episode_0057

Monday morning assembly was boldly skipped.

Because I spent a sweet morning in the infirmary with Rosalie-ssi, who was cutely clinging to me, saying, “No thinking about Pisces-ssi!”

“Ras got so busy from Friday afternoon, so I was a little sad, you know? Teacher-nim wanted to see Ras even on the weekend~”

“Haha… I had a bit of work.”

Promising myself that I would soon reveal the full story about myself to Rosalie-ssi without hiding anything, I stroked the back of her head.

Our beautiful Teacher-nim purred like a cat, a deeply satisfied expression on her face.

“Hehe. Your touch is so gentle. And something… huh..??”

Rosalie-ssi buried her head in my embrace, where I was stroking her hair, and looked slightly puzzled.

Then…

“It’s a little annoying that the scent of Pisces-ssi is so strong on your body, but Teacher-nim is a mature adult, so I won’t get too jealous. Hmph! Besides, we’re at school right now…” she said, rubbing her face vigorously into my chest, making me flinch.

“Oh..!”

At some point, this level of skinship had become completely natural and familiar.

Is this what the adult world is like? A world where actions speak louder than words, even without a single word to define the relationship.

Anyway, it was all good for me, and as for our relationship… I just needed to clearly define it myself.

I briefly recalled the famous confession spots near Delphi in my mind.

As I thought about the words, the situation, the time that would be good for a confession… and Rosalie-ssi smiling brightly, my heart felt like it was beating a little faster.

“Yes… like this. When you’re with Teacher-nim, you only think of Teacher-nim. So thoughtful, our Ras.”

Thanks to this mischievous Teacher-nim, who was impossible to deceive, I came to cool down but ended up with a fever, yet it was a good, healthy kind of heat, so it didn’t matter at all.

“Then I’ll be going now.”

“Time has already flown by like this. Have a good Monday, then? I’ll contact you. Then, nom…!”

Rosalie-ssi playfully nipped my cheek lightly with just her lips, without using her teeth.

“Uh… uh…”

I left the lab making a foolish sound for the first time in a while.

It was a Monday morning where tiger energy seemed to surge within me.

*

“Emma. You’d better explain properly.”

“Ugh… that is…”

During lunchtime, Emma was predictably summoned by Lizley and went up to the rooftop.

Emma’s spirit had been shattered after being subjected to monstrous badgering from loan sharks since early morning, but her master didn’t consider such circumstances.

No, in fact, Lizley, who was interrogating her, also had her spirit half-broken due to trauma, so she had no room to care about Emma.

“Don’t stutter, speak clearly. Didn’t you say you paid back the money? Why are loan sharks coming to Leon’s place? What have you been doing?”

“Ugh. I’m sorry, Lizley. The truth is, I couldn’t pay it back. Because the black mage Lergo was a debtor, all the penalty money he was supposed to give me was taken away…”

“What? What is this story now? Lergo gave you penalty money, and you, like an idiot, let it be taken away? Speak clearly.”

Emma began to tell Lizley a fabricated lie she had cobbled together, racking her not-so-bright brain all morning.

The story was that Lergo had a creditor, and that creditor was the same loan shark who had lent money to Emma herself.

And after claiming that he had higher priority in creditor rights, he had forcibly taken away the penalty money that Lergo was supposed to pay her… that was the story.

“Seriously… Emma. What’s most astonishing is that you’re blabbering about this as if it’s something to be proud of. So, are you boasting that you were defrauded by both a loan shark and a black mage?”

“Defrauded… it’s not like that. That loan shark was actually above the black mage. Lergo still had debts and could have ended up being killed or dragged away by that man! When I went back yesterday, Lergo’s workshop had been completely seized, and he was nowhere to be found.”

Emma, for now, desperately shifted the blame from herself to Orca, the intruding loan shark.

And for Lergo’s whereabouts, which was the biggest problem, she conveniently created the excuse of ‘missing in action.’

Since Lergo was, in any case, a black mage actively trading with Leon, this information was necessary for Lizley, but she didn’t know that it was based on a lie.

“Hoo… that man. What’s his name? If Lergo disappeared, I’ll have to tell Leon first… and also about that arrogant loan shark.”

“Orca. He’s a loan shark, and I heard he’s quite a big shot. I almost got killed for talking back to him…”

“Shut up. How would you possibly know if he’s a big shot or just a smooth-talking swindler? Do you think you have the ability to discern that? To someone like you, anything even slightly plausible would look like a big shot anyway.”

There was, in any case, nothing particularly wrong with Lizley’s foul-tempered rebuttal.

However, Lizley actually had no right to badger Emma, given that she knew Emma was so incompetent yet never bothered to find her a proper escort.

If she had properly asked Leon for help, Leon would have readily assigned Emma a competent escort.

“The loan… principal and interest, tell me. If it’s something I can handle, I’ll try to stop it somehow.”

“The principal is 14 Talentum gold coins, and the interest is 7 Talentum gold coins per day… As of today, it’s 21. Tomorrow, it will increase by another 7…”

Emma confessed her debt in a voice like a flea crawling into a mouse hole, and Lizley pressed her throbbing forehead.

