Chapter 45: Princess Mia is No Loner

For the record, Mia was not a loner. As befitting her status as the Princess of Tearmoon, she was frequently surrounded by an entourage of other girls. Though their numbers had dwindled somewhat compared to the previous timeline — a result of Mia turning away anyone who ever said anything bad about Anne — they still represented the largest faction in her class.

Speaking of factions, it may be beneficial to describe the makeup of her class, in which Mia's group reigned supreme. Whether through clubs, kinship, or some other commonality, students would eventually form connections with one another. A sense of honest camaraderie or sometimes a mutual alignment of interests would cause these students to spend more and more time together, eventually separating the class into a number of cliques. Obviously, there would always be those who belonged to no group — those who failed to find their clique and would inevitably be given the label of "loner."

Mia's class had a girl like that. Her name was Chloe Forkroad. She was a timid girl whose defining features were her thick crop of black hair and even thicker glasses.

A bell rang, signaling the end of classes.

"Haaa..."

As the other students rejoiced at their liberation, Chloe let out a deep, weary sigh. She came from a family of merchants who ran a fairly large business. Her parents had gone from roaming with caravans to establishing a company, before further parlaying their accomplishments into a noble title. They were worldly merchants who knew their way around people. Their daughter, however, had a much more reserved personality. Given more to books than banter, she was always a shy girl, and their efforts to bring her along during their travels and have her meet all sorts of people only worsened her introversion. Fearing for her future, they decided to try sending her to the best academy on the continent, Saint-Noel. After an extensive campaign of gift-giving and string-pulling, they succeeded in having her enrolled.

Once Chloe showed up at the academy, however, what awaited her there were the harsh realities of the nobility, and their obsession with lineage and tradition. As the newcomer whose family bought their title with money, she stuck out like a sore thumb. Thus began her lonely life at school.

For those who don't fit in, the worst time in class is during the breaks. Not a day went by when she didn't have to contend with the problem of how to spend these breaks — a time meant for socializing with friends — all by herself. To this end, the books she'd brought from home became her salvation. As concentrated vessels of knowledge, books sold well and fetched high prices on the market. Even Chloe's family, operating as Forkroad & Co., had always placed a particular focus on books as one of their primary products. Having grown up around them, she developed a love for books and brought many with her to the academy. However...

This is the last one... Spending every single break immersed in their pages had quickly exhausted her supply. What am I going to do tomorrow?

With only twenty pages left in her final book, no matter how slowly she read, she'd be done by tomorrow.

Maybe I should try talking to someone? As if. I can't work up the courage to do that. Even if I could, I should have done so when school first started. Now that everyone has already settled into groups, it's way too late...

She pressed her face flat onto her desk.

I wish I could just... disappear...

She wasn't sad. At least, she didn't think she was. Nevertheless, her eyes welled up with tears. That was when she heard a voice.

"Excuse me..."

Not realizing she was being spoken to, Chloe simply sighed and continued to press her face into her arms.

"Excuse me, do you have a moment?"

"...Huh?"

Chloe slowly looked up. As she blinked the tears from her eyes, the figure of a girl appeared.

"....Huh?!"

She froze with the kind of shock one experienced when the gloomy loner that nobody liked realized the coolest kid in class was speaking to her. The metaphor was apt, because this girl was the undisputed star of their class and a veritable celebrity in her year. The Princess of the Tearmoon Empire, Mia Luna Tearmoon, was speaking to her.

"Um... Uh... Huh?"

Words failed her as she struggled to think through her confusion. Meanwhile, Mia's gaze fell on Chloe's book, open on the desk.

"What were you reading?"

"Oh, um, that? That's, uh... an illustrated guide to plants that grow in the desert... It tells you how they get their water... and stuff like that, and..."

To Chloe, this felt like the first real conversation she'd had since coming to the academy. In her thirst for interaction, she started to lean further and further forward, speaking with the frantic intensity of someone who was terrified of the slightest lull in their dialogue.

As Mia listened, a frown creased her brow.

"...Do you find that interesting?"

"Yes! Oh, um... Actually, it might not be too interesting to read. I mean, I think it's interesting, but... maybe not to other people, so..."

"Hmm... You seem to be reading books all the time, do you read any story books?"

"Oh, um, yes. I do. I like the one about, um... a love story between a prince from a small kingdom and a princess. But I, um... finished reading all the books I brought with me, so..."

And that was when, for some reason, a glint of excitement appeared in Mia's eyes, and she stared at Chloe like a hungry cat that had just spotted a mouse. The sight spooked Chloe a little, and she jerked back, only to find that her arm did not move with her. Her eyes drifted toward her shoulder, down to her wrist, over a pair of hands that were wrapped firmly around hers, and finally up to her captor's face.

Mia beamed.

"I've been looking for someone like you. Would you like to be my friend?"

Without a doubt, that was the last thing Chloe expected to hear.