Date
After my confrontation with Camilla ended, I spotted Senior Bella surrounded by a throng of students.
Well, that was only natural.
Top graduate of the Academy, and a former member of the Silver Fangs—the hero’s personal knight order, a name everyone recognized. With both skill and looks to back her up, it was no wonder she was popular.
The students competed to strike up conversation with her. Bella looked a little put out, yet she still answered each one diligently.
I watched the scene with mild interest from a short distance away, arms folded.
Senior really is popular no matter where she goes.
After enduring the barrage of questions for a while, Bella’s gaze suddenly drifted in my direction.
Our eyes met for a moment.
She furrowed her brow slightly, then raised a hand toward the students.
“Sorry, but that’s enough for today. Something urgent came up.”
The students looked disappointed at her abrupt declaration, yet none dared hold her back.
Bella seized the opening and strode straight toward me.
Then she grabbed my wrist without ceremony.
“Uh… Senior?”
Again?
Lately it felt like I was getting dragged off by her more and more often.
“Come with me.”
Still clueless, I let her lead me down the corridor.
Whispers and sidelong glances from the surrounding students followed us.
“Oh my, even Professor Bella doesn’t seem to like that bitch.”
“Serves her right. She’s probably about to get chewed out again somewhere.”
“Calling her out alone like that—she’s definitely on the hit list.”
Hmm…
If Bella really were dragging me off to torment me, that would have been even better.
Only after we reached a deserted stretch of hallway did Bella stop and turn to face me.
Her expression was still blunt, yet the atmosphere felt freer than when she had been surrounded by students.
“Yeon.”
“What is it, Senior?”
“Are you… free right now?”
“Uh… well, I don’t have anything particular to do.”
Classes were over, and going back to the dorm would only mean another awkward staring contest with Elise.
“Good.”
Bella hesitated for a beat, then drew two small brooches from her coat and held one out to me.
It looked like an ordinary silver brooch, yet a faint trace of mana clung to it.
“This… is an item that conceals identity. It won’t last long, but it should hide your appearance for a while.”
“Huh? Why are you giving this to me…?”
“I need you to help me out for a bit.”
She pressed the brooch into my hand as she spoke.
“It’s the kind of place that’s a little awkward to go alone.”
“Uh… where are we going?”
“You’ll know when we get there.”
She waited for my answer with that characteristic indifferent look of hers.
Asking for help yet sounding so matter-of-fact about it.
Still, I didn’t particularly want to refuse.
“All right. I was bored anyway, so this works out.”
I pinned the brooch to my collar.
A faint light flared, and a slight blurring sensation washed over me.
“Good. Then let’s go.”
Bella took my wrist again.
This time her grip was gentler than the rough tug earlier.
We walked side by side toward the Academy’s main gate.
“So, where exactly are we headed?”
“There’s a new dessert shop near the Academy. The reviews have been good.”
“Dessert shop…?”
Had I misheard? Bella and a dessert shop—those two things simply did not go together.
“Yeah. Going alone is just… a little awkward, I guess.”
She cleared her throat lightly and looked away.
Huh?
Was she… embarrassed?
“Pfft…”
A laugh slipped out before I could stop it.
Bella whipped her head around and glared at me, yet there was nothing threatening about it.
If anything, she looked almost cute.
“Senior, you have a surprisingly adorable side, don’t you?”
“Shut up. Just walk faster.”
She tightened her hold on my wrist a fraction and took the lead.
Even that gesture somehow looked awkward.
We left the Academy and stepped into the bustling streets.
Thanks to the identity-concealing brooch, no one recognized me at all.
Walking the streets like an ordinary student felt like something I hadn’t done in ages.
Bella still held my wrist, and by now it simply felt natural.
“There it is.”
The place she stopped in front of was a small shop decorated in a charming, cozy style.
Pastel walls and a cute signboard.
A sweet scent drifted out through the cracks of the door.
It really was a dessert shop.
“Senior, you like places like this?”
“…Sometimes I get a craving for something sweet.”
She answered as curtly as ever, yet the tips of her ears seemed faintly red.
“All right. Then let’s go in.”
Just the two of us, quietly…
“Hold on a moment!”
A voice I really did not want to hear right now blocked our path.
I looked up, and sure enough, Rina stood with her arms crossed, barring the way.
Her pink hair fluttered lightly, and those clear emerald eyes were fixed on me—more precisely, on the brooch pinned to my collar.
“Student Rina? What brings you here…?”
Bella asked, sounding flustered.
Rina glanced at her briefly, then locked her gaze back on me.
She pointed at the brooch with one hand.
“Yeon, that magical tool doesn’t work on me.”
Ah, damn it.
I cursed silently.
I had forgotten.
Rina was a candidate Saintess.
