Chapter 31: Unintended Ties

If Lady Arnburrow had strongly disliked my presence, I wouldn’t have sat down.

After all, there are people who prefer to eat alone.

Back when I was a student, I always felt a little self-conscious eating alone, but once I became an adult, I couldn’t be bothered to sit with someone I didn’t know well.

Even knowing that, I still chose to sit down because Lady Arnburrow seemed lonely.

If she had a smartphone, or something to distract her, I might have hesitated to intrude, but she was just poking at her meal, eating slowly, all by herself.

“Beef stew? Is it good?”

“Hm? Ah, it’s… it’s good. Mmm.”

I suddenly asked, sitting down in the seat in front of her, and Lady Arnburrow looked quite flustered before answering.

“Really? Maybe I’ll try it again next time.”

“I don’t really eat stews that much,” I said.

Then Sasha, who had sat next to the Lady, chimed in.

“Stew’s too hot for me, nya…”

“Because of your cat tongue?”

“Our family doesn’t handle hot food well, nya.”

So that’s why her meals are always sandwiches?

Come to think of it, even when money was tight, I used to eat food that wasn’t too hot.

“Is that… a characteristic of cat beastkin?”

Lady Arnburrow cautiously asked, as if unsure whether that would be rude to Sasha.

“It seems like it’s the case for the cat beastkin in my village, nya.”

Sasha casually answered, then took a big bite of her sandwich.

“Coo-uh.”

And sitting next to her, Narya nodded.

“We often made stew at the church as well.

It was the best way to share meat with most people.”

There was always a pot of stew simmering at the inn in our village, too.

It didn’t look great, and it didn’t taste great either.

Other inns might have served food that was better, I suppose.

Now that I think about it, even the stew we had at the inn by the road wasn’t very tasty.

I wonder if there’s a special “good restaurant” out there somewhere.

“Weren’t you also a saint candidate?”

Lady Arnburrow asked, and Chloe shrugged her shoulders.

“I’m different from the others. I wasn’t raised as a saint candidate by the church. I grew up in the Cloren Church, then lived in a nearby frontier village before coming here. They say my name comes from the land I was born in.”

“Ah, I see…”

Though she didn’t outright say it, Chloe had just admitted that she was an orphan.

She probably didn’t mean anything by it.

“That’s why I really like steak like this. Honestly, every time I saw meat in the stew, there were times I wanted to sneak some away.”

Chloe said this as she cut a large piece of steak and popped it into her mouth.

“Your swordsmanship was impressive today.”

Siwoo spoke to Lady Arnburrow with his usual, calm expression.

Her eyes flickered for a moment.

Whether it was because of Siwoo’s good looks or because of the conversation they had last time, I wasn’t sure.

“It’s not really that great. My brothers are much better.”

“But you’re still a hero candidate, aren’t you?”

I answered like that and took a bite of my sandwich.

I had bought it out of curiosity after seeing Sasha eat one, but honestly, it wasn’t to my taste.

The bread was a little too hard, and the fish meat was so soft that it didn’t have the satisfying texture of meat.

At my words, Lady Arnburrow glanced at me for a moment, looking slightly surprised.

…Did I say something wrong?

According to Siwoo, there are over 70 heroines in the game.

Of course, not all of them appear in the main story.

Some only make brief appearances, and others take on main character roles in subplots, but if all those characters were given equal weight in the story, the plot would become far too complicated.

Even after the Demon King was defeated, the story didn’t end.

As the focus shifted slightly, more characters started to appear, and eventually, all the heroines would get their moment to shine.

Naturally, I hadn’t memorized every single heroine or their background.

I only made sure to remember the key ones and learned a bit about their stories and skills.

That said, I knew enough about her background to understand her situation.

“Even someone like me ended up as a hero candidate, so there’s no need to think too much of it.”

“…But didn’t you defeat two dragons?”

“Well, that was just luck. I didn’t take them down alone.”

The Empire might have been trying to elevate my status, but honestly, it made me uncomfortable.

The academy students seemed to think I had single-handedly defeated two dragons.

How would they react if they found out I had fallen on my ass during the fight?

“A sword that cuts through monsters is much more meaningful than one that just slashes the air.”

Hm, every answer he gave seemed a little grim.

