The Demon Prince goes to the Academy
chapter-118

After Lunch.

Kono Lint went straight into action—he headed right towards a certain someone preparing for her next class.

“Hey, Grantz.”

“Huh, what?”

His target was Liana de Grantz. Was he thinking about getting closer to Liana?

However, I didn’t know if that was the best choice. She was the female version of me after all, you know?

“Hey, would you like to go eat something together with me after class? There’s a good new shop on Mainstreet.”

What the hell? I didn’t know what to say either.

He just looked like he was openly flirting with her.

“…With you?”

Sure enough, she completely looked like she wanted to say something like, “Why do I have to eat while looking at your ugly mug?”

Wow, although it was happening to someone else, I felt even more ashamed. Erich and Cayer couldn’t even look at the scene because they felt similarly to me.

“H-huh?”

“We have P.E. next. I’m too tired to even move after that.”

“Ah… Okay. Yeah, come to think of it, that’s true!”

Kono Lint was as stiff as a creaking wooden doll. He turned around, returned to his seat, and sat down.

Ah.

I already knew that it wouldn’t go well, but seeing it directly like that made it hard to bear for me.

***

After some time.

“…It didn’t work.”

Before P.E., Kono Lint came up to me, whispering under his breath again in the locker room. I could also feel Erich and Cayer paying keen attention to our conversation.

“Well, first of all, what you did wasn’t natural at all. It was no wonder that when you ask someone out for dinner like that, they would ask, “Why?”. It probably felt burdensome.”

There was more!

Natural, huh. I didn’t even know what natural meant anymore. Was it really natural to just ask someone out to eat or to go out to play? How does one even do that?

I was confused.

Of course, Ellen was actually the one who’d asked me out to eat at that point, and if I asked her to go play, I was somewhat sure that she would come.

If it was Harriet, she would say something like, “Why should I do that with you?” However, if I forcefully dragged her along, she would let herself get dragged—even though she would grumble.

That was only possible after I built some kind of relationship with those two. Kono Lint wasn’t close to our female classmates to begin with.

We had to start from zero, but how could one act naturally with zero progress? I mean, I wasn’t even good at that either.

I was just lucky. So I wouldn’t know how to do it again if someone asked me to.

“What are you talking about so secretively?”

Bertus approached me with a smile after he finished changing his clothes.

“No, well, he wants to know how to get close to the girls…”

“S-stop!”

Kono Lint covered my mouth when I tried to say something, but Bertus had already heard everything.

“Ah… So you were in the middle of consulting him?”

Bertus had a subtle look on his face as he looked at Kono Lint. His expression looked quite ambiguous.

“That… There are probably more important issues… No. Don’t mind it. Cheer up.”

-Pat, pat

Bertus patted Kono Lint on the shoulder with a knowing attitude and then left the locker room.

“…To be honest, I’m not completely sure, but I think your target is simply the wrong one.”

Harriet and Liana, who both had a prickly side, would probably answer with “Why should I?” when approached like that. He’d get the same reaction no matter what.

In Class A, Ellen might go along with him if he were to ask her out to eat, and types like Adelia might agree as well.

When I told him to try someone else, he nodded and said that he would give it a try, regardless of him liking Liana or not.

***

During P.E., Kono Lint was busily wandering around during our breaks.

No, how many people was he flirting within a single day? Weren’t you supposed to take your time? Did he want to be portrayed as a philanderer?

“No.”

“Ah, I see.”

Ellen refused sharply when Kono Lint asked her if she had some time later. He skipped Harriet because the results were rather obvious without having to try. Then he approached Adelia, who was completely exhausted because of the continuous physical training.

How would it go with Adelia, who would probably go along with it after hesitating for a bit?

Kono Lint started by handing her a water bottle instead of immediately badgering her.

“Oh, ah… Thank you…?”

Adelia smiled slightly when Kono Lint suddenly showed her some kindness by handing her a water bottle.

“Are you tired?”

“Ye-yes… That’s right.”

“After P.E., would you like to go out to drink something cool together?”

“…Huh?”

At Kono Lint’s shamelessness, Adelia just smiled apologetically.

“Ah… I’m sorry, I planned to go buy some magic tools together with Harriet later. Let’s eat together some other time.”

“Oh, I-is that so? Then it can’t be helped. Ha, hahaha!”

Adelia refused him as well, but at least she tried to not hurt him too badly.

Kono Lint—who created some kind of record and got dumped by all the female students of Class A except for Harriet in a single day—came back to the male students completely deflated.

It was truly a hard to watch sight, so Cayer, Erich, and I couldn’t look at him properly.

