Monster no Goshujin-sama - Volume 13 - Chapter 22

Chapter 22: My Feelings for Her

I sank into the sofa in the living room of the space that’d been prepared for us.

“She sleeping?” I muttered, lowering my gaze.

Lobivia was curled up in my lap, breathing quietly. I placed my finger to her lips, and she nibbled around my finger’s second joint. Sitting on my opposite side, Lily peeked down at her.

“A lot did happen today,” she said.

“Yeah.”

Lobivia looked younger than she actually was. It was possible the stress was making her act more like a child. Thinking back on today’s meeting with the exploration team, I’d never even imagined they’d be carrying that kind of bomb with them. It’d been a pretty dangerous situation.

We were currently in a very delicate position. Having discord between us and the highly influential exploration team wouldn’t do us any favors. We were lucky that this hadn’t developed into a definitive fissure between us. Nakajima’s unexpectedly favorable reception and Lobivia’s levelheaded dispersal of the tension had saved us.

I brushed her red hair, and Lobivia’s expression softened a little. That was about the time Rose opened the door from the adjacent room.

“Master. Um, may I have a moment?”

“What’s up?” I asked, finding her hesitant tone somewhat odd.

Rose took a moment to ready herself, then cut to the chase.

“Um, it’s about Mana. She seems to be feeling very down.”

“Aah... The whole thing with Mitarai?” I asked.

That was, of course, the first thing that came to mind. Mitarai had done all that for Katou’s sake. Katou hadn’t done anything, so she wasn’t responsible for any of it, but it probably bothered her seeing that she’d been the cause for it.

“Yes, there’s that too,” Rose said, nodding. She seemed to be holding something in. “That obviously isn’t all, though...”

“What?”

“No, it’s nothing.”

Although I didn’t quite understand what she was getting at, her next words caught my attention more.

“In any case, I honestly cannot stand to see Mana so depressed. Could you say something to her, Master?”

“Me?”

“I believe that would be best.”

Would it be? I questioned that, but Katou’s best friend was the one telling me this. After our meeting with the exploration team, Katou had apologized to me about Mitarai, and I’d told her not to worry about it, but maybe that wasn’t enough.

“Got it. I’ll talk to her.”

◆ ◆ ◆

After dinner, Katou passed the time in a separate room with Rose. Rose came out, saying that she was getting some tea ready. I took the tea she prepared on a tray and went to their room.

“Here you go, Master.”

Rose opened the door for me, seeing that I had no empty hands. We then entered the room together—or so I thought, but Rose came to a stop.

“Well then, Master, please take care of the rest.”

By the time a question mark floated in my mind, the door had shut behind me. I’d been under the impression that Rose would be with me, but she’d meant for me to speak with Katou alone. I’d misunderstood.

Normally, I wouldn’t mind, but it was a little troubling in this instance. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to; it just felt awkward. As for the reason for that—I tried not to think about how pathetic it was and switched gears. I resolutely turned to look inside the room.

“Huh...?” I mumbled, befuddled. I couldn’t see Katou anywhere.

That question was immediately answered, though. After stepping inside, I found Katou sitting at a desk in a blind spot from the door. She was lying over it, making it even harder to spot her.

“Is she sleeping...?”

I could hear her quietly breathing. She’d apparently fallen asleep during the short time that Rose had left the room. Using her arms as a pillow, her face was turned my way. She looked so defenseless sleeping like that. When I looked at her, it even made me feel strangely guilty.

Katou always seemed precarious and fleeting. Whenever that came to the fore, my desire to protect her increased. That said, as I was now, I properly recognized that there was more to my feelings for her. Perhaps my wavering emotions caused my hands to shake, because the cups on top of the tray clinked loudly.

“Ah... Senpai.”

It turned out she wasn’t sleeping very deeply. Hearing the sound, Katou woke up right away.

“Sorry for waking you,” I said as she sat herself up. “Anyway, if you’re gonna sleep, you’re better off going to bed.”

“No. I just dozed off a little...”

At a glance, Katou’s expression looked the same as usual, but considering her personality, that didn’t put me at ease.

“Huh? Where’s Rose?” Katou asked a beat later, suddenly coming to a realization.

“Looks like she had something to do,” I said, indicating the tray in my hands. “She asked me to bring you this.”

She sank into thought for a bit. This was Katou we were talking about, so she might’ve noticed Rose’s consideration. Regardless, she didn’t point it out.

“Thank you. I’ll have some then,” Katou said, standing up and taking the tray from me. “I’ll pour it, so please take a seat.”

“Sure.”

So I said, but this room was small, and there were no chairs aside from the one Katou was using. I hesitated for a brief moment but sat down on the bed. Soon after, a pleasant scent tickled my nose. Katou walked over with two cups in hand.

“Here you go.”

“Thanks,” I said, accepting a cup.

“Excuse me.”

I thought she’d go back to her chair, but instead, Katou sat on the bed next to me. There wasn’t even space for a hand between us. She sat close enough for our arms to touch, almost as if she was going to lean against me.

The reason this weighed on my mind wasn’t because it was particularly unusual or anything. This closeness was very normal to us now. Without my even noticing, it had become a matter of course to the point that I hadn’t really been conscious of it. Thinking back to the days when I only ever looked at her with suspicion, it felt truly strange. However, as we were now, this was natural.

That said, that was only between us. How would a total stranger interpret this? I doubted they would see it as normal. More likely, they would view it as special. To us, our relationship was “special as trustworthy companions” and not “special as a man and woman.”

On the other hand, no one but our companions would know that. This close, we did look like a couple. Maybe that was how Mitarai saw it. In that case, I could understand why she’d acted that way. To a high school girl, seeing a guy who had relationships with multiple women trying to get closer to her friend would be cause to put a stop to it.

