Chapter 197
『Translator: RainTL』
༺ Love Consultation (2) ༻
These past few days, Germain was in deep agony. It was because Melina, his peer that he was fond of, had a date planned with Korin.
‘Why… Why is she okay with Big Bro Korin, and not me?’
He was the one who spent a lot more time with her, so why?
Germain was anxious.
Who was Korin? He was the most popular knight and player of the Academy with countless ladies surrounding him.
What if Melina is interested in him?
‘No. No. Big Bro Korin knows that I like Melina. There’s no way he would betray me…’
But putting aside Korin, what about Melina? isn’t it pointless if Melina was interested in Korin?
Despite being a future priest of the Xeruem Order and a spy, Germain was just a seventeen-year-old boy. Unable to keep it to himself, he immediately went looking for Melina.
“Melina…”
“What is it, Germain?”
“Umm, on Friday, by the way… are you doing something with Big Bro Korin?”
“Yeah. How do you know that?”
“Like… I, I just heard it by accident. Umm… Why?”
Melina smiled before giving a clap as if she found Germain cute.
“Are you asking why I agreed to his offer and not yours?”
“Y, yeah…”
“Well, because it’s comfortable.”
“Huh? Comfortable?”
T, then what about me?
She replied before he could continue with his questions.
“He doesn’t have any ulterior motives in mind. I can tell he isn’t hiding anything.”
“T, that’s the same for me too!”
Melina sneered in response, evidently laughing at him.
“Yes yes. Of course, of course.”
“I, I’m serious!”
It was widely said that girls were mentally more mature than boys at a young age. The restless Germain and Melina teasing him were arguably a piece of evidence supporting that statement.
……
…
“Senior! Did you have to wait a lot?”
“Yeah, nice clothes. It’s a great match with your straw hat.”
“Wow~. You have amazing eyes!”
“My friends had a thing for fashion. And they always became sulky whenever I didn’t notice they were dressed up.”
Of course, there were always exceptions to that statement.
***
Asking Melina out on a meal was to show an example, but I had to keep my word. We went to the hair salon together and asked for some advice that only girls could help me with.
During the meal, I was planning on making her have a favorable opinion of Germain but she brought up that topic first.
“Actually, the reason I agreed to have a meal together is because I had something to consult about.”
“What is it? Is it something I can help you with?”
“Hmm~ probably. If it’s you, Senior Korin who’s collecting all the beautiful girls of the Academy, I would assume so.”
“What’s wrong with everyone’s evaluation of me…”
Why are they all misunderstanding me so much?
“So what is it about?”
“It’s about Germain.”
Is this… a coincidence or fate?
Melina grinned before picking up a spoon to cut the caramel custard, which we were having as dessert.
“I actually like Germain, and I’m even thinking that maybe I should go out with him.”
“Germain had a similar thing in mind.”
“Hahat~”
She swirled the custard around with a mean look on her face.
“Of course, I know that already. He makes it so obvious, but he’s quite cute so I’m pretending I don’t know it.”
“What a nasty attitude.”
“But that could be considered a quality, right?”
I thought she was just a young junior, but she was a lot more mature than I thought. In any case, the content of her consultation was rather simple.
“So you are willing to accept it if he asks you out first. Is that correct?”
“Yes. Confessing first as a girl is a bit… weird, right?”
She was right – even though there were elements of the modern world mixed into the world, the foundation was based on the late Middle Ages. Machismo wasn’t considered machismo and was instead an obvious virtue of a male. The same went for females.
In other words, there was a slight tendency to consider girls who approached men first as being immoral.
“Knn…”
“What’s wrong all of a sudden?”
“No. I was just thinking that I might have been a bit mean to the girls.”
As for me though, they all approached and confessed to me first. Marie, Alicia, Hua, and Ran… it was an element that I didn’t take into account due to being in the mindset of a modern world person.
“There are so many possible things you could be thinking about, that I don’t know what to say.”
“Really? Is it that bad?”
“Yes. That’s why I am consulting you in the first place, Senior.”
Simply put, she was asking me for advice because I had the experience of hitting on multiple girls here and there.
“So what you want is for Germain to confess to you first, right?”
“Yes.”
“Alright. I’ll tell him to be a bit more proactive.”
“Yes~! Thank you, Senior! Thanks for the meal as well!”
“Hold up.”
I stopped Melina in the middle of her thanks.
“You have to buy the meal today because I listened to your worries.”
“What~? Come on~ Mr. Senior~”
A girl asking for a favor like this might work on everyone else both in this world and on Earth, but not on me.
“Ehem! Ms. Mel, don’t be like this. This won’t work in this time and age.”
“Uht…”
“Consider this as my labor cost. You are paying for the meal.”
“Tch… You’re so cold.”
“But I’ll buy you coffee.”
