Chapter 161: I can’t stand frustration! (5)
‘He’s compatible with me…?’
I was sitting on a luxurious couch in the center of the hall of the mansion, thinking back to the words of Deidros, the dragon that Zetto had introduced me to.
Connection… bonding… the words were hard to make out, but the gist of it was that I and the red dragon inside the orb were a good match.
I wanted to deny it since she’d been spouting off a bunch of crap ever since we met.
I waited patiently for Deidros.
His voice had long since stopped echoing in my head, so the conversation seemed to be going well.
But as I fidgeted with my hair, I felt uneasy.
I wondered if she’d been spewing out some strange sounds to Deidros as well.
Then it happened.
-BANG!!!
The sound of an angry slamming on a desk came from the room
“…Maybe he’s angry.”
Zetto reacted.
He scratched his head, thinking it was the first time he had ever seen Deidros lose his temper.
It was a strange thing for a dragon who rarely lost his temper. He wondered if the Orb had been talking nonsense.
Somehow, he could picture it.
“…Can you hear what they’re talking about?”
I asked, sneaking a look at Zetto.
If I overheard their conversation, I would be labeled as a strange woman.
He said they were just making small talk, but it wasn’t really small talk.
It wasn’t as if the dragon was spouting obscenities.
“I can hear them, but they’re talking in the language of dragons, so I don’t know what they’re talking about.”
“…I see.”
Good.
I’m glad, but I’m still worried that Deidros is angry and that the conversation is going to drag on for a while longer.
Zetto, who was sitting next to me, turned to me and spoke up.
“What kind of dragon was that?”
“What kind of dragon?”
“We already talked about it, I was just wondering what kind of dragon it was.”
“Uhm…”
I had to roll my eyes at the difficult question.
No, it wasn’t a hard question to answer, but I wasn’t sure how to describe that perverted lizard.
“Well, it was just… It was a dragon with a lot of lust…?”
“What kind of desire was it?”
“Nothing much, just plain… Yeah…”
Even as I said that, I wanted to sigh at my own excuse.
A dragon’s desires can’t be ordinary.
They must be on a different scale than humans.
“Ordinary… I don’t think the Red Dragon has a good heart, and she must have asked for something quite troubling.”
Zetto paraphrased my answer. It was correct.
“Troublesome, yes…”
“Like, world domination?”
Zetto jokes, his voice filled with laughter.
“…Like that?”
I couldn’t help but laugh.
I wanted to conquer Zetto, if not the world.
If world domination was about eating, then she wanted to ‘eat’ him.
‘Eat him…’
It was the kind of word that would make my father cringe.
“World domination,” Zetto muttered under his breath.
“Can I help you?”
He asked me, sounding quite serious.
“No…”
There’s no need to be so serious.
It’s just that I can’t tell him that his request is to “f*ck” Zetto.
Soon there was silence between him and me.
Deidros didn’t come back for a while.
I didn’t know much about his background, so I had no idea what they were talking about.
“…Why does Ms. Yuri want to become stronger?”
Zetto asked, breaking the silence.
Why do I want to be strong?
It was a question that made me think a lot.
When I was younger, I wanted to be strong because I had to be.
It was the honor of the Clementine family.
I wanted to be strong to fulfill people’s expectations.
Until I entered the Academy, I didn’t think much of it.
I thought I was strong enough, that I could just step on a solid foundation and let things go the way I thought they would.
But the world is a big place.
I didn’t expect to meet people my age who were stronger than me.
Not just strong enough to beat me once in a duel, but strong enough that I couldn’t even keep up with them without breaking out.
Not to mention Aizel, I’ve fought with her many times and seen the results.
Zetto was also much stronger than me.
To be precise, he grew so fast that he outgrew me.
“…I felt like I was falling behind.”
“Falling behind?”
“I felt desperate and thought I had to do something…I couldn’t go on like this…”
Because I have someone I want to protect more than anything and I don’t want him to push himself too hard.
I felt like I was going to lose him if I stayed still so I was anxious.
“…I don’t think it’s necessary to feel impatient.”
“I don’t think that’s coming from someone who’s been spewing blood from overexertion.”
“Haha…”
Zetto shrugged and scratched his head.
Come to think of it, he hadn’t been bleeding as much lately, and he felt much better.
Was the diet working?
Just as I was thinking that a trickle of blood dripped from Zetto’s mouth.
