Ch.134134. A Very Fair Room Assignment Game

“It’s common for desired items to be out of stock when trying to make a purchase.

So, this situation was quite ordinary too.

Coming to find lodging at such a late hour, it was only natural that rooms would be limited.

However, sometimes these ordinary variables can cause significant inconvenience.

“…”

“…”

“…”

“…”

An awkward silence hung in the air.

In this situation, common sense dictated they would need to split into pairs.

Then, a question suddenly occurred to me.

“Excuse me, if it’s a double room, would there be two beds?”

“Hmm? No, just one~ Just one~”

I had asked hoping there might be two single beds, but that didn’t seem to be the case.

I see. So there’s one double bed.

I tried the obvious cliché line.

“I can sleep on the floor…”

“No. That’s not acceptable.”

“Yeah. Why sleep on the floor when there’s a bed?”

“Aren’t you paying too? Do you think we’re shameless enough to make someone who paid sleep on the floor?”

Celia, Alkine, and Lilith each took turns objecting.

I expected this. These offers are typically refused.

What should we do then? Look for another inn?

Just as I thought this, Celia shook her head.

“Ludion. I disagree. It’s already dark, and there’s no guarantee we’ll find rooms elsewhere. I think we should just stay here.”

“How did you know what I was going to say?”

“You were going to ask if we should look for another inn, right?”

She was so accurate that I had nothing to say, so I stubbornly asked my intended question anyway.

“Should we look for another inn?”

“No.”

“I don’t want to.”

“Why bother?”

Thanks to my persistence, I learned that everyone shared Celia’s opinion.

Well, I guess there’s no choice then…

“We’ll take the remaining rooms.”

I rented the two double rooms that were still available.

Meanwhile, the elderly innkeeper seemed quite amused watching our situation.

She must have recognized Celia as the princess, but her years of experience seemed too deep for her to bow in surprise.

Survival means strength. It wasn’t strange for someone who had lived to that age in Ritten, running an inn that Belmont would recommend.

Anyway, now that we had the rooms… all that remained was assigning them.

I couldn’t get involved in this part. I stepped back slightly to wait while the three women sorted out the room assignments themselves.

“Let’s decide who will share a room with Ludion.”

“Alright. How should we decide?”

“How about rock-paper-scissors?”

“That’s fair.”

Perhaps because it was too late to make a big deal out of it, Celia and Alkine decided to settle it with a simple and fair contest.

By the way, rock-paper-scissors wasn’t something I taught them; it already existed in this world.

It existed as a mini-game within the game, so the rules seemed to be integrated into the world.

Anyway, right after deciding to settle it with rock-paper-scissors.

While Celia and Alkine seemed quite enthusiastic, Lilith had been keeping her mouth shut for a while, looking rather reluctant.

“Hey, I don’t really need to share a room, why don’t you two just decide between yourselves?”

“Lilith. If you’re just worried about it being awkward, stop talking nonsense and join in.”

“No, I really don’t mind…”

“If you don’t participate, you’ll be sleeping outside.”

“Why are you being like this?”

However, participation was mandatory, and Lilith was forced to join this very fair room assignment game.

And… in cases like this, the one who cares least tends to win.

“…”

“…”

“Look, I really don’t mind? Can’t you two just—”

“Alkine. Let’s go to our room.”

“Yes, let’s.”

The two women quickly accepted the results and left, leaving Lilith and me standing there alone.

Wait, where did the innkeeper go? She had been watching until just now, but with impeccable timing, she had vanished, making the situation even more awkward.

But we couldn’t just stand there all night…

“Shall we go to our room?”

“…Yeah.”

We chose to head to our room as well.

///

Rock-paper-scissors for room assignment.

Celia and Alkine’s defeat was actually predetermined.

Or rather than predetermined, they deliberately invited defeat.

If they had actually wanted to win, Lilith would never have been able to win.

With Celia and Alkine’s abilities, they could easily have figured out what Lilith would throw.

That’s also why Ludion always lost when betting on who would buy dessert.

