TMHMFMIS-03

CHAPTER 3

I stared at Noah like that, and heat suddenly rushed to my face.

“I-I didn’t know it had gotten on me.”

“Only I need to know.”

He even gave me a gentle, smiling glance.

Hng, my heart clenched painfully.

Was this really part of his scheme, too?

Was it?

He had clearly been completely concealing his true identity by bewitching me like this every time.

Before, my heart would have simply fluttered with excitement, but now it was beating irregularly, almost like an arrhythmia.

…Still, the choux pastry was delicious.

“Eating something sweet makes me feel like my fatigue is disappearing.”

As I brought another piece of choux pastry to my mouth, Noah watched me intently and muttered, “I should have prepared some stamina supplements.”

“Hm? Why?”

“Because my wife has such a hard time getting up every morning. You couldn’t even get up this morning no matter how many times I woke you.”

I blinked twice before shooting Noah a sideways glare.

“…That wasn’t because of me.”

Noah raised an eyebrow as if asking why.

“Then was it because of me?”

“Of course!”

“I didn’t do anything.”

His shameless tone left me speechless.

“It’s because you kept me from sleeping until dawn, Noah! I told you yesterday that I was so sleepy.”

“So I held myself back.”

“…Held back from what? When?”

“I tried very hard to hold back because Hazel said she was tired.”

That was what he called holding back?

Liar!

What a man who acted completely differently in the day and at night.

I shot him another suspicious look, but Noah merely gave me another gentle smile.

“So, what is this good news my wife mentioned today?”

“Ah.”

I suddenly remembered what I had completely forgotten while eating the choux pastries.

“I got a report from Nijella today, and do you know what? Our sales were a whopping ten times higher than last year! That includes the rate of completed requests, too!”

“Is that so?”

“Yes, at this rate, I don’t think expanding will be difficult at all. So I’m wondering if I should hire one more employee.”

“An employee. Hazel, I’ll help you with that. I’ll find you someone quick-witted like Nijella.”

I paused again at his words.

“…Someone?”

“Ah, I mean, a person.”

Well, it wasn’t exactly an insult… haha.

Nijella had already been introduced to him, so I figured having one more person around wouldn’t make much difference.

“Could you do that? I think it would make things easier for me.”

“Of course.”

I moved the now-empty basket aside and turned my entire body toward Noah.

“That reminds me, I was thinking of increasing the benefits for customers who use us frequently, too. There are customers who always come to our guild. There’s one mercenary who uses us more than anyone else, and our sales have practically increased thanks to him.”

“Yes, and?”

“So I was thinking of treating that mercenary to a meal. He was my first customer, so he’s special to me, but even though he looks a little intimidating, he has a good personality, and he’s so fast and skilled at completing requests that clients tend to flock to him…”

“Noah?”

“A meal?”

He was definitely smiling gently, yet suddenly the temperature inside the carriage felt as though frost had settled over everything.

“Yes, it’s nothing special, just a simple meal as part of customer relations.”

“Just the two of you?”

No, why was it suddenly so cold inside the carriage?

“Probably, yes? It’s not a company dinner or anything.”

Noah tapped his fingers against his thigh.

“My dear, I don’t think that’s a very good idea.”

“Pardon…?”

“My dear is wise, so I’m sure you can think of a wiser solution.”

“Hm?”

As he asked the question, Noah gently stroked my hair.

His fingers lightly toyed with my golden-red hair as it curled around them.

I flinched at the word “my dear” and straightened my posture.

I must not be fooled by that sweet “my dear.”

There was a huge trap hidden behind it, because “my dear” was Noah’s magic word whenever he was displeased with something, becoming intensely jealous, or getting angry—in other words, whenever he had to suppress something.

For him, calling me “my dear” was practically the same as calling Hazel Love by her full name.

And the fact that it had slipped out here meant…

“Uh, um… T-that’s true, but he’s a top-ranked mercenary and only accepts requests from our guild.”

“Now, think about it again, Hazel.”

I immediately shut my mouth.

As Noah waited for my answer, his hand moved from my hair to the tip of my chin, gently stroking it.

In the past, I would have found it cute that Noah was jealous and simply smiled before agreeing to him, but now that I knew his true identity, this was no longer a situation where I could laugh.

Before, even when he said things like this, I would have pushed ahead with what I wanted.

Noah had always ended up following my wishes.

Now that I thought about it, maybe that had actually been a threat!

Looking back, perhaps that hadn’t been jealousy at all, but murderous intent.