“When you signed the contract, you didn’t raise any objections? The repayment period is less than a week, and the interest is so high…”

Lizley was lecturing Emma furiously, but in truth, if she had issues, she should have given proper instructions herself.

Leon had deliberately not helped Lizley to observe her people management skills and how she used her head, but if he had been watching, this was a detail that would have made him click his tongue in disapproval.

‘21 Talentum gold coins… that’s an amount I can’t freely draw from Gracia. It’s even harder for a family like Agnelli, which has no money to begin with… A loan? No, but why would I? How would I know if that loan shark is a swindler or not?’

Lizley, for now, organized her thoughts.

‘Whatever happens to Emma’s debt is none of my business. Cutting her off before things get bigger is also an answer. After all… the Agnelli family has no particular merits anyway.’

The breaking off of the engagement with Etgard had not yet been formally agreed upon between the families because Logier was very busy, but if the engagement was indeed broken, Gracia would have to repay the debt.

However, it was a merciful reduction, much more than Lizley had nervously worried about, and it wouldn’t lead to being buried under an suffocating pile of debt.

‘Anyway… since Ras was too soft and reduced the debt quite a bit… we won’t return to a gutter like before. Our family can self-sustain perfectly well even without Agnelli.’

Thus, Lizley decided to send a message to the head of the Gracia family, advising them to prepare to cut ties with Agnelli.

“Li… Lizley. What do I do? They said they’d send the bill to my family if I can’t pay it back by this week. Where can I get help…?”

“Emma.”

Having completely sorted out her thoughts, Lizley calmly made up her mind and cut Emma off.

“Figure it out yourself. If you think about it, why should I clean up the mess you made? In a way, this is your final test. Don’t think of asking for my help; you absolutely must pay it back within a week. I can’t accept someone who can’t even handle that much as my vassal or subordinate. The loan sharks said earlier, didn’t they? If Agnelli can’t pay, they’ll come to Gracia, their master… That must absolutely not happen. Understood?”

In a situation where Emma virtually had no way to become self-reliant without the help of Lizley, and by extension Leon, Lizley’s words were practically a declaration of cutting ties.

And before this ruthless tail-cutting, like a mouse before a cat… Emma couldn’t say a word.

Leaving Emma, who was sobbing with trembling shoulders, Lizley descended from the rooftop first.

Thus, the largest and thickest string that connected Emma snapped off.

“Who… what should I do…? What do I do?”

Emma’s vision went dark!

*

“Garett… I came to see my senior. Is he perhaps inside the student council room…?”

After school, Emma ultimately went to Garett, having put in the effort to find him.

In effect, the very thin and fragile last string remaining to her.

The fact that Garett and Emma had broken up was not grand enough to spread as a rumor, so the only ones who knew were Skada and Ras.

“Oh, Garett’s girlfriend… hmm…”

Neru Nellami, a small, cute, fairy-like second-year student council member who had fainted after being put in a chokehold by Ras, looked at Emma with a slightly troubled expression.

She, too, was one of the students who had witnessed the spectacular debt collection show put on by Ras’s subordinates while on her way to school that morning.

‘This little one really seems to be in a lot of debt. How was Garett? Huh…? But they said he seemed completely fine…’

Anyway, although they were a couple famous enough within the academy, Garett, whom she had seen all day, truly seemed unbothered.

Breaking through Neru’s thoughts of “something’s odd…,” Emma made a request in a slightly desperate voice.

“It’s a bit urgent, so… even if Senior said he wouldn’t meet me or something like that…”

“Hmm? No, not that! He didn’t say anything like that. I’ll call him out for you, just wait a bit.”

Normally, Emma would have looked at Neru, who spoke in such an incomprehensible and peculiar dialect, likely because she was from an isolated region, with an openly scornful expression.

But to her now, the rustic Neru seemed like a savior descended from the heavens.

“Thank you..! Senior-nim, thank you..!”

Neru, who went inside, called Garett, who was subtly sticking close to Skada and doing work in a sweet, harmonious way.

“Garett. Your sweetheart is outside. She’s trembling and begging to see you. Didn’t she get into debt or something? Go out and talk to her.”

Skada’s beautiful face instantly crumpled, and Garett wore a slightly dumbfounded expression.

“Oh… what an audacious visit. Neru, I didn’t tell you, but I broke up with her. Phew… Anyway, I guess I should go out and see her face to finish things. I’ll be back in a moment, okay?”

The gentle tenderness, slightly apologetic and soothing, was directed towards Skada, and it made her feel good.

Garett quickly left to settle things with Emma, leaving only a suddenly awkward Neru and a now-pleased Skada in the student council room.

‘However… that impudent brat needs a bit of schooling. It’s annoying enough that she keeps bothering him… and what does she want by calling him out after getting into such a huge debt?’

Of course, her uplifted mood was separate from her decision to deal with Emma.

“Neru. Watch the student council room for a bit. I also have some business to take care of, so I need to go out for a moment.”

“Yes..!!”

Skada muffled her presence and quietly, silently, followed the former lovers.

