Chapter 86: Young Lady

When I opened the streaming dashboard, my eyes caught on the follower count.

[Followers: 1,600]

Chewing a bite of my sandwich, I leaned closer to the screen. The last time I checked, it hadn’t even reached thirteen hundred. Despite not streaming for several days, people were still following my account.

Apparently, the clips of Caramel beating me were still doing their job.

I wasn’t sure whether I should be proud of that.

I placed the plate at the edge of the desk and checked my microphone. The blue-haired avatar on the screen moved with me when I turned my head. After making sure everything worked properly, I started the stream.

It didn’t take long for the first messages to arrive.

[Finally!]

[Where have you been all this time?!]

[I was starting to think you’d abandoned us.]

[All hail the Great Noctis!]

[I thought she’d never stream again after Caramel.]

I picked up my sandwich again and read the messages. Less than a minute into the stream, I was already being questioned and reminded of my recent defeats.

After swallowing my last bite, I leaned toward the microphone.

“Oii, you ungrateful mortals!”

Laughing emojis appeared in the chat one after another.

“You have no idea what the Great Noctis has been dealing with lately! You should be grateful I’m streaming at all.”

[Forgive us, Great Noctis.]

[Can we make it up to you with a sandwich?]

[Finish what’s in your mouth first.]

I frowned at the last message.

“I already did.”

When that answer made them laugh too, I rolled my eyes and pushed the plate aside.

Over the past few days, I had survived an Overlap, been knocked to the ground by Eris countless times, and received a mission from the System telling me to kill someone. If I told them any of that, they would probably think I was making it up and laugh even harder.

“Anyway. Today, you’ll witness the Great Noctis’s victories.”

I opened Nexus Frontline and joined the matchmaking queue.

When the first match began, I sat a little straighter. As I placed my fingers on the keys, I remembered what my angel had said about the Chained Executioner.

Predicting what my opponent would do…

It was easy enough to say.

When my first attack missed, I was reminded that putting it into practice was still difficult. My opponent took advantage of the opening and knocked off some of my health, but this time, I didn’t try to strike back immediately.

I retreated and waited for them to repeat the same move.

When they came at me, I swung the chained scythe. A smile spread across my face when the weapon connected and their health bar dropped sharply.

“That’s it!”

The chat grew livelier when I won the first match.

[She’s learned a thing or two!]

[All hail the Great Noctis!]

“I’ve always been this good. You just didn’t appreciate me.”

My defeat in the second match gave the chat plenty of chances to throw those words back at me.

Still, I kept playing. After a few more matches, my fingers had grown used to the controls again, and most of my attention had shifted to the game. Between matches, I read the chat, talked back to the people giving me advice, and explained why it wasn’t entirely my fault whenever I lost.

But between every match, my eyes searched for the same name.

Caramel.

There wasn’t a single message from her in the chat.

Noticing that bothered me more than I had expected. After our last encounter, I hadn’t even wanted to be in the same game as her for a while. But things had changed a little now.

I wanted a rematch, at least.

Maybe I would lose again. Still, getting beaten for six matches and acting as though nothing had happened hurt my pride.

Next time.

Without telling the chat why I was looking for her, I pressed the matchmaking button again.

By the time I decided to end the stream, my follower count had reached nineteen hundred.

[Followers: 1,900]

Looking at the number on the screen eased my exhaustion a little. Taking a few days off hadn’t ruined everything. Besides, I wasn’t far from reaching two thousand followers.

“That’s all for today, mortals. The Great Noctis needs to rest.”

[Don’t disappear again!]

[Good night!]

I took off my headphones and picked up my phone.

There were no notifications.

Moving to the bed, I lay on my back and opened my conversation with Angel.

It had been about three hours since my angel left my apartment. She had said she would call tonight, but she hadn’t sent even a single message yet.

Was she arguing with her father?

Remembering the missed calls on her phone and her expression when she checked the time, the possibility didn’t seem unlikely. She might have gotten into trouble for coming home late.

Or perhaps she had something else to do.

I stared at the empty conversation for several seconds.

Maybe she had forgotten…

I didn’t like that thought.

Moving my thumb across the screen, I sent a waving emoji.

[👋]

I rested the phone on my chest and waited. When I picked it up again a short while later, nothing had changed.

I looked at the ceiling, then checked my phone again.

I knew this wouldn’t make her reply any faster.

Still, I couldn’t stop checking.

Should I call her?

I had never spoken to her on the phone before. We had exchanged messages, met in the park, and even seen each other in my apartment today, but I had never heard her voice on the other end of a call.

My finger hovered over the call icon.

If she was busy, she wouldn’t answer. There was no reason to make a big deal out of it.

Finally, I pressed the button and brought the phone to my ear.

No one answered on the first ring. On the second, I sat up on the bed. Just as I was wondering whether I should hang up, the call connected.

“Angel!”

I hadn’t even tried to hide the happiness in my voice.

The reply from the other end froze the smile on my face.

“Who are you?”

It was a man’s voice.

I pulled the phone away from my ear to check the number I had called, then brought it back.

A man? Why is a man answering my angel’s phone?!

“Hello? Are you there?”

“Y-yes!”

I tried to keep my voice as high as possible.

It was probably her father or brother. At least, I hoped it was.

Clinging to the possibility that he was her father, I continued.

“I’m a friend of your daughter’s.”

There were several seconds of silence on the other end. My fingers tightened around the phone, and I even began breathing more slowly.

Finally, the man spoke again.

“Yukie is busy right now, young lady.”

Yukie?

I repeated the name in my mind. Then I noticed the rest of his sentence.

Young lady…

Normally, I would have protested. Right now, I had no intention of correcting him.

“Busy?”

“It’ll be a little while longer. She’s grounded at the moment.”

I frowned.

“Grounded?”

“Her mother told her to clean up her room. When she didn’t, she took her phone away. She won’t get it back until she’s finished.”

For several seconds, I couldn’t say anything.

I pictured my angel standing among clothes scattered around her. I imagined her looking innocent as she occupied herself with something other than cleaning her room, then getting caught by her mother and slumping her shoulders.

The corners of my lips rose.

I covered my mouth with my free hand to keep from laughing.

“I see,” I finally said, trying to keep my voice steady. “I’m sorry for bothering you.”

“No problem. I’ll tell her you called.”

“Thank you. Good night.”

“Good night.”

When the call ended, I rested the phone on my knees and let out a long breath.

So nothing had happened to her.

She might not have forgotten me either.

She had simply been grounded by her mother.

I looked at the name Angel on the screen for a while. Then I quietly repeated the name I had just learned.

“Yukie…”

So that was your name, my angel.

I was supposed to do forty pull-ups to learn her real name. Her father had told me in a single sentence.

Still, I had no intention of backing out of my promise.

I put the phone on the bed and ran a hand over my face.

In a way, I had just had my first conversation with my father-in-law.

And he thought I was one of his daughter’s female friends.

“Ahh… This wasn’t how I imagined it.”

I leaned my head back and looked at the ceiling. A small smile still rested on my lips, but a few seconds later, I remembered the other matters I had been putting off all day.

I opened the System window.

[Ongoing Missions]

[Place in the top three in the cosplay contest.]

[Kill Marven Voss.]

My smile slowly faded as my eyes stopped on the second line.

I needed to prepare for the contest, continue training with Eris, and grow stronger so I could enter the Academy. Amid all that, I couldn’t ignore the latest mission the System had given me either.

My phone lay right beside me. A few minutes ago, my only concern had been getting a call from her.

Now I sat on the edge of the bed, staring at the words in front of me.

I had a lot to do.