FVN Chapter 647: Episode 647
Chapter 647: Episode 647
"There’s nothing between us," Lethe said coolly, plucking a grape from the bunch.
"Hehe! That’s what they all say," Eshe chirped.
"And what about you?" Lethe countered. "How do you feel about Simon? Are you just trying to sound me out because you like him?"
Eshe smiled candidly. "We’re just friends! Oh, of course, if he made a big fuss and confessed his undying love for me, I might consider it."
"You might?"
She shook her head. "The competition within our department is just too fierce. I don’t want to get on bad terms with my friends, and I’m not confident I could win him over anyway."
Lethe closed her eyes and took a sip of wine. "Competition... you mean people like Lorraine or Serne?"
"Oh, you already know about them?"
"I’ve met them. Simon introduced us." As if on cue, they saw Serne approaching Simon. Lethe watched with a blank expression.
"Then how about this question?" Eshe asked, her eyes twinkling as she watched the same scene unfold. "Outsiders have to leave the island soon, right?"
"Yes."
"So, are you worried about leaving your childhood friend behind?"
"..." Lethe thoughtfully popped another grape into her mouth. After a moment, she let out a small sigh, a conceding smile playing on her lips. "Let’s just say I’m a little worried."
"I knew it!" Eshe’s eyes sparkled as she raised her glass. Lethe met it with her own. "You just got here, so you don’t know much, do you? Want me to tell you about the Simon I’ve gotten to know this semester?"
For the first time since their conversation began, a genuine spark of life entered Lethe’s eyes. "That sounds interesting! Do you have any embarrassing stories?"
"Of course!"
---
Despite the rare party, Simon was having a hectic time. He was completely drained from meeting and greeting people from every corner of the social ladder. ’Being the Student Council President is exhausting.’ Some people had come to the Summoning Department’s party specifically to see him, so he couldn’t just hide away.
During a brief lull, he sank onto a chair, his face etched with fatigue.
"Hey! My bestie!" A familiar voice rang out as an arm was suddenly slung around his neck.
"Ah, Dick!"
"Haha, you okay? You look dead on your feet." Dick handed him a glass filled with ice. Simon gratefully took it and downed the contents in one go.
"I feel alive again. Thanks."
"Don’t mention it."
"Simon!"
"We’re here too!"
From a distance, Dick’s younger brothers, Bill and Al, were waving. Each of them was already chatting up a girl. ’Some things just run in the family,’ Simon thought, waving back.
"So, Dick, what are you doing here? What about the Venomology Department party?"
"The atmosphere was a total downer, so I bailed and came here," Dick said with a chuckle, pulling a nearby chair over and plopping down. "Everyone was hoping for at least second place, but we ended up in fourth. The third-years, especially Senior Balak, are in a foul mood. It’s supposed to be a party, but everyone’s just nervously watching them."
"I can imagine."
"Ah, more importantly!" Dick’s eyes suddenly gleamed. "I heard from Meirin and Kamibarez! A childhood friend from your hometown came to visit? Her name is Lena?"
"That’s right."
"That must be her, right?" Dick pointed to a girl with ash-colored hair sitting on a nearby bench. She and Eshe seemed to have hit it off, clinking wine glasses and chatting excitedly. "Hey, man, don’t you remember? Last time, you said ’Elizabeth Waffer’ was also a friend from your hometown of Leshill."
"Ah, that...!"
Something had felt off, and now he knew why. He’d already used that excuse. The name Elizabeth Waffer had been the alias for Erzebet’s human disguise.
"Another beautiful childhood friend after Elizabeth! Wow, is Leshill some kind of town populated only by gorgeous people? I’m definitely visiting during the break, for real!"
"Calm down, Dick."
"Spill it!" Dick suddenly lowered his voice. "Where is Elizabeth Waffer? She’s not on the second-year roster. I thought maybe she got expelled, so I scanned last year’s admission list, but she’s not there either! I even asked the kids from Class E, and they said they’d never even heard of a girl with pink hair!"
Simon’s mind raced. He couldn’t believe Dick had cornered him like this.
"So, are you going to introduce me or not?" Dick asked, a wicked grin spreading across his face.
Sweating, Simon stammered, "There are... some complicated circumstances!"
"Yeah, yeah, I’m sure. It’s probably related to Kajan again, right? You two were inseparable during the Dark Festival." It was a relief that Dick had jumped to that conclusion. As his former roommate, Dick knew Kajan was a secret agent.
"And, um, the reason I can’t introduce you is..."
"The reason is?"
"Elizabeth thinks you’re... um..."
Dick held up a hand, cutting him off. Like a tragic hero in a play, he shook his head and covered his face. "Sob’, it was brief, but I loved her!"
"..." Simon just smiled wryly and handed his wine glass to Dick, who chugged it and slammed the empty glass down, his face flushed.
"Kya-ha."
Dick stared blankly toward Lethe for a moment, then hung his head. "I have a favor to ask, Simon!"
"I have a bad feeling about this, but go on."
He snapped his head up, eyes blazing. "Take me to Leshill! The city of beautiful men and women! My true love must be there!"
Simon sighed and pulled Dick to his feet as if slinging an arm around his shoulder. He glanced over and shouted, "Bill! Al! Your brother is very drunk!"
"Ugh, seriously! We told him not to drink so much!"
"Why can students even drink at this school?"
Bill and Al came over, grumbling, as Dick began to thrash about. "I’m not drunk! Do I really look drunk to you? Huh?"
"Bro!"
"No, let go! Do I really, ’really’ look drunk?!"
