CH 171

When I glanced at Hylli, he handed me today’s assignment from mid-level magic. I scribbled down the formula to the question that he’d circled. Hylli looked satisfied.

Nice, next problem.

When I raised my head again, Cory came into view.

Cory had been staring intently at me from earlier. When I turned my head to look straight at him, he flinched slightly.

Cory’s hair was a mess, as if he had rushed to come here. For some strange reason, he couldn’t look me in the eye and just glanced at me. He raised one hand and roughly tousled the back of his head. His ears, peeking out between his blond hair, was red.

Cory glanced at Yves once and thought about something before opening his mouth to speak.

“You’re the only friend I have to go with. I don’t want to go alone, that’s why.”

That was an acceptable reason. I briefly thought about being his partner, but Cory had a backup.

“Just go with Viedielle.”

Cory’s problem was solved. Thank goodness.

I turned my head to stare straight at me. Swanhaden was trying not to show it, but he had a generally pitiful expression on his face and was holding a rose in his hand.

He was my last problem.

Swanhaden glanced at Cory, who was muttering to himself about saying it wrong, and Yves, before hesitating and speaking.

“……I don’t know why, but the others keep avoiding me. I don’t have family who’s older or younger. I don’t have anyone to go with. I’m scared of how others will see me if I go alone. I desperately need ‘you’ to go with me.”

Yves had a disgusted expression on his face as he quietly listened to Swan’s explanation. He threw the rubber duck at him.

The duck hit Swan’s head and bounced off. The squeak was loud as it bounced off of his head.

Swan made sure his voice shook as he tried to sound as sad as possible, but he was expressionless. He didn’t look sad at all.

This was Swan’s acting face, so I briefly narrowed my eyes. When I shot him a suspicious look, Swan made his eyes bigger. It was glinting brightly unlike his usual self.

Honestly, Swanhaden had a lot of people who followed him but nobody who would be his partner. He had built up a wall between himself and girls to begin with. No, actually, girls just refused to interact with him.

Normally, if there was a handsome, rich, talented kid like Swan, everyone would clamor to be acquainted or connected to him. But sadly, it was Swan we were talking about. People would get on their knees and beg, “I’m so sorry that we’re acquainted,” to him. I would probably do the same if I wasn’t close with Swan.

Thinking back, Swan had been unimaginably popular when he first entered, but now all of that fervor switched to fear. As Swan changed, the people who were scared of him began to slowly change their view of him, but a lot of people were still scared.

Anyway, Swan’s words were the most honest and persuasive. It wasn’t like he had other personal reasons. Moreover, I had thought that going would Swan wouldn’t be too bad either. Thinking about it logically, Swan was the most pitiful. He didn’t have family as backup, no friends, and wasn’t able to avoid the party either.

“Nunaaaa, Shushu nuna. Where are you?”

I was staring intently at Swan and trying to resolve this problem when I suddenly heard another voice. Hearing how cute and young the voice sounded, it had to be Karim.

When I turned my head in the direction I thought Karim’s voice was coming from, he was really there. A lovable creature with sky blue hair and scarlet eyes was walking towards me. Karim, who had grown a lot taller, smiled brightly as he discovered me. He was waving his hand as he ran towards me, so I waved back.

“Shushu nuna, I heard from Hestia nuna. You’re taking me to the senior end party as your partner, right?”

Karim’s cheeks were red as he looked elated. He hugged me in excitement. Karim was a lot taller, so my face was hidden behind his chest. Thanks to that, nobody could see my confusion.

I had been thinking of going with Karim, but I hadn’t said anything to him yet. I was flustered because of this. I remembered that Karim had mentioned something about Hestia. Oh, I guess Hestia told Karim in advance.

I remembered saying something about going with Karim when I was with Hestia.

“You’re taking me to your one and only senior party?”

Scarlet eyes, the same as mine, seemed to shine in joy.

I had been so busy with my knight test preparations these days that I wasn’t able to focus on Karim. Because of that, he was more excited than he would’ve been before about being my partner.

“Nuna, you’re the best.”

Karim whispered, voice shaking in joy.

Karim gave me another hug and shot the final blow. My heart dropped. It felt like all of the blood in my body just spilled out. My ears went a bit stuffy. I felt like I was dropping down from a cliff.

I held onto the rose that Karim had brought to give me. Whatever, I don’t know. Family comes first. Whatever’s cutest wins. Karim wins.

“Oh, right, nuna! Harun hyung is coming to the academy to see Hes nuna, let’s go greet him!”

Karim held my hand tightly as he smiled with his teeth. He was more handsome than cute, now that most of his baby fat was gone, but he was still cute.

“Hyungs, what are you doing here?”

Karim was just about to leave with my hand in his when he tilted his head in confusion at the looks being shot his way.

