Chapter 74

“We’re seeing each other seriously.”

“Yeah?”

Thankfully, Commander Dezeb Avganis’s suspicion shifted back to Sanche Vermilion, who was getting jabbed in the forehead with the corner of a phone aboard the shuttle.

“Why are they sitting so close together?”

Dezeb frowned and slipped a fresh cigarette between his lips.

Well, her reach is short. Of course she has to get that close. Erabelle’s got short arms to match that not-exactly-pretty face.

Afraid his thoughts might somehow show on his face, Aries Cider lowered his head.

“Clean this up. Quickly.”

Already on edge, Dezeb began finding fault with everything.

The cleanup team was already working, but at his words they scrubbed even harder. Dezeb kept kicking one of the corpses toward a body bag, grumbling under his breath.

“Do these things think I’m going to treat them like actual humans just because they’re wearing human skin?”

He cursed the Sanctuary priests for sending cannon fodder and daring to call it a fighting force, but his eyes never left the screen.

At least one of the Vermilions had come running immediately. Cutting off the Count’s communications had been worth the effort.

Aries had been telling himself that, one way or another, this mess would finally be settled.

But now doubt was beginning to creep in.

He honestly wasn’t sure whether it was safe to relax yet.

***

“...”

Sanche sat there with a vacant expression, struggling to make sense of the situation.

They were inside one of the hotel restaurants.

Lieutenant Erabelle Vermilion’s direct superior, the commander of the 41st Division, was a man of breathtaking beauty.

If Sanche kept staring at him much longer, he felt as though he might forget his own orientation, start spouting indecent compliments, and confess on the spot.

Which was why he could not begin to understand why this impossibly beautiful man was serving his sister’s food.

“Have some of this too.”

And why, for that matter, Lieutenant Erabelle Vermilion was accepting it as though it were the most natural thing in the world.

The cognitive dissonance was severe.

“You must be tired from the trip.”

“Pardon? Ah, no.”

Sanche had been staring blankly when the commander suddenly addressed him.

The man’s warm baritone brushed pleasantly against his ears, and Sanche found himself stammering before he could stop it.

“The travel channels were relatively stable, so it was an easy trip.”

Lately, the transit channels had become increasingly unstable. People said it was an aftereffect of last year’s Wave, though even the experts could not agree on the exact cause.

“That’s good.”

Dezeb replied gently.

Then he refilled Erabelle’s empty glass with water and placed more salad on her plate.

There are waiters standing right here with perfectly functional hands...

What am I even looking at?

“I heard you graduated last year.”

“Y-yes. I did...”

“Then I suppose you’re busy with your heir training now.”

“Y-yes. I’m taking it step by step, slowly... Um, Commander, why... why are you...”

Waiting on my sister?

Sanche could no longer suppress his curiosity.

“Oh. If I don’t look after her myself, she eats whatever she feels like and calls it a meal. Apparently I’m the only one who worries about it.”

As Erabelle choked and started coughing, Dezeb casually slid her water glass closer.

“And you don’t have to be so formal with me. We’ll be family soon.”

Family soon?

Sanche stared blankly.

“Am I enlisting or something?”

He leaned toward his sister and whispered the question.

Then his eyes met the commander’s.

Sanche flinched.

His entire body locked up.

For a split second, he felt like a mouse frozen beneath the gaze of a snake. His mind went completely blank.

And then, as though it had all been some misunderstanding, Dezeb smiled at him gently again.

Sanche’s thoughts turned hazy.

“If we’re finished, we should head home.”

Erabelle, who had eaten unusually quickly, spoke as though she desperately needed fresh air.

“Sure.”

Dezeb answered pleasantly and rose from his seat.

Several attendants, apparently having already taken care of the bill, were waiting near the elevators.

For some reason, the entire corridor seemed unusually quiet.

“How was the meal?”

Compared with the attendants’ cold, expressionless faces, Dezeb’s gentle manner seemed almost unnaturally warm.

“It was... good.”

The elevator passed the lobby floor and continued down into the basement.

“I wasn’t particularly impressed.”

“Uh...”

“Want a beer? We can pick up some chicken on the way home.”

Before Sanche fully understood what was happening, he found himself seated in the back of an unfamiliar car.

Then, without anyone asking for his opinion, the vehicle pulled away.

Cold sweat ran down his back.

“I’m fine. You must be tired...”

“I’ll have the boys take care of it.”

