With the mood persisting, I find myself looking around, trying not to look at the young Rockmann across the table who has started reading one of the books he had with him. I worry he might think I’m avoiding him if I just get up right away, and so I remain in place for the time being. Not that it’s such a big problem if he does get that idea... Still, it would probably bother me if I were in his shoes.
Let’s try to bail out as naturally as possible.
“Miss Natolie, do you happen to know anything about Treyse?”
“Huh?” I abruptly raise my head, my focus on the book in front of me broken.
“What? I thought you noticed something about her.”
I blink in response. For a while we stare at each other in silence, unmoving. I’m sure we have the same Treyse in mind here, but what is it he expects me to have noticed? Why is he asking, anyway? He hasn’t realized who we really are, has he? Surely...
Bringing up Treyse now goes beyond perceptive—it’s way too scary. Still, I can’t allow myself to be intimidated by the young Rockmann. He’s just Alois Rockmann. That’s it. Tempted as I am to avoid his red eyes that feel like they see through everything, I can’t falter now.
“Noticed what?” I ask, playing dumb.
Here I go again, hiding things from Rockmann (his child form, anyway). And sure, I’m forced to, given the situation, but I’m not so certain I’ll really be able to look him in the eye again after returning to my time if things keep going this way.
“I can sense things through my skin. For example, when a demon is nearby, I get goose bumps. And Treyse, it feels like she has a curse of sorts placed on her. It’s a bit of an exaggeration, but I suspect she might be possessed by something like a demon,” says the young Rockmann, looking at nothing in particular as he probably recalls his new neighbor in class.
“Surely you got the wrong idea,” I reply, feeling bad for Treyse.
“I don’t know about that,” says Rockmann and returns his gaze to his book.
According to him, he’s met her at parties several times before and she gave off a very different impression from today. He also finds it suspicious that he can’t recall his conversations with her at said parties. And he noticed that I stared at her too much and looked odd when she went up the stairs in the classroom, which was why he thought I knew something.
“It might just be my imagination. I apologize for saying something so strange,” he says at the end.
“It’s not strange, what you said...”
As the young Rockmann shoots me a questioning look, I consider his words. Assuming the Treyse we’ve encountered has the personality of the one from the future, then either she’s magically shape-shifting into a young form or she’s possessed her child self. If it’s the former, she must be extremely good at shape-shifting magic, because most people can’t maintain it even for ten minutes. There are some who can keep it up for a whole day, but even they still put up with the occasional spell failure. For the purposes of long-term infiltration, it’s definitely dangerous. And it would be one thing if she only made simpler changes to her appearance, but changing her height so much should be taxing on her body.
There’s also the matter of what she’s done to the young Treyse from this age. Did she hide her? Maybe she told her everything and persuaded her to cooperate? Whichever it was, it’s going to be a real pain to deal with.
Going by the young Rockmann’s account, it’s more plausible that she’s been possessed. I’m almost certain of it, in fact.
“I just remembered something! I have to go!”
I rush to the third bookshelf from the wall, the one with books on psychology, and look for books on possession. Earlier I found a specialized book on the lightning school of magic called Lightning Blood—I take it with me under my arm too. Finding an open spot in the library, I flip through the books, scanning them for information. Possession spells are a specialty of the lightning school of magic, and if I remember correctly, Treyse was a lightning-type too.
“Nana... Uhh, Miss Natolie! So that’s where you were.”
Feeling a pat on my shoulder, I turn around to find Benjamine standing with a textbook in hand. She has her red, waist-length hair tied into a ponytail.
I return the books to the shelf in a fluster.
“You’re just in time,” I tell her. “Where’s His Highness?”
“He’s carrying teaching materials to the staff room. Heh heh, it’s funny how we have an actual prince running errands,” says Benjamine quietly with a playful smile, tilting her head, her large jade earrings swaying. She’s noticed that my young self and the young Rockmann are in the room. “Is there something you want to ask His Highness?”
“Yeah.”
We keep our voices down as we sneak out of the library and quickly walk to the staff room.
“Rockmann... I mean, the Rockmann you saw in that room...” I begin.
“Come on, I know who you’re talking about.”
“He said Treyse is acting strange, and I realized he must be right.”
“Huh? Wait, hold on a minute, did something happen in class?”
Oh, right, I still haven’t told her that the Treyse that came to my class is the one from the future. Once I tell Benjamine what Treyse said to me an hour ago, she looks surprised at first, then her surprise turns to anger.
“What in the world...?” she says with a frown on her face. “If she’s so desperate to change the future that she chose to literally physically regress, she should’ve put in more effort from the start!”
Her steps in the hallway grow louder.
“Calm down, my friend,” I tell her, pulling on her hand.
She breathes a deep sigh and faces me, her eyes as blue as a deep ocean slowly closing, then reopening.
“Regardless of whether Treyse is possessed or shape-shifting, our goal doesn’t change,” she says. “If it’s the former, we free her, and otherwise we bring her back.”
“Yeah...”
“First we need to go see His Highness and... Ah, hey! Over here!” exclaims Benjamine, waving to someone walking behind me.
Turning to the source of the footsteps, I find Prince Zenon, in neither a knight’s uniform nor a military one but clad in simple commoner’s garb, carrying class materials in his hand, just like Benjamine. He’s heading this way.
“We were just making our way to you,” says Benjamine.
“Did you find anything out?” asks the prince with a serious expression on his face as he approaches a hallway window.
Once I tell him what I heard from the young Rockmann, as well as what happened in class, Prince Zenon brings his hand to his chin and closes his eyes.
“He said something like that?”
“Has he always been like that?” asks Benjamine, looking towards the library.
“Yes, pretty much. He’s apparently sensitive to such things. Especially when it comes to demons. He claims to get goose bumps when one is around.”
“Is that something he was born with?”
“It’s unclear whether it’s caused by his excessive magical powers, but that’s surely related. Which seems to have made it all the more difficult for him to bear what happened to Count Huey.”
This is the first I’ve heard of any of this. Looks like there’s a lot I don’t know about Rockmann. It feels kinda sad, but in a way that kinda makes me hate myself for feeling bad in the first place; I can’t decide. I’m such a mess on the inside lately.