Chapter 256: A Matter of Pride

“…Since I have finished my business, I will be going now.”

Regrettably, this was a space surrounded by bookshelves, meaning there were no holes for me to hide in.

For that reason, I intended to leave entirely, and as I turned around while saying those words —

Reysir suddenly grabbed my wrist.

“Finished your business? What does that mean?”

“Hasn’t all the important discussion already concluded?”

“What about recommending a novel for me?”

My original purpose was to make the Protagonist of Another Novel use the [Truth-Reading Eye] on me, which had already been accomplished.

However, the superficial business I had proposed was exactly what Reysir just mentioned.

‘Ah…’

It was inevitable that such a sound escaped my mouth.

And similarly, Reysir had to cover his mouth once more to swallow his laughter.

“St-Stop laughing.”

“You were the one who was funny first, so saying that… *pfft*…”

As if to prove he wasn’t just pretending to laugh to tease me, Reysir’s face was flushed from the lack of breath, and the hand holding my wrist even trembled intermittently.

Because of that, my embarrassment reached its peak.

I felt a desperate urge to declare that the novel recommendation would be postponed and flee the scene immediately.

Unfortunately, my wrist was currently held by Reysir.

It had only been a few minutes since I confirmed the fact that the gap between our Strength stats was nearly three times. Rather than wasting energy on a futile struggle and wounding my pride, I concluded it was better not to even try.

However, that didn’t mean I just stood there.

I kicked his shin with all my might.

Even Yor seemed to think Reysir was being too much, as he balled his tiny hands into fists and repeatedly tapped Reysir’s head. *bam, bam, bam.*

“Whew… That was really close. I almost couldn’t hold it back.”

Even though I had kicked harder than usual, hard enough for my toes to hurt, the Protagonist of Another Novel just caught his breath and murmured words of relief as if nothing had happened.

I expected it.

Since Reysir’s defense stat had exceeded 100, there was no way he would feel pain from our actions.

That was why I had struck him without hesitation, but seeing him not even pretend to be sore — and not even showing a sign of it being ticklish — was incredibly irritating.

“Kar-r-r, no-o-ong.”

“Alright. I’ll let go, I’ll let go.”

“Meow, myaoo.”

“Ah, right. I should return this too, shouldn’t I?”

Since Reysir had burst out laughing every time I spoke, I kept my mouth shut and simply glared at him to prevent the same thing from happening again.

Instead of me, Yor slapped the back of Reysir’s hand and protested.

Once Reysir released my wrist, Yor didn’t forget to take back his Whitenboard and board marker that he had lent to him.

‘I swear, at times like this, he seems much more sensible than I am.’

As expected, My Baby Dragon was great in many ways.

Coming to that conclusion, I began to walk away with long strides in silence.

Then, naturally —

“Karbaldr, are you sulking by any chance? You aren’t really planning to just leave like this, are you?”

The Protagonist of Another Novel followed me, uttering such nonsense.

Honestly, I wanted to do exactly that, but if I did, it was obvious he would tease me for it forever, so I didn’t intend to.

I was simply moving to another bookshelf because the book I planned to recommend to Reysir was located there.

I silently turned the corner, pulled out the book I had scouted earlier, and handed it to Reysir.

The other man let out a small chuckle and flashed his characteristic eye-smile.

It was very irritating.

“I have truly finished my business now, so I will be leaving. Do not stop me.”

“Wait a moment, I have something to say.”

“If you’re going to say something pointless again…”

“It’s not like that. This is a very serious conversation.”

I was going to ignore him and keep walking, but the Original Protagonist’s eyes held a truly serious light.

His face was also calm — almost cold — as if it had never been filled with laughter.

Because of that, my footsteps were halted even though my wrist hadn’t been grabbed this time.

“…I will listen. Go ahead.”

“I’m thinking of using [Jin-Ik-Nun] on Pret.”

“Even if you shorten it like… No, fine. Whatever.”

Readers of the Original Work also referred to the skill by that shortened name, but I didn’t expect the Original Protagonist to do it too.

The narrative of the Original Work had always faithfully written it out as [Truth-Reading Eye].

In the original novel I read, Reysir had never explicitly spoken that skill name aloud.

‘It wasn’t that he never revealed the existence of the [Truth-Reading Eye] to trusted comrades, but even then, he usually just explained it as a skill that allowed him to read information windows, right?’

I was momentarily flustered, but thinking back, Reysir had a history of shortening the title 《How the Repentant Villain Saves the World》 to 《Hwoe-Ak-Beop》.

He had even requested to call me by a nickname, citing that the five-letter name ‘Karbaldr’ was too long.

Given that, it might be more strange for him not to shorten a six-letter skill name.

‘The owner of the skill is doing it, so there’s no need for me to keep calling it the [Truth-Reading Eye] every time.’

For this reason, if I ever had to mention that skill in the future, I would also refer to it as [Jin-Ik-Nun].

“He is a suspicious character in many ways, so I expected you to do so. I just didn’t expect you to notify me in advance like this.”

“It felt like he was getting more and more persistent about acting close to you. I brought it up because I wanted you to be careful of him, at least until I can confirm his identity.”

“And if you confirm it and find out he isn’t just an ordinary member of the Circus Troupe?”

