Arc 3: Chapter 12
“So, what is the whole ‘partner’ thing about?”
Sunset paused, half-way through lathering her hair. She and Chisame sat side by side, washing up before they entered the dorm baths to soak. “...please tell me you aren’t buying into the ‘prince’ thing.”
“Of course not,” Chisame scoffed, pausing a moment to rinse out her hair. “But you seem to know what it’s really about. So?”
Sunset sighed, rinsing her hair out as well. “Some custom from England,” she said. “It isn’t romantic, first of all. It’s more like… a work agreement. Partners agree to support each other, help each other out in their careers.”
Chisame raised an eyebrow. “Really? And a ten-year-old is thinking about all of that?”
Sunset chuckled, shaking her head. “Yeah, he’s way too young for that sort of thing. I think he’s just taking himself too seriously. Not surprising, really. You’ve seen how adult he tries to be.”
“Yeah, and it’s annoying.” The girls stood up and walked over to the baths. “Any chance the rest of the class will listen if we-”
“Hikaru-chan! Hasegawa-san!”
Sunset and Chisame looked over to the entrance of the baths to see a tomboy-ish, tan haired girl standing there in a one-piece swimsuit. Misora Kasuga grinned as she jogged over, carrying a couple of bikinis with her. “Glad I caught you. Quick,” she held up the bikinis, “put these on!”
Sunset shared a quick glance with Chisame before turning back to the baths. “Yeah, no.”
“Come on,” Misora said, tossing one of the bikinis to Chisame. “The rest of the girls are bringing Negi-sensei here for a ‘Cheer Up Negi-Sensei Pool Party.’”
Sunset looked around. The baths that served their dorm did resemble a large pool more than a place for simply soaking. “And this concerns me, why?” Sunset asked, settling down into the water.
Misora raised an eyebrow. “Well, would you rather Negi-sensei see you in a swimsuit, or naked.”
Sunset shrugged as Chisame began pulling on her swimsuit. “Honestly, I couldn’t care less either way.”
Chisame paused, sharing a look with Misora. “You… don’t care?”
Sunset stifled a groan. Stupid human nudity taboo. “He’s just a kid, right? What’s the big deal?”
Misora blushed while Chisame shrugged, finishing putting on her bikini. “Honestly, I’m more worried about the rest of our class,” she said, slipping into the water beside Sunset. “Do you think they’ll leave you alone if you’re the only one without a swimsuit?”
“Win-win then,” Sunset said, grinning at her. “When I see who’s staring or sneaking glimpses, I’ll know who in the class is interested.”
Chisame rolled her eyes, sighing as she leaned back and closed her eyes. “Whatever,” she muttered, ignoring the sound of the class entering and setting things up. “Though why you would want to attract the attention of a bunch of ditzes is beyond me.”
“Oh come on. We aren’t all that bad.”
Sunset looked up, smirking at the dark-skinned girl that towered above them both. “Do I really have to point out the problem that Chisame has with you?”
“Don’t engage them, Nichibotsu,” Chisame groaned. “You’ll only encourage them.”
Mana chuckled, settling in on Sunset’s other side, her bikini covering very little. “I’m guessing it’s either jealousy or the fact that I look like I’m in my twenties.”
“The second one,” Chisame grunted, massaging the bridge of her nose as the noise in the baths increased. “You and Nagase and Chizuru. Even the class rep looks too old for our class.”
“Could be worse,” Sunset said, her eyes drifting to the far end where two girls were cannonballing into the slightly deeper waters. “Could be the Narutaki twins. Are we sure that they’re actually as old as the rest of us?”
“I’d suspect them of skipping several grades if they weren’t such idiots.”
Mana frowned at the two of them. “Is this really how you two spend your time? Insulting the rest of the class and coming up with all the ways that they annoy you?”
“Only when I’m forced to be around them,” Chisame clarified.
Sunset shrugged, watching as Yuna and Makie started racing, the former easily outpacing the latter through the water. “Meh, I just like shooting the breeze. And Chisame seems like a sane person to do that with. I agree with everything she says, it just doesn’t bother me so much.”
