Fake Saint of the Year
Translator: Tsukii
Editor: Geli
Read at Watashi wa Sugoi Desu!
After Story: Fake Saint Goes to Japan (7)
An hour had passed since I emailed Yamoto Tamaki, but I still haven’t received a reply yet.
It wasn’t rare for a person to only check their mailbox once a day, and it was possible that they would only do so in the morning.
Also, because it was kind of a suspicious email, it was even more likely she wouldn’t reply. It wouldn’t be weird for people to be wary that it was some kind of scam.
That was why I intended to wait patiently, but if I still didn’t get a reply after a few days… At that point, I would just resolve myself to give up altogether.
Originally, there was no real reason for me to meet Yamoto Tamaki at all costs.
However, I wished to meet Propheter at least one more time and properly give my thanks to her. Such was my selfishness … It was purely just for my self-satisfaction.
I was the only one who would benefit from meeting Propheter once more. I would be the only one who would be relieved of guilt and feel refreshed about it. Propheter would get no benefit whatsoever.
That was why if she thought it would be troublesome, then I wouldn’t force her to meet me, and if she judged the mail as spam, I would just accept it.
I would just like to settle my regrets and seal the space-time rift afterward. That would be the end of it.
Then another hour passed… since it had come to this, I chose to watch the “Kuon no Sanka” Grand Route video.
I gave up on buying a console and playing it myself since it was sold out, but I could still watch it this way.
But… this was embarrassing…! It was more embarrassing than I thought!
My character inside the game was totally depicted as an orthodox Saint-type of heroine, but seeing it all with my own eyes made me like I was going through humiliation play.
On top of that, whenever the favorability increased during the game, the “Elrise” on the screen would be blushing.
Turtle-san?! Did I ever react like that?! No, I definitely never did! What kind of forgery did you make here!
I had never felt this kind of embarrassment when I had played it as Fudou Niito. Rather, I had even laughed while playing it.
Even though I was aware that both of us were the same person, the reason I never felt that way was probably because Fudou Niito had no memories of life as Elrise. So the feeling I got during that time was, at most, just “My other self is somehow acting like a heroine LOL.”
However, my current-self has both memories due to the fusion of our souls.
So for me right now, what I was doing was no different from torturing myself with shame.
No good, my face was heating up…
No good, it’s too hard for me, it’s unbearable! As I thought that, I switched to the mailbox tab to escape and saw that I had gotten a reply.
Alright, I didn’t have to watch the game anymore! Time to stop! Stop!
The content of the email was to meet up tomorrow, at the same café we had last met in to talk.
The meeting time seemed to be the same, but the details like the name of the café, its location, as well as the meeting time weren’t written in the email.
I see, so if the email was really sent by Fudou Niito, then I should be able to know what the “same as before” meant.
As expected, she was wary of me.
Even so, this wasn’t a problem for me since I remembered it properly.
I sent a short reply and then left the internet café.
I felt the gazes of the other customers and the clerk who had been looking at the bookshelf, but I didn’t feel bothered about it since I was already used to it.
In the end, I purchased things like seeds for my vegetable garden and a couple other things before returning to Fiori once more, but since the log house was a bit farther from the cave, I decided to stay at the Saint’s castle.
Alfrea asked me to cook meals for her, but I figured I could just consider it as my accommodation fee.
Personally, I just wished to eat meals made by others without having to put any of my own effort.
That seemed to be a difficult goal to achieve.
It was a little off topic, but in my mind, the person who first thought of hotcake mix was a god.
By using it, even a beginner like me could make the perfect hotcake to my desired thickness.
The first time I noticed this divine food hack was when I had watched a gourmet TV drama.
When I saw the protagonist eating a thick hotcake, it made me want to eat one too. So I immediately departed to the convenience store, but as expected, the pancake there was thin after all.
So I had no choice but to buy hotcake mix instead and to make it on my own. That was my first experience using it.
By the way, I kept switching back and forth between pancake and hotcake when I talked about it, though both of them were practically the same thing. Just don’t mind it too much. To be honest, I didn’t know which of the two terms was correct.
