I Need the True Ending to Graduate - Chapter 106

After finishing submitting my thesis and returning to the dormitory, I took off my coat and bag and put them away with a heavy heart.

I was tired from writing the thesis, and my mind felt restless, so I was going to rest a little and then sort out my thoughts, when, as if it had been waiting, a status window popped up.

[Congratulations! You have fulfilled all the conditions to see the ending.]

[Current capture target affection:

Ruad Rochef: 100%

Evan Bell: 100%

Jeran Ennessy: 100%]

[Choose one of the following endings.]

[1. Ruad Rochef]

[2. Evan Bell]

[3. Jeran Ennessy]

[4. ]

‘It won’t give me even a second to rest.’

I sat on the edge of the bed and let out a deep sigh as I stared at the brightly lit choice window leading to the ending.

I’d filled all the capture targets’ affection meters, and I even received confessions from them directly. So it wasn’t all that surprising that the three of their names were in the choices.

What bothered me was the disabled option number 4.

‘It’ll probably unlock if I achieve the true ending conditions.’

I still remembered the conditions the game system had set to see the true ending. It would be strange to forget.

First, I had to become the protagonist, Lucia, and safely graduate from the magic academy, and I had to raise all the capture targets’ affection to 100%.

On top of that, there was one more condition I’d forgotten because I was busy raising affection and writing the thesis.

Find out Lucia’s hidden secret and see the true ending.

And Lucia’s secret was simple.

‘Lucia Even was planning to leave this world with dimensional transfer magic she researched for a year under the pretext of a graduation thesis.’

It had bothered me from the start.

To escape Karl Evenhart’s exploitation, among the many research fields that brought in no money and couldn’t get support, why did she choose dimensional transfer magic?

Lucia was aware of the mana and magical talent she had.

So she wouldn’t have been able to accept an ordinary life of marrying Evan and having children.

As Ruad said, it wasn’t just so so talent.

It would’ve been a waste to let it rot like this, to just work under some lord. She probably thought she wanted to go as far as possible, climb as high as possible.

Thinking that, she accepted Karl Evenhart’s offer and abandoned her family, her friends, even her fiancé. Because for Lucia, it would’ve been the only chance in her entire life.

But what returned to her was exploitation and abuse, and what she saw and heard at the academy was nothing but the students’ various taunts and insults.

There was nowhere to get help. Because she wasn’t a noble, and she was a commoner with no one to rely on. It had been a long time since she even lost contact with her family.

With her isolated alone, with exploitation continuing for years, there wouldn’t be many people who could keep their sanity.

And for someone like her, how sweet would the existence of another world, where class and status, imperial family and nobility, didn’t exist, have felt?

Especially if she had enough talent to actually succeed at dimensional transfer magic.

Lucia bet her last year on that possibility, and that was when I possessed her body.

Putting all the information together, it couldn’t be explained any other way.

As if proving that this inference was right, the last choice, which had been disabled, appeared.

[Choose one of the following endings.]

[1. Ruad Rochef]

[2. Evan Bell]

[3. Jeran Ennessy]

[4. Lucia Even]

And the real dilemma started from here.

If I chose the option called ‘Lucia Even,’ I’d probably be able to see the true ending.

It was certain that the true ending was, just as Lucia had planned from the start, activating the dimensional transfer magic she’d devised all this time, abandoning this place and crossing over to another world.

And by crossing over to that other world, I’d be able to return to my original world.

During summer vacation, while going around old bookstores with Jeran and looking over the materials about Galore Jamis’s memoir that we obtained, I confirmed that the other world he spoke of was the place where I used to live.

‘The part about using letters made up of geometric combinations of circles and short and long straight lines made it click right away….’

In the end, saying that I could only return to my original world by seeing the true ending meant that I, as Lucia, had to decide to leave this place, and that I had to succeed at the final magic.

The moment I chose an ending other than the true ending, I probably wouldn’t be able to return to my original world, either because the demonstration of the magic circle I devised ended in failure, or something like that.

‘They said that no matter how many other character endings I saw, I couldn’t return to my original world, and that I had to see only the true ending.’

As I played the game as Lucia, I had no intention of staying here.

Sometimes my heart tilted, but living as someone else for a moment and living as someone else for a lifetime were completely different problems.

Of course, even if I went back to reality, there probably wouldn’t be anything good waiting. Maybe living here would be abundant and happy.

…And I wouldn’t have to write a thesis, either.

Even so, even though I was pathetic and insignificant and had no money and had nothing, I wanted to live as my original self. Not as Lucia Even.

Leaving was obvious, but I was worried about the three people who would be left behind here after I left. And what worried me even more than that was Lucia Even herself.

‘What was Lucia even thinking as she spent this year?’

Anyone could tell that Ruad, Evan, and Jeran loved Lucia in some form.

