episode_0129

Imperial Year 525, May 26th. Special Training, Day 11.

From now on, to prevent straying into other topics, I plan to talk about training first.

Now, you know enough about ordinary skeletons, right? Their large numbers are still annoying, but thankfully, I didn’t get hit once today. Of course, I still haven’t gotten used to the attacks of the strange skeletons.

Thinking about it carefully, isn’t it stranger to get used to those weird skeletons? Ordinary skeletons can at least be thought of as people. The strange skeletons… Ugh, I don’t even want to imagine them.

Just among the strange skeletons I’ve seen so far, there are so many: skeletons with stretching arms, skeletons with tongues popping out, skeletons that shoot ribs, skeletons with six arms that shoot three bows simultaneously, and skeletons riding skeleton horses.

If the strange skeletons ended there, I might have memorized them. But there are still skeletons attached to Hogu’s side that haven’t moved yet.

Hogu said he would help me defeat Betzdo within a month, and for that, I first need to get through all the skeletons in practice. Surely Hogu won’t be disappointed if I can’t do it within a month, right?

When I first started training, I wondered if I could really get stronger by avoiding these things, since they were fake anyway.

Today. I realized this training has quite a lot of meaning.

During Professor Gedra’s class. I ended up sparring with someone else, and it was much easier than I expected.

Compared to dodging skeleton attacks, I didn’t feel any tension, and most importantly, it was just one person, not multiple.

Furthermore, perhaps because I kept moving with a mask on during after-school training, my stamina has increased a lot; I don’t get tired even after fighting for a long time.

Thinking about this, I feel like I’ll train even harder tomorrow.

Alright, that’s enough about training for now. Now, I’ll just make a small complaint.

I didn’t say anything because it’s a bit awkward to ask Hogu directly. How can he never wear the perfume I gave him? Does that even make sense?

Listen carefully.

Last time, I misunderstood a bit… No, on second thought, it’s more accurate to say Hogu spoke in a way that made me misunderstand.

Anyway. So, I once went dressed in a one-piece dress and wearing perfume, mistaking it for an invitation to have tea instead of training, you know?

Back then, Hogu said the perfume smelled good, so I even gave him a gift, and Hogu clearly said he liked it.

Seriously! Why! Has he never worn it when he comes?!

Even now, holding back my embarrassment, I have a bunch of one-piece dresses similar to the one Hogu said was pretty last time, which I asked my mother to get.

Wait. If I do this, it’ll look like I’m a girl who fell hard for a guy who bought a bunch of one-piece dresses and perfume, just because Hogu complimented me once.

What’s important right now isn’t the one-piece dress, but the perfume!

Tomorrow, I’ll definitely confront Hogu about it.

… But what should I say?

Hmm. Let’s decide on a few candidates first.

[1. Hogu, why aren’t you using the perfume I gave you last time?]

Rejected. Anyone can see I’m bothered by it! What I want is, you know? To ask it a bit naturally, pretending not to care, pretending not to mind.

[2. How much of the perfume I gave you is left?]

Hmm… This is also rejected. It’s a bit more natural than number 1, but Hogu would definitely tease me, saying, ‘Why are you curious about that? Oh, are you going to give me more if there’s not much left?’

★★★★★[3. Hogu, you haven’t worn the perfume I gave you, have you? I’m not really bothered by it, but it’s proper etiquette to wear a gifted perfume at least once. I’m saying this again so you don’t misunderstand: I’m not upset or anything that you haven’t worn it even once, so don’t get the wrong idea!]★★★★★

This is good! It seems a little long, but it doesn’t make me look like I’m clinging to Hogu, and most of all, I like that I can ask naturally while pretending to teach him etiquette.

I’ll mark it because it’s important.

So, I’ve written everything I needed to write in today’s diary.

My eyes are getting heavy, so I should stop writing here and go to sleep today.

As I lay in bed, closing my eyes to sleep, something that made me angry came to mind again!

Why on earth! Hogu said we’d have tea later, but then he said nothing else! When is ‘later,’ when is ‘later’?! He should tell me precisely so I can prepare.

Surely, he wouldn’t say ‘Ta-da! Today is the day we go for tea together’ if I went in comfortable training clothes, after all this, right? If he does, I’ll seriously kill him.

…. He wouldn’t have forgotten, would he?

If he really forgot, I’ll call him Hogu the Goldfish from now on.

He said we’d have tea later, but he wouldn’t really just have tea, would he? No, Hogu wouldn’t be that dense.

