Male Lead, Don’t Follow Me! - Chapter 1

“The male lead is a son of a b*tch!”

I took a deep breath, clasped my hands together, and shouted towards the front.

The voice I drew from my core, loud enough to clear my insides, echoed through the forest for all to hear.

“The male lead is a son of a b*tch!”

“The male lead is a son of a b*tch!”

“The male lead is a son of a…!”

“Son of a…!”

“Son of a….”

“Son….”

Thinking my voice might have been too loud, I quickly turned around, but no one was there. Well, this place was practically an abandoned forest anyway.

“Ah, that feels better.”

Although it looked somewhat eerie, it was a lush forest with densely packed trees and a mountain behind.

It was known for frequent appearances of magical beasts, but the reality was the opposite.

Untouched by human hands, rare wildflowers bloomed here, and there were many rare herbs that could be used for medicine.

I regularly came here to collect rare herbs.

Selling the herbs provided quite a decent income.

The reason I needed money was to buy magic scrolls to protect myself.

The spirit power in my body was so weak that it couldn’t protect me.

Then why did I need scrolls to protect myself, you ask?

According to the plot, I was destined to be one of the many ill-fated individuals surrounding the female lead, doomed to perish due to some ill-conceived action.

Kiara Rowell.

A supporting character in the novel who meets her end, unable to escape her predetermined fate.

 That’s right, that’s me.

Quite literally, I exist within a novel. Unlike some web novels where characters have traffic accidents and wake up in a story, I simply regained memories of my past life naturally.

If you’re wondering how I accepted this so readily, I’d say it’s wise to quickly adapt to reality in order to survive.

It wasn’t really about adapting since this was where I had always lived, but accepting my situation was an incredibly challenging task.

Long ago, I had abandoned any desire to become the protagonist of a story.

I didn’t even wish to meet a wonderful prince from a fairy tale and fall in love.

I was born as the only daughter of an ordinary count’s family, living a life of sufficient love and comfort.

“And yet, why! Why do I have to die a dog’s death by standing out!”

They say it’s a regret story, but the author who wrote this must be crazy.

The male lead, Duke Bishwaltz, was a character who was cold and would stop at nothing for his own benefit.

He only saw the female lead’s abilities and used her to keep her by his side, only to develop possessiveness later on.

He called it love, but he must have surely misunderstood the word.

The female lead in the novel was my best friend, Ephelia Kirin.

Ephelia could summon spirits at will and was excellent in many ways.

I liked her too. She was a friend who got along very well with me.

“But! Why! Her of all people! Why!”

I gritted my teeth as I dug into the innocent ground with a shovel and dug up herbs.

If you were to place Bishwaltz and Ephelia on a scale, it would undoubtedly tip in Ephelia’s favor.

It wasn’t as if I intentionally sought to capture the male protagonist’s attention.

 In the original story, an incident occurs where I have no choice but to intervene on Ephelia’s behalf.

Although I was labeled a spirit user, it was merely a title; I hadn’t even properly awakened my abilities.

The sub-male lead, the Tower Master, isn’t in his right mind either and starts a war to possess Ephelia.

It’s literally the villainization of the sub-male.

Ephelia steps up to stop the war caused by her, and all the spirit users help her confront the Tower Master.

‘Does this even make sense? Starting a war, this place must be crazy.’

To summarize, Kiara ultimately finds herself indebted to Ephelia during that conflict.

The war concluded swiftly due to Ephelia’s interventions, but the repercussions were substantial.

When Ephelia gets hurt, Bishwaltz goes berserk like a mad dog.

He tries to seal Ephelia’s powers so that she can’t act as a spirit user anymore.

In the end, I died opposing Bishwaltz alongside the spirit users, trying to repay the debt of gratitude I owed Ephelia for saving my life.

The Kiara in the original story wasn’t particularly righteous, but it seems she wasn’t a coward either.

Didn’t I say it? The male lead is a son of a b*tch.

The female lead had to be his and his alone, and the crazy male lead started eliminating everything around her.

He left nothing, not friends, not family, not anything.

And today, I ended up encountering such a bastard at the banquet hall.

***

The banquet begins with spirit users summoning their spirits to bestow blessings upon many.

Among them, Ephelia stood out the most.

As the spirits she summoned flew through the air, blessing people, everyone smiled happily.

“As expected, Lady Kirin’s spirit power is amazing!”

“My heart already feels warmer. It seems to be growing stronger and stronger.”

The blessing was one of the most important rituals for everyone. Ephelia, who was in charge of it, was an indispensable figure here.

‘Alright, I’ll succeed this time for sure!’

In the novel, it only mentioned that I lacked spirit power, without much additional information.

Being quite positive and persistent, I didn’t give up and attempted to summon again today.

Crash! Bang!

Failing to summon a spirit, I ended up causing trouble again.

“Is it Lady Lowell again this time?”

“At this rate, she might have to give up being a spirit user.”

Unlike Ephelia, I struggled quite a bit with summoning due to my weak spirit power.

It would be one thing if I could summon properly, but today it’s a tree again!

Perhaps due to my feeble power, instead of spirits, occasionally sacred objects with spirit power would respond to my call.

In other words, I couldn’t summon spirits, but similar entities were forcibly summoned to me.

Everyone was surprised and looked at me because of the flower tree that suddenly appeared in the center.

To others, it might just look like a flower tree, but it was a sacred object.

‘It’s better if I’m the only one who knows.’

Compared to spirits, it didn’t have much blessing power or any particularly noticeable abilities, so I kept quiet.

‘But it’s way too big!’

If it had to be summoned, how nice it would have been if it were a small flower or something pretty like a butterfly.

Summoning a large tree in the banquet hall was nothing short of embarrassing.

As I stood there dazed, my face red, looking at what I had done, a warm breeze settled in between the banquet hall.

When the wind spirit summoned by Ephelia gently shook the flower tree, flower petals scattered, creating a spectacular scene in the banquet hall.

“Oh my! It’s so beautiful. It feels like we’re in the middle of spring.”

Thanks to that, people’s expressions quickly brightened, improving the atmosphere of the banquet hall.

Cleaning up after me was always Ephelia’s job like this.

‘What on earth is the problem?’

At this rate, it might really be better to quit being a spirit user.

But if I quit being a spirit user, I wouldn’t be able to stay by Ephelia’s side, which was troublesome.

Having caused trouble, I obediently stayed in a corner of the banquet hall as punishment.

When the ceremony ended, perhaps concerned about me, Ephelia came over to comfort me.

Up to that point, it was fine. No, I can’t say it was good, but it wasn’t a bad day.

It wasn’t the first or second time I made mistakes, and I had expected that much.

Even in the novel, it was often expressed that I made mistakes.

But why, at that moment when I was linking arms with Ephelia and drinking wine, did we have to run into Bishwaltz of all people?

Is this what they call the effect of coincidence?

The devastation at that moment…!

Fortunately, he hadn’t fallen for Ephelia yet, but knowing all the facts, I was so tense that cold sweat ran down my back.

That’s because I had committed a sin…

Maybe it’s because I’ve been secretly cursing so much, but my heart was pounding as if it would burst, feeling oddly guilty. I should probably refrain for a while.

“Hello, Duke Bishwaltz.”

Bishwaltz nodded at Ephelia’s greeting.

Contrary to his seemingly uninterested attitude, his curious eyes couldn’t leave Ephelia’s side.

“A spirit user……”

His eyes gleamed strangely. Sensing danger, I abruptly stepped between them.

‘Where do you think you’re looking?’