WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Irevi
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 58: You’ll Make Use of Me?
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“Aren? Why?”
“Why did you recommend Aren to me?”
“Because Aren’s kind, diligent, and strong. You two will probably work well together too.”
Cecilia became certain after hearing Halibal’s answer.
‘...This man has no idea Aren is a woman, does he?’
Of course, Cecilia herself had not been able to discern Aren’s gender from her appearance alone.
She had only realized it after holding Aren’s hand.
Only after piecing together every bit of information from Aren’s movements had she finally noticed.
Aren was even listed as male on the paperwork, and no one at the Academy seemed to think she was a woman.
Still, it was strange that Halibal, who had shared a room with her for a month, had not noticed.
Cecilia trusted Halibal.
As a person, as a man, and above all, as a swordsman.
He was certainly dull, but only when it came to relationships.
His senses were not so dull that he could not tell someone’s gender.
There was only one conclusion she could draw.
For some reason, Halibal firmly believed Aren was male, or thought Aren had to be male.
‘He must have a reason for thinking that.’
And as long as Halibal thought that way, a careless disclosure would not be the best choice.
Aren likely had her own circumstances, and it did not seem like she had romantic feelings for Halibal right now.
A pointless disclosure might only stir up trouble.
Then there probably had not been any of the “unpleasant business” Cecilia had been worried about.
Halibal had most likely recommended Aren out of pure goodwill.
For Cecilia’s sake.
“Have you had any... problems living with that wom... guy?”
“Problems? Not really...?”
Still, that was one thing, and this was another.
He was sharing a room with an unrelated woman?
For an entire month?
“Ah.”
“There was something, wasn’t there? I knew it!”
And he would keep doing so until the manor was completed?
“He does not really try to talk to me. He seems to get along well with everyone else, but he especially avoids me. If it’s okay, could you ask him why?”
It might have been different if it were her own room, but Cecilia could never tolerate such a thing.
“...Fine. Leave that to me.”
“Thanks. I’m counting on you.”
“Of course. I’ll thoroughly... uncover what that guy is really up to.”
“You don’t have to go that far.”
Once she had decided to draw her sword, she had no intention of sheathing it again.
‘Even better. This distance works out nicely.’
If someone interfered, she would cut them all down.
‘Now that Aren has become my Follower, I can adjust the distance between the two of them as much as I want.’
As she made up her mind, light returned to her previously dim eyes.
“Ah! If it’s okay, can I visit your room from time to time? Aren gave me permission, but you share that room too.”
“As often as you like. It’s not like I’m the owner of the room, and if Aren gave you permission, I have no reason to stop you.”
With her usual smile, Cecilia swung her sword without hesitation.
“Then I’ll do that.”
Having naturally secured permission to visit, the two continued chatting as they always did.
The topic soon turned to Mine.
“By the way, how is Mine? She looked incredibly nervous when you chose her.”
“She’ll gradually get better.”
“Are you planning to enter dungeons as a pair?”
Cecilia was secretly relieved that he had chosen Mine.
The Doll Dungeon raid had made one thing perfectly clear to her.
The magic contained within a dungeon.
A dungeon’s magic stirred the human heart and drew out inner desires.
So entering a dungeon alone with Halibal meant more chances for a new romantic rival to appear.
Yet if it was Mine, who had a dungeon phobia, it would be difficult for things to develop into the same kind of relationship Cecilia had with him.
At Cecilia’s question, Halibal scratched his cheek awkwardly.
“Not as a pair.”
“Hm? Follower classes are usually done in pairs.”
“I guess I’ve been labeled a troublemaker. The board assigned an upperclassman to me. It’s probably meant to be surveillance.”
“An upperclassman? Who?”
“Princess Alicia.”
“Ugh.”
Cecilia’s expression crumpled.
The Ren House was one of the two pillars of the imperial faction.
Since the family had many dealings with the imperial household, Cecilia had had plenty of opportunities to meet Alicia after returning to the main house.
To Cecilia, Princess Alicia was, how should she put it?
A beast black to the core.
If Cecilia stared into Alicia’s eyes for too long, she felt as if she would become a puppet moving as Alicia wished if she let her guard down for even a moment.
There was a reason she had earned the ominous alias Red Scales at such a young age.
