Side Story 1: Unaccustomed
Chapter 6
The “good information” that Pel had promised, after much prodding, turned out to be a small cafe with a nice view. I hadn’t expected him to have any real information, so I wasn’t disappointed.
“This is Gemin’s famous rose tea. How’s the aroma?”
“Hmm… It’s good. Quite sweet.”
My face was vaguely reflected in the clear tea.
‘Come to think of it, I promised to have tea with Woo yesterday.’
…But why was I having tea with this man?
The more I thought about Woo, the heavier the weight in my stomach became. I tried to erase his face from my mind, but I couldn’t think of anything to talk about with Pel either.
“Are you bored?”
“Huh?”
“You look bored.”
I had been swinging my legs back and forth, my head resting on my hand, but it had been an unconscious action, and I hadn’t realized how I was behaving until he pointed it out.
“Ah… Sorry.”
“Huh? No, it’s okay. I kind of forced you to come here. And you can speak informally.”
“Ah… Okay.”
He cupped his chin in his hands and hummed cheerfully. I chuckled, wondering why he was so happy, and his eyes sparkled.
“Haha, that’s the first time you’ve smiled while talking to me.”
His frivolous voice was devoid of any sincerity. I averted my gaze, feeling a shiver run down my spine at his intense stare.
“But… why didn’t you follow him?”
“Huh?”
“Woo, that guy. If you didn’t want to be with me, you could have just followed him.”
“….”
I took a sip of my tea, unable to answer his pointed question. Pel leaned back in his chair.
“Why are you being so cautious?”
He was rambling on as if he knew everything, even though we had just met. But he wasn’t wrong, so I felt even more annoyed.
I could have just followed Woo back to the inn if I didn’t want to be with Pel. He hadn’t told me not to follow him, and he certainly hadn’t forced me to go with Pel.
I had known that even as Woo was leaving. Then why had I let him go and ended up having this boring tea party?
“…I don’t know either.”
I stirred my tea with my spoon, instead of sighing.
I just couldn’t follow him. My legs wouldn’t move, and I didn’t want them to.
‘Ah, right, that woman, the red-haired woman. No, not Sue, the one here. Celine, was it? She was looking for you, Woo. You should probably go back to the inn.’
“…Celine…”
It was a name I had never heard before, but I knew who he was referring to.
‘So her name was Celine.’
She had been a mature woman. She had a similar aura to my aunt Elizabeth, with her red hair. Yesterday, she had just been a fleeting impression.
‘But why was she looking for Woo?’
Why had Woo just gone back to the inn without even looking back?
Why had they become close in the first place?
What was going on?
‘…I should have asked him in the morning.’
It was too late to regret it now.
“Are you concerned about this Celine woman?”
Pel asked, as if he had heard me mumble. I quickly licked my dry lips.
“Just… not really.”
“Hmm.”
It was half a lie and half the truth. It was my heart, but I didn’t even know my own heart.
I wasn’t curious about Celine herself. I just wanted to know how she had suddenly become close to Woo.
Just curiosity?
…Could she really dismiss it as such?
“But I’ve been curious since I first saw you. What’s your relationship with that guy, Woo?”
That question again.
I sighed, clutching the handle of my teacup.
“Why are you curious about that?”
“Why? Because I’m in love with you. It’s natural to be curious about the person you like, isn’t it?”
I couldn’t help but chuckle at his frivolous voice, his confession devoid of any sincerity. He grumbled, “I’m serious,” seeing my mocking reaction, so I just nodded vaguely.
“So what’s your relationship? You said you weren’t… lovers last time. Then are you friends? Or siblings? Master and servant?”
I had tried to change the subject, but Pel clung to it like a leech. I finally gave up and answered, looking down,
“He said he likes me.”
“Woo? Likes Sue?”
“Yes.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“Hmm…”
Pel stared at me intently, then took a sip of his tea. It was the first time he had touched his tea since we had entered the cafe.
“That’s strange…”
“…Yes, it is strange.”
I chuckled bitterly at his blunt words. Pel, startled, put his teacup down.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.”
I didn’t know why he was surprised by his own words, but his face, devoid of its usual playful expression, seemed sincere.
I chuckled, seeing his genuine expression for the first time.
“It’s okay, I don’t really understand either. Why he says he likes me.”
“….”
He didn’t answer, and I didn’t say anything more. An uncomfortable silence fell between us.
“Then do you hate Woo?”
Pel asked, clinking his empty teacup. I answered, my voice unsure,
“…I don’t think so.”
