No Confidence in Winning
I blinked, staring at her in disbelief. What the hell did I just hear?
Even Isabel’s face had turned bright red after she spoke, suggesting she wasn’t used to lying and had slipped up. Still… ball-buddy? The words “You don’t even have any” rose all the way to the tip of my tongue, but I barely managed to swallow them back. If I actually said it out loud, that would be the end.
Typical of Isabel, who treated dungeon diving as a casual hobby, her speech had clearly been influenced by adventurers. She really spoke like one of them now.
“…Ball… buddy? What’s that…?”
Kiene seemed to have no idea what the word meant and asked again.
“W-well, you see…!”
Liana jumped in, ready to explain. Please don’t.
In an instant, the table descended into complete chaos.
“…Your drinks are ready. Please enjoy.”
Thankfully, the drinks arrived right on time. As each cup was placed in front of us, the space filled with a fragrant aroma. It was oddly soothing.
Isabel grabbed her steaming hot coffee and downed it in one go.
“Isn’t that hot?”
“It’s… your fault, you know…”
She sounded a little wronged.
Despite the minor incident, everyone surprisingly got along well and continued chatting. Sane and Liana, for instance—
“…Listen to this, Sane unnie! The first time I met Logue, he dragged me straight into a dungeon without any warning!”
“A dungeon? …Where?”
“I touched some kind of tombstone and suddenly a door appeared… and then these crazy monsters made of bones came out and attacked us!”
“…Melek?”
“Melek… what?”
“Never mind… So what happened next?”
They were enthusiastically badmouthing me.
Meanwhile, Kiene and Isabel were having their own conversation.
“So your little brother also got some strange pattern engraved on the back of his hand and then suffered in pain?”
“…Yeah… After he came back from the dungeon…”
“Now that I think about it, I might have gone through something similar…? I can’t really remember it clearly though.”
“Logue… fixed it for him…”
“Oh… Did he stab your brother with a knife too?”
“…?”
Why did every topic of conversation somehow revolve around me?
I can’t hear anything…
I pretended not to hear them talking about me and simply savored the aroma of my coffee. If any sparks flew my way, it would just be annoying.
In front of me sat a hot Americano. Not iced. It felt almost sinful, but in this world, hot Americano seemed to be the default.
Is it because making ice is difficult…? Don’t they have refrigerators or something?
I took a sip. The rich, nutty scent unique to Americano spread through my mouth, followed by a slight bitterness. It cost a whole silver—a luxury—but the caffeine hitting my brain made me feel truly alive.
With coffee still in my mouth, everything in the world felt utterly insignificant. Yeah. This was bliss. I’d been living far too harshly lately. Who would’ve thought a single cup of coffee could bring this much peace?
Even if everyone here except me started insulting me, I wouldn’t care at all. This was the true Clear Mirror, Still Water. A heart of steel that wouldn’t waver at any provocation. Perfection.
“Hey, isn’t that Logue…?”
“Pfft. I heard he got kicked out of his family, but he still had money to come here?”
“Probably living off the girls’ money, right? Pathetic. A failing student who still has time to fool around with women.”
Lately, it felt like more and more people were jealous of me. Even on the way to the café earlier. It was only natural for those without to envy those with, so I’d planned to just ignore it and pretend I didn’t hear, but—
Crash!
“Aaaagh!!!”
“W-what?! Are you okay, Ligwen?!”
A glass had flown straight into the head of one of the guys who’d been badmouthing me. Of course, I wasn’t the one who threw it. The culprit was Kiene.
“K-Kiene?!”
“…Logue isn’t pathetic… Take it back.”
Kiene was glaring at them with an expression I’d never seen before, demanding an apology. The male student who’d been hit was someone I’d only seen in passing around campus—a knight department student. The fact that he hadn’t left any impression meant he probably wasn’t particularly outstanding. Still, as an academy student, he looked surprisingly fine even after taking a glass to the head.
“You damn bitch…!”
“Hey… that girl’s Kiene from Class A… and there’s that crazy bitch next to her…”
“Huh? What did you just call me?”
Isabel immediately reacted to the word “crazy bitch.” The atmosphere quickly turned hostile. Sane watched with clear interest while Liana looked completely lost. I took another sip of my coffee, trying to reclaim my peaceful state of mind… as if that was possible.
Kiene… what are you doing…?
“…Take it back.”
