No Longer The Hero | TBATE

Chapter 10.5 | Jasmine's Dilemma

!!Please Read!!

This is a makeup chapter since I've missed two updates in the past two weeks. Arthur's reunion with his parents will be posted on Monday.

(A/N I forgot to mention this but after Jasmine and Arthur left the adventures guild Arthur used illusion magic to change his hair color and eye color back to normal.)

Enjoy

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'Are we done yet?'

Sylvie's voice resounded throughout my head as she lay sprawled on the ground with impatience. If it wasn't for the fact that I could feel her emotions through our bond, I probably would've thought she started to develop the phobia for shopping that was common amongst men.

'Yes. If you were paying any attention you'd know I just paid, now all I have to do is change into them then we can go meet my parents.'

As my response finished I grabbed the bag that contained my new clothes and entered the dressing room, paying absolutely no attention to Sylvie's internal rejoicing.

...

"Wow..."

As I exited the dressing room I immediately drew a lot of unwanted attention from just about everyone in the store, including my daughter and Jasmine.

'Hey Sylv, is there anything wrong with my outfit?'

Despite the fact that I had made enough money to live the rest of my life in luxury, I had opted to buy clothes that looked more modest and were focused on comfort rather than the more luxurious wear. My current outfit was just made up of a plain white t-shirt, a pair of black workout shorts that hung down to just above my knees, and a black chained necklace with a blue gem attached at the bottom.

Other than the necklace, which I had made in the beast glades with the remains of a few high ranking mana beasts, every other piece of clothing was just normal unbranded wear that even well off commoners could afford.

'Hello? Sylv? Why is everyone looking at me?'

However, as I was about to ask again, my daughter, who was just lazily lying on the ground, jumped up onto my head and glared at the people who were staring at me as she yelled in my head.

'Papa, we need to get out of here!.'

I started to grow even more confused and asked.

'Why?'

She paused as I felt a mixture of pride and fear formulate inside her through our bond.

'Well papa... you're just too cute!'

'...What.'

Being called cute by my mother or sister when I'm a child is one thing, but for my own daughter to gush over me like an adorable kid caused quite a bit of damage to my pride.

Sigh...*

"Jasmine."

I turned to Jasmine who was also frozen in place as she stared at me, and called out her name to break her out of her reverie.

"W-what?"

As she broke out of her daydream she stuttered in response to my call with a slightly shaken look on her face.

"Let's go, we're leaving."

"Y-yes."

And without another word, I put all of my stuff on my dimension ring and left the store.

...

{Jasmine POV}

'NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NONONONONONO! This isn't possible! I'm not like that!'

As I walked next to the ever stoic Arthur I continued to scream at myself mentally to direct my mind away from the boy in question.

Now you might be wondering, 'why exactly am I doing this?'. And well, the reason while simple is also quite complicated.

'No Jasmine! He's a decade younger than you, you can't think like that!'

As Arthur revealed his new getup, instead of thinking of how cute my little brother looked in normal clothes, I strangely thought of how he looked hot.

'Although since I'm technically a nobl- nonononononono! Mind out of the gutter Jasmine! He's practically your younger brother!'

Amongst nobles, a wide age gap in couples was quite common among high ranking nobles, both male and female, as they tended to take multiple spouses that are much younger than them, making our mere decade age gap look like nothing.

'Not to mention Arthur looks nothing like a child...'

If someone was given a chance to guess Arthur's age based on his physical appearance, most people would probably think he's in the range of the middle teens(15-17). This was not only because of his toned, muscular body which stood at an astounding 178 cm (5,10), but also his stoic face which was completely devoid of any innocence.

Slap!*

As my thoughts started to get more and more out of hand I subconsciously slapped myself, drawing both Arthur and Sylvie's gazes.

Arthur looked at me with a confused expression before looking away as if deciding it had nothing to do with him, but Sylvie locked eyes with me and gave me a suspicious glare that contained hints of defensive malice.

'No, it's Arthur's fault for looking so manly! Wait no- please! I'm not a pedophile!'

But my internal screams remained unanswered as I continued to walk next to Arthur with a flat expression.

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A/N

If you didn't notice, I had some fun writing this chapter because of its nature.

What do you think?

Any feedback or ideas for the future?

Please comment on the person(s) that you think should be your love interest. (I won't confirm the ship tho until the later chapter when it becomes apparent.)

~908 words