Leave a comment

I tried my best to keep a calm composure as I looked down at the delicious (?) looking snail dish with its shell still intact. Just how did you end up getting caught by humans and become cooked like this, snail?

Seeing the sad state the snail is in, it made me nearly tear up.

“Try it.”

While smiling like a devil, Katalina cut the body of the snail into a small piece with her knife, stabbed it with her fork and brought it up near my mouth.

“I… I’m fine.”

If it was a different situation, or a whole different body, I would have been honored¹ to receive such a gesture. However, right now I’m just not really into it.

“Come on, don’t chicken out. Now, say ahh~”
“Ah~”

Seeing her open up her mouth cutely in a round shape, I unconsciously opened up my mouth‌, and before I realized my mistake, the pieces of a snail’s corpse entered my mouth.

This is just a ‘cooked conch’. Yep, just a plain cooked seafood conch.

Hypnotizing myself, I kept trying to forget about the delicious flavor² spreading through my mouth enhanced with the perfect herb seasoning.

“Delicious, right?”
“… Yeah.”

I felt a bit annoyed at Katalina, since I couldn’t tell if she was smiling because she knew how I felt or not. But still, I’ll forgive her because of how beautiful she is…

Hm. A brilliant idea popped in my mind. I once heard that British people find eating small octopuses… Repulsive, even though it’s regularly eaten in Korea³. I’ll feed that to her once I get a chance, perhaps.

“You were frowning all over your face just a moment ago, you know? Looks like the escargot was ‌delicious, seeing as how you keep smiling like that. See? I know it looks ‌suspicious, but it’s much more delicious than you think. Now, have one more.”
“It’s fi…”

I tried to tell her no, but seeing the fragment of snail’s body already held up to my mouth, holding up some kind of silent protest waiting to enter ‌my mouth, I ended up holding back my tears as I ate it‌.

I’ve already tasted the forbidden fruit, what good is it to keep trying? Some say that when a person wants to cry so much, they end up laughing, and that’s how I felt about right now.

And so, the breakfast between us where smiles and light laughter was enjoyed had finally ended, though it was only smiles for me on the outside.

“Now that we finished our meal… I must unpack my belongings now.”

We were having tea time when Katalina spoke as she put her teacup down.

“Belongings?”
“Ah, I didn’t tell you beforehand, did I. I’ve decided to stay in your mansion for a while. I also went on break for a semester so I can go to school together with you. My parents said they’ll be gone two months for a trip around Asia; since there won’t be anyone I know in my house for a while, I got permission from your butler to stay in your mansion.”

What I want to know is why you’d get the permission to move into my mansion from the butler rather than the owner of the house, which is me!

“So! I’m saying I’ll be staying in this mansion for a while. We’re already always close to each other in the game, so it’s nothing embarrassing at all, right?”
“…”

She looked very excited and happy about all this, so I didn’t want to particularly show my disagreement with it. It would look weird if I spoke up my disagreement and just hurt her feelings.

“I have permission, right?”

She’s quick to ask.

“Yeah.”
“Hehe, thanks.”

Katalina gave a bright smile and walked over to give me a light kiss on the cheek.

“Jeez…”
“Hm?”

The sudden kiss on the cheek surprised me, to which Katalina looked back at me with wide eyes and confusion on her face.

W… Well, I heard that in Britain, one way to greet people is to kiss the cheek of the person. There’s no need to be so flustered or blush so much from having a misunderstanding.

Come on, stop blushing…!

“It was just so sudden.”
“I see. You’ll help me unpack, right?”

I’m sorry. But can’t you tell the maids to take care of it instead? I’m extremely tired mentally right now.

“I’ll help‌.”
“Thanks, Ellie!”

I cursed at myself for thinking one way, yet acting the exact opposite every time.

Seeing nearly endless amounts of things that needed to be unpacked, I shook my head from side to side. It took nearly an hour to move everything, even though nearly every employee of the whole mansion was used in helping move the articles. It was just staggering, the amount of things she brought.

Nearly everything was all deeply related to clothing and accessories except the cube, which was identical to mine. Can you believe that?

Doesn’t matter if you do or not. Katalina, who’s been quite a handful for everyone in the mansion, was now proudly using the room that was located right in front of mine, and forced her way to installing her cube right next to mine in my ‌bedroom. It wasn’t like it was a problem since the room was so big and could easily fit in another cube next to mine without worrying about space.

“Fufu. To think ‌a day where we can lie down together in one room could come.”

Katalina said, which could have been easily misunderstood by someone else, as she stepped inside her cube. She said that there was an official guild staff conference in a moment, which was why she needed to connect.

“Do I need to come as well?”

But I couldn’t understand why I had to come‌.

“Yep. We’re going to be hunting together for a while, after all. So I planned to introduce you to the guild members. Oh, and do you want to join my guild, while we’re at it? I’ll give you the position equivalent of second-in-command.”

She’s ‌crafty, isn’t she…

“Nah, it’s fine.”
“Tsk!”

Katalina looked ‌disappointed at my clean rejection. However, seeing as how she quickly returned to her usual mood, it seemed that she expected me to say that.

“How about being Joint Guild Master, then? I’m being ‌generous here. You gave me this staff‌, so I want to do something for you‌.”

Being a guild master of a giant guild like Volcano’s guild, huh? I’ve also dreamed about being a guild master of a giant guild like that back when I was in Korea, so I felt a little enticed by the offer.

“I’m sure there’ll be a backlash though?”
“What backlash would there be? I build the guild around me, and there’s no user that exists that has higher fame and skill than you‌.”
“Hm…”

But I was sure that there would be a backlash. From their perspective, I may be a huge shining star, but I’m still invading their little party suddenly. If it was a small ‘friends only’ guild, it wouldn’t have mattered, but for a giant guild like Volcano, a complex web of tight relationships between all the members probably already exists.

Those that always enjoyed a certain amount of power wouldn’t be happy to share that with me. I also didn’t want to become a guild master if I am going to end up building hatred and a poor relationship with several people.

“I’m sorry, but I’m more comfortable playing alone.”
“Mmh… If you say so.”

Thankfully, Katalina didn’t push her suggestion any further.

“Then promise me one thing. That you’ll never join a guild that’s our enemy.”

I had no plan to join any guild in the first place, so it was an easy promise for me to keep.

“All right. I never wanted to join any guild, anyway.⁴”
“I see. That’s a shame.”

Finishing the conversation there, Katalina closed her capsule while saying she’ll meet me in the game, to which I nodded and closed my ‌capsule‌.

Author’s note
Finally, this act is now complete! Since it was a closure chapter for the act, it was ‌short‌. I think I’ll upload one more chapter today! But ‌the story will ‌develop for real.
Thank you for reading my humble story, and have a great day, readers!

1. Robinxen: Resisting British spelling
2. Robinxen: THE ALPHABET HAS A U FOR A REASON!
3. Robinxen: So originally this sentence was worded very differently and it was confusing. Then there were efforts to correct it. Then there were efforts to retranslate it. Then efforts to correct it again. Anyway long story short this was a bit of a nightmare on the editorial side and honestly a reminder of why I should edit before I upload rather than as I upload.
4. Robinxen: Wonder how this will go.
5. Footnote content.