Chapter 80
“Miss, how are you finding life at the academy?”
The chauffeur, who had been hesitating and watching her reaction, broke the awkward silence first.
“Yes.”
“Nothing particularly difficult?”
“Yes.”
Yet with Haru's curt answers, the conversation came to an end as though it had never existed.
The chauffeur felt sorry for the once-cheerful young lady, whose bright nature had vanished after her frail mother passed away before winter was over.
At Vice Chairman Lee's request, he drove his daughter all the way to the academy himself every day, but there had been no progress in the situation over the past few months.
“I'll be back.”
“Um... Miss?”
“Yes...?”
“Since there are always plenty of people around you who can help, mi—”
“If you're going to say something like that, I'll just get out. Thank you for driving me today, too.”
“I'm sorry... Have a safe day. I'll wait for you here at the rear gate at dismissal, just as usual.”
The girl got out of the car and filled her lungs with the refreshing air.
Yet her walk to school did not make her heart flutter as much as she had expected.
From ‘that day’ onward, Lee Haru's world had been dyed black and white in an instant.
Nothing was fun, and nothing gave her energy.
The only people Haru could still bring herself to feel attached to were her friends at the academy.
“Hi, Haru-jjing! I was waiting for you.”
Jeon Nuri approached her, waving.
She had been in the same Class 1-C as Haru the previous year and was also her closest friend.
Only then did Haru relax her stiff expression and return the greeting.
“Whoa, you use a chauffeur instead of self-driving? I guess Samjin Group really is different!”
“It's just because my dad told him to. It's so uncomfortable having two people in the car.”
“Still, it has a certain romantic appeal. In dramas, rich heiresses always seem to have their own chauffeur.”
“That's because they're dramas. It's not like that in real life.”
Haru knew Nuri was only joking, anyway.
Nuri, whose grandfather was the director of a university hospital, was also among the academy's wealthier students.
Haru had never deliberately sought out friends from a similar background, but she disliked the distance created by wealth gaps, and that may have been another reason Nuri felt more comfortable to her.
“Haru, you seem really different from before.”
“Me? How am I different?”
“Hmm... How should I put it? You used to be such a chatterbox, but these days you hardly talk, and... Yeah, you've gotten chic.”
“Chic...?”
Haru wore a bewildered expression at the word.
“Yeah! Like Ressa from Frozen 4!”
“I haven't seen that movie, so I don't really know.”
“Wow, you haven't seen it? Ressa is Queen Elsa's daughter, and she was amazingly good at ice magic from a young age. She's incredibly pretty, but she never smiles, so everyone in the palace tried all sorts of ways to make her laugh. So what they did was—”
“Stop spoiling it! I'm going to watch it later, so no more.”
“Anyway, that older sister looks super chic. She always has a blank expression, but she's incredibly cool...”
“You mean like No Name?”
Haru and Nuri exchanged glances.
Nuri let out a thoughtful groan, pondered deeply, then shook her head.
“No Name has a blank expression, but calling her simply chic feels a little off. She's kind of complicated. If you're cool-chic, Haru, then No Name is maybe cute-chic?”
“What's cute-chic?”
“The opposite of cool is hot, so should we call her hot-chic? But that sounds weird—it sounds like Hot Six! Hehe, I don't really know either. It's just... like that.”
Nuri burst into giggles, apparently finding something hilarious.
Haru tried to laugh along awkwardly to match her mood.
At the sudden mention of No Name, Nuri seemed to think of another topic and swung their joined hands back and forth.
“No Name's been giving off such a nice scent lately! Should I ask what perfume she uses? She's in the row next to us, but it keeps distracting me so much I can't focus in class.”
“Yeah, I could smell apples on my side, too.”
“Right? You smelled it too. It's not just apples. It's an incredibly sweet apple scent, like the apples have been soaked in sugar and honey.”
“You can tell that much? You have an incredible nose.”
“I kind of do. My mom says that to me all the time, actually!”
“Ah... Yeah... Your mom...”
“Huh? What's wrong? Are you feeling sick?”
Nuri's offhand remark made Haru's heart sink.
Seeing Haru's complexion suddenly worsen, Nuri examined her worriedly.
Bweeeeeep-
‘Again...’
A sound that muddled her thoughts rang in her ears.
Normally it wasn't this loud, but today it was especially hard to endure.
Haru crouched down on the street for a moment, clutching her head and taking deep breaths.
‘One, two...’
Bweeeeeeeeeep-
“Agh...!”
“Haru! Are you okay?”
Along with the ringing growing louder, a splitting pain spread through her head.
Flustered, Nuri asked quickly.
As far as Nuri knew, Haru had always been healthy and energetic, and had never suddenly collapsed like this.
“Lee Haru! What's wrong? Are you hurt?”
“No. It doesn't hurt... The sound... Cover my ears, please.”
“Your ears? Like this?”
“It still hurts... I can still hear it.”
At Haru's desperate request, Nuri tried covering both her ears with her hands, clumsily but earnestly, yet it seemed to be no use.
As the situation seemed to be getting serious, Nuri wondered whether to ask a passerby for help or call an ambulance; just then, she spotted their classmates walking toward them along the same road.
“Hey, Nuri! And the one beside you has to be Haru, right? What are you doing sitting there?”
Seori and Jihye were there, followed by Yuna and No Name.
“Hi, guys... But Haru seems really sick right now...”
“Haru's sick? Haru, are you okay?”
Seori dashed over and checked Haru's condition. But there was nothing visibly wrong with her.
“I was wondering whether we should call an ambulance... Haru keeps saying she's okay, though.”
“Wouldn't it be better to call one anyway...?”
