Ch.110Chapter 110 – Proposal (3)

“…Eek?”

Rachel Watson, who was breathing heavily and about to remove her lower garments as well, turns her head with a startled expression when the office door suddenly opens.

“Holmes?”

Her eyes widen as she discovers Sharlotte Holmes quietly entering the infirmary.

“What are you doing here?”

“That’s what I’d like to ask you, Watson.”

Sharlotte, looking expressionlessly at her partner who was removing her top, shifts her gaze to Issac Adler lying beneath her and begins to mutter.

“I came to see a friend after a long time, and I find our doctor creating life with her boyfriend instead of saving it.”

“B-but I’m sure I locked the door?”

“I can easily pick that kind of lock. Have you forgotten that lock picking is my hobby since we’ve been seeing less of each other lately?”

“…Sigh.”

Watson closes her eyes tightly with a deep sigh.

“Get out.”

“…?”

“I said get out right now.”

Though she spoke while suppressing her anger, Sharlotte remained unmoved.

“…What are you trying to do?”

“I’m trying to observe my friend’s reproductive activities with her boyfriend to build up sexual knowledge for future use.”

“………”

“Didn’t you say what I read was extremely obscene and antisocial erotica? Instead of such distorted knowledge, didn’t you say you’d show me directly and teach me the correct information?”

As Sharlotte muttered with a calm expression, Watson’s face gradually turned ashen.

“…You certainly do have a lot of distorted sexual knowledge, Holmes.”

“Yes, so…”

“Come to think of it, I should have taken responsibility and educated you properly since that incident…”

After glaring at her partner for a while, she picks up her coat from the floor, hastily puts it on, and mutters with a regretful expression.

“What do you mean by that…?”

“Ah, well.”

Adler, still lying beneath her, cautiously asks the question, while Watson looks at Sharlotte with a resentful gaze for interrupting her plans.

“One day, I returned to our boarding house very late at dawn due to night duty.”

“And then…?”

“For some reason, Sharlotte wasn’t there. So I thought she might be investigating a case outside.”

“Watson, it would be better to stop there.”

Realizing what she was about to say from her drowsy gaze, Sharlotte hurriedly steps toward her and mutters in a cold voice.

“Anyway, I went into the bathroom to take a bath to relieve my fatigue…”

But despite this, Watson continued speaking with a smirk.

“And would you believe it, our cute genius girl was in the bathroom with a photo of Issac Adler in her hand….”

Just as her voice was about to reach its peak.

“…Mmph.”

Sharlotte rushed forward and covered Watson’s mouth while keeping her head down.

“”………..””

An awkward silence began to fill the room.

“Holmes, there’s nothing to be embarrassed about.”

“Stop it.”

“In fact, at your age, it’s quite normal to…”

“I said… stop it…”

As Watson broke the silence with a sweet voice and a satisfied expression, Sharlotte’s voice came out in a shrinking tone, her ears turning bright red.

“Why? You said it was fine as long as I didn’t tell Adler, right?”

“…Shut up.”

She briefly makes eye contact with Adler, who was lying on the floor looking at her.

“Our genius girl is really going through puberty, it seems.”

“…I’m sorry, please.”

As Sharlotte’s tone changed to pleading after meeting his blank gaze, Watson quietly smiled in victory.

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A few minutes later.

“So, Sharlotte. Have you reflected on your actions now?”

“…Reflected?”

“I mean reflecting on invading my privacy and entering my room without permission.”

Watson, feeling triumphant for having completely subdued Holmes for the first time since they met, addresses Sharlotte, who was still blushing and keeping her head down.

“To be honest, I’d like to make you pay a more severe price…”

“…I think turning a blind eye to the fact that your boyfriend is Professor Moriarty’s henchman and not making an issue of it in the future is sufficient payment.”

But upon hearing Sharlotte’s response, she stops speaking and starts biting her lip nervously.

“You heard our entire conversation…?”

“…’Knew from the beginning’ would be more accurate.”

At Sharlotte’s words, Watson hangs her head with a dejected expression.

“I could have told you earlier, but you looked so happy. I was worried, but I’m glad it ended this way.”

“…When you put it like that, what does that make me?”

“Garbage who uses a friend’s secret as a weapon to spread around?”

“……..”

“Just kidding, of course. I’m not narrow-minded like some people.”

After staring at her for a while and subtly getting back at her, Sharlotte suddenly remembers something and mutters.

“By the way, Watson, they’re looking for you downstairs.”

“Huh? But today’s my day off?”

“Seems like there’s an urgent patient who needs your help.”

After Sharlotte’s statement, Watson tilts her head briefly before heading to the coat rack.

“Anyway, we’ve had too many patients lately…”

“Isn’t it good to have many customers?”

“…Don’t make such unfunny jokes, Holmes.”

After hurriedly gathering her doctor’s coat and stethoscope, she stops briefly as she’s about to leave.

“…Neville.”

She then bends down and leans her head toward Issac Adler, who was sitting dazed on the floor.

