The Lily Blooms in Another World: Since My Engagement Was Broken Off, I Will Enjoy Living with My True Love, the Villainess! - Chapter 0.2

Fuuka Hamilton was drinking her morning tea.

…Tea.

The color filling the cup reminded her of the woman with tea-colored hair who had taken everything from her.

Until three years ago, everything had been going smoothly.

A privileged family environment.

An engagement to someone close in age and handsome, even if it was a marriage for mutual family benefit.

—Though it might sound conceited coming from me, I think I had a smooth-sailing life. And I’d made efforts worthy of it.

Everything changed when she, Miyako Florence arrived.

Miyako possessed a healthy, radiant beauty that seemed to glow from within.

Her blunt way of speaking, her intelligence.

Fuuka herself understood better than anyone.

Miyako Florence was captivating.

‘Fuuka. I want to make Miyako my bride. Please break off our engagement.’

When her former fiancé Klaus Reinhardt told her that, Fuuka had only one thought.

—’Ah, as expected.’

It wasn’t as if she had been idle until then.

For the Hamilton family, Fuuka’s family and an earldom, the engagement with the higher-ranking marquis house was absolutely something they didn’t want to lose.

To win back Reinhardt, who was increasingly captivated by Miyako, she had tried every means possible.

To meet her family’s expectations, she had no choice but to employ some underhanded methods.

And yet.

When she was told of the selfish engagement cancellation, rather than feeling frustration or misery. She found herself accepting it.

Somehow, she felt as if she had known this would happen all along.

Yes. As if it were some kind of predetermined fate.

“This won’t do, getting lost in thought like this.”

She let out a sigh.

Placing the cup back on the saucer.

“Now then, I have plenty to do! …I must make Father acknowledge me once more.”

After Fuuka’s engagement with the marquis house was broken off, her father, the head of the Hamilton family, was deeply disappointed.

And as if he had completely given up on her, he was now engrossed in finding fiancés for her younger sisters.

Treated as if she weren’t even here, Fuuka nevertheless continued to strive.

Economics.

Business studies.

Languages of various nations.

White magic.

She greedily learned everything she would need to survive from now on.

For now, her father paid her no mind.

Still, he allowed his ‘damaged’ daughter, whose engagement had been broken, to maintain her previous lifestyle.

Her privileged environment remained unchanged.

“Now then. I think I’ll try reading a classic from the neighboring country in its original language today.”

That’s why.

That’s why, such thoughts.

“…Somewhere.”

Yes, somewhere.

“I want to run away,” she murmured.

Wanting to run away.

If a white knight, a hero, would appear to take me somewhere far away—such thoughts.

I shouldn’t be thinking them, and yet.

“Lady Fuuka!”

“!? Wh-who’s there!? What is it!?”

At that moment, the door to her room burst open.

Wind blew in through the window, rustling Fuuka’s lustrous black hair and skirt.

“Please, come with me!”

Standing there was Miyako Florence.

The woman who had taken everything from her.

Fuuka was stunned.

Come with you?

What are you talking about?

In the distance, she could hear the servants panicking at the sudden (and terribly rude) visitor.

As the proud daughter of the Hamilton family, she ought to sternly reprimand this senseless intrusion.

The woman before her, eyes shining, should be her hated romantic rival.

Therefore, the hand being offered.

There’s no way I should take this hand, and yet.

The woman with tea-colored hair, swaying in the morning breeze, knelt before Fuuka like a white knight and took her hand.

Not caring that her skirt touched the floor, her former rival knelt before her, looking up at Fuuka with upturned eyes.

“Lady Fuuka, I have always admired you.”

Ah.

I, the proud daughter of an earl.

Taking that hand should have been impossible, and yet.