Dear gods, she’s cute. Wait, crap! I’d been so charmed that my train of thought had completely derailed.
“Finallyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!!!” Lady Kobayashee screamed so loudly that she blasted away my confusion and left my ears ringing.
“C-Calm down, Kobayashi!”
“I can’t, I can’t, I caaan’t!!! Did you see that?! Sieg and Liese-tan...kissed! I know it was on the cheek, but still. That’s a kiss! That counts! That’s a fat smooch right on her cheek. Plus, Liese-tan is so cute! You know what? Getting to see that was enough for me. I couldn’t care less about the small stuff!”
“Care a little! Look, I don’t know how, but he can actually hear our voices. So if we have Sieg do his best, don’t you think we can avoid all this final boss, witch stuff? C’mon, get your head in the game so we can try to help them!” After attempting to calm down his fellow deity, Lord Endoh paused briefly and added, “Would you stop hitting me?!”
“You’re right!” Lady Kobayashee cried, excited. Then, the two of them began to whisper to one another in hushed voices.
I gingerly pulled my hand away from Lieselotte’s cheek. Not wanting to bother my heavenly advisors, I had no choice but to wait. Still, I’d like to make it clear that I wholeheartedly agreed with their assessment that “Liesettan” (who I assumed to be Lieselotte) was cute.
Usually, she was prideful and strict when it came to etiquette. No matter how many men charmed by her beauty appeared before her, she always coldly turned them away without so much as blinking.
“I am His Highness’s fiancée,” she’d say.
I would have never thought I’d see the day when she would be rendered speechless, flushed and trembling before me.
Well, in fairness, I’d done something brazen enough to make her that way. I was prepared to have my bad manners criticized, to receive an icy glare that’d reduce me to roadside filth, or even to get slapped for my troubles.
Yet when I looked at Lieselotte, her face was completely red—in fact, so were her ears and neck. How far does her blushing extend?
“Um... Ahem.”
The goddess suddenly cleared her throat as I lost myself looking at my fiancée. It seemed the divines had reached a conclusion, so I stood up straight to bear witness to their word.
“Uhhh, first of all, we’re not really sure why you’re calling us gods. Since we can’t play the part or anything, we’re gonna keep talking like this,” the esteemed goddess said.
I nodded up toward the heavens. As the gods will.
“I know the plot—er, I know the details of an upcoming incident that will take place in your country, revolving around this very academy.”
As expected of the goddess. I was in awe at Lady Kobayashee’s wisdom, but the word “incident” left a sinking pit in my stomach.
“Please wait a moment. Do you mean to say that something is going to happen at the Royal Academy?”
Every potential magician in the kingdom was obligated to attend this school. In practice, this meant the institution was filled with the sons and daughters of influential nobles, including those from the royal family. The faculty, staff, and security here were the best the crown could afford. I could hardly imagine anything going awry here, of all places.
“It’s less that it’s gonna happen and more, uh, we want to prevent it from happening? But, uhhh...”
“You have the power to prevent the incident, Sieg. The thing is, though, we don’t really wanna tell you—or I guess it wouldn’t work out if we explained it, so...”
Lady Kobayashee hesitated as she spoke, and Lord Endoh did the same as he jumped in to help. I tilted my head. Is this about the “final boss witch stuff” that they mentioned earlier? What do I have to “do my best” in, and how?
“Lemme see,” Lady Kobayashee said. “Basically, at this rate, the super duper cute tsundere Liese-tan—a.k.a. Lieselotte Riefenstahl—is going to be doomed to ruin.”
I felt my soul abandon me as I listened to Lady Kobayashee carefully pick her words. Lieselotte is...“doomed to ruin”? What does that even mean?
“But we still can’t say why. We’re not allowed to tell you right now, Sieg.”
Her outright refusal to fill me in left me incredibly frustrated. Lieselotte was my fiancée, and yet I was still deemed unworthy of knowing how to save her.
“Hey, don’t worry about it! C’mon, it’s no fun to spoil everything in the opening act, right?” Lord Endoh said in an attempt to cheer me up.
“That’s right! Besides, if we tried to explain everything all at once, it’d get really messy and waaay too long! So we’re gonna wait for the perfect moment, then bam! We’ll give you the best advice we can through our play-by-play and color commentary!”
I tilted my head once again at the goddess’s peculiar divination. Play-by-play and color commentary? Although I remained puzzled, the gods excitedly continued on.
“Er, so, I’m—ahem. I’ll be your play-by-play caster, Endo!”
“Joined by your color commentator, Kobayashi!”
I chiseled their introductions into my brain: the god was the great “Play-by-Play Caster Endoh” and the goddess was the venerable “Color Commentator Kobayashee.”
“Going forward,” the goddess said, “we’ll give you real-time analysis of Liese-tan’s emotions, so we want you to use our advice to confront her with an open heart. No guarantees that we’ll be able to explain everything even if you do, but the incident and Liese-tan’s ruin and the totally stupid bad end won’t happen! We won’t let it!” A wave of relief washed over me with her emphatic conclusion.
“We’ll keep talking,” he said, “and all you have to do is listen, think, and do your best. Can I add that these past few minutes of you talking to us have been really awkward? You look super cringe, so think of our commentary as a third-party thing. There’s no need to reply to us; just listen, and then brush us aside.”