Chapter 97: Sequel: The Fake Saint Is Off to Japan 7
I'd sent my email an hour ago, but I still hadn't received an answer.
There were plenty of people who only checked their mailbox once a day—many of whom only did so in the morning. Besides, my email was admittedly a bit suspicious. Even if she'd seen it, she could have assumed it was fraudulent.
I was obviously going to be patient for a bit longer, but if I still hadn't received an answer after a few days... I'd have to give up. I didn't even need to see Yamoto Tamaki in the first place. I just wanted to thank her for my own personal satisfaction. I would be the only one benefiting from this meeting by getting rid of my regret. Selfish, I know.
Profeta, on the other hand, didn't stand to gain anything. That was why I didn't want to bother her or force my way in to see her. If she saw the email and decided she wasn't interested, that was fine. I'd give up on that one regret, go home, seal the rift, and end this story for good.
I spent the next hour watching a playthrough of Ellize's route. I couldn't play it myself because the consoles were all sold out, but there were plenty of videos around. That said...watching myself on-screen was incredibly embarrassing! I'm dying of shame here!
Inside the game, I looked exactly like your average saintly heroine. "Ellize" even blushed sweetly when you raised her affection enough.
No, seriously, stop! I don't have a humiliation kink. What's wrong with you, Miss Turtle?! Did I ever make these kinda faces?! No! I don't think so! So why make things up?!
As Fudou Niito, I'd never felt so icky watching these. In fact, I remember laughing my ass off most of the time. Now that I thought about it, it was probably because I still felt detached enough. Even though I was aware that Ellize and Fudou Niito were both me, I hadn't had access to Ellize's memories at the time. I'd been able to just brush things off and think, Lol. Look at the other me acting like a dating sim heroine, ha ha.
With my soul whole again and both my memories as Ellize and Niito, this was just torture. I felt like my cheeks were about to catch on fire.
Stop! No more! I can't take it anymore!
I switched tabs in a fit of desperation and checked my mailbox again. She'd finally answered!
Perfect, I don't need to watch the rest, then!
Yamoto Tamaki was asking if I wanted to meet tomorrow. "Same café, same time," she'd written without specifying anything else.
I see.
She was trying to ascertain whether I was the real Niito or not. As expected, she'd thought that my email was a little suspicious.
Thankfully, I still remembered the details from last time, so that wouldn't be an issue. I answered briefly to tell her I'd be there, then left the internet café.
I felt like everyone was staring at me even more than usual on my way out, but I ignored them. I wasn't going to start caring now.
After that, I visited a few shops to buy the seeds and gardening tools I wanted before going back to Fiori. I was pretty far from my log house, so I decided to spend the night at the saint's castle instead.
Alfrea begged me to cook her dinner, and I eventually agreed. I decided it'd be my way of paying her back for letting me stay at her castle. To be perfectly honest, I would've much rather preferred to sit on my butt and let others serve me.
Sadly, you can't always get what you want.
◇
All right so, this may be abrupt, but I'd like to say that whoever invented hotcake mix is a god.
With this wonderful kit, even an amateur like me could make delicious pancakes of my preferred thickness.
I'd first noticed how godly hotcake mixes were while watching a TV series about a gourmet. I saw the main character enjoying a thick stack of pancakes and I immediately craved some. I rushed to the convenience store to buy myself a couple, but they only sell those thin, boring ones.
Out of options, I'd purchased a pack of hotcake mix...and that was how everything started.
And yes, I'm aware I've been calling them pancakes half of the time and hotcakes the other half. Leave me be.
As a rule of thumb, I called the ones I made at home with hotcake mix "hotcakes" and the rest of them "pancakes." To be honest, I had absolutely no clue what the difference was.
Anyway, to make hotcakes, all you had to do was add soy milk and eggs to the mix, blend it all together, and add a dollop of oil. Then, you poured some batter onto the pan, flipped it halfway through, and bam! Done!
I usually layered two hotcakes on a plate along with some butter and maple syrup. Why two layers, you ask? Because it looks good, that's all.
By the way, I personally didn't usually cook hotcakes on a pan. I used a rice cooker instead—much easier. In Fiori, though, that wasn't an option. I'd thought about buying a rice cooker and bringing it over, but I'd ultimately decided against it. It would've been a little out of place here.
I brought Alfrea a plate, and as soon as I set it on the table, she practically started vibrating. She was looking at me like she couldn't possibly wait any longer.
