TPIMAWW Chapter 5

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Chapter 5: Am I hated?

“I don’t know what we did wrong.”

“Do you think he knows what he’s doing?”

“That’s what I’m saying. It’s the right thing to do.”

Their move seemed to have been a waste of time, since there were four pairs of eyes now peering through the door of the study. It was impossible for Craig to have not noticed, but since he didn’t say anything, Shun didn’t dare to either.

The best Shun could do was remain focused on Craig’s onslaught of questions.

“503 divided by twelve?”

“Forty-one. The remainder is eleven.”

“That’s correct. Then, 889 times forty-nine?”

“43,561.”

“…312 times 447?”

“Uh; 139,464.”

Sometimes, Shun had to calculate the answers while using a mental abacus on the desk. He was happy that he had gotten them all right, but he was beginning to feel a bit fatigued after solving almost thirty problems in a row.

After he became a member of society, Shun only did flash arithmetic to kill time and had lost a lot of his original skill at it.

Even so.

“That’s enough, isn’t it?” The delinquent boy in the doorway said exactly what Shun was feeling. It was impossible for Shun to know these questions before had, so his mathematical skills were proven. They had to admit at this point that Shun was the best fit for the bookkeeping position, especially since several of them had done it before.

Nevertheless, Craig continued to spit out math problems as if he was forbidden from saying, “you’re hired”, and every time that Shun answered correctly, he became more and more depressed. It was almost as if hiring Shun would mean the end of the world.

Shun knew he wasn’t particularly liked, but he didn’t think he was so hated that he would be refused to the position at this point. It said it’s essential to bond with someone in order to build a good rapport with them, however what was Shun supposed to do when he had already fumbled it this badly?

Shun felt dizzy.

“Are you tired?”

Shun’s consciousness suddenly became aware of something other than formulas, words. Although Craig sounded considerate, his dour expression remained unchanged.

“No… Yes, I’m tired.” For a moment, Shun thought it might be better to lie than admit the truth, so he wouldn’t be considered weak.

Craig ran his hand through his bangs expressionlessly. For some reason, he looked more confused than Shun was feeling.

Shun became even more bewildered. If he didn’t like it, all he had to do was reject him outright. He just couldn’t understand.

“This is the last question. If you get it right, you’re hired.”

“Yes!” The cheers that burst out were, unexpectedly, not from Shun. When Craig glared behind Shun in surprise, Gin hurriedly shut his mouth.

Craig took a thin book from a nearby shelf and opened the first page.

“Answer in five seconds.” Craig pulled out a watch with a silver chain from his chest, clicked open the silver cover, and placed it on the desk before him.

“What’s seven plus seven, minus seven times seven, minus seven divided by seven, plus one, plus seven times seven, minus seven times two, plus one, minus fifty, plus seven, plus seven, plus seven times seven, minus seven divided by seven, plus one, plus seven times seven, minus seven times two, plus one, and minus fifty?”¹

Before Shun had even gotten the chance to respond to his earlier stipulation, Craig quickly recited the formula.

“Huh?” Someone said, verbalizing Shun’s feelings once again. However, he didn’t have a moment to be thankful. He managed to calculate it about halfway but felt like he missed something while he was flabbergasted by the question.

The design of the watch was almost the same as the ones in his original world. The face had a golden dial and twelve black numbers with long, needle-thin hands, and the seconds ticked by mercilessly.

Just before the seconds hand passed the fifth dot and while in a panic, Shun shouted vigorously, “Zero!”

He hadn’t moved even a millimeter from the chair the entire time, and yet he was out of breath. As the energy from his answer dissipated, silence spread again.

Craig looked as if he was bearing all the troubles of the world. Then with a little relief, he said, “You passed.”

“I did it!” Bang! The door flew open, and the first person to jump into the room was Gin. As Shun stood up, he grabbed both of Shun’s hands in his and spun them round and round. Although Shun knew that he was giddy from being saved from bookkeeping, Shun was about to lose his mind.

