Chapter 92. Falling (2)
Chapter 92. Falling (2)
2
Romance Fantasy Rule 1
『Any man near the protagonist is suspicious.』
Romance Fantasy Rule 2
『The most ordinary man is actually the most extraordinary.』
3
"......."
My heart pounded. I'd grown anxious. My heart beat off-rhythm like a broken piano key. That much, that intensely, the Heretic Questioner's laughter carried an ominous scent.
A premonition that I'd keep sliding down this pit just as things were.
I couldn't see the bottom of this pit.
"Heretic Ques...."
"You seem unharmed, Lady Golden Thread Plum, the baron's daughter."
Before I could even finish the Tower alias, Lady Silver Lily called out this world's name first.
The name had been preempted.
"I heard you were attacked by an assassin... Truly, you are a daughter raised in the borderlands. Your lifeline is as tenacious as a weed. I suppose a single assassin is nothing to you."
"Hmm."
The Heretic Questioner raised the corners of his lips.
I realized a little late that it was a sneer.
Words the Heretic Questioner would never normally utter had flowed from those lips.
"Did you deliberately walk all this way at this late hour to praise my health? I thank you with all sincerity, Lady Silver Lily. His Highness the Crown Prince does the same, and so many people look after this unrefined person—I am happy! Enough that tonight's misfortune feels like fortune!"
Lady Silver Lily's eyes turned vicious.
Two thorns had been stuck straight up in what the Heretic Questioner just said.
'Aren't you the one who hired the assassin?'
A threat.
'His Highness the Crown Prince came in person because he was worried about me.'
A provocation.
"...Even your head resembles a weed, all unkempt. Imagination and delusion are one step apart. Whether one tramples that boundary at will determines a person's dignity. I do hope you will keep the manners of a noble."
"Oh, my apologies! Slapping another person's cheek at a ball did not violate noble etiquette, did it. Dear me, I was raised in a borderland house and never learned the decorum of a ducal family!"
"......."
"If it would not be an impertinence, might you invite me to your salon sometime, Lady Silver Lily? I wish to receive etiquette instruction from you directly. As I am unaccustomed to striking people, I believe I must study the angle and force of the hand in depth."
A motorcycle engine was attached to that tongue.
I'd wondered where the engine sound was coming from, but when I listened more closely—this crazy? It was my own heartbeat.
Thump-thump.
The ominous premonition coiled around my heart, then seized my throat.
"Young Lady! How insolent!"
"To spout such nonsense when you're from a backwater barony......."
The ducal servants were outraged by the Heretic Questioner's tongue-waltz. Among them, there were surely retainers who had betrayed their master and been won over by the Crown Prince. I didn't know whether there was one traitor or several, but right now, that wasn't what mattered.
"My apologies!"
I hurriedly interposed myself between the gold and the silver.
Lady Silver Lily's brow furrowed.
"You are......."
"The young lady was greatly startled by today's distressing events. This lowly servant judges that she desperately needs rest. As the night is late, might I suggest that Lady Silver Lily also take her leave? Any misunderstanding may be resolved tomorrow."
"......."
Lady Silver Lily closed her lips.
Behind her, the servants seethed, but that was all.
When their mistress raised her right hand, every one of them stopped moving. In an instant, silence wrapped the corridor. Impossible unless she had long kept her subordinates on a tight leash.
"Wait a moment, butler. What are you saying?"
Rather, the Heretic Questioner—Lady Golden Thread Plum—pushed back against me.
"I still have much to say to Lady Silver Lily. Do not end the conversation as you please......."
"Be quiet."
I seized the Heretic Questioner's wrist. Seized it, and walked as if dragging him along. The Heretic Questioner flailed—"Ah, wait, butler! Wait just a moment!"—but I absolutely did not let go of his wrist. If my immersion in the character deepened any further here, it would truly be a problem.
"Lady Silver Lily."
Just before leaving the corridor, I looked back. Lady Silver Lily was watching us with an unreadable expression.
"...What is it?"
"I have long admired the proper bearing of the ducal household's servants. Seeing them again tonight, the ducal retainers are indeed demure, unlike a ragtag fellow such as myself."
I bowed my head to her respectfully.
"I have realized many things. Though I am of lowly station, I offer Lady Silver Lily my respect."
"......."
"If you will excuse me."
And I dragged the Heretic Questioner out of the corridor.
The Heretic Questioner, who had resisted at first, had grown docile before long.