“Then do you like him?”
And then, an even more difficult question came.
“I don’t think… I do.”
I frowned and forced out an answer. But Pel’s interrogation didn’t stop, despite my increasingly uncertain voice.
“Then…”
“Aaaah! I don’t know!”
I slammed my hand on the table and stood up abruptly. I ignored his piercing gaze and gathered my belongings.
“I don’t know, so let’s get out of here.”
“I still have questions…”
“You said you would give me good information. If you don’t, I’m going to report you.”
“…Okay.”
He finally stood up, seemingly giving up, as I cut him off.
“But report me to whom?”
“To whom? To the king of this country, of course!”
I quickly left the table.
That man, Pel, was strange. He had a strange ability to drag people into his pace.
Even though I was in a strange state of mind, I didn’t want to end up having a ridiculous conversation about my love life with a man I had just met.
‘…Ah, tea leaves.’
I saw tea leaves being sold at the counter as I was about to leave the cafe.
‘Rose tea… It was sweet and delicious.’
Someone’s face suddenly flashed through my mind.
Should I buy it? Or not?
I stood there, frozen, unable to decide, and then Pel, who had followed me, started to annoy me again.
“You want to buy tea leaves? I’ll buy them for you.”
“…I have money.”
“But I want to buy them for you. I have a lot of money.”
“….”
I stared at him, his head tilted, his eyes smiling, as he lowered himself to my eye level.
Now that I looked at him closely, his eyes were sharp, but he was quite handsome. The clothes he was wearing looked loose, but they were new. And his way of speaking, the words he used… I thought I was starting to understand him after talking to him for a while.
“Are you… a lord or something?”
“What are you talking about?”
“You said you have a lot of money.”
“Hahaha, it’s not like only lords have a lot of money.”
“Then are you a merchant? …No, you use words that are too difficult for a merchant… Are you a noble after all? So that’s why Woo was acting strange.”
“I’m asking what you’re talking about.”
Pel tried to change the subject, but he couldn’t fool me.
Why hadn’t I noticed it before?
His clothes were too neat for an ordinary commoner, and he was using difficult words that commoners didn’t use.
‘He must be a lord of this land, or his son. That’s the only explanation.’
And Woo had already realized his status.
‘…That makes sense.’
Otherwise, he had just abandoned me.
I bit my lip.
‘…But even so, why would he have to appease Pel? Just because some rich guy was flirting with me, he ran away without a word?’
We had encountered local nobles a few times during our travels, but Woo had never treated them with special favor.
‘Then what about this guy? Why did Woo abandon me? Did he really think it would be helpful for me? …Really?’
My thoughts were back where they had started. And all I could do was sigh.
‘…Forget it, what’s the point of thinking about it?’
She didn’t even know why she had to understand him.
Woo Acrea had always kept his reasons for doing things a secret. It had been like that since they were in Lohn, it was a chronic disease. And her chronic disease was pretending not to know and just going along with it.
“Sue, so are you going to buy the tea leaves or not?”
“….”
***
I left the cafe with a paper bag of rose tea leaves. And I bought some snacks for Rem at the “good guild” that Pel had introduced me to.
…The problem was the “good guild” that Pel had introduced me to.
“Here it is, the good information, the good guild, I promised you.”
He spread his arms wide, as if he were presenting a grand prize, but I couldn’t bring myself to react.
“…You really are a scammer.”
“What? Why do you keep calling me a scammer? You’re hurting my feelings.”
I tried to calm my trembling hands.
It was ridiculous.
This was the same Magic Formula Theory Research Guild that Jean Emilia had founded, the guild that was on the verge of collapse.
“Sue, this is a really good guild.”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m sure it is.”
Was the guild’s name “Karina”? What did the name even matter?
I sighed and followed Pel inside the tent, feeling like it would be a waste to leave now that we were here.
The tent was, as expected, empty. It was late evening, so the guild members must have already left. The only person inside was a man sitting at the reception desk, yawning lazily.
“Haaaaahm… Huh? Gasp!”
As fate would have it, the man in the pointed hat was the same one who had given us Jean’s collection of papers at the park.
“Y-you’re…!”
The man in the pointed hat, seeing us at the entrance, gasped and rushed towards us.
He was so flustered that he knocked over the neatly arranged chairs, causing a commotion.
The man in the pointed hat, ignoring the pain in his shin, which had been hit by the leg of a chair, clasped his hands together, his face beaming with joy.
“Mr. Pel! You came!”