Descending Into A Novel-Chapter 125:Disbelief

"You had a girlfriend?!"

"Why do you look so shocked at that?"

No, he hadn’t told Ellen about Sophia or her, so she likely assumed he was someone who had been single his whole life. But why did she have to look so taken aback?!

"It’s just...how on Terra did someone like you manage to find someone? Were they...mentally-

"Don’t insult them like that."

"Them? There were multiple?!"

He was already regretting muttering that, and he definitely shouldn’t have said them instead of her.

"Wow. I want to meet them."

"It was a long time ago. I’m not sure where exactly they are right now."

Sophia was likely still alive on Erde, while she was a bit of a unique figure so it was hard to know for sure what exactly she was doing. With how long ago it was, plus the fact that Raymond never tried to re-enter Erde after doing so once and being attacked by the Punishment monster. He really had no clue on what they were up to, it was hard and inconvenient to check up on others when they all lived in different dimensions.

"Is there a guy?"

"What..?"

"You once said you didn’t really care about gender or race, as long as there was love. Is there a guy?"

"Why is that important?"

"Because I’m dying to know."

So it was just pure curiosity.

"I’m not saying anything."

Unfortunately for Ellen. Her burning curiosity wouldn’t be satisfied today, or tomorrow, or for a very long time in fact.

"Raymond please!"

"No is no. I’m not telling you and don’t try and use ice cream to bribe me."

Ellen mildly glared at him, already formulating a plan in her head alongside a minor act of mischief.

"Just you wait."

What happened to respecting privacy?

***

"Dad. Why does mom look angry?"

"Because she is angry."

Erin tilted her head, her tail forming the shape of a question mark.

"Why?"

"Because Ellen doesn’t like it when I keep secrets from her. You should act angry at her and never be like her okay? Make sure you respect others privacy."

"Hmm. Can we go get ice cream now?"

He picked her up, putting her beside him on the couch as he petted her head.

"Sorry, but Ellen says you can’t have ice cream as much anymore. Don’t you remember? She said it a few days ago."

"Mom also said you can’t have ice cream but I saw you get ice cream just now."

"...let’s go. Don’t tell Ellen."

He checked the time, currently an hour before midnight. Most shops and places in the commercial district would have closed by now, but the ice cream parlor Raymond often went to had extended its time to be open 24/7 purely for him. A perk of his high potential score, being their number one customer by a wide margin probably also helped as well.

Just so there wasn’t any wrong ideas. It was run by an automatic machine, so there wasn’t any poor employee forced to work at midnight just for his ice cream.

As for why Raymond and Erin were currently in the living room instead, well Ellen had decided to temporarily kick him out of his own room—and Erin was watching a movie so he just decided to join her.

Casting a illusion spell on her, Raymond asked. "You remember what to do right?"

"Mhm!"

Erin wasn’t exactly a secret, the whole group knew about her. Even if they hadn’t seen her yet other then a brief glance. But Raymond didn’t really want the entire academy to know. It was just too much trouble.

Imagining what would happen already brought him a headache. He already attracted enough attention, but Erin was entirely different attention.

So he casted an invisibility spell on her, as well as several other spells to hide her presence. Since Raymond could detect his own magic on her, he would know her location even if she was completely invisible.

Holding her invisible hand, Raymond let out a small yawn as he bought ice cream for her. Before putting it into his storage, it would be weird to others if it just disappeared into thin air when being eaten by an invisible Erin after all.

Arriving back at his apartment, Raymond handed Erin her ice cream sitting down next to her.

He still felt a bit tired, but with all the stuff being delivered by Sienna. Raymond was likely going to reactivate his second circle much faster then expected. So he wanted to make sure his magic could keep up. The entire group was also about to reach the E-rank so he had to work on his magic before they got on his level.

No way was he about to accept being weaker then a bunch of teenagers!

Taking out one of countless notebooks, Raymond started working on his ice magic. Next to him, Erin sipped on her melted ice cream as she watched him work.

For someone like Erin who used magic instinctively, it was hard for her to understand what exactly all of this was. Raymond even briefly considered letting Flare and Erin meet. Mainly because he was curious how an interaction between them would go down.

"What is this for?"

"It’s to improve the purity of the ice and prevent dust or debris from being trapped inside when forming the ice."

"P-pur—d-debris?"

He lifted her up briefly, putting Erin onto his lap and letting her see the entire spell in clear.

It was a waste for someone like Erin to never properly learn magic, if she was going to learn. Then learning young was always better, and Raymond considered himself to be an amazing teacher.

"This part here helps to keep all the different components together. That way when I create the spell out of mana. It doesn’t require extreme amounts of control or mana to activate."

"Why not just use mana?"

"This way, you don’t waste mana. You have a lot of mana, but you should still learn to manage it properly."

Erin’s mana quantity even surpassed his, in his current weakened form that is. Considering all her instinctual spells were extremely light on mana consumption, she probably saw no need for mana conserving.

Even Erin had fallen into this trap, the same one that Flare had fallen into so long ago as well.

"Are you going to teach me?"

"Do you want me to teach you? If you don’t want me to, I can send you to a school or hire a private tutor."

She shook her head. Her tail and wings lightly slapping against his chest.

"The internet says that school is bad! I don’t want to go. I want you to teach me!"

Despite it only being a week, Erin was already taking after Raymond. Sharing the same disdain for classes and waking up early. If not for her occasional pangs of homesickness for Colleen, it would have seemed like she had been living with them for years already.

He wiped away an imaginary tear, squeezing Erin in his arms. As she happily squealed at his unexpected hug.

"Then I’ll teach you, but we have to ask Ellen first okay?"

"No need to ask me. Just go ahead and teach her, I’m fine with it."

"You’re still awake?"

Ellen let out a yawn, her messy golden hair let down freely as she got a cup of water for herself.

"I got worried when Erin wasn’t coming in."

"Am I still banned from sleeping in my own room?"

"Yes. Until I’m satisfied."

He sighed, luckily the couch in his living room was big enough to work as a bed.

Erin chimed up from his lap, "I want to join dad!"

"Sorry?"

"I want to sleep together with dad!"

"!!!"

Her eyes shook, for Ellen this was the worst case scenario occurring right in front of her eyes!

"No—! Don’t you want to sleep with me tonight Erin?!"

"No."

She was extremely heartless, only responding with a simple no. Like throwing a rock at a glass statue, Raymond could almost hear Ellen’s heart shattering.

Raymond made eye contact with Ellen, flashing the biggest sh*t-eating grin he could muster.

How the tables had turned, it was usually Ellen who would smirk or laugh at him from behind others. Now that it was finally his turn, Raymond made sure to utilize this opportunity to the max!

"You—!"

"Hehehe. Too bad, Erin wants to be with me tonight!"

With Erin protecting him, Ellen could do nothing but watch her own standing slip away.

"You can sleep in your own room again!"

He stared at her confused, before finally realizing what her ploy was.

It might have worked, if Raymond didn’t know Erin was going to join him.

He nudged her slightly, "Do you want to be with me tonight or with mom?"

"I want mom and dad."

"..."

The ban on his room didn’t even last a single day.

That night, while the three of them were sleeping together. Raymond did have a strange dream—one where he was married and Erin was his actual child.

Who was his significant other was unknown, since he forgot the dream when he woke up. But the odd feeling stuck with him throughout the entire next day.