The Things That Approach (2)
“U-um… there might be people with multiple questions, so if you pressure them like this….”
“Pressure? Me? Did I pressure anyone?”
— No!!! —
When Julia turned around and asked, the entire class answered in perfect unison as if they had rehearsed it. A few students even squeezed their eyes shut at Marei’s behavior.
“Well… still, if that’s how you felt, I apologize. I won’t interfere anymore, so feel free to ask Pawen whatever you like.”
The students looked utterly bewildered by Julia’s reaction, which was the complete opposite of what they had expected. She crossed her arms, pushing up her chest, and leaned against the wall as if she had washed her hands of the entire situation.
A timid female student hesitantly raised her hand.
“Um… aren’t you the person who was with Philia the princess yesterday?”
“Pardon? You mean Philia the Blood?”
“Yeah… the princess of the principality….”
Marei nodded at the girl who kept glancing nervously at Julia. The girl who had just asked the question clasped both hands over her mouth, eyes sparkling with delight.
“What’s your relationship with the princess?”
“Huh? We’re… friends, I suppose? As for questions about Philia….”
“Please refrain from asking questions that make the individual uncomfortable. There are about twenty minutes left, so feel free to ask anything you like. I still have work to do, so I’ll take my leave. That concludes the morning assembly. Gilia?”
When Marei stumbled over a difficult question, Julia clapped her hands lightly and brought the assembly to a smooth close. At her call, a girl with brown hair tied in a ponytail shot up from her seat.
“Yes! Class, attention! Salute the teacher!”
“Thank you~”
Once the students’ greeting, led by the girl named Gilia, was finished, Julia gave a small nod, patted Marei’s shoulder twice, and left the classroom. Marei sat down in the seat closest to the blackboard—the one Julia had personally assigned. The students immediately began swarming toward him.
“Are you really dating the princess?”
“When did you meet her?”
“Is there an engagement between the Pawen family and the Blood family?”
Questions about Philia poured out without pause. Since Marei knew almost nothing about her, he could only trail off with vague answers like “I’m not sure,” causing the direction of the questions to scatter wildly.
“I heard a rumor you transferred in. What’s the story behind that?”
“Well, it’s a bit… um….”
“What classes are you taking?”
Whenever a difficult question came up, a few quick-witted students swiftly changed the subject.
“You’re taking Lee Ha-eun’s class, right? I heard it has a terrible reputation. Are you okay?”
“I heard she’s actually a really good person….”
“A senior told me she makes you run the entire time and brutally torments you under the guise of sparring. Is that true?”
“U-um… I wouldn’t know. I haven’t experienced that yet….”
Marei thought that if there was a cheerful older-sister type named Lee Ha-eun, she would probably be quite an interesting person.
“With a schedule this packed, do you even have time to study?”
“W-well….”
The same story Celine Ferdinand had told him came up again.
“Isn’t it too much to take both Illien and Idrien’s classes at the same time?”
“Pardon?”
“I mean Elemental Magic and the Theory and Practice of White Magic Basics.”
“Ah… yeah….”
Marei had simply followed the schedule Labella had made and Illien had recommended, so he still had no idea what was wrong with it. Just like Celine had been shocked, his classmates stared at his hellish timetable with open disbelief.
“You need to be careful. If you don’t maintain proper grades, you can’t graduate… There are quite a few people who stay for four or five years. Usually those people are….”
A frightening story that Celine hadn’t mentioned suddenly popped up. Wasn’t graduation supposed to be possible as long as you completed the curriculum? That was the common sense Marei knew. But seeing how worried his classmates looked while staring at the reckless transfer student’s schedule, it seemed his common sense was somehow different from reality.
“Icher… that person has some dangerous rumors going around. There are stories that she used forbidden magic during the Unification War. It’d probably be best to avoid her class if you can….”
“Forbidden magic…?”
The girl nodded lightly. Marei had simply asked because he genuinely didn’t know what forbidden magic was, but the girl seemed to interpret his dazed reaction as confirmation that he had used it.
