Chapter 185
Erich was turned into a living corpse. He was beaten up by the Orbis Class and whined to the others, but he only got his mentality completely shattered by the guys from the Royal Class.
Thinking of it, Erich was already made into a permanent sandbag, as he had been the main instigator of Scarlett’s bullying.
That wasn’t what I wanted to talk about, though.
“Why are you suddenly acting like you’re worried about them? And I really didn’t hit them.”
“Sure.”
“Seriously! I really didn’t hit them!”
No matter what I said, she wouldn’t believe me.
Anyway, I didn’t expect Harriet would intervene after seeing me like that, so I was strangely bewildered.
The three brothers had snuck out of the room, so after looking around, there was only Harriet and me left in the lobby.
“And why would I care about them? I’m just saying that you shouldn’t do these things. I hate seeing you like that.”
Her focus wasn’t on the kids getting bullied but on the fact that I bullied people. That was kind of sad as well.
Harriet’s character had changed so much that it couldn’t even be compared to the one she had in the original. Where the hell did the Harriet go who treated kids from lowly backgrounds with utter contempt?
It seemed that such contempt for commoners forcibly disappeared the more involved she got with me.
“What was it this time?”
“What?”
“What did they do this time to piss you off?”
“Ah.”
Harriet seemed to be curious as to why I did what I did, believing that it wasn’t for no reason.
“Nothing really, I was just asking that guy where he got the bruises from and what he did to get them.”
“…You didn’t beat him up?”
“No! I didn’t beat him up, okay?”
You really didn’t? I could clearly see what she was thinking by the look in her eyes.
She was just that convinced that I did that. Weak, it couldn’t be helped that things were like that. I was the boy who cried wolf in that situation, after all. No one would believe me, no matter how I tried to explain myself.
“Looks like he got beaten up after getting in a fight with the Orbis Class, so that was why I just said a few words that they should stop picking fights and stuff…”
“…The Orbis Class?”
“Yeah. Seems like he got beat up after picking a fight with them after class because he lost in their practice match.”
Harriet seemed to have fallen in a slight daze when she heard that things were a lot different from what she thought.
“Just what is wrong with him?”
“If you ask a leaky bucket why it’s leaking, would you get any other answer but because ‘it’s leaking because it’s leaky’?”
“…What are you talking about?”
“That’s just how that guy is.”
When Harriet heard that idiot got so mad after he lost in the match and got beaten up for it, she felt that Erich seemed even more pathetic.
He was just someone who was bound to get beaten up wherever he went.
Harriet’s evaluation of Erich seemed to have fallen even lower. She was staring at me with her arms folded.
“…Come to think of it, aren’t you like that as well?”
“…What?”
“If you go around and piss people off and create grudges, you’re bound to get beaten up.”
“…What are you on about?”
“Or you’ll fight with them over nothing as soon as you bump into students of the Orbis Class.”
No matter whether Erich got beaten up or not, taking my personality into consideration, it seemed like she was convinced that either of those two situations would occur.
“…Something similar happened to me already, though?”
“…What? You fought?”
“It wasn’t a fight! Hey! Do I look like some crazy bastard that punches everyone he sees? …I know what you think! We just had a practice match this time!”
When I explained to her what happened, me having already fought against students of the Orbis Class and completely defeating them, Harriet looked a bit tired.
“…Yes, you didn’t just brawl.”
“I’m also someone who greatly cares about manners and dignity, you know? It might be hard to believe, though.”
“…Hah, you deliberately lost without using your supernatural powers, then overwhelmingly won when you used them and were intentionally rude to him. I know everything, you know?”
“…No, that’s not it.”
Why did she know me so well? Did she know exactly when and how I lost my temper?
Harriet and I chatted about various things in the lobby until I heard someone calling me from behind.
“Reinhardt.”
“Ah, yeah .”
It was Ellen, who had changed from her school uniform into training clothes.
She pointed her chin towards the training room. It looked like I was going to have some training with her.
“It’s fine to win using your supernatural powers, but you do know that you would have been completely defeated if you didn’t have them, right?”
“I know, okay? I’m not proud of that either, you know?”
“You seemed very proud, believing in your supernatural power.”
‘Damnit.’
Anyway, it was time for training.
“I’m leaving, okay?”
“Huh? Ah…Yes ”
Harriet nodded with a slightly blank expression pasted on her face.
* * *
That day’s training session wasn’t all that long because I had to hand over something I couldn’t the previous day.
“…Are all of these gold coins?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Ellen looked surprised when she saw that huge bag filled with gold coins that I carried into her room.
“Exactly 180. If you want to count, go ahead.”
“Annoying.”
It would certainly be quite difficult to count them. Ellen seemed surprised at the amount of gold she received, but she didn’t seem to be that thrilled over it. One could buy a lot of things, like food and clothes, with that money
The real reward we took with us from the Darklands wasn’t the earrings I gave to Harriet or the cursed sword, but the money.
It was a huge amount of money worth billions of won.