Holy power often came with strong resistance or the ability to see through deceptive magic like this.
What a nuisance.
Rina looked me up and down with eyes full of suspicion.
“Hiding your identity to this extent… just what wicked scheme were you plotting?”
“Wicked scheme? What are you talking about…”
Bella tried to explain in a panic, but I deliberately shook the arm she was holding and answered in a surly tone.
“Can’t you tell just by looking? I was about to do something bad and got caught by this senior, so she’s dragging me off.”
“What? That doesn’t make any…”
Bella stared at me in disbelief, but I shot her a look that said to stay quiet.
Rina frowned at my words.
She didn’t seem to believe me completely, yet she didn’t outright deny it either.
“Take that magical tool off right now. Trying to hide your identity with something like that…”
She reached for the brooch, then suddenly stopped as if something had occurred to her.
Her expression grew complicated; she sighed and spoke again.
“…No, leave it on. It might be better this way for now.”
She must have remembered the way the students had been harassing me in the hallway earlier.
“So, are you done with whatever you wanted?”
I snapped at her in an irritated voice.
“Why do you keep bothering me? Just go your own way.”
Rina looked briefly hurt by my cold words, but she soon met my eyes again with a firm gaze.
She hesitated a moment, then carefully opened her mouth.
“When we were little, you saved me. From the monsters.”
“…….”
That hadn’t been me.
It had been the original Yeon Bennet—nothing more than a doll collecting the Faith of Malice.
Why she had saved Rina back then never came up in the game until the very end.
“I saw it clearly then. I believe there’s still… a good part left inside you.”
Rina’s voice held unshakable conviction.
“So I will never give up. I will definitely… redeem you!”
I let out a deep sigh at the way she declared it.
But that very quality was one of the reasons I liked Rina.
A girl so upright it was almost foolish, who never abandoned hope.
“Do whatever you want. Not that it’ll ever go the way you hope.”
I shrugged and tried to walk past her.
“Ah, where do you think you’re going!”
Rina cried out and this time grabbed my other arm.
“Since I’m already here, let’s go together!”
“Where?”
“For dessert!”
She beamed as she shouted.
“Professor Bella doesn’t mind, right? I heard there’s a new popular place nearby!”
“What? I…”
Bella tried to protest, but Rina paid no attention and simply took both of our arms, one on each side, and started walking briskly.
“Come on, come on! Let’s eat something delicious and talk! Yeon, you’re far too thin. You need to eat plenty of sweets!”
In the end, Bella and I were dragged along by Rina all the way to the dessert shop we had been heading for.
An impromptu date with the two of them.
Bella glared at Rina with open displeasure from the side, but Rina chattered away excitedly as if she didn’t notice at all.
She had so much to say that her stream of talk never paused from the moment we arrived, ordered, and waited for the desserts to come out.
When the desserts finally arrived, we picked up our forks in silence.
The sweet, soft cake melted on the tongue.
The shop was filled with a sweet fragrance. We sat side by side by the window, each tasting the cake in front of us.
“Wow! This is really delicious! Right, Professor Bella?”
Rina’s eyes went round with delight as she turned to Bella.
“Mm. Not bad. The cream is smooth… and not too sweet.”
Bella nodded with a rare look of satisfaction.
So she really did like sweet things after all.
I stabbed my fork into the chocolate mousse.
Honestly it was good, but I deliberately scowled and muttered unhappily.
“What’s so good about this cheap food? Your taste is terrible.”
I’ll have to apologize to Senior later.
“Yeon!”
Rina spun toward me, flaring up.
“Can’t you speak a little more nicely? That’s why you don’t have any friends!”
I shot back with a sneer.
“You don’t have friends either, which is why you’re hanging around with us right now, isn’t it?”
“What are you talking about! I—I have plenty of friends!”
Rina flushed and protested.
Yet her voice lacked confidence.
“Is that so? Then try naming even one close friend.”
I folded my arms and stared her down.
“Th-that’s…”
Rina couldn’t continue and bit her lip.
“When I was little… I had lots of friends. You know that.”
After a brief silence, she murmured weakly.
“But… after I parted ways with them and became a candidate Saintess… everyone either treated me too carefully, or they only approached me because they wanted something. People who came to me sincerely… there weren’t many.”
The loneliness in her voice left me momentarily speechless.
Did I go too far?
I hadn’t wanted to see that expression on Rina’s face.
Suddenly Rina slowly lifted her head.
The face that had been steeped in sadness and loneliness only moments before was gone without a trace.
“But…”
A cold, expressionless mask now covered her features, empty of any emotion.
“What exactly… were the two of you doing?
Her voice was completely different from the frail one just now—ice-cold and razor-sharp.
“For some reason, you two looked awfully close.”