Chapter 51 - An Outing

It felt strangely awkward all over again. Probably because this was the first time they had met like this—on a personal basis, with nothing to do with their contract.

"..."

"..."

Noel and Aiden looked at each other in silence.

Aiden had made himself a little more presentable than usual, but Noel had plainly poured her heart and soul into dressing up from head to toe.

... Wasn't this the same woman who wore her uniform even to banquets hosted by the imperial family?

'Stay calm.'

Aiden took a deep breath inwardly and prepared to speak.

In any case, Noel looked more than a little unsettled. She seemed utterly dazed, as though she herself had no idea what she was doing.

... Or perhaps she was simply nervous as hell.

Either way, at least one of them had to keep his head.

It was something he had reflected on before. The more someone liked him, the more on his guard he needed to be. The closer they grew, the harder it would be to handle a single misstep.

"Is there anywhere you'd like to go?"

At his question, Noel snapped out of her daze and struggled to answer.

"G-going to the movies, or having something nice to eat... Isn't that what a date involves? I'm not really sure."

"... Then shall we start with a meal—"

"W-would you wait a moment? I brought a list!"

"..."

Speechless, Aiden watched Noel pull a notebook from inside her clothes and rapidly scan through it.

Well, sure. He had done some basic research on things they could do, too.

But it hardly compared to the handwritten lists in Noel's notebook, covered in annotations, circles, and crosses.

Just how much preparation had she done?

Overwhelmed by her thoroughness, he followed without complaint to a restaurant, where he looked around with a slightly pale face.

"... Dame Noel."

"Yes?"

"... Isn't this place a little too nice?"

But the place she had brought him to was, by any measure, horrifyingly expensive for someone like Aiden.

Opening the menu with trembling hands, he found it packed with prices that made him want to leap out of his seat and leave.

For Aiden, who had lived with his father and younger sister in a little house where money was a daily worry...

"..."

Just looking at those figures felt enough to give him an irregular heartbeat.

"Shall I bring you everything on this page?"

"Yes. Thank you."

"..."

And of course Dame Noel went right ahead and ordered the lot.

'... Once again.'

He had felt it any number of times before, but even little things like this made it obvious.

She and Aiden lived in different worlds.

"You don't look well. Is something bothering you?"

"... No."

And when he thought about it, it was stranger still that someone like her was the more nervous one, anxiously watching for his reaction...

This whole situation already had his stomach in knots, but something else was making it even worse.

'... What is she doing over there?'

He could feel Katya's gaze boring into his back.

She was doing everything she could to conceal her presence. Unfortunately, Aiden could keenly sense fellow divinity wielders, and she remained firmly within his range.

She had crept after them all the way here and was watching them from a distance.

"..."

Honestly, he could do nothing but sit on pins and needles.

Whatever else might be true, Katya's current relationship type with him was Obsession. If he let something careless slip, who knew how she would react over there?

He ought to keep the conversation as natural as possible, treading that fine line without hurting Noel's feelings.

Frankly, there was no telling what trouble Katya might cause if something rubbed her the wrong way.

"You've seemed busy lately. Are you holding up all right?"

Official business was the easiest subject. Even Katya shouldn't have much of a reaction to that.

"Actually, you've been giving me more trouble than my workload, Aiden."

"... Pardon?"

"There is so much I've wanted to tell you, but we hardly ever get a moment alone. Her Highness Katya is so oblivious that she won't even give you any time to yourself—"

He could vividly picture the sparks flying from Katya's eyes behind him. The glare stabbing into his back was so fierce that he didn't need to turn around to be certain.

Aiden hastily changed the subject.

"I don't mind that, so you needn't worry. But as I was saying, you've been summoned to the imperial palace quite often lately."

In truth, he was curious about that himself.

The prince and the minister of administration would be keeping their heads down for a while. However active they might be behind the scenes, they weren't in a position to cause major trouble openly.

Yet he remembered seeing Noel summoned for personal discussions with the Emperor remarkably often lately. Even an outsider like Aiden, who took no direct part in governing the nation, could readily guess something was happening.

Noel answered with a deep sigh.

"The ducal House of Aslan is causing trouble."

Aiden's eyebrow twitched at the name.

'... The ducal House of Aslan?'

He knew that house's name well. The shield that protected the Empire from the northern void region. One of the Empire's foremost martial houses.

The Lionhearted might be the greatest warrior in the Empire, but the ranks immediately below her were filled with people from House Aslan. That alone attested to their might.

