Chapter 31
Translator: True Detective
### Chapter 31: Doubt (2)
"I'll have to look a bit more. Because traces of the records being erased might remain."
It was the moment I was about to get up from my seat to see if there was any more relevant material.
Someone was approaching me.
It was Yuna.
"......?"
I hurriedly pushed Eleanor, who was poking her head out of my sleeve, back inside.
I knew from the settings that she was a library regular.
But to think we would run into each other head-on in this vast place.
Furthermore, she was approaching with a gaze that looked like it would pierce through me.
*'Don't tell me she came to give me a piece of her mind?'*
The Yuna of the original work was a character whose weapon was her audacity.
A tough cookie who would talk back even to the Princess, Yveline, despite her status as a commoner.
No matter how much Yveline rattled her mental state.
The next day, she was the type to raise her head stiffly like a blade of grass, you know?
Synthesizing those personality traits.
There was only one conclusion.
Ah, she must have come to lecture me about how I embarrassed the professor yesterday!
A strange sense of anticipation suddenly arose.
Am I finally being recognized as a villain?
Is this the moment my painstakingly crafted villain cosplay finally bears fruit?
If I solve the ghost disturbance like this, stack up my villain points well, and just return the original flow.
I might be able to return to the laboratory faster than expected.
I braced myself.
Yuna, who had approached right in front of my nose before I knew it, stared intently at me.
I also stared piercingly at her, not wanting to be outdone.
Originally, in this kind of staring contest, seizing the initiative is life.
The one who blinks first loses.
I must properly imprint the presence of the villain Rihan using this opportunity.
I recalled how Yveline treated Yuna in the novel.
Surely when Yuna opened her mouth, she would cut her off with a single stroke and say 'Get lost', right?
*Ahem*, I cleared my throat.
Yuna finally opened her mouth.
"Um, would you like to... become friends with me...?"
"Get lost."
"......."
"......."
Silence flowed.
Eh?
What did she just say?
Is something wrong with my ears?
Wasn't this the timing to come and lecture me?
The words were cut off in the middle but.
Circumstantially, the second half of the sentence was definitely 'Would you like to become friends?', right?
The words 'let's be friends' weren't in my expected scenario at all.
Looking at Yuna's expression, her fluster was evident.
No, beyond being flustered, it's a face that looks like it will burst into tears any second.
But I must not let my heart weaken here.
Because my painstaking villain acting would go down the drain.
Unexpected errors are bound to occur in experiments.
Let's not be flustered.
I have to push her away firmly.
I must be faithful to my duty as a villain.
I hardened my expression even more coldly.
"I don't need a friend like you, so I'd appreciate it if you went away."
"......."
As soon as my words ended, Yuna's shoulders shrank noticeably.
Tears welled up in her large eyes and soon trickled down.
"You didn't... have to go that far with your words......."
Yuna turned around and ran far away.
Her heaving shoulders over her receding back are pitiful.
She cried.
She definitely cried.
[Rihan. You certainly made her cry. You miserably trampled on someone who gathered the courage to visit because they wanted to be friends. Truly a deed befitting a high-class piece of trash.]
Eleanor's rebuke hit home.
A corner of my heart stings.
*'......It's not like I did it because I wanted to.'*
[As I see it, you are beyond-redemption trash. How could you to such a pitiful child......]
Even in my own eyes, what I just did is beyond-redemption trash behavior.
In the original work, Yuna had a setting where she had almost no friends.
She was a kid who didn't even have the leisure to reach out to someone because she was busy living hard.
And I just swatted away the handshake such a girl offered with a full swing.
*'At any rate, this means I'm definitely marked as a villain, right?'*
I wonder if I'll have to go settle my karma later.
Becoming a villain is a planned event.
But I decline having my head on the guillotine because I genuinely earned the heroine's grudge.
[If I were that child, you would be executed on the spot. That mouth is far too harmful to be left alive.]
Stop saying scary things.
"I can just stop by the place where that kid lives later and do some good deeds."
The Yuna in the novel is from an orphanage near Asterion.
Because she lost her parents at a young age and grew up in an orphanage, she cherishes the children there like her own siblings.
If I throw a few bags of gold coins anonymously at the orphanage later.
Won't Yuna let it slide at least once?
Anyway.
The mood is very strange.
It feels more uncomfortable than when my thesis was rejected in my past life.
So this is what it feels like to become trash.
****
It was before the discomfort of making Yuna cry had even faded.
"Hey, don't you think your words were too harsh?"
Breaking the silence, someone suddenly popped out.
It was a library staff member.
"You're a transfer student, right? Don't be so hard on Yuna. She's a very kind girl, despite how she looks."
A female student with blue hair wearing a cute star-shaped hairpin.
Looking at her appearance, she's a second-year.
She looks strangely familiar.
Who was she.......
Wait a minute.
*'Isn't this person the second-year Chief?'*
The name is fuzzy, but.
I remembered that she was a character who stayed quite close to Yuna in the work.
