Chapter 78: Prince Maker (3)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 78: Prince Maker (3)
To be honest, if I wanted to avoid this, all I had to do was tell her we should end our romantic relationship.
That would solve everything.
But if I did that… I wouldn't be able to use Daisy for the things that were about to happen.
Even if I accepted that this world was a RoFan novel and that incidents happening around Daisy was an inescapable fate, if I could just secure a bit of her cooperation, I could guide the direction of those events toward my own goals.
I had already gained a lot of results through that method.
If I could still deceive her, that would be one thing, but I was certain that Daisy, who had already caught on to everything, wouldn't be fooled again.
That was why I couldn't help but agonize over the decision.
“……”
Since the Royal Family wasn't going to order me to drop out of the Academy and return to Leon immediately, I had to choose, considering I’d be spending at least three more years in Academy life.
To renew the contract, or not.
At that crossroads of choice.
“Three months.”
In the end, I had no choice but to wave the white flag.
“One year.”
I tried to proceed with the negotiation, but it seemed the initiative had already shifted to the other side.
“Three months after school starts.”
With this, I was conceding half of the first semester.
“One year.”
However, Daisy was as steadfast as a mobster shouting for a fixed price.
“The first semester of sophomore year…”
“One year!”
Why was she so obsessed with one year?
When I asked her about it.
“Because my intuition is screaming it!”
Daisy ended her explanation with that single word: intuition.
“…Intuition?”
I wanted to ask what kind of nonsense that was, but this was the intuition of a RoFan heroine.
While there were cases where the heroine had poor intuition, for some reason, I felt like Daisy’s was quite sharp.
Well, asking Violet would be the most certain way to know, though.
“What will you do?”
Daisy wanted an answer right now.
“Could you give me a little time to think?”
“No.”
She was a difficult opponent.
She forced her desired goal and didn't even give me time to think of a scheme.
It was a move she could only pull off because she knew I was the one in a bind.
The RoFan heroine is terrifying!
“…Half a year?”
“Do you want me to just ruin that plan of yours?”
Was it just my imagination? I felt a sense of intimidation, as if she would ruin not just this plan, but all my future plans as well.
“…One year. In exchange, include the Magic Sword rental service I mentioned before.”
“Deal!”
In the end, I had no choice but to submit.
“So, how am I supposed to help?”
Having successfully negotiated, Daisy asked about the Tsukishima Operation with a beaming smile.
“Ah, well.”
Usually, a plan would be very complex and require a lot of time to explain.
But our Tsukishima Operation was very simple.
“It hasn't been that long, but there have been several incidents at the Academy, right?”
“There were.”
“If someone asks how those were resolved… just say it was all thanks to Prince Esid.”
“…Huh?”
It wasn't very difficult to make Daisy understand what sounded like nonsense to her.
“Just say Prince Esid solved everything.”
“…Isn't that a scam?”
“No. It’s a fact that Prince Esid was present during most of those incidents.”
To put it precisely, it was a consolidation of credit. Or perhaps, an exaggeration.
“Will this work?”
“It’ll work.”
In my past life, there was a four-character idiom called Three Make a Tiger.
It meant that three people could create a tiger where there was none—that even if there was no evidence, if multiple people said the same thing, it would be accepted as the truth.
“I-I guess so, but…”
As for me, I was someone who vied for the top spots in the Swordsmanship Department and was a regular at the training grounds, so I had a fair amount of popularity.
Daisy was the fatally charming golden capybara who had seduced all those RoFan male leads even when she had nothing, and now she was the Saintess, a true power player of the Holy Kingdom.
And our collaborator, Uncle Aeryun, was a very suspicious person who claimed to be our age despite that face, but because of that, the students treated him with caution.
If all these people spoke with one voice, saying, “Did you forget? That incident back then was all thanks to Prince Esid!” it wasn't impossible for everyone to perceive it that way.
“Of course, the more helpers we have, the better.”
It would be great if Boradori and the RoFan male leads could help.
I just had to order Boradori, and for the other RoFan male leads, Daisy’s request would be more than enough.
Considering their influence, if they all spoke up together, they could create not just a tiger, but a dragon.
“Ugh… I feel like I’m tricking people.”
“Why feel that way now? Our romantic relationship was a deception from the start.”
At my look that asked how the person who just extended that deception for another year could say such a thing, Daisy’s attitude did a complete 180-degree flip.
“Hmm. Now that I think about it, everything did go well thanks to Esid!”
Seeing her shift her stance immediately, it seemed she understood perfectly.
She was capable of executing the Tsukishima Operation flawlessly.
“But there’s something a bit vague.”
As if something had occurred to her, Daisy suddenly frowned and asked.
“Isn't it… a bit strange to suddenly say, ‘Everything was thanks to Esid!’ out of nowhere?”
She was right.
Unless someone asked about the events of that time, suddenly saying, “By the way, that incident was all thanks to Prince Esid!” would definitely be strange.
“You don't have to worry about that.”
It would be strange if we brought it up out of the blue.
But if the other person asked first, it would be natural.
“The environment for them to ask first has already been prepared.”
The groundwork for that was already being laid by Uncle Aeryun and Taylor.
“Which means!”
