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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: FusionX
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“Why do we have to wear these too?”
As I grumbled, looking down at the suit that was choking my neck, Tana, wearing a yellow dress, gave me a puzzled look as if I was asking something obvious.
“Are you going to be there in servant’s clothes? You won’t have time to do anything while being called around by people to serve.”
“……”
The answer was so logical that I couldn’t say anything.
I just stared blankly at Tana as she checked and adjusted my attire.
“You seem quite interested in dressing up?”
“I’m a female student. Isn’t it natural?”
Recalling when she had dressed up Eve before, Tana seemed to have a lot of interest in dressing up, and seemed to have some talent for it too.
“You have a somewhat wild side, so let’s unbutton a few buttons like this, and style it this way.”
“If it’s wild, shouldn’t I just go around naked?”
It was my best joke, but Tana immediately punched me in the stomach and snapped.
“You know you sound like a real old man when you joke?”
“……”
“Don’t open your mouth. If you do, just greet people. Don’t even think about covering up your lack of etiquette with weird jokes.”
She hit me quite hard.
After Tana finished dressing me up, when I looked at myself in the full-length mirror, I definitely looked more polished.
She seemed satisfied too, grinning and nodding her head.
“Looks good, right?”
“I said this earlier too, but have you thought about going into this line of work? I think you’d do well partnering with Hayun.”
“Huh? Me?”
Tana answered with an expression that showed she had never even imagined it.
As I nodded affirmatively while turning in front of the full-length mirror, she suddenly rested her chin on her hand and started pondering.
“Hmm, I do like dressing up. And Hayun would probably be able to make the clothes I want perfectly.”
“You have quite a good sense too, judging from how you dress up Eve and me. I think you could definitely do it.”
“……I’ll have to think about it. Even though I’m from a branch family, we still have connections to the Mayas family, so running a clothing store would be quite conspicuous.”
Originally, it was natural for children of high nobility to not be able to freely decide their own dreams.
It was similar for Hayun too.
“Then let’s go. Let’s just go and dance a little while we’re there.”
“Hmm, I shouldn’t be recognized…”
“Hey, there will be hundreds of nobles there. Even if he’s a prince, he won’t even be able to see you.”
Especially Prince Oliver would have to stay by the frail current king’s side to assist him, and would have to move around quite busily.
“Then let’s go.”
Led by Tana, I headed with her towards the banquet hall that was being held with the purpose of wishing for the current king’s health.
The banquet hall was so huge and splendid that I had never seen such a luxurious place in my life.
Tana and I couldn’t help but be naturally surprised and shrink like country mice who had come up to the city.
“Wow……”
“Th-They put in a lot of effort.”
But it seemed we weren’t the only ones.
Even nobles who would have attended enough banquets to be sick of them were entering with subdued expressions at the scale of this banquet.
“The food looks incredible.”
“Wow, right? Isn’t that caviar?”
Since the banquet hadn’t started yet, we couldn’t eat right away.
Sitting in chairs, Tana and I chatted about which foods to target first and from where.
We were so focused that Prince Oliver’s brief opening speech announcing the start of the banquet had already passed its midpoint.
The current king, gasping for breath due to illness, was forcibly seated, and Prince Oliver was holding the microphone and talking about various things in place of the king.
The content was predictable.
The king’s long life and health, and the kingdom’s infinite and brilliant future, blah blah blah.
Honestly, I didn’t listen to the first half because I was talking about food with Tana, and for the rest, I made eye contact with another woman.
“……”
To be precise, I made eye contact with the Priestess of Time sitting in the VIP seat prepared by the prince, and had a bit of a mental battle with her.
To the point where it felt foolish for me to be on guard, she raised her hand and greeted me with a smile.
After the prince’s speech ended, Tana and I headed towards the huge chunk of meat being grilled by the most expensive-looking chef, as we had planned.
“What kind of meat is this?”
Since the smell itself was so intense, Tana, who was first in line, asked with a smile.
The chef smiled at the small girl and answered.
“It’s the meat of a magical beast called Bigship.”
“What? This is Bigship?”
A magical beast that volunteered to be prey, rare even in the Demon Realm Forest.
It had a huge body, so it was a very grateful creature that allowed magical beasts to prey on it.
I had seen in the Magical Beast Encyclopedia that it inhabited places other than the Demon Realm Forest more.
By the way, I had tried eating it several times, but I remembered giving up because the fishy smell was too strong and the meat was too tough.
“Haha, you’re surprised. It’s a ferocious magical beast that our kingdom’s knights brought back after a very difficult hunt. The meat is very tough and fishy, but we processed it for a long time with special seasonings and spices.”
Indeed, when he placed it on the plate, the cut meat was sliced smoothly.
The meat was steaming.
I never thought the day would come when I would think Bigship meat looked appetizing.
We returned to the table with plates full of foods we couldn’t normally eat.
Tana also came back with her plate abundantly filled, and we smiled as we picked up our forks and knives.
“Let’s eat!”
“Let’s eat!”
We immediately started inhaling the food.
We had deliberately starved ourselves since morning because of today’s banquet, and it was a feast of flavors that made us want to praise ourselves for doing so well.
