Chapter 50 - A Request

Even at its most generous, Noel Astria Seamus's reputation at work would be hard to sum up as anything more than “devoted to her duties.”

Keep professional and personal matters strictly separate. No idle chatter during work hours. Everything done efficiently, on a tight schedule.

She never abused her authority or made unreasonable demands, so she could hardly be called a bad superior. But ask whether she was someone her subordinates could grow fond of, and they would all have to think about that.

After all, it was hard to feel close to someone who was so unbending.

Being human, she surely had days when she felt unwell or simply didn't want to work. Yet during work hours, Noel always worked exactly the same way, like a machine. It was only natural that people found her impressive rather than approachable.

In that light...

“Dame Noel, are you all right?”

“Are you feeling unwell—”

“If something's wrong, perhaps you should go and rest—”

Hearing remarks like these from everyone in turn was practically unheard of for her.

Whenever anyone spoke to her, she would struggle to answer as though desperately holding something back. Her face had been strangely flushed all day, and cold sweat poured off her. Who wouldn't be worried?

“... If I let my guard down for even a moment, I feel like I'll say something terribly embarrassing.”

“...”

“So could you please avoid speaking to me as much as possible too, Aiden?”

That was the immediate answer he received when he asked what on earth was wrong.

'... Come to think of it.'

Hadn't Aiden been responsible the first time she'd gone through something like this, too?

Noel gave him a vaguely aggrieved look, but the man on the receiving end wasn't in particularly good shape either.

'What am I supposed to do about this?'

Aiden thought this as cold sweat poured off him almost as heavily as it did Noel.

She had her quirks... enough that she sometimes seemed to live on another planet altogether. But when it came to work, she had never once faltered.

Wasn't this the same Noel who had ultimately crossed swords with the Lord Protector because she believed it was her duty?

... The potency of a potion that could give her this much trouble was downright frightening.

The one consolation was that the potion he'd just bought from the Point Shop and given Noel was explicitly described as having a “short duration.” She wouldn't stay like this for very—

-System Message

▶The ‘Lowest-Grade Random Potion’ currently affecting target ‘Noel Astria Seamus’ has 14 hours remaining!

“...”

So it wasn't all that short.

Aside from their randomized effects, the potions available in the Point Shop were proving more useful in all sorts of ways than he'd expected.

... The problem was that he wasn't particularly pleased about that right now.

'Couldn't this turn into a major problem if things go wrong?'

With anyone else, he could have shrugged it off as a full day of drunken antics. Unfortunately, the person who had drunk it dealt with all manner of dignitaries as routinely as she breathed.

If this continued and she committed some serious breach of etiquette, that alone could escalate into a tremendous diplomatic incident...

“...”

Then drastic measures were the only option.

Taking a deep breath, Aiden approached Noel and leaned toward her face. Close enough that she flinched and instinctively backed away.

“Dame Noel.”

“—”

Her breath visibly caught the moment their eyes met. Then she squeezed her eyes shut and spoke.

“Aiden. If you come any closer, I'll punch you.”

“... What?”

“Compared with the other things I'm suddenly tempted to do, that's the least objectionable.”

“...”

“Would you please stop me from doing something strange to you?”

... He was almost afraid to ask what on earth that meant.

And after hearing that, he did feel a little guilty.

But he still couldn't stand by and do nothing.

“Dame Noel, let's go outside.”

“What?”

Even if it meant getting punched.

He couldn't simply leave her in this state.

▣

Katya Heinkel Craven had been in a rather foul mood lately.

... More precisely, since the highs and lows of her emotions were determined almost entirely by Aiden Kellermain, that could also be taken to mean she hadn't had much contact with him recently.

'All that talk about earning points with him.'

Once again, she pictured the detestable face of the Pontiff, who had breezed back to the Holy Kingdom not long ago.

Honestly, hadn't she done all the important things during the fight?

She'd set up the Suppression Pillars, saved Aiden from near death, and even at the end, she'd tried to support him and get him out of the area.

She didn't care how the battle turned out. His safety mattered far more, and she'd looked after that much better than the Lionhearted had.

And yet.

Lately, Aiden had been far more absorbed in other things than in paying attention to her.

He wandered around libraries devouring bizarre books like ‘The Ecology of Magical Beasts’ and ‘Magical Beast Studies,’ spent entire days running around in the name of basic fitness training that didn't suit him at all, and studied how to maintain swords and guns...

“...”

On reflection, those did sound like productive activities. Regardless, their very existence displeased Katya.

'Why waste time on pointless things like that!'

If anything dangerous happened, she'd take care of it all herself anyway. Weren't they friends?

Instead of spending time on those things, he could at least offer her a word of praise—

'... Oh, right. He did praise me.'

—But he could still give her a few more. In any case, would it kill him to spend less time with the Lionhearted, who was every bit as detestable as the Pontiff, and more time with her?

Unfortunately, she wasn't very good at hiding her emotions. As a result, everyone who encountered her at the capital's headquarters turned around and fled in alarm.

Before long, rumors were circulating through the building that Katya looked ready to kill someone, but that was clearly none of her concern.

... Unlike the sight approaching right in front of her. That certainly warranted her attention.

Aiden was dragging Noel along by the arm. One glance was enough to tell he meant to take her somewhere.

Katya's face crumpled at the sight.

'What's this?'

Leaving her all alone while they enjoyed themselves, were they?

Resentment bubbled furiously inside her. She wanted to barge between them that very instant, shrieking at the top of her lungs, and tear them apart.