Well, I guess with his backstory, it’s not that surprising that he’s not the cheeriest type.

But the atmosphere feels so different from when he first grabbed my hand and smiled.

Did something happen between then and now?

For a while, we continued eating in silence.

“Anyway, you learned swordsmanship, right?”

I asked suddenly, and Lady Arnburrow blinked in surprise.

“I did, but…”

“Then teach me.”

“Huh?”

Lady Arnburrow showed a brief, confused expression, similar to the one she had when I first sat down in front of her.

“Me? Teach you?”

“Why? You don’t want to?”

“No, it’s not that…”

She stared at me in silence for a moment before speaking.

“Can I ask why?”

“If I’m supposed to be a Hero, then being better at swordsmanship is definitely going to help. Even if cutting people and cutting monsters are different, knowing various sword techniques can only be a good thing.”

I looked at the noble girl as I spoke.

“I keep getting my ass handed to me by Lady Blackwood. I think it’s about time I won at least once.”

“…”

The noble girl stared at me for a long moment, seemingly trying to figure out the reason behind my words.

Of course, that didn’t mean she’d be able to uncover any hidden intentions.

Because, quite simply, there weren’t any.

As night fell again, Siwoo and I met up at the warehouse only we knew about.

Well, saying we “met up” might not be the right way to put it.

We still didn’t have a proper way of contacting each other.

The only reason we were both here now was because we had come together.

But this time, unlike before, Siwoo had been the one to bring me here.

He had called out to me from the lobby, and while he was waiting, several girls passing by were shooting curious glances at him.

And when I approached him and greeted him cheerfully, I caught some jealous looks, too.

Some of them were probably heroines, huh?

Not that they had any reason to get upset.

I knew perfectly well that I wasn’t particularly attractive by the standards of this world.

I even had short hair, for one thing.

If Siwoo decided to date someone… I’d probably feel really weird about it.

But it’s not like I have the right to stop him.

So if they want to approach him, let them.

“That thing you said at the cafeteria.”

As soon as we entered the rundown warehouse, that’s what Siwoo brought up first.

“Had you been thinking about it for a while?”

His face was faintly lit by the glow from the holy sword leaning against the wall.

He already looked serious, but the light shining upward from below made him seem even more intense.

“I’ve been thinking about sword training for a long time. I just didn’t have anyone to learn from.”

I said while leaning against the wall.

“Honestly, what I said at the cafeteria was a little impulsive.”

“You know what kind of background Rebecca Arnburrow has, right? I told you.”

“Yeah… right.”

I nodded and scratched my head.

“Her mother was a commoner, and the duke didn’t care about her until rumors spread that she was talented with a sword. That’s when he finally took her in. But even then, she was always compared to her talented older brothers, and only when she became a Hero Candidate did they finally start to treat her well.”

“Exactly.”

Siwoo nodded and continued.

“And that’s why she’s someone you need to be cautious around. She might not mean any harm, but her brothers have more than enough reason to target you.”

“…Really?”

“You remember when the prince tried to approach you? Even though he eventually backed off.”

I frowned.

“Was that in the original? Guys randomly approaching Rira?”

“Not really. But the original story was just something written by someone.

This place is the real world.”

Right.

He did say fighting a wyvern and nuker in the first week of the academy wasn’t part of the game either.

“Even if they don’t approach you like that, they could very well try to use her. Whether you meant it that way or not, nobles can be—”

“Because on the surface, it can just be framed as a teacher-student relationship.”

Hearing all that, I did start to wonder if maybe I’d spoken too carelessly.

But still—

“I’m not going to back out now.”

I said that part firmly.

“At the very least, it’s not like she has any ill intent toward me. If she ever shows signs of anything off, I can distance myself then.”

Siwoo stared at me in silence for a while, then eventually shrugged.

“Well, it’s not like I can interfere with everything.”

“Sorry I brought it up without talking to you first.”

“Nah, I think I might’ve been too sensitive about it.”

“But still… you said it because you were worried about me.”

I shrugged, mimicking him.

“If you hadn’t told me, I wouldn’t have even considered that possibility. So honestly, I appreciate it.”

When I flashed him a grin, Siwoo scratched the back of his head, looking a little sheepish.