“Until next month?”
Nigel’s eyes narrowed slightly. To have received enough medicine needed until next month would have been quite a large amount. After confirming Nigel’s reaction, Professor Vera judged that he must have already finished all the medicine for next month and scolded him.
“I told you countless times not to increase the dosage on your own. If you do that, you’ll build up a tolerance and it won’t work later. Even as it is, your attending physician at the Imperial Palace has so many worries.”
Nigel found Professor Vera’s reproach annoying, but he sat in the chair entrusting his body to her diagnosis without complaint. This was why he preferred sending Eden Lake here every time rather than coming directly himself.
“Don’t tell me you haven’t taken the medicine even once for several days?”
“…Yes. The situation was a bit. It was a situation where it was difficult to take medicine.”
Unable to say that he himself had become a frog, Nigel spoke as roundabout as possible. Professor Vera, not liking that answer, sternly scolded him.
“Taking it regularly is the most important thing.”
Rowen’s brow furrowed as he watched that extremely natural treatment process. From the words about reducing dosage and the Imperial Palace’s attending physician also worrying, it seemed like a much more serious situation than what he’d heard through Nigel’s mouth.
In the first place, Rowen had only heard about Nigel’s physical condition through his own mouth. He knew that Nigel was someone who hid his weak parts.
‘I shouldn’t have just trusted what he said…’
It was when Rowen was regretting inwardly. After finishing the examination and sending Nigel to a bed inside the healing room, Professor Vera’s gaze reached Rowen, who was still standing behind the chair.
“What brings that student here? Are you sick somewhere?”
Rowen, who had been thinking about other things, answered a bit late.
“…Pardon?”
She looked Rowen up and down and chuckled. There was no way the professor wouldn’t know the student from the Ashfield family, who was Nigel Kaiserion’s longtime friend.
“You’re just Nigel’s companion.”
“…Hello.”
Rowen bowed politely, but his expression was stiff unlike usual. Rowen’s gaze was already directed at Nigel sitting on the bed inside the healing room.
Nigel’s face as he properly adjusted his forehead and collar that the professor had touched for the examination was cold as always.
Rowen, who had been looking at such a Nigel, opened his mouth.
“Professor.”
It was a voice small enough that Nigel sitting inside the healing room wouldn’t hear.
“Is Nigel’s condition… very bad?”
Usually he just thought that Nigel was so sensitive and fastidious in nature that he couldn’t even stand a small headache. Like some kind of Crown Prince-specific mysophobia.
But this isn’t something to be dismissed as simple sensitivity.
Professor Vera stopped her hands that had been preparing medicine and glanced at Rowen. Then she shrugged her shoulders.
“Well, it’s not a fatal illness but… it could be a disease with an unknown name yet, so we need to keep watching the prognosis. His nerves are excessively sharp. At this rate, his body won’t be able to endure.”
“……”
The professor, who casually said something like a bolt from the blue, approached carrying the prepared medicine and a cup of water, and gestured with her chin to Rowen.
“After taking this medicine, his senses will become sensitive for a while and he’ll have trouble even with light. If you have time, sit beside him for a bit. He’ll definitely try to leave right after drinking the medicine.”
“…I understand.”
Rowen drew the thick blackout curtains toward the window without complaint. As the room darkened, Nigel’s pale face sitting on the bed stood out even more.
He received a bottle of potion that Professor Vera held out, then as if familiar with it, dropped a few drops into the prepared water cup.
Gulp. Gulp.
Nigel emptied the entire water cup without frowning even once. Thunk, he was about to put down the empty cup on the side table and get up from the bed.
“Let’s leave in a bit.”
Rowen’s hand gently pushed Nigel’s shoulder back onto the bed.
“…What? We don’t have time for this right now—”
“It would be good to listen to your friend. Sleep until the medicine takes effect. I’ll tell them not to wake you until you get up.”
When Professor Vera disappeared into the inner pharmacy, a heavy silence descended on the room. Nigel had his eyes closed languidly, perhaps due to the medicine’s effects. Rowen approached the bedside, pulled up a chair, and sat down.
“……”
Rowen’s gaze swept over Nigel’s pale cheeks and faintly trembling eyelashes. He was a friend who always seemed strong, arrogant, and perfect. But looking at him now, he seemed precariously fragile as if he might break.
“…You.”
Rowen opened his mouth with a hoarse voice.
“It wasn’t just a bit of a headache?”
Nigel replied with his eyes closed as if it was bothersome.
“It’s nothing serious. I’m just tired.”
“Liar.”
“…I was planning to go to the Imperial Palace once the festival ends anyway.”
“To meet Harind-nim?”
