The Betrothed — A Solo Journaling Game

# The Betrothed *A solo journaling game for the fiancé they were promised to before the story began. Free. Pay what you want.* --- You are engaged. It was arranged. Five years ago, or three, or ten — the point is that the contract is old. You have both grown into it. You know the tea they take in the morning. You have written them letters. Some were kind. A few were even honest. They kept them; you have seen them in a drawer. Then, at the beginning of this season, someone else arrived at court. The traveller. The exiled prince. The mysterious scholar. The low-born mercenary. The visiting priest. The returning pilot. It does not matter what they are. What matters is that your betrothed saw them across a room on a specific evening — you were there; you watched it happen — and the shape of the story bent around that meeting like a river around a new stone. **You have thirty days until the Season Ball.** You have thirty days to decide what to do with the contract that has your name on it.                           You may **uphold** it. You may **release** it. You may **reach** for something small and true. You may **sabotage** what threatens it. You will roll dice. You will keep a Regard meter. You will write a journal entry every day. On the thirtieth day, one of six things will happen. You have every advantage a story could give you: legitimacy, family, income, history. You have every advantage except the one the story is currently writing for someone else. --- ## What's inside (56 pages, one PDF) - A complete mechanic — two attributes (Duty and Grace), one Regard meter, four daily choices, five Milestone events, six endings - **Five full settings** , each with its own cast, event table, witness table, five Milestones, setting-specific Reach ideas, and an editorial still-life plate: - **The Regency Court** — England 1813. You are Edmund Halworth, second son of a viscount, engaged to Miss Georgiana Ashcombe. Colonel Sir Marcus Reed has returned from the Peninsula. - **The Silk Palace** — the imperial court of the Zhen dynasty. You are Consort Yun-Xia, the Emperor's neglected first-named consort. A western scholar has begun reading him poetry after the evening meal. - **The Merchant Republic** — Venice 1487. You are Lorenzo Contarini, promised to Isabella Morosini of the rival banking house. A Byzantine astronomer has arrived at the Doge's court. - **The Sky Duchy** — high fantasy, air-fleet houses aloft above the Third Sea. You are Jorden Vallenar, betrothed since seven to Iselte Corvin. A windrider from the free skies has taken service under the Duke. - **The Cygnus Colony** — a far-future genetic-pairing colony. You are Iven Halbrekt, paired at fourteen with Ren Adaku. A pilot from the Outbound Survey has returned. - Printable character sheet - Printable daily log template - Suggested playlist (Max Richter, Ólafur Arnalds, Nils Frahm, Ryuichi Sakamoto) - A short reading list per setting (Austen, Heyer, Priest, Chambers, Robinson) - Two-player variant — play with a friend as the Interloper, by post if you like --- ## Six endings, one of which is only good - **The Released Contract.** You let them go before they had to choose. Your name is unmarked but diminished. - **The Miracle.** Something small you did shifted a whole season. It is rare. It is available exactly when it stops mattering whether it is. - **The Signed Marriage.** The contract holds. You marry. They will always have loved someone else more. - **The Third Path.** You speak first, at the Ball. You take a post that will carry you from the capital indefinitely. - **The Quiet Path.** You reached, again and again, for something small and true. The marriage settles into a slow, real friendship. - **The Ruined Season.** Small cruelties compounded. The Interloper is gone. Your betrothed knows. They never say. You win. You find the letter in a drawer ten years later. --- Inspired by *Alone Among the Stars* (Okada), *Thousand Year Old Vampire* (Hutchings), *The Wretched* (Bissette), and — directly — *Reincarnated as the Unlovable Villainess?!* by wym _lawson. --- ## Free, forever This game is a gift from Wrong Route Games. If you play it and it lands for you, consider paying what you want, leaving a rating, or telling one other person who reads webnovels or Regency or courtly drama. That is the whole marketing plan. *Wrong Route Games publishes solo journaling games for characters the story replaced. Our other games — Route Nine, Route Zero, Route One — are available at full price on this account. The Betrothed will always be free.*