Prologue 1: Corporate Slave

-Who am I? Where is this?

You might think this is some shitty joke, but right now this is real, in all honestly this is for real, seriously.

But, actually, who am I? 

Because within me right now, there are two different versions of me.

My name is Yukimura Rina, a corporate slave.

What are standard Labor Laws, does it taste good? The company I worked at was dirty, I was faced with unrealistic standards day in day out, every day was tiring and hectic as if like a raging storm. I usually only averaged about 3 hours of sleep every night. Staying overnight at the company was considered normal, and if you could go home you were lucky. Those were the days I lived. 

Whether this was fortunate or unfortunate, at least the work was very rewarding. My job of helping make deadlines that were thought to be impossible was very satisfying, although no one complimented me, I would like to believe that my work was appreciated.

Yes, if you think about it, I was being used and overworked, a stupid, gullible corporate slave.

 I thought about changing jobs, but I was much too used to being a corporate slave. When I finally thought of doing a job change I was already sucked in way too deep my everyday work that just the idea of it was naive of me.

 "Let's play an otome game to make myself feel better!"

No I should sleep. If I think about it, I should take this little free time I have to rest.

But then again, I've been working so hard these days that I was no longer thinking straight, so I picked whatever otome game I could find and downloaded it on my smartphone. On the train ride home I started to play it, and I got obsessed. 

The idea of a magical fantasy world, and attending an academy with fellow students to capture a target, the prince, was very satisfying. Reaching the sweet ending of receiving a proposal was almost like torture for me. Then again, I've always preferred action and fighting over shoujo and romance, so I wonder why I suddenly decided to play an otome game?

But, I developed a favorite within this game.

The game was very common, it followed the basic requirements of having an evil villainess, being set in a magic, fantasy academy with a capture target prince. No, actually the setting was revolved around the Prince of an Empire. But there was one thing that was a bit different, it was that the brother of the evil villainess had a very strong attachment to the villainess.

His appearance was perfect. Compared to the Prince and the other capture targets his appearance was so much better. 

Light blue hair, light blue eyes, ice magic, and an extremely handsome face that lacks emotions which gives off a cold feeling. He wears glasses and is the smartest within the academy, a character set up to be extremely cool. 

And in this setting, he is a Duke, not a legitimate child but still a Duke, although he is just a student of the academy he succeeded his father after he passed away at the mere age of 17. 

Looking at him now, he looks like he's 20, a very mature adult-like appearance.

This particular person spoils only his evil villainess sister, and says phrases that are only meant for her.

"You are more beautiful than anyone, my dear sister, only you're fit to be the Empress."

"I will put everything on the line, even my Dukedom to fulfill your wishes and desire, my dear jewel."

"I wouldn't even allow God to make you sad, much less the prince!"

His character doesn't appear that much so his voice actor isn't really that famous, but his voice is very low-toned and nice sounding. He spoils his sister and is an absolute siscon, where did the original setup of his cool and cold appearance go? That twist in the game made me laugh a lot.

But his sister, in all honestly was a stupid child, why does she think that by harassing the heroine for no apparent reason would get her the love of the Prince? You spend way too much money on clothes that are way too extravagant, to the point where I can't even see your originally beautiful appearance anymore. 

Despite everything, her brother would keep giving her everything and anything possible, and when the villainess' plans of harassing the heroine fail he say to her,

"I'm sorry it was all my fault."

And take full responsibility.

No what the hell, this isn't your fault, it's your sister's fault. 

And so I continued playing the game while laughing at the joke of the brother sister combination. Yes, as time went on I no longer cared about the prince capture target. But as I reached the final event of the sister losing control over herself and trying to kill the heroine, which resulted in the brother and sister being stripped of their titles and properties. It shocked me how 

the brother hugged the crying sister all the while consoling her for something she caused. 

Instead of feeling glad I got rid of the evil in the game, I felt sad. He tried his utmost to make his sister the Empress, but rather he was just a mere 17 year old who suffered the consequences of loving his idiotic sister.

Although I did play to the end after this event, the rest was just a painful experience. 

Maybe it was due to the underpaid slave like work I did at the corporate I worked at, or the bland unappreciated life I lived, but whenever I saw the brother unconditionally loving his sister, some part of my worn out heart healed itself.

It would have been great if the brother was a capture target. But it seems that even through searching on the net the brother was not available as a capture target through some secret route. That's why after capturing the main target, I kept on replaying the same route, watching the scenes that only included the brother and sister. 

"...I'll say this one more time, I really need to go to sleep."

But once I realized this, I couldn't sleep anymore, maybe it was the stress or depression that had set in from my lifestyle, I just wanted an escape. Any escape.

I laid down in bed at home, not being able to sleep holding my smartphone that was still running the game, as it was running, I blacked out without even noticing.

I probably died huh?

"I really am an idiot..."