At that, Daisy narrowed her eyes and pouted.
“You just assumed I would participate, didn't you, Adam?”
“……”
This is why sharp RoFan heroines are such a pain.
…Seriously.
A member of the Imperial Family, the one closest to becoming the next Emperor, has been dispatched to investigate a certain incident that occurred in the Rias Territory!
The secret spread of such a rumor was quite sudden.
“Oh, I’ve already been questioned.”
“It was real?!”
Thanks to the testimony of Adam, who had actually been questioned, no one doubted it.
If rumors started circulating without a witness, it would be strange.
But once one person appeared who had actually gone through it, people naturally tended to think, ‘Ah, so that’s why those rumors were going around—other people must have been questioned too!’
“What did they ask?”
Naturally, the students of the Swordsmanship Department flocked to Adam to ask about the investigation.
Part of it was curiosity, as meeting the person closest to the Emperor of the Empire was not something that happened easily to ordinary Academy students.
But it was also because the fact that Adam, a foreign noble, had been questioned meant that they, as nobles of the Empire, were also highly likely to be questioned.
So, to avoid freezing up during an Imperial investigation, they had no choice but to bombard Adam with questions to prepare their expected answers.
“Hmm…”
Having anticipated all of this and worked hard to lay the bait, I pretended to think for a moment, agonizing over it for a long time to draw everyone’s attention.
“First, there was that terrorist incident at the beginning of the Academy. I actually saw the criminal named Silence back then.”
“Ah, right.”
“You achieved quite a lot of credit then, didn't you?”
“It was impressive. I heard he even neutralized McGregor, the Head Professor of the Magic Department.”
“As expected of Adam. You’re the pride of our Swordsmanship Department!”
Seeing the students praising me and urging me to continue as they recalled the events of that time, I chuckled and waved my hand dismissively.
“It was nothing. Back then… it was all thanks to Prince Esid…”
As if reminiscing about those days, I sold Esid’s name with a wistful voice.
“Huh?”
“Prince Esid?”
At that, the other students tilted their heads.
Their expressions asked why Prince Esid’s name was coming up here…
“Did you forget? Even though a wanted criminal like Silence invaded the Academy, there were almost no casualties and the damage was minimal. And the fact that we were able to safely subjugate that great villain Silence… it was all thanks to Prince Esid.”
“…Wait, was it?”
“Hmm… back then, we were just taking our midterms…”
Seeing the students groaning and frowning as if they couldn't quite remember, I let out a small, deep sigh.
“Think about the people who received commendations for helping everyone back then. Who was there?”
When turning a lie into truth, the best way is to sandwich truths in between.
In that sense, the reason I was confident in this Tsukishima Operation was…
“Ah, right!”
“It was a hot topic because most of them were from the Dessert Club!”
“I completely forgot about that!”
The fact was that the RoFan male lead party actually had a hand in most of the incidents.
And most students remembered Esid, the Prince of the Empire and the most likely male lead candidate in the early part of the original work, as their representative.
Furthermore.
“I didn't know there was such a story behind it.”
“We didn't see it ourselves.”
The fact that no students had directly experienced the incident also played a huge role.
It was only natural.
When such an incident occurs, a student should run away; who in their right mind would step forward to resolve a terrorist attack?
Prince Ellen and those RoFan male lead bastards were the crazy ones. The general students were the normal ones.
“At that time, thanks to Prince Esid’s perfect command, we were able to win a fight we couldn't have won.”
“Just what kind of command was it…”
“Uh. Well. Something like, ‘Asran, swing your sword!’?”
“……You could really win with just that?”
“It was a realm of work that’s hard to explain in words, something ordinary talents can't understand!”
“I see!”
I made a momentary slip, but this wasn't the brain-using Magic Department; it was the non-brain-using Swordsmanship Department.
Generally, if you just gloss over it, they tend to accept it and move on.
That was why I was spreading the rumor here first.
Because.
“I heard everything was thanks to Prince Esid’s help?”
“Was it? Where’d you hear that?”
“I heard it from someone who was actually active in the Swordsmanship Department.”
The rumors spread that way naturally reached the Magic Department.
“Who said that?”
“Everyone I meet says so.”
When more than a hundred people said the same thing, far beyond just three.
“Is that so?”
“…We were all knocked out back then anyway.”
“Damn that Silence bastard… But hey, you’ve been meeting people from the Swordsmanship Department a lot lately?”
“There are a lot of dungeon exploration assignments since we came to Rias, right? I met some while teaming up with the Swordsmanship Department… there are some decent people there.”
“…Really?”
“Want me to introduce you?”
“Is he handsome?”
“You shallow brat… his body was good, though.”
“Look who’s talking, you only care about bodies.”
The Magic Department also just accepted it and moved on.
Thus, the Magic Department students also naturally came to think that Prince Esid’s help was significant in resolving the incidents.
Once the rumor spread like that, a reverse rumor began to circulate: “I heard a rumor from the Magic Department…”
And just like that.
“Prince Esid, thank you.”
“……?”
“To think everything was thanks to you, Your Highness.”
“……?”
“It’s late, but I wanted to express my gratitude…”
“……???”
Esid’s Truman Show had begun.