For some reason, I just decided to classify things made with hotcake mix as hotcakes, and then everything else as pancakes.
So the divine hotcake mix was mixed with soy milk and egg, and poured into an oiled mold.
After that, I just had to cook it on the frying pan and flip it over halfway through the cooking time to make sure it was completely cooked on both sides.
Then the resulting hot cakes were stacked to two layers, and I patted butter on top before pouring some maple syrup on it.
There was no deep reason to make it two layers. It was just a matter of aesthetics.
By the way, I personally thought that the easiest way to make this was with a rice cooker, but… I didn’t really feel like it would be appropriate to bring one to Fiori. It would become an OOPart by this world’s standards.
Then as I put the hot cakes in front of Alfrea, she glanced furtively at me while squirming as if she couldn’t wait to eat.
How do I say this… it really felt like I was feeding a doggo…
“Please go ahead.”
The moment I gave her permission to eat, Alfrea immediately ignored the gazes of those around her and started eating heartily.
Although I couldn’t say that she has good table manners, the fact she still looked cute while doing that must be because she was already cute to begin with.
But if I spoiled her too much, she might get fat, so I should do it in moderation.
I also served the same thing to the Guard Knights, who usually worked hard as Alfrea’s aides, if they asked for some.
Unexpectedly, there were a lot of them… Rather, all of them requested it, so the hot cake mix I had brought back from Japan was used up for a single meal.
Or rather, Alfrea, don’t look so enviously at the other knights’ portions after you just finished eating up yours.
…Ah, she tried to steal some from the knight beside her but she was avoided. What a girl…
“Hey Elrise, why don’t you live with me in this castle, after all? Then you can become my bride!”
That was a tempting invitation. However, I was the bride, huh…
Rather, the moment I lived together with Alfrea would be the moment my dream NEET life ended.
Also, she seemed to say things like bride without really understanding what it meant.
Had she really been about to get married just before she got sealed…?
Then I went to Japan once more, and entered the shop where I had met Yamoto at the same time as our previous meeting.
The moment I entered, people started murmuring among themselves, and everyone was looking at me.
Among them, there was one person who looked familiar to me … As I headed for the seat where this black-haired woman sat, she stared back at me with a dumbfounded expression.
“E…Elrise…?”
“Long time no see, Propheter. Your name on this side is Yamoto Tamaki, isn’t it?”
I smiled back at the shocked woman — at Yamoto Tamaki.
It was obvious that she’d be in shock.
She probably thought it would be Fudou Niito who would visit her, but she didn’t expected to reunite with Elrise (me).
Yamoto looked around and then hurriedly stood up from her seat. She whispered, “Follow me. It’s too conspicuous here.”
Rather, she grabbed my hand and forcefully dragged me away. She didn’t even give me the choice not to follow her.
Then after she settled the bill, we left the café and got into a car that was parked in a nearby parking lot.
It was a stylishly designed red car. You sure ride a nice car.
“Go sit on the passenger seat … err, the seat beside me. Also put on the seatbelt … err, yes, that thing that looks like a belt … wait a minute, I’ll do it for you.”
Although I didn’t really respond to her fussing, she still tried to explain things until she just decided to abandon the notion altogether and just put on my seatbelt for me.
Well, from her perspective, I was an otherworlder who came to earth after all.
Perhaps she thought that I wasn’t aware of things like a seatbelt.
Yamoto started the car and drove off as if to escape from the people’s gazes. She started speaking again after a bit.
“You are Elrise … I’m correct in assuming that, right?”
“Yes, your assumption is correct.”
“I’m surprised. Actually, you recently started trending on the internet so I was aware that you had come to this side, but how did you … no, rather why do you know who I am? How did you find out?”
“I inferred it after what Fudou-san had told me, and your reaction confirmed it.”
Yamoto parked her car on the side of the road and started rubbing her furrowed brow.
