“It is disrespectful of me to have you hold my hand,” Lieselotte insisted for the nth time. “This isn’t appropriate for a transgressor who needs to atone for their offense!”
“For Liese-tan, holding hands with Sieg is like an amazing reward she can’t help but be delighted about,” Lady Kobayashee explained. “She seems to be having a hard time accepting that joy when she still feels guilty about Fiene.”
A reward felt more than fitting to me. I smiled at my fiancée. “You’re not a transgressor, Lieselotte. What you did today was worthy of praise.”
“N-No, that’s not true...”
“It is. Being covered in water is nothing compared to being engulfed in flames. You absolutely did a good deed. I know you regret overdoing it, but the clothes we’re about to buy will make up for it. Next time, you can use what you learned from this experience to do a better job.”
“If Your Highness insists, then I suppose it may be true... H-However, that does not mean I deserve such an honor!”
“Holding hands with your fiancé isn’t anything out of the ordinary, is it? It’s normal to touch one another when dancing or attending events as a couple.”
“H-However, we are both wearing gloves on those occasions. If I were to dirty Your Highness’s hand with my sweat, I would have to slit my own throat!”
“No, please don’t. I sweat too, so you wouldn’t be dirtying me.” I couldn’t help but sigh at her persistence. “You were fine with holding hands the day we first met,” I murmured.
“Everything was different back then.” She turned away with a pout, and I was struck by the beauty of her side profile. The childish gesture only made her perfect ladylike comeliness stand out more.
I was captivated, and at the same time, I began to worry. She may be my fiancée, but is it rude of me to casually hold such a beautiful woman’s hand? Simply being with her like this made me feel like I was walking on a cloud. I was enjoying our little outing very much, but was she resisting because she didn’t feel the same? When we were children, she openly admired me, but now, she was distancing herself quite a bit.
“It’s fine!” Lady Kobayashee shouted. “You don’t have to worry about that stuff when you’re on a date! Go ahead and hold hands!”
“Sieg, you don’t have to look so worried,” Lord Endoh said. “Everything Lieselotte’s been saying just means, ‘I can’t handle how happy this makes me. My heart is beating so fast; I can’t take it anymore.’ She doesn’t hate you—it’s the opposite. So go for it! Kobayashi’s ecstatic too, so please stay that way for her sake.”
They had a point. In her panic, Lieselotte had let slip that she considered holding hands “an honor,” which could be interpreted as her being happy to do it. Lady Kobayashee’s excitement and Lord Endoh’s calm advice convinced me: if my fiancée truly didn’t like it, she would say so clearly. She was also rather calm when it came to others. Or to phrase it differently...
“Hey, Lieselotte, are you perhaps saying that, unlike when we were children, holding my hand makes your heart beat a little faster now?” I asked.
She blushed. “Of course not!”
“Which means it’s not just ‘a little.’” Lord Endoh did not miss a beat. “If she wasn’t nervous at all, she wouldn’t be resisting this much and her hand wouldn’t be sweating.”
“Ha ha ha! I see!” My unintentional laughter was met with a reproachful glare from Lieselotte. However, her cheeks were flushed, and thinking about it, I realized she had never physically tried to shake off my hand. Her complaints had been purely verbal. It seemed that she really was happy to walk hand in hand with me. “I’m sorry for laughing, Lieselotte. You’re just too cute. Now, we’re almost at the store. Why don’t we find some clothes for you as well while we’re at it?”
My fiancée, who seemed to be in a bad mood from my teasing, shook her head in response to my cheerful suggestion. “No, Your Highness. We came here today to find clothes for Miss Fiene. We cannot waste time and keep her waiting when she is likely wearing her sports uniform as a stopgap,” she said bluntly.
I was a little disappointed, but she was entirely correct. Fiene was the priority at the moment. I decided to give up for now and make plans for a future occasion instead.
“Yes, you’re right,” I said. “We can shop for your clothes another day, when we have time to do it leisurely. I’d like to look at other stores too. As long as I’m with you, even walking around town would be enjoyable... Assuming we can hold hands like this again, that is.”
“Th-That’s... My heart can’t take this...” my fiancée said weakly.
“Sieg, I think you pushed way past Lieselotte’s heartbeat limit with that up-close princely smile of yours...” Lord Endoh said, exasperated.
“It’s okay! People don’t die from excitement! Keep going!” Lady Kobayashee insisted.