“Where did you come from? Come on, tell us the truth. Most of us here didn’t exactly come through proper channels anyway~”
“I-I was near the barrier.”
“The barrier? That place is actually really nice… I’m jealous~”
Marei had been talking about the small village where he used to live, but the girl who responded seemed to imagine snow-covered mountains or a resort. The conversation felt increasingly off-track.
“If you’re from the Pawen family, you must have met His Majesty the Emperor in person, right?”
“Only on television… Ah, I did see him once in person when the principality sent a congratulatory delegation.”
The topic suddenly shifted to the Emperor. Though they looked clearly disappointed by Marei’s lack of knowledge, the conversation quickly moved on.
“What kind of person is Labella, the Director of the Inspection Bureau?”
“Do you live with Labella?”
Although he had come to Valter as Labella’s adopted son, the other students didn’t seem to know that. He answered as best he could, but the endless barrage of questions was starting to feel overwhelming.
“Alright, alright. The transfer student can barely get a word in. Everyone back to your seats!”
The brown-haired girl who suddenly stepped in caused the others to reluctantly return to their places after giving half-hearted answers. She was a girl whose black eyes felt both strangely familiar and oddly unfamiliar. She seemed to be the class president—the same girl who had led the salute to Julia earlier.
“My name is Gilia Marita.”
She was slightly taller than Marei. If he lifted his head just a little, their eyes would meet. Her hair was tied in a neat ponytail with bangs left out in front. She had thick eyebrows and a straight, elegant nose.
“I’m Marei de Pawen.”
When Gilia extended her hand, Marei instinctively shook it. Despite her soft-looking skin, her palm was covered in hard calluses. Perhaps she trained in martial arts—her grip was surprisingly strong for her appearance.
“I heard Labella had taken on a successor. So it was you?”
“Ah… yes.”
Adopted son.Gilia mouthed the words silently. Marei flinched in surprise, stared at her blankly for a moment, then nodded since it was the truth. Although she held the title of Governor-General of Valter, Marei had no way of knowing the inner workings of the Pawen family that essentially owned the territory.
Or rather, there were far too many captivating female bodies craving the young boy’s affection every single day for him to pay attention to such things. No—perhaps lust was the more accurate word than affection. Seeing them shake their hips like beasts in heat in front of the boy was a sight so surreal that no one could possibly feel grounded in reality.
And Labella, the sole heir of the Pawen family, was also educating(?) him as his adoptive mother, so it was accurate to say he simply didn’t have the bandwidth to care.
“Since we’re from a distant branch family, you might not remember. Anyway, let’s get along from now on. Marei.”
She was a strong-willed girl. Gilia Marita, standing at the crossroads between “girl” and “woman,” still hadn’t let go of his hand and was slowly shaking it up and down.
Her lips were smiling, but her eyes were not smiling at all. The black eyes scanning him made Marei shiver. Unlike the loving gazes from Labella and the other women, this one felt strangely unpleasant.
“I didn’t know I had any relatives.”
Black eyes. It wasn’t an extremely rare color, but it wasn’t common either. Even though this was their first meeting, the mention of being relatives gave Marei a strange sense of closeness.
Of course Labella was far closer in terms of blood relation, but to a young boy, a beautiful working adult felt impossibly distant. The fact that they were in the same school and same class instantly shortened that psychological distance.
Of course, the boy currently forcing healthy loads of baby seed deep into his aunt(?)’s womb every day, making her beg for it like a cheap whore while receiving all sorts of service, was not thinking any of that.
“I was surprised too. I never expected Labella to adopt a son. Well, I knew Lady Mari had a child, but….”
Since he knew almost nothing about Gilia, Marei simply smiled politely. If they really were relatives, why hadn’t Labella said anything about Gilia? The question crossed his mind for a moment, but since he had been struggling to make friends, the thought that he might finally have one made it seem unimportant.
“Have you met the Governor-General?”
“You mean Loren? Mother— I mean, Labella said we should go greet her together when she has time. She’s been really busy lately….”
The Governor-General of Valter. Marei had been curious to meet the dragon known by many names, including the Green Dragon, Loren de Pawen. But since Labella was truly too busy to even find time to see Loren, he understood.