She also wanted to see how Garett would handle the situation.

*

“What is it?”

“Oppa. Um… that…”

Emma was considerably flustered seeing Garett, who was extremely cold and showed not a single shred of lingering affection.

Garett Shabrier was a good-natured person, deeply affectionate, and a righteous young man seemingly drawn from a picture, strong in both responsibility and loyalty.

Emma had never imagined that he, who had been bound to her for quite some years, would show such knife-like resolve in just a few days.

It was solely Emma’s delusion that even if he had a new girlfriend, she could always win him back anytime she set her mind to it, given the long time they had spent together.

Garett was a good-natured person, deeply affectionate, and strong in both responsibility and loyalty… but at the same time, he was also a sharp person, like a well-honed spear tip.

Having realized that the two days he spent with Skada were far happier than the years he spent with Emma, he understood how terribly wrong his relationships had been until now.

“If you came to talk about getting back together, I’ll tell you upfront that I refuse. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t even mention that.”

Emma felt as if a sharp spear tip was digging into her heart, but at the same time, pathetically… she was relieved that it wasn’t about money.

“Right… Phew… I didn’t come to talk about that either… Rather, I need some money, could you help me out? I’ll pay you back later…”

“You really are something. Since you cut straight to the chase, I’ll give you a direct answer too. No.”

Garett chuckled and cut off Emma’s rude request.

Emma, who omitted the amount, explanation of circumstances, pleas for sympathy, and desperate requests, instead performing ‘give me money,’ was indeed Emma through and through.

“I don’t know how much money you’re in debt for, but if it’s a small amount, I might be able to help. As a friendly gesture between families, not between lovers. But Emma, if you want to borrow money from me, you have to tell me why you got into debt. I’m not some gambling machine that spits out money when you hit it. If it’s a debt you incurred for a reasonable reason, I might help… but it doesn’t seem to be the case at all.”

“Ugh…”

Emma had essentially come to him aimlessly, having underestimated Garett.

She had thought that Garett, who was weak to affection and had patiently endured her hysterics, would simply lend her some amount without asking about her circumstances.

“I spent almost five years as your boyfriend. But… how on earth did you manage to get into such debt that debt collectors are showing up at the academy? I really can’t understand it. And honestly, the whispers? They’ve been circulating all day. How do you think I feel?”

Garett sighed deeply with a slightly disgusted expression and began to list the whispers he had heard throughout the day.

“They say she got entangled with a male escort at a high-end bar for nobles, that she gambled, that she crazily splurged on luxury goods… Emma, what about my reputation? And then you even come to me asking to borrow money?”

Honor is important to nobles, and if one’s lover does something dishonorable, the other party inevitably suffers harm as well.

“Cleanly resolve it yourself. I don’t know why you got into debt, but… it seems it’s true that you and I couldn’t go on any longer. Don’t contact me anymore. I’ve started seriously dating someone, so it’s a huge disrespect.”

Garett cut off his ties with Emma even more sharply and decisively than his spearmanship.

“You jerk… if you weren’t going to help me, you should’ve just said so and left… Adulterer. You trashy scumbag. Seriously dating someone? You were just looking for an opportunity to switch, weren’t you? You can pretend to be a saint, but you’re even worse trash than me.”

Emma screamed insults and hurled abuses at Garett, but Garett merely chuckled.

“I should have become a bad guy sooner. Whether that makes me trash or whatever, it would have been a better choice than stubbornly continuing to meet you. Anyway, pay back your debt. Don’t come looking for me again.”

Swish—

Garett, with a light step, turned his back on Emma and left.

“Ha… that… that…!”

Emma was biting her lip, about to hurl curses in the direction Garett had disappeared.

But then, Emma gasped, unable to scream from a pain that felt like her shoulder was about to shatter.

“…!!!!”

“That’s enough. It’s laughable to see a pathetic ex-lover come begging for someone to take on her debt.”

Silently, Skada was extremely satisfied watching her knight cut off a bad connection without an ounce of hesitation.

Thus, she held back quite a bit on her oppressive aura and grip strength, more than usual.

“If you approach ‘my lover’ again… you won’t be able to walk properly on two feet. I’ll keep a close eye on how much nerve you have to covet the Princess’s man, you nameless brat.”

Her beautiful crimson eyes, like finely cut rubies, glowed fiercely, radiating a predator’s intimidation and killing intent, and Emma fled without even being able to properly respond.

Thus, Emma, who had completely become a woman whose strings had snapped, no, a kite, had only one last place to go.

*

“The ways of the world are truly mysterious. To think that you, who used to flinch at the mere mention of money, would come to me asking to borrow it.”

“……”

Seeing Emma, who was bowing her head deeply before me and looking only at her toes, I couldn’t have been more pleased.

Orca? He wasn’t my complete self, so this was the first direct encounter between just Ras and Emma since my regression, wasn’t it?

Money, merchants, Etgard, Ras… these were things she used to despise and disregard, yet to see them become what Emma needed most right now, made me feel the profound mystery of life.

“So, how much?”

I was thoroughly enjoying this situation.