Excited and free from the heavy responsibility, Gin finally let go of Shun and went to Craig to give him a firm handshake. When Shun was thrown aside, he was supported by the boss’s, who had a punch perm², arm.

As he managed to swallow a scream that almost came out instinctively that ended up sounding more like a whimper, a nifty wink flew out with a powerful thumbs-up. It seemed he did a good job. Funny.

“You’re awesome. I never met anyone like this in school. What’s going on in your head?” the delinquent boy, who was called Evan, that was next to him was too impressed and stunned by him.

“Oh, I think I spent all my talent on this.”

“No, no. You did well, boy! Now our accounts are saved!” As Evan responded to his self-deprecation, a heavy shock hit his left shoulder, and Shun nearly collapsed beneath it.

Dian³, or Santa as Shun’s been calling him, stroked his fine beard with a hand resting on Shun’s shoulder, smiling heartily.

“Well, Gin wasn’t suited for it by any stretch of the imagination,” Evan turned toward Gin with a hateful expression, and Gin responded by showing his teeth, pretending to intimidate him.

“Well, it was worse for everyone else. Some people can’t even keep their letters straight,” Carl(boss) said solemnly, narrowing his thin eyes, “I mean, right now our finances are in shambles because of you.”

“No, that’s different.”

“At any rate, I’m glad the boy is here. Come to think of it, I haven’t asked your name yet.”

Dian looks at Shun with black eyes that are as bright as his shiny head.

“It’s Shun, thank you very much. However I’m too old to be called a boy anymore.”

“Shun, Gin.”

All of the hustle and bustle quieted down. Shun, who wanted to change Dian’s perception rather than introducing himself, suddenly hesitated before turning to speak.

Craig called the two of them back in while urging the other three back out. Evan gave him a sharp look, but Dian and Carl simply smiled and obeyed.

“Gin, you’re not done with your work yet. Make sure you take over properly.”

Gin, who thought he would be free from bookkeeping the moment Shun was hired, slumped his shoulders. Still, Gin nodded, reluctantly agreeing, and Craig’s golden eyes turned towards Shun.

“Eep,” Shun squeaked, cringing. It was a pity that he still hadn’t shown any signs of growing accustomed to Craig’s intense gaze after so many times.

“You can use anything in this building as you wish, except for this study. I have to ask you to refrain from leaving until we’ve decided that you’re worthy of trust. You can sleep here until then. There are plenty of rooms available, but whenever you leave, I or someone else will have to take you out like when you arrived here. You won’t have to wear a blindfold, but you’ll be riding in a carriage with no windows to avoid you knowing where this is. Is that alright?”

“Yes, of course.” Shun nodded deeply. He had a few questions about this, but this wasn’t the atmosphere to do so. He doesn’t want to lose this opportunity he worked so hard to get, after all.

“Carl is in charge of meals, and cleaning the common areas is on a duty schedule. Ask Gin if there is anything else you don’t understand.”

Shun nodded again like a karakuri puppet⁴.

“And you don’t have to use honorifics here with me or anyone else.”

Shun returned from a puppet to a human and looked at Craig’s and Gin’s faces. Gin affirmed his words with a nod of approval.

“This place is like a gathering place for people of any status or age. I’m the head of the group, so I can make the final decision and make decisions on emergencies, but it’s basically a system of consensus. We don’t want any sense of hierarchy.”

Craig granted them leave when Shun didn’t say anything in response to his determined voice. However, even as Gin walked out while stretching, Shun remained standing there.

Shun didn’t think that the first prince of the Wolf Country had thought so much about ordinary people and his rootless grass⁵ partners.

Gin was the only Dawn Fog character that appeared in Craig’s route, and he just thought this was a part of Gin’s personality and not the group as a whole. Come to think of it, the spoilers didn’t even mention why Craig ran away from the Wolf Country and was believed to be dead.