Until her young master arrived, she had to rush home, greet him with a welcoming kiss, spend the entire afternoon filling her empty womb with thick, sticky semen, and then service him with her entire body during a light shower(?) right before dinner. She truly had a mountain of work.
On top of that, a new sex pet named Illien Ksakru had recently joined them, so for Labella, who was desperately trying to secure even a little alone time with Marei, meeting Loren could be postponed.
Of course, the more accurate statement would be that she found Marei displeasing and was deliberately stalling, but the boy and girl sitting on the bench had no way of knowing that….
“I’m jealous. I tried contacting her because I wanted to meet her too, but I never even got a reply.”
Gilia Marita let out a small laugh. The corners of her mouth were lifted, but her eyes still weren’t smiling. For some reason it felt self-mocking, so Marei awkwardly scratched his cheek.
“The food here is pretty good, right? The taste is one thing, but the Valter School cafeteria is excellent in terms of price too.”
“Ah, yes….”
There was a lunchbox in his bag filled with Labella’s love, but Marei couldn’t bring himself to refuse and ended up eating with Gilia. That was how they ended up sitting on a bench, chatting about various things.
“How do you like the school? It’s very different from a normal school, isn’t it?”
“Ah, yes. The way you choose your own classes, and how diverse they are, and….”
He answered her various questions diligently, but to Marei—who couldn’t exactly be called a country bumpkin—the culture and technology of Valter were still all so new and amazing that he could only give vague answers.
Even so, Gilia would smile and laugh softly as if she found it amusing. Marei kept feeling an inexplicable sense of unease, but he repeatedly scolded himself for thinking badly of such a kind relative.
“If you have any questions, feel free to ask me anytime. Can I come visit you sometime?”
“Pardon? To my house…?”
“Yeah. I’d like to meet Labella too. I’ve never met her in person. She’s such an amazing person, so beautiful….”
As she praised Labella, Marei trembled with a strange sense of pride. He was the only one who knew that the body everyone admired—Labella de Pawen—was the same one he filled with every drop of his lust, the same one that shamelessly shook her hips and begged for his cock.
“Should I ask Mother— I mean, Labella?”
“Of course. As expected, you’re still more comfortable calling her Labella, huh?”
At Gilia’s words, Marei instinctively nodded. To anyone who didn’t know about the secret, sticky relationship between the Witch of the Audit Bureau and her adopted son, it would only be natural to assume Marei still found Labella intimidating.
Of course, if Labella saw this, she would be secretly delighted that her discipline(?) was proceeding properly….
“I have a separate afternoon class, so I should get going soon. Thank you, Marei de Pawen.”
Gilia lightly pinched the hem of her skirt and gave a small bow.
Gilia Marita had invited a distant relative from the branch family to the main house with deeper political intentions, while Marei had simply taken it as a relative coming to visit. It seemed it would take quite some time for their misunderstanding to be resolved.
Gilia disappeared with quick steps, but there was still a long time left until the end of lunch. Although the lunchbox Labella had given him was still untouched, he didn’t feel like forcing himself to eat it. So Marei wandered around the school to aid his digestion when a familiar back view caught his eye.
Was it more accurate to say she was leading a group? Several students followed behind the three walking in front, and some of them burst into loud laughter at whatever was being said. Silver hair that sparkled like moonlight under the sun swayed gently with each step, and when she smiled faintly, sharp fangs peeked out.
At the welcome sight, Marei began following the group from afar. When he got close enough to hear the voices of those with Philia, she quietly separated from the group.
“Ah, everyone. I have a personal matter to attend to, so I’ll excuse myself first.”
She waved to the disappointed group and walked off alone. Marei quickly followed after her. For a moment he wondered if she had noticed him, but Philia didn’t even glance in his direction and continued walking at the same pace.
Curious about what was going on, Marei carefully trailed behind her. The moment they turned a corner, he felt something sharp poke into his stomach. The dangerous sensation that any movement would tear his clothes and pierce his flesh made his entire body freeze solid.