I laughed heartily again at their three different reactions.
────
“That was smooth, Sieg,” Lady Kobayashi said. “It was also great how you guys gave Fiene the clothes in person. Liese-tan couldn’t have done it without you by her side!”
Her words of praise had me feeling a bit embarrassed. I scratched my cheek. “I suppose. When we met with Miss Fiene, she wasn’t upset in the slightest. Rather, she was humbled yet overjoyed to receive new clothes. In the end, Lieselotte was the only one who still believed she was in the wrong.”
“No, Baldur was quite exasperated with me,” Lieselotte said from across the table.
I wasn’t going to let her put herself down. “Yes, he had enough of your clumsiness and your tendency to push yourself too hard. It wasn’t because you failed to control your water spell. Besides, in the first place, that was the fault of the Witch of Yore. You did nothing wrong at all.” I smiled at her.
Lieselotte averted her gaze, sulking. It seemed she finally ran out of arguments.
“And then there was the makeup incognito town date later on... Oh, Liese-tan seems to be at her limit, so I guess we shouldn’t talk about it!” Lady Kobayashi said.
“Yeah, that’d be way too inconsiderate,” Lord Endo said. “Oh, but don’t worry, you two. I guess since we were watching you through Magikoi, we couldn’t see anything that was too far off from the scenes in the game. We didn’t see that next date at all.”
Now that he mentioned it, I hadn’t heard the Voices of the Gods during that date even though Lieselotte was present. In other words, the memory belonged solely to us.
I’ll treasure it.
“Hey, Aoto, how do you think it determined which scenes we could see?” Lady Kobayashi tilted her head. “Like, we could only see events that clearly felt important, right? And personally, I found it really weird we could even see them outside the existing maps in the game. It can’t just be based on Magikoi, right?”
Lord Endo tilted his head as well and frowned. “Well, I do have a theory. Remember, we couldn’t see much of what Baldur was doing when Fiene—Magikoi’s heroine—wasn’t involved. But we could see Lieselotte. I think the difference between the two...would be Lieselotte’s Memoir.”
“Oh, I get it! The fan disc counts as part of the game! Is that why we were able to meddle with those scenes too?”
“Yeah. I feel like we were able to get involved in the scenes mentioned in Lieselotte’s Memoir even if they weren’t covered in the main game where Fiene was the lead, like the ones that only had Sieg and Lieselotte. Same goes for anything relating to the Witch of Yore. She didn’t appear in the main game until the final battle, but she came up a lot in the fan disc.”
“True. You’re a genius, Aoto! I bet that’s spot-on. It also means we won’t be able to connect to this world as easily as we used to, which makes sense, but it’s kind of depressing.” Lady Kobayashi hung her head.
Lord Endo frantically tried to reassure her. “W-Well, it’s just a theory! There were exceptions to that rule, weren’t there? Maybe the game was just a starting point. Like, it was made up of scenes that were easy to connect to?”
“Yeah, that must be it. We’re gods, after all! We did a lot of miraculous things like giving our divine blessings. Linking different worlds together is a piece of cake, right?” Lady Kobayashi’s worried expression made it clear she was only pretending to be upbeat.
“Definitely. Heck, I feel like if we keep saying it, it’ll actually happen.”
Overcome with sympathy, I placed a hand on Lord Endo’s shoulder. “Yes, we also trust that today won’t be our last meeting,” I said firmly. “We’ll continue to pray to you from here. It’s said that the faith of the people contributed to the Goddess Lirenna’s revival. In other words, people’s prayers become a god’s power. When enough is gathered, the path will open.”
“When Lady Lirenna went to your realm, she gave you her divine favor as a foothold, did she not?” Lieselotte added. “I, too, have received Lady Shihono’s divine favor. Our connection should help pave the way.”
Lieselotte and I exchanged looks and we smiled. Yes, I’m sure we’ll be fine.
“Oh yeah!” Lord Endo said. “Lirenna said that’s why Kuon made Magikoi in the first place—as players think about the scenes in the game, their prayers create a path! So if we all keep praying for each other, we can do it again!”
Lady Kobayashi nodded happily. “Yep. If that’s all it takes, we’ll be fine! I’m looking forward to seeing you guys again! Well then, now that we don’t have to worry about that anymore, what should we talk about next?” She had her usual energy back.