Towards a Glory Not Worth Taking

by Ao Jyumonji

  “There were circumferences?” Anna-san said, continuing to rub Mimorin’s butt as she shrugged. “Oh! No. Circumstances? That why Kikkawa not here, yeah.”

  “With Kikkawa, there would have been four of us, and we could have had a productive time getting to know one another. That was why I said okay to this...”

  “In life, there is ups, there is downs! Yeah?” Anna-san said.

  “I don’t get it...”

  “Bullshit, you need to understand a maiden’s heart, darn it! Yeah!”

  “It’s fine.” Mimorin wiped the tears from her eyes using both of her index fingers. “This isn’t enough to discourage me.”

  Be discouraged, please...

  Haruhiro did think that, but it wasn’t like he wanted to break Mimorin’s heart. If possible, he didn’t want her to be hurt.

  She might be in someone else’s party, but they were like allies, so he wanted to get along. At the very least, he didn’t want it to be a strained atmosphere. He didn’t want anything special, just for things to feel normal between them. However, Mimorin didn’t feel the same way for some reason, and he had repeatedly received invitations to go out with her through Anna-san.

  At first, it had been for one-on-one meetings with Mimorin. Well, basically something like a date. It had been clear Anna-san was trying to get him to just go with the flow and hook up with her, so he’d politely declined.

  That still hadn’t made Mimorin give up, and Anna-san had probably gotten upset by it, too, so he’d been asked on dates over and over. Ultimately, even Tokimune had asked him to Please, go on a date with her, just once.

  If he’d kept on stubbornly refusing, he’d figured he might rub people the wrong way, but Haruhiro could be pretty stubborn. He had given conditions.

  A one-on-one meeting was out of the question. Because, as he had already clearly told her, Haruhiro wasn’t interested. If someone else was present, and it was strictly as friends, Haruhiro didn’t hate Mimorin or anything, so he wouldn’t have a problem with that. That was how it came to be that Mimorin, Anna-san, plus one other person would occasionally go out for food with Haruhiro, or they’d go on walks together.

  This time, because they were back in Alterna for the first time in a while, the suggestion had been that the four of them—Mimorin, Anna-san, Haruhiro, and Kikkawa—would go to a decent restaurant to get dinner together. There had been no reason for him to say no, so he’d accepted.

  Honestly, he’d still felt a little hesitant. But he couldn’t deny they were starting to feel a little bit vaguely like friends, so maybe they could get through this fine? That was what he’d thought.

  Maybe he’d been being naïve. He’d fallen right into their trap.

  He wasn’t pleased.

  He wasn’t angry either, though. Getting angry would only make him tired.

  “Well, anyway, shall we get something to eat?” Haruhiro asked.

  “I’ll eat.” Mimorin gave a powerful nod.

  Whoa, thought Haruhiro. Mimorin’s eyes are sparkling. Is she that happy?

  When someone else is that happy, it’s hard not to be happy about it. But, well, I don’t dislike her, you know? As a person. I do think she’s pretty weird, though. She’s too tall, which means I have to look up at her and my neck hurts, but that’s not a major problem.

  The three of them headed towards a place Anna-san said she’d picked out. Surprisingly, the cook, who was also the proprietor, was an elf man. This restaurant was popular for its spicy meat and wide variety of vegetable dishes.

  It was a long, narrow restaurant, and crowded, too, but they managed to get inside somehow. There was a small table in the back with four-legged chairs around it. Anna-san and Mimorin sat on one side, while Haruhiro sat across from them. The ordering was done by Anna-san, who really liked to be in charge on occasions like this.

  The herbal beer went down easier than normal beer. Every dish gave off a wonderful aroma that stimulated the appetite, and the flavor was quite good, too.

  During the meal, Mimorin said nothing. Anna-san was talkative, though she always was. Also, Mimorin sat up straight, barely making any noise. The way she ate was very neat.

  Anna-san’s eating was pretty rough. To be perfectly frank, her manners were atrocious. The truth was, Haruhiro couldn’t stand people who were always dropping their food, knocking things flying, and chewing loudly. He didn’t tell her off or frown at her, but he did wish she could do something about it.

  On that point, he had a favorable view of Mimorin. Honestly, he didn’t hate her as a person.