How should I put it...? Once again, it feels like I'm feeding a puppy.
"Please dig in," I said.
At my signal, Alfrea started wolfing down her food. Her manners were terrible by any standards, but she still looked adorable—a testament to the extent of her natural beauty.
If I overindulged her, though, she'd put on weight in no time. I'd make sure to keep things in moderation.
I also offered to make more hotcakes for Alfrea's guards who wanted to try them. I hadn't expected quite so many volunteers to raise their hands—all of them, in fact—so I ended up going through all of my hotcake mixes in one morning.
Alfrea, always the glutton, started covetously looking at her subordinates' plates after she'd emptied her own. Come on, stop it! One of the knights looked away for a second, so she tried to take advantage of that and try to snatch a hotcake, but he dodged elegantly.
I can't believe her...
"Ellize! You should come live in this castle with me!" Alfrea cooed. "Marry me! Don't you wanna become my wife?"
A most tempting proposal. I'm the wife, though, huh?
Still, living with Alfrea would hardly be restful. I'd have to give up on my NEET aspirations. Besides, I had a feeling she didn't exactly understand what asking for someone's hand in marriage implied.
Was she really on the verge of getting married before she got sealed...?
◇
A couple of hours later, I returned to Japan and made my way to the café where I'd met Yamoto once before. I entered at the exact same time as last time. As soon as I stepped through the door, though, all eyes turned to me.
I quickly recognized one of the faces—a young woman with black hair—and walked up to her table. All the while, she stared at me unblinkingly, a vacant expression on her face.
"E-Ellize?" she asked tentatively.
"It's been a while, Profeta. You go by Yamoto Tamaki here, correct?" I answered with a smile.
Her eyes opened wide. I understood her surprise—she'd been expecting Fudou Niito to show up, not Ellize. She looked around, then quickly stood up.
"Follow me," she whispered. "You stand out too much; we shouldn't stay here."
She grabbed my hand before I could answer and dragged me away. Why did you ask me to follow you, then?
She hurriedly paid for her drink and dragged me to a nearby parking lot. She stopped in front of a fancy red car and hopped in. Whoa, she drives a fine car!
"Sit on the passenger seat... Um, I mean, there, next to me," she explained awkwardly, gesturing. "All right, now fasten your seat belt. Oh. Hmm... See that string there? Well, hmm... You know what? I'll do it for you. Hang on."
I'd yet to say a word, so I totally got why Yamoto was treating me like that. From her point of view, I was actually from Fiori and had no idea how to function on Earth. She must've thought that I had no idea what a seat belt—or a car, for that matter—was.
She started the engine, drove away from prying eyes, then asked once more: "You're really Ellize...right?"
"Yes, I am."
"I can't begin to tell you how shocked I am. I've seen posts on the internet in the past few days, so I knew you were here, but how in the world did you do that? And you even know who I am! How?!"
"I drew that conclusion from what I heard from Mister Fudou. I wasn't sure initially, but your reaction confirmed it," I lied.
Yamoto stopped the car on the side of the road and proceeded to rub the area between her brows.
As you'd probably already guessed from my answer, I had no intention to reveal to her that I was Fudou Niito.
Why? Obviously, because she'd seen me going in and out of the women's bath whenever I pleased at the academy! I'd made use of my womanly appearance to appreciate the nudity of the female students many times. I wasn't about to tell Yamoto that I'd always been a dude on the inside—she'd think I was some kind of pervert!
Well, to be fully honest, I still wouldn't have told her regardless. I probably was the fakest sham there was, but I'd sworn to play my role as Ellize until the very end. I didn't intend to take that back now. Protecting the image of Ellize everyone had formed over the years wasn't actually my responsibility, but I still kinda felt like I'd gone too far to back out now. Anyway, I intended to take my secret to my grave, and that was final!
I have my pride as a liar, all right?!
"Fudou-san once told me that you visited him in this world. Ijuuin-san also confirmed it, but I remember them telling me that you didn't have a physical form. You were supposed to be like a ghost... You clearly have a physical form now. What's going on?" Yamoto muttered, as though she was talking to herself more than to me.
She seemed desperate to make sense of the situation, but the more she thought about it, the more confused she appeared.
I can hear the gears grinding in her brain.
Yamoto was also from Fiori. Compared to the people of Earth, her natural resistance to weird, magical events was much higher. Besides, she'd lived for a thousand years and seen a lot on the other side.