Rowen even knew the name of the attending physician at the Imperial Palace who had been looking after Nigel for a long time. Nigel glanced at Rowen once as if finding it curious that someone with such good memory had no interest in any academic subjects other than swordsmanship, then closed his eyes again and said.
“Right.”
“Does Eden Lake know?”
“…Know what?”
Nigel frowned with his eyes closed. He kept talking to him so much that he couldn’t tell whether he was telling him to sleep or not to sleep.
“That you’re this sick, Nigel.”
“Not in detail.”
“That guy is with you almost 24 hours a day?”
“Because I’ve never explained it to him.”
“……”
With that question, Rowen said nothing more. Nigel slightly opened one eye while lying down. The guy had the most worried face he’d ever seen.
“Why are you worrying so seriously? It’s not a serious illness.”
Even after hearing Nigel’s words, Rowen’s stiff face didn’t improve. He sat quietly in the chair for a while, then pulled the blanket up a bit more toward Nigel’s face and said.
“Just sleep for now. I won’t go anywhere and I’ll be here until you wake up.”
The medicine’s effects were already spreading throughout his body anyway. Nigel wanted to say, “While I’m like this, you at least should be investigating inside the Academy,” but soon his consciousness became so hazy that even moving his mouth became bothersome.
As Professor Vera said, since he hadn’t taken medicine at all for several days, the medicine’s effects seemed to come on stronger.
In his sleep, he felt the warmth of something hot carefully wrapping around and holding his hand.
* * *
What he felt as soon as he opened his eyes was an unfamiliar sensation. There was no throbbing pain. The heavy fog that had been weighing down his mind lifted, and his vision was clear. Nigel blankly looked up at the ceiling.
A morning where that terrible headache he had to experience every time he opened his eyes in the morning had disappeared. It had been so long he couldn’t even remember.
“…Are you awake?”
A low, hoarse voice was heard. When he turned his head, he saw Rowen uncomfortably leaning against the chair beside the bed.
Rowen’s face was still slightly dark, but as soon as their eyes met, he smiled with relief. His large hand was still carefully wrapped around and holding Nigel’s hand.
“You didn’t leave?”
“I said I wouldn’t leave. That I’d stay by your side until you woke up.”
Rowen got up from his seat while massaging his stiff neck. He familiarly picked up a water cup and handed it to Nigel.
Still….
Nigel received the water cup with a subtle expression. He knew Rowen’s personality well. He knew that he didn’t like sitting still and keeping watch beside a sick patient.
Would he have acted like this even if it were a different friend? Probably not. While he could come to the infirmary together out of goodwill, staying by the bedside until they opened their eyes was a different matter.
‘It seems the fact that I went missing for several days was quite a shock.’
He was already a guy who worried a lot. Thinking that his longtime friend had disappeared made Rowen’s current behavior somewhat understandable.
“How’s your body? The professor said that if you drink medicine after stopping for several days, it might feel a bit strong.”
“…Really?”
Nigel looked down at his hand after taking a sip of water. Feel a bit strong? Nigel frowned slightly. Because his current physical condition was the complete opposite of what Professor Vera had said.
“My body… feels light. My head doesn’t hurt at all either.”
Rather, it felt similar to when he first took the medicine, before he’d built up a tolerance to it.
“Really? That’s a relief.”
Rowen’s face brightened cheerfully. Come to think of it, Headmaster Silvanus had said that.
“You don’t need to worry too much. The Crown Prince is rather…. Yes, rather in a state of having escaped danger. Very safe.”
Could that really be the case? The fact that Nigel had turned into a frog might have actually had a good effect on his health. Rowen said without hiding his relieved expression.
“It really seems like you had built up a tolerance to the medicine and it wasn’t working. From now on, it seems better to just visit the treatment room directly every time.”
“…Of course I should.”
If I have the time, that is. Once the festival starts, the Student Council’s work will be cut in half. After that, it would be possible to meet Professor Vera every month or visit the Imperial Palace.
Rowen nodded as if pleased that Nigel had answered positively to his words.
“Want to rest more? Your complexion still isn’t great.”
At those words, Nigel stubbornly got up and said.
“No. I want to go back to my room. I need to change clothes too.”
He was still wearing the clothes he’d borrowed from Rowen in the morning. Including spare school uniform shirt and pants… even underwear. Of course, they were all items newly issued to Academy students every month, but it bothered him because Nigel’s measurements were slightly different from Rowen’s.
Rowen sighed as if he couldn’t stop him and helped Nigel, who was getting up from the bed. Nigel of course pushed away that touch. It wasn’t a situation where his movement was uncomfortable enough to need support.
Such overprotection.