However, since we were in Temple, a place in which we were 100% guaranteed to receive food, clothing, and shelter, Ellen and I weren’t that impressed by it. As Ellen simply lifted and let go of the pouch filled with gold coins with a clunk, she leaned over and looked at me.
“It’s burdensome.”
Ellen didn’t seem to feel anything much about that enormous amount of money.
“Then give it to me.”
“Don’t want to.”
She shook her head and refused my attempt at getting more than a 1,000 gold coins like that. Tch, I thought I would get even more money like that.
Ellen was glancing at the pouch filled with gold.
Did she think nothing more of that money than she would of a sack of rice or something?
* * *
Translator – KonnoAren
* * *
Evening time.
If there was one difference from before, it would be that Ellen could eat with the other girls again.
And I was included in that. Of course, Ellen still wasn’t much of a talker, and she had little to no reaction to things. She mostly tended to leave Liana and Harriet to do the talking and Adelia to react to them.
I also wasn’t the type of person to say anything unless someone talked to me first. The kids also knew that I was like a broken vending machine that would only give rude answers even if they put a coin in it, so they didn’t really talk to me often.
On that note…
“I want to ask you something.”
Rather unusually, Ellen was the first to talk. She wasn’t looking towards me, but towards Liana and Harriet.
“Yes, go ahead.”
“This is the first time Ellen is asking me something. Yes. What is it?”
Both of them were surprised as Ellen did something she didn’t usually do, which was strange. Ellen nodded her head, seeming slightly troubled with something.
“You have a lot of money, right?”
“Money? Well… I guess so? Same would go for Harriet.”
Duke Grantz had villas all over the continent.
And the young lady of the Saint-Owan Grand Duchy, Harriet, was more of a princess than a mere noble to begin with.
Asking those two if they had money was the same as asking a human if they were breathing. It was obvious. But why was she asking about money so suddenly?
“If you have a lot of money, what do you do with it?”
That girl…
What should I do with that stuff in my room before dinner? What should I do to spend that money well?
It looked like she was struggling with those questions.
I imagined Ellen struggling like that all alone in her room, which would be kind of cute. I didn’t think that kid would do that, though.
What did one do with a lot of money?
The two of them were a little startled because they didn’t know Ellen, of all people, would ask them such a question.
“Ah… The reward you received from the Adventurer’s Guild. Is it about that?”
The additional reward we received was also rather high. We got it through Mr. Epinhauser the day before. However, that was just a cute amount for the two of us.
“Additionally, there is the money we got from selling precious metals and such. We got so much money that I don’t know what to do with it.”
“How much?”
“More than a thousand.”
A thousand gold coins.
“Cough! Cough, cough! Cough!”
“A-Adelia! Are you okay?”
“Drink some water!”
While listening carefully, it seemed like Adelia was so surprised to the point her eyes almost popped out, and she started coughing like that.
She calmed down, her face flushed red, after she drank some water.
1000 gold coins…
Over a billion won.
“It’s quite a lot…”
“Yeah…”
Even Harriet and Liana didn’t deny that it was quite a lot of money. The amount itself probably wasn’t much to them, but we earned it in a single go. Of course, as they knew the details, they were aware that it wasn’t earned easily.
What did they do when they had too much money?
Where did they usually spend their money?
Ellen seemed curious about those things.
“Well… I would buy some magic tools or rare magic stones to research them… I think. While this certainly is a large amount of money, I think it’ll be quickly used up if you go with that.”
“Yeeah… I also often think that I’d like to do that if I had a lot of money.”
Adelia agreed to Harriet’s words. Temple provided various items as support, but that investment wasn’t unlimited. It was clear that there were quite a lot of things that they couldn’t do due to their financial limitations.
Those of the magic major had a lot of things they could spend their money on, but Ellen wasn’t a wizard.
“I usually buy clothes and other stuff. Although you made quite a lot of money, I also think that it’ll be used up soon if you do that.”
You bastard, we’re talking about a billion!
You’re telling me you would just spend all that on clothes? Would you even be able to wear all that?!
I managed to hold back my retorts, almost jumping at Liana’s words which would make any commoner cringe hard.
Anyway, Liana seemed to be able to spend large sums of money on her own personal hobbies and preferences.
“…That reminds me.”
Harriet hesitantly opened her mouth after listening to Liana. When she said it, I also realized something.
“Ellen, you don’t have any other clothes besides your school uniform, right?”
“I have more.”
Ellen pointed at the clothes she was wearing. Liana and Harriet looked rather pale at her words.
“…I mean, casual clothes that aren’t training clothes.”
Harriet was right.
Ellen was always either wearing her school uniform or a training suit. She didn’t have any casual clothes. I had never seen her wear anything like that, at least.
Even right at that moment, Ellen was just wearing her training suit.
After class, all of us changed into our casual clothes and decided to roam around.
Adelia wore a gray dress, Harriet wore a luxurious lacey black dress, and Liana wore trousers and a blouse.
We didn’t really agree to dress up, but everyone ended up wearing their casual clothes.
However, Ellen was still dressed in just a tracksuit, and it had almost the same design as the one she wore earlier. There weren’t that many differences in tracksuits anyway.
