A Precious Charm
The free preview was over. From here on was the main story—
I hope… Even with that solid, hardened body of his. Please—just don’t let him get hurt.
Shaaaah…
A faint violet light settled over the necklace laid before her, then faded away.
At a glance, it might have looked similar to the blessings the priests of the Holy Order called down. A kind of miracle, woven from earnest desire and a power beyond ordinary reckoning. But what she had just worked was something different from a priest’s blessing.
They drew on the light granted from the heavens—the pure white radiance of holy power. Shamans, by contrast, made use of faith that answered to no fixed form. That faith could be vanishingly trivial, or outright irreverent; and at times it could be more sacred than any holy power. Nothing about it was set in stone. To one person it became an ominous light; to another, a mysterious haze.
That was shamanism—the name of the power Tisha was drawing forth now.
“…Done.”
Tisha’s face shone with deep satisfaction. This had to be the cleanest, most perfectly seated piece of shamanism she had managed in a long time. Even when she had treated the wounded in the frontier margraviate, it had never gone this smoothly. Strangely, this time her focus had held and her heart had not wavered once.
He’ll fight the same way again, won’t he? No matter how sturdy his body is, he can’t just throw himself into danger like that…
What human being in this world would dare fight bare-handed against edged steel? Even seasoned swordsmen would tell you to run if the other side had a weapon and you were unarmed. And yet Kyle had actually pulled it off—an astonishing feat. The image was still vivid behind her eyes: a sword shattering to pieces before his fist. Kyle standing there without the slightest tremor in the face of that flash of metal.
Tisha almost resented how truly terrible she was at drawing. If only she could have captured that scene on paper and kept it… The way the memory was already beginning to blur felt like a genuine loss. She ought to start practicing her art from now on, she decided—and with that thought, she left her room and set off toward wherever Kyle would be.
In an academy this vast, how was she supposed to find him? Someone might well have asked. But for Tisha, who already had a fairly solid grasp of Kyle’s habits, it was no difficulty at all.
“Kyle? Are you in here?”
She went straight to the indoor training hall, opened the door, and stepped inside. From the far end, where he had been in the middle of putting things away, Kyle waved a hand.
“Over here.”
“I knew you’d be here.”
“Nothing else to do on the weekend. Figured I might as well move my body a little.”
“…And by ‘moving your body,’ you mean… like this?”
Tisha swept a look around the hall and couldn’t help a soft sigh of despair. Just looking at the equipment made her limbs feel heavy. Even the bar alone over there was absurdly heavy—and he was loading those plates on top of it?
“Tisha!”
“Yes?”
“Uh, if you’re free, could you give me a hand? I need to sort out the plates.”
“Huh? Oh—sure. Of course.”
She had definitely come looking for him for a reason of her own. And yet the moment she arrived, Tisha found herself suddenly drafted into plate organization. Even so, she noticed that Kyle was sliding only the lighter ones her way. Was he being considerate, worried she might strain herself? The thought only made her admire that gentle heart of his all over again. He was a completely different breed of person from that wretched Ian.
(In reality, Kyle was cherry-picking the heaviest plates for himself, chanting about contraction and relaxation the whole time—but that was another matter.)
“Whew. Thanks, Tisha. Finished early thanks to you.”
“It was nothing. More importantly—today’s the Victory Festival. You’re not going out to see any of it?”
“I’m curious, sure. I just don’t really want to spend my weekend that way.”
Was there something wrong with spending a weekend like that? Weekends were for resting and preparing for the week ahead, weren’t they? Most people used them to do the things they hadn’t had time for. Kyle, meanwhile, was training on the weekend the same way he never skipped on weekdays.
Ordinarily, Tisha would have left it there and withdrawn. She herself usually spent weekends diving deeper into her study of shamanism. But this weekend was far more special than usual. It was the Empire’s Victory Festival—the time of its greatest celebrations and festivities. Wanting to enjoy that festival at least once with someone close to her was only natural. She wasn’t out in the mountains gathering herbs and dusting off forgotten tomes anymore. Living as a student of the Imperial Academy, that kind of feeling was bound to stir.
“Kyle.”
Of course, it would be rude to simply beg with empty hands. So Tisha decided to resort to a slightly underhanded approach.
“Take this.”
“What’s with the necklace?”
“It’s a kind of charm. I put my shamanism into it.”
“Shamanism? What kind?”
“You push your body so hard… It’s just a simple protective charm.”
In truth she had put a great deal of care into it—but she deliberately didn’t say so. She wanted to see how this man would react when he was told it was nothing special.
“You put the shamanism on it yourself, Tisha. That makes it incredibly precious.”
“Huh?”
“You can’t get something like this just anywhere. There isn’t even another one of it. Thank you. Really.”
