Chapter 3
In truth, Emily had been trying to distance herself from Miss Kira. She didn’t want to be associated with someone who had become entangled not only with Miss Astina but also with His Highness the Second Prince.
How surprised Emily had been when she learned that she was assigned to the same dormitory room as Miss Kira on the day of the entrance ceremony. She had immediately rushed to the faculty office to request a room change.
If only she hadn’t accidentally overheard Astina and her group’s conversation in the corridor on her way to the faculty office, she would have changed rooms right then.
“…Why don’t we try to bring Miss Emily over to our side instead?”
“At this rate, Miss Astina will become the laughingstock of high society.”
“…We must, absolutely must make that commoner leave this Academy of her own accord!”
Although she couldn’t hear the details due to the distance, Emily bit her lip hard at the snippets of conversation she caught.
If Emily were to distance herself from Miss Kira at this timing, it was obvious that Miss Astina would try to pull Emily to their side.
And if she were to join Miss Astina, she would undoubtedly become the main figure in bullying Miss Kira, used like a puppet.
‘What if I end up being quietly disposed of by the Second Prince, who seems to favor Miss Kira?’
Emily’s mind was in turmoil. She didn’t dislike Miss Kira enough to bully her for being a commoner, nor did she like her enough to become close friends.
Emily, who just wanted to spend her Academy life peacefully, bit the tip of her finger hard.
‘…What should I do?’
In truth, the ordinary Emily wanted to become a slightly less ordinary mage.
She wanted to live an uncommon life as a mage, rather than marrying at the young age of 16 and spending her entire life raising children in a quiet countryside. How could she give up this chance that had come to her by chance?
Emily squeezed her eyes shut, then opened them.
She didn’t want to take the initiative in bullying someone, nor did she want to get involved in love triangles or political struggles.
After agonizing over numerous options, Emily finally chose to quietly endure for one year at this Academy.
“We’re in the same room? I look forward to living with you, Miss Emily.”
When Emily returned to the room with her troubled thoughts, Miss Kira, who was just unpacking her luggage, smiled brightly at her.
Looking at her smile, Emily felt a tightness in her chest, but she soon returned an awkward smile and replied.
“…Yes, likewise, Miss Kira.”
* * *
While sharing a dormitory room with Miss Kira, Emily neither distanced herself nor grew close to her.
She tried to maintain an appropriate distance, but naturally, they spent a lot of time together as they lived in the same place.
Along with this, Emily found herself falling into Astina’s traps meant for Kira more frequently, to the extent that even those who set the traps were repeatedly surprised.
Splash!
“Gasp!”
“Miss Emily!”
Just like now.
Emily and Kira were on their way to attend Monday’s class.
As Emily grabbed the doorknob to open the classroom door, she suddenly felt a tingling sensation in her fingertips, followed by an enormous amount of water pouring down on her head. Suddenly drenched like a drowned rat, Emily gasped for air.
“Miss Emily! Are you alright?”
“Eek!”
As Emily stood frozen, unable even to scream from the sudden water bomb, Kira, who was right behind her, called out urgently.
Inside the classroom, students screamed in surprise at the sudden water commotion.
“Wh-what is this…!”
Shocked by the strong impact, Emily raised her head to look straight ahead. At that moment, her eyes met with the culprit who had activated the water magic.
The blue-haired female student stood with both hands covering her mouth, her face pale with shock.
It was Sophia Fons, who always accompanied Miss Astina. Sophia was staring at Emily in front of the door with an expression that looked as if she might collapse at any moment. Seeing this, Emily let out a bitter laugh of disbelief.
Looking incredulously at the perpetrator who was acting like a victim, Emily swept back her dripping hair with one hand.
“…Miss Sophia.”
“I-I’m so sorry, Miss Emily, it’s… I was practicing magic and lost control… You accidentally got hit by my misfired spell…”
Sophia, pale with guilt, fumbled for an excuse, clearly flustered. Realizing from her words that magic had already been set on the classroom door handle, Kira, upset, was about to step forward and protest, but Emily quickly grabbed Kira’s shoulder to stop her.
“I see, these things can happen.”
Emily wrung out her sleeve, which was still dripping with water.
As she did so, she glanced at Astina, who was sitting in the back of the classroom, watching the scene. Miss Sophia is the daughter of a baronial family.
She’s probably acting on orders from Miss Astina, the count’s daughter. If I had sided with Miss Astina, I would probably have been assigned a role like Miss Sophia’s.
The role of taking the lead in bullying Miss Kira, that is.
“Miss Kira, I think I need to go change my uniform. Could you please inform the teacher for me?”
“Miss Emily!”
“I’m fine. I’ll be back soon, Miss Kira.”
After stopping Kira, who looked indignant and ready to run to the teacher, Emily turned back towards the dormitory.
Nobles bullying commoners was a common occurrence at the Academy.
Having been caught up in such incidents several times over the past two months while standing by Miss Kira’s side and having visited the faculty office multiple times, Emily no longer wanted to draw the teachers’ attention.
Behavior scores were part of the overall grade, and besides, telling the teachers wouldn’t solve this problem anyway.
Splash, splash
Emily walked down the corridor, her soaked shoes making squelching sounds and leaving wet marks like a fish just pulled from the water.
Fortunately, the corridor was empty, as classes seemed to have already started. Emily took a breath, thinking it was a relief that she didn’t have to show this sorry state to others.
