Chapter 825: Planning The Perfect Date

"...Hafu."

Since there were still three weeks before the promised date between Alex and Aeris, the young man had plenty of time to prepare it properly.

"....Mngh."

Seeing how sincere she had been earlier, he understood that he had to do this right. Since Aeris wanted a romantic date, he would do his best to make it happen.

"...Mmmh... Hafu..."

But to make his plan succeed, he first had to gather more information about Aeris. Unfortunately, he didn’t really pay attention to her character back when he was playing ELO.

In fact, he never even played her route. Not even once.

"...Hah...Mmm..."

It was then that Alex decided that he would ask Lapiz for information about her sister. The things she liked, the things she didn’t like, as well as her outlook on life.

While Alex was thinking about these things, he heard someone cough lightly beside him.

"If you keep on petting Lala’s head like that, the poor girl is gonna melt." Lumi was giving Alex the stink eye for only paying attention to Lala.

The young man was seated on the couch, while Lala was seated on his lap with her head resting on his chest.

He was deep in thought, so he subconsciously started petting her head.

But Lala seemed to feel very happy about being treated like this, so she was making those happy sounds after receiving Alex’s head pats.

Lumi’s comment made Alex snap from his daze before hurriedly removing his hand from Lala’s head.

The little girl puffed her cheeks in response before reaching out to hold Alex’s hand. She then placed it on the top of her head and made patting movements with it, urging the young man to continue what he had been doing earlier.

Naturally, he was more than happy to oblige. A few minutes later, Lala started to make happy sounds once more, as if she was melting from happiness.

Lumi could only sigh helplessly because there was nothing she could do at the moment. It wasn’t like she could toss Lala to the side and make the Alter cry.

During the battle in Hy-Brasil, Lumi had merged with Latifa so that she could fight at full strength.

It was then that they noticed that one of Reverse Latifa’s tails had a necklace tied around it.

They instinctively felt that the tail was none other than Reverse Lala, who no longer appeared after she went to see Alex one last time.

Lala was one of Latifa’s Alters.

It was the shy and childish side of hers that she didn’t dare show to anyone.

Because of this, Latifa, including Lotte, Lumi, and Lulu, simply watched as Alex pampered their newest family member.

If not for the fact that Alex and Latifa were still young, the moment they walked along the streets while holding Lala’s hand, many people would think of them as a family.

"Remember, don’t go patting Lala’s head in public," Lotte warned him. "People might think of you as a criminal if you do that."

Alex blinked at those words. "What are you talking about? Did Auntie Flo visit you today? Why are you cranky?"

It was then that they heard someone laugh inside the clubroom.

It was none other than Lulu, who had helped Lotte cook some pancakes for Alex and Lala as their afternoon snack.

The rest of the club members of Endless Horizon were currently busy, so they didn’t visit the clock tower.

In fact, most of the time, Renard, Charles, and even Vaan spent their free time in the training grounds sparring with each other.

As for Nessia and Chuck, they busied themselves with alchemy. The two were trying to create special artifacts that would prove useful during battle, which they would supply to their members.

"Well then. Isn’t it about time for you to tell us what’s on your mind?" Lumi casually asked before taking a bite of the pancake that Alex was planning to give to Lala.

The little girl puffed her cheeks once more because her food was stolen.

"Don’t worry, Lotte and Lulu made plenty," Alex said as he cut another small piece of pancake that was lathered in honey. "Here, say ah..."

"Ahh.... mmmm." Lala chewed happily after securing her snack.

Latifa and her three other Alters couldn’t help but feel envious of Lala right now.

Lumi even thought that sitting on Alex’s lap and letting him feed her didn’t sound bad right now.

"Is this what it feels like to have a daughter?" Alex muttered as he used his handkerchief to wipe the corner of Lala’s lips. "I wish my daughters would be as cute as you, Lala."

"Don’t worry," Lumi said subconsciously. "Our daughter will look cuter than her."

Hearing this, Lala pouted back at Lumi, as if she was saying with her eyes that no one could be cuter than her.

Meanwhile, Alex froze up a bit as his eyes wandered to Latifa’s bed, where the young lady was sleeping.

However, she wasn’t asleep right now.

Instead, she met Alex’s gaze and blushed deeply. It was then that someone spoke up, making everyone shift their attention to Lotte.

"...How many daughters do you want to have?" Lotte asked with genuine curiosity.

"Um... I don’t know," Alex replied. "One or two should be fine, I guess? Having more might force me to destroy a kingdom if some arrogant prince wants to ask for their hand in marriage."

A chuckle reached everyone’s ears, making them shift their attention to Lulu.

"You’ve already thought that far, huh?" Lulu asked in a teasing tone. "Don’t worry. It doesn’t matter how many kids you want. We will give birth to them without fail."

Lala blinked. Just as she was about to raise her hand as if volunteering to join in on the discussion, Alex, Lumi, and Lotte grabbed her hand at that moment, preventing her from raising it.

This was a discussion for adults, so having Lala participate in it would be a crime.

"Muuu..." Lala pouted once more. "Not fair... nano!"

"What not fair are you talking about?" Lumi arched an eyebrow. "You’re still a kid. Wait until you grow as tall as me before you join this talk."

"Hmph!" Lala wanted to continue pouting, but Alex was still feeding her pancakes, which made it hard for her to continue pouting.

The Alters then tried to pry some information from Alex because they were curious to find out why he was deep in thought earlier.

When all of them found out that he was thinking about his future date with Aeris, the atmosphere inside the clubroom quieted down.

Alex and Lala then blinked at the same time because they had no idea what was happening.

A moment later, Lulu and Lumi grabbed Alex’s arms and pulled him to the bed where Latifa was lying.

Lotte moved right next to Lala and dutifully covered her eyes.

"Is Papa in trouble, nano?" Lala asked.

"Yes," Lotte replied. "So, be a good girl and stay where you are."

"Okay!"

"Good."

Lotte didn’t want their youngest family member to see how her Papa would be dealt with by the three ladies, who planned to make him forget about Aeris by showing him who truly held his heart.

A few hours later, Alex left the clock tower while using a crutch to help support his shaking feet, making him the laughingstock of the dormitory when they saw him walking like his very soul had been sucked out of his body.