"How cute."
Eliza's reaction after that, was quite 'explosive' in a different kind of way as Evan could have sworn he saw steam come out of the blonde girl's head.
He smiled lightly as he patted her head, before turning around and walking to the door, only to turn back to the still-blushing girl and speak.
"Oh, you already agreed so you can't back out now, okay?"
After saying that, he left the room, leaving the embarrassed battle priestess alone...or not.
It was only after Evan closed the door that Eliza's mind finally rebooted and she realised something.
'Weren't Pride and the others still here?'
She slowly turned around wishing they weren't but the four life signs she could sense in close proximity told her that her wish did not even have a chance to attempt to come true in the first place.
Her eyes caught sight of the quartet who were fed an unexpected amount of dog food this early morning, with four pairs of eyes staring straight at her.
Pride, Kayla, Amy and Kuro were all seated at the table in the room gazing at her as the high demon and the two humanoid spirits who were in their larger forms, along with the shadow spirit who had no visible appearance change, sipped their tea/milk simultaneously.
*SLUURP!!
The sound was the only thing that rang out in the silent room, a few seconds before Pride dropped her teacup and spoke.
"Don't mind us."
Follow on NovᴇlEnglish.nᴇtKayla instantly followed up her words.
[You can go after him if you want.]
And a finisher was delivered by both Amy and Kuro.
[[We'd just sit here and watch the show.]]
All four of them simultaneously gestured towards the door of the room, indicating for her to go after Evan, but that only served to increase the blonde girl's embarrassment to new heights.
◇ ◇ ◇
Obviously, the current Eliza didn't have the guts to go after Evan, so she ended up wallowing in embarrassment for the next few minutes.
To say she wasn't expecting this, was actually kind of a lie.
The girl wasn't dense, she had obviously noticed that Evan's gaze towards her had recently changed slightly. Like there was something more in it.
It didn't take her long to figure out that the young hero might have held some sort of feelings towards her, but while she expected that he would have eventually acted on them, she definitely didn't expect it to be this soon!
Thus, she hadn't noticed how he had casually asked her out on a whole-day date, with the realization only dawning on her when she had agreed.
"I'm more surprised by the fact that you didn't notice it after he said 'I meant just two of us'."
[Even though I don't know much about that stuff, I realised what master was doing too.]
Pride and Kayla spoke as the two of them finished their beverages and dropped the cups on the table, with Pride asking a question afterwards.
"So, what are you gonna do about it?"
"What do you mean by that?"
Eliza tilted her head in confusion as she asked back, causing Pride, Kayla and Kuro to simultaneously sigh in exasperation while Amy just shook her head slowly.
"w-what's with that reaction?!"
To Eliza's question, Pride just facepalmed before replying with a question of her own.
"The kid has pretty much made his intentions clear with that, so what are your intentions?
Are you going to reject his advances? Or not?
Whatever you do, don't make things awkward around here. It would be very irritating for me."
With that, Pride got up from her seat and picked Amy up, holding the young spirit's hand as the two of them left the room.
Kuro also wrapped his shadow around Kayla before the two of them melded into the shadow of the table on the ground and disappeared.
The blonde battle priestess was left alone in the room, with Pride's question resounding in her head.
'What am I going to do?'
She questioned herself in silence, tracing her memories back to when she met Evan and trying to figure out how she felt towards him.
From when she saw the boy in Luka close to a year ago, when he was still acting cranky due to the stress of travelling alone and how she had ended up underestimating him due to his appearance.
Follow on Novᴇl-Onlinᴇ.cᴏmThen moving on to how she spent a few days with him and ended up warming up to him, only for him to vanish after an argument.
Then Ralphie showing up the next day and her discovering that he was actually a high-ranked noble.
She thought through their interactions all the time and how they kept in touch despite being at two opposite ends of the country, and how she had freaked out when she arrived at Geto and found him half dead during the battle against Xakon.
Deciding to follow him and Pride and spending time with them over the past two months, and finally arriving at the current situation now.
By the time she was done with her reminiscence, Eliza had pretty much figured out how she felt towards Evan, and how he most likely felt towards her too.
"It's not like he's in love with me or anything, I highly doubt it. His feelings for me aren't that deep.
At most, it is just a crush..."
The blonde teenager ran her hands through her hair as she continued her statement.
"...and I feel the same way too. I have a crush on Evan."
Her cheeks slowly turned red with embarrassment as she admitted it to herself.
It wasn't like it was the first time she had a crush on a guy before so this wasn't completely new to her, however, the last time it was someone else who helped her figure out her feelings, not her sitting down to think about it and realizing it herself.
"I wish I was still at home, maybe then 'she' would have helped me out on this..."
She remembered her elder cousin who she looked up to like an older sibling and was more experienced in the matters of the heart before sighing.
"But if I was still at home then I would not have met Evan, so maybe it is better I left."
Eliza slowly pulled her legs up to the bed and hugged them as she leaned back and rested on the headboard, unaware of how gloomy her expression became at the thought of not having met Evan in Luka that day.
It was then that she realised one huge problem.
"Wait up. What am I gonna wear that day? I obviously can't dress up like normal."
The blonde teenager instantly hopped off the bed and bolted to her own room as she began sorting through her clothes to piece together a nice outfit.