10. Degenerate Creep (7)
It was the weekend after the sports day, so the school deliberately chose Friday to give the students some rest before studying again. They also understood that the students wouldn't be able to study anyway with the tension and tiredness.
As usual, Lucian woke up at 4 again and continued his new routine. It was as he expected or hypothesized—it's only slight, but he did feel the effect. He could run faster and longer now. His stamina wouldn't lose to a 10-year-old kid; even his speed wouldn't lose despite being shorter.
He never competed, so he never knew though.
"So, what are you doing?" Lucian spoke to the usual girl he found in the morning.
'Seriously, what is she doing here?'
"Nothing," the girl replied. It was also the same as yesterday. "What are you doing?" Then she also asked back.
And of course, there was only one answer he had. "Nothing," Lucian replied with her own medicine.
He had expected the same silence as yesterday; however… "Liar!" Liselotte suddenly snapped with an accusing tone.
"Liar?" He was dumbfounded by the sudden outburst.
"You liar! I clearly saw you running just now, and you said you've done nothing. A liar!" Then she flashed a smug smile as if she had won something.
'...This brat does have a screw loose in her head.' He was speechless both inside and out.
Finally, after a few breaths, he responded professionally.
"Do you know there's a phrase called 'a pot calling the kettle black'?" he responded on the same level. Lucian… a petty man.
"What?! I'm not a liar!" Liselotte snapped back. 'How dare you call me a liar?!' She wouldn't accept such an insult.
'Oh… she understood that. Not bad,' he honestly praised. 'Except for Kate, who started to act with more complicated thoughts than her peers because of my and Aunt Layla's actions, this is the first time I've seen someone who did the same.'
"Yes, you are," he wouldn't back down.
"No, I'm not," she denied.
"I know what you've done, you can't fool me," he continued, but… '...What am I doing with a child?' Lucian took mental damage from the inside. 'I seriously think I've been influenced by this child's body and a child's way of acting.' He remembered he had heard about it somewhere before.
The body is like a vessel of water, while the mind is the water. And just like water in a jar, the mind adapts to the body—a good, healthy body brings a good, healthy mind.
'Isn't that the way to avoid depression…'
"…" Like a hidden thief coincidentally being called a thief, Liselotte staggered, her face showing an 'I've been found out' expression. "Hu, hmh! What do you know? I'm not a liar," she said, acting tough with rolling eyes and cold sweat.
'Well, a kid, at this time, alone, every day… even a stupid person would find it strange.'
"Confess yourself, you can't fool me."
"Seriously, what am I doing with my life?" He really started to question his life choices, cornering a kid like that.
"Grr! I said, I'm not a liar!" She started to lose patience, unable to control her expression any longer.
'Yeah, not worth it,' he then just spat some bullshit to end this meaningless pettiness. "Yeah, yeah, I know you've been sneaking glances, peeping at me." Then she would deny what he said, realizing he had just been spouting bullshit from the start—or so Lucian planned to end this.
"Ugh!" Liselotte seemed like she had just taken an arrow to her heart. "How did you…"
'How did you know… I'm using… to conceal myself.'
"Kuh, did I even fail this… something like this?" The girl started to mutter in despair, her expression dropping to a ghostly pale, just like how Lucian saw her the first time.
Then… as if something snapped, the last defense was broken and torn apart. It started with a single drop, then… continued endlessly.
"Gh… sob… uu…" Both of her hands, on top of her lap, gripped tightly as if they were almost bleeding.
"W-wait, don't cry, okay? It's all my fault," Lucian tried to recover the situation. However, he had never played with a child before; he didn't know that the more you tried to cheer a crying child, the more the child would cry.
"Uuuaaa!" she cried like a child her age.
****
'I think I could call myself Tear Bringer, or Cry Instigator, or even a little Heartbreaker at this point,' Lucian thought meaninglessly on the inside. Meanwhile, on the outside:
"Thy—The great beauty, Miss Liselotte, unfathomably wise, unrivaled in honesty, unparalleled in bravery, the peerless Miss Liselotte, the hope of our humanity, our hero who will pave the way to fight evil with her holy kick—please find it in your heart, full of magnanimous compassion, to forgive this humble self and ward away your wrath. Please, thou greatest beauty in this whole universe, Miss Liselotte, please forgive this humble self," spouting some nonsense like always.
"Pfft, ahahaha!" The girl laughed nonstop as if nothing had happened.
"What the heck are you saying? Unfathomable? Peerless? Magnanimous compassion? Puhahaha!"
"Ahh, I can't stop laughing. Hero? With a holy kick?! Kyahaha!"
"Aaaah, my stomach hurts, I can't stop… uu hahaha!"
He could only watch with an awkward face from the sideline.
"Hu… hu… at last… phew, that's a good laugh. But still, how do you know so many difficult words?" Liselotte continued. "How interesting. I felt it from the first time we met—you're like me, matured beyond our age."
'That's my line!' He didn't want to make another mistake, so he held it in.
"That's what I thought too," he replied casually.
"But you're still a child to say something like that to me," she criticized, pointing out how childish Lucian was.
'Guh…'
"Do you still remember your conduct in the beginning?" Lucian countered.
"Ugh," she made a pained sound, just like him.
"Then what's with the breakdown just now?" He didn't just counter but doubled the attack.
"Ughh!" It was like another arrow shot into her heart.
"...."
"...."
"Why don't we stop hurting each other?" he suggested, rather than playing on thin ice. She agreed.
"Un, let's stop it here."
"By the way, how do you know I was peep—looking at you when you're jogging?" She believed she had hidden herself well; she had to know her shortcomings to fix them.
"Huh?" He was confused. "I didn't know about that."
"B-but! You were clearly saying that with confidence just now!" She had a face of horror, almost discovering the truth.
"Nah, I'm just spouting nonsense when you confirmed it yourself," he shook his head, with a slight sneer at her stupidity.
"U."
"U?" He tilted his head.
"Uaaahh, so embarrassing?!" She bent down and tried to hide her face with her hair and body.
"Haha, you don't have to care about it. After all, you did something more embarrassing—bawling your eyes out." He tried to cheer her up while trying to hold back his laugh. It was actually a finishing move.
"Ack, Ahhhh!!!" She suddenly stood and ran in circles like a headless chicken.
'Even with a screw loose, she's quite comedic,' Lucian corrected his impression of her.
"Well then, see you later," he said his goodbye, ignoring her strange conduct. But she suddenly stopped.
"Wait," she called. "You're leaving?" It was as if she was trying to say something hard to speak, wanted to say it but was afraid.
"I'll stay for a while, I still have time," he conceded.
"Really?" She looked so delighted. She acted mature, but in the end, was still a child.
'I couldn't leave after seeing that face,' he muttered softly to himself. Then he stayed till the last minute.
"See you again tomorrow, Liselotte."
"Un, see you again tomorrow, Lucian." They said their goodbyes with a wave and disappeared.