“I-I got dumped by everyone, Reinhardt… Well, Adelia said that she would eat with me later… Is she actually interested in me?”

“No, she was just saying that. Don’t believe it.”

“As expected…”

The boy sat down next to me, his expression seeming as if his soul had left his body.

“Ah… Well, most of them had plans already… So that couldn’t be helped…”

I was unusually careful with my words because if I rebuked him too harshly, he might fall into a serious depressive state.

I didn’t really like that guy, but more than not liking him, I pitied him.

“H-hey, is that even the right way? Just asking them to go out to eat with me normally… That’s the wrong method, isn’t it?”

Kono Lint threw me some resentful looks. He seemed to believe that I gave him some strange method which was actually to blame, not himself.

W-well… Seeing it play out right before my eyes, it really seemed to be the wrong way to go about it. When a guy they weren’t even close with suddenly asked them to go and eat together, they would be kind of at a loss for words.

Still, shouldn’t they be a little more understanding and be more like, “If there’s an opportunity, sure, let’s eat something together!” or something?

“W-well… It doesn’t seem to be the right method, I think… yeah.”

I could invite Ellen or Harriet out to eat without a problem, but Adelia was scared of me, so she would probably cry and run away. I don’t think I would be able to invite Liana.

“Hey, Reinhardt…”

“…What?”

Kono Lint fell into despair, but it didn’t seem like he had given up yet.

“Can’t you demonstrate?”

“W-what do you mean by demonstrate?”

He wanted to see the demonstration of an actual ‘pro’.

I’m not Casanove! How did this happen?!

“P-please, just show it to me once. Pleeeaase.”

Kono Lint, who got mentally damaged slightly due to my wrong instructions, was seriously about to grab at my pant leg. I thought those guys absolutely hated me. Kono Lint. They might brand you as a traitor, you know?

Did he want to do something like share his girlfriend with his two friends?

“No, I’m not even that skilled in those kinds of things.”

Ah.

Come to think of it, that’s right.

Would they bother me less if I let them see me get dumped? I didn’t want to be treated as some kind of casanova.

“Sigh… Yeah, see, I’m no different from you.”

If they saw me flirting and getting dumped right in front of their eyes, they wouldn’t be able to call me a playboy who would only hang out with women.

So I reluctantly got up from my seat and headed to the girl who was most likely to do me that favor.

I turned to Liana de Grantz sitting on a bench drinking some water. She seemed exhausted.

“…Hey.”

“…What? I’m tired.”

Liana looked at me as if she didn’t even want to bother talking to me. She certainly looked worse than before P.E.

“Want to go eat something after you’re done?”

“…?”

I didn’t do anything different from what Kono Lint did. She wasn’t really in a good mood so she’d definitely reject me…

“… I’m not really hungry, but I really want to drink something cool.”

Huh.

What?

This wasn’t what I wanted.

What’s with this?

Why did I succeed?

Even after exercising so hard, which should have put her in a worse mood, she gave me that kind of response to my sudden question.

I thought she would reject me no matter what, telling me that she didn’t want to move anymore because she was exhausted from P.E.

Liana asked me to see her in the classroom after P.E., then she went off. Feeling like I got possessed by some ghost, I returned to Kono Lint.

“How did it go?”

“Huh? Ah, well… She said she wasn’t really hungry… But wanted to drink something cool with me…”

“Wha-what?”

Kono Lint, as well as the other guys who eavesdropped on us, seemed skeptical. They also seemed to think that I would get rejected after they saw Liana in such a bad mood.

“What did you do?”

“I-I don’t really know? I didn’t do anything different. I just said, “Want to eat something?”… That’s all.”

I was actually the one most baffled about it.

I went to her, who was the most prickly in our class, while she was in a really bad mood, and I didn’t act any different from Kono Lint, so I had thought I would get rejected without a doubt. The situation was even more unfavorable than before.

Kono Lint started whining to me again to tell him my secret, and I couldn’t even say anything to him.

* * *

Reaper Scans

Translator – KonnoAren

* * *

***

Like that, I tried showing them that I had no actual skills to seduce women by getting rejected, but I failed, so as a result, that misunderstanding got aggravated.

And, incidentally, I went on a date with Liana de Grantz, which I hadn’t really planned to do.

Of course, we were only going to drink something cool after school.

“I don’t want to go all the way to Main Street. Let’s go somewhere nearby.”

“Okay.”

After P.E., Liana and I decided to go to a place close by rather than going to the main street. What was going on? Wasn’t she completely uninterested in me?

