Chapter 08
“Why are you coming out of there at this hour?”
“I couldn’t sleep, so I went for a walk….”
“A walk? Thirty minutes away from your house?”
“This trail is prettier.”
I pointed toward the riverside where small rowboats were tied up.
“It looks even prettier from up here.”
I patted the top of the wall. Want to come up too? I kindly suggested, but he ignored me.
Who, you ask?
Who else—Arden.
He looked at me as if I were the strangest creature alive, then suddenly grimaced.
“But, senior.”
“Hm?”
“Are you standing on that wall with your shoes on?”
“Would it have been better if I took them off…? Sorry.”
His cold stare made me immediately lower my tail.
“Get down.”
“Okay.”
I jumped off at once.
Arden, who had reached out as if to catch me, stared blankly when I landed perfectly on my own.
“……”
“……”
“I’ve always been good at keeping my balance.”
“So it seems.”
“Next time I jump from somewhere higher, catch me.”
“You’re planning to climb again?”
“You never know how life goes.”
I pointed at the distant clock tower in the plaza. “If I jump from that clock tower someday, you have to catch me with all your strength.”
“…Don’t go pushing people off things.”
He didn’t even bother responding.
“If you can’t sleep, go to a hospital. Don’t wander around like this.”
“Is there a hospital open for sleepless people? Oh right, didn’t a new one open recently?”
A hospital for those who suffer not physically, but mentally—
His Imperial Highness the Crown Prince personally invited physicians from abroad, apparently.
Such a good man.
“The Crown Prince must be a meticulous and kind person.”
“……”
“He strengthened night patrols so people feel safe going home, and now he built a hospital. Isn’t he thoughtful?”
I even clapped while praising him.
“He’s getting crowned soon, right? How old is he again? Two or three years older than me?”
“No idea.”
“You’re no fun.”
I grumbled internally while looking him over.
Even wearing the pitch-black uniform of the Imperial Knights and a dark coat, his face was so bright and handsome it didn’t look gloomy at all. His blond hair was basically an accessory.
The purple cufflinks peeking from his coat sleeve—those matched ridiculously well with his hair color.
Those cufflinks look like gemstones… everything he owns seems expensive.
Maybe he’s broke from buying fancy trinkets every day—fifty handkerchiefs at a time, cufflinks, accessories—so he’s forced to live in our boarding house.
Tsk-tsk.
“Arden.”
“What.”
“You get a pension as an Imperial Knight, but life sometimes throws accidents you can’t handle even with that.”
Unexpected expenses increase as you age.
“You should save a portion of your salary for that. You know, right?”
“Nope.”
“How long do you think you’ll stay young and healthy? Prepare for old age. Think of splitting your current income with your elderly self sixty years later.”
“……”
“You… have parents, right?”
“If someone else overheard, they’d think you said something worthy of execution…”
“What?”
“Never mind.”
“You’re impossible.”
He ignored every word I said, yet didn’t walk away. Naturally, we continued strolling along the riverside together.
“But what are you doing here at this hour? Late shift?”
“I saw Capital Guards running somewhere on my way home.”
“Oh.”
“They said there was a report from D’Marcy Street.”
“Oh.”
Just act clueless.
“Really? What happened?”
“Nothing serious. A magician appeared, apparently.”
“A magician…”
“There was noise for a moment but it ended quickly.”
Arden showed no sign of connecting the D’Marcy Street incident with me mysteriously going on a late-night walk.
“Phew.”
He stared at me as I let out a relieved sigh.
“What?”
“There’s something in your hair.”
“Really?”
Where? I tilted my head and shook it with my hand.
Shake shake.
“How about now?”
“No.”
Shake shake shake shake.
“Now?”
“No.”
“I’ll just leave it then.”
Arden hesitated, then reached out.
At some point he’d put on gloves. With minimal touch, he brushed the ends of my hair and stepped back. What came away on his fingertip was—
“Oh.”
A flower petal.
It must’ve fluttered out during my transformation.
Seeing what it was, Arden curled his hand around it.
“I ran an errand earlier at a mansion with a greenhouse.”