The boys...

He presumably meant his attendants.

It felt deeply wrong to call those dangerously handsome men “boys,” even if none of them could compare with the man sitting in front.

Come to think of it, where are my attendants...?

“If you don’t like chicken, we can get something else.”

“Pardon?”

“Something else to eat. Your sister has enough beer stocked at home to supply a small army. Take this chance to drink it all. Whenever I’m not around, she sneaks it anyway.”

“...Huh?”

The car merged onto a road in the Upper Plane, passed through several districts, and eventually entered an ordinary residential area.

“Why are we here...?”

“Ah.”

Dezeb stepped out at an unhurried pace and smiled.

“Home is more comfortable, isn’t it? And since you came all the way to the capital, you should at least see where your sister lives.”

“My sister’s... house?”

Flustered, Sanche slowly remembered that Erabelle did, in fact, have a place on 107S.

“Ah.”

Right.

They had originally been heading here before detouring for dinner.

He had completely forgotten.

...It’s nicer than I expected.

Sanche at least knew that, by imperial standards, upper-class commoners generally lived on the 100-series satellites.

He wondered whether his sister had received some sort of housing benefit after serving in the military for so long.

Considering that Erabelle’s previous “homes” had ranged from a secondhand camper to a run-down motel, this was easily the best place she had ever lived.

He still could not understand how dozens of people managed to live packed into one residential complex, but at least the building itself seemed respectable.

Sanche had no idea why the commander had personally escorted them all the way here, but he was just about to thank him when Dezeb moved first.

“Let’s go inside.”

Then he simply walked ahead.

The ease with which he did it was almost unsettling.

What...?

Frowning slightly, Sanche followed him all the way to the top floor.

Erabelle Vermilion said nothing.

Sanche’s frown deepened.

“...”

They reached the front door.

Dezeb casually pressed his fingerprint to the scanner.

Didn’t you say this was my sister’s place?

“Pick any room on the right and make yourself comfortable. Our bedroom is on the left.”

“Our bedroom...?”

Sanche’s head snapped toward Erabelle.

She immediately looked away and refused to meet his eyes.

He turned back to the tall, long-limbed man walking farther inside as though nothing were unusual and carefully chose his words.

“Forgive me, but... you said earlier that this was my sister’s home...”

“It is.”

“Then why...”

“It’s ours.”

Sanche drew in a slow breath and tried again.

“This may be rude of me to ask, but are you perhaps... living with my sister?”

“It’s our home. Of course we live together.”

Sanche had been suspicious for some time now.

Did they find out she’s an S-grade support-line?

If they had, then perhaps something like this was possible.

If someone had discovered that she was a rare and valuable S-grade support type, it would not be particularly strange to lure her in and secure her loyalty.

Granted, it made little sense for the Avganis heir—and a division commander at that—to go this far merely for the sake of a single contractor.

But if he had some highly specific personal use for her, perhaps it was not entirely impossible.

“You really don’t need to speak so formally with me.”

Dezeb glanced toward Erabelle.

“Oh, Erabelle. I emptied the dryer. I told you not to throw your socks in there inside out.”

Sure.

He’s luring her in...

And doing her laundry while he’s at it—

Absolutely not.

Sanche immediately pulled out his phone and punched in a number.

The Count answered.

Sanche shouted at once.

“Dad! Sis is living with a man!”

Erabelle hurled her phone.

It struck Sanche squarely in the forehead.

People said humans could display extraordinary strength under extreme stress.

Apparently that was true.

She had just landed a clean hit on a Level 5 combatant’s forehead with a single throw.

“You’ll hurt your hand.”

Completely calm, Dezeb showed concern for Erabelle—the one who had thrown the phone.

***

The apartment was full of unmistakable signs that people actually lived there.

A blanket had been tossed carelessly over the sofa.

Several DVD cases lay nearby—the sort of thing only a nerd like Erabelle would still buy, even as souvenirs.

And on the table sat a metal lighter that very obviously belonged to a man.

“Since when?”

Sanche had heard that his security detail was still waiting back at the hotel.

They had to be.

There was no room here for an entire escort team.

By imperial standards, the 100-series satellites were considered residential zones for upper-class commoners, but that did not change much.

Any place identified by a number instead of a proper name was fundamentally the same.

Which meant that here, in a place completely removed from noble society, his sister was living with the direct heir to a marquessate.

“Don’t tell me you’re the other woman?!”