The very next day, I had no energy to do anything. I just sat there wallowing in my own misery, not even bothering to grab my bag and go back to the bus stop. I didn't see the point anymore and quite honestly, I had chickened out of doing what it was I wanted to do. Of course, this left a problem of what I was going to do with my free time. I had finished all my assignments and I really didn't feel like studying. Going out with cost money, which I did not have.
And, there was really nothing fun to do on the internet for me to occupy my time with. At least not anymore.
And so being a young man I decided to do that one thing which is absolutely free, easy to do, and quite... satisfying. But before I could unzip my pants, someone rang my doorbell.
I went to go open it wondering just who it could be at this hour. My parents lived in a different city and they did not visit me often. I would get phone calls from them occasionally, but I couldn't think that they would visit at this time of the year.
Maybe it could be my landlord, but I'd already paid the rent for this month, so I had no idea why he would be coming knocking. I opened the door to see an extremely beautiful young lady looking at me.
At first, I didn't really recognize her but then it registered in my mind that this was the same girl I had helped out yesterday. And it occurred to me that I must have been really wrapped up in my own thoughts (or just denser than the dumbest harem MC) because I had not noticed just how beautiful she was.
She was wearing plain clothing, though in my mind that just seemed to accentuate her beauty even more, I'm sure you've seen that meme in which they'll show you the average supermodel, and then they'll show you a picture of the random girl who works as a cashier at the retail store with the normal girl being way hotter. This was the same thing, but in real life. She had lovely hair that fell down nearly to her waist, and there was something exotic about her features- she looked to be a foreigner, or perhaps, she was only half-Japanese?
It took all of my self-restraint not to say, "I would like to order one McMommy please."
"Uh, I'm sorry," she said. I snapped out my thoughts as I realized she had asked me a question and I had not paid attention to it.
"Um, uh, uh sorry. I was lost in my thoughts for a while," I finally said.
"Oh, I just wanted to thank you for yesterday," she said. "The way you stood up for me. It was really amazing. It was quite... cool actually." she blurted out rapidly. She didn't have an accent, so I could only assume she had been in Japan for a long time.
Seeing her flustered, like this actually made me flustered a little and I rubbed the back of my head.
"Uh, it was- it was nothing," I said.
And quite honestly, after that incident a few months back I had kind of lost interest in dating or with women in general. But she seemed so kind and sweet...
But now that I thought about it, so had she the first time we met, so I guess that didn't really mean anything.
Still. One question definitely came to my mind. "Hey- wait a minute. How did you know where I lived?"
"Oh," she said. She took out my student ID card. "You dropped this. And I called the university and they told me where you lived."
"Oh, oh, I see," I said and took the card back. I was mentally kicking myself for not only having lost it but not noticing that it was lost until this point. "Uh well, thank you very much for giving this back to me."
"No problem," she said. "Uh, my name is Raphtalia."
That confirmed it for me as that was definitely not a Japanese name. So either her parents were from abroad or she was a mix of Japanese and some other race. Regardless, she was still quite pretty.
"Um, so I hope those men didn't cause you any trouble after I left." I said.
"They didn't," she replied. She then paused. "Oh wait I remember now you didn't actually get your meal after you paid for it. What happened?"
"Uh, yeah, I had to run after something," I said.
"Yes, but I saw that you had missed the bus, and you didn't even bother coming back to the restaurant," she said.
Wait, had she been stalking me?
No, she was probably just wondering what I was doing after having run off like that.
"Yeah, but I kind of just had to come home after that."
"Well, about my job..." she said trailing off "Uh, there was a bit of a commotion after you left and I ended up getting fired."
"What!" I exclaimed. "That's totally unfair!"
"Maybe," Raphtalia said.
"If you want I'll go have a word with your manager," I said. Granted, I had no confidence in my ability to do anything about the situation. I just didn't like the whole situation in any way. Maybe threatening that I was a law student would help... nah, that probably wouldn't work.
"No, no don't bother," Raphtalia said. "I don't want to work there anymore. If that's the kind of place it is, what's the point at best? They'll give me my job back, right? And I don't want it."
"But then that means you're out of a job then, right?" I asked her.
"Well yes, for now," she said
I almost said "goodbye and good luck" to her at that point, but then the gears started turning in my brain an idea came to my mind. It was crazy, but the more I thought about it, it didn't seem that crazy.
"I'm sorry. Is there something wrong?" she asked, seeing my blank expression for several minutes.
"Oh no. No, not at all," I told her. "Um, why don't you come in? Uh, there's actually something I wanted to talk to you about, but yeah, please come in first. Uh, sorry I didn't invite you in earlier." Where were my manners After all, we had been talking at my doorstep for the last five minutes. So, indeed, I had been quite rude. If my father had been here, he would have smacked me over the head for treating a lady like this.
A/N: Naofumi meets Raphtalia- but who is this other 'she' Naofumi keeps referring to? Why am I treating you like you've never read the novels and don't know the answer already? And just what is Naofumi's big idea here? Find out in the next installment of 'The College Days Of the Shield Hero!'
