A Slit-Eyed Counterattack Character’s Lunchtime Nightmare
I could handle it. It wasn’t a big deal.
“…What the hell…?”
It had been ages since I’d eaten lunch alone.
Even Shion and Charlotte were suddenly avoiding me, so I started wondering if they’d deliberately set me up to get back at everyone who’d made fun of me all this time.
“What a surprise. Eating lunch by yourself? Just the other day Astorious-nim was still having meals with you, wasn’t he?”
At that moment someone slid a tray in front of me and sat down.
“Lady Chloe…! You’re not avoiding me, are you!?”
“…Did something taste bad? Well, people usually avoid me anyway. Why are you suddenly acting like this?”
Oh, the cold response. That was the real Chloe.
“Thank goodness…! If Lady Chloe had caught it too, I’d have no idea how I was supposed to live!”
“Catch what? I’ve never heard of any epidemic.”
Lady Chloe tilted her head like I was talking nonsense.
“After all, hasn’t Lady Shion been avoiding me since yesterday? So I asked Lady Charlotte to investigate what was wrong and bring me back the answer. And look what happened—Lady Charlotte started avoiding me the moment she returned. I’m about to go mad!”
I explained everything that had happened to Lady Chloe.
“Hmm…”
“Any ideas?”
“I don’t have any off the top of my head.”
“Haa, as expected. I should’ve known better than to count on Lady Chloe. Still, thank you for trying to think along with me.”
“What?! Hah! I was worried about you and you treat me like this?!”
“Hahaha, of course that was just a joke. Even I’m confused and Lady Chloe can’t solve it instantly. Just knowing you were willing to help is enough for me.”
Lady Chloe puffed her cheeks and glared at me.
“Well, you two sort it out. …Did the family matter yesterday turn out okay?”
But then she hesitantly asked.
“Oh, yesterday. Haha, it was tough. I thought I could just talk to Father alone, but Lady Pascal’s mother was there too, so I got a real shock.”
“…Did you speak politely?”
Lady Chloe sounded like she was interrogating me. I smiled brightly and spread my fingers.
“Lady Chloe, what is politeness? Politeness is, above all, the basic manners you show when speaking with someone else. Everyone who’s speaking should practice it so the conversation flows smoothly…”
“Don’t make me mad. Just get to the point.”
“The other side talked without any manners, so I replied in kind.”
“Aah! Really?!”
“Eek! You said you wouldn’t get mad!”
Lady Chloe put a hand to her head, looking utterly exasperated.
“You can do it with Pascal, but what about upperclassmen?! If you keep this up, you might actually get expelled. Haa…”
“Oh, expulsion came up too. It was Father who mentioned it.”
“You’re insane?!”
Lady Chloe let out an angry shout. The whole garden suddenly turned to stare at us.
Lady Chloe, cheeks flushed, bowed her head in apology.
“…Ugh, this is so embarrassing.”
“Tsk tsk, Lady Chloe. You’re a member of the Prelia family—maintain your composure. You should learn something from me.”
“…What is this mess over?!”
“Who knows. It’s beyond me.”
The fork in Lady Chloe’s hand bent slightly. Whoa, that looked dangerous.
“Haa, so I just got scolded properly?”
“Hahaha, it’s good when we hit each other honestly without holding back. I’m glad I reconciled with Father. He said he’ll call Pascal soon to give her proper education.”
“…Really? Well, that’s good to hear.”
Lady Chloe nodded absently, clearly not caring.
But I noticed the faint smile lingering at the corner of her mouth.
She really is a tsundere, after all.
With that conversation over, we finally started eating. The food had cooled a bit from all the talking, but it still tasted great.
Just as we were finishing, Lady Chloe suddenly turned to me.
“Um, Sion. Listen…”
She blushed and stared at the ground as if she were about to say something embarrassing.
“Of course you won’t remember because of memory loss, but… I’m sorry I tormented you.”
Ah, that. I thought she’d pulled off some huge stunt and I’d missed it.
Lady Chloe hadn’t actually tormented me that much.
Pascal had said she used me as an emotional punching bag, but after reading all the Chloe-related stories I knew she’d quietly worried about me the whole time.
If she really saw me as beneath her, memory loss or not, she wouldn’t have cared.
“That’s fine. The only one who still paid attention to me when everyone else ignored me was Lady Chloe, right?”
