Meanwhile, back in Blue Dawn, Penny stood shell-shocked after listening to Emilia’s explanation of why she had the knights stay out of the arguments regarding the new policies. ‘So what I was trying to do on my own wasn’t helping her, but the other way around instead?!’
The thought made the petite girl so ashamed that she didn’t even dare to think about touching Emilia. It was one thing to do good deeds and not leave a name, but if Emilia found out about her actions and misunderstood her intention and motivation… just what would she think?
Penny didn’t even want to imagine Emilia ever looking at her with disappointment and disgust, let alone hatred or loathing.
A soft and warm feeling on her head made Penny snap back to reality, and she couldn’t help but blink up in surprise at Emilia’s gentle smile.
“Just what’s going on in that silly head of yours to make you frown so hard?”
Despite having ‘molested’ and ‘taken advantage of’ her princess numerous times before, Penny still felt her mind go blank when Emilia took the initiative to touch her head so ‘intimately’.
Naturally, her mind at the moment was about as capable of filtering her speech as a fishing net could filter water for drinking.
“I-I was afraid that you’d be mad at me if you find out about—!”
It was only after she had already made that irreversible slip of tongue that Penny’s eyes turned wide, but she knew that it was already too late.
To her shock, however, Emilia just moved her hand down to her face and squeezed the shorter girl’s left cheek playfully. “Are you fretting over your ‘personal effort’?”
Penny’s heart almost stopped beating from the mischievous glint in the gorgeous girl’s eyes.
Emilia grinned. “I’m not mad, to be honest. It’s adorable and heartwarming to see you so indignant on my behalf. It makes me…”
She paused, and then leaned closer to the shorter girl’s face till their breath mingled and Penny almost went cross-eyed while blushing furiously.
“… almost want to reward you with a kiss!”
Before the ponytailed girl could jump for joy, however, the crimson-haired beauty pushed her away with a giggle. “But since you still disobeyed me, I obviously can’t do that, can I?”
Fortunately, Penny only stumbled back momentarily before blinking up at her in confusion. “Eh? Ehhh? S-So…?”
Emilia smiled. “Disobedient girls need to be punished, no matter how adorable they are.”
Nodding to herself, the gorgeous girl pretended to make a fierce expression, though it only made Penny feel like her heart was about to melt into a puddle. At least, until she heard the rest of her words.
“So as punishment, I won’t be giving you that kiss today, and we also won’t talk to or see each other for the next three days!”
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Although Penny hadn’t cried or collapsed in despair, and only really begged for mercy with her eyes, in the end Emilia still ended up feeling a little soft-hearted for the ‘pitiful’ girl.
Much to the shorter girl’s joy, her sentence was lightened to ‘three days after leaving the study’ and she even got to enjoy Emilia’s luxurious lap pillow!
Unfortunately, that was the extent of Emilia’s mercy, and she was dragged out by Dixie shortly after, along with a bag full of salted strawberry cookies.
Oddly enough, though, Penny didn’t feel very disappointed or sad at having lost the chance to earn Emilia’s kiss this time, but felt relieved instead. As she was right now, perhaps she didn’t deserve it.
When faced with the thought of having unwittingly betrayed her princess, the terror she felt in her heart left her feeling a little shaken. And although she was usually quite carefree, Penny could tell that not all of it came from herself.
Having been so close to Emilia for so long, she also understood how her princess worked to an extent. And while no one had betrayed the gorgeous girl to the best of her knowledge, the feeling that whoever dared do so would have a very, very miserable ending was unmistakably real.
Where it came from or how she could think so about her princess, Penny had no idea, and she couldn’t help but be disappointed.
Not with Emilia, but herself.
For someone who claimed to be her number one fan, and even dared to rally all others behind her, how could she ever think poorly about her princess?
With such a frame of mind, she really didn’t feel like she deserved to be able to molest her gorgeous princess, let alone accept any further blessings.
Taking a deep breath as she got into the car outside the villa, the pontytailed girl decided to make a solemn vow, though she knew the one she was making it for would probably never know about it. “Princess, I promise you, there will be no next time!”
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Back in her study, Emilia had long since put the little episode with Penny out of her mind as focused on the canvas in front of her.
Although the painting was almost finished, she still found a few places that required touch-ups after careful observation, and hummed happily each time it seemed to get closer to the perfect image in her mind.
Looking at the beautiful painting of a transparent half-feline goddess fighting against ferocious pig-like monsters seemingly made of glass, the raven-haired girl couldn’t help but shudder. “I don’t see why you need to do this…”
Her partner’s confused voice made the crimson-haired girl smile. “I really don’t, but it will help me get things right on the first try, which means less energy wasted. Isn’t that great?”
Naturally, what made Cynthia uncomfortable wasn’t how ferocious those beasts were, nor the so-called goddess, but what she knew her partner planned to do, though she would never admit that.
Despite having done her best to groom her into a ‘villainess’, whenever Emilia really showed her decisive and ruthless means, Cynthia somehow always found herself caught off-guard, though she wasn’t sure why that was, exactly.
Could the image of the girl being a goody-two-shoes little princess be too deeply ingrained in her mind? Obviously not.
Emilia was no longer the same after she took that dagger to the heart, and Cynthia had no trouble coming to terms with that fact. Why was it, then, that she felt so uncomfortable?
Shaking her head furiously, the raven-haired girl used her most powerful distraction technique — change of subject!
“I really don’t understand why you bother with all these mortal affairs so much, actually! Two of our missions are already over, and while the last one is hard, I’m sure you already know how to complete it quickly, right?!”
The gorgeous girl seemed to have long expected her partner’s ‘tactics’, and it didn’t even interrupt the stroke of her brush, but she still happily indulged her with a smile. “Sorry, Cynthia… I can be more efficient, yes, but do you know at what cost?”
The raven-haired girl couldn’t help but let out an ‘eh’ in confusion, making her partner giggle in amusement.
“I love how cute and oblivious you are sometimes.” Emilia sighed. “Anyway, I know that you don’t think much about all the mortals around me, but… I do. If we just quickly finished the mission and left right now, what do you think will happen?”
Cynthia thought about her partner’s words for a moment before frowning. “What is it? I don’t get it.”
The crimson-haired girl smiled. “If we leave without taking care of everything here properly, I will be filled with guilt and keep thinking about how they might be doing after leaving. Later on, when we’re in the next world, don’t you think that would affect my efficiency?”
She didn’t mention anything ‘extreme’ like not even being able to complete her tasks, but Cynthia still coughed awkwardly. “I-I already told you that it’s possible to bring back—”
Emilia interrupted her with a sigh. “Cynthia, please… I know that not everyone can return with me. Even if I could take them, just because I care about someone doesn’t mean they will be willing to abandon their world for me, right?”
The raven-haired girl thought about the obsessive way most of the monkey-brained mortals around her partner behaved, and she couldn’t help but have some serious doubts. ‘I’d be surprised if they even had a second thought before jumping in…?’
Unaware of her partner’s strange thoughts, Emilia hummed happily as she finished touching up her painting. “Anyway, never mind that, I think I’m done!”
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