Aiden was also familiar with them through somewhat different information.

'The key figures in Chapter 2.'

Wasn't their house the main setting of Act 1, Chapter 2, Night of the Hunt?

"... What's happening there?"

"Well... There have long been rumors about Grand Duke Aslan's health. The problem is that his heirs are all ambitious. It's common knowledge that his son and daughter don't get along. Your typical succession dispute."

"..."

Yet again, this differed from the original.

'... Grand Duke Aslan is ill?'

Chapter 2 was originally a quest where the basic progression involved working with the grand duke to nip the source of the magical-beast disturbance in his domain in the bud. But once again, things had been twisted at their very foundation.

'I have a bad feeling about this.'

With the family embroiled in a succession dispute on top of everything else, it was the perfect opportunity for the prince and minister to meddle when they couldn't take center stage themselves.

Since Chapter 2 led straight into Chapter 3, Grand Duke Aslan and his domain had an enormous influence on the scenario.

What Noel had just said was not something he could afford to dismiss.

"More importantly, Aiden."

"... Yes?"

"That isn't what matters right now."

Then, as if cutting off the train of thought her information had set in motion, Noel cleared her throat and spoke.

"Here and now, well, what I mean is—"

Her gaze darted about as she stumbled over the words. The way she fidgeted made it seem as though she was drawing on every ounce of courage in her body just to say this.

"I'd like us to talk solely about ourselves."

"..."

"Th-there's so much we don't know about each other. We are going to be husband and wife, after all."

"... True. Is there something you'd like to know about me?"

There was nothing strange about Noel's request, really.

For all that a contractual marriage bound them together, they knew almost nothing about each other. Wanting to talk wasn't particularly strang—

"I think I'd prefer a son to a daughter. What do you think, Aiden?"

Aiden went rigid.

He couldn't know for certain, but Katya, watching behind him, surely looked much the same.

"... Was that a strange question?"

"... Quite."

At the very least, it definitely wasn't a question for a first date. Especially with an uninvited guest listening who got upset merely seeing the two of them together.

Noel's face paled a little. She appeared to be racking her brains for a better question...

"Then should I ask how many children you'd like to raise instead?"

"..."

Please.

No.

Once again, he was reminded that this woman's ability to rein herself in on subjects like this was truly, catastrophically nonexistent...

"... Shall we talk about something a little different, Dame Noel?"

"... What baby supplies we should use?"

... Could her train of thought please move away from children? He was begging her.

As Aiden squirmed, trying to escape these utterly inappropriate first-date questions, Katya's gaze grew sharper and sharper.

He could feel himself withering under the strain by the second.

"..."

Please.

Save him.

Someone save him from this hellish situation—

As Aiden squeezed his eyes shut with that thought, saviors burst into the restaurant.

"Get down!"

"Put the money in here. Now!"

... In the form of masked men pointing guns.

"..."

It was abrupt, but given that they had freed him from his current predicament, calling them saviors wasn't entirely unreasonable.

Robbers had actually become quite a rare sight in recent years. Especially the old-fashioned sort who wore masks and waved guns around.

With people capable of smashing boulders barehanded through supernatural power all over the place, the number of fools bold enough to try something like that was bound to dwindle.

In fact, two people at the very pinnacle of that group were sitting in this restaurant right now.

"Get down! Twitch a toe and I'll blow your head off!"

"Get your wallets out! All of them! Put them in the sack!"

For that reason, what Aiden felt as he watched the men wave their guns and bellow was clearly something other than fear.

While all the other diners threw themselves to the floor in panic, his gaze kept shifting between Noel and Katya.

"Hah..."

Noel sighed, a thick vein bulging on her forehead. Beneath that breath pulsed energy so refined that it almost looked like white vapor.

"After I, finally, managed to work up the courage, to arrange this—"

"..."

Breaking into a cold sweat, Aiden watched the murderous gleam in Noel's eyes. The knife and fork in her hands crumpled...

"These goddamn criminals, with absolutely no sense of timing—"

... It was a little funny that her anger seemed directed more at the interruption of her date than at the threat to public safety, but still.

Farther back, Katya was scraping her fork across her plate, a smile fixed on her face. No matter how he looked at her, she showed not the slightest trace of nervousness.

Instead, Aiden was beginning to get nervous.

'... What kind of trouble are these two about to cause?'

Mostly along those lines.