Tisha, too, was one of the protagonists. And those protagonists each possessed formidable talent. Where Ian’s gift lay in swordsmanship and Elga’s in governance, Tisha’s talent for shamanism was something no one else could hope to match. It might not look like much yet, but given time it would ripen fully. An amulet crafted with care by a talent like that? Of course it would be something fine. Which meant it was the kind of gift Kyle couldn’t help but be glad to receive.
“I-I’m glad you like it, then.”
But Tisha, who knew none of that, could only watch Kyle rejoice with pure, unfeigned delight—and end up scolding her own traitorously pounding heart. Please stop thumping! He’s going to hear it at this rate!
Meanwhile, Kyle put the necklace on right then and there. Confronted with the sight of his solid chest and shoulders, the young woman sucked in a sharp little breath.
“Nice. Feels like some incredible power is watching over me.”
“I-It’s not that incredible…”
“It’s more than incredible enough. I was taught it’s rude to just take something like this, so—is there anything I can do for you? Just say the word. I can fix your form, walk you through the benefits of training, anything.”
She had no idea why the conversation had veered into exercise talk, but either way—mission accomplished. She had been waiting for exactly those words to come out of Kyle’s mouth, and they actually had!!
“In that case… come to the festival with me.”
“Huh?”
“Skip training for today and tomorrow, and enjoy the Victory Festival together. That’s what I want.”
“Ah… skip training.”
Kyle smacked his lips. He had fled to the Academy precisely because he was sick of that damn gym-rat life. And he had already committed acts that would have been unthinkable in the John Nassen barony—skipping cardio, eating ice cream, loading up on carbs, and so on. Offenses that would have made his parents, brother, or sisters faint on the spot. But even in that streak of rebellion, not training at all had never once crossed his mind. He genuinely disliked having to train—and yet the thought of not doing it left him restless and uneasy. On top of that, he worried a little that the body he had worked so hard to sculpt would fall apart overnight.
“Hmm…”
His hesitation was plain. Tisha suddenly felt bad, wondering if she had asked for too much. From what she had heard, the John Nassen family had tempered themselves this way for a very long time. After so many years, it would have long since ceased to be habit or rule and simply become daily life. Which meant she might have just asked him to break that daily life.
“It’s all right if it’s hard. I was thinking of heading back to the library this weekend anyway to dig up more books on shamanism.”
So she said something she didn’t even mean, fidgeting with her hands for no good reason.
I want to go together. I want to ask him not to say no…
After everything Kyle had already done for her, saying that felt far too selfish. Tisha had half given up, her head bowed—when he spoke.
“Let’s go. To the festival.”
“Huh? Ah—ah! Y-You don’t have to force yourself…!”
“One weekend should be fine. And I did just receive a gift this precious, after all.”
Kyle smiled, showing her the necklace around his throat. Tisha’s heart went into a wild, frantic dance all over again—as was only natural.
Khh—! Please, please! Heart!!
She bit her lip and barely managed to quiet her thundering chest.
“I—um—then! I-I’ll go get ready! You should go get ready too, Kyle.”
“Get ready? I get it for me, but you already look plenty pretty, Tisha. What more do you need to prepare?”
“Hiiieee!!”
And with that, Kyle finally overloaded Tisha’s heart completely.
“….”
“….”
A young man and a young woman walked the streets—Kyle and Tisha. And yet not a single word passed between them.
Had they fought? No. Was something awkward between them? Not that either. Tisha was simply too embarrassed to do more than fidget. And Kyle…
Whoa… that’s a bit much. Deep-fried and then topped with whipped cream? Ugh.
Looks good, I’ll give it that… but just thinking about burning the calories makes my chest tight.
He was busy calculating the calorie counts of every street food in sight. For reference: the last time he had eaten three ice creams, he had ended up doing three times the cardio.
Oh—that one looks fine.
Not some sugar-drenched juice, but fruit pressed right there on the spot. That was a compromise he could live with, so he bought two cups on the spot.
“Tisha.”
“Yes? Oh—thank you. I’ll enjoy it.”
She took the cup on reflex—then realized the drink Kyle had bought was orange. Her absolute favorite fruit. Only, the place she had grown up was so far north that you had to go down into the city and talk your way into a fruit shop just to taste one once in a great while. She had even sworn that once she got to the Academy, she would eat oranges to her heart’s content. And now here he was, holding out a drink thick with the tart fragrance of oranges. Coincidence, surely—but her spirits lifted all the same.
This man is… really good…
So how had Kyle known to get her orange juice?
Because he was a transmigrator who knew the characters inside and out? Not a chance. He had only gotten through the free preview—how was he supposed to know something that came up in the main text?
From Kyle’s point of view, he had simply asked for whatever was right in front of him, and it had happened to be orange.
Yes. We have decided to call this “dumb luck.”