CH 201

“If there is nothing else, I hope you can leave. It is very busy here.”

“Sorry.”

Rieta nodded her head slightly, but she did not step aside.

“I think… I think I should stay a little longer.”

He wrinkled his face, showing annoyance.

“It’s you, right?”

Rieta turned around and looked at him.

“Professor Gilliam’s Gatherer.”

The researcher did not answer.

Instead, he just looked into Rieta with a meaningful gaze.

He seems to be trying to gauge how confident she is in this matter.

After some time passed, he put on a disappointed look.

He seems to have come to realize that arguing is perhaps of no use.

“To be honest, I am not Professor Gilliam’s gatherer. I am a gatherer of this country.”

He put both hands on his cheek and added, ‘I’m a civil servant.’

He seemed to want to show off his cuteness in his own way, but to no avail.

“……Tch”

He felt that Rieta’s reaction was disappointing, so he threw himself into a large chair and stretched out.

He looked very different from when he pretended to be a sincere researcher.

“I didn’t know I was going to lose such a trivial bet.”

“Did you make a bet with Darrell?”

“I did.”

Noel entered the professor’s room again and closed the door.

The two soon approached the place where they faced the gatherer.

“Were you betting …. If I would be able to recognize you?”

“Hmm? No? There is no way I would do such nonsense bet.”

“Then what?”

“I was betting on whether my aegyo would work. Naturally, I put all of my effort into ‘It works’…!”

He wrapped his arms around his head and grabbed it in agony.

Rieta and Noel looked at the man with cold eyes.

Because it was surprising that he truly believed he would win such a pathetic bet.

“By the way.”

The gatherer tilted his head and opened his eyes brightly toward Rieta.

He seemed to be the type of person who couldn’t keep his body still.

“How did you know?”

“That’s vague to explain.”

Rieta laughed awkwardly when the gatherer asked.

He had only taken an assumption from what Darrell or the professor had said.

[“Gatherers are experts who secretly bring in plants and animals from other countries at the request of Imperial researchers. There must have been something to collect this time as well.”]

[“No, let’s not stay here like this, let’s hurry and go to my lab. They said something good had just arrived. I’m sure you’ll be interested too.”]

She couldn’t think of it at the time, but the saying that something good had arrived.

She wondered if it could be interpreted as saying that the gatherer came soon.

“Ummm… but I could have been a real researcher. Isn’t it?”

The gatherer spoke the worst case in a light voice.

He also felt like Rieta was worried about it somewhere.

“If that were the case, the academy would have been greatly overturned by now.”

Yes… it must have been.

It wasn’t enough for a princess from another country to come here, it will be revealed that she wandered around in search of a gatherer.

“So that means we need to be a little more cautious.”

“Thanks for the advice.”

“Anyway, I’m really curious. How did you know I wasn’t a researcher?”

“You’re a little too much to be called a researcher here…”

“Too cute?”

He stuck his face in front of Rieta’s.

With a smile full of aegyo.

Rieta turned her head in disgust.

“No, looking at the umbrella Noel brought with him, you don’t seem to expect it.”

The researchers here seemed to be well aware of the professor’s umbrella problem.

Didn’t Darrell say the same thing?

[“I hope there’s a junior who took over that mission. All researchers would be delighted.”]

“Ugh, I really didn’t know that. I’ve heard that Professor Gilliam is a bit blind except for work.”

He had now withdrawn the face he stuck out to.

He still had a pleasant smile.

“And more?”

“What?”

“There is more.”

Why was she so sure he was the gatherer? There’s one more thing, but that’s not the reason, it’s just…

“I’m more curious because it’s hidden like that, what is it? Tell me.”

Rieta let out a small sigh and answered without saying anything.

“Yes, because I knew it before.”

Rieta didn’t bother to say who affirmed what.

For some reason, it feels like he knows the other party somehow.

“I see. You’ll meet me. No matter what happens.”

Since Darrell had said this, it was clear that Rieta would meet the gatherer.

No matter ‘what’ happened.

Even though she didn’t know that the ‘what’ that would happen was to meet Noel by chance and change clothes pretending to be a student.

“Ymm.”