“Take what back?! Did I say anything wrong?! Everyone knows that guy’s an idiot, don’t they?”
Bang!
The male student who’d insulted me slammed his fist on the table in rage. The table legs gave out instantly and collapsed.
“Why is that person talking like that?!”
Liana was getting angry on my behalf now. Crack. Not only had they ruined my peaceful coffee time, but they kept insulting me. My blood was starting to boil.
What had I even done? It wasn’t like I’d done anything directly to deserve this, and yet I was getting cursed at. And now they were saying it right to my face. Even Buddha would throw a one-two straight at that bastard’s face at this point.
“You son of a bitch. Get outside.”
Thanks to how well Logue’s body and my own ego had fused lately, I could spit out some pretty slick curses now.
“W-what?! S-son of a bitch? What kind of vulgar—!”
“You rude, disrespectful piece of trash born from sexual desire. I said get outside right now.”
“S-sexual de-desire byproduct?! Urk…”
The male student was completely stunned by my fluent profanity.
“I’m so sorry… We’ll leave right away… We’ll pay for the damages over here…”
Sane was dealing with the employee who had rushed over after hearing the commotion. Hey… you wrote my name down, didn’t you? …I don’t have any money to pay for damages.
Crash!
“Aaaagh! You bastard…!”
I finished the rest of my coffee and hurled the glass. It flew in a clean arc and struck the male student squarely in the head.
“This is a duel challenge. Get outside right now.”
Throwing a glove was for challenging people. For a sexual-desire byproduct like him, a glass was more appropriate.
Our group and the male student’s group left the café together and headed to the training ground nearby. Thanks to Kiene and Isabel—two people from the knight department whose strength was hard to match—the other side didn’t dare rush at us recklessly. If they were enrolled in the knight department, they would know exactly how strong those two were.
“I’ll make you look even worse than that commoner did!”
That was probably why he was acting so tough with me. I was the easiest target. Even now, he couldn’t even make eye contact with Kiene, who had thrown the first glass. A perfect example of the strong preying on the weak.
Isabel was clicking her tongue, clearly displeased with the situation. Probably because her peaceful time had been interrupted.
“Tsk. Hey, Logue. Want me to kill him for you?”
“No, it’s fine. Just keep Kiene under control for me.”
Sane and Liana were standing beside Kiene, trying to calm her down. If they hadn’t been there, she might have already torn that male student apart with her bare hands.
Why is she so worked up?
Was Kiene always this kind of person? It seemed like she was reacting because I—her little brother’s savior—was being insulted… but seeing her angry face for the first time felt strangely unfamiliar.
I used Insight to check the male student’s status window.
…He’s acting tough with stats like these?
They were even lower than Luden’s when I first possessed this body. Luden had been a pretty useful dealer in the game, so comparing this guy to him felt almost unfair. This was just a random extra. No traits, and the chances of him having any decent skills were extremely low. If he had a unique character skill, I would have at least known his name.
“I’ll turn you into a bloody pulp…! Don’t stop me, Dürang.”
“Haha. Go easy on him. If he ends up unable to tell shit from piss, it’ll be hard for him to stay at the academy.”
The guy named Dürang next to him was equally unimpressive. Just another part of the extra crowd.
“Kiene. I’ll handle this… Thanks for getting angry on my behalf.”
In the end, she’d gotten angry for my sake and this was the result. Thinking that way made her seem so adorable that I unconsciously reached out and patted her head.
“…..Eep…”
I really did it without thinking. Was this Logue’s body influencing me?
Did Logue have a habit of patting his little sister’s head?
“I-I got angry too, you know…!”
Liana said timidly from beside Kiene, looking away in embarrassment.
“Yeah. Thank you too.”
“Eep! Who said you could pat my head…?!”
Was that not right? I really couldn’t figure her out. For some reason, Sane was also fidgeting with her own hair. …And so was Isabel.
“…How long are you going to keep fooling around?”
Shing.
Ligwen drew what appeared to be his weapon. It was a sword with a sparkling silver surface, shaped like a Japanese katana. The hilt was decorated with jewels, suggesting it was quite expensive.
I drew my spear and shield in response to Ligwen drawing his sword. …Well, I just picked them up, really.
“…Assume a stance. Heh heh… Or do you not even know how to do that?”
Ligwen mocked me.
“Do I have to?”
To be honest… I had no confidence. No confidence at all that I could beat this guy.