Senior, I've Come to Visit - Chapter 22

The smell of freshly baked bread made my appetite rise. Soon, a feast of various dishes filled the entire table.

“….”

It felt incredibly luxurious.

Feeling something I couldn’t quite describe, I sat quietly and waited. Only when Nardi sat across from me and told me to eat did I pick up my spoon.

“…Thanks for the food.”

“Eat a lot, take your time.”

“Yeah.”

I scooped up a spoonful of hot stew, cooled it enough, and put it in my mouth. As I savored the delicious, nutrient-rich stew and swallowed, warm energy spread through my body. Feeling myself warm quickly, I tore the appetizing bread along the grain and dipped it into the stew. I also ate a piece of the sweetly seasoned grilled meat that Nardi placed on my plate.

“This is really good.”

“Haha, I saw you enjoying something similar at the restaurant last time, so I tried making it myself. You seem to like sweet flavors, Eloise.”

“Do I?”

Now that I thought about it, Iella often told me I had a childlike palate.

“Yes. You also seem to like sweet drinks.”

“…I don’t dislike them.”

I drank them sometimes during research because they gave me energy and helped me think.

Nardi let out a laugh, then his eyes sparkled.

“Talk about yourself, Eloise.”

“About me?”

“Yes, I want to hear about you.”

I’d never heard anyone say that before, so I was momentarily taken aback.

What on earth was I supposed to talk about?

I always had a lot on my mind, but I wasn’t the type to talk much.

“What should I talk about?”

“Hmm, when and how did your magic manifest?”

Ah….

A typical question wizards often asked each other. But one I didn’t particularly like.

“When I was seven. I used to go into the forest with my sister to gather herbs….”

“Yes.”

“Then we ran into a demonic beast deep in the woods. It attacked my sister, and she almost died… My magic awakened then, and I was able to kill it.”

“So your magic manifested in a moment of crisis.”

“Yeah. There are quite a few wizards who awaken that way.”

I tried to speak as casually as possible, as if the incident hadn’t been a big deal.

I didn’t want to talk about, or remember, how desperate and terrifying the situation had been.

“I’ve met your sister before, Eloise.”

“Really? When?” I asked in surprise.

“At the academy graduation ceremony. That was your sister, right?”

“Oh, yeah.”

Iella had come to congratulate me at my graduation. I remembered her beaming with joy. I, too, felt a rare sense of elation as I showed her the academy where I’d spent four years studying and living.

“You two looked alike, maybe because you’re sisters. And you seemed very close.”

“Yeah, we’re family. You were at the ceremony too, huh?”

Nardi was a year below me, so he must’ve attended as a junior.

“Of course I went. Do you live with your sister?”

“She got married and lives with her own family. She had a daughter too, Rubel. She’s really cute.”

I planned to visit once the breastfeeding experiment ended and my milk stopped. It was inconvenient to visit while I was still producing milk.

“If she’s your niece, she must be really cute. Does she resemble you?”

“Hmm… quite a bit.”

Iella and I looked similar, and Rubel resembled Iella more than her father.

“Ha, I really want to meet her someday. I can only imagine how cute she’d be.”

Nardi scrunched his face slightly, as if the thought alone made him melt.

Would there ever be a day when the two of them met?

Without answering, I naturally continued eating.

“Then after your magic manifested, how did you live until you entered the academy? I first saw you at the academy, so I thought your magic awakened later, but it awakened much earlier than I expected.”

“Nothing really changed after that. I kept living in the same village where I’d always lived, gathering herbs. I wanted to use magic to help earn money, but my sister said it could be dangerous and stopped me, so I lived hiding the fact that I was a wizard. I just bought books and studied magic on my own until I entered the academy.”

Even at a young age, if you could use magic, you could take on various small requests and earn money. I really wanted to do something, but Iella worried too much. She was afraid that if rumors spread, something bad might happen to me.

“A young girl from a commoner family with no parents, and a wizard on top of that, could become a target for bad adults.”

It wasn’t unheard of for people to be exploited or even kidnapped. I understood Iella’s fears and did as she wished.

“She sounds like a wonderful person. She genuinely cares about you.”

“Yeah.”

If I’d taken on requests, I could’ve escaped poverty much earlier, but Iella didn’t care about that at all. She always put my safety before anything else and tried to protect me.

Just like when we’d run into a demonic beast in the forest and she’d deliberately tried to lure it away to sacrifice herself.

“Eloise, you’re amazing too. Before entering the academy, you didn’t even have a teacher, you only studied alone, and yet you did so well at the academy.”

“It’s not really….”

“You were always first in every evaluation.”

“…I just wanted to get stronger.”

Before entering the academy, and after.

I never wanted to be helpless against a demonic beast again.

When I hid the fact that I was a wizard and studied alone, the first things I practiced were offensive and defensive magic. Because of that, when I gathered herbs, I could walk around with Iella much more safely than before.

“By the way, did you know me when we were at the academy?”

Feeling embarrassed by the praise, I changed the subject.

Nardi and I were in different years, and we weren’t acquainted. I only knew of him one-sidedly because he was the heir of House Gracian.

“Of course I knew you. Not just knew you, but I liked you even back then.”

My hand froze.

“…You liked me?”

“Yes, I’ve liked you all this time.”

Nardi’s face turned slightly red with embarrassment. I looked at him in confusion, trying to figure out if he was serious.

“You’re not joking?”

“Why would I joke? I wanted to have sex with you and date you because I genuinely like you. I wouldn’t do any of that with someone I don’t like.”

Then what does that make me….

“Do you want to sleep with me?”

“To the point I’d sell my soul to a devil.”

“Since it has already come to this, we should take the chance and date seriously. If that feels like too much pressure, you can think of it as starting lightly. Spend time together and slowly see how it feels.”

“….”

“I will often cook delicious food for you, and I will suck the milk that can make you sick every day. At night, in bed, I will… serve you passionately.”

Just like he said, I’d already noticed yesterday that he really wanted to have sex with me and date me. I’d vaguely realized he had feelings for me. But I’d assumed those feelings started after he entered the Magic Tower. I never imagined he’d liked me since the academy.

“No, I mean… you liked me since the academy?”

“Yes, my feelings started back then and never stopped. I guess my one-sided love lasted a long time.”

“…Why did you even like me?” I asked because I genuinely wanted to know.

It wasn’t false modesty, nor was it low self-esteem. I was simply, purely curious. We hadn’t even known each other back then, so I couldn’t understand how he had possibly liked me.

“Hmm… there are so many reasons I like you.”

“For example?”

“You’re as beautiful as an angel, and you’re smart and good at studying, and incredibly diligent. Those qualities were impressive and admirable, so you kept catching my eye.”

Nardi continued with a shy expression, “At the academy, you usually went around alone, and even that looked free and confident to me.”

“?”

I had never heard anyone dress up my lack of social life so nicely.

“I just wasn’t interested in making friends.”

“That’s exactly it. Most people care a lot about that kind of thing. Especially in the academy years, it tends to be even stronger.”

“Is that so….”