There’s Something Special About Her - Chapter 52

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 52.
My heart plummeted as though I’d been punched in the gut.
The slack tension I’d grown comfortable with in these peaceful days suddenly pulled taut.
‘How long has she known?’
Idiotically, that was the first question that came to mind.
Since when had Gisela Roth been performing in front of me?
Since when had she stopped being sincere?
Did she know my real identity too?
I wanted to confront her about it.
Nothing about this was funny.
Not when I was nothing but a lie—”Runelk Eines.”
I shook off the amateur thinking and asked her.
“Who?”
“What?”
“Who’s chasing me?”
I waited, quiet and still after asking the question.
Like a fisherman watching for his line to twitch.
Wickes? Or perhaps someone Edward had hired privately—a manhunter?
Either answer would have come as no shock.
I was watching Gisela Roth’s sealed lips intently when it happened.
Crack!
“Ow!”
“You little brat!”
As I grabbed my stinging scalp—as if I’d been burned—a groan escaped me involuntarily.
“How the hell would I know that, you idiot!”
“Pardon?”
“I was trying to be nice about this! I asked you why you’re so damn anxious like you’ve only got today to live, and you—you dare backtalk your senior?!”
“Ah…….”
“Ah? Ah ah? Did I hit your head wrong just now? Want me to hit you again to set it straight?”
Gisela Roth glowered at me, fists raised, growling.
“No, I don’t!”
Thank goodness.
She hadn’t found out after all.
“What is it—why are you suddenly grinning like an idiot?”
“Huh? Am I grinning? Why can’t I stop?”
“……Should I call Noah? Did you really get hit that hard?”
She repeated “How many fingers am I holding up?” several times before she finally believed me when I said I was fine.
“Don’t scare me like that, you brat!”
“I apologize.”
“Anyway, you’re banned from Physical Combat Training for a week.”
Gisela Roth declared this while roughing up the orderly black hair characteristic of Liene Berk, the kitchen maid.
“While your palm wounds heal, clear your head and think about this carefully.”
“What am I supposed to be thinking about?”
“Why you don’t know the value of your own life.”
Me? Not knowing the value of my own body?
In this world, no one was more important to me than myself.
“I actually take very good care of myself.”
“Yeah, I know. That’s why you bomb the exam like that—to preserve your body, right? But why do you put Konrad’s training above your own well-being?”
“Well, that’s…….”
I needed to recover my abilities as quickly as possible.
“Sure, you’ve got your reasons. But you can’t pull that off for long. Drop the attitude where only the goal matters and everything after is irrelevant. Not if you want to live long.”
Gisela Roth’s fingertips tapped my forehead gently, deliberately.
“Think about it. You’ve got a good head on your shoulders, don’t you?”
“……Yes.”
I rubbed my forehead where her fingers had touched and answered.
She was right.
At some point, I’d begun pushing myself to the back.
It was a habit.
A habit from when revenge mattered more than my own life.
But that wasn’t true anymore.
Following my parents’ wish that I alone survive, I had to keep living.
And for that, I had to cut the lifeline Killian Nox held over me.
“Thank you for the advice, Gisela.”
“Ugh, that’s giving me goosebumps.”
Gisela Roth shot me a look of annoyance.
Her manner was blunt to a fault, but the fact that she was a decent mentor hadn’t changed.
Someone like her—maybe I could ask for advice if I played it right?
“Hey, Gisela.”
I approached her just as she was returning from leaving something on Konrad’s desk.
It looked like a note she’d been scribbling on with a terrible expression just a moment ago.
“Didn’t we have new trainees move in recently?”
“Is it that time already?”
“Yes, I heard this year was a bit late. But those trainees—their backgrounds were verified properly, right?”
At my question, Gisela Roth’s posture in the chair shifted.
She answered with her elbow propped on the armrest.
“They’re verified. The Intelligence Bureau handles it.”
“……So it’s basically not being done at all, is it?”
“Have you seen those guys actually do their jobs?”
Gisela Roth muttered, “Useless wage parasites.”
“But what suddenly got you interested in trainees?”
“Oh, nothing much. Just what kind of training do they get at the Training Ground?”
“Basic combat skills, Weapon Handling, and that sort of thing—the rules of Nox. But the Training Ground isn’t so much a place where you learn things as it is where they find your aptitudes and specialties.”
“Oh, like figuring out what you want to do? Sounds better than I thought…….”
“Want to do? Do you think there’s any hope in hell?”
Gisela Roth ground her teeth as if the very thought gave her chills.
“What you want doesn’t matter. They strip away everything that makes you human, show you the bare bottom of what’s left, and then decide which department might find you useful. That’s what that place is.”
The Training Ground was far more terrifying than I’d imagined.
Looking back at all the Nox people I’d met so far, none of them seemed normal—which made me wonder if perhaps the Training Ground itself was the problem.
“Why, you thinking about becoming a trainee? Want me to get you in right now?”
“Absolutely not.”
My desperate wish to remain human came through far too plainly.
I hurried to add something plausible.
“The training at the Nest is enough for me. And I hear the procedures are incredibly strict anyway.”
“Still, it wouldn’t be that hard for the boss to slip you in, would it?”
That was probably true.
After all, what was difficult for Dupont Klansher except for the lifetime ordeal that was “Killian Nox”?
But knowing that power could effortlessly slip someone in as a trainee only made my unease worse.
‘Spies don’t always come from the outside.’
Someone with moderate power short of Dupont Klansher’s could also insert a trainee with dubious motives.
Had it really been the right call to turn a blind eye to that suspicious figure sneaking over the Commercial District walls in his nightclothes?
Should I confess now while I still could?
But what Gisela Roth said next lifted a great weight from my mind.
“Unless you’re hoping to enter the Training Ground and get a proper assignment now, you should stop worrying about it. There are good Safeguards there besides the Intelligence Bureau to filter out spies.”
***
“So they’ve got good safeguards…….”
My hollow murmur was swallowed by the cheering around me.
“Woohoo!”
“The little hero strikes again!”
“Rookie! The pride of the Action Squad!”
That was Jake, Hubert, and Bono in order.
I wiped the gloomy look from my face and spoke carefully to them.
“Guys, it’s the middle of the night—could you keep it down……?”
“Shut it, you punk!”
“Tch.”
The pride of the Action Squad could freeze to death.
This “little hero” business was really getting old.
Just then, the guy pinned under my legs stirred and began to struggle.
“Urgh! Ugh—!”
I pressed my knee harder against his spine and gave a warning.
“Want me to make sure you never walk again?”
“Ugh…….”
A little light threatening was all it took to get him docile again.
“Hah.”
Here I was celebrating in the dead of night with the Action Squad over an incompetent, amateurish spy.
It was so ridiculous I could only let out a hollow laugh.
“Who changed the patrol route?”
That was it.
All of this stemmed from the sudden shift in patrol assignments.
Hours ago.
I’d opened the door to the Guard Post without incident, peacefully as always.
But what greeted me was the rugged faces of Action Squad seniors I barely knew.
“What’s up? Rookie, didn’t you get the memo about your route change?”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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