“Mmm.”

Adler, now quite accustomed to kissing, naturally receives Watson’s soft tongue that suddenly enters his mouth.

“”……….””

And so begins the silence.

“I’m fine with it, so let’s get married. Us.”

“………”

“If you want, I’ll quit the hospital. I was planning to open my private clinic anyway. That would make it easier to match your schedule.”

Watson whispers quietly with her forehead against Adler’s in the silence.

“…I just need you.”

“……..”

“You feel the same, don’t you, Neville?”

She squeezes their clasped hands slightly as she asks, and quietly tilts her head waiting for an answer.

“…I’ll be waiting for your answer.”

But when no answer comes, she gets up and heads for the exit after whispering that.

“”………””

An awkward atmosphere begins to fill the room.

“Um, so…”

– Thud, thud…

As Sharlotte slowly approaches him in this atmosphere, Adler cautiously gets up from his seat, staggering.

– Bzzzzzz…

“Aaaagh?”

But the next moment, Adler begins to convulse as if electrocuted, with Sharlotte’s finger piercing his heart.

“…Forcibly removing the magic makes you naked, so I see your disguised clothes were illusions created with mana.”

“……..”

“I’m not sure if they’re simply tangible illusions or if they can deceive others’ sense of touch as well, but it’s certainly a high-level disguise.”

As the convulsions subside, Sharlotte Holmes crouches in front of him with a dark gaze and mutters.

“When did you learn such magic…?”

“Since you’re so good at disguises. I recently acquired it to be able to respond anytime.”

“…How impressive!”

Adler, whose disguise was instantly removed by Sharlotte’s mysterious magic, covers himself with his coat from the floor and smiles brightly.

“Then I’ll be going…”

– Swish…

“…Ah.”

As he tries to get up, Sharlotte quietly takes out and waves his clothes that were hidden inside his coat.

“I found them in the bathroom. Mr. Adler usually disguises himself there.”

“…This isn’t some fairy tale about a fairy and a woodcutter, what are you doing?”

“Fairy? Woodcutter? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

She tilts her head and answers, then covers Adler’s clothes again with her own coat.

“…Miss Holmes. Stop playing around.”

“Does this look like a joke to you?”

At her dark gaze, Adler sits up straight with a quiet sigh.

“That’s not a marriage registration form, is it?”

“You’re quick-witted. How did you deduce that?”

As he looks with a shocked expression at the paper she was about to pull out from her bosom, Sharlotte asks with genuine curiosity.

“It just seemed like it would be…”

“Intuition. The most necessary virtue for a detective, yet also the one that should be trusted the least.”

She nods in agreement with his answer.

“By the way, my intuition is telling me that it has to be now or never.”

The form, which he had seen several times today, enters Adler’s view.

“…Sign it or don’t.”

“……..”

“But it would be better to choose the most rational way to pass on your genes to the world.”

Meanwhile, Sharlotte mutters while looking at Adler’s eyes, one of which had turned gray, with a slightly chilling gaze.

“…You know very well that marrying someone other than me would be a waste of genes, don’t you?”

After quietly concluding, she gets up and heads for the exit.

“Oh, and…”

She stops briefly, hesitating with a fidgeting expression.

“…About that photo.”

She quietly turns her head and begins to speak in a calm voice, but.

“……….”

For some reason, the words don’t come out, and a bead of cold sweat runs down Sharlotte’s forehead.

“…Anyway, it’s a misunderstanding.”

After fumbling with her words, she hurriedly leaves the room.

[This is definitely a critical branching point.]

[What will you do now?]

After staring blankly at her retreating figure for a while, Adler reads the message that appears before him and answers in a low voice.

“…I need to get advice.”

[You’re going to receive advice, not give it?]

“There’s exactly one suitable person.”

It took quite a while for Adler, who had muttered this and left the infirmary, to realize that he was wearing nothing but a coat over his naked body.

“…Dad, why are you walking around naked?”

[Pfft.]

“Ah, shit.”

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Meanwhile, at the Diogenes Club in the outskirts of London, which was as heavily secured as always.

“…Hey, you know.”

A frail girl in a wheelchair, about to enter the entrance, asks her henchman in a low voice.

“How much time has passed since Issac Adler pounced on me and made me his slave?”

When the henchman couldn’t answer and lowered his head, she squints her eyes, smiles, and asks again.

“I really don’t understand. He boldly pounces and makes me his slave, then leaves me untouched. It’s beyond rude; it’s becoming curious.”

Though Microny was muttering with her usual bright expression, the henchman’s face turned pale as he realized her eyes were slightly open.

“…He’s forgotten about me, hasn’t he?”

“………”

He knew all too well what kind of news appeared on the front page of the next day’s newspaper whenever she opened her eyes even slightly.

“What do you think?”

“…Heheh.”

Microny Holmes’s hand began to glow golden when she finally opened her eyes completely and asked her henchman the same question for the fifteenth time.