LIGHT NOVEL
LIGHT NOVEL
— Tisli’s perspective —
Aaagh… what in the world have I done…
Unrelenting dizziness, brutal nausea, and on top of it all, a fierce regret gnawed at me.
What was I regretting? Why, my conduct at yesterday’s class-reunion-turned-get-together…
In the end, I got drunk, and I…
I, to Yuinas…
what on earth did I do?!
As I writhed about on the bed, a wave of hangover sickness brought up an “Urgh…!”—and just then, a knock came at the door.
“Heeey, Tisli, you awake? Lunch is ready—what do you want to do?”
Apparently worried that I hadn’t shown myself even by noon, Alde had come, but…
there is no way I can face him!
After all, I, the super-genius beauty, retain every last memory no matter how drunk I get!
That’s me for you!
I can recall last night’s me as if it were someone else entirely!
When forgetting it all would be so much easier!!
To that me, Alde called again through the door.
“Tisli, are you feeling sick or something? I brought a water pitcher, so I’m coming in for a sec, all right?”
What…?!
I’m still in my pajamas, my hair’s a mess, I haven’t made myself presentable in the slightest—and he means to walk into a maiden’s room? What is going through that head of yours, as ever, Alde?!
I nearly manifested a blast spell on reflex, but caught myself at the last second.
This is Alde’s family home, so I have no authority to forbid entry in the first place—and were Yuinas to witness a charred-black Alde, that truly would make her hate me!
So, abandoning the idea of blowing Alde up (nearly to death), I curled into the bedding to hide myself.
“Hey, Tisli, what’s wrong? Are you feeling sick after all?”
Alde’s worried voice came through the bedding, but here I’d commit to pretending to be asleep.
“Tisli, you asleep?”
Whereupon the utterly tactless Alde suddenly patted the bedding, and my body flinched up before I could stop it…!
I thought my sleeping act was blown—but Alde didn’t press the point.
“I’ll leave the pitcher and a cup on the side table, okay?”
For Alde, he’s being… oddly considerate…
Ah… but…
If I don’t have to let him see me, then maybe, just a little, I’d like to talk…
So I reached out from inside the bedding with just one hand and caught Alde. Got his pant cuff, it seemed.
“Hm? What is it?”
But having caught Alde…
where do I even begin…
What I want to know is how Yuinas is doing, but… if she’s seething with rage, whatever shall I do…?!
As I wavered along those lines, Alde suddenly tugged at the bedding?!
“Heeey, Tisli, if you’re awake, at least show your face.”
No delicacy whatsoever, this Alde?!
Making a woman show herself fresh out of bed—there’s something wrong with him!
So I pinned the bedding down desperately with both arms and legs, until at last Alde, apparently giving up, made to leave the room, but…
Honestly! Why are you so utterly lacking in tact?!
Left with no choice, I grabbed the departing Alde’s pants again!
“…Hey, Tisli, what exactly are you trying to do?”
Isn’t it obvious?!
“I can’t tell a thing if you stay silent, can I?”
Sensing it even when I stay silent is what makes a fine attendant!
“Say something, come ooon?”
And yet you can’t understand a thing unless it’s spelled out for you from A to Z?!
I had a mountain of complaints I longed to hurl at him—but this once, it isn’t as though I’m entirely without fault, so I could say nothing!
So I kept gripping his pants as my way of signaling that he was not to leave the room.
My intent finally seemed to get through; with a sigh, Alde gave the sense of lowering himself onto the bedside stool.
I was breathing a sigh of relief, when—
“Opening, spotted!”
“Ah…!”
Alde stripped the bedding clean off me!
And then the queasiness of the hangover, the embarrassment of being seen fresh out of bed, and yesterday’s regret all jumbled together, and my eyes grew hot in spite of myself…?!
And to the frail, helpless me of that moment, Alde—
“………Huhh?”
—merely let out a sound of supreme idiocy!
Th-this man!
Hooonestly!
Is the very concept of consideration absent from his brain?!
What’s more!
He’s staring at me, rude as anything?!
So, embarrassment now winning out over anger, I clapped both hands over my face!
“P-please, don’t look at me…!”
“Eh, ah, eh? Ah… right…”
U-ugh…
With no bedding left to cover me, my just-out-of-bed state is on full display…!