“Not that you don’t use it when you need to,” Chisame said, opening one eye and smirking at Sunset. “That rant at the World Tree Plaza was brutal. I’d love to hear what you have to say about the rest of the class.”
Sunset groaned. “That should have worked so well. I can’t believe that Natsumi saw through it.”
Chisame’s retort was cut off by a large splash, and the three girls looked over to see a naked Negi sputtering and coughing from the depths of the pool.
“And so it begins,” Sunset muttered, leaning back and closing her eyes as the class shouted out a welcome to the child teacher. “Let me know when they start groping him.”
*****
The party went about as poorly as Sunset expected. As soon as it looked like Negi was starting to cheer up, Ayaka started in about being his partner. All it took from there was one of the girls volunteering to wash his hair before the whole thing deteriorated into what Chisame called “a sexual harrassment party.” Sunset, feeling that any further opportunity to relax had been officially destroyed, stood to leave.
She almost made it to the door before the screaming started.
“KYAAA! A MOUSE!!!”
“THERE’S A RAT!!!”
Sunset groaned, staring at the door. I should just walk away, Sunset thought. I should just walk away and ignore it.
“KYA! THE MOUSE IS UNDOING OUR BIKINIS!!!”
Sunset immediately turned on her heal, leaning back against the wall. Then again…
It was at that time that Asuna burst through the door. She stared dumbstruck as swimsuits went flying and several girls desperately tried to cover Negi’s eyes. “Wh-what the heck?”
“Something in the baths,” Sunset replied, watching the affair with a small smirk on her face. She pointed to a small shadow that was darting from girl to girl. “It’s going after their swimsuits for some reason.”
“And you’re just standing there?!”
Sunset shrugged. “Why interrupt the show when I can sit back and enjoy it?”
Asuna rolled her eyes, grabbing a nearby bucket and rushing for the pool. The shadowy figure turned to her, two eyes gleaming through the steam of the baths. It leapt straight for the girl. Asuna jumped to the side at the last second, smacking the figure with her bucket and sending it flying back towards the door.
Sunset’s hand lashed out, grabbing onto the creature. She quickly darted outside, slamming the door behind her. She breathed a small sigh, her lips twitching upwards as she heard Asuna berating the rest of the class. “Doing my job for me, eh, Asuna? Now…” She lifted the creature in her hand to give it a good look.
She was surprised to find herself holding a normal looking ermine, his fur a pure white, his beady eyes an intelligent red. “Huh,” Sunset muttered, beginning to walk towards her dorm. “Got to admit, I was expecting something… more unusual.”
“Hey, I’m as unusual as it gets, girl.”
Sunset stopped, her eyes going wide as she stared at the ermine in her grasp. “You… can talk.” She shrugged and continued onward. “Well, that’s interesting enough.”
The ermine fidgeted and squirmed, trying to get out of her grasp. “You, um, aren’t going to drop me?” he asked nervously.
“Why would I do that?” Sunset asked. She reached her dorm and stepped inside, walking over to her dresser and beginning to pull out her pyjamas. “Slippery as you are, you’d be gone in an instant.”
“Yeah, well,” the ermine was definitely sweatring now, “m-most people just do it on reflex, you know? Strange, mutant talking ermine and all that? Freaks most people out.”
“Magic talking ermine, you mean.”
The ermine was silent for a while. “...crap. You’re a mage.”
Sunset nodded, pulling on her clothes. A difficult task with only one hand. But she managed. “And I have quite a few questions for you. First of all,” she glared at the creature, squeezing him slightly, “what’s a talking ermine doing in the girls’ baths in the middle-school dorms?”
“I-I-I-I can explain,” he stammered nervously. “I-I was just looking for my big bro! I heard he was a teacher here and was staying in these dorms!”
Sunset raised an eyebrow. “Big bro? You mean Negi?” The ermine nodded emphatically and Sunset sighed, massaging the bridge of her nose. “Well, that’s that then. His problem now.”