‘So it’s come to this in the end.’
For some reason, Alicia had shown a deep interest in Halibal for years.
Come to think of it, she had persistently questioned Cecilia and Senia about Halibal before.
From Alicia’s attitude, Cecilia instinctively understood that she wanted to put a leash around Halibal’s neck.
“Be careful not to let the princess use you. People say she’s a monster of the imperial household.”
“A monster...”
Halibal fell into deep thought with a complicated expression.
When he looked like that, he was such a defenseless man.
‘Right. It can’t be helped. I have to protect him.’
With that resolve, Cecilia suddenly looked up at the sky.
Things she had never paid much attention to until now began surfacing in her mind.
Herself and Senia, Mine and Aren.
And Princess Alicia too.
‘Aren’t there... a few too many women around him?’
⁎⁎⁎
‘A monster, huh.’
Cecilia’s words lingered in my mind the entire way to my meeting with Alicia.
The hype around her was still as strong as ever.
‘From what I can tell, it’s just luck.’
Though it was not entirely hype either.
The Alicia from the original game was not incompetent.
She was exceptional, just somewhat careless in certain ways.
This Alicia had been betting on me for a very long time.
Far earlier than when she began investing in Aren in the original game.
And I had actually delivered results.
So perhaps I was the one who had reinforced the public’s assessment of her.
When I arrived at our meeting place, the café was completely dark despite it being broad daylight.
As I looked around, a spotlight turned on over a small stage in one corner of the café.
Dun dun.
Alicia appeared beneath the light, accompanied by grand classical music.
“I’ve been waiting.”
I found myself nodding.
She really did look like she had been waiting.
“Did you reserve the entire café?”
“This is the first time you and I have met in private, junior. Isn’t it natural to make this much of an effort?”
Alicia gave a light clap, and course after course began emerging from the back.
“I didn’t know your tastes, so I had the finest chefs I know prepare this. Eat as much as you like.”
This was what it meant to be careless.
It was not even dinnertime yet, and this was clearly a café.
Why were full courses suddenly being served?
“Thank you.”
Still, there was no reason to turn down delicious food.
As I immediately began eating, Alicia rested her chin on her hand and watched me with a meaningful gaze.
‘Ugh, this is uncomfortable. No wonder people misunderstand.’
A princess looking at me like that.
Anyone would think she had ulterior motives.
But I knew.
Lurking behind those sharp eyes was not some three-headed, six-armed monster, but a simple-minded cat.
That strangely dignified attitude was only a mask too.
Alicia was competing with the prince for the right of succession.
She had faced assassination attempts numerous times throughout the process, and people close to her had been eliminated or targeted.
So she chose not to create weaknesses.
She made every relationship she formed appear to others like a card she could discard at any time.
As a result, no one was left by her side with whom she could share her heart, but that was fine.
The moment she grew close to someone, they would become a new target.
The times she seemed careless in the original game were really closer to mishaps caused by trying to prepare perfectly.
When someone tried to take care of too many things, something was bound to slip through the cracks.
It just so happened that those things always led to major disasters.
“Do you know why I called you here separately, junior?”
“I’m not sure.”
The way she was treating me now was probably the same.
Every word and action had likely been thoroughly calculated.
After taking a sip of coffee, Alicia placed a Tier 2 Shard on the table.
“This is a Shard synthesized with something called the Alicia Machine yesterday.”
“...”
“Your naming sense isn’t very good. If it were me, I would’ve named it something like Shard Converter.”
Exactly.
“I heard about you from Elia Work. It seems I’ve received a great deal of help from you without even realizing it. Your reputation has been growing even where I could not see, so I called you here to thank you.”
“I only did what I had to do.”
“What you had to do...”
Alicia seemed to ponder for a moment, then looked steadily at me and spoke.
“Why do you go so far, junior? Do you wish to become the Empire’s sword, or do you have another purpose?”
“Nothing like that. As a citizen of the Empire, I simply can’t overlook threats to it.”
“As a citizen of the Empire, you say?”
She leaned forward.
“Then what do you believe the Emperor of the Empire should be doing right now?”
Her golden eyes flashed.
It was the kind of question that would make cold sweat run down the back of any ordinary noble.
No matter how one answered, it would be easy to find fault with it. What else could one expect when the person asking was the princess called Red Scales?
