Chapter: 106
After erasing all the trash, Yuna Yurensto became the Master of the Purple Tower.
She could have dismantled the Purple Tower or left it to someone else and escaped. However, the reason she felt compelled to keep this place, where only painful memories remained, was simply that she had nowhere else to return.
The instigators had either fled or died. The only survivors in the Purple Tower were those who had not participated in the consciousness experiments. To them, Yuna was a monster who had suddenly killed her seniors and mentors to take the Tower Master’s seat.
As a result, many people left the tower once again, and only a few remained.
The Purple Tower felt empty, and the remaining mages only maintained silence even when they made eye contact with Yuna; there was no exchange of words whatsoever.
It’s not that she wanted to do fine. Yuna Yurensto tried to engage in conversation. However, it didn’t work out well. Not a single person noticed that she was just a young girl.
From the moment she opened her eyes to the moment she closed them.
She prepared her meals alone, envied the mages who chatted with each other, dreamt of nightmares from that day, and fell asleep alone in a large room.
And so.
She thought that such a life would repeat itself until death…
“Master of the Tower, so I twist my mana like this?”
“U-Um, so like this, like this… Gah, um… I’m sorry for not explaining it well…”
“C’mon… Let me see your hand. I’ll place a spell on your palm, so it might help you stop stuttering.”
A rather strange fellow had entered the tower.
“Get out of here…! I don’t trust men who follow me just because they wiggle their butts around like indecent fools…!”
“Then why not fall in love with 2D?”
“?”
He really turned the tower upside down.
“That’s interesting, the Master of the Tower is just adorable. And this is a case of male bullying, trying to make a person feel miserably alone. Master of the Tower! Let’s have a dinner party!”
“Wha… huh? Dinner… party?”
He somehow swept her up entirely and transformed the atmosphere of the tower.
He became a bridge between Yuna and the other mages. Before she realized it, the tower that had once been a freezing blizzard of indifference had been turned into a warm place, even more so than other towers.
Her ambition to cut research funding became a craving for a cozy gathering…!
One day, Yuna Yurensto asked him whether he wasn’t scared. And why he went this far to help her.
He replied.
“Because you’re pretty…?”
“Wha…?”
“Half-joking there, but I really understand that feeling. I was lonely when I was young… So, I often saw that expression through the mirror, and I wanted to help. It seemed such a waste for someone with your nice personality to have no friends.”
“…”
“You can have more confidence in yourself. You’re cute, and you’re a good person, Master of the Tower.”
Perhaps it was from that moment onwards. She began to be conscious of him.
That peculiar… feeling she experienced.
===============================================================
The Second Prince caused a bit of a commotion to lure the Capital Knights Order. It seemed there was a similar incident happening nearby, so they dispatched without leaving any standby personnel.
Yuna and I took advantage of the gap and slipped across Crownhall.
After discovering something suspicious in the mind of a Black Wizard, the Master of the Tower maintained a gloomy expression the whole time. I didn’t know exactly what was wrong, but I was worried.
I thought, “What if Yuna ends up stress-eating and loses half her face?”
I developed a simple wish to break whatever it was, and make her smile again.
Finally, we reached the front of the headquarters of the Capital Knights Order. If we advanced just three more blocks, we would find the mansion in question. As I hurried to move forward, the Tower Master tugged at the sleeve of my cloak.
With the brim of her hat pressed down, she spoke.
“… Why are you tagging along? This isn’t your business…”
“What if you dig a hole in the ground just because you’re feeling down? It’s disappointing to hear such things… We’re bound together, right? Why divide it into your tasks and mine?”
I lowered my posture and lightly pinched Yuna’s cheek.
“It’s because I want to. Besides, you wanted to help me too, right? It’s not a matter of give-and-take… We’re doing this because we like each other. Isn’t that what friends do?”
“…”
Even though her face was hidden by the brim of her hat, I could see her ears had turned slightly red. She hesitated for a moment before speaking to me.
“Then, let’s just go back.”
“… Wasn’t this an important matter?”
“It is important, true.”
Yuna discussed her rationale for judgement.
“It was a trauma for me, but I thought it through. The addition of a sublimation-class expert on the side of the Black Wizards is a dangerous situation. They can utilize mana almost infinitely as long as they have someone else’s soul…”
The matter of righteousness and revenge.
“I apologize to the Second Prince, but my priority is the Purple Tower. Maintaining a good relationship with the Second Prince is beneficial, but his ascension to the throne is still uncertain. Identifying traitors might be more important. Even if it burdens the Second Prince politically…”
The issue of priority.
“And the Second Prince mentioned that if my rash ascension is discovered… a tremendous incident could occur. But it’s not an insurmountable situation. Even if I’m suspected of treason, I just need to bind myself before the Emperor. There’s a leash around the Emperor’s neck…”
The matter of risk mitigation.
Yuna carefully laid out the reasons she had to enter the mansion. Then, she hesitated and looked up at me.
“However, there’s one point that bothers me.”
“… What is it?”
“I feel like you might be in danger.”
Yuna’s previously shaken eyes sharpened.
“If we go together, it will be dangerous. But if I go alone, it may be a loss for you too. You wouldn’t want to risk damaging the relationship with the Second Prince, would you…?”