“…what?”

Seeing Craig’s troubled face, Shun hurriedly looked around the room and realized that they were alone.

“Oh, oh, uh… “

“…did you calculate the last question?”

Shun was unable to say anything when Craig asked him this. Even though he had lingered because of the questions things that were on his mind, it would be rude for him to turn and run away now.

It was a blunt way of asking, and Shun wondered if Craig even cared about the answer.

“Actually, no… I didn’t.”

Craig raised an eyebrow at him, and Shun merely shrugged his shoulders in response. Now that they had come this far, Craig probably wouldn’t fire him all of a sudden.

“Problems with the same number in succession usually cancel each other out to get another number, like one or zero. I knew that if I got fifty minus seven squared plus one at the end, the answer would be zero.”

Craig probably knew that five seconds wasn’t enough to calculate the answer. So Shun answered honestly, but as soon as I finished say that and fell silent, I felt uneasy. Daring a glance at Craig, Shun became wide-eyed.

“You look like nothing but a weak man, and yet you’re surprisingly ballsy. You had the brains to think that far ahead with a time limit.”

To Shun’s surprise, Craig was laughing. His beautiful eyes were lifted into crescents, and he seemed to be enjoying himself. However when Craig noticed Shun’s gaze, he returned to his original, difficult expression.

“Go.” He spoke bluntly, but Shun could see the blush growing in the corner of his eyes, so it seemed more like a cover for his embarrassment. Shun had imagined him as an arrogant, arrogant man, but the reality was that he was a good, free, young man. He truly was a capture target.

Shun’s face suddenly turned red, and he took a step back. Craig tilted his head in curiosity.

“Well, that’s all that I had to say. Thanks for hiring me!” Shun quickly turned on his heel.

Right. Craig was a capture target.

Before now, Shun may have seemed to be acting suspiciously, so Craig had been harsh with him. However now, with the absence of the heroine, he should avoid being left alone with any of the heroine’s capture targets.

“… Hey.”

“Oh!” When he was caught by the shoulder from behind, he became nervous.

“I have one thing to tell you.”

As if to keep Shun from turning back, a low, sweet voice sounded in his ear. A soft stimulus rippled through him from the warm breath that ghosted over the shell of his ear.

“Don’t get too close to me.”

Craig’s frighteningly quiet voice engraved itself in Shun’s mind. He didn’t even know how to reply. If there was one, Shun did not know them. Craig pushed him out of the study and shut the door as if he was saying goodbye.

Shun was then surrounded by the group who had begun to make merry again and was forced to join in. He didn’t even notice Craig cursing at himself with his back against the door.

**************************
1. 7+7-7×7-7÷7+1+7×7-7×2+1-50+7+7+7×7-7÷7+1+7×7-7×2+1-50 …this is unreadable both ways honestly. But grammar tells me to write it out, so. Hopefully I didn’t miss anything lol. Bless Shun’s soul for being tortured like this with math.

2. The raws just said basically the punch perm guy’s arm, and the boss guy was frequently described to have black, close-cropped hair, so… Also a punch perm looks like this (for those of you who remember this meme):

3. Diane‘s name might actually be Dian? It’s “ディアン” in the raws (for anyone who knows better than me), so I’m probably going to go back and fix it in the last chapter… Sorry about that (￣ー￣；

4. “Karakuri puppets are traditional Japanese mechanized puppets or automata, originally made from the 17th century to 19th century. The dolls’ gestures provided a form of entertainment.” -wikipedia (basically he’s saying he’s nodding mechanically a.k.a. a bot)

5. Rootless grass is a term coined by a Japanese playwrite and author, Abe Kobo. It’s basically a term for being without attachments, literally having “no roots”.

TL Note: I did not think I was going to be able to get this out before bedtime, haha. Anyways, I’ll see ya’ll with chapter six on wednesday? I’ve got some assignments I have to prioritize for a few days x’D

Word Count: 2,211

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