We had heard that Prince Oliver had put a lot of effort into this banquet, but we didn’t expect even the food to be this delicious.
“It melts in your mouth, it’s melting.”
It was a bit disappointing that we had to be satisfied with one plate, because if we got too full, it would be difficult to move.
Tana was also looking at the food regretfully while licking her lips.
At that moment, classical music started playing.
It was time for dancing, which was essential at banquets.
I wondered what was so fun about men and women spinning around, but Tana approached me, took my hand, and led me.
“Let’s go! Let’s dance!”
“Ah, why. I don’t want to.”
“It’s fun!”
Led by Tana’s hand, I reluctantly came onto the stage.
I was worried about what would happen if Prince Oliver noticed us, but he was busy and had gone somewhere.
It was annoying to see the Priestess of Time clapping slowly, saying it was fun, but for now, I stood on the stage following Tana.
The stage was wide enough to play battle soccer on, and there were so many people that you could trip over their feet, so we didn’t particularly stand out.
As the music started, I began to dance, matching Tana’s steps.
“Hm? What, you’re dancing better than I expected?”
“I’ve danced once before.”
“That’s a bit off-putting.”
The time when I danced with Elise at the masked ball still came to mind vividly.
I didn’t know there would suddenly be a knife fight there.
‘Come to think of it, wasn’t that the starting point of all the incidents?’
I had unnecessarily gone to confront Elise directly then.
If I hadn’t gone myself, she wouldn’t be clinging to me crazily now.
“Haa.”
“Why the sigh? Was it that unpleasant?”
At my unconscious sigh as I recalled Elise, Tana asked with twitching eyebrows.
“No, I was just thinking about the past.”
It felt like it was a really long time ago, but when I actually looked at it, it wasn’t that long ago, but maybe because I was talking about the past, Tana grinned and said,
“Hey, but when you think about it, haven’t you and I known each other the longest?”
“What about Rin and Ares?”
“Come on, they’re exceptions. They’re childhood friends. I was your first friend after coming to the academy, right?”
“……Well, I guess so?”
When I thought about it, that was true.
“I even came to your room and confronted you about why you were hanging out with Ares when I had my eyes on him.”
“Ah, I shouldn’t have brought this up.”
Tana clicked her tongue and turned her head away.
It seemed to be quite an embarrassing memory as she spoke faster.
“I thought that was real love then! How could I understand something as complicated as love at such a young age!”
“Yeah, yeah.”
Even I, who had lived until 28, only started to grasp it after receiving a proposal from Eris and dying.
How could you know?
“Tch, this is annoying. I didn’t call you to talk about this.”
“Hm? Did you have something to say?”
She usually talked a lot, but she was especially talkative today.
I was wondering what it was about, and Tana opened her mouth just as the music was transitioning to the next song and we were taking a brief break from dancing.
“I wanted to say thank you. For coming along like this and for preventing me from becoming a maid.”
“……”
“If I had been alone, I would have given up. I would have just thought it was fate and accepted it. Even though Eve, Hayun, Sen, and May are growing and shedding their shells. Because I couldn’t do that.”
I couldn’t deny that it was wrong.
In reality, if I hadn’t helped her, she would have been pathetically defeated in the duel with the twins.
But now that she had overcome that, I believed she would definitely move forward from now on.
“I know you went through a lot because of me. I’m really grateful and sorry.”
“It’s fine, we’re friends.”
Tana might not know, but she was a very precious existence to me.
It was rare for me to have someone I could talk to this comfortably without romantic worries.
“Yeah, we’re friends.”
Tana smiled softly.
It seemed like there was something on the tip of her tongue, but she finally closed her mouth, swallowed it, and chose different words.
“But I’m not just friends with you. I’m friends with Eve too.”
“Huh? That’s right.”
The hand we held again to dance suddenly tightened.
Tana smiled like a village rascal and warned,
“So don’t make Eve cry, got it?”
“……”
I remembered hearing this warning once before.
Certainly in Batian, Lucia had declared that she wouldn’t let it slide if I made May cry.
“You’re not answering?”
“That…… isn’t something I can answer.”
“Hey.”
“No, you know too. That I have someone else I like.”
“Phew, I don’t care about that! Just take responsibility!”
“You’re really too much.”
As I grumbled with my lips pursed, Tana couldn’t hold back her laughter and let out a chuckle.
“Hey, don’t act cute. It’s annoying.”
“I’m not acting cute.”
I felt embarrassed for no reason, as it seemed like it was the first time in my life I’d been called cute.
Tana looked at me like that and let out a long sigh.
“Why did everyone end up liking this kid.”
“You’re really speaking harshly. I don’t know either.”
As we kept bickering, before we knew it, the music had all ended, and the dance was over.
And suddenly, Prince Oliver appeared with a smile, holding the microphone.
The Priestess of Time started to move.
As I was about to move immediately, following her, I felt a small palm on my back.
When I glanced back, Tana was smiling reassuringly and pushing me.
“Go do what you do best. I’ll save some meat for you to eat when you’re done.”
“What I do best?”
When I asked back, a bit curious, Tana crossed her arms and shook her head.
“You don’t even know that? I mean beating everyone up.”
“Ah……”
Certainly.
“That is my area of expertise.”
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