Just For Today

I could have shaken off the hand firmly holding me if I wanted to.

Unlike the willful noble lady from my first playthrough, the current Daina wouldn’t ignore my wishes.

If I continued to firmly refuse, Daina would eventually give up.

However, the problem was that the ‘refusal’ option in <Another World> mostly led to unfavorable results.

It seemed quite absurd that refusing a single request could change the future for the worse, but… having already entered such an unreasonable world, I had no other choice.

It also wasn’t a particularly difficult or strenuous request to justify taking the risk of refusing.

After all, it’s just sleeping together for one night.

Just like when I sleep with Asha, we’d chat for a while, and when sleepiness starts to come, I’d just close my eyes without thinking and that would be it.

The person who had been trying so hard to be nice to me all this time wouldn’t suddenly change and harm me.

“O…kay.”

“…!”

Once again, I couldn’t bend Daina’s will.

Seeing me slowly nod instead of shaking my head, her face gradually brightened.

Then, as I was about to be led to Daina’s room while still having my wrist firmly gripped.

“I-I’ll go tell Asha Unnie that I’m sleeping with Daina Unnie. She might worry if she sees I haven’t come home.”

“Ah… Yes. Please go ahead.”

I decided to set up at least a minimal safety measure, just in case.

Either way, Asha is my guardian.

Come to think of it, I’m staying out overnight. I should at least tell my guardian, right?

So, after briefly moving in the opposite direction from where Daina’s quarters were located, I soon arrived in front of the office door, which somehow felt like I hadn’t visited in quite a while.

After carefully opening the office door, what I saw was the usual scene of the office.

I ran quickly toward the familiar face that was, as always, suffering amidst mountains of documents.

“I’m back!”

However…

“L-Luaaaa~!”

–Squeeze!

“Ughhh—”

Perhaps because it had been a while since she’d seen me, her joy was a bit excessive.

I couldn’t even mention my purpose for visiting Asha and was tightly hugged for a while.

By the time I could barely open my mouth, my ears and face had already been thoroughly squeezed and touched.

“Hey, Asha Unnie. Tomorrow Saint Unnie will be leaving for another place, right?”

“Thinking that I won’t see her anymore makes me feel a bit regretful, so…”

“Can I sleep with Saint Unnie just for today? Just this one day.”

Worried that she might refuse without listening to everything I had to say, I immediately fired my words like a machine gun.

Asha’s face looked slightly taken aback.

But not long after, she returned to her usual expression as if nothing had happened.

The answer that came was closer to permission than refusal.

“Hmm… I don’t see why not?”

Considering that she had been on the verge of fighting with Daina over me, I thought she would flatly refuse. Honestly, it was a bit unexpected.

A question about how I felt about Daina came right after.

“I’ve heard that she’s been treating you well. Still, what’s most important is what you think, Lua.”

“Hmm…”

After thinking for a moment, I chose the most pleasant-sounding words.

“Honestly, when I first met her, she seemed like a strange person… But now I think she’s a good person. She’s been helpful with requests and such.”

To be precise, it was Daina who offered to help first, but anyway.

“I think I’ve become quite close with Saint Unnie.”

“Really? Then, do you like the saint or do you like m—”

“Asha Unnie.”

“I thought so?”

Once again, I only gave the model answer to the kind of question I had already heard several times.

Every time I spend time with someone other than Asha herself, she always asks who I like more.

I know it’s just a joke, but from my perspective, it felt like I was being forced to make choices or branch points at inappropriate times, which was a bit burdensome.

Anyway, having gotten permission, I was about to return to Daina, thinking there was no reason to keep holding up a busy person, now as ever.

“Lua.”

A calm voice that reached me just before I turned the doorknob held me back.

What flowed into my slightly stiffened ears was a single sincere wish.

“Unnie wants our Lua to be loved a lot in the future too. You know what I mean, right?”

However, it seemed there were a few other meanings besides what I understood.