“This is not a date though.”
“You are too young for a date, lass. We’re just playing around and having a meal.”
“Wow… So that’s the mindset huh~”
The sun was starting to set.
“I’ll take you to your dormitory. And thanks for helping out with my shopping today.”
“Thank you too. And please don’t forget my request.”
Making Germain take the action was going to take some work.
***
Germain was restless for the entire day.
Melina and Korin were pretty much on a date, and it was driving him crazy.
Objectively speaking, Korin Lork was an attractive person. He had a wild-looking appearance and a great personality. The only downside was his rather messy relationship with girls, but there were so many who were willing to stay with him despite that drawback.
He was a fabulous senior, even in the eyes of a teenage boy, but it was a different story if that senior was going on a date with the person he liked.
The plentiful imaginative powers of a teenager acted as poison.
『Senior… I actually, for a very long time…』
“Ahhhk…!”
He was a faithful believer and a spy of the Old Faith but was nonetheless a seventeen-year-old young boy.
“Fuu… Are they not here yet?”
That was also what kept him waiting for five hours straight in front of the dormitory. The night breeze was hitting cold, but he was still waiting for Korin and Melina to come back from the city.
His wait was not in vain, and Germain spotted the two of them walking together from a distance.
Korin and Melina.
The two of them were looking at each other with an evidently friendly smile and were chatting while walking toward the dormitory. In their hands were a bunch of shopping bags.
‘Why… Why are they so close to each other?’
Really? No, there’s no way Melina would… well she could, but there’s no way Big Bro Korin would do such a thing. He knows… He knows I like Melina so he wouldn’t…
…But what if he did?
Germain suddenly remembered all the rumors about him.
No one denied the fact that he was a nice person, but he was at the same time a shameless person when it came to relationships, who reached out his octopus legs at a bunch of girls.[mfn]TL Note: Two-timing in Korean is called two-legs; three-timing is three-legs and so on. Therefore, a person sticking out legs like an octopus implies they’re hitting on a lot of people (because octopuses have 8 legs)
ED Min Note: Remember this, it'll come back up later.[/mfn]
There was even news of people spotting him with Professor Deina, Professor Lulara, Senior Professor Josephine, and Chairman Erin Danua around the campus. In the city, he was even seen going around with Sword Master Lunia.
He was the most alpha man out there, with such a wide spectrum of followers, that even a few male students were interested in him.
‘No. I, I trust Big Bro Korin.’
It was weird coming from a spy roaming around Korin for information. Despite knowing that himself, he still trusted Korin Lork’s personality and the sincerity of his attitude.
“Huh? Germain?”
The two of them stopped after noticing Germain in front of the dormitory. Melina and Korin glanced at each other before turning to Germain and realized from the look on his face that he was having a misunderstanding.
Even though the usual approach would be to explain the misunderstanding… Korin pulled Melina by the shoulder towards himself instead.
“Senior?”
“Germain. What are you doing here?”
“Ah. U, uhh…”
It was because he was worried about having Melina taken away… but he naturally couldn’t say that.
‘Why is he touching Melina’s shoulder like that!? Even though I haven’t even done that yet!’
Germain was deeply frustrated but couldn’t do anything apart from throwing glances at Melina and Korin.
“Do you have something to talk to Melina about? Melina. Go have a chat with him.”
“Ah, yes…”
What was with that attitude? It was as if he was giving Melina permission to talk to him!
He was quite displeased by everything but there was nothing he could do. He took Melina as far away from Korin as he could and whispered in a soft voice.
“You were… umm, quite late.”
“Y, yeah…”
“Are you… by any chance with Sir Senior Korin…”
“Ah?”
Melina flinched from his question but quickly understood what Korin was doing and followed along.
“Senior is very kind, right? He was worried about sending me off alone late at night so we came together.”
“A, all the way to the female dormitory?”
“What were you doing here by the way?”
“M, mhmm… I was just passing by.”
“Really? It’s late so you should head back.”
“O, okay…”
She then turned around with a cold flick. She hopped her way over to Korin and gave him a bashful smile.
“Stay safe on your way in, and let’s play together again when we have time.”
Korin said with an amicable smile while naturally tapping her on the shoulder, and Melina sent him off with a rather shy look on her face.
“...”
This was bad.
Melina was about to go to Korin, that man.
Maybe not yet, but what if she settled her mind completely on their second date? It was more than possible for that to happen.
“N, no.”
He had to make a move before it was too late. Germain made up his mind in the span of a single day.
“M, Melina…! P, please go out with me!”
“Wow… It actually worked. This senior is innately gifted or something.”
“Huh?”
“N, nothing! Sure! Today’s our day 1 then.”
“Hukk! R, really?! Thank you! I love you!”
Watching that unfold from the side were the three 2nd-year seniors.