By the way, you could probably tell already from my actions so far, but I had absolutely no intention to reveal that Elrise = Fudou Niito.
As for why … just think about it a little.
I blatantly entered the women’s bathroom when I was a student, you know?
Because of the fact I was also physically a woman, I was able to look at women’s naked bodies, you know?
Of course, Yamoto was aware that I had to enter the women’s bathroom… If I were to tell her that “my mind was that of a man’s” it would be dangerous for me.
I would be branded as a pervert.
Well, either way, I had no intention to reveal that to begin with.
Although I had built myself up with lies and my façade, I had already decided to live as “Elrise” until the bitter end during the battle against the “Witch.”
I had no intention of going back on that decision.
This was my own stubbornness. I still had my pride as a liar.
I had the duty to protect the image of “Elrise” for all the people I have deceived so far … Well, I had no such thing though… Rather, I already got this far so I couldn’t back off anymore…
Anyway, I would be keeping this lie up and taking it to my grave.
“Indeed, Fudou-san had said that Elrise had come to this side, and Ijuuin-san had also backed him up on that… However, I heard that she had come in a state that was similar to that of a ghost instead of bringing her real body… But the Elrise right here has her real body… What’s happening here…?”
Yamoto muttered to herself as she was desperately trying to grasp the situation.
Oh~ oh~ she was confused.
However she had originally been from Fiori as well.
Her mental tolerance for strange and unusual events was probably much higher than others.
She didn’t live for nearly a thousand years in her past life for nothing.
Eventually, she raised her face and looked at me with a more relaxed expression.
“I have a lot of doubts, but … long time no see, Elrise. I’m happy to see you again.”
“I’m also happy to see Propheter too. I’m glad you look fine and all.”
I wasn’t sure it was appropriate to tell a person who had died that they looked fine, but since she really did look fine, it should probably be alright.
Then I began to explain to Yamoto about the space-time rift and how I passed through it and could go back and forth between the two places.
Then Yamoto folded her arms as she went “Hmm.”
“To think there was such a place… that Alfrea, she never told me about it.”
“So Propheter also didn’t know about it?”
“Aah, I guess Eve only told her daughter about it.”
The Prophet could view every place in the world without needing to move.
But that didn’t mean that they could perceive every part of the world at the same time; it was just the Prophet had the ability to choose what location they’d like to see.
If Propheter had been aware of such a place, then she would have likely seen that place.
But since she never knew about it, she never saw it, so it couldn’t be helped.
“But that makes sense. That rift is what connected both Fiori and this world. Perhaps my soul also passed though the rift and then reincarnated on this side. And I was able to retain my memories due to the fact that reincarnation across the two worlds had originally been impossible.”
Certainly, it was as she’d said; the people who had reincarnated after crossing between the two worlds got to keep their memories.
Only Yamoto and I had done this at this point, so I couldn’t declare that this was a definite thing, but as long as that rift existed, that meant that reincarnators who still retained their memories would likely increase in number.
As expected, we better seal that hole hole soon.
When I return after this, I would tell Alfrea to close it.
“Even so…”
Yamoto glanced at me and squinted as if seemingly impressed.
“Although I was aware of it in my past life, I didn’t really get affected by it. Now that I have become a human, I finally understand.
Based on your appearance, nobody would’ve ever thought of you as anything else but the real Saint.”
I paid careful attention to my appearance so there was no way I’d get doubted based on that!
Since the content was fake, then at the very least, I needed to make sure my appearance and behavior seemed more authentic than the real one.
Just like in that werewolf game, where some werewolves seemed more innocent than the actual villagers sometimes.
Since a villager was already a villager to begin with, they had no need to pretend whatsoever.
However, since the werewolf was a fake, they needed to appear more villager-like than actual villagers.
To be honest, I always felt a little nervous that I might get caught at any moment.
It might be a little too late to say this, but it was amazing that I never ever got caught back then.
“Rather, how is it possible?
There were no tools for beautification and no beauty salons on the other side. Even the make-up in Fiori was inferior to what was available on this side.
