Over the past few months, I tirelessly trained day and night to increase my mana capacity and magic skills.
As of now, I have around the same mana capacity as an imperial royal guard.
I can't lie, I'm very proud of myself for achieving such a feat in such a short amount of time. As expected of my genius, however, that's nowhere near the inhuman mana capacity the story's protagonist has.
To say Aaron has a mana capacity is a lie to begin with. There is no limit to the amount of mana he can use.
Goddammit, Mr. Author, why would you make such a broken ability anyways? Then again, who wouldn't make their self-insert protagonist stupidly overpowered? That aside, I should now be able to fulfill my goal… hopefully.
It has been five months since Stella made her debut as my father's second wife. As stated in the novel, after the natural outrage from the masses, the kingdom became relatively peaceful after that.
I'll never understand how such a situation manages to quell the masses, but I'll just chalk it up to bad writing or something.
However, this peace would not last long because, in seven months, Stella will die. Well, not if I have anything to say about it.
Currently, I am in the midst of trying to escape the view of the royal maids. It essentially feels like a prison here.
So unbearably boring.
This is essentially a small classroom with the purpose of teaching young royals, such as myself, how to read, write, and other forms of etiquette.
Normally, Stella would be here to be teaching us, but alas, she is occupied with noble stuff or whatever. Anyways, I, being the magnificent genius that I am, had already learned all that good stuff and am essentially stuck here to be babysat against my will.
As I was finally about to leave the room, a maid with long dark hair tied back in a bun spotted me.
She walked over without any trace of emotion and picked me up, "Where do you think you're going, Young Master? Certainly not to the library again?"
Damn! The head maid!
I have been sneaking into the library for months to deepen my knowledge of magic, swordsmanship, and my understanding of space and time magic.
However, due to the repetitive nature of my actions, I have become somewhat predictable in the eyes of the castle staff. Unfortunately, this means someone like the head maid would be keeping watchful eyes on me. And she could easily catch a toddler like me attempting to slip away.
"It seems the prince is trying to escape again," one maid remarked.
"Not this time since Head Maid Sophie is here," another chimed in.
"Indeed."
Head Maid Sophie was a former commander of the elite forces of the royal army. She made contributions together with my father during the battle against the Demon King.
As per her wish, after the war, she became the head maid of the royal family. Her skill in swordsmanship is practically unmatched by any other woman in the kingdom.
The two other maids nodded as Sophie placed me at a desk next to a little girl with light brown hair with blue and red dual colored eyes. She was diligently studying the contents of some book.
Wow, it seems Sophie doesn't want me to leave. She even made the point to put me next to Cassandra, the 2nd princess.
Cassandra was born as twins with the 4th prince, Casey. Cassandra is around two years older than me and, unlike her other half, is a real stickler for the rules.
As I thought that, she looked up from her book and spoke sternly, "If you leave without permission, I'll be forced to report you to Ms. Sophie."
Well, as stern as a six year old can sound anyway. It was with this uptight personality that Cassandra eventually became student council president of Knightford Academy and commander of the elite troops of the country.
She was often described to come off as rude to the protagonist, giving him a hard time by calling him to the student council room to discipline him.
This constant bullying got on his nerves, and he eventually developed a strong animosity towards the princess. Unbeknownst to him, the princess had actually harbored feelings for him and took every opportunity she could to speak with him. Unfortunately, he never saw through her act and grew to hate her without understanding the meaning behind her actions.
In the war against the Azure kingdom in the distant future, she is murdered on the battlefield by Aaron himself. With her final breaths, she had finally confessed her love for him. Unfortunately, Aaron was too far gone to accept her feelings, and she died without love.
I frowned when thinking back at Cassandra's fate in the novel.
Reading through the arc made me want to die several times. I disagreed with many of Aaron's choices as they were awful and often led to bad outcomes. However, this was what made the novel so unique to me. Shame I'm about to go and fuck that up.
My plans in this world are quite simple. Prevent or stop events unnecessary to my desired 'happy' ending. Step two, grow up and become strong enough to rival or even beat the protagonist. Step three, make the dumbass protagonist understand human emotion along with the feelings some of these girls have for him, and naturally I'll snatch a few for myself of course. And my final step, live peacefully in the happy ending I created.
Truly perfection. If I could hear the readers of this story, they would surely praise me. But to do that, I need to be strong enough to prevent the first unnecessary event, Stella's death. But the question of how to get out of this situation keeps occurring.
Well actually, I had been preparing for this day.
My mana capacity should be high enough to try this. I looked at my wrist to see a faint glowing symbol, like a wristwatch. I began to spin the hands on the watch around five minutes ago.
The glowing must have caught the attention of Casandra, because looked over from her book and began speaking, "Hey, what are you-"
Before she could finish her sentence, I hit the watch and time began to flow backward. The sensation made me incredibly nauseous. I knew this would feel awful, but I did not expect it to this extent.
