Paul

“That bastard, Rick… god dang it… some day I’m gonna pay it back to him…”

That was the next day after my fight with you and Rick, several years ago. I was going home from school.

“…Isn’t that Regina… Ahem…”

“Oh, hello, Paul. As gentlemanly as usual, aren’t you?”

“You know me?”

“Of course I know about your family. You intend to follow in your family's footsteps of becoming a knight, right?”

“I guess I don’t need to introduce myself then…”

I mean, I don’t have to explain myself, right? She’s beautiful (well, even now I still have to say that), she’s cute, she’s elegant, and she has a way with words. Anyway, I tried to flatter her with whatever words I had. She giggled a lot. I thought I was being a real charming prince there. …hang on, I’m getting there! Anyway… she invited me to come to a house to the north of the capital. It was a very luxurious house, even had a maid. Regina led me to her private room. I thought I was gonna get lucky, but…

“You are the <<>>?” I ask

“That’s right. I will i<<>>t the <<g>>m <<>>nts some day. Although in th<<>>ld, th<<>> are not g<<>>oon. But anyway, you are gonna

Sorry, I have to avoid talking about her i<<>>. If I did, the curse will definitely kill me.

What did she tell me to do?

The first thing is, I have to watch every single move of you, yes you Ryle, and report back to her.

I mean, she approached me, all because I happen to be your classmate. The main reason. Even though there’s also another convenient reason like she doesn’t have to… it’s hard to talk about this without talking about h<<>>y. So please tolerate me on this. Another reason being that… Well, she wanted to take revenge against me, on your behalf. What happened? I don’t remember, but it hurt, and I lost consciousness, then she told me she didn’t want to keep making me lose consciousness over and over.

As for the reason why she wanted me to watch you, one she told me was that she was too busy. This concerns the <<>> again, you catch my drift. Although, even if she wasn’t busy, maybe she would still have asked me.

She has never told me to stop doing this, even up until now. No matter where you go, I have to follow you, and watch what you do. Although, she did permit me to attend classes or mandatory family businesses, to be fair. It would raise suspicions otherwise after all.

That’s why it came as a surprise to her that you two are going on a journey without telling her. There was no sign you were planning to do that at all. She told me some days ago that, right on her graduation day, she only managed to know through your parents when she reached home, and had to sprint quickly toward your ship.

Map…? Well, I think I can provide some information which could be relevant to that… I don’t know…

The second thing she wanted me to do, besides following you, is to help her hide the Artifacts across this kingdom.

Where did she get them from? How did she…? How am I supposed to know?! I only helped carry them! And tried to hide them in many ways, of course. She let me rest today, tonight I mean. I’m sure the Artifacts are not from her own room though.

Why does she do that? If you take her words for it, she said, ‘I want to make up for all the time I didn’t get to spend with Ryle.’ She said that, grinning with her teeth, like a child. Never saw her like that around anybody, always seemed very mature. Yet when she talked about you…