She left her dorm, making her way swiftly to the room that Negi shared with Asuna and Konoka. Receiving no response when she knocked, she decided to enter and wait for them inside. She let the ermine down, and he immediately scampered off to one of the girl’s dressers and began rummaging inside. Sunset simply shrugged, looking around for something to occupy her time with.
“So, you say you know the kid, huh?” Sunset asked, spying the loft and growing intrigued. “I guess that means you would know something about his father, right?”
“Eh, not much,” the ermine replied from within Asuna’s underwear drawer. “No more than anyone else. Why do you ask?”
Sunset shrugged, climbing the ladder into the loft and finding a sleeping mat and a well-organized desk. Must be the kid’s. “Just curious,” Sunset replied, looking over the desk and finding a mix of lesson plans and notes on spellcraft. “I heard he was some sort of famous mage or something.” Hm. Mostly lightning and wind magic. Those must be his specialties.
“Oh yeah,” the ermine replied, sticking his head out of the drawer to look up at her. “The Thousand Master was the most powerful mage of our day, maybe the most powerful in the last hundred years. Everyone in this world and the magical world knows about him.”
“The magical world?”
The ermine’s reply was cut off by the sound of the door opening. “Phew, yet another crazy day.” Sunset looked up at the sound of Asuna’s voice, turning to see her and Negi walking into the room.
“But thanks to everyone, I’ve cheered up a little,” Negi replied, rubbing the back of his head sheepishly.
“Yeah, seeing a bunch of cute girls get stripped will do that,” Sunset said, grinning as Negi and Asuna jumped a little before looking up at her. “Yo.”
“Nichibotsu-chan?” Asuna asked, surprised and a little suspicious. “What are you doing here?”
Sunset shrugged, jumping down from the loft. “Nothing much,” she said, jerking her thumb behind her. “Just escorting a certain troublemaker to his precious big bro.”
“That’s right, Boss!” The ermine leapt from the dresser, landing in front of Negi and smiling up at him. “It’s me, Albert Chamomile! Long time no see.”
A massive grin instantly split Negi’s face. He knelt down, arms outstretched to the fuzzy creature. “Chamo-kun!!!” The ermine named Chamo leapt into his arms. “It’s so good to see you again!”
Asuna flinched back, staring at Chamo in shock. “D-did that ermine just talk?”
“You find all sorts of strange things where magic is concerned,” Sunset replied, shrugging. “After finding out about love potions, golems, and vampires, talking animals really shouldn’t surprise you.”
Asuna groaned, staring up at the ceiling, a defeated expression on her face. “I’m never going to get used to this magic stuff.”
“So what’s the story here, anyway?” Sunset asked, turning her attention back to Negi. “How’d you become friends with a rodent?”
“I’m a mustelid, thank you very much!” Chamo exclaimed, leaping out of Negi’s hands and glaring up at Sunset. “And it just so happens that Aniki earned my eternal friendship when he saved my life! You see, it all started five years ago in Wales, when I-”
“Don’t care.” Sunset turned towards the door, waving casually behind her. “I only dropped you in here to get you out of my hands. You’re the kid’s problem now.”
“What’s Negi-kun’s problem?” Konoka stepped into the room, a towel wrapped around her body. Sunset heard a quiet “Oo-la-la” from behind her, followed by some quick shushing. “Nichi-chan, you aren’t causing problems for Negi-kun, are you?”
Sunset rolled her eyes. “Relax, Konoka. The only one causing problems is the pervy little weasel behind me.”
“Eh! Nichi-chan! That’s a horrible thing to say!”
Sunset chuckled. “Not the kid.” She pointed. “That pervy little weasel.”
Konoka gasped as she saw Chamo. She rushed over, picking the stoat up and cuddling him to her chest. “Cute! A pure white ermine!” She ran out into the hallway, calling for the rest of the class. “Everyone! Come look at Negi-kun’s pet!”
Sunset took the opportunity while everyone was distracted to slip out and back to her dorm, though she did sneak a jealous glare at Chamo as he unashamedly nuzzled into the various faces and breasts pressing in around him. Lucky creep. She quietly slipped into her room, closing the door behind her and leaning back against it and closing her eyes with a sigh. “Glad I’m out of that hassle.”