When Karim asked, Cory’s eyes began roaming as he tried to figure out a reason. He flung a bit of fountain water with his finger and said, awkwardly, that he was playing at the fountain.

Karim seemed to accept the response with a, “That sounds like fun!” with a emphatic nod. With everyone in an eerie silence, Karim smiled brightly at each and every one of the four here.

“Then, goodbye.”

Karim politely bowed and said goodbye.

“Then, bye.”

I lowered my head slightly and headed out. Everyone’s gazes slid to me.

Man, I don’t know anymore.

I ran away.

After a lot of shenanigans, it was finally the day of the senior end party.

I changed into my outfit and sat in front of the mirror and was just about to put on makeup before I stopped myself.

I had to admit it. There were a few things that I just couldn’t do, no matter how much I tried.

The first one was singing, the second one was makeup, and the third one was my fashion sense. All of the makeup and fashion that I thought was nice were all things that would make anyone else disgusted. I didn’t know this before, but now I knew.

It wasn’t a problem if I was bad at these things, though. I could just ask someone who was good at it instead. I always looked the best when Hazel dressed me up, so I asked Hazel for help this time.

The interesting thing was that Hazel came to me first before I could even ask for her help.

“I thought you would just apply anything in sight, so I came! Our Shushu, you can’t become a laughingstock at your very last academy party, right?”

To be honest, it was great to be able to see Hazel after a while with the excuse of makeup. Hazel had become incredibly successful after opening her own beauty shop, so it was hard to see her. She had become even cooler in the time I didn’t see her.

The room felt overwhelming now that Hazel was here again. I had been using the room alone after she graduated.

I was supposed to share this room with a new underclassman, but nobody came. I had too many magical devices littering the room because of my club activity, so I had begun using the room as a storage room of sorts, and the academy had allowed me to use this room as a single. This was only possible because of how successful my club was.

Because of this, I had been using this room all by myself. It was so, so lonely. The room felt livelier now that Hazel was in it again.

Apparently, you had to pay a ton of money to have makeup done by Hazel, who was now a professional. Hazel promised to use me as a model for new clothes or makeup styles in return for doing my makeup for free. I didn’t care too much, so I nodded and accepted the deal.

“The theme for today’s makeup is pure, sorrowful, and mature.”

Hazel added more powder upon powder on my face. Based on her humming, she seemed to be in high spirits. She always enjoyed dressing me up, saying that nobody else matched her makeup style quite as well as I did.

Hazel, who had finished creating a new me, seemed incredibly pleased with her makeup skills. She told me that she could see her skills improve whenever she dolled me up. She put her hands over my face, a wide gap between the two so it wouldn’t smudge, and took me to a full body mirror.

Hazel stood me up in front of the mirror and removed her hands from my eyes.

“Ooooooh……..”

Honestly, I had never been too shocked like the others when Hazel dolled me up. It was just an “Oh, I look prettier,” and that had been it.

I stared at my reflection in the mirror.

The dress I was wearing was a mermaid-style white dress. The shoulders were cleanly exposed. There was a pretty white flower necklace upon my exposed neckline. The side of the dress was slightly exposed, so my short legs seemed incredibly long. My curly orange hair was put in a pretty braid and was resting on my shoulder.

My skin looked much brighter than before. It might have been because of the whitening cream that Hazel had put on my entire body. The white dress seemed to make my lighter skin seem even lighter. There was a slight pink tint on my cheeks and lips. The glitter on my eyes made my eyes seem kind of wistful.

For the first time ever, I was awed. Honestly. I was so pretty.

When I genuinely expressed how surprised I was to Hazel, she was even happier. I guess she had been a bit disappointed by my lackluster reactions to her skills, even if she hadn’t said anything.

Hazel told me that she had an appointment that she had to rush to as soon as she finished me and rushed to leave the academy. I was a bit disappointed at how she had to leave so soon, but let her go.

When I exited the dorms to go to the party, the sky was filled with multi-colored lights in the sky. The senior end party was even larger than the junior end party, so the decorations were even more expansive and flashy.

When I turned my head to look around at my surroundings, I found Karim, who had been waiting for me. Karim, who had dressed up in formal outfits, was holding a rose as he sat on the bench in front of the dorms.

“Nuna!”

Karim immediately greeted me as soon as he saw me. Then, his eyes grew wide.

“Woooooow…..”

Karim walked closer to me and stared at my face before handing me his rose.

“For a moment, I didn’t realize it was you….”

“What?”

“It’s nothing, I might get some glares though because I’m your partner and you look so pretty! But I’m so excited! Let’s go dance together! It’s been so long since we danced together!”

Karim placed my hand on his arm and headed to the party hall with excited steps.

T/N: no matter how hot something is……the cute thing wins