"This voice… these words…?"
The instant he heard Emilia's murmur beside his ear, Natsuki Subaru's entire body went rigid, eyes snapping wide open.
It was pure instinct — a surge of deeply familiar dread and revulsion welling up from sowhere inside him.
"The… Witch of Envy?"
Natsuki Subaru nearly choked the words out through gritted teeth, his mind flashing to that forbidden na — a na that had appeared in his mories countless tis.
The Witch of Envy — Satella. The one who had granted him the power of Return by Death, allowing him to start over again and again in pursuit of a perfect future.
But she was also the source of no small amount of trouble — every ti he died, another layer of the Witch's lingering miasma clung to him, setting off even more deaths in a vicious chain.
His feelings toward her were tangled beyond sorting: fear, gratitude, and fury all knotted together.
What baffled him most was the mory of Satella's voice whispering "I love you" into his ear, over and over again.
He couldn't make sense of it. Why, in his mories, had he barely arrived in this other world before the Witch of Envy had already singled him out for her affection? Where did that "love" of hers even co from?
Natsuki Subaru had a feeling — maybe this journey, with all the advantage his mories gave him, might finally lead him to an answer.
But what left him most confused right now — and more than a little unsettled — was sothing else entirely.
Emilia, standing right in front of him, had just spoken words that were identical — whether by coincidence or sothing more — to the words of the Witch of Envy, Satella.
Natsuki Subaru's mind spun with bewildernt. Why had the reality he was living diverged so many tis from the mories he'd received before crossing over?
Speculations and associations began rising unbidden in his thoughts.
Could there really be so hidden connection between Emilia and the Witch of Envy — sothing no one knew about?
The thought hit him like a jolt.
He leaned in to study the silver-haired girl before him, searching her eyes for so kind of answer — and then he froze.
Emilia's eyes, eting his, were hazy and unfocused. An emotion he couldn't read churned behind them — sothing that looked disturbingly like raw, aggressive desire.
While he stood there dazed, the distance between them was quietly closing. Their lips were a heartbeat away from touching —
And then a pair of small, fluffy paws landed on both their foreheads simultaneously, effortlessly wedging itself between them.
At the sa mont, a crisp, clear voice — sharp with intelligence — rang out in the tiny space between them.
"Alright, that's enough~"
Startled by the sudden interruption, both Natsuki Subaru and Emilia instinctively stepped back, putting distance between themselves.
They looked toward the source of the voice — and found a small cat, no bigger than a kitten only a few months old, floating in midair between them, sitting upright.
The cat was white as fresh snow, its tiny ears twitching gently, its sharp gaze fixed on the two of them — or more precisely, locked squarely onto Natsuki Subaru.
"Puck!"
Emilia exclaid the little cat's na in surprise. Puck was both her contracted Great Spirit and her closest companion.
At the sound of his na, Puck gave a small nod. When he spoke, his voice was young yet carried an undeniable air of authority:
"Mm, it's , Lia. Looks like sothing interesting happened while I was asleep."
"Puck, what's going on? You appeared so suddenly…"
Still not quite back to herself, Emilia's eyes were glazed, a hint of helplessness in her expression.
Puck let out a small, resigned sigh and spread his tiny paws in a aningful gesture:
"If I'd kept sleeping without a care in the world, it seems my adorable daughter was about to be whisked away, hmm?"
"Haven't I told you before? Lia, if you go around kissing people, then such-and-such will happen… and so-and-so will follow…"
Puck rambled on, his fluffy tail swishing idly back and forth as he seized the opportunity to fill the still-dazed Emilia's head with all manner of peculiar ideas.
Natsuki Subaru watched the Great Spirit Puck take full advantage of Emilia's bewildered state from the sidelines, and couldn't hold back a laugh.
Apparently catching that laugh, Puck's cat ears gave a rapid twitch and he turned his head, his gaze zeroing in on Natsuki Subaru with pinpoint accuracy.
Seeing those eyes on him, Natsuki Subaru imdiately straightened up, composed his expression, and introduced himself to the floating spirit with full solemnity:
"Nice to et you, Puck! My na is Natsuki Subaru!"
For all his effort to look calm, Natsuki Subaru was far from it on the inside.
He was staring at a Great Spirit who looked utterly unassuming yet wielded terrifying power — and now that his mories had confird exactly who Puck was, a very specific kind of nervousness was setting in.
Alongside the instinctive awe one feels before the genuinely powerful, there was also the particular anxiety of eting a… prospective father-in-law — even if said father-in-law probably saw him as nothing more than so slightly goofy stranger who'd made his daughter smile.
"Natsuki Subaru… is it?"
Puck murmured the na under his breath, just low enough for only himself to hear. The look he turned on Natsuki Subaru carried sothing searching in it — and a trace of inexplicable complexity.
"To think they would still et, even so… could this be fate…?"
He gave his head a small shake to scatter the thought, then landed lightly on Emilia's shoulder. His tone shifted back to easy and playful:
"Oh~ Natsuki Subaru, was it?"
Puck stroked his whiskers with one tiny paw and cocked his head to the side. Those clear cat eyes studied Natsuki Subaru as if they could see straight through him.
"No need to be so formal — just call Puck. Since you're Lia's friend, you're my friend too. That said…"
Puck's voice took on a aning-laden edge. "I say that, but if you ever dare make my Lia cry, I won't let it slide so easily, understood?"
"Though, I suppose Subaru probably isn't a bad person. That's how it is, right?"
The tone was light, but Natsuki Subaru could feel it beneath the surface — the dead seriousness of a father watching over his daughter, and the quiet warning threaded through every word.
"W-wait, Puck, you don't know him like I do — Subaru is absolutely a good person!"
Emilia jumped in to defend Natsuki Subaru on pure reflex.
The shalessly one-sided endorsent made Puck clutch his chest as if mortally wounded, his face crumpling into a theatrical display of heartbreak.
"To think… to think it's already co to this — a daughter grown too big for her father's arms?"
"So Lia has reached that age already, has she!"
Puck dabbed at nonexistent tears with one small paw — then promptly recovered his serene composure.
He affectionately nuzzled his head against Emilia's cheek and said, with genuine warmth:
"Still, seeing Lia looking so lively — and with a new friend, no less — I can rest easy. This young man looks a little goofy, admittedly…"
Puck shot a sidelong glance at Natsuki Subaru, a mischievous little grin seemingly playing at the corners of his expression.
"But Subaru seems like a good person, doesn't he? He certainly makes Lia happy."
"Puck!" Emilia squird from the nuzzling — but it was the teasing in his words that brought the color rushing back to her face. She gave the small spirit on her shoulder a gentle push, flustered. "Don't say such things! Subaru, he… he's just…"
Her voice trailed off, and her cheeks burned as though they might actually catch fire.
Her heart hamred in her chest — faster than it ever had — the flutter that Puck had so casually laid bare leaving her with absolutely no idea what to do with herself.
Her fingers curled without thinking into the hem of her skirt, the delicate fabric wrinkling beneath her grip.
...
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