"I’m telling you, you’re drunk."
"You! What’s your basis for thinking I’m drunk?"
Simon gestured silently. A suit of Bone Armor instantly encased Dick’s body and launched him into the air, flying swiftly toward the dormitory.
"I’m not druuuunk!" he wailed, his heartbroken cries echoing pitifully in the night.
---
"Uh, so let me get this straight," Lethe said, trying to process everything with a dazed expression. "He rescued a kidnapped freshman on the day of the entrance ceremony, taught a lesson to the third-years who were hazing people, won every single match in an exchange event with another school, defeated a professional assassin during a performance evaluation, and cut down ten thousand monsters with a single undead called a Dullahan?"
"Yep! Yep!" Eshe confirmed enthusiastically.
Lethe’s expression soured as she propped her chin on her hand. "You’re just a Simon admirer, aren’t you? Instead of embarrassing stories, you’ve told me nothing but legends."
"It just came out that way," Eshe said with an awkward laugh. "But it’s all true! And that’s just what he’s done in his second year. I heard he was incredible as a first-year, but I didn’t know him back then."
"..." Lethe remained silent, her chin still in her hand. She’d always known Simon was popular, but now she understood why. He was leaving a legendary trail in his wake.
"Goodness," she muttered with a hollow laugh. "He’s certainly built up quite an image. Everyone would be shocked if they knew the real him."
"The real him? What’s he really like?" Eshe asked, her eyes sparkling with curiosity.
"Are you curious?"
"I am!"
"The truth is, Simon is..." Lethe trailed off, lost in thought. A dozen different images of Simon’s gentle smile flashed through her mind. "Simon is..."
She remembered him shielding her from harm, holding her hand, their eyes meeting in the cramped carriage, him sitting silently beside her covered in wounds, him wielding the scythe of divinity, him awakening the Saintess’s power, and him standing proudly before the false goddess.
’—I am the proof that that goddess is a fake, Lethe.’
After biting her lip in concentration, a resigned smile finally touched her lips. "Honestly, I tried my best to think of something bad, but nothing comes to mind."
"Right? Right?" Eshe laughed in agreement. "I guess that’s just the kind of person he is."
Just then, Simon, having finished his greetings and sent the drunken Dick on his way, started walking toward them. Eshe raised her half-empty wine glass. "It was a brief meeting, but we’re friends, right?"
Friends. The irony of a Saintess befriending a necromancer was not lost on Lethe. She was wearing a perception-disrupting artifact anyway; in a few days, Eshe wouldn’t even remember her face clearly. She could just walk away. But then...
’—Instead of worrying about the future, let’s be more faithful to the present.’
On a whim, Lethe smiled and raised her own glass.
With a soft clink, they touched their glasses and drained the last sip. Lethe chuckled. "You know, you really remind me of my roommate."
"Your roommate?" Eshe’s eyes widened before she giggled. "I don’t know who she is, but I’m sure she’s a beautiful young lady of culture and grace, right?"
Lethe burst out laughing. "You’re exactly alike."
"Lethe."
Simon had arrived. With a meaningful smile and a nod at Simon, Eshe excused herself.
"Sorry," Lethe said. "We don’t have much time left, and you were so busy."
"It’s fine."
The temperature had dropped sharply, so they decided to stop by Simon’s dorm to grab their robes before leaving. Simon took the stairs, while Lethe, with familiar ease, scaled the outer wall and slipped in through the window.
"Alright, let’s go," Simon said, pulling a robe on over his uniform. But then...
’Peep! Peeep!’
A strange bird was perched on his bed.
"What’s this?"
"I think it flew in when I opened the window earlier," Lethe said, seeming uninterested as she checked her reflection in the mirror.
The bird hopped over and stared intently at Simon. A small letter was tied to its leg.
"Looks like some kind of carrier bird." Simon carefully untied the letter. He examined the name on the envelope. "Who’s it from?"
Lethe, who had been fixing her hair, saw the letter and her face instantly turned beet red. ’Don’t tell me...!’
Her eyes darted around in a panic. Just as Simon was about to break the seal...
"Don’t look!" she shrieked, lunging forward and snatching the letter from his hands.
"What’s wrong?"
"That’s a letter I sent!" She shoved the envelope in his face. "See! It is, right?" She then clutched it fiercely to her chest.
Dumbfounded, Simon replied, "It is, but... since you sent it to me, isn’t it okay for me to read it?"
"No!" she screamed, her face a furious shade of crimson. "I came here in person and said everything I needed to! There’s no point in reading it now! L-let’s go, quickly!"
"...Alright, I get it." Simon turned his back without another word. As Lethe breathed an internal sigh of relief, Simon secretly flicked his fingertips. The letter she was clutching was plucked from her grasp.
"!"
Catching the letter in a wisp of Jet-Black, Simon grinned playfully. "Did you really think I’d give up that easily?"
"Hey!!" Lethe shouted, lunging for him.
Simon quickly held the letter high above his head. "You wrote it for me to read anyway, right?"
"Give it baaaaack!" she wailed, stretching on her tiptoes, her fingers just barely brushing the paper. She pushed forward, causing Simon to lose his footing.
They tumbled to the floor with a dull thud in a tangled heap. Lethe managed to wrench the letter from his grasp, her face so red it looked like it might burst.
"You’re so dead...!"
’Knock, knock, knock, knock.’
A sharp rap echoed from the door. They both froze.
"Student Simon, Student Toto, I believe I just heard a female student’s voice. Could you please open the door?"
Hearing those words, Simon’s face turned ashen. It was the voice of the dorm supervisor.