“Ohh. Look at him go. Kids these days~”
“...”
“...”
Looking at the outcome of Korin’s “Jealousy Invoking Strategy”, Jaeger and Lark shook their heads.
“He knows very well so…”
“What’s wrong with his own freaking relationships?”
No one had the answer to that question.
***
Recently, Erin was a lot busier than usual.
Even aside from her personal lessons to a few students including Korin, she also had to organize the yearly examination and the Autumn Harvest Festival.
The Harvest Festival was especially an important event that substituted for the ‘Festival’. Actually, it was more correct to say that usually, the Academy wasn’t able to attend the Harvest Festival due to the ‘Festival’, where academies competed against one another.
In any case, it was decided that this year, Merkarva Academy would be cooperating with the City to carry out the Harvest Festival in full. This nationwide celebration lasted a whole week so there were many things to be prepared to liven up the mood all the way till the last day.
‘Recently… Hasn’t there been a rumor that a couple spending the midnight of the last day together would get married? A 500-year-old legend, huh~?’
It was funny. She had lived in this city for more than a century and yet it was her first time hearing such a legend. Naturally, such rumors did not exist before, and it was probably an empty rumor considering how teenage girls were the sources of those gossips.
But even so…
“I want to spend time with Korin~”
Even though it was her saying it, hearing herself say that made her cheeks turn red. Erin questioned if she had been such an open yet childish person the whole time.
-Knock knock!
“Come in.”
The old wooden door creaked open. It was around a 100-years-old, so it was about time to change it…
“Master.”
“Haht?!”
She shot out of her seat upon hearing a familiar voice and saw Korin, her favorite disciple.
“Why’re you so surprised?”
“I just happened to be thinking about my dear disciple.”
Erin smiled bashfully at her disciple before opening the drawer of a cupboard.
“I’ve received some good biscuits from Josephine. Let me prepare them along with some tea.”
“Sounds good to me.”
It didn’t take long for her to finish her preparations because she also had a treasure that immediately boiled water.
“So what brings you here?”
“Weird of you to ask that when I always come here when I have free time.”
“That’s true too. Fufu…”
While carrying the biscuits and cups of tea over to the table with Erin, Korin glanced at the pile of documents on her desk.
“It's the yearly exam followed by the Autumn Festival straight away, right? It must be busy for you.”
“Yes. I would love to have another body if possible.”
“Do you want me to help you?”
“You are also busy. And it wouldn’t be right to receive help from a student.”
Korin shrugged his shoulders.
“It would be a win for me since I’ll get to spend more time with Master though.”
“H, huh?”
“Plus when we finish early, we can spend the time training.”
“R, right. Yes. Of course. Kuhum…”
She knew she was being silly, and Erin found herself pathetic to be so shaken by every sentence of her much younger disciple.
“Master.”
“What is it?”
“Happy birthday.”
“Huh? How did you kno— Ah.”
Korin was from the future and had spent time with her there, so it wasn’t strange for him to know when her birthday was.
“This is my present for you.”
He took out a small box. Inside it was a beautiful gold necklace, and he said after picking it up.
“Can I hang it around your neck for you?”
“S, sure.”
Erin sat modestly with her arms right next to her body. Her disciple slowly walked towards her and wrapped the necklace around her neck.
Korin was standing right behind her. Each of his breath was tickling her ears; his eyes were on her neck and his fingers were scraping past her hair.
-Gulp!
It had been a very long time since she last received such a gift, and it made her quite timid and embarrassed. That was probably also because the young man behind her was special.
“All done.”
“Haa…”
Erin gently breathed out her nervousness as soon as it was done. Then, she gazed down at the gold necklace around her neck.
“It’s very pretty.”
“Had to get some advice for it.”
It was an expensive necklace he bought with the help of Melina. The reason he asked a girl that he wasn’t close with, was him being as considerate as he could.
“I also prepared a set bracelet and earrings that go with the necklace. Please wear them at the Harvest Festival.”
“I certainly will.”
“And also…”
Korin hesitated a little out of embarrassment. However, the embarrassment wasn’t big enough for him to swallow the words that he was about to say.
“You’re very pretty as always. Master.”
“Nnn?”
He looked so serious that Erin could not turn her eyes away from him. Right when her cheeks were about to blossom like warm flowers…
“Oh right. Master.”
“Y, yes? What is it?”
“You know the last day of the Harvest Festival.”
“The last day?”
This was an amazing coincidence, considering how she had just been thinking about the girlish rumor of a couple celebrating the last midnight of the festival getting married.
“Yes. At midnight on the last day, actually.”
“M, midnight?!”
What a coincidence among coincidences! Erin’s hand quivered and created numerous waves on the tea inside her cup.
“Can you stay with me that night?”
“Uhht!?”
Embarrassment made her heart race.
Is it that?
Really?