What? You mean, what’s the problem with just having tea when that’s what we planned to do?

Hmm…….. Hmm……..

Well…

Ah, right! Time, time is precious!

It’d be a waste of time just to have tea, so we should eat a simple meal before tea, right? And then after tea, maybe walk together a bit to digest, right? If we get tired while walking, it’d be nice to watch a play or something.

But it’s embarrassing to ask when we’ll have tea. So tomorrow, I’ll just ask about the perfume.

————–

Imperial Year 525, May 27th. Special Training, Day 12.

As I wrote in yesterday’s diary, I succeeded in asking Hogu very naturally why he wasn’t wearing the perfume on our way to school today.

What? Didn’t I say I’d talk about training first? That’s not important right now.

Hogu’s every word and action is usually absurd, but his reason for not wearing the perfume is even more ridiculous, you know?

He said he didn’t wear it because it would be a waste to use it.

Isn’t he a complete idiot?

Of course, it’s natural for it to decrease when you use it. And when it’s all used up, he can just ask for more.

But when I got angry, he said he’d wear it tomorrow… Wait, this means he found out I was bothered by him not wearing the perfume.

This is all because of Hogu, who made me angry with his strange answer. If I hadn’t gotten angry, I wouldn’t have been found out.

If he still doesn’t wear it tomorrow after all this, I’m going to spank him until his back disappears.

—————

Imperial Year 525, May 28th. Special Training, Day 13.

Today was a good day.

Why?

Because Hogu finally wore the perfume when he came.

Today, we coincidentally met and walked to school together, and Hogu, as if showing off, said he wore the perfume I gave him.

I originally wanted to say, ‘Is it something to brag about, wearing it almost two weeks after I gifted it?’, but when I smelled the same scent coming from Hogu as me, it was… something, something else.

It’s hard to express even in writing like this, so how could I have expressed it in words? Of course, I couldn’t say anything and just walked. But Hogu, that guy, seemed to not care, and he said, ‘Huh? Sepia-ssi, you smell just like me.’

Is he kidding? Of course, we’d smell the same because we used the same perfume! Who wouldn’t know that and wouldn’t say anything?!

And if you think about it, it’s not that I smell like Hogu; it’s that Hogu smells like me.

You’re asking what the difference is?

It’s vastly different! There’s a huge difference between me smelling like Hogu and Hogu smelling like me.

More importantly, he seemed to like it, so he’ll wear it again tomorrow, right?

And all the perfumes I ordered have arrived. I guess it’s roughly 200 bottles… The problem is, how can I naturally give them to Hogu…?

First, it will take time for him to use up the perfume I already gave him, so let’s think about it slowly later.

Now, let’s slowly get to the training story……….. Before that, let’s talk about Little Bird.

There’s one problem with Little Bird……..

It’s growing too fast.

You might ask if growing fast isn’t a good thing?

I expected it to grow quickly since it’s a hatchling, but it seems to be growing too rapidly. It’s gotten to the point where if it sits on my head, I’ll sway.

On the way to school, I asked Hogu about it, and he said he’d go with me to ask Professor Alicia.

It was good that he offered to go together; it was the most perceptive thing Hogu has done lately.

But when I asked Hogu if we shouldn’t usually go to the Professor of Magical Beasts for something like this, he said Professor Alicia knows almost everything.

Professor Alicia looked at Little Bird, stroked her chin once, and said she would examine Little Bird for the day.

Since there was no reason for Professor Alicia to do anything bad to Little Bird, I readily agreed, of course.

Little Bird, however, seemed to disagree and caused a ruckus. Of course, she quieted down after the Professor gave her one stern look. At home, she chatters noisily until the spirit tells her off.

As I left Little Bird with Professor Alicia, looking glum, and was about to leave the faculty office, Professor Alicia said that training in the forest is good, but not too late, and to tell her if we need anything.

Later, when I asked Hogu, he said Professor Alicia and Professor Idra are close. So, could that be why Professor Alicia knows that Hogu and I train in the forest?

Surely Professor Alicia isn’t imagining something strange, is she? For example, Hogu and I in an empty forest doing ———— ………….. Even if it’s a diary only I read, this really doesn’t feel right. I should erase it quickly.

Although training is tough, I’ve been so happy lately.

It would be really great if tomorrow goes just like today.

——

Imperial Year 525, May 29th. Special Training, Day 14.

Johanna Freya visited the classroom.