A spring-night garden. A wide garden stretched between the ballroom and the dormitory.
Magnolias that had bloomed only recently hung their heavy heads. Beneath the white trees, fragrance hung thick. Some night bird, bewitched by the scent of the flowers, tapped one with its claws—tok—and a pale magnolia petal fell.
"Good heavens."
The Heretic Questioner stepped on the fallen magnolia.
"Ah."
He stopped, and the Heretic Questioner looked up at the night sky. A moment later, the Heretic Questioner turned his head and stared at me. An expressionless face. A dazed look.
The hunter known as the craziest in the Tower muttered as if he couldn't believe what he himself had done.
"Death King... What did I just say back there?"
4
The moment I closed the door to the lodging, I spoke.
"Let's set a passphrase."
We had been quiet on the walk to the dormitory. Not a single word passed between us. Silence coiled around my ankles and made walking a little difficult.
Was it because my immersion in the character had deepened? The path from the garden to the lodging surfaced naturally in my head.
Perhaps the deeper the immersion, the clearer the character's memories become. Whether that was good or bad, I couldn't judge right now.
"A passphrase......."
The Heretic Questioner blinked.
"A secret passphrase......?"
"If we leave things like this, we're in real danger. We have to get our heads on straight."
"We must, Death King. You're right. Yes......."
The Heretic Questioner seemed to be straining to catch hold of a voice that kept slipping away. The speed of his voice outrunning the speed of his thoughts. A red-light signal that the person before my eyes was becoming dangerous.
I gripped the Heretic Questioner's face firmly with both hands. And forced eye contact, if I had to.
"When spring comes, the magnolias fall."
"Yes......?"
"If I say [When spring comes], you answer [The magnolias fall]. That's the passphrase between the two of us. A passphrase meaning 'get a grip.' Now, if you've got it, say it. When spring comes?"
"The magnolias......."
"Again. When spring comes."
"The magnolias fall."
The Heretic Questioner's gaze gradually returned. He began to look at the near space in front of him, not the distant void. The Heretic Questioner went "Hm," and shook his head, then "Hm!" and nodded.
"Yes! I've got a grip!"
"Okay. Well done."
"Thank you, Death King! Ah-ha. Truly, astonishing things are storming in today. I think this will be remembered as a day I'll never forget."
"Want to drink some tea and calm down?"
"Please!"
Good. Not yet. It's too early to give up on this run.
I wrapped a blanket around the Heretic Questioner and headed for the kitchen. Befitting a dormitory at an academy attended by royalty and nobility, Lady Golden Thread Plum's private room had a small kitchen. I found the tea leaves and the kettle easily.
"Wow."
As I brewed the tea, I was dumbfounded.
"My body just moves on its own......."
I had never seriously brewed tea before, not with a teabag. My whole life. But my hands moved automatically, as if I had handled a teapot for ages. A side effect of immersion.
Worse, my body was [enjoying] brewing the tea.
'The young lady likes black tea best with milk mixed in and a spoonful of honey.'
I hummed a little tune.
'For occasions like this, I asked a servant attached to the academy to procure precious honey. It cost a bit, but she is so frugal and never wasteful. A luxury of this degree is fine.......'
[Your immersion in the character deepens.]
[Your current Immersion Rate is 6%.]
It is not fine!
Not fine!
Damn it!
This dogshit romance! Why am I getting happy over the idea of putting honey in black tea! Want me to crack open your skull and smear honey on your synapses? I'll shove a beehive into your head!
[Sparkle worries about the Hero's condition.......]
[However, Sparkle voices a minority opinion that the Hero's butler attire is quite admirable.]
My weapon sparkled gleefully all on its own. Maybe it was my imagination, but its glittering sheen looked a little lovelier. While its owner was crouched on the floor clutching his head in agony.
'I can't let the butler eat my mind.'
I clenched my teeth.
'I really can't. After how hard I worked to clear all those stages!'
Stubbornness flared up.
I resolved to brew the tea, but not the way the original character would. I used a kettle I normally wouldn't use, and took out a teacup I normally wouldn't use. Then I gave the tea to the Heretic Questioner.
"Death King."
The Heretic Questioner took a few sips of the tea, then tilted his head.
"Yes."
"The tea tastes strange!"
"So?"
"Unless my sense of taste has dulled, this puckery flavor is salt?"
"This tea is originally like that."