Emily, who was about to head straight back to the dormitory, decided to stop by the infirmary to get some medicine, as she felt a headache coming on from the sudden drenching.
Knock knock
“Excuse me.”
Emily, who had come down to the first floor, knocked on the infirmary door and immediately opened it, only to find the school nurse’s seat in front of her empty.
“…Teacher?”
“Miss Emily…?”
As she hesitated, entering the infirmary and calling for the teacher while approaching the empty seat, suddenly a familiar voice came from the side.
Startled, Emily turned to her right to see Lord Valenti rising from his chair with a surprised expression.
As her eyes met his wide, gray eyes, Emily called his name softly in surprise.
“Lord Valenti…”
“No, what on earth… Are you alright? What happened?”
Lord Valenti, who had been waiting for the school nurse, literally jumped up from his seat when Emily suddenly appeared, drenched from head to toe.
“Ah, no. It’s nothing. A spell misfired in the classroom… I’m fine. I’m just a bit wet, that’s all.”
As Valenti strode over to examine her and offered her a handkerchief, Emily stepped back in surprise, waving her hands to decline the handkerchief, insisting she was fine.
“Do you happen to know where the school nurse is?”
“Ah, yes. Sir Lucas was feeling a bit of stomach pain, so he went to get some medicinal herbs. It seems they had run out of the herbs he needed… He said he’d be back soon, so I was just watching over the infirmary in the meantime.”
“Oh… I see.”
For a moment, she wondered, ‘Who is Sir Lucas?’ before immediately realizing it was the Second Prince’s name.
She was so used to not casually mentioning the prince’s name that it sounded unfamiliar when she heard it.
“Yes, are you feeling unwell somewhere? Please, take this handkerchief.”
“Ah…, thank you. I have a bit of a headache, so I just came to get some medicine.”
Despite being refused once, Valenti offered her the handkerchief again with a worried expression. Finding it difficult to refuse a second time, Emily hesitantly accepted it.
Only then did Valenti take a step back.
Looking at Emily standing there with a somewhat troubled expression, holding his handkerchief, Valenti remembered that she had been looking for headache medicine.
“Headache medicine, you say? I believe most of the medicines were on this shelf…”
As he approached the shelf next to the school nurse’s desk and opened the middle drawer to start looking for the medicine, Emily hurriedly approached and reached for the top drawer of the shelf.
“Ah, I know where the medicine is. Could you just let the teacher know that I took some medicine?”
As she came closer, the wet ends of Emily’s hair lightly brushed against the back of Valenti’s hand as he bent over, opening the shelf.
Flinch
For a moment, Valenti’s hand twitched at the cold, damp sensation. His gaze fell on the wet brown hair that had just grazed his fingertips.
As Emily passed by his side to reach for the leftmost top shelf, her hair no longer brushed his hand, but the water droplets falling from it continued to wet the back of his hand.
Instead of moving his hand away from the drawer handle, Valenti watched her, her hair now reaching down to her waist, dripping water.
As he looked at her profile, stretching up on tiptoe to reach for the medicine, her uniform darkened by water, a drop of water that had been clinging to her eyelashes fell into her eye, causing Emily to blink. A clear droplet that had rolled down from her moist green eyes crossed her pale cheek, gathered at the tip of her chin, then trickled down her neck.
“Lord Valenti?”
“Yes?”
At that moment, when Emily called out to him, Valenti looked at her with a start.
His shoulders stiffened as if he had been caught peeking at something he shouldn’t have seen.
Emily, while searching for the medicine, glanced at him when he didn’t respond and spoke again.
“I was wondering if you could pass on the message to the teacher when they return.”
She had been wet for some time now and was starting to feel chilly.
As Emily, lacking the energy to wait for the teacher and wanting to quickly return to the dormitory with the medicine, asked him once more, Lord Valenti nodded in understanding.
“Ah, yes. I understand.”
“Thank you so much, Lord Valenti.”
With this, Emily expressed her gratitude and turned her head back to the drawer to take out the medicine.
As she took out a bundle of medicine, kept only two pills, and put the rest back in the drawer, water continued to drip onto Valenti’s hand, one drop at a time. Yet, he didn’t move his hand away.
Before long, the individual droplets merged and streamed down, creating a rivulet on the back of his hand. Valenti remained frozen in that position until Emily finished taking out the medicine and turned around. Then he closed the drawer he had been holding and straightened his bent back.
He then moved his wet hand behind his back, hiding it from her view.
“Thank you, Lord Valenti. I’ll take my leave now.”
As Emily looked up at him and spoke, Valenti’s gaze fell on her blue-tinged lips.
He wanted to give her his coat, but unfortunately, having come straight from the training grounds, all he had on was this black training uniform.
As he was contemplating whether he should tear down the curtain from the infirmary bed to drape over her small shoulders, Emily suddenly bowed and left the infirmary.
“Ah…”
Although Emily had expressed her gratitude several times, she left after giving Valenti, whose reactions were strangely slow, a puzzled look, unable to endure any longer.
‘Is he distracted because the Second Prince is unwell?’
Valenti belatedly came to his senses as Emily bowed and turned around, but she had already gone through the door.
Staring at the wet marks left where she had passed, Valenti stood there motionless until the school nurse returned.
A water droplet that had been clinging to his fingertip fell to the floor.
