Chapter 116: Do You Want Anything Else?

Such a close, intimate gesture immediately surprised and flustered her.

"H-hey—!"

Just as she was about to pull away, Hilda had already succeeded in getting them trays.

Afterwards, she began to drag her around.

"What’d you wanna eat? Pasta, soup, burger, pizza... Stew?" Hilda pointed around, then added, "I’m not a picky eater, so you don’t need to think on my behalf."

Nadia, having given up trying to escape Hilda, quirked an eyebrow. "What made you think I would think on your behalf—"

"Hey, hey! Be hostile towards me after we’ve eaten!" Hilda pouted.

Taken aback by Hilda’s unexpected pout, Nadia looked around. She wasn’t a picky eater either, so it didn’t take long for her to find a stall.

Burger Head.

After reading the franchise’s name, Hilda leaned over to glimpse what Nadia ordered and smirked.

"Burger, <anno data-annotation-id="ed7b7762-d486-49ab-ac06-5c0e4737b567" data-title="chips">chips¹</anno>, and nuggets, eh~? Very good choice~" Hilda cooed, eyeing what was on Nadia’s tray. She also watched as the Heroine ordered an orange smoothie as well.

"Hmph." Nadia huffed as she balanced everything on her tray, then turned away from the stall, intending to find the others.

But.

As she was about to leave...

"Uhm... you have to pay for that."

... She was stopped by the worker behind the counter.

Nadia instantly froze in place, then swiftly turned around, almost knocking her drink off her tray.

She then asked incredulously, with wide eyes. "I have to pay?!"

She hadn’t expected an institute that gave out free housing, education, and other utilities to charge its students for something as necessary as food!

The worker behind the counter chuckled in understanding.

"I haven’t seen you before; you two must be the new first-years, right? Yeah, so, since this is a franchise and not something the academy provides itself, you’ll have to pay if you want something from this stall. This is about the same for the rest of the stalls here.

"But since you both are students, the academy does provide you with a 25% student discount."

Nadia was hesitant until she heard about the discount. "25%, huh?"

She walked back to the counter and placed down her tray.

Though still reluctant to pay, she pulled out her wallet from inside her bag.

"How much will it be?"

"Let’s see... with the burger, chips, chicken nuggets, and smoothie, it’ll be... £15 after the discount."

"F-fifteen?" Nadia repeated. ’So expensive!’

She then looked inside her wallet to find only a few measly £10 notes.

Clearly, she had enough for the meal, but...

’I really don’t want to blow so much on a single lunch.’ Her face contorted, then darkened. ’Maybe, I should’ve taken up Uncle’s offer for allowance...’

With a loud sigh, she embarrassingly asked:

"How much... without the nuggets?"

"Without the nuggets? It’ll be—"

Before the worker could subtract the item from the register, a £20 note suddenly appeared on the counter.

"That should be more than enough, right?"

Nadia, noticing a gloved hand pull away from the notes, instantly turned to Hilda.

"H-hey, I don’t need you to pay for me—"

"Do you want anything else?"

"... Huh?"

The Heroine watched as the German flexed the inside of her wallet, which was filled to the brim with £20 notes.

She gulped. ’That’s... so much money!’

Watching as Hilda received her change, she asked, "W-what did you mean if I wanted anything else? No way you’re going to just keep paying for m—"

"I meant, did you want anything else to eat?" Hilda tilted her head, then smiled comfortingly. "I asked you to go out to lunch, not to worry about spendings~... It’s depressing to see you act like that."

She then giggled. "So go on, impose on me. What else do you want? Another burger? Chips?"

Seeing the sincerity in Hilda’s words, Nadia was left speechless.

At the offer, she was hesitant, wondering if she should...

But then shook her head and grabbed her tray. "No, it’s alright... thank you, though."

Hilda quirked an eyebrow. "Are you sure? Is that really all that you’re getting?"

Nadia nodded confidently. "This’ll be all I’m getting. I want to leave enough food for other people."

The German blinked at the Heroine’s answer and laughed. "There’s so much food here, yet you’re worrying about something as trivial as that? Alright, fine."

She then ordered five orders of burgers, chips, nuggets, and a black coffee.

After getting her food, she walked alongside Nadia, who waited for her, over to where everyone was.

Once they were settled down, Hilda sneakily tucked two of the burgers she ordered into her Inventory.

[System Inventory: ... Burgers x2]

...

[New Quest: Have Lunch with Nadia Crane]

[Importance: Minor]

[Reward: 50 SC

[Status: Completed]

After a casual lunch, they had enough time to make their way back to the classroom.

But along the way back...

"Are you sure you aren’t still hungry?"

Hilda couldn’t help but notice that Nadia still wasn’t satisfied with lunch.

Although the woman was hiding it extremely well.

"We can go back for more food. I bet this lesson will just be a continuation of the last one as an analysis."

Nadia glanced over at Hilda, who walked alongside her, and noticed her genuine concern.

Once she figured there was no possible way her answer could be used for some ulterior motive, she said:

"I’m... fine. Thanks for asking. And I’d rather not miss any lessons, if possible."

Seeing how set Nadia was on this choice, Hilda shrugged nonchalantly. "Alright, you do you."

...

It was 12 o’clock.

At this point, everyone had returned to the classroom, including Herman, who immediately began his lesson without much introduction.

Just like Hilda predicted, it was a continuation of the last lesson, except with more in-depth analysis of some things.

This lesson continued for an hour, like last period, before they were let out for another 30-minute break. But when they returned to the same classroom, they found Herman preparing a lesson that wasn’t on History.

Instead...

It was Geography.

"We’ll be looking into the Geography of the United Kingdom. Specifically, the overpopulation brought by Vitality, along with the borders set between the low-to-high-valued towns and cities."