“I’ll have to be even more careful and distance myself much further.”

Reysir answered with sharp decisiveness, as if wondering why I would ask such an obvious question.

He didn’t even know it was already too late for me to distance myself from Pret.

‘Well, even if I had heard this earlier, I still would have met Pret behind Reysir’s back to propose the deal.’

Since I knew he was doing this out of concern, I didn’t lie to Reysir or draw a line by telling him not to interfere. Instead, I shifted the meaning of my previous question.

“I wasn’t asking about me; I was asking what you plan to do.”

“Me…?”

“Yes. Surely you aren’t planning to call Pret out for a talk out of the blue and demand to know his purpose because you know his identity? If you do that, you’ll only be asked in return how you found out who he was.”

“Even if I’m asked that, if I just don’t answer… Ah…”

The Protagonist of Another Novel replied nonchalantly, then suddenly stopped and let out a sigh.

He must have realized what the problem was.

“If you reveal those silver eyes, you’ll have to explain what you can do with Silver Ethere. At least to those in the Awakened Special Class.”

“Yeah, I suppose so. I could try to lie and say [Jin-Ik-Nun] can only read simple objects or plants without a sense of self, but…”

“If Pret is truly not an ordinary person and you go to him saying you know his identity, he will realize the true nature of your skill immediately.”

“It would have been a disaster if you hadn’t told me in advance. Thank you.”

Actually, I didn’t think it would be a disaster even if he were caught by Pret regarding [Jin-Ik-Nun].

In the original, Pret did notice that Reysir could see the status windows of others.

However, he never sold that information to anyone or used it to blackmail him; he kept the secret until the end.

He didn’t even try to tempt Reysir into making money using that ability, nor did he ask him to check someone’s skills.

It was because he felt Reysir’s ability might be exposed to others if he did.

He valued the person named ‘Reysir’ more than the value of the information he could obtain through the Original Protagonist.

‘Thinking about Pret’s characterization, it would have been more fitting for him to propose a deal… or even suggest recruitment, just as he did with me!’

I suspected that because Pret was a character who was criticized by readers for being sinister due to his setting of constantly investigating people’s backgrounds, the author might have turned him into an excessively ‘convenient supporting character’ while trying to highlight his good side as much as possible.

Regardless, the setting that Pret was a man of great loyalty definitely existed.

Since it was natural for a supporting character like him to feel favorable toward Reysir, Pret likely wouldn’t breathe a word to anyone even if he found out Reysir could read other people’s information this time as well.

‘The reason I spoke to Reysir as if I were warning him, despite thinking that…!’

It was partly because I didn’t know how to respond to Reysir’s advice to distance myself from Pret, so I wanted to move the point of the conversation elsewhere.

“Speaking of which, about your Silver Ethere and your skill. I think it would be better to keep them hidden for at least one more semester.”

It was also to naturally bring up this topic.

“Why? Because we still can’t trust the kids in the Special Class?”

“You know it well.”

I answered Reysir’s question that way, but there was another reason.

The level of [Jin-Ik-Nun] had risen too quickly, and it just so happened to be right after he read Yor’s and my status windows.

‘If the Original Protagonist starts walking around without his eyepatch right now, how will Author Senna handle this content in her novel?’

It was because such a worry had suddenly occurred to me.

“Ah. As a side note, even if you eventually come to trust everyone or have to reveal the existence of the Silver Ethere for an unavoidable reason, you must hide the fact that the power is connected to the ‘First Mystic Realm’.”

“I naturally intend to do that. They’ll surely treat me like an experimental subject and try to use this ability, claiming they need to analyze it since it’s a power linked to the Demonic Realm.”

Reysir didn’t specify exactly who would do such a thing.

However, it was easy to guess that the subject of that action would be the ‘Imperial Family’.

He spoke with an unusually sarcastic tone, unable to hide his hostility as it showed plainly on his face.

I watched his reaction and spoke cautiously.

“In that sense, I’ve thought of a story you can use as a pretext… How about explaining that the Silver Ethere was originally a power you possessed, and that since you were young, your eyes would occasionally turn silver before fading back?”

This was a lie that could never be caught.

Because everyone who could testify that it was a lie had died ten years ago during that incident.

“Then explain that when the ‘First Mystic Realm’ appeared, you exhausted all your gold Aether while struggling to survive. Because of that, the power of the Silver Ethere, which was already unstable, went out of control. Since then, you haven’t been able to control the power, leaving you with no choice but to cover your left eye, which serves as the medium for the skill’s activation.”

“That… sounds very plausible? Much more so than saying a new power appeared after defeating a Boss Monster in the Demonic Realm. It’s to the point where I’m confused if the Silver Ethere really was a power I was born with.”

“You would know best that it isn’t.”

“Yeah. There was no such thing as an Aether rampage, and as soon as I defeated the Boss Monster, a strange energy suddenly flowed into my body and settled in my head. I just meant that the story sounds more like the truth than the truth itself.”

Knowing well what Reysir had lost due to that incident ten years ago, I had been inwardly worried that just mentioning it would cause his wounds to rip and tear.

Seeing that he could make a joke like this, it seemed that his wounds had fortunately healed quite a bit.