“Fine then — since there’s nothing left here for me to do, I’ll head back first and report to Lord Hermes.
I really can’t figure out what on earth Lady Astraea sees in you.”
“If my interview ends in failure, the one with the biggest headache would be you, wouldn’t it?” Natsuka narrowed his eyes and gave a small smile.
“Hmph.”
Asfi let out a haughty little snort and was just about to turn and leave, when Astraea’s gentle voice came from behind her.
“Um, sorry, please wait a moment.”
Astraea took two steps forward and softly asked,
“I heard that child has sent a letter.
I’d like to write a reply — could you wait for me a little while?”
The moment Asfi heard that, her face fell, and even the glasses on the bridge of her nose slid halfway down.
“Honestly, even Lady Astraea is going to do this to me…”
“So I can only ask this of you, Asfi-chan.” Astraea showed a soft smile.
She took the letter from Cecil’s side, carefully read it through line by line, then fetched a piece of parchment and a feather pen, lowering her head to think about how to reply.
Natsuka, full of curiosity, also leaned over.
He casually rummaged a pencil case and a notebook out of his bag and handed them to Astraea.
“Try using these — they might be a little more convenient.”
“Oh, these really are easier to use.”
The goddess didn’t mind switching tools at all.
Once she had taken them, she began writing stroke by careful stroke.
On the clean, pale paper, rows of beautiful, dignified handwriting were quickly laid down, delicate and gentle — practically a perfect match for the impression she herself gave.
The contents of the letter were warm too.
Just like a mother fretting over a child traveling far from home — between the lines, everything was wrapped in a soft layer of worry and tenderness.
Feeling the goddess’s presence from this close, Natsuka found his heart inexplicably settling down.
In short.
Only, when Astraea got to writing about her own recent state of affairs, her pen tip paused several times.
Every so often, she would lightly press the feather pen against her chin, a hint of contemplation in her brow and eyes, clearly somewhat at a loss.
“Are you having trouble figuring out what to write?” Natsuka asked.
“Mm.” Astraea gave a small nod.
“This is a letter to a very important senior in the Familia.
For many reasons, that child had been stuck in place for a long time, unable to step away from it.
But in the letter she sent recently, it seems she’s finally slowly come to a halt and started to look for a new direction.”
Astraea told Natsuka about Ryuu, bit by bit, her tone soft, like reminiscing about a child who pained her heart.
Toward the end, she let out a gentle sigh.
“It’s just…
she also cares a great deal about how things are on my side, and for the moment I really don’t know what to write back to her.”
Natsuka smiled.
“Why not just tell her about the new things happening over on our end?”
“New things?”
“Like the Familia gaining new members, for instance.” Natsuka pointed at himself, then at Cecil.
“Isn’t this kind of thing both worth being happy about, and worth showing off?”
“Oh, that’s right!”
Astraea’s eyes lit up slightly, and she gave a small clap of her hands, as if she had suddenly hit upon an idea.
After that, the handwriting quickly continued to spread across the page.
She wrote about both Cecil’s and Natsuka’s business, and didn’t even leave out Natsuka’s little ambitions and aspirations.
Of course, the clever goddess still kept the specific contents of Natsuka’s abilities concealed.
But watching his dark history once again being laid out in black and white, Natsuka still couldn’t help pressing a hand to his forehead.
“Why are you even writing this kind of thing in too…
Couldn’t you praise my good points a bit more?
If, after Senior Ryuu reads this, her initial impression of me goes up a little bit, wouldn’t that mean I’d be able to pick up a tidy little batch of stat values for free on the spot?” This chapter is updated first at novelping dot com.
“Oh, that’s right!”
Astraea clapped her forehead again, as if she really had been reminded.
But she didn’t cross out what she had already written.
Instead, very naturally, she simply continued and tacked on a long, additional stretch of praise for Natsuka after it.
How to put it.
As an orphan character straight out of the standard protagonist template, Natsuka actually didn’t dislike that feeling at all — like a mother out there showing off her son, casually spilling some interesting little stories on the side.
But then, when he saw the very last thing Astraea wrote ——
‘That child has a head of hair as ardent as flame — he’s very much like Alise.’
Natsuka instantly went quiet.
In that moment, he finally seemed to understand why, when he had used that kind of reason to apply to join the Familia, the goddess had, in the end, half-reluctantly half-willingly agreed.
“I just hope that after Senior Ryuu reads the letter, she won’t think too badly of me.”
“She won’t.” Astraea covered her mouth and gave a soft little laugh.
“Ryuu is a very gentle child.
She’s just a little stubborn, that’s all.”
Let’s hope so.
Natsuka silently sighed in his heart.
If everything went smoothly, then as a Familia senior plus a captain candidate plus a newly arrived junior, this great senior — still far off in Orario and never once met — should, no matter what, be able to provide him with a quite respectable bit of numerical feedback.
That was, after all, a top-tier adventurer at the peak of Lv4, already qualified for promotion long ago.
____
👻🔥Read More: Walnut-chan🔥👻
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