This Isn't Supposed to Happen?

I’d been pushing myself hard even before I entered the Academy.

I thought that no matter how meager my talent was, if I worked hard enough, I’d eventually reach it.

That vague belief I’d held as a child gradually faded as I grew older and enrolled in the Academy.

Talent was always an obstacle, and no matter how hard I worked, it was impossible even to catch up to those ahead of me.

I couldn’t understand how talent could make a person feel so powerless.

I lamented again and again that hard work wasn’t enough, but when all my efforts came to nothing, I began to hate the world.

One day, when my heart was filled with nothing but hatred,

I happened to pass through a hallway and meet her, as if by fate.

Her name was Agnes, and she was the one who turned my dark sky blue again.

She stood on a level far beyond mine, yet before I knew it, I was following in her footsteps...