He might suddenly change his plans because I had displeased him and kill me on the spot.

First things first, I had to survive!

I raised both hands and clapped them together.

“Um, you’re right, I guess it might be a little inappropriate? It could cause gossip for me to meet a customer one-on-one when it’s not even a consultation! I’ll just have an employee handle it and slightly increase his payment percentage. Y-Yes, that sounds better!”

I found myself sneaking a glance at Noah.

Apparently pleased with my answer, Noah leaned closer, kissed my lips with a soft peck, then curved his eyes into a dazzling smile.

“See? You can do it.”

“Th-Thanks to you, Noah…?”

“What else can I help you with?”

“Hmm, I’ll tell you if I need anything later. I don’t think there’s anything right now.”

As soon as I answered, Noah kissed me again.

“I see. But…”

“Yes?”

“What is that mercenary’s name?”

His name?

Why was he asking that?

He gently rubbed my cheek again.

It tickled, and I squinted one eye as I asked, “Why do you want to know his name?”

“I was simply curious because he’s a customer my wife is grateful to. He’s someone I should be grateful to as well for making my wife smile.”

If that was all he meant, there was no problem, but…

“Ah, what was his name again? G-Gobi something. I should check the records properly. His name was rather difficult.”

Just in case, I vaguely brushed it off and glanced at Noah.

“That’s enough.”

Noah changed the subject, telling me there was no need to think about it any further.

The place we had come to by carriage was an ordinary part of the city.

More precisely, it was a market alley right in the middle of downtown!

It was an area lined with countless shops.

Once every week or two, we would come into town like this and have a simple date.

When I got off the carriage while holding Noah’s hand, everyone’s eyes immediately turned toward us.

As always, however, those gazes disappeared within a few seconds.

“There are quite a lot of people today, so we should be careful.”

“Exactly. Come to think of it, it seems like the population has been growing the closer we get to Ferrarium. Maybe we should do some advertising.”

“I think that would be fine.”

“Then what do you think about setting up a small temporary office somewhere around here? We’d only need to check inquiries and publicly posted requests, so we could hire a part-timer instead of assigning one of our employees.”

“That also sounds like a good idea.”

“Hmm, are you really sure it’s a good idea?”

I asked while giving Noah a slight sidelong glance.

“Everything Hazel does is right. Just leave anything difficult to me.”

“All right. I’ll think about it a little more.”

I nodded and looked around while holding Noah’s hand.

Normally, the moment we entered the market, I would search for something to eat first, but today I wasn’t particularly hungry because I had filled up on cream choux pastries.

Instead, my eyes were drawn to a huge bulletin board towering near the entrance.

It was covered so densely with notices that they filled the entire board.

When I headed toward it as if drawn in by a spell, Noah naturally followed me.

There were an especially large number of red notices bearing the words WARNING!

Looking closer, I saw that they warned travelers heading toward the northern and western regions to exercise extreme caution because the number of monsters there was steadily increasing and their territory was expanding.

“The north and west…”

This place was in the southeastern part of Elkiam, meaning it was far south of the capital, Elcard, so it didn’t seem to fall under the warning.

Still, I couldn’t simply dismiss it.

The reason I had settled in Ferrarium was because it was just as developed as the capital, had lower living costs, and had access to the sea, but more importantly, it was the exact opposite of Northern Sergal.

Northern Sergal was, quite literally, the most dangerous region in the original story.

It was also where the final mastermind and boss of I’ll Stop the Destruction and Achieve a Happy Ending broke the seal and regained his power.

His power was still sealed for now, but someday, he would become a major threat to the protagonists.

The steadily increasing number of monsters was also because of his influence.

Furthermore, once high-level monsters began appearing, followed by dangerous monsters known as the Followers with purple magic stones embedded in their heads, it would mean that the time for the seal to break was drawing near.

That was also why I had submitted my resignation even more quickly.

If someone asked whether I had done all that just to save myself, I couldn’t say no, but…

In any case, the protagonists would definitely defeat the final boss in the original story and achieve the happy ending promised by the title.

After Hazel Love had died from overwork, that was.

So that meant nothing would go wrong even if I wasn’t there.

Still, the fact that the territory was expanding did concern me a little.

Ah, come to think of it, I had heard that around the time the final mastermind appeared, Kailus Hadid would disappear from sight.

Until then, he had constantly tormented the two protagonists…

Wait.

If Noah was Kailus Hadid, then who was the mastermind who was supposed to appear before the two protagonists?

There really was a way to confirm Noah’s identity…

I turned my head and looked up at Noah.