Nevertheless, it was all a misunderstanding. Yes. Just a misunderstanding... It was supposed to be. I tipped back my cup and wet my throat before speaking.

“I heard from Rose,” I said. “Is Mitarai still on your mind?”

“She is. I’d be lying if I said it didn’t bother me,” Katou said, nodding honestly, then her expression darkened quickly. “I thought it’d be nice if my relationship with Aoi could help you make a connection with the exploration team. The only links we have with them are Shimazu and Iino, after all.”

“Is that so...?”

“Yes. I was so stupid. In the end, it turned out the total opposite.”

If that was what she’d been planning, then that development must’ve been an even greater shock for her.

“The option of joining the exploration team vanished because of it,” Katou said with a dejected sigh. “Not only that, it might’ve worsened any relations we have with them.”

Just as Rose had said, Katou looked awfully depressed about it. It was, in fact, the right choice to come talk with her about it. I needed to follow up with her.

“Not really. I don’t mind,” I said.

“But Senpai...” Katou said, looking up at me.

“Either way, with that incident between Draconia and Okazaki, there’s no joining them.”

“That’s only in hindsight.”

“Besides, I was already thinking of refusing them.”

“You were?” Katou said, her breath catching slightly.

“Somehow or other, yeah. I was thinking it in the corner of my mind.”

That was why it hadn’t come as much of a shock that things had ended up this way. I simply thought to myself, “That went as expected.”

“Part of my meeting with the exploration team today was to make that point clear,” I added.

Naturally, throwing away the choice from the very beginning would narrow our possibilities. Plus, I’d also considered just maybe joining them, so I’d given it serious thought. Although, with the matter of Draconia and their perception of Lily, that possibility had gone out the window.

“Depending on how you look at it, you could say that we got to hear the exploration team’s thoughts thanks to Mitarai,” I said. “It really saved us to hear how they wanted to use Lily as a tool to revive the dead. So there’s nothing for you to worry about, Katou.”

“I see...”

She could tell I was being honest, so she nodded with relief. However, her gaze quickly fell to the cup in her hands. Her expression was sullen again. I wondered why that was. It looked like I’d gotten through to her, so why was she depressed again? Just maybe, something else was bothering her. Around the time I figured that out, Katou opened her mouth to speak.

“Um, Senpai. There’s one more thing I want to apologize for.”

“Apologize? To me?”

“Yes.”

She timidly raised her eyes from her cup to me, as if she was scared of my reaction.

“It’s about what I told Aoi,” she said. “About how, um...I don’t like you.”

My body stiffened.

“I don’t like Majima-senpai or anything. Your misunderstanding is causing trouble.”

Those words remained stuck deep in my ears.

“That’s not what I meant,” Katou said, choosing her words in a panic. “That makes it sound as if I hate you or something. But that’s not what I meant. It’s because Aoi was acting like that, so I just said it. I...respect you. You’re, like, important to me. I definitely don’t hate you.”

She spoke falteringly and had trouble saying what she wanted. Nevertheless, she needed to get this across to me. I could sense that.

At this stage, I was probably supposed to say, “It’s okay, I know,” right away. We’d confirmed the fact that we were precious companions to each other, not that I’d ever doubted that. Nevertheless, I found myself speechless for a moment. Now that she brought it up, I realized something. No, rather than realizing, maybe it was better to say that I could no longer turn a blind eye to it.

I knew this was because of what she’d said to Mitarai. Regardless, it really bothered me. It was stupid of me. Even I thought I was being dumb. Still, I didn’t think it was worthless.

Logic didn’t apply.

Reasoning didn’t help.

That was because I was aware of the feelings I had for the girl beside me. Before I knew it, those feelings had grown so much. It was impossible for me to repress them.

“Senpai...?”

Katou raised her voice curiously, sitting close enough to me that if I reached out, I could hug her. Her voice brushing against my ears, her body heat warming me from her being so close—her petite, delicate, and somewhat uncertain existence felt so dear to me.

This feeling was like a flame. Until now, I’d always drawn a line when it came to Katou, but in this moment, this spreading fire in my chest burned away everything I’d been holding back. Perhaps it was a little ironic that Mitarai had been the trigger for this, but I couldn’t stop at this point.

“Katou.”

I called her name and touched her shoulder. If she showed the slightest hint that she didn’t like it, I meant to pull my hand back right away. However, though she jolted and froze, she didn’t seem to hate it.

“S-Senpai...?”

Her cheeks flushed red in an instant, and her eyes moistened.

“Katou, I—”

Just as I was trying to speak the critical words, the terrifying sound of something breaking and boring through something obliterated this time we had to ourselves.

“Wha?!”

“Hyah?!”

Completely by reflex, I pulled Katou in close to me. The cup in her hand fell to the floor and shattered.

“What was that?!”

I kept alert to my surroundings while keeping Katou in my arms. The sound had come from a nearby room. I didn’t know what was going on. All I knew was that the sound was too loud and intense for it to be someone accidentally dropping something or knocking something over. This was an emergency—the kind for which I had to rendezvous with Lily and the others right away. Regrettably, by the time that thought came to mind, it was already too late.

“Wh-Whoa?!”

In the next second, I sensed a thick concentration of mana. By that time, my body was assaulted by a bizarre sensation.

“What...?!”

It felt like I was floating, then slipping, then the world changed. I remembered this feeling.

“This is Fairy—”

In a flash, those words were left far behind with nobody able to do anything about it.

We hadn’t been careless, and we hadn’t skimped on our escort detail, yet this abnormal event defied everything. It had happened so suddenly that I couldn’t deal with it properly. For that reason, I had only one option left to me. I held Katou tight to my chest, making sure not to let go.