“…”
…Not exactly.
I spontaneously wiped the blood from the corner of Zetto’s mouth and opened my mouth.
“…Anyway, I’m grateful for the orb.”
“It was a delicious meal, and it energized me… The orb was something I didn’t really need anyway, so there’s no need to feel pressured.”
“…”
I smiled wryly, but then I had a question.
“…But why was it me? You have Aizel, and it’s not like you had to give me the orb in return for my cooking…I didn’t cook for you to receive something in return… It’s weird to give someone something as valuable as an orb for cooking for them in the first place, isn’t it?”
Looking back on it now, it was very strange.
I was grateful, but his behavior didn’t make sense.
“Why was it Yuri…?”
“Because I’m important to you? Does that mean Aizel isn’t important to you?”
“…Not exactly.”
Well, then.
Zetto is sweet and kind to everyone.
That’s not a bad thing, but for some time now, I’ve wanted him to be different.
But what if he was already different?
Aizel hadn’t gotten that from Zetto.
The question was answered by Zetto’s next words.
“Then let’s just say it was a gift for someone I like.”
“…What?”
“Isn’t it normal to give a gift to someone you like?”
“No, it is, but…”
I wonder what he’s talking about.
So he gave me the orb because he likes me?
“……”
My head went white and I couldn’t continue speaking.
The corners of Zetto’s mouth turned up but I couldn’t tell if he was being serious or joking.
No one else was speaking.
“…I apologize for the wait.”
From the other side, Deidros appeared, holding the orb.
“Uh, what happened?”
I scrambled up from the couch, trying to clear the awkward atmosphere that was hovering between Zetto and me.
“Well…She said she’d tell you her true name.”
It was good news, but there was a shadow over Deidros’ face.
Somehow, I thought I knew why.
I wondered if she was a dragon so insane that she would say such strange things, even to her own kind, and it seems that was exactly the case.
Finally, Deidros, who had taken a seat, managed to stifle a sigh and spoke up.
“Miss Yuri, are you sure you’re okay? Dragons are quite difficult to control. A true name isn’t a cure-all, and I could throw it in my storeroom…”
Deidros’ reaction to the conversation was polarized between before and after.
“…It’s okay, I can handle it if I can get stronger.”
I nodded, showing my enthusiasm.
She may be strange, but the fact remains that she’s a dragon and I need strength so there’s no other choice.
“Hmm… If that’s your opinion, I’m not going to argue with you, since she belongs to Ms. Yuri anyway.”
Deidros looked reluctant, but he tapped the orb and it glowed.
The orb then spoke.
[Hah… How are you, my master, I’ve missed you so much in the few minutes I’ve been away, I almost broke you.]
The orb yawns nonchalantly.
He almost broke it… I wondered if she had offended Deidros.
“May I speak with this child for a moment?”
I asked cautiously, wondering if it would seem odd to talk to an orb since the others wouldn’t be able to hear it.
“She’s not exactly a child, but I don’t mind.”
“I don’t mind either, although she’s not exactly a child.”
“Oh, it’s just that I don’t know what to call it yet…”
I can’t really use a pejorative like “kid”.
Maybe if it was Deidros, who seemed to have realized her true nature, but not in front of Zetto.
[You shall call me ‘Benno’]
Then the orb interrupted the conversation and gave her name.
Benno was a rather cute name, I thought.
“That’s… That’s not your real name, is it?”
I frowned, looking at Benno.
[Real name? With a few letters missing at the end]
“Don’t you have another name?”
[Calling me Benno would help with the bonding.]
“Well, if you say so…”
After a brief conversation, Deidros went on to explain the process of signing the contract.
To summarize, Deidros explained that after Benno offered to serve me, if I recited her true name and said I accepted, I would be able to use her powers.
She…was.
Benno was female.
Well, I’d guessed that from her voice and her weird targeting of Zetto…and Deidros confirmed it.
Anyway, the stronger the bond with Benno, the better I would be able to use her power.
“How do I make my bond stronger?”
“If you grant her requests or fulfill her desires, the bond will grow stronger. There is no such thing as a contract with a dragon in the first place. It’s just the way she’s stuck in the orb, but keep in mind that the stronger the bond, the more power you can wield, but you can’t escape the effects.”
Deidros assured me and I couldn’t help but worry since I had a clear picture in my head of what this perverted lizard wanted.