Because the frequency was low and they always created natural situations, he still thought it was just his bad luck.

Who would think someone could use magic to analyze neural movements and use enhanced vision to see what the opponent would throw?

Well… while the former might be unusual, the latter is actually quite common in this world…

Ludion, trapped in the fixed idea that rock-paper-scissors in the game was completely random, hadn’t noticed this.

Or perhaps he had noticed but believed they wouldn’t do such a thing.

If he believed they wouldn’t do it, then winning like this would prick their conscience… but they had no intention of playing rock-paper-scissors fairly anyway.

Who ever said rock-paper-scissors was fair?

Indeed, the recent game was not fair at all.

It might have been fair if just Celia and Alkine had played, but once Lilith joined, it was far from fair.

Nevertheless, they chose to lose.

There were various reasons, but…

“Lilith is probably the person Ludion would feel least burdened by in the current situation.”

That was the biggest reason.

In truth, Celia and Alkine had already confessed their feelings to Ludion and expressed them openly every time.

So if they ended up sharing a room in this situation, he would certainly try to accommodate their behavior. That’s the kind of man he was.

So they deliberately lost at rock-paper-scissors.

It was all consideration for Ludion.

“I thought you would force yourself to share a room with him regardless of whether he felt burdened or not.”

“What do you take me for? Well… of course I want to, but…”

“But?”

“I want our first night together to be more romantic. So… I want to get closer before that happens.”

Of course, it was consideration mixed with personal desire… but it was consideration nonetheless.

Celia, sitting on the bed, was talking with Alkine about her plans for their first night together when she flopped backward onto the bed.

And she declared:

“Besides, with Lilith in that state, nothing will happen even if they share a room.”

“For someone saying that, you seem to be monitoring them quite intently.”

Alkine could see it. Celia was staring intensely at some kind of magic connected to Ludion.

It was surveillance magic that she had set up previously.

Just as Alkine sensed, Celia was currently monitoring the room Ludion and Lilith had entered.

But Celia was confident. Because Ludion had said it was okay.

However… Celia’s face suddenly turned red, and she began to disrupt the surveillance magic she had deployed.

“What’s wrong? Why are you doing that?”

“I think Ludion is about to take a shower.”

“Ah.”

It seemed she had caught Ludion undressing for a shower.

Seeing how cleanly the magical energy disappeared, Alkine smiled wryly.

“So you do have some boundaries… no, wait.”

And then she was surprised at her own thought.

Because… monitoring in the first place was already crossing a line.

Especially if the surveillance was detailed enough to identify specific actions like “taking a shower.”

She had almost accepted it as normal.

She felt like she was being influenced by Celia.

…No, actually, she was being influenced by Celia who was influenced by Ludion… so in a way, couldn’t she say she was being influenced by Ludion?

“…”

Alkine suddenly hated herself for thinking that.

“I’ll shower first.”

Perhaps because of her foolish thoughts, her face felt hot.

So Alkine decided to take a cold shower to clear her mind.

“Okay. Oh, right. I’ll go get our clothes from Ludion.”

“Thanks.”

While Alkine went to shower, Celia headed to the room where Ludion and Lilith were staying.

Most of their belongings were already in Ludion’s inventory.

From underwear to everything else.

That’s why this sudden trip posed no problems.

“Lilith. It’s Celia. Could you open the door?”

“Oh, yes. What is it?”

“I just realized I forgot to get our clothes from Ludion.”

In truth, Celia hadn’t forgotten at all. She had just pretended not to know.

Did they realize that all of this was just Celia’s ploy to see Ludion one more time?

“Oh. That’s right. But Ludion just went in to shower…”

“Then I’ll wait inside for a bit.”

“Suit yourself.”

At least Lilith didn’t seem to know. She accepted Celia’s words without any suspicion.

Celia entered the room naturally and sat down on the bed.

…She could hear Ludion showering.

For a moment, she felt the urge to activate her surveillance magic, but she managed to resist.