With a somewhat awkward expression, I responded that I understood.

After leaving the office and walking again, the guest quarters soon came into view.

As expected, Daina, who was waiting in the corridor, grabbed my hand once more.

And so, led by the hand firmly gripping my wrist, I finally stepped into the luxurious quarters.

–Click.

The faint sound of something locking passed by.

Why did the bright yellow gaze that was always directed at me feel clearer than ever before?

Less than a few seconds later, two hands carefully picked me up.

Without giving me a chance to say anything, I was laid down on the wide bed right in front of us and slowly embraced.

“Um, Daina Unnie…?”

What I faced was a gaze half puzzled, half bewildered.

However, from the moment I had brought the child into my room, something I had been suppressing began to overflow little by little.

Because inexplicable affection and longing, without cause, reason, or trigger, once again mixed turbidly and numbed my reason.

Sure enough, I pulled the slightly stiffened small body a little closer. Embracing it, crossing my arms behind that thin back, leaving not even the slightest possibility for escape from my arms.

I knew it wasn’t a very commendable act.

I already knew that I shouldn’t have done this from the beginning if I wanted to remain a good person until the end.

“…I’m sorry. For being greedy…”

But being remembered as a good person alone wasn’t enough.

I wanted to cherish the child more than anyone the child had ever met, even if just for a few hours.

At the same time, I wanted us to become closer, even if just for a few hours.

Even if that no longer meant just psychological distance.

“Just a moment, just a moment… please bear with me…”

I held the heartbeat, which was getting as fast as my own, a little closer, and carefully pressed my head against that soft nape.

What was naturally transmitted beyond the touching cheeks was the warmth I wanted to make mine no matter what.

Somewhere in my chest gradually began to ache with unnecessary regret and sorrow.

Nevertheless, I carefully reached up and stroked the soft hair once.

I lightly fondled the soft ears that I had been hesitant to even touch with my fingertips for fear of being disrespectful.

If there was a fortunate thing, it was that the child, still silently trapped in my arms, didn’t push me away harshly.

However…

“Um, Lua-nim…”

“…Yes.”

The voice that responded to my call, made with a hopeful heart, was not one that could be called bright even as a pleasantry.

Naturally, I couldn’t continue what I was going to say due to fear that extended endlessly.

However, not long after, when the child asked what I was going to say.

Even though I knew I had already been quite disrespectful, I opened my mouth once more and whispered into that small ear.

“Please… hug me too… Lua-nim…”

Almost simultaneously, swish.

Instead of firmly refusing my request, the small hands that wrapped around me without a word made my breathing gradually constrict.

“…Just for today.”

In other words, it meant that no matter what happened in the future, a day like today would never come again.

Even though it was a temporary kindness that would completely disappear in a few hours…

For now, it was more than enough.

Only, it seemed I would never be able to forget the warmth that had become closer than ever before.

In addition, it was already a predetermined course that an aching regret would overwhelm me the moment the softness of the touching skin departed.

“I don’t want to part with Lua-nim… I want to stay like this together…”

I soothed my anxious heart while whining like a child.

I relieved my frustration by uttering things that had already been determined to be unfulfilled wishes.

After continuing to act spoiled for a while, at the moment when I myself realized that I couldn’t go further.

At the moment when I noticed that the line the child had drawn a few days ago was right in front of me.

“Just one last time… please hold my hand…”

This time, I asked the child to cross the line from their side, just this once.

And so, once more. Thump.

The softness that slowly intertwined from the fingertips finally stopped, completely interlocked.

What I faced then was a small face that somehow contained the familiar brightness I was used to.

At the very least, I thought it would be stiffly hardened…

Why does it make me yearn so much until the very last moment?

“I told you. Just for today.”

It was truly, cruel.

If only the child had firmly pushed me away, I wouldn’t have had to yearn more.

It felt as if the very concept of pushing someone away didn’t exist for this child.