  “So?” Anna-san, who seemed to have gotten a little tipsy, fixed her gaze on him, then let out a belch that smelled strongly of herbs. “What unearth you not like about Mimorin? You are just a stupid Haruhiro. What the hell, cherry boy!”

  “What on Earth, you mean...” Haruhiro glanced over to gauge Mimorin’s expression.

  Their eyes met. She was staring at him hard.

  “Wait, that’s what we’re talking about? I’m ready to say let’s just be friends, really...”

  “You may be fine with it, but Mimorin is not fine, yeah!” Anna shouted. “Figure that out, dummy! Understand?”

  “No understand,” he said flatly.

  “Why not?! Dead or death?!”

  “If those are my options, I’m dead either way...”

  “No witty comebacks! You answer!” Anna-san banged on the table. “What wrong with Mimorin, yeah?! If you not have good reasons, I not forgive you, yeah?!”

  “Anna-san, c-calm down,” Haruhiro muttered.

  “How can I calm down, huh?!”

  “Well, at least keep it quiet...”

  “Why, you, why you so calm?! Fuck, you piss me off!”

  “I don’t know what to say to you there.”

  The restaurant grew quieter as Anna-san got more and more heated up. This was really awkward.

  Haruhiro loudly cleared his throat, rubbing his forehead. He didn’t want to have this talk, but if he didn’t give a serious answer, Anna-san wasn’t going to stop.

  “Well... I dunno,” Haruhiro said. “It’s not... what is it? It’s not that there’s something wrong with her, or that I dislike her, or anything like that, you know.”

  “Then,” Mimorin asked, leaning in, “what?”

  “Hmm...” Haruhiro closed his eyes, rubbing them with both his hands. “I’m not confident I can explain it all that well. I get the feeling... I lack the experience.”

  “It’s the same for me,” said Mimorin.

  “And for Anna-san, too, yeah?!”

  “...I-I see. Erm, so, it’s, like, you know? It’s not a logical thing, right? This kind of stuff isn’t. I mean, obviously, yeah? There’re things like liking the person’s face, or them having been kind to you, that sort of stuff. The reasons people, basically, fall in love, and such? The triggers. In some cases, there may be one, but is that all there is to it? Maybe not....”

  “I love you, Haruhiro,” said Mimorin. “You’re right, there’s no logic behind it.”

  “No, listen—”

  He almost said, Thank you, but he forced himself to stop. There was no question that he was feeling inconvenienced by it. If he thanked her, that would be a lie.

  “Yeah,” Haruhiro said. “Somehow, well, yeah... Like, right, erm, it’s not what’s not good about you, it’s that I just don’t have those sorts of feelings for you whatsoever, you know. It’s bad of me to say that so bluntly. No, maybe it isn’t?”

  “Of course you are bad, yeah?! Ohhh, Mimoriiiin, Mimoriiiin...”

  Anna-san lost her mind, trying to hug Mimorin around the shoulders—but, given their relative sizes, she couldn’t possibly hug her. It was an impossible challenge.

  Give it your best shot, Anna-san, Haruhiro thought. Mimorin is still crying. But man, she sure looks like she’s in anguish. When I look at her, it makes my chest hurt. That doesn’t mean I’m going to give in to emotion, though.

  Anna-san started to tear up, too, and when s
he glared at him with her teary, reddened eyes, he honestly wanted to run away. “Haruhiro is heartless! Such a cold-hearted man, yeah?!”

  “Oh, sure,” he said. “I can’t blame you for calling me that.”

  “You corn seed?!”

  “Huh? Corn seed...? Oh, I concede?” Haruhiro asked.

  “That! That’s the word, yeah?! How did you know?! That amazing!”

  “Well, I’ll have to admit, I’m amazed I got it myself, but—”

  “That doesn’t matter, yeah!” Anna-san yelled.

  “Of course it doesn’t...”

  “No,” Mimorin said with a sniffle. “Haruhiro isn’t cold-hearted.”

  “What?!” Anna-san shouted.

  “Haruhiro isn’t cold,” said Mimorin. “He’s just not a liar.”

  “Nghhh.” Anna groaned, holding her head. “Not a liar? But...”

