Chapter 2 …
What Comes a Few Seconds Later Is Only Emptiness
The reason Liliana treats me this harshly is simple.
The biggest reason is probably that Liliana and I are engaged.
More than that, Liliana and I were childhood friends. Since we were little, our families spent time together regularly.
To begin with, this engagement itself was something Liliana requested, and that likely makes it even more unforgivable for her now.
And above all else, the current Liliana is completely infatuated with my younger brother, who is one year younger than me. She probably wants to break off our engagement immediately and become engaged to my brother instead. That is most likely why she treats me so cruelly.
As for that, I feel the same way.
Maybe things would have been different with the Liliana from the past, but if possible, I do not want to marry the current Liliana.
Just imagining what life after marriage would be like is enough to make me go bald from stress.
Without a doubt, I would be worked like a beast of burden every single day. Then, after returning home, I would be forced to do housework, while Liliana would naturally cheat on me and squander both the money I earned and the wealth of the ducal family.
However, since she is the eldest daughter of the Emperor, even though I belong to a ducal house, there is nothing I can do to oppose her through authority or power.
Besides, abusing power just to do whatever I want would make me no different from Liliana, and I have no desire to sink to her level.
To begin with, when we had first become engaged, Liliana truly did show affection toward me.
That was precisely why she chose to become engaged to me in the first place.
But once she learned that I had no talent for magic, and that my younger brother possessed exceptional magical talent, she began treating me the way she does now.
In other words, Liliana never truly looked at me.
She looked at status, appearance, and magical talent.
That is why it never specifically had to be me. The moment someone superior appeared, she was ready to abandon me and switch sides without hesitation.
Even someone like me can only endure so much ridicule before every feeling I once had for Liliana disappears completely, replaced instead by resentment and hatred.
Still, the fact that I have no talent for magic is an undeniable reality.
No matter how much I want to repay Liliana—and my younger brother, who joins her in provoking me—for everything they have done to me, it is obvious that I cannot do anything back to them.
More than obvious, I would simply be crushed in return.
How pathetic.
I’m frustrated.
I’ll never forgive them.
I want to make them suffer through hell.
But no matter how strongly I think those thoughts, what comes a few seconds later is only emptiness.
“Seriously… Liliana was the one who used 【Water Sphere】 on me in the first place, so she should be the one cleaning this up.”
