal Guard duties.”

“But why is Sir Ksanov looking for Tislin? It’s not like she has any connection to the Knight Department.”

The students’ eyes lit up at the fundamental question.

“Did anyone hear anything?”

“I don’t know. She was going upstairs with Sierra earlier. Her eyes were swollen and she looked out of it.”

“Are they close?”

“Maybe it’s an errand from a professor?”

“What professor would send Damian Ksanov on an errand when there are so many other students?”

“How would I know! Maybe a Knight Department professor…”

There were only guesses.

But since lounge time was usually dull—just chess and predictable debates—the students happily chewed over this new piece of gossip to pass the time.

* * *

“Something feels ominous.”

Tislin leaned against her bed’s headboard and muttered.

She had lived in this dorm room for three years. It was spacious and well-furnished, meant for noble boys and girls. But today, it felt strangely empty and shabby. A chill ran through her body.

“Hasn’t the ominous thing already happened?”

Sierra, lying lazily on the sofa like laundry left to dry, nodded toward the letter from Count Hermiz lying open on Tislin’s desk and grinned. She wasn’t wrong. What could be worse than this?

“I really didn’t want this.”

“Why? Did Sir Ksanov say he’d rather die than marry you?”

“If only it were something like that. At least that would be straightforward.”

But Damian Ksanov wasn’t the type to say such things. And the real situation was a bit more complicated.

As Tislin hesitated, Sierra asked the real question.

“By the way, your family doesn’t even live near the Grand Duchy of Luxen. How do you two know each other?”

“Well…”

Tislin hesitated for a long time.

“Either tell me or don’t. Decide now. If you’re not going to tell me, I’ll just comfort you and go to sleep.”

Tislin let out a deep sigh.

“So, Damian and I… It’s not like we’re anything special. Just…”

It wasn’t easy to explain.

Sierra clicked her tongue. “Damian,” she noticed. Not “Sir Ksanov.”

The Cedassi-Manorca royal family supported this Siedel Royal Academy. Though large compared to other schools on the continent, the student society—mostly nobles in their late teens and early twenties—was small and rumors spread quickly.

If there were a girl close enough to call Damian Ksanov by his first name, rumors would have spread long ago. Yet even Sierra, Tislin’s closest friend, had no idea.

The reason was simple.

No one had ever seen them together. Not even in shared classes with the Knight Department. They hadn’t even greeted each other.

“Should I just explain everything? It’s hard to sum up. Do you want to hear it?”

“Wait. I’ll get popcorn.”

Tislin burst out laughing.

Sierra really did bring back a large bowl of popcorn from the dorm kitchen and sat on the sofa opposite the bed.

Then she casually dropped another bomb.

“Tis. It looks like Sir Ksanov came looking for you earlier. I stopped by the lounge to share popcorn with Kisha and Irina, and everyone was talking about you and him. I barely escaped.”

So that was the ominous feeling.

They had almost run into each other.

“In the middle of the lounge, in front of everyone—we almost talked about the engagement!”

Tislin buried her face between her knees and screamed silently.

“But if he came all the way here looking for you, doesn’t that mean your relationship isn’t that bad?”

Sierra hugged the popcorn bowl, eyes sparkling.

Tislin hesitated over where to begin, then decided to start from the very beginning.

“Our first meeting.”

“When I was eight, and Damian was ten.”

“Wow. We’re going that far back? Is this going to finish today?”

“I’ll try to keep it short.”

“Try.”

Actually, she decided to skip most of the earlier explanations and talk about the recent event instead—the real reason she had cried at the sudden engagement.

“About a month ago, I impulsively confessed to him. He rejected me, saying that if we broke up later, it would make things difficult with Adel. I was so embarrassed and upset that I told him I’d never see him again and ran away. And then this letter arrived.”

“…Hey. Start from the beginning. Who’s Adel?”

So the story returned to the first meeting.

When Tislin was eight, and Damian was ten.

This is how it all began.