CH528

Okay, I wasn’t expecting to have to deal with anything like this in my last couple days here.

Dinner with everyone had ended smoother than he’d been expecting. It had been nice enough to see his friends and in the end, Yuzu had managed the conversation with his students enough that he didn’t really have to talk to them and make nice outside of one or two questions, but in the following day, he was being forced to deal with the small change in all of them.

Zallith was adapting well to his life as a footstool, considering it penance for his poor behaviour when Ben had first arrived while Xilly was just quietly doing the assigned work, too beaten down by Yuzu’s reveals to keep up her confrontational attitude, nor could she keep holding his species against him. As far as he was concerned, it had created a far nicer environment overall, but that did leave just one last person on his mind.

He could see Nati’s thoughts and knew that there was almost something picking at her mind, yet something she hadn’t managed to put into full words herself. It wouldn’t have been too bad if that was all, but it left her constantly taking glances at him, opening her mouth to say something and stopping partway through. It was exhausting.

It was only when he heard the notification going off in both of the girls’ heads at another connect level that he released them from his mind, giving them a break.

“Okay guys, take five and then we’ll change things up a bit. Instead of practicing more connect, you’ll both be trying to apply the lessons I’ve been giving you. Decide amongst yourselves what you want to enchant and I’ll look it over after.”

And decide where I’m going to change things. Let’s see, I’ve been making them both deal with the same configurations of my thoughts but Xilly’s the one falling behind. If I want them to match a little more so they both end things at the same level then I should make the minds she deals with a bit more complicated. It’s not exactly going to be pleasant for her but this is just using hard work to make up for a lack of talent. She’ll just have to deal with a bit of a migraine when we go back to this tomorrow, it will be fine.

With that casual choice sealing the girl’s fate in Ben’s effort to raise up her connect level as fast as possible, Ben was content to sit back and relax just a little while watching them work.

If he was being honest with himself, he was a little tired. He chalked it up to teaching taking a bit of a toll and promised himself he would let himself sleep in just a little for his first day back to Stonewall, but it was clear he wouldn’t be getting any real rest soon with that fact becoming more and more apparent as he watched his students. Each time they tried to lay down an enchantment together, they failed, with only one of them being the issue.

“Nati, if you have something to say then just say it already,” He told her, not really wanting to play the role of therapist but not seeing any chance of her ending up productive unless he did, but despite putting that offer out, she denied herself.

“Um, I don’t. I’m just a bit distracted, sorry.”

When she wasn’t even able to get a firm grasp on what was bothering her, how could she get help from another? The issue was that she was suddenly thinking about Ben a lot more and she couldn’t say why, nor could she ask anyone for advice. If she tried to ask Xilly, she knew what the girl was going to say, and Zallith was just a little too useless outside of the work he did for her or the faith to bother with his opinion.

“I’ll give you a hint,” Ben sighed. “You have not accidentally fallen in love with me so it doesn’t matter what Xilly would say, don’t even consider that as an option.”

“…I understand you’re reading my mind, but could you at least pretend not to, please?”

“That depends entirely on what you’re going to think.”

She didn’t see much solution for that, so instead she tried not to think at all, switching to humming a popular tune to drown out the thoughts rattling around in her head, only to get a far more pained reaction from Ben in exchange.

“I change my mind. If it means you’re not going to hum that then sit there and think about me for however long you need to till you get what the actual problem is.”

“My humming isn’t that bad,” She said in her defense, a little offended by the reaction until Ben shook his head.

“It’s not a problem with the humming, it’s the song of choice I’m objecting to.”

“The song of choice?” She trailed off, trying to imagine what could possibly be the problem until she remembered both the lyrics, along with the circumstances of the songwriter who’d created them, feeling her eyes go wide. “You’re kidding me.”

“Unfortunately, I am not.”

“Haven’t you only been on this planet for like, four years?”

“Yeah, and it feels infinitely longer than that so no trying to inflict mental damage on me by making me remember just how popular that song is.”

Ben could only count his blessings that he hadn’t heard anyone in Stonewall singing Greed’s famous piece yet, but it was beginning to feel more and more like just a matter of time. One he was going to end up facing one day that would leave him without the smallest of ideas on how to handle it, but he at least got the mercy of Nati quieting down, though that only returned her to her original issue.

It was clear she was too distracted to actually make the progress she needed, so he stopped getting her to try.

“Xilly, keep practicing on your own for a bit. Nati, over here already. Take a seat.”

It wasn’t a request and she moved to do as she was told, seeing Ben wouldn’t let the matter drop.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“I’m really fine, I’m just a bit distracted is all.”

“Yeah, and we’re clearing that up right now so you can get back to work. Let me spell things out for you. You keep thinking about how I talk with Myriad. Why do you think that is?”

The brief back and forth he’d had with his god just the day prior, along with a few other times they’d exchanged words in Nati’s presence were echoing around her head, distracting her from the work she needed to do.

Ben would have preferred to ignore it if he could have, but it was at the point that it was distracting her from her ability to learn, the one thing he was there to make her do, so whether she liked it or not, she’d be confronting her feelings about the topic head-on.

“I don’t know, it’s just, isn’t it weird?” She asked him. “You’re talking to someone so high above you, how can you just have a casual back and forth? It seems more like you’re talking to a friend than anything else.”

“That’s because when I do it I am talking to a friend.”

The answer seemed to have caught her off guard and left Ben to sigh as he went on.

“Alright, Nati, what are gods to you?”

“What, what’s that even supposed to mean? Gods are gods. They raise up and guide us. They look after us and they make sure our needs are met while giving us the protection they can.”

“Propaganda.”

“What?”