To be honest, I’m perplexed at how you managed to maintain such an appearance, though…”
I merely laughed off her question in an effort to deceive her.
Well, about that. Magic was almighty.
I would spare you the details, but I did things like using water magic to keep my skin moisturized and healing magic to repair the skin tissue to maintain my appearance in the best possible condition.
Before, a maid who had served me in the castle said “I’m jealous that Elrise-sama can stay beautiful without taking too much care of her appearance,” but in fact, it was the exact opposite.
It wasn’t that I never took care of it. I just used magic to automatically and constantly take care of it!
Well, you could recover lost limbs if you mastered healing magic in Fiori, so once you could do that, you could practically recover almost anything.
Perhaps I could already ignore the cellular division inside my body, and it was also possible to intentionally manipulate the extent of it as well.
The dark power had already left my body, but even without that, I think I could maintain my ageless appearance.
By the way, just to be clear, even if I dispelled the magic, it wasn’t like I would suddenly turn ugly.
It wasn’t like I used magic to magically change my current appearance after all (though I did use light magic to create an otherworldly lighting effect…)
If I stopped, it would just mean that the maintenance magic would stop working but my current appearance would stay as it was.
So even if I dispelled the automatic magic, it wouldn’t make my appearance instantly deteriorate.
…Well, I was still a human being though, so obviously, if I cancelled the magic for several days and didn’t put in work to maintain my appearance, there would be some degradation like rough skin or something.
In fact, Elrise(True) had indulged in gluttony and ruined her originally good looks.
Her body odor was said to have been terrible as well, as Vernell in game had described it saying “because of the unnecessarily wasteful use of too many sweet and luxurious perfumes, the scents had mixed and turned into an unbearably intense odor.”
In other words, even if I had a cheat-like bishoujo’s body, if I didn’t put in the necessary effort to maintain it, it would eventually go bad.
“Anyway, you better not walk outside too much.
Although the security in this country was better compared to that of Fiori, there are always fools who are likely to stir trouble.
No, we could even say that there are more evil people here compared to the other side.
Moreover, your appearance is… it might even cause a normally serious person to lose their reasoning.”
“Thank you for your advice. I’ll be careful.”
“It’ll be helpful if you do so.”
After Yamoto said that, she pulled a smartphone out from her chest pocket.
There was a calendar there, and it seemed she was confirming something.
“Hey… if you want, can we talk about things in a quieter place? If it is possible, for a whole day.
I’d like to hear about the things that happened on the other side after I was gone.
This will likely be the first and the last … no, nothing. Let’s put that fretful topic aside for now.”
Yamoto had probably confirmed her schedule for tomorrow.
Either way, her suggestion was in line with my purpose.
I originally came here for the purpose of meeting up with her once more, so there was no reason for me to decline.
So I replied with a silent nod.
A/N:
-Past Life
Propheter: (Hee… Well, I guess she might look pretty proper for a human. Since I am a turtle, I don’t understand it though.)
-Present
Yamoto: (Isn’t Elrise way too beautiful…?)
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I am both happy and sad here. I am happy that they met and sad that this will probably be the last time they meet.
Ah…one last bittersweet reunion with the previous and new generations. How nice, but also fleeting. Like a scattering flower in the wind.
Thank you for the chapter translation-sama, author-sama, and editor-sama!
Ahh… Nice they can talk with each other again… Feels like a nice way to wrap things up…
Finally they are reunited….uhh…I somehow feel a little sad and happy at the same time
You are right to feel so.
Hmm… omoshiroii
tashikani…
Reunion! I’m glad they get to reconcile a bit. This is truly a HAPPY END.
Indeed, author trying to resolve everything.
hahahaha atleast she knows now how Elrise is unworldly beautiful in the human standards… But I’m quite intrigued, Tamaki should know she used “email” at this point, her not knowing about Earth perception should be going away lol
actually, Tamaki noticed that, but chose not to say it since Elrise didn’t feel like saying it.
She could easily say she had Niito write it for her or teach her how to do it.