Wandering Mage Luke #7
Wandering Mage Luke #7
"I wanted to thank that nun."
"Now's not the time."
I pointed toward the closed annex door.
Because moments after it shut, the voices of young girls began ringing out from inside. Kate must have called in her junior nuns. Hearing unfamiliar voices so close by was bound to set off alarm bells.
"It's getting noisy in there. Someone might try opening the outer door. Let's get the hell out of here."
I pulled Rebecca along and hurried back toward the doghole.
Rebecca still looked like she wanted to say thanks to Kate, but in the end she followed me.
We crawled out past the wall and finally succeeded in escaping the church.
But instead of taking a single step away, I stood there staring at the ticket in my hand. Rebecca beside me did the same.
"That blonde brat isn't the type to hand out freebies."
"No kidding."
I stared down at the fluttering ticket in my hand and thought of Kate.
The blonde nun whose impression had scraped rock bottom from the moment we first met during the caravan escort quest.
The one who smashed the merchant company's artifact and kept her mouth clamped shut, who acted like a goddamn queen while adventurers showered her with gifts.
And that woman had handed over a congratulatory present with pure intentions?
I couldn't believe it for a second.
"Didn't she hate couples?"
"R-right. When she was pounding the ground with her fist earlier today, I thought she was batshit crazy. That glare of hers practically choked the breath out of me."
"...I have no idea what the hell happened."
Had the woman really changed in just half a day?
In that final moment, what Kate had shown us was a genuinely pure smile. A smile so dazzlingly bright that, just for that instant, she actually looked like a real nun. The kind of pretty smile that'd make clueless virgin guys fall for her on the spot and still have plenty left over.
"W-well, it worked out. This is a chance to go on a date. I really wanted to go out and have fun with you, just the two of us."
Rebecca clutched the ticket in her hand, looking a little excited. The smile tugging at her lips made it clear she was already imagining the day we'd go see the play together.
"We're not just playing lovers anymore, we're actually going out now. We can do anything we want. Dates too—."
"Yeah... I've wanted to try going on a date too. Let's go out and do things sometimes on our days off. We've got all the time in the world."
"Yeah-!"
Dating might be a luxury for Bronze Tier adventurers.
But lately, Rebecca and I had been on a pretty decent roll as adventurers. Money for dates was something we could easily cover just by doing quests together.
'The bounty for taking down that old giant came in pretty fat too, so that works out. Thanks to Kate, we even managed to set up a date.'
Running my eyes over the ticket, I found the performance date printed on the back. And I couldn't help but be surprised.
"The play's happening exactly three days from now. The date's written on the back."
"F-for real? It really is."
Rebecca checked the date on the ticket in her hand and was surprised too.
Neither of us had expected it to be this close.
But it wasn't a problem.
After finishing the subjugation quest, I'd been planning to take it easy for a while. I wanted to fit in some magic training to prepare for the Silver Tier promotion match. Which meant my schedule was pretty wide open for the time being.
Plenty of time to go see a play.
"You free three days from now?"
"Of course I am-!"
"Then come to my place that morning. I'll take you to the theater at Yoen-su. You don't know where the theater is, right?"
Rebecca nodded with an expression of understanding. She'd only been in Yoen-su for a month — there was no way she'd have the city's geography memorized.
The route to the theater was pretty complicated, as I recalled. Better to go to the trouble of taking her there myself.
And well, walking the streets together from morning on — that'd be nice, wouldn't it?
It felt like it'd be a different vibe from usual.
"Thanks, Luke."
"Anyway, you worked hard today. Go home and get some good rest."
"Th-then I'll be looking forward to it-!"
After that, we walked through the streets of Yoen-su until we reached a suitable spot and parted ways.
When I got home in the dead of night, I collapsed onto my bed and plunged straight into a deep sleep.
All I'd done was go to a church, and yet it felt like I'd pulled off something monumental.
*
Until the day before the date, I buried myself in magic training inside my room. Nobody came looking for me, so I pretty much did nothing but eat and train magic.
But unlike usual, stray thoughts kept intruding on my training.
Rebecca, who I'd be seeing soon, kept flickering before my eyes.
'My concentration's shot.'
Come to think of it, this was my first date.
Back on Earth, obviously, and even in this other world — I'd never done anything even resembling a date.
What the hell even is a date?
What am I supposed to do? Just grab her hand and walk around like crazy? Do we loop the whole damn continent once and come back to Yoen-su?
'I'm getting nervous for no reason.'
The closer the promised day got, the more restless I became. I felt this weird pressure, like I had to take the lead on this date.
What if I let Rebecca down after she'd gotten all hyped up?
Mana charging might be off the table for a while.
No way in hell.
Mana charging has to happen.
When I opened my eyes on the morning of the third day after we'd parted.
I was ablaze with motivation to start the date. I washed up, came back, and sat seiza-style in the middle of the room waiting for Rebecca — to steel my nerves like a warrior about to march into battle.
"Hup."
At last, the moment the sun rose outside the window.
A knock sounded from the door of my inn room.
At the same time, Rebecca's voice rang out brightly from the hallway.
"Luke-! I'm here."
In that instant, I lunged for the door like a cheetah homing in on its prey.
I flung the closed door wide open.
"Ah."
Had she been fixing her hair right before the door opened?
Rebecca, who'd been brushing her bangs aside with her fingers, looked flustered when her eyes met mine.
"Good morning."
"G-good morning."
That was the moment I raised my hand in greeting.