Because of them, she could break free from Karl Evenhart, attend the academy until graduation, and be protected from that nasty group.

But I had no way of knowing what Lucia thought of them.

I knew well of their affection, but even so, did she decide to leave this world because she didn’t want to live here anymore, or did she plan from the beginning to use their hearts to achieve her own goal….

I wasn’t Lucia, so I couldn’t guess what her heart was like. All I could do was make a choice as myself.

And my choice was already decided.

‘…I have to go home.’

It was true that thinking about the sincere confessions they gave me made my heart uncomfortable.

At first, I thought of them as just capture targets whose affection I had to raise, and I thought only that I had to form relationships somehow and go home. And on top of that, I enjoyed the hot intensity.

But dismissing everything as nothing more than them moving according to the game company’s design, the sincerity they showed me was real.

In the Calypse Empire, they protected me in their own ways.

That was why their confessions made me uncomfortable instead. Because I couldn’t respond to the three confessions in any form. Because I couldn’t choose anyone’s sincerity.

I had to coldly betray the time I’d spent together with the passionate affection the three of them had given me. That tormented me.

Even so, just because I was afraid of hurting others, I couldn’t sacrifice my entire life for them.

If I didn’t have the confidence to remain here for the rest of my life and live as Lucia Even, then even if it hurt them, it was right to return to my original world.

“Whew.”

Letting out a deep sigh, I slowly stretched my index finger toward the status window. My final choice here, one that I could never take back once I chose it.

As my index finger drew closer to the status window, the three names came into view one by one.

Ruad Rochef.

I’m sorry I tried to keep my distance because I thought you gave off a bad impression when we first met.

I did get a little pissed off when I found out you approached me in the past with impure intentions, but I believe your sincerity.

Evan Bell.

I’m sorry I thought there was something wrong with your personality. When I realized it was all my fault, I didn’t know how I should react and I just brushed past it, but I really am sorry.

And thank you for forgiving someone like me, someone I would never forgive if I were you.

Jeran Ennessy.

Thank you for always being kind to me, and for being considerate every single time. For throwing everything away to protect me, yet not showing it.

Also, thank you for not freaking out at your disciple’s weird tastes. Thanks to that, the time we spent in the secret room was really fun.

And my slightly trembling fingertips touched the last remaining choice.

Soon, the choice window disappeared, and the contents of the status window changed.

[‘Lucia Even’ Selected]

[Entering Lucia Even’s route.]

***

Before I knew it, the season had come when the wind blowing in turned cold.

The academy grounds, which had been thick with lush green leaves, calmly changed the color of its foliage and shed fallen leaves.

Fallen leaves piled up in layers on the ground, and every time I stepped on the ground, I could hear them crumble with a crisp crackling sound.

As the trees gradually dried, I could truly feel that the season was changing.

When winter came, the trees in the academy grounds would shake off all their leaves and endure the cold winter wind, bare and lonely, in desolation.

‘And I won’t be in that scenery.’

I didn’t quite fill a full year, but I still experienced every season here.

There were hard things, but there were also quite a lot of enjoyable things.

Especially, I won’t be able to forget the summer vacation I spent here.

‘The last time I had a vacation that fun was when I was in elementary school.’

Of course, even then, my heart wasn’t exactly at ease, but fun was still fun.

Thinking I’d be leaving this place soon, the scenery here and the things I went through here all looked newly beautiful.

Getting snubbed at the bank because I was a commoner, getting picked on over ridiculous things by strange nobles, getting caught up with a crazy woman who was aiming for Evan.

At the time, it was absurd, ridiculous, and all it did was piss me off, but looking back, that was also one kind of memory.

‘But Karl Evenhart is something I’ll never remember fondly, and I’ll never forgive him….’

No matter how I thought about it, that one man couldn’t be romanticized.

From start to finish, he was trash, unchanged, a fucking piece of trash I’d never forget for the rest of my life.

The fact that all of Lucia’s misfortune stemmed from him, too, meant there was no room to make allowances for him.

‘In my heart, I’ll remember him as trash forever.’

Or maybe it’d be fine to leave behind that he’s trash in a game review.

As I walked while thinking this and that, before I knew it, my steps reached Bell Restaurant.

The doors of Bell Restaurant were tightly shut, and the inside was pitch-black without a single light. Because it was a regular day off.

‘That’s a relief. It’s closed on the day of the graduation demonstration.’

If it weren’t, I would’ve been nervous, worrying I might run into Evan.

With a small, bitter smile, I pulled out the letter I wrote yesterday from the inner pocket of the jacket I was wearing.

On the envelope, my name and Evan’s name were written. If an employee found it, they’d deliver it to Evan.

I crouched down and carefully slipped the letter through the gap in the door.

After confirming the letter went inside properly, I was about to stand up, when a familiar voice came from behind me.

“What are you doing here, Lucia?”