And since this is Alde’s family home, I can’t even flee the room!
So I had no choice but to sit hunched and small on the bed… until at last Alde spoke.
“U-um… here…”
And he handed back the comforter he’d snatched from me.
Your consideration comes far too late!
For that matter, didn’t he just want to see me in a weakened state?!
Seething even as embarrassment still won out, I took the comforter in silence—
—and curled back into the bedding to hide myself once more.
“Heeey, Tisli? What in the world is going on with you? Should I just clear out?”
I rocked my body side to side to signal “Don’t leave!”
“Then what? Is there something you want to talk about?”
Of course there’s something to talk about—it’s why I’m keeping you in a maiden’s bedroom!
“Heeey, Tisli. I can’t tell anything if you stay quiet.”
Then sense it even when I’m quiet?!
“At least tell me why you were bawling—”
“I was not crying…!”
Told something so utterly beyond imagining, I argued back before I could stop myself! Thanks to the hangover, my voice came out drier than expected…!
But even as I suffered through a hangover, Alde knew no mercy!
“Your eyes were super teary just now.”
“My hangover is terrible, and my eyes were simply bloodshot!”
“Can’t you just fix that with magic?”
“Hangovers, for whatever reason, cannot be cured by magic!”
“Really?”
“One suffers a good half day at the very minimum! And I still feel sick today!!”
“Well, you did drink like crazy yesterday…”
“………!”
H-he keeps bluntly dredging up things I don’t even want to remember…!
My anger at the far-too-tactless Alde had finally let me forget last night, and now this!
What’s more, Alde just kept piling it on?!
“You yesterday? Honestly… you were a disaster, you know?”
“………?!”
My body flinched before I could stop it!
“You spent the whole time trading nonsense with Naavin.”
Flinch…!
“Mia watched the whole thing and was completely appalled.”
Flinch-flinch…!
“And as for Yuinas, you were straight-up pestering her nonstop.”
Flinch-flinch-flinch…!!
“After all that goodwill you’d earned with the farming, the spectacle you made more than canceled it out. Seriously, thank goodness yesterday was a small gathering.”
“Y-you…!!”
Past all endurance now, I poked just my face out of the bedding and attempted my utmost rebuttal!
“Comforting your master, encouraging her—are you incapable of that sort of consideration…?!”
“Comforting you won’t undo yesterday’s spectacle, though?”
“………?!!”
Already past the limit of embarrassment, I had no recourse but to hide my face in the bedding!
To think Alde was the kind of man to prey this hard on a person’s weakness—I’m truly disappointed in him!
This is surely harassment aimed at flawless, perfect me?!
What a small-minded man!
“I never knew you were such a cold human being!”
To my accusation, however, Alde’s voice was flat.
“I mean, come on. You’re the one who ignored my warning and drank yourself silly. There’s no defending that.”
“If you knew it would end like this, shouldn’t you have stopped me, by force if you had to?!”
“Ehh, no way. I might’ve gotten a hailstorm of offensive magic for my trouble.”
“You could slip right through that magic and stop me anyway, couldn’t you?! You of all people!”
“………So firing the magic is already a given?”
Shall I make it no joke at all and rain offensive magic down on this very spot for him?!
Just as I was beginning, in earnest, to consider “how to char Alde black without destroying the house and without Yuinas noticing…,” Alde spoke.
“If you want comforting, I’ll comfort you, sure. Everybody makes a fool of themselves once or twice before they get used to drinking. So don’t sweat it.”
Hm… the way he puts it, it seems Alde has his own banquet disgraces. Or rather, knowing Alde, those disgraces are surely not one or two. There are bound to be a hundred, two hundred!
So, to counterattack, I put on a meek act and poked just half my face out of the bedding.
“……What kind of drunken mess did you make, Alde?”
“Let’s see… in my case… wait. What exactly are you planning to do once you’ve wormed my drunken stories out of me?”
…Tch.
A man sharp in only the most inconvenient ways.
I tried to draw it out with an innocent face all the same, but Alde came back with “You’re absolutely going to throw them in my face?!” and we fell into an argument.
And in the end, I declared, “I’m never drinking again!”
Not declared in the heat of the moment—truly, from the bottom of my heart, I resolved to give up drinking…
(Continued in Part 2!)
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