Espin (2)

Espin (2)

When I said “hand,” I simply meant for her to quickly give me her hand.

But it seems Sien interpreted it differently than I intended.

She placed both her hands on top of mine and her face turned red.

‘I’d like to explain that’s not what I meant, but…’

It’s too late to say something like that now.

So I decided to leave it as is and firmly grasped Sien’s hands.

“… Hnngh.”

It was just a firm grasp of her hands, but Sien made a strange sound and squeezed her eyes shut.

It’s nothing special, just our hands touching, so I don’t understand why she’s so tense.

Thinking this, I spoke briefly to help her relax.

“Is this how we’re supposed to do it?”

At those words, Sien slightly opened her eyes to look at me.

Then she nodded her head quickly, her face turning even redder.

“… I see.”

I thought light conversation would improve the situation, but it seems to have had the opposite effect.

Seeing Sien like this, I decided to wait until she calmed down and helped her sit on a nearby chair.

“Ah… Lord Deren…”

Sien seemed uncomfortable sitting alone, looking around trying to find a chair for me.

She showed a confused expression, realizing there was nowhere else to sit except leaning on the desk.

I was inwardly laughing at Sien’s amusing behavior when she suddenly spoke to me with a somewhat confident air, as if she had thought of something.

“Since there’s nowhere else to sit, you can sit here.”

Then she patted her thigh with one hand, gesturing for me to sit comfortably.

At first, I ignored it, thinking it was a joke.

But she kept patting her thigh with a serious expression, making it difficult to ignore completely.

‘… Is she serious?’

Isn’t sitting on someone’s thigh a bit too much?

I was gritting my teeth and pretending not to notice Sien’s suggestion.

Sien, seemingly realizing this wasn’t working, pulled on my hand and said.

“It’s not as hard as you might think, so don’t worry. Although I’ve been training my muscles for a long time, I always massage them after each session to keep them soft.”

Then she made me touch her thigh and said somewhat proudly.

“How is it? Isn’t it quite soft? This is the result of all my efforts for Lord Deren since childhood…”

Sien suddenly stopped mid-sentence as if coming to her senses, quickly closing her mouth and opening her eyes wide.

Then she blinked repeatedly, not knowing what to do.

Soon after, her face turned bright red again as she offered an apology.

“… I-I’m sorry.”

Not knowing how to respond, I closed my eyes for a moment.

To break the silence that had fallen, I tried to make a short joke.

“It’s alright. As you said, it’s certainly soft.”

Only after speaking did I realize I had said something wrong.

As I was trying to act as if nothing had happened, regretting that I should have just stayed quiet.

Sien, who had been staring at me blankly, slowly nods and begins to burn with a strange determination.

“Yes…! I will make it… even softer.”

It’s not meat, so what does she mean by making it even softer?

Feeling that if I stayed any longer, I might become strange too, I decided to leave and said to Sien.

“I have some issues to resolve, so I’ll be going now.”

“Thank you so much for today.”

I nodded slightly and slowly left the student council room.

* * * * *

I went to bed early to relieve the accumulated fatigue, but I woke up much earlier than expected.

Since I had nothing else to do anyway, and thinking it would be better to go to school early to talk with Espin.

When I arrived at school earlier than usual, Espin came to the lecture hall as if he had been waiting.

“Let’s talk.”

It seems he’s already found something out.

Thinking that while his personality might be questionable, his abilities were certainly there, I nodded.

After entering the painting in the art room, I sat down somewhat arrogantly and spoke.

“Seems you found something.”

“……”

Looking at Espin’s face nodding slightly, seems the scale she confirmed was bigger than expected.

While thinking what on earth is happening to make her show such a reaction, when I silently looked at Espin.

Espin lightly bit her lip and after contemplating for a moment, slowly opened her mouth.

“I discovered traces of large-scale human experiments.”

… Human experiments?

At those words, I couldn’t hide my puzzlement.

Though the Heaven God cult did conduct large-scale human experiments in the original novel too, that was content from ‘the middle-latter part’ and wasn’t content that originally happened at this point in time.

‘Could it be because I took the ruins?’

Originally this would be the period when the Heaven God cult side would occupy the ruins and be researching ‘ancient magic’.

Since I took the ancient magic including the ruins from them, seems they’re proceeding with this first.

Having heard those words, to first verify whether what I knew matched up correctly.

I probed those contents in a tone as if testing Espin.

“Then have you also grasped what the Heaven God cult is doing to conduct human experiments?”

She nodded then spoke to me while deeply frowning.

“… I grasped the rough outline.”

“For example?”

“Things like maximizing pain to use human emotions as an energy source, then mixing dozens of humans into one. Or massacring many people at once to perform unidentified rituals…”

When passages that appeared in the novel continued one after another, I nodded.

Because I noticed that what Espin grasped was similar to what I knew.

‘That means we can use this to some extent.’

Since I already know what they’re trying to do.

If we use this, we can prevent what they’re planning to do in advance.

I thought about using Espin for this and continued speaking.

“So what do you want to do?”

At my question, Espin falls into deep thought for a moment.

As an inspector, Espin would have had the will to stop this.

But as a ‘student’, Espin would have had the psychology of not wanting to be in unnecessary danger.

‘Moreover, it’s not just an ordinary murder case, but a serious major issue that’s happening on a large scale.’

It would be even more of a dilemma.

Watching Espin like that, I wiggled my foot to indicate that she could think about it more.

She bit her lip and closed her eyes, then spoke as if she had made a decision.

“I’m planning to tell my father and have him handle the case.”

“Your father, huh.”

If her father, a high-ranking administrator, finds out, the central government will try to do something about it.

‘The problem is that there are so many followers of the Heaven God Cult spread throughout the central government.’

Far from properly suppressing the people of the Heaven God Cult.

Due to the checks and interference coming from various places, there was a high probability that it would end up fizzling out in the end.

Knowing this clearly, I threw out words that could shake her up to prevent this.

“As expected of the youngest inspector. As soon as a problem arises, you don’t think about solving it alone, but first think about running to your parents.”

“… What?”

When I deliberately provoked her, she glared at me, seemingly upset.

I thought to myself that touching a sore spot really does elicit a satisfyingly strong reaction, and continued speaking slowly.

“I can’t say your choice was wrong. But it’s hard to call it a good choice either. You’re not an ordinary person, but an inspector. You’re in a position where you need to lead others.”

I deliberately listed the ideal qualities she aspired to have.

She seemed to be troubled, biting her lip again and squeezing her eyes shut.

I smiled briefly at her and threw out some more words that might tempt her.

“When someone in such a position can’t solve the problems in front of them and runs to their daddy… I can see why others don’t want to entrust you with work.”

As I continued to poke at her sore spot with a sharp needle.

Espin finally couldn’t hold back, baring her teeth and glaring at me as if she wanted to kill me.

Seeing her like this, I thought it might be a good time to dangle a carrot, so I casually hinted at something she might like.

“… However, if you and I solve this problem together, that atmosphere would almost disappear.”

I slowly continued speaking to Espin, who was now showing interest in me.

“If we can solve something as significant as a large-scale human experiment, which is practically a national disaster, people will no longer see you as just the youngest mascot, but as an inspector fully capable of doing her job.”

At those words, Espin seemed to make up her mind, nodding calmly and saying to me.

“… You’re good with words.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“It is a compliment. People actually call you a puppy trainer.”

… A puppy trainer?

Just as I was about to feel indignant about why I got such a nickname.

I realized that Delia, Rumi, and Sien kept barking in places like the auditorium or hallway, so I had to keep my mouth shut.