  You’re starting to act like a middle-aged man there, Anna-san, thought Haruhiro.

  “He just doesn’t say things that would leave a false impression.” Mimorin bit her lip hard. “He doesn’t give me, whom he doesn’t love, any hope.”

  “Gwahhhhhhhhhhh.” Anna-san started pulling out her hair, forcing herself to speak with a voice that sounded like she might start coughing up blood. “Mimoriiiiiiiiiin, you not have to say all that, yeah?!”

  “I understand it.”

  “Buuuut—”

  “I love that about him, too.”

  “Ohhhhhhhh!”

  “I love you.” Mimorin stared at Haruhiro as the tears streamed down her face. “So, please, let me keep you as a pet. No, wrong one. Go out with me.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I expected that response.”

  Haruhiro went on hesitantly. “Well, you know... even if the whole pet thing is kind of weird, I can see you’re serious about this, and, well, I can understand, but... while I comprehend it, in my own way, still... but that’s what makes it all the worse... like, you know? I can’t just say whatever...”

  “You idiot!” Anna-san shouted, pointing her finger at Haruhiro. “Are you stupid?! You at the age when you want to do it all the time! Day and night, you think about it! That’s you, young! Why not just go out with her and do it? You can, can’t you? You’re in mating season! Yeah!”

  “You’re getting a little lewd there, Anna-san,” said Haruhiro.

  “Shut up, yeah! You look! Mimorin’s boobies! Boing! She have very good body! She does, yeah?! You not want to sink your teeth into that?!”

  “No, I’m not going to be doing that,” said Haruhiro. “I’m not Ranta. Well, he’s all talk, too, so I doubt he’d actually do anything.”

  “Mimorin is head over eels for you!”

  “You mean head over heels...”

  “With her endless sexniques, she serve you endlessly, no doubt about it!”

  “...Sexniques?”

  “Sexual techniques are sexniques, yeah?! Special technique! You know?!”

  “Yeah... Kind of. But you’re saying it kind of loud...”

  “What’s more, she is a virgin! Virgin! Not even had her first kiss yet!”

  “That’s true.” For some reason, Mimorin confirmed this with straight face.

  Was that an important point, maybe? Haruhiro didn’t really get it, but there was one thing that seemed off to him if it was true.

  “Huh? ...Then what about this special... technique?”

  “I’ll study.” Mimorin nodded again. “It’s fine.”

  “Just leave it to Anna-san, yeah?!” Anna-san thumped one hand on her ample, though not so ample as Mimorin’s, bosom. “Anna-san take her by the hand and teach her each and every technique there is, yeah!”

  “You have a lot of experience... then?” Haruhiro asked hesitantly.

  “Don’t be silly, pervert boy! I’m obviously a fresh virgin, yeah?!”

  “No, but then—”

  “Heh heh,” Anna-san put on a bold smile and pinched her own earlobe. “Anna-san knows so much about sex. I’m the kind of girl who comes along once in a century, you know? It will be easy.”

  “...I see.”

  “In my imagination, I make more than a million guys climax, you know?”

  “Maybe you’re fantasizing a little too much.”

  “It was obviously a joke, yeah?! Because Anna-san’s a pure, proper, holy virgin!”

  “Okay, fine. Whatever...”

  Haruhiro took a sip of his herbal beer and looked downwards. The inside of the restaurant wasn’t silent like it had been a moment ago, but Haruhiro and the others were still drawing attention, and more than a few customers were listening in. Anna-san sure liked her dirty jokes. Haruhiro didn’t especially hate them or anything, but he didn’t like them all that much, either.

  “So, how about it?!” Anna-san took a long swig of her herbal beer, then let out a satisfied sigh. “For now, you try going out with her? Try it? Not a bad deal, yeah? Because, with her nice body, you drown in dirty desire every day?”

  “Yeah, no, I’ll pass.”

  “Fuck you!” Anna-san flipped him the bird.

  No matter what they said, he wasn’t going to cave in on this. Especially because they were his allies—but even if they weren’t, he’d have felt the same. He wasn’t keen on going out with someone he had no romantic feelings for. Or rather, Haruhiro felt it was impossible for him to do that. Even if she paid him, he’d feel that way. No, if he was offered money, that might make it even worse.