She soon raised her head and looked at me, her expression far more relaxed.
"I do have many questions, but I'll leave them for later. I'm glad I get to see you again, Ellize. It's been far too long."
"Likewise, Profeta. I'm happy to see you look well."
I wasn't sure saying that to someone who'd died was appropriate, but she did look full of vigor.
Now that she was in the correct headspace to listen to me, I explained the rift and how I was able to travel between the worlds thanks to it.
Yamoto crossed her arms, sighed, and replied, "To think such a place existed... I can't believe Alfrea kept that to herself all this time."
"So you didn't know about this either, Profeta?"
"No. Eve must have shared it with only her daughter."
The prophet could see any place in the world without having to go there, but they couldn't observe every single location at once. They needed to make conscious choices as to what they wanted to see. Had Profeta known about the place, she would've taken a look for sure. The thing was, she didn't even know it existed.
"Still, it makes a lot of sense," Yamoto said. "This rift is what connected both worlds all along. That's most likely how my soul found itself in this world after my death. Now that I think about it, that might also be why I retained my memories. Reincarnating in another world must have made the impossible possible."
Her theory would also explain my experience—and, for all we knew, perhaps that of others as well. As long as the rift remained, more people risked transmigrating in the future.
We really should get rid of it as soon as possible.
When I returned to Fiori, I'd ask Alfrea to seal it up for good.
"Still..." Yamoto started, looking at me fondly. I could see the admiration in her eyes. "I finally see why no one ever doubted that you were the saint. I mean...I did understand it, but as a human, I'm now experiencing that feeling for myself."
Well, not to brag or anything, but I put a lot of effort into my appearance to make sure that wouldn't happen!
While my personality was a major red flag, my appearance was the greenest flag there was. No one looked saintlier than I did.
I'd taken the same approach as most people playing that one party game, Werewolf—you had to try to look like a harmless villager even more than the real ones. The actual villagers, on the other hand, didn't need to go the extra mile—they were already harmless.
Nah, for real, I was so on edge the entire time. I still think it's a wonder no one figured it out.
"How do you even do it? There aren't any beauty salons or skin care regimens to speak of, and there's barely any makeup in Fiori. You're an enigma."
I smiled and kept my mouth shut.
Can't you guess? The key is magic. It's all magic!
I wouldn't go through my entire routine because it would take ages, but to give a few examples—I used water magic to moisturize my skin, healing magic to repair any imperfections, and I made sure my hair and skin were always in perfect condition. Any new way to improve my appearance I could think of, I immediately applied.
The maids of my castle used to tell me how jealous they were that I could look so pretty without having to do anything, but they had it entirely wrong. I had a wide array of spells on auto mode, so I was technically always doing something about my looks.
Well, since I was able to regrow people's arms, I didn't think my being able to keep my skin smooth and moisturized through magic would be that shocking. Healing magic was so overpowered that it could most likely even bypass the limit on the number of cell divisions.
I'd gotten rid of the dark powers inside of me, but even without them, I still hadn't aged a day.
By the way, even if I were to suddenly stop using magic, I wouldn't suddenly age in one go. I wasn't projecting an illusion over my actual face—which I could technically do with light magic—I was just maintaining my appearance. So if I ever disabled my automatic spells, my looks would simply slowly deteriorate over time.
The original Ellize had ruined her natural beauty by going ham on every craving she ever had. Apparently, she also stank. In the game, Verner had once stated that her stench combined with the saccharine smell of the perfume she drowned herself in was so pungent that he could barely stand to be in her presence.
My point was: even if you were born with striking good looks, you could easily destroy them if you weren't careful.
"You shouldn't wander through the streets too much," Yamoto said. "This country is far safer than anywhere in Fiori, but no place is perfectly safe. There are still dangerous idiots roaming around. In fact, I'd say there are many more scoundrels here, and with your looks...I worry even those who usually control themselves may lose their minds for a moment."
"Thank you for warning me. I'll be careful."
"Glad to hear that," she said, taking out her cell phone from her breast pocket. "Say, would you like to go somewhere quiet where we can talk? For the entire day if possible. I'd love to hear about everything that happened after my death. It will probably be our first and last... No, never mind. Let's not bring up depressing topics today."
I assumed she'd taken out her phone to check if she was free for the rest of today and tomorrow. Either way, her offer was a godsend. I'd come to this world hoping to have a proper conversation with her, so I had no intention to refuse.
I nodded without a word.
(2.8 word count)
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