Chapter 93
“Ophilia.”
“Yes, Princess?”
“Would you get mad if I asked what’s going on outside?”
Ophilia looked at the girl asking so casually from the bed and smiled faintly.
“Unfortunately, I don’t know either.”
“No way, you’re lying. There’s nothing Ophilia doesn’t know.”
“There are things I don’t know too, Princess.”
“The Ophilia I know never had anything she didn’t know. That’s weird.”
The girl let a bitter smile touch her lips for a moment. It was a bright smile that might have looked perfectly ordinary and happy at first glance, but Ophilia didn’t miss the red tinge gathering at the corners of the girl’s eyes.
“Maple leaves, huh.”
“Huh? What do you mean?”
“Nothing. Since autumn will be here soon, maple leaves just suddenly came to mind.”
As usual, once the sharp summer sunlight passed, the leaves would start to turn. The sun that had felt so close was already slowly slipping farther away.
It wasn’t as if the sun was actually closer in summer or farther away in winter, of course.
People tend to feel emotions as closer and more familiar than plain reality, so that sort of thing didn’t matter.
“Princess, this.”
“Ah... yeah.”
As always, the medicine powder and a cup of warm water came toward her in Ophilia’s hands. The girl rose from the bed she had been lying in, settled into a posture suitable for taking medicine, squeezed her eyes shut once, then slowly opened them.
In the dark bedroom as always, most of her view was filled by the tiny light shining faintly through Ophilia’s line of sight.
“So Ophilia and I are looking at the same thing.”
“Yes, you could say that.”
“That makes me kind of happy.”
“Is that so.”
The girl, having received the medicine from Ophilia, slowly looked down at the medicine in her hand. On the surface of the water sloshing in the warm crystal cup, the pale light scattered through Ophilia’s view broke into tiny fragments and flashed in her eyes now and then.
“Did you just say autumn?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“I see.... Time feels incredibly fast. Why does it feel that way?”
“I’m not really sure either.”
Before a proper answer could come, she lifted her chin, tipped the paper cup in her hand into her mouth, and filled both cheeks with water. In the silent bedroom, the quiet sound of the medicine dissolving and sliding down the girl’s throat rang out.
“Ahaha. Say something at least, Ophilia. The gulping sound is embarrassing.”
“I’ll be more careful next time.”
“Honestly.”
The paper cup, with its wavy folded rim forming a bowl-like hollow, was then crumpled in the girl’s slim, snow-white fingers as they slowly clenched.
“Ugh, ughgh..!!!”
“....”
Rustle, rustle.
Unlike the plain, unadorned curtains, deliberately made thick and heavy so not a single ray of sunlight could pass through and quietly holding their place even against the outside wind seeping in along the wall.
The paper cup, so easily crumpled even by the grip of a girl who had never properly lifted anything heavy once in her life, was then released from her palm as she felt the pain of her nails digging into her skin, and slowly rolled down onto the white blanket.
“I’ll take the glass away.”
“Ah, okay. Thanks.”
Ophilia reached out, picked up the crumpled paper cup, took the crystal glass from the girl’s hand, and slowly opened the bedroom door before going outside.
Stepping out of the bedroom, where a fluffy rug covered the entire floor so not even a single footstep could be heard, Ophilia’s shoes went click-clack beyond the door and lingered in the girl’s ears for a long time.
“278 days.... 279, was it..? No, 276..?”
She could feel the bitter medicine slowly being digested and affecting her body, which was made of organic matter. More precisely, mostly her head.
“Then... I’ll be eleven soon.”
Ophilia still hadn’t come back. There was a mountain of things she wanted to talk over with her, but for some reason that day the wait for her return felt especially long.
“How contradictory.”
She had just told Ophilia that time felt like it was passing quickly.
“....”
The girl rose and got off the bed she had been lying in all day. The pitch-dark bedroom didn’t even show where her slippers were, so after groping around the floor with the tips of her pure white toes for a long while, she finally found them and slipped them on.
“Let’s go.”
* * * * *
“Uuuuuuuoooooooggggggggh..!!!!!”
Super-mega-ultimate-hyper stretch.
“Kyaaahhh..!!”
I think I had some weird dream in the middle of the night. Maybe Ophilia was there too, talking to me about this and that. But dreams are the kind of thing you forget right after waking up, so I don’t really remember any of it.
—drip....
“Ah, I’m tearing up.”
After rubbing my eyes for a while after waking up and looking toward the window, I can see a little sunlight slipping in between the curtains. For the past few days the sky had been packed with clouds, so even during the day it had been gray and murky. But today, for some reason, a wide, bright blue sky is spread out overhead.
Every now and then a few fluffy clouds drift by, and it’s nice to watch the way the shadows move with the sunlight.
