Chapter 88
A mistake?
Eki froze and shot a glare at her master. Cassius clamped his mouth shut as if he had also been struck by guilt and hurriedly looked elsewhere.
“Hmm. Then what’s with the chain? Why are you two stuck together like that?”
【 That’s because Cassius keeps running away from Eki. Eki wants to stay with Cassius, but he keeps running so I made it so he cannuhh w-wun awaaay! 】
“Venta, how about staying quiet for a moment? We promised not to talk about other people’s inner thoughts, remember?”
【 I only promised Cassius! 】
This unfilial fairy. If it was born from her, shouldn’t it listen to her the best?
“Why do you only listen to Master?”
【 Because Eki listens best to Cassius. So I’m going to do that too. 】
“…Ha.”
Eki let out a hollow laugh in disbelief. Then, seeing Cassius stifle a small chuckle, she jabbed his side repeatedly with her elbow.
“Master, how could you laugh.”
“I didn’t laugh.”
“I saw it clearly.”
“I said I didn’t. And stop poking me.”
Ikelid’s eyes grew even more sly as he watched the bickering master and disciple. Eki quickly stepped away from Cassius, pretending to be composed before she showed anything more embarrassing.
“Shall we get to the main point now? The reason I came to Cassius’s tower is because I sensed fairy magic. It woke me up from a lovely deep sleep.”
It seemed Venta’s chain magic had allowed Ikelid to sense the fairy’s existence.
“But Cassius, how much does Miss Eki know about you?”
“…About what exactly?”
“With that chain, you can’t send her outside, can you? How much are we supposed to talk about in front of her?”
Eki tilted her head.
She knew Cassius was a dragon. Then she already knew his secret, didn’t she? Was there really another secret she wasn’t supposed to hear?
Narrowing her eyes at her master, she noticed him avoiding her gaze with an oddly sunken expression. Cassius spoke calmly.
“She knows most of it. About why we need to find fairies and that the dimensional barrier isn’t complete.”
“Only up to that?”
“…Yes.”
“What do you mean only up to that. Is there another secret?”
Cassius didn’t answer. But Eki knew. His silence was essentially a yes.
‘Wait, there really was another secret?’
She’d spent seven years learning under Cassius and prided herself on knowing him better than anyone else, but maybe that had all been her own delusion. She had only recently learned he was a dragon, after all…
Back then, that revelation alone had been overwhelming, yet now she realized there were still more secrets left. Eki’s tone cooled slightly.
And on top of that, her master had been distancing himself from her. Ever since meeting Venta, his complexion had worsened and his behavior had been strange.
Her instincts, built up from a lifetime of interpreting people and patterns, told her this. Maybe Cassius avoiding her wasn’t just the conscience of a teacher. There was certainly another reason tied to the fairy.
“Anyway, it’s good news. You won’t have to study that dreadful summoning circle anymore.”
“Right.”
“From now on, with this fairy born from Miss Eki as the start, many more fairies will appear. Then the dimensional barrier will naturally heal. It’ll take about ten years, I suppose?”
“Ten years?”
“Haha. Ten years isn’t a long time, Miss Eki.”
Ikelid leaned forward with his elbows on his knees and whispered conspiratorially.
“Once you learn lifespan extension magic someday, you’ll understand. How quickly each day slips by. How fleeting the years are.”
Her time already slipped by quickly. By the time she finished the association’s orders for magic circles and potions, it would suddenly be night. And she had been a salaried worker who often worked past dawn. Eki shut her mouth. She wasn’t foolish enough to complain about her workload to the highest executive of a client.
“Then in ten years, Cassius, you’ll be able to leave this tower too, right?”
At that, Eki’s eyes rounded.
“What do you mean?”
“Ikelid.”
Cassius, for once flustered, sharply warned him, but Ikelid simply tilted his head.
“Miss Eki’s been living with you for quite a while. Doesn’t she know? That you can’t leave the tower—”
“Shut it.”
Cassius growled and glanced at Eki. She was staring with her mouth hanging open at a truth she had never even imagined.
“Y… You can’t leave?”
“Ah, so you really didn’t know.”
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