Liana just opened her mouth blankly as if she came to the same realization again.
“Don’t you have any normal one-piece dresses?”
“…No.”
The only time I saw Ellen wearing skirts was when she wore her school uniform. Liana grabbed Ellen’s hand as she entered her berserk mode.
“I can’t leave you like that. Let’s go buy some clothes.”
“?”
Liana had bought her a swimsuit the other day because she couldn’t bear seeing Ellen in her school swimsuit. Next, it seemed that she was bothered by the fact that Ellen didn’t have any proper casual clothes. Liana decided to shop for some casual clothes for Ellen; that was when she looked towards me.
“Hey, you, come along as well.”
“…What? Why me? I didn’t ask you how I should spend my money, you know?”
Liana frowned at my words.
“How are you any different? You only ever wear your uniform and your tracksuit as well.”
Just as Ellen didn’t own any skirts and such of her own, I didn’t even have a proper pair of pants other than the ones from my training clothes.
Although we were of different genders, my and Ellen’s clothing styles were exactly the same.
I mean, why would one need casual clothes if the only thing one did all day long was train? I wouldn’t even have a chance to wear them anyway, right?
Ah.
I was pretty sure that Ellen was thinking the same thing.
“Anyway, we’ll go shopping tomorrow after class. We’ll meet up in the dormitory.”
Was it just my hallucination when I felt like Liana de Grantz had the most authority right then?
* * *
I had meditation, supernatural power control, and supernatural power practice classes on Wednesday. Meditation and supernatural power control were classes I already had in my first semester.
The previous day’s practical swordsmanship class consisted of performing actual combat with a summoned practice dummy. There were also some cases where they summoned monsters, so it was literally a class where we fought against remote-controlled dolls with our swordsmanship. It was simply fighting against golems holding swords.
Supernatural power practice was just another version of that; it was also Royal Class-only.
There were a total of six supernatural power users in the Royal Class Year 1.
Liana, Kono Lint, Charlotte, Heinrich, Ibia, and me.
Those who take that class possessed offensive abilities.
Class B’s Ibia had telepathic abilities, so she didn’t take the class, as she hadn’t discovered an offensive use for her powers yet.
Although she would later on, no one knew that yet.
Of course, in Kono Lint’s case, his teleportation ability was a little vague.
Depending on how one used it, there were ways to use Teleportation offensively. However, due to the fatal side effect of his ability, appearing naked, he couldn’t take part in the practical classes.
Of course, all of Royal Class’ supernatural power users had improved in their own ways, so Kono Lint’s ability should have improved as well.
Before the supernatural power practice class…
The supernatural power control class.
-Oh… Ooh! Lint! Unbelievable! For that to be possible!
-T-teacher…! I did it! I finally… finally did it!
-Well, still! Don’t… Don’t come any closer to me wearing just that!
-Urgh… Uuh. Yes…
Kono Lint was sharing some intense emotions with the teacher in charge of the closed-off classroom where he usually practiced his ability.
“…What’s going on?”
“Who knows?”
After completing her ability test, Liana heard Kono Lint making a fuss and turned to look away.
I didn’t see Charlotte anywhere around, as she might have still had her lessons somewhere else.
-Bang!
“Everyone! Good news!”
Then, Kono Lint’s training teacher opened the door to the closed-off room and cried out, their voice filled with emotion.
“Our… our Lint! Lint can finally…! He can finally teleport together with his underwear!”
At those words, everyone in the class stopped what they were doing, even the teachers in charge had bewildered expressions on their faces.
It came as a great shock to everyone.
“Re-re… Really?!”
“Yes, Ms. Lelin! It’s not a coincidence either! I did it three times in a row!”
“This… this can’t be!”
That’s right.
Kono Lint’s ability had evolved so that he could teleport along with his underwear after rigorous training!
“Kuh… Kuhuk…”
Kono Lint, who seemed to have gathered all of his clothes, was so moved that tears came out of his eyes as he covered his mouth. Heinrich and Ibia were also astonished by his remarkable growth.
That ability, which forced him to give up all of his dignity to use, now only required him to give up about 90% of it.
Liana looked rather pale as if she had fallen into a daze.
“It feels… really incredible… What is this feeling…?”
That fatal side effect had finally disappeared, so it was only right to celebrate.
But… it was rather subtle.
I definitely remembered that part. From then on, Kono Lint’s ability would continue to evolve.
He was able to teleport with his underwear, but later on, he would be able to teleport with all his clothes on. His ability would increase in power to the point where he wouldn’t have to give up his dignity anymore.
However, going by how it progressed…
I guessed that his next evolution would make him able to teleport with his socks or something.
Kono Lint, who succeeded in teleporting with his underwear, eventually would be able to teleport along with his socks as well, but I didn’t know if it would be the socks or not.
“I… I… I knew I could do it…!”
However, at the moment, we couldn’t help but cheer for Kono Lint, who was so greatly moved by the moment.
It was such a strange moment that seemed both happy and yet sad.
Anyway, that day’s protagonist was Kono Lint.