“Even so… Wait, how did you know that? Weren’t you supposed to have lost your memory?”
“Um…”
Eep, I slipped up.
But I had the perfect shield for moments like this.
“Yesterday Father told me that Lady Chloe has been taking care of me a lot.”
“I-I didn’t do much. Anyway, if I’m sorry, then I’m sorry. I’ll just take your word for it.”
Still, Lady Chloe looked troubled.
In that case I had to fix it.
“If it really bothers you that much, how about giving me a simple gift?”
“A gift? Well, that’s not a bad idea at all. Want me to bring you anything specific?”
“Nothing too big…”
I grinned and continued.
“How about bringing me some tteokbokki later? You’re pretty good at that, aren’t you?”
“Die! Just die already!”
To escape the bent fork charging at me, I had no choice but to run.
***
“…”
After eating, Charlotte took a leisurely walk through the garden to aid her digestion.
Her mind was filled with only Sion and Mana Storage Deficiency.
Yet after four hours of worrying, nothing had come to mind.
“…Is there really no solution?”
Every time she felt a weak thought creep in, Charlotte shook her head and denied it.
“No. There must be some way.”
She tried convincing herself, but she knew the truth. In this situation, there was nothing Charlotte could do.
It was truly awful. Every little thing that caught her eye only made her angrier.
Just as she was desperately reaching for the stars, a familiar figure caught her eye.
“…Elis.”
The demon who had approached Sion to mindify him.
Sion himself seemed to deny it, but Charlotte was certain Elis was a demon.
Normally she would smile brightly and greet him.
To eliminate the opponent without giving time to react, it was easier to approach gently and close the distance.
But right now Charlotte couldn’t do that.
She couldn’t maintain the calm that was her greatest strength.
Why were these demons suddenly so eager to mindify the poor guy when they could just leave him alone?
He was already pitiful. Would leaving him alone make him worse?
Couldn’t he ever be happy?
“…Ah. Charlotte. Long time—”
“Shut your mouth.”
Charlotte had completely lost her composure.
“I… I can’t understand.”
Charlotte glared at Elis with eyes full of hatred.
“Why… Why won’t you leave Sion alone?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Even with Charlotte’s sudden explosion, Elis showed no change in expression.
The brazenness of her response only enraged Charlotte more. She shot out her words like arrows.
“That guy was going to die anyway… What the hell do your demons even want to take Sion for?!”
“…”
“Sion… You can’t even make him a little happy…?”
Elis’s face hardened.
Learning that Charlotte knew she was a demon was already a shock, but the greater one came next.
“Sion is terminally ill?”
“Why didn’t you know? Hah, I guess you didn’t. You only approached him to complete your mission. You know nothing about his situation.”
Charlotte spat out a single tear.
“Mana Storage Deficiency. That idiot doesn’t even know he has an incurable disease and keeps grinding himself to the bone every single day.”
Mana Storage Deficiency. The illness Charlotte had read about in a textbook when she was a princess.
Clearly, the symptoms were… growth restricted, death before twenty.
Elis had often wondered why Sion was stuck at 1-Star.
If he truly had Mana Storage Deficiency… all her doubts would vanish cleanly.
Then, then.
“…Sion is terminally ill?”
Elis’s breath caught.
“Elis. I don’t know which demon faction you belong to, but remember this.”
Charlotte grabbed Elis’s collar and stared into her eyes.
“If you ever put even impure intentions toward Sion, I will personally tear you apart.”
“…”
Charlotte released Elis’s collar, opened a gap, and vanished.
Now the only one left in the garden was Elis.
Amid the gentle breeze and rustling leaves, Elis simply stared blankly into the empty sky.
Charlotte had learned the truth about her.
This was an emergency, no question.
But somehow the emotion dominating her mind was not worry—it was pure frustration.
Sion was terminally ill.
It wasn’t frustration at the loss of an ally who might have helped her.
It was frustration at the existence who had always cheered her on, cracked jokes when she was lonely, and—most importantly—had thrown her life away to save her when she herself had given up.
Now that her parents were gone, the most precious person to her was terminally ill.
Why couldn’t she do anything for the people she cherished? She could only send them off.
A princess of a country couldn’t even save one dying friend.
She thought she’d grown stronger thanks to Sion, but nothing had changed at all.
“…Pathetic.”
A weak girl who could do nothing alone.
Elis had called herself that.