I suppressed the discomfort and replied, feigning indifference.
"I'd prefer if you didn't mind my business. The rumors about me must be bad anyway."
If she knows I'm a transfer student.
There's no way she doesn't know about my antics that broke out in Class A yesterday.
But she stared intently into my eyes and gave a small smile.
"Ah, were you thinking about the rumors? I don't particularly care about those. Originally, anything you don't see for yourself isn't worth believing. I watched you read books for a while, and you didn't look like such a bad person."
This person is quick-witted.
Or is my acting lacking.
I'll have to learn how to make a villainous face from Yveline later.
I was about to just nod my head roughly, ignore her, and pass by.
She added words from behind.
"If you have anything you're curious about, visit the library once in a while. I'll let you know."
At her proposal, my steps stopped.
My head started spinning fast.
A library staff member.
Furthermore, she is an honor student at the school's Chief level.
Since she's an acquaintance of Yuna, she must know all the information Yuna leaked and the gossip students chatter about.
*'This looks like I've met a more valuable informant than I thought.'*
Since the other side threw the bait first.
There is no reason to kick this opportunity away.
I turned around, feigning composure, and threw out a topic.
"Are you saying I can ask anything?"
"Of course. Though I may not look it, there's nothing I don't know here."
A confident answer.
I immediately threw the main point.
"Then, do you happen to know about the ghost rumors?"
"Ghosts? Ah, that rumor about ghosts appearing in First Year Class A?"
She rested her chin on her hand and continued.
"I don't know exactly, but there are quite a few accounts from students who saw something while passing by Class A at night. They say the frequency has increased compared to before."
Hmm.......
This is an unexpected variable.
In the original work, the entity wasn't distinct enough for ordinary students to see ghosts.
There were only many rumors.
Because most of the time it was dismissed as just a feeling.
Don't tell me, did Yuna originally settle it quietly before the matter got big?
It was then that I was lost in thought.
[Rihan.]
Eleanor's low, grounded voice was heard from inside my sleeve.
A tone one level more serious than usual.
*'What is it? Did you find something?'*
[My eyes cannot be deceived. That person is not human.]
*'.........?'*
Yes? No, then what is she.
Don't tell me, this person was a ghost?
Goosebumps rise on my spine for an instant.
Genre drift into a ghost story is not allowed!
There was no such thing in the novel!
I'm saying I absolutely hate ghost stories!
*'......So you're saying she's a ghost?'*
Fuck, I have to do an exorcism right now!
It was the moment I hurriedly tried to condense mana at my fingertips.
Eleanor quietly stopped me.
[That is not it. This fellow is an Arcana.]
What is that.
Is this another addition to the worldview settings?
I busily searched my head wondering if such a term existed when reading the original work.
'.........'
I remembered.
It was a top-secret setting of the Magic Tower mentioned briefly in the mid-to-late part of the novel, right?
An artificial human created by the Magic Tower's mages who touched a taboo to create eternal life or a perfect assistant.
It must have been an existence like a homunculus.
*'So, you're saying the person in front of me right now is an artificial human?'*
[It seems you have heard of them too. They are dolls manufactured in secret by the old fogies of the Magic Tower since long ago. However, since they are things whose origins are not intact, most are destined to fade away before they can surpass twenty-three.]
I don't know much because it's a setting from the latter half that I didn't read.
23 years old.......
Does that mean she has a terminal life.
I'm already busy solving the ghost disturbance.
I have not even a grain of intention to get involved in such a heavy back story.
It was the moment I was about to turn around and leave.
"......"
Should I just ask how old she is.
"......Lastly, I'll just ask one thing. Senior, how old are you?"
"Hm? I'm 21. Why? Is it because I look young for my age?"
She answered with a playful laugh.
So there are still 2 years left.
Well, since Yuna is the protagonist, she'll solve it somehow.
There is no reason for me to touch it directly.
I roughly nodded my head saying understood and tried to leave.
But she lightly grabbed my sleeve as I was turning away.
"Hey, what's your name?"
"Rihan von Hayes. What about you, Senior?"
She fiddled with her star-shaped hairpin and laughed as prettily as sunlight.
"I'm Aria."
With those words finishing, I left the library.
****
I sat listlessly on a school bench and inhaled the cold air.
Let's organize.
Currently, the biggest variable is the ghost sightings in Class A that have become frequent.
In the original work, it was a minor disturbance that Yuna could handle quietly.
If so, what about now?
*'The fact that sightings have increased means it wouldn't be just a feeling.'*
Is it a setting where the vengeful spirit itself is leveling up in real-time?
"Senior. Can the power become stronger the longer it stays in the Spirit Vessel?"
[That is a natural occurrence. The longer they stay as a vengeful spirit, the more their obsession with the living world accumulates into a toxic energy. Cases where they bloat enough to have a permanent influence are common too.]
Just as expected.
*'It's not the time to sit still, trusting only in Yuna.'*
Tonight, I'll have to drop by the school again.
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