“The class going crazy again?”
Sunset cracked an eye open. Yue was sitting on her bed with a book, already changed into her pajamas. Nodoka was in the middle of changing and gave Sunset a concerned look. “Nothing too bad,” Sunset said, waving them off. “They’re just freaking out about the kid’s pet, the ermine that was causing trouble in the baths.”
“Eh?” Nodoka questioned as she finished buttoning up her shirt. “Negi-sensei has a pet?”
Sunset nodded. “Apparently, he just got in from Wales. I don’t know the details.”
“And neither do we care,” added Yue, her nose going back into her book.
Sunset chuckled, walking to her ladder and vaulting up into the loft. “Exactly,” she said, lying back on her cot. “So long as it stays his problem, I have no intention of getting mixed up in it.”
“Hm.” Yue hummed to herself. “Is that how you’d like us to handle your… revelation from last night?”
Sunset tensed. She looked down from the loft to see Yue eyeing her over the top of her book. “...that depends,” she replied hesitantly, laying down on her bed but maintaining eye contact. “Is that how you want to handle it?”
Yue sighed, closing her book. She placed it down and began massaging her temples. “Honestly, I’m tempted. The possibility that something like m-magic exists…” She sighed and looked up at Sunset. “But Nodoka told me the details about last night, and I remember our trip to the depths of library island. That combined with your strange behavior and everything around Negi-sensei…” She shook her head. “The rational part of me wants to dismiss magic as pure fantasy, but it also tells me that it’s the only logical explanation for all of this.”
Sunset nodded, rolling over to stare at the ceiling. “Sounds like quite the dilemma. I don’t envy you.”
Nodoka frowned. “You aren’t uninvolved, Nichi-chan. We need your input on this.”
“Do you?” Sunset sat up and looked down at them. “I found out today that Evangeline isn’t going to be a problem anymore. Her seal only weakens at the full moon, and someone else is going to keep an eye on her. She won’t be attacking anyone else. So at this point, it’s up to you.” Her eyes narrowed. “Do you want to go deeper, or not?”
Yue and Nodoka shared a look, the former frowning in thought while the latter wrung her hands nervously. “That’s, well,” Nodoka looked down, unsure. “I don’t really know.”
“Good answer.” Sunset sighed and leaned back on her cot again. “Really, there’s no rush. I’ll keep learning, Evangeline will stay harmless, and Negi will hopefully get his magic more under control.” She snorted, grinning to herself. Not much a chance of that, though.
“I guess,” Nodoka muttered. “It just… feels weird knowing about this and not doing anything with it.”
“Just try to forget it,” Sunset said, waving her off. “Trust me, all this magic stuff won’t even affect you.”
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SO MUCH IRONY !!!!
Because that's always how things work out in stories where magic is involved.
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I had a feeling people would love that line.
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Especially this one.
various faces and breasts pressing in around him.Lucky creap
1. Creep.
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Oh you have no idea... Or you did but did it anyways and cackled like the mad person you are. Keep doing it.
And apparently no one noticed/cared that Sunset was naked.
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Well, they were in the baths. Besides, most of them were naked before too long.
Ha!
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Sunset, Sunset, Sunset... Fate's calling and she wants to know when she should arrive. After such a... temptation she can't resist.
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What can I say? She needs to get on TV Tropes more often.
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Sunset? Murphy called. He said "Challenge accepted girl. And may you live in interesting times." before starting to cackling like a Marvel/DC Comics Villain.
Pffft! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!
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Yeah, that was temping fate.
Flash forward to them being the villains in the sequel
media.makeameme.org/created/boy-that-escalated-zop93h.jpg
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That's the way it's written.
Yeah, but she went all the way back to the dorm carrying the perv ferret without even a towel and no one said anything?
I call the ferret getting caught in there room and sunset punting him out the window at high speeds for being a creep
murphy: oh how beautiful, when someone invokes my name with such fervor and passion.
❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤
Famous last words Sunny.