And she would have, if something hadn't suddenly stopped her in her tracks.

Mostly, it was Aiden's expression as he dragged the Lionhearted along. His face was rigid, extraordinarily grave.

And the Lionhearted being pulled along behind him had gone beyond red-faced to almost deathly pale.

It certainly wasn't a romantic atmosphere...

“...”

Her instincts told her.

Those two were about to have a serious conversation.

At that premonition, Katya unconsciously broke into a broad grin and concealed her presence.

'A serious conversation involving the Lionhearted, huh...?'

She didn't know the details, but she had a feeling that eavesdropping would give her plenty of useful material for getting under that woman's skin later.

... They no longer fought openly the way they used to, but it was still abundantly clear that she and Noel were not on comfortable terms.

She secretly followed them. The moment they reached a secluded spot, the Lionhearted violently shook off Aiden's hand.

As though enduring his touch for so long had been an immense ordeal.

The drama was beginning. Katya rubbed her hands together eagerly.

“I told you, didn't I, that right now, I can barely hold my tongue—!”

“If you have something to say, say it. I'll listen, even if it's embarrassing.”

Aiden replied without the slightest sign of taking offense at her behavior.

Everything about him suggested he wouldn't particularly mind whatever she said.

“We're husband and wife anyway, aren't we?”

“...”

“I don't think anyone would find it strange for you to say something like that.”

Noel blinked blankly at those words.

Something had shocked her so deeply that, for a moment, even her desperate efforts to filter what she could and couldn't say vanished.

She closed her eyes briefly and took a deep breath, trying to trace that shock back to its source.

The answer came sooner than she'd expected.

'Déjà vu.'

... Come to think of it, that was exactly how Noel herself had behaved before.

Before she'd developed any particular feelings for him. They were husband and wife, after all. They had mutually agreed to become so.

Things like this were simply part of that ‘contract.’

Because a sham marriage was what bound them together.

“...”

The moment that realization struck, Noel's gaze darkened.

Recognizing anew that this was how he defined their relationship sent her spirits plummeting.

To be more precise, she was upset.

Very upset.

Then pure-white energy erupted from her entire body.

“H-huh? Dame Noel?!”

It was fierce enough to draw that startled exclamation from Aiden. She looked ready to launch into battle at any moment.

No, more than that.

Aiden had had plenty of opportunities to wield energy himself, and he had seen a great deal of how Meyer, the foremost master of martial arts in his era, manipulated it.

What Noel was giving off now didn't pale in comparison at all. The resolve in her eyes alone was more than worthy of a general preparing to enter an actual battlefield...

“... Hngh!”

What she did next was every bit as outrageous as that intensity suggested.

But instead of using Shaping to produce some combat construct, she forced all that energy inward, into her own body.

Then, as Noel steadied her breathing and circulated the energy throughout herself, the clear liquid she'd drunk began dripping from her fingertips.

She had gathered up every last component of the liquid circulating through her body and extracted it.

'Good God.'

The thought came unbidden.

She'd precisely isolated a drug that she'd already ingested, that was already circulating throughout her body, and forced it out?

To accomplish something like that, she'd need concentration and computational ability sufficient to control every pulse of every cell in her body. That was only a slight exaggeration.

It was a feat worthy of a knight capable of producing energy in a single color. The question was...

'... Why go that far?'

... Wouldn't the drug have left her system naturally with time?

At worst, she'd say a few mildly embarrassing things and that would be the end of it. He hadn't imagined that her aversion to that would drive her to do something so terrifying that she exhausted herself.

And it really must have taken an enormous toll even on Noel. She was panting, visibly drained.

She was drenched in sweat. Her face was scarlet. Her breathing was ragged beyond belief.

... In some ways, she looked worse than when the drug had been affecting her. But clearly, that wasn't merely the exhaustion from forcing it out of her body.

“Did you tell me to speak if I had something to say?”

But contrary to Aiden's impression, this was something she absolutely had to do.

The words she was about to say had to be entirely sincere.

She had to deliver them with a clear head, of her own free will, in a way that let them both understand exactly where the other stood.

“Yes. I will.”

Yet the words she'd been unable to let out for fear they would burst free the moment she opened her mouth now refused to take shape as sound.

Her returning emotions weighed her down.

Self-restraint, embarrassment, shame, worries and fears.

Her mouth opened and closed again and again. Her heart pounded. Her mind was blank.

Every organ in her body was probably screaming at her not to do it.

To stop this nonsense and quietly go back. That she was making a choice that might shatter a relationship which could at least have remained intact as it was.

But even so.

“Aiden!”

“... Yes?”

Uh.

Uhh.

What was wrong with her?

The look in her eyes was anything but ordinary. There was such menace in them that it wouldn't have seemed out of place for her to declare war and announce she was going to take the imperial prince's head right that instant.

As Aiden broke into a cold sweat at that thought, Noel gathered the words beneath her vocal cords as though concentrating every last scrap of energy in her body for one explosive release.

“With me!”

Red flames almost seemed to pour from her eyes. She huffed and ground her teeth so hard it was a wonder they didn't shatter.

“Tomorrow!”

And Noel couldn't help behaving that way.

“Would you have dinner with me?!”

Taking that first step away from a ‘contract’ toward something ‘real’...

For her, it unquestionably required that much courage.

“...”

Understanding what those words implied, Aiden's jaw dropped.

“...”

... And Katya's face twisted as she listened secretly nearby.