“Right..! Today is..!!”
Today is the day we’re doing a tech demonstration for those high-up Five-Star Group executives. Our company is supposedly trying to sign some kind of official partnership, and my tech demo is apparently part of the contract or whatever.
“Mwahaha, what if everyone gets so shocked they freak out.”
The materials will be prepared by Five-Star Group. Since it’s Five-Star Group and nowhere else, I figure they must have prepared something amazing. Maybe I should just make a ridiculously huge glow-in-the-dark mecha T. rex and have them go, ‘Whoa, amazing—Princess Eve approves.’
Approved by Five-Star Group, approved by the Approval Association.
But lately I’ve heard T. rex are apparently shaped like giant lucky sparrows. Then would it be a glow-in-the-dark mech Spinosaurus??
—beep-beep-beep..!!
“Doggy, up yet?”
—beep....
The doggy, after letting out a refreshing stretch, stretched its short stubby body this way and that, wiggled its legs, displayed a fully charged battery icon on its face, and sprang up in a flash.
“Heehee. Come here!!”
Tucked Doggy under one arm and holding my phone in the other, I went into the bathroom attached to the master bedroom and grabbed my toothbrush and toothpaste.
“Set a 3-minute timer.”
—beep....
A 3-minute timer spun round and round on Doggy’s face, where it had been placed on the toilet with the lid down.
—gurgle-gurgle
After spitting out the rinse water, I went outside, where Ophilia was in the middle of preparing breakfast.
“Ah, Ophilia. I’m up.”
“Have you risen, Princess?”
“I brushed my teeth too. I did good, right?”
“Excellent.”
After getting a “well done” stamp from Ophilia, I slipped back between the warm bed and blanket thanks to the electric mat I still hadn’t turned off.
There’s this fish game I’ve been totally hooked on lately and having a lot of fun with, and I’m in the middle of farming boxes and waiting for time to pass so they open.
“Please..! Give me a super-strong fish..!!”
Fish with higher drop rates come out first from the box gacha. A higher drop rate means worse performance. The one I’m using now is a collector shark that came at a 1-in-120,000 chance, but it’s not just a simple 1-in-120,000 draw.
If you open lots of boxes, you get some extra luck chance or something like that, and if you fill out the compendium, it raises your luck too, so in the end stronger ones start showing up more and more.
—flash..!!
And then, along with a tremendous flash of light filling the screen, out comes a super-cool rare unique legendary shark.
“Sawfish!!! A 1-in-1.7-million chance!!!!”
—beep....
“Look at this, Doggy!! Isn’t it super cool!!!!”
Is this thing really called Sawfish? It looks like a shark with a chainsaw attached to the front of its head—probably some kind of translation issue. Maybe it’s like a Chainsaw Man shark or something. Anyway, it’s awesome. I was so happy I even did a little cuddling with Doggy.
“Princess, breakfast is ready.”
“Ah, okay!”
Too bad, but I’ll test it out for real later. Right now I have to eat.
* * * * *
—creak....
“Eve, Ophilia. Did you rest well?”
“Yes, we did.”
“Yep. Hehe.”
“Eve, did something good happen? Your face looks bright.”
“Chaerin unnie, look at this! I’ve been playing this fish game lately, and I opened a box and got a Sawfish with a 1-in-1.7-million chance. Its speed is a little low, but its growth rate is insanely fast, so if it eats even a 10,000-point fish it suddenly jumps to 50,000 or something. Isn’t that amazing!”
“Oh, ooh~ That’s impressive.”
“Right!! Heehee.”
After we finished eating, around 11 o’clock Chaerin unnie came to pick us up in a car. Today’s destination is a secret base for Five-Star Group’s defense industry or something like that, so apparently Ophilia can’t drive us in herself.
So Chaerin unnie is taking a car that doesn’t look anything like a Nova vehicle, trying to move around discreetly like this.
A car with the Nova Guild emblem slapped right on it would stick out like a sore thumb, so we can’t ride in something like that either.
This time we’re really going to work and meet important people, so I wore a suit. Since it’s indoors, it won’t really be cold, and the heater inside the car is blasting anyway, so I’m fine.
“Eve, you’re wearing a suit? You look really cute.”
“Cute? Hmm-mmm-mmm....”
“Why? Do you not like being cute?”
“I’m not cute. I’m cool.”
“Oh, really?”
Anyway, this time I’m really going to make a cool golem. Of course I’m not saying Suri or Minyumi aren’t cool, but I wanted to make something really huge like that too. Sort of a tank vibe?
Maybe I should play a little game on the way?
“All right, Sawfish, sortie!!”
“Eve, though, you’ll have to turn your phone off~ It can’t stay on because of GPS.”
“What!!!”
“My Sawfish.”