About a week ago, I set up a time barrier in this room to test out my time abilities. Sadly, I never got the chance to utilize it until now. Time continued to flow backward until it finally stopped. I was back near the door. The Head Maid hadn't noticed me yet and I still had a bit of mana to spare.
"This time, I'll take it easy," I whispered to myself.
There wasn't much I could say due to being exhausted after the reversing time, but I still managed to say what was on my mind. I looked towards the door and saw the hallway outside. I immediately teleported there without anyone noticing.
I let out a gasp as the teleportation nearly drained me completely.
I couldn't immediately teleport to the library due to using a large amount of mana reversing time, but this is enough. I started making my way toward the library.
I managed to make my way to the library unseen. I entered the library and quickly made my way toward the magic section. I stared at the large shelves full of books about various subjects. They must've been taller than 20 feet.
I stood at the area I left off last time and began picking out books to take over to the table. Because of my weak body, I could only move one or two books at a time, so it took longer than expected.
I finally finished transporting the books to the table and climbed up onto a chair. I picked out a book that had been titled, Advanced Spatial Magic, and began reading through it. I have always loved reading.
I spent most of my previous life reading on my own. I didn't have any parents to care for me, or a girlfriend to love me, so I relied on books to find these missing pieces in my life.
My days were usually spent studying or reading novels. Even though I was an orphan, I received top marks at school. I even earned a scholarship to a university. But I was always so empty inside. Immersing myself in fantasy and fiction could only do so much to fill this emptiness I had.
In the end, I spent my whole life desperately trying to fill my empty heart with books, hoping someone would reach out to me. Ah, how depressing.
As I immersed myself in the books, time quickly flew by. Before I knew it, it had become dark outside. Just then, I heard the sound of the door opening. I had been at the back of the library and could not see who it was, but I was certain that I knew who it was.
"Young prince, it is time for bed."
"Coming!" I exclaimed cheerfully, ignoring the rules of the library.
I hopped out of my chair and began walking toward the voice. I didn't need to put the books up since they would most likely be put away by someone else. Plus, I had already finished reading through all of them.
As I got closer to where the voice was coming from, I began to see the figure of a woman in a white nightgown with beautifully flowing purple hair. She looked at me with a warm smile.
"You come here every day. Are you reading, or are you just hiding from the maids because they can't come in here?" She asked while kneeling down to meet my eyes.
"That's a secret," I replied playfully with my hands behind my back.
She let out a small chuckle at my reply before nodding and rubbing the top of my head. I needed to get close to Stella. To do that, I played the role of a boy with a playful and kind attitude.
Not to say that I haven't been enjoying myself. This was the first time I have ever experienced having an actual parental figure. It was a brand new experience, and I wasn't about to lose it to some racist assassins.
"Come, young prince. I must take you to your quarters." She said while standing back up.
"Kay"
She reached her hand out toward me. I grabbed it and we began walking out of the library.
In the novel, Stella was Raine's caretaker and mother figure. He had grown very attached to her and was heartbroken when she died. As time went on, he learned to move past her death by drowning himself in pleasure from women until he came across Aaron at the academy.
Aaron was the only son of Lurian Leonhart, the man who planned the death of Stella, and thus Raine began tormenting Aaron. He used any method he could think of to make his life at the academy as miserable as possible.
While his anger was somewhat understandable, his constant abuse of the protagonist became rather annoying.
Speaking of the protagonist, he should have discovered his system ability.
It would've been nice if I had an ability like that, but oh well. I was lucky enough to gain the 'speed reading' skill and the 'quick learner' skill during the time I spent studying. My past life might have influenced the acquisition of skills as well.
We finally made it to the room I was living in. Stella opened the door and began to walk me to my bed.
She helped me climb into the bed and tucked me under the covers. I had still not gotten used to being tucked in like this. She gave me a warm smile and patted me on the head.
"Good night little prince."
"Night Auntie Stella."
In the face of my utter adorableness, Stella couldn't help but blush slightly. Seems my words caused critical damage. The faint redness on her gray skin was becoming more and more noticeable, so she got up quickly and started to rush out of the room.
Noticing her reaction, I commenced another attack, "See you tomorrow Auntie Stella"
"Eeeek." I heard a small squeak from her as she rushed out and closed the door.
Do you see what I did there? That was a lethal attack using the immensely adorable face I got from two of the most beautiful people in the kingdom. My amazingness is just too overwhelming.
I rolled over in the large bed and flipped the soft pillow over to the cooler side as I placed one arm underneath. Once I got into a comfortable position, I began to doze off. As I thought, my body must be exhausted after using so much mana today.
Oh well, I better get used to this, because I'll be doing this every day now.
I shut my eyes and fell fast asleep. I have to get up early tomorrow if I want to be able to get the amount of studying I want.