MLWP 1

MLWP

Posted by savage, Released on October 7, 2025

Chapter 1

“A letter of recommendation has arrived for student Cilia Bronyu. It’s from the Royal Academy.”

“……”

“It was sent by the Diamant Count’s household.”

The headmaster of the boarding school, Paxton, lifted his head slightly.

Standing before him was a girl with dazzling red hair and brilliant silver eyes — so strikingly beautiful that it almost stole one’s breath away. Her features were fine and distinct, but there was something… off about her.

Was this student always like this?

Perhaps it was the sharp, blade-like expression — too cold and honed for her age. Facing her felt like standing before a seasoned hunter. Shaking off the unease, Paxton asked again,

“What do you think?”

“I think it’s a great idea!”

“Julian Sarga. I wasn’t asking you.”

He’d clearly summoned only the girl, yet a boy had tagged along like a shadow. Paxton ignored the boy’s enthusiastic wave and wink, fixing his gaze back on Cilia.

He couldn’t understand why a grand noble family like the Diamants wanted this girl from a shabby boarding school. When he’d first met the Count, the man hadn’t seemed particularly interested. What had changed?

Of course, as a headmaster who’d receive a generous donation in exchange for releasing a student, he had no reason to complain — but curiosity still gnawed at him.

From what Paxton knew, the girl’s family had long fallen into ruin. She was constantly behind on tuition, withdrawn to the point of seeming eerie, and had no remarkable talents to speak of—

Bang!

Suddenly, Cilia leaned forward, planting both hands firmly on his desk. The force made Paxton hiccup involuntarily. Cilia spoke, her voice steady and low.

“I’ll go.”

“H-Hic… right? Of course, it’s a wonderful oppor—”

“For me, it’s the chance to catch that bastard.”

“…Eh?”

There was murder in her whisper.

“To drag him out and—”

Paxton didn’t know. He didn’t know that Cilia Bronyu had been waiting for this chance to go to the capital.

“…I’m not missing the chance to tear him apart.”

Nor that this wasn’t her first life.

One week earlier.

“AAAH!”

“W-What the hell?!”

Chaos broke out in the old dorm room. A bloodcurdling scream ripped through the air like a knife. Click. A candle flickered to life in the corner.

“Cilia?”

Cilia lifted her head toward the familiar voice. A girl with short ash-gray hair and lilac eyes peered at her anxiously from behind glasses.

“…Class rep?”

“Yeah, it’s me. Margaret Abby.”

Hearing her answer helped Cilia’s scattered senses settle slightly. She looked down at herself, then muttered softly,

“I’m fine. Just… sore where I got hit.”

“Who hit you?! I’ll tell the teachers—”

“You’re such a good kid. Didn’t realize that before.”

“…Huh?”

“Forget it. I’ll be fine after some sleep.”

“But—”

Cilia waved her hand dismissively, and the class rep fell silent. Margaret hesitated, but eventually blew out the candle and lay back down.

In the darkness, Cilia sat motionless, her hand running repeatedly over her chest.

“…This is screwed up.”

Crack.

Her interlaced fingers flexed until the joints popped. She stretched her arm forward. A crimson mark — a reverse triangle — glowed faintly on the back of her right hand, a magical circuit symbol.

The exact mark he had possessed.

“What the hell…?”

Moments ago, her mana had suddenly surged while she slept, shocking her awake.

“How… did this happen?”

She was in her dorm room — seventeen years old again.

But she should’ve been twenty-three. And on a battlefield.

Cilia tried to piece together what had happened.

The smell of blood thick enough to numb the nose filled the air — a crimson battlefield.

“Why?”

Her question was cut short by the hoarse whisper of the man holding a sword.

“I can’t do this anymore.”

Can’t do this? What did that mean? Who else could, if not him?

“…Illod. Why?”

Illod Heinz. The prodigy swordsman said to appear once in a thousand years. The youngest Swordmaster in history. Heir to the Grand Duchy of Heinz.

The continent’s brightest hope — idolized, adored, and envied by all. The man who was supposed to end this war…

…was the one stabbing his sword into her chest.

“Why… me?”

He wasn’t supposed to attack her. This was the Beast War. They were supposed to be fighting monsters, not people.

The war had broken out the same year Cilia enlisted at twenty. For three years, the kingdom had been hell on earth. The sight alone told the story — corpses piled high, yet beasts still swarmed in hordes.

And at the center of it all pulsed the source —

Thump. Thump.

The sound of a colossal, black, heart-shaped magic stone beating in the middle of the battlefield — the Earth’s Heart.

No one knew where it came from, but its appearance always summoned hordes of monsters. Whenever armies tried to destroy it, it vanished — only to reappear elsewhere, spreading terror across the continent.

Everyone had risked their lives to destroy it — from elite warriors like Illod, to lowly soldiers like Cilia and her comrades.

So what was he saying now?

“I can’t.”

“I saw you… earlier…”

She had seen him running toward the Earth’s Heart — she’d believed in him. Even as her comrades were slaughtered one by one, she’d kept fighting, clinging to the hope that Illod would return victorious, that he’d end it all.

That belief was the only thing keeping her alive.

Shhk.

And now the man she’d waited for drove his sword through her.

“Illod… pull yourself together…”

The pain was unbearable. His sword, Feriet, renowned as a holy blade, was glowing white — cracked in half but still burning through her chest.

It was all too absurd. Around her, everything was red — blood, smoke, the dirt beneath her feet. Her vision blurred.

Thump. Thump.

The Earth’s Heart still pulsed. Maybe that cursed stone had bewitched him.

As tears welled, Illod spoke quietly.

“So please… do it for me.”

“…Do what?”

The moment their eyes met, Cilia realized —

He was serious.

“Y-you son of a— you’re perfectly sane!”

His gaze was calm. Too calm. No one possessed by the Heart ever looked that clear-headed.

He was pristine — hair tied neatly, white armor unsoiled, black cape still immaculate — in a battlefield drenched in blood and filth.

“You bastard…”

Heat flared behind her eyes.

He hadn’t even fought. Everyone had died to give him a chance — believing their hero would end the war.

All those lives.

All those who’d fought to save the world — and wanted to live.

Her jaw clenched so hard her tongue bled.

She wanted to scream, to punch that face. But before she could, someone else screamed — a monster.

Screeech!

She looked up. A golden-haired man was plummeting from the sky, impaling a flying beast as they fell.

No…

Her whisper went unheard. She couldn’t save him. Couldn’t save anyone. The hero who should’ve saved them had turned his back.

“You damn bastard…”

Her vision dimmed. Clarity flooded in — instinct told her this was the end. The moment before a burned-out candle flickers its brightest.

“Hey.”

Cilia gritted her teeth and gripped the blade impaling her. Blood dripped from her hands, but she didn’t care. Holding him there — she spat out the only words she wanted to say.

“You’re dead.”

Looking into those same silver eyes as hers, she hissed,

“I’ll come for you. Even if I have to crawl back as a ghost… I’ll hunt you down.”

“…Yeah.”

Don’t forgive me.

She thought she heard him say that — softly, wetly — but she couldn’t be sure.

Because the next moment, everything went dark.

Cilia Bronyu, twenty-three-year-old soldier, died that day.

Or so she thought.

Until she woke up like this.

Sitting on her bed in the dorm, she could hear the breathing of others. She wasn’t alone — and the realization hit like ice in her veins.

“I don’t know what’s going on,” she muttered.