I spoke first—preemptive excuses.
“There was a flowering tree in the center yard. I must’ve gotten it while passing under it. Lucky them—they get spring flowers already.”
“What’s lucky about that? It’ll be spring soon.”
“Well, true.”
It would be spring soon.
I looked up at the sky. Right now, every breath turned to visible mist in the cold air, but warmth would come eventually.
“Arden.”
“…Yes.”
“Do you think the world is in winter right now?”
Is it truly that cold and chaotic? Chaotic enough that for the first time in 950 years, the Oracle declared a new Magic Saintess must appear?
“In terms of chaos, wartime was worse.”
That was five hundred years ago. They didn’t even have a Magic Saintess then, so why now? I swallowed a complaint I couldn’t voice.
I didn’t expect an answer, yet Arden replied seriously.
“Things got better overall, but the gap widened.”
“Huh?”
“Back then, everyone lived at -100. Now—”
Some live at +100, most at -50.
“Oh.”
“To some, that disparity might be the greatest chaos of all.”
“That’s… true.”
I hadn’t thought of that. I nodded. Arden glanced at me and added:
“So we’ll work to change it. To bring a fair spring to everyone.”
We?
“You?”
“Why? You think I can’t?”
It’s not that. But how can he speak like that when he’s not even the Emperor?
“You can change it too, senior.”
“Me?”
“Yes. Isn’t that why you studied?”
To make the world a better place, he added.
“……”
No. I studied for personal prosperity.
But saying that out loud in front of a junior who wants to reform the world felt… shameful.
“Yes. Right. I studied to change the world.”
“I thought so too. I think you can do it.”
“Sure. Let’s do our best. If I succeed, I’ll buy you dinner.”
“Twice.”
“Deal.”
Just like that, I became someone destined to change the world.
“You too can change the world.”
“What are you mumbling?”
By then, we’d arrived at my boarding house. Arden held the door open, staring as if wondering why I wasn’t going in.
As I checked the mailbox, I called out before he could go upstairs.
“Hey, Arden.”
“Yes.”
“When you say ‘I thought about it,’ does that mean you think about me when I’m not around?”
“No?!”
“Oh?”
Why is thinking of me something to get that angry about? His voice rose sharply.
“I’m not someone who thinks about others. I don’t care about other people.”
“Oh.”
“I only ever think about myself.”
“R-right.”
Arden of the Imperial Knights (age 21): Will change the world, but does not care about anyone in it.
“I got chocolate at the knight’s cafeteria earlier. It reminded me of the chocolate they sold at the academy. You used to eat it all the time. It didn’t make me think of you—it just… popped into my head.”
That’s the same thing.
“Okay.”
Holding back a smile, I nodded. Arden pursed his lips in displeasure and went upstairs.
“Good ni—…?”
My farewell dissolved into emptiness behind his stupidly handsome back.
＊＊＊
Morning, a short while later—
“Ugh… I don’t want to go to work…”
After barely sleeping thirty minutes, I dragged myself up.
“Huh?”
A green yarn string dangled outside my window.
It came from upstairs—Arden’s room.
Just like how we used to pass notes at the academy when we attended different classes.
At the end of the string was—
“…Chocolate?”
I leaned out, but Arden was nowhere in sight.
The moment I grabbed the chocolate, the string snapped.
Tap. His window closed.
“…It’s the same one they sold at the academy vending machine.”
I used to run errands for the teaching assistants just to get one of these.
There was a note attached:
– I don’t want it anymore.
“……”
Two days ago, I wondered which girl would ever take Arden.
I take it back.
Someone absolutely will.
He’s too handsome—and just a little cute.
Just wait until I pass the Imperial Civil Service exam before you get married.
I’ll give a big wedding gift.
As I made that solemn vow, newspaper boys cycled down the street, tossing papers onto doorsteps.
[“There are too many bad people in this world—so I’ve come to catch them myself!” The Magic Saintess Appears!]
[What is a Magic Saintess?]
[Who is the innocent rookie whose job was stolen?]
I saw the printed photo—
And promptly threw up.