‘I know this question.’
Of course, it did not apply to me.
She probably thought it was a masterstroke, but I knew the answer.
‘The problem is that she asked Aren this question.’
Why was Alicia so obsessed with the right of succession? What did she truly desire?
The answer was simple.
‘To defeat the Evil God and bring peace to the Empire.’
It might not have looked that way to others, but she had always worked toward that ordinary and obvious goal.
The Empire had, in its own way, endured while leaving the Abyss of the Evil God unattended.
Soldiers at the front lines had worked themselves to death to hold back the demonic energy and were sometimes killed by monsters, but the heart of the Empire remained peaceful.
Within that false peace, the imperial household, nobles, and church had spent years obsessed only with lining their own pockets. Maintaining the status quo was enough for them.
But Alicia must have known this situation could never last forever.
She would need absolute power to sever the Evil God’s chains in her generation.
I knew what she truly felt, so the answer I would give was already decided.
“Builders and soldiers should be stationed around the Ronwood Mountains.”
“...Why?”
“To construct a Base Camp for raiding the third Abyss of the Evil God.”
The expression vanished from Alicia’s face.
“...Junior. Did I understand you correctly? It has not been long since we raided the second Abyss, and you already want to challenge the third?”
The Undead Dungeon was vast, so we had to prepare for a prolonged battle.
Including farming, it would be a little tight even with two months, according to the original game.
That was why a Base Camp, which would reduce unnecessary travel, had to be built as soon as possible.
Instead of answering, I nodded. Alicia stared blankly for a long while, then the corners of her mouth began to twitch.
“No. That is not what the Emperor should do right now.”
Intense passion filled her eyes.
Bang!!
She placed a small certificate on the table.
The certificate bore the emblem of Nevil Bank, along with my name and an amount with more zeroes than I could count.
“This is money that should have originally gone to you. I recovered it from the vermin who had been using it to line their own pockets.”
Just as I thought. It had definitely been skimmed off somewhere along the way.
Though the amount was still enormous, even considering that.
“Think of the rest as compensation for raiding the second Abyss. It is still far too little compared to your contribution.”
Alicia drew in a deep breath before continuing.
“What the Emperor must do now is grant fitting rewards to the hero who strives for the Empire. And... stand at the front lines with that hero and lead others.”
With a low “Kuhuhu,” she pulled out the fan at her waist.
“Anyone who cannot even do that is unfit to be Emperor. Isn’t that right?”
With the sound of cutting wind, red magical power rose like a haze from the fan and resonated with her Abyss Core.
“I, Alicia Cyrus, Princess of the Cyrus Empire, shall place the greatest bet of my life here and now.”
“...”
“Throughout these two months of special practicum, I promise to devote myself completely to raiding the third Abyss of the Evil God alongside Sir Halibal Velder, the Empire’s sword.”
“...Are you certain?”
“Kuhuhu.”
She snorted.
“Truthfully, I made my bet long ago. It’s too late to withdraw now.”
“Ah, yes.”
Then why bring it up?
“So you should prepare yourself as well, junior. From now on, I intend to make thorough use of you in dungeon raids.”
As soon as she finished speaking, the spotlight illuminating the stage began to narrow.
Alicia rose from her seat, then stepped onto the stage with a captivating smile in her eyes.
As darkness engulfed the café, her voice came from within it.
“By the way, junior. Do you know what an imperial consort is?”
When I gave no answer, her kuhuhu laughter lingered in the darkness like a shadow.
After confirming that her presence had completely disappeared, I leaned back in my chair and looked down at the table.
No, how could she turn off all the lights while I was eating?
A smile formed on my lips as I looked at the spot across from me where she had vanished.
‘Make use of me? That’s my line.’
When I first heard that Alicia would be joining the party, I was deeply surprised.
I had panicked and did not know what to do.
But it had not been a bad surprise.
I was just that happy.
I had not expected her to join this quickly.
Alicia’s magical power was insignificant compared to Cecilia’s or Luna’s.
Her attack power also fell far short of Aren’s, Ran’s, mine, or Senia’s.
Nor could she heal or tank like Mine or Eugene.
As Academy of the End’s greatest buffer, Alicia joined the party late in the original game and still secured her place as a heroine.
Footnotes:
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