I dropped my gaze down and took Rebecca in — and in that instant, I couldn't help but be stunned. Her outfit was completely different from usual.
The leather pants she always wore, the crimson top tied up with straps — none of them were in sight today.
"Oh—."
A pure-looking white linen blouse, a wool skirt that covered her thighs. Rebecca, with her long straight red hair tied neatly back with a ribbon, falling all the way to her waist.
"Goddamn...."
The moment I saw Rebecca, I was completely overwhelmed.
I couldn't pull myself together against the full-force feminine power radiating from every inch of her body.
I don't even have a particular thing for women with their hair tied up, and yet I stood there spacing out, staring at Rebecca.
Her bare, pale nape looked impossibly erotic.
"H-how is it?"
Rebecca asked me, her cheeks faintly flushed.
If she's asking how it is — of course she looked beautiful.
She was showing less skin than in her usual clothes, but I liked it better that way.
That innocent charm had utterly seized my heart.
And on top of that, it was a skirt instead of leather pants.
Which meant this was the first time I'd ever seen Rebecca wear a skirt. Had today's date awakened some kind of feminine instinct in her?
In my heart, I offered up a prayer of gratitude to Kate for setting this up.
Thank you, Kate.
I won't forget this debt.
Okay, enough silent gratitude for now.
First, I had to answer Rebecca's question. Since she'd put so much effort into dressing up, I needed to give her proper encouragement in return. I racked my brain for flowery words to praise her with.
"Back when there was a festival in Yoen-su a while ago — I once saw some noble young ladies riding in on a carriage. You're way more beautiful than any of those ladies I saw back then. I mean it. There's just no comparison."
Lacking eloquence, I'd scraped together whatever I could manage to compliment her looks. Women usually yearn for the life of nobility, so I figured Rebecca would be happy to hear this kind of praise.
"Yeah? I see."
But when I gauged her reaction, I was taken aback. Rebecca didn't seem particularly happy to hear the compliment. She just smiled and nodded calmly. A natural, easygoing reaction, like water flowing downstream.
I'd squeezed my brain dry to come up with that line.
Had I chosen the wrong words? Or could she actually be the daughter of some noble house? Whatever the reason, I hastily fired off my next line.
"You're so goddamn beautiful I'm losing my mind. My head's going haywire, Rebeccaaaaaaagh."
I clutched my head and started shaking it around like a maniac — figuring I could make up for my lack of vocabulary with sheer reaction.
Fortunately, it seemed my heartfelt headbanging got through to her.
Rebecca giggled away with a face full of delight.
"I like the way you shook your head — I could really feel the sincerity. Makes all the effort I put into dressing up feel worth it."
"Yeah. But wait — did you actually buy new clothes?"
"Mm. Used the bounty money to get a new outfit."
No wonder it reeked of brand-new goods — she'd shown up in newly bought clothes?
She'd put some serious fighting spirit into this date, apparently.
Rebecca asked for my escort in a tone like some noble lady.
"Please take good care of me today, Luke."
"The pleasure's all mine, my lady. Let's head to the theater before we're late."
I led Rebecca out of the inn and straight into the city streets.
I'd already finished getting ready to leave, so we could move without delay.
A summer morning under a clear sky.
Walking the streets with Rebecca really did feel different from usual.
Just looking at her all dressed up was enough to warm my chest.
Was this seriously the same warrior woman who'd gone into a bare-handed brawl with a kelpie when we first met?
Rebecca gave me a puzzled look.
"What? Is there something on my face?"
"No, just...."
"Just—?"
"My chest feels colossal."
"'My chest feels colossal' — what kind of expression even is that? Is it slang you incubi use?"
"Eh, you could say that. It's a phrase we use when we're moved. Means I was moved by how you look all dressed up."
"M-moved? You're hyping me up way too much."
She was playing humble with her words, but before I knew it, Rebecca was wearing a pleased smile.
Chatting merrily, I escorted Rebecca to the theater at Yoen-su.
A large theater located in Yoen-su's bustling downtown.
The theater named Goldberg — unmistakably the same name printed on the tickets Kate had given us.
I showed the tickets to a staff member at the box office beside the theater building. I'd worried they might be bogus tickets, but the staff member showed no sign of any issue.
"You may enjoy the performance of <Siegfried>, which will begin in thirty minutes. Please take your seats and wait for the play to start."
"What's this play 'Siegfried' about?"
"It's a play adapted from a heroic epic of the Midgard Continent. It tells the life story of a hero who sets out to slay an evil dragon."
A heroic epic — so basically this world's version of a hero story.
Hero stories weren't half bad. At least it was way better than comedy or horror. Not that I even knew whether horror as a genre existed in this medieval fantasy-land.
A story about a hero's life meant there'd be action, right?
The kind of rip-roaring action where a real man smashes everything in his path.
"Let's hurry inside."
Rebecca grabbed my wrist and pulled me along.
I followed her into the theater and took the seat written on the ticket.
As it happened, my seat was near the front, even on the second-floor balcony.
A spot that overlooked the entire stage in a single glance.
Even among the teeming crowd of spectators, we could enjoy the play without any trouble.
Inwardly, I thanked Kate again for snagging us such good tickets. It seemed Rebecca was thinking of Kate in that moment too.
Amid the noisy chatter of the audience, Rebecca opened her mouth.
"Luke. About that nun we met last time."
"What about her?"
"Let's stop calling her a tool-bitch."
"I'll keep that in mind."
I resolved to take Rebecca's advice to heart.