Did she like me?

Although I asked her out, I still felt somewhat uncomfortable. Of course, we weren’t really talking much.

We also had a canteen inside the class building, but we opted to go to a nearby street where some cafes were located and sat down at one of their terraces.

I could feel those three idiot brothers tailing behind us.

“Why are they following us?””

“…Who knows?”

Liana also noticed them because they were tailing us so clumsily. Ah, those guys were called incompetent for a reason. Liana ordered a yogurt smoothie, and I ordered an iced lemon tea.

Those three also sat down at a table on the terrace quite far away from us, watching us.

Liana didn’t seem to care that much that they were following us.

“Haah… I’m so exhausted from P.E.”

She said that her whole body felt stiff as she drooped in her chair. She drank her yogurt and didn’t really seem like she actually held any interest in me.

She seemed about to go back because she was so exhausted.

“Isn’t it strange that you’re still having such difficulties? Shouldn’t you get used to this by now?”

Although it had only lasted one semester, we had to do that hard training twice a week. It was actually more surprising that she was still struggling so much. Well, those who had no combat talents usually would still struggle, I guess.

At my words, Liana glared at me.

“It’s because you’re working out every morning.”

“… Is that so?”

She knew that I was training at dawn. I thought only those who came to exercise in the morning knew. Those two training sessions a week would improve one’s basic physical strength, but it would still be difficult.

“Why do supernatural power users even need physical strength? The same goes with those magic majors… But you’re also a supernatural power user. No, but your supernatural power is used to strengthen your body.”

Liana continued to grumble that she didn’t have any use for something like physical strength.

“It still has its advantages. Didn’t your physical strength improve?”

“…You sound like a teacher. How annoying.”

Liana didn’t even look at me, saying that she was tired of talking about that.

I didn’t really think that she was interested in me, so why did she go there with me in the first place? I mean, I also went there with her while not being interested in her. Nothing was bad about it.

“I’m curious about something.”

“About what?”

“When Kono Lint asked you out earlier, you refused.”

“Yeah. I did.”

Then why did she come when I asked her out? I said the exact same thing as him, but you actually accepted my invitation.

This seemed a bit like I was bragging, but I was really curious. What was the difference between us?

“Oh, are you curious why I did that?”

“So to speak.”

“…You don’t know?”

No, why would I have asked then? Would I ask something I already knew? Liana took a sip from her yogurt then folded her arms.

“Oh, you really don’t know.”

She thought I knew, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, so she found it strange that I didn’t know.

“If you don’t know, you don’t need to know.”

“What?”

“It’s fine.”

Liana didn’t say anything more to me.

***

Eventually, I returned to Royal Class’ dormitory with Liana without finding out the reason.

We didn’t really talk about anything important other than our classes and things we found hard.

“How was it? What did she say?”

Kono Lint glanced at Liana as she was returning to her room with a curious expression on his face. If that idiot actually liked Liana, he wouldn’t have reacted like that. I guess he was just flirting with girls because he found it fun or something.

“What we talked about? Mostly about how P.E. was difficult and stuff like that.”

“Strange… What’s the difference between you and me?”

Liana seemed to have a distinct reason for her actions, but when she had found out that I had no idea, she didn’t want to tell me.

That made me even more curious, that punk.

“And, dude, why did you follow us?”

“No… I was just… curious…”

“She might think you’re even a creeper, so be more careful.”

Kono Lint kept on asking me if I had any special skills he didn’t know about, and then at the moment I was about to tell the guy to fuck off…

“… Are you guys still talking about this?”

Bertus looked at me and Kono Lint alternately with a slightly exhausted expression.

“Sigh… There’ll be no end to this, huh? You two, follow me.”

Bertus dragged the two of us to our usual terrace. Kono Lint seemed a little anxious that he was called out by Bertus just for something like this.

“Lint, you’re curious why Reinhardt is so friendly with the female students, right?”

“Huh… so to speak.”

“You’re wondering if Reinhardt has some special technique or method or something similar, right?”

“Ah, well.”

Kono Lint was ready to grovel in front of Bertus if he told him that “technique”. Bertus covered his eyes with his right hand and sighed slightly.

What?

Did this guy know a secret I didn’t know about? The reason why I attracted girls like that?

“Lint, don’t get hurt, okay?”

“Yes. I won’t get hurt.”

Bertus lowered the hand he used to cover his eyes and directly looked at Kono Lint.

“Reinhardt is handsome.”

His eyes were filled with pity.

“That’s it.”

There was no other reason. Bertus went straight to the point, wrapping it up.