“No, I…”
“If your relationship with the Second Prince worsens… Your hobbies will also shrink. Yep. You only got into the Academy thanks to his recommendation. You had so much fun at the Academy. You’d become distant from your friend Yuri too…”
“I mean, so…”
Then Yuna grabbed my hand. It was a smaller hand than mine, and the strength she exerted was as light as down, but it seemed to contain an undeniable strange power.
“I’ve thought it through.”
“…”
“Somehow, right now, you seem more important to me than any resentments or hatred I have.”
In that moment, my breath caught.
I was flustered. My heart began to race violently all of a sudden, and my face heated up. Frantically, I cast a spell to suppress lust, but this mysterious heart-pumping didn’t ease off.
Thump, thump. The reason my heart was pounding like it might burst wasn’t anything like lust.
What should I do? What… should I say? I didn’t know. I inwardly panicked, hoping my expression wouldn’t betray my confusion.
But it seemed Yuna was very clear on what she needed to say.
“Let’s go back and go on a date…!!”
“…”
I relaxed my shoulders and nodded.
“… Should we?”
She gave up on the chance for revenge. It wasn’t for any other reason, but for me. If she had laid aside that deep grudge, which she couldn’t control even in front of the Second Prince, for my sake.
Thinking of that made my already pounding heart scream even louder. Calm down, calm down. That was such a vague statement. Don’t get worked up…
If I took that as a confession and it turned out not to be, how would I even handle that?
I took a deep breath, trying to calm myself. To be honest, I wasn’t calming down at all, but I just had to pretend that I was so I could think clearly.
For now… should I plan the date course?
Even if she gave up, she must have felt quite upset. At the very least, I should give her some enjoyable time in return. First, I’d have to scout out some good restaurants.
I took Yuna’s hand and turned around. I wouldn’t go to the red whatever and the Black Wizard. It turned out well. Wouldn’t it just have been a nagging worry? That must’ve been sour grapes anyway. It was certainly a trap.
Sweat was forming on my palms. It was making me incredibly uneasy.
I never felt like this even when I was on a date with my girlfriend in my past life. Has changing bodies caused me to develop hyperhidrosis? No, that couldn’t be…
“Are you trying to go back?”
Suddenly, I froze.
“Weren’t you here for something? So it’s kind of disappointing that you’re trying to go back first. I’ve been waiting for you, you know. The Master of the Purple Tower.”
“…”
I felt a force pinning me down throughout my body, as if I had fallen naked into the deep sea. I couldn’t even turn my head.
“If you just turn around and go back… this is going to turn out to be… ah, a real problem.”
“… I’m not going to cause any trouble here. I don’t know who you are, but I’m telling you to turn back.”
“Hmm~ Well, if that’s the case, then I’ll have to abandon the plan to ambush the crime scene and fight under that pretense. I’ll have to use my backup plan!”
“… I told you to go back!”
Vvvvvvrrrrrr!
The sound of a roaring engine filled the air.
“Now, I’m going to knock you back with this punch, Tower Master. If you resist or start fighting here, it’ll get inconvenient for both of us. Your handsome guy next to you might get caught up in it too.”
“…”
“We’ll have our little fight far away over there, just the two of us.”
“… Don’t worry about it. I’ll be back soon. Just stay at the inn, okay?”
Yuna said that to me and then summoned her magic.
────!!
Then there was a battle of some sort that I couldn’t follow with my eyes. In the place filled with explosive sounds and flashes, only a crater with a radius of 50 meters remained.
A line traversed the sky, appearing for a moment before disappearing.
“… Huh.”
I missed out on my date partner.
Was the one who suddenly picked a fight the Commander of the Capital Knights Order? There must have been a reason the Second Prince warned me repeatedly. I never thought they would challenge me to a fight this abruptly.
“Ugh.”
With a sigh, I prepared to return to the inn.
In the current situation, I had no method of doing anything. It was a fight between sublimated superhumans after all. There was no way for someone like me, who hadn’t even reached a method of transformation, to jump in.
It sucked and was frustrating that I was thinking of transforming myself instead.
I retraced my steps down the empty street. Thanks to the Second Prince, all attention from the Capital Knights Order had shifted elsewhere, and due to the Knights Commander, the Master of the Purple Tower had gone off for some reason.
Perhaps that’s why it was so quiet around here that you wouldn’t notice if a person vanished.
Unusually quiet.
“…”
Did I stumble into a trap?
I felt a strange sense of unease. It felt like I was being led somewhere. The outlines of things seemed drawn in a picture. It was suspiciously tossing hints about Yuna’s past.
However, even if Yuna were being targeted, I thought that as long as I supported her, it would be fine…
But if they weren’t targeting Yuna from the start, and were aiming at me instead…
“Did you figure out something was peculiar? Good sense for a commoner.”
“…”
Clop. Clop. The sound of heels echoed.
A slender voice. A guy who looked like a weasel appeared. He wore a tailcoat and had a rapier at his waist. I couldn’t see anyone else. Just him, alone?
“Remember my name, commoner. I am Roderus, the second son of the House of Redburn.”
“Interesting introduction. You’re just admitting that the Redburns are behind this scheme.”
“I’ll generously forgive your ignorance. Let me explain. Speaking to a corpse is not a confession…”
He drew his rapier and charged at me.
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