"Oho. You mean this substance, closer to saltwater than tea? Objectively, if one measured the salinity, it would be judged as nothing more and nothing less than simple saltwater."
"Just shut up and drink it."
"Understood! I will shut up and drink it well!"
The Heretic Questioner slurped down the tea.
"I drank it well! It's salty!"
The Heretic Questioner beamed. Yes, this is how it should be. Our natural psycho had finally recovered his old purity.
"So then, what do you plan to do from here?"
"We have to get the villainess together with the Crown Prince."
I sighed.
"Or at least, we have to grind the love line between Lady Golden Thread Plum and the Crown Prince into powder. Let's aim for one of the two endings."
"A crumble-crumble operation......."
The Heretic Questioner named the operation on his own.
Well, it didn't matter. I also preferred the latter of the two endings.
I've never dated anyone, so I don't know for sure, but.......
'Wouldn't breaking them up be much easier than getting them together?'
It would be hard to connect the Crown Prince with Lady Silver Lily, but it would be easy to make him break up with Lady Golden Thread Plum.
On this point, the Heretic Questioner and I were in 100% agreement.
"For that, the Crown Prince's love for Lady Golden Thread Plum must cool! Do you happen to have a brilliant plan in mind?"
"I do."
I'd realized it earlier, when I nearly lost my mind brewing the tea. This stage required extraordinary measures.
'There is a way.'
A method that would not only lower the Crown Prince's Favorability toward Lady Golden Thread Plum, but would also be extremely effective at maintaining the two of us—especially my own mind.
"What is this brilliant plan?"
"In the end, the more you act [like Lady Golden Thread Plum], and the more I fall into [butler-like] behavior, the higher our Immersion Rates climb."
Think of it in reverse.
"So what if we do things [Lady Golden Thread Plum would absolutely never do] and things [the butler would absolutely never do]?"
"......."
"Our Immersion Rates might drop. Even if they don't drop, they won't rise any further. How about it?"
The Heretic Questioner's eyes lit up.
"...Oho, indeed. A simple and excellent method. As expected of the Death King! Befitting a hunter who conquered the impregnable 10th floor and cleared through to the 20th with unstoppable momentum!"
"The praise is nice. Hm, anyway, our conclusion is simple."
I snapped my fingers and activated a skill.
"From now on, let's become a [Delinquent Young Lady] and a [Delinquent Butler]."
The Heretic Questioner tilted his head.
"Huh?"
And Hundred Ghost Reincarnation unfolded. There was no need to summon many ghosts, as with the Chronicles of the Heavenly Demon. For us—for me—the ghost I desperately needed right now was just one person.
My shadow wriggled and transformed into a single ghost.
"......."
A ponytail tied back.
Eyes more insufferable than any life-form in the universe.
"Hey......."
It was the Flame Emperor, Yoo Soo-ha.
The moment Yoo Soo-ha was summoned, he scowled with his whole face. His expression crumpled like a wad of tissue as his mouth opened.
"You fuckin' bastard. What kind of bullshit are you gonna make me do this time......."
"Now, let's become a shut-mouth, shut it."
"—. ...Mmph, mmph! Mmmmmph!"
No matter how foul his words, he was a ghost who could not defy my commands. Yoo Soo-ha only kept squirming like a caterpillar wrapped in spider silk.
Seeing the Flame Emperor's face improved my gloomy mood considerably. How should I put it? The feeling of putting a lid on a trash can? It was as if the fine dust in my mind had been refreshingly swept clean. The Flame Emperor. He was a man like a vacuum cleaner's dust bin.
"Heretic Questioner."
"Yes, Death King!"
"Judging by your appearance alone, you're too much of a model student."
I put on a solemn expression.
"Your gestures, everything—your conduct is pure. But to properly change class into a delinquent young lady, your current state won't cut it. You're far from enough."
"Oh."
The Heretic Questioner pricked up his ears.
"If I have shortcomings, please teach me! I will learn!"
"Yes, I'll teach you. With one-on-one intensive tutoring."
I slowly looked at Yoo Soo-ha.
"The greatest tutor will guide you down the path of delinquency, Heretic Questioner."
"Ah-ha, I'm looking forward to it!"
"Mmph... mmph! Mmmph-mmph!"
The Heretic Questioner smiled brightly like a puppy. Yoo Soo-ha scrunched his face like a dog. Between the puppy and the son of a bitch, I nodded seriously.
"Now, let's get delinquent."
The next day, Sormwyn Academy exploded.