Jihye timidly offered her opinion. Yuna merely watched from a distance, apparently uncomfortable with the situation itself.
“Can you come out with me for a moment?”
In the end, No Name stepped forward, unable to watch any longer.
“Where does it hurt, Lee Haru? Is it your head?”
“The sound... It's too loud... Please...”
Haru spoke in a voice filled with pain.
Yet they were standing somewhere quiet, not beside a major road.
[2nd Circle Cast: Diagnosis]
No Name tried even using magic to find the cause of her pain, but got no results at all.
When No Name shook her head, the children's expressions grew even more serious.
“It's okay. I have an idea.”
Even so, No Name did not panic. She tightly wrapped her trembling arms around Haru's body.
Suddenly, a golden aura flowed from her body and enveloped her completely.
Feeling as though the black-and-white world had suddenly brightened, Haru opened her eyes.
Beep-
The phantom sound she had hated hearing gradually subsided.
As a warm energy circulated through Haru's body, her complexion slowly began to improve.
After checking her condition, No Name brushed Haru's bangs, damp with cold sweat, to the side.
“You might get a little sleepy. If you feel like sleeping, go ahead. We'll take you to class.”
Just as No Name said, this moment felt like a cozy nest, and Haru felt her eyelids growing heavy.
‘Apple scent...’
Haru realized it was the same scent she had been discussing with Nuri earlier.
The longer she smelled it, the more her body and mind seemed to settle, and her head grew clearer.
‘The sky is blue...?’
She saw the blue sky spread across the background—the sky she had thought she might never see again.
Not wanting to forget this inexplicable, peaceful, overwhelming feeling, Haru reached out to No Name.
“I think... I'm feeling a little better.”
* * *
Haru thought it had truly been a day when sleepiness poured down on her all day long.
After winning her battle with sleep, Haru had to struggle against the drowsiness that came rushing back after lunch.
Fortunately, fifth period was physical education, and sixth period had suddenly changed from math to art on the schedule; otherwise, she might have ended up attending class in a state where listening would have been worse than not attending at all.
Unless it was performance-assessment season, PE class was always replaced with dodgeball.
Since there were only twenty students in a class, regular PE classes were usually held with two classes at once.
Every single boy participated in dodgeball, while only about half the girls did.
In a corner at the back of the gymnasium basketball court, No Name sat leaning against the wall, eyes closed.
Normally, she would have been chatting with Yuna, but today she was alone because Seori had apparently dragged Yuna away by force.
Nuri was also absent from the gym for a parent-teacher conference, so Haru had no choice but to spend a boring stretch of time by herself.
Haru sat quietly and watched only No Name.
Haru didn't know why, but the person called No Name was a ‘mysterious girl’ to her.
It was something every student in the class would have agreed with without even needing to ask.
Sephyron Academy almost never accepted transfer students outside the regular first-year entrance examination, yet this was a girl they had brought in to the point of breaking their own rules.
As if to prove it from her first day as a transfer student, she memorized all her classmates' names in a single go as soon as she heard them.
And what about the aptitude evaluation?
In a notoriously difficult exam that covered not only material that could be learned only at the academy but also topics that would not appear until much later, she scored a perfect 100 as if to show off.
She was the smallest student among the academy's second-years—small enough that people would believe she was a first-year, or even younger—but the air she gave off was unmistakably mature.
Aside from calling her ‘mysterious,’ Haru could think of no particularly fitting description.
Haru quietly moved closer and sat beside No Name.
Even though Haru deliberately made some noise, No Name still kept her eyes closed.
Perhaps she was tired too, and was taking a brief rest like Haru had.
Haru took advantage of the opportunity to enjoy some time admiring No Name up close.
‘She's so cute...’
No Name was extremely skinny overall, but the baby fat remaining on her cheeks made her look like a baby who had simply grown taller.
Seeing her occasionally furrow her brow and twitch the corners of her mouth, Haru decided she must be dreaming.
And above all, for the past few days, Haru had felt better whenever she caught the rich scent of apples.
‘Would she be my friend too?’
Haru was a fairly popular girl in many ways—popular enough to have even served as class president the previous year.
She was well aware of that herself, so she thought there would be plenty of chances to grow closer in the future and decided to quietly leave so she wouldn't wake No Name.
“Hey, watch out! The ball's coming!”
Park Taehyun, a boy from the same class, shouted to warn them.
“Huh...?”
Turning her head to check the dodgeball flying toward them, Haru realized its trajectory was aimed at No Name.
It happened too quickly for her to even give a warning when, suddenly, No Name's eyes snapped open, followed by her swinging her arm forcefully to the side.
Bang!
A sound like an exploding bomb rang throughout the gymnasium.
“...!”
“What? It burst.”
No Name spoke in a subdued voice as she looked at the dodgeball, which had been reduced to a complete rag.
She carried the ragged ball over to the boys herself and apologized.
“Sorry.”
“N-no, it's okay. There are more balls.”
“What if the teacher gets mad at us?”
“If we quietly take another one out of the storage room, she won't know.”
After returning to her spot, No Name leaned against the wall in the same way and fell into thought,
“How did you do that?”
Haru asked in an incredulous voice.
“I used my aura without realizing it. I got momentarily confused between my imagination and reality.”
“You weren't sleeping?”
“I wasn't asleep.”
Haru's face quickly turned bright red.
What if No Name had noticed her secretly staring at her?
Feeling flustered for no reason, Haru fired one question after another at No Name.
“What were you imagining?”
“Imagining taking on a hundred people with a dagger.”
“...?”
It was the day the word ‘eccentric’ was newly added to Haru's personal dictionary for No Name.