I Wish You Well In Your Next Love, My Love

When our eyes met, his eyes, framed by faint double eyelids, curved gently into a good-natured smile.

“Please look around at your leisure.”

Was it because I wasn’t accustomed to books? No one was making me uncomfortable, yet I felt awkward all by myself.

It wasn’t my first time in a bookstore, though.

In fact, I visited them fairly often. Of course, it wasn’t because of me. It was because of Gerard.

On days without combat, he would invariably pester me and tease me. Only when I seriously told him to stop would he reluctantly pick up a book.

Sometimes, he constantly carried books around to the point that I wondered if he was addicted to printed words.

“Is it interesting?”

Whenever I asked that…

“It’s fine.”

This was the only dry answer I received. He didn’t seem particularly attached to the books he read.

Most avid readers eagerly waited for the next volume of a series or looked forward to a favorite author’s new release, but Gerard showed none of that passion.

However, it wasn’t as though he indiscriminately read anything either. He usually read history books written by poets who had died centuries ago, collections of philosophers’ letters, or heartrending stories about the fated love between a man and a woman.

Whenever he read romance novels in particular, he would compare the protagonists’ situation to ours.

“They’re just like us.”, “If it were me, I would’ve reassured her more. What a pathetic bastard.”, “The protagonist here has the same name as you.”

Whenever a book had a protagonist who shared my name, Gerard would tear it apart just before turning the final page. I had no idea why.

In any case, although Gerard hated sitting at a desk and reviewing documents in a businesslike manner, he liked books. Whenever we traveled far from the capital, we would often stop at bookstores.

I could count on one hand the number of times we bought a book for me. Perhaps it had happened once. I couldn’t remember clearly.

I was more interested in watching Gerard read than reading books myself, and Gerard never forced his hobby upon me.

“It feels a little awkward coming here alone.”

After checking the listed price, I picked up the book I had chosen, <Keeping an Appropriate Distance from the Superior Who Likes Me>, and headed to the counter.

The owner, who had been handling the purchases with practiced speed, suddenly paused. He glanced at my face through his glasses.

He had been handing the other customers their books without wrapping them, but he took out a sheet of newspaper and wrapped mine as though sealing it shut.

“The sequel to this book always arrives at our store first.”

The owner whispered quietly enough that only I could hear.

“Oh, I see…”

So it wasn’t a standalone book. Since he had already finished wrapping it, I couldn’t back out and paid for it.

I could feel the owner’s steady gaze on the back of my head until I left the bookstore.

…It isn’t a strange book, is it?

Perhaps it was a secret missive plotting treason.

The lingering unease made me take the thought seriously for a moment, but I soon dismissed it. There was no way anyone would openly display such an outrageous secret missive on the shelves at the very front of the store.

A long time passed after that.

The cold was even more difficult to endure than the long walk.

Gerard considered my stamina comparable to that of a sparrow that had only just broken out of its egg, but that was merely by his standards.

I might be thin, but I wasn’t completely weak, and my endurance was quite good.

The fact that I had performed deep contact purification on him all night with a fourth-rank body and still been able to get up and walk on my own the following day was proof of how excellent my stamina was.

“Ugh… If only the weather were a little warmer.”

I muttered through frozen lips.

I felt as though I might collapse in the entryway the moment I opened my door. Summoning the last of my strength, I hurried through the alley.

However, I had no choice but to stop when I saw the hulking silhouette standing before the stairs.

He had a solid body without the slightest trace of fat and a towering height. Even beneath the dying light of the streetlamp, his features were sharply defined. He seemed like a completely foreign presence in the secluded slum.