  Maybe I’m just being stubborn? he thought. I can’t deny the possibility, but the point is that that’s just how I am.

  “Is there any...” Mimorin started, then the tears started running again and she wiped them with her hand. “I’m sorry. For crying.”

  “...No,” he murmured. He didn’t know why, but that made his heart skip a beat. Now why might that be? Why had his heart skipped a beat? Haruhiro himself didn’t know at all. “Y-You don’t need to apologize. Erm, it would help if you’d stop crying. It’s not like I want to make you cry. I don’t want you to cry...”

  “This is a first for me,” said Mimorin. “I’m so sad, it hurts.”

  “...Sorry.”

  “Don’t apologize. It’s not your fault, Haruhiro. I just went and fell in love with you on my own.”

  “Er, well, yeah, that’s true, but...”

  “Can I continue with my question?” Mimorin asked.

  “Oh, go ahead.”

  “Is there any possibility?”

  “...Of what?”

  “Even if you can’t do it now. Someday...”

  “Um, you mean at some point in the future?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Hrm...”

  Haruhiro wanted to writhe and squirm, but he desperately restrained himself.

  I’m not sure. That’s a really tough one. I’m stumped.

  He felt that, maybe, telling her No, at no point in the future would it ever be possible might be the kind thing to do here. It was wrong for her to fall in love with someone like Haruhiro in the first place. Time wasn’t infinite. Even now, it was ticking by. It wasn’t as if he didn’t think she should give up on him and find someone else—but, you know?

  Was that something for Haruhiro to decide? Mimorin, in her own way, had found something appealing in Haruhiro. As a result, she had fallen in love with him. Did Haruhiro have any right to deny those feelings?

  Having worked alongside the Tokkis, he had gotten a sense for what Mimorin was like. True, she was strange. She was a mage, but she couldn’t ditch the habits she’d picked up as a warrior. It scared him when he saw her running up front and waving her sword around. However, she was strong, and she was good with a sword, too. She also cared deeply for her comrades.

  Occasionally, she was adorable.

  He didn’t really hate her as a person. If anything, he actually liked her.

  The way she came straight at him and did nothing but push her affection on him was what he had a problem with. If not for that, honestly, he
would have had no issues with her.

  He even had a positive view of Mimorin’s personality. At the very least, he liked her enough that he wanted to respect her thoughts and feelings.

  Haruhiro didn’t know what to do about Mimorin’s affection and thought, If only we were just friends, that would be easier, but even so... wasn’t it wrong for Haruhiro to try to change her values or feelings to get rid of her bothersome feelings for him? After all, Haruhiro was only thinking about his own convenience.

  Besides, if he were to tell her there was no possibility of them ever getting together, sure, he could say that, but wasn’t it a lie? No one knew what tomorrow might bring. It was questionable whether they’d even still be alive.

  Despite that, might it be best to tell that lie?

  Or should he be honest to a fault?

  What was right? What should he do for Mimorin? For Mimorin? Was Haruhiro really thinking of Mimorin? Wasn’t he just pretending to care for her? Wasn’t he being a hypocrite?

  “Can I give it to you straight?” Haruhiro asked at last. “Well, I’m going to. I don’t know what’s possible. I don’t know the future. That’s not just me; it’s the same for anybody. Just, right now, honestly, I think you’re an interesting person. It’s fun to watch you, and I don’t mind talking at all, but I can’t consider a romantic relationship. I really do feel like, ‘Can’t we just be friends?’ I can’t do anything more than that right now. Maybe, some years from now, I might decide I do like you that way, but I don’t want to think about that. It’s not reliable. Even if I started feeling that way, you might already have a boyfriend by then, and there would be nothing I could do about it. It’s a matter of timing, you know. I can only speak for now, sorry. I have my hands full just worrying about the present.”

  Mimorin stared intently into Haruhiro’s eyes, listening closely. It wasn’t that Haruhiro didn’t find that intimidating, but he did his best not to look away. When he finished, all of his strength left him.

  I must have really sleepy eyes right now, he thought. He wasn’t sleepy, but he was exhausted.

  “I understand,” Mimorin said, her whole face twitching. She narrowed her eyes, raising both corners of her lips in what was probably a smile.