Mushoku Tensei: The Mad Witch's Magical Redemption

[MC's POV]

Ah, it was so embarrassing... mortifying even...

First of all, I didn't realize that I was wearing a nightgown the whole time. Ever since the time I took over Eris' body and glanced in the mirror, I solely focused on her face and didn't bother looking down. But in my defense, not a single person pointed it out, so it's not my fault.

Secondly, what was I thinking when I requested Rudeus' tutor job in the Boreas way? I should have known about the weird tradition since it was in the novel. But even if I knew about this, I couldn't think of a way to avoid it without disappointing Sauros and Philip.

"Urggh..."

"Still embarrassed by what happened earlier?"

The voice—Rudeus' voice—broke my inner struggle. Of course, he was going to notice. I had been writhing in the seat of his tutor room, trying to hide the heat creeping up my face. Why did it have to be like this?

"You know, I already told them to quit with that tradition, right?"

Ah, I'm glad he mentioned it. After that embarrassing request, Rudeus had spoken up, boldly demanding that Sauros and Philip stop forcing me into that ridiculous practice. Fortunately, they both agreed when I vouched for him to do so.

Returning to the conversation, I nodded gratefully. "Yeah, thanks for that."

"Don't mention it," he replied, his tone completely casual.

For a moment, I glanced around the tutor room. It was spacious, yet sparsely furnished—the kind of place you could tell was reserved for immersive study. We settled on a long wooden table by the window with two benches set on both sides.

"Hey Eris, are you listening?"

Looking back, I noticed Rudeus was observing me while carrying a book. Ah, I almost forgot we were in the middle of a tutor session and he was teaching me basic mathematics.

"Sorry. Please continue."

Rudeus raised an eyebrow and sighed wearily. "Look, if you were willing to learn, you should pay full attention to me."

I bit my lips, trying to focus on the book in front of me. But my mind kept drifting back to that embarrassing moment. My face still blushing from the memory of me sticking out my hip and unwillingly saying "n-nyan~."

Trying to shake the memory, I mumbled, "I know… but I need to get these awkward memories out of my system first."

"Is that so..." he narrowed his eyes, shutting the book with a thud. "Then I suppose we won't have time to start language lessons if we can't get through this."

"What? No way!" I blurted, my pulse quickening. 

I couldn't afford to mess this up. If I didn't learn this world's languages, how would I ever read anything about my objective?

"Just kidding~" Rudeus joked lightly, opening the book again. "But for real though, please pay attention to me, okay? Be like Ghislaine over there."

I glanced to my side, only to realize that our huge, muscular cat-woman bodyguard had been listening the whole time. I'd almost forgotten she was even there.

Ghislaine met my gaze, nodding slightly. "Don't mind me."

"And besides," Rudeus continued, "those memories will fade eventually."

"Fine, fine," I conceded, trying to pull myself together. "Let's get through this already."

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As the tutor session resumed, I did my best to concentrate on the math lessons Rudeus was teaching. For the most part, the content of the lecture was rather expected—just the basics of mathematical operations like addition and subtraction.

However, I didn't want to give myself away, so I pretended as if these were all new concepts to me. Occasionally, I would throw in a question here and there, or intentionally make simple mistakes, just to keep up appearances.

Right now, Rudeus is teaching me to add numbers with multiple digits.

"Listen, Eris," he began explaining. "If you add these two numbers, you will get this result."

He added some small numbers together and got a result that didn't require carrying. But with the next example, he introduced an equation that did, which gave me an idea.

Nodding at his explanation, I pretended to act curious. "Okay, so what's next? Do I add these two numbers like this?"

I wrote down an answer, intentionally forgetting to carry the number.

"Close, but not quite," he remarked, calmly erasing my answer. "Remember, when you added these two numbers, you're supposed to carry the second digit to the next column over."

I nodded again, doing my best to look like I was concentrating, but I couldn't help feeling a bit like I was back in grade school, relearning things I'd mastered ages ago.

Playing the role of a beginner sure was tiring.

"Alright," Rudeus continued, his eyes glancing to the side with a playful grin. "How about you, Ghislaine? Want to try solving equations with us?"

"No thanks," she quickly declined. "Math is too hard to understand."

Rudeus chuckled and shook his head. "You might find it difficult at first, but if you considered trying for a while, you would realize it is not that complicated. Right, Eris?"

Meeting his gaze, I noticed that he was shifting his eyes, silently asking for my help. Knowing this, I turned to Ghislaine and pretended to persuade her.

"He's right—Math may look hard, but it could be fun too, so give it a try."

Hearing my words, the muscular cat woman seemed reluctant but she sighed in resignation.

"If the young lady insists, I will obey her commands."

With that, Rudeus came up with a simple equation for her. Ghislaine frowned at the numbers, her eyebrows knitting together as she eyed the problem on the paper.

"I don't get it," she admitted gloomily. 

"It's okay, Ghislaine," I reassured her. "Rudeus will correct it even if you answered wrong."

"Exactly," Rudeus concurred and nodded. "It's all part of the learning process."

Convinced by our reassurance, Ghislaine tried her best to answer the equation. Rudeus then looked at her paper and checked the result.

"You're quite close, but you made the same mistake as Eris," he remarked calmly. "Just don't forget to carry the numbers, alright?"

Nodding silently, Ghislaine accepts her failure.

After that, Rudeus continued giving us more equations to solve. Utilizing what we'd learned, Ghislaine and I answered the problems together.

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Once the math lessons had ended, Rudeus finally moved on to teach language—specifically the human language. I must say—for a language to be named after the race it belonged to, it was surprisingly straightforward, making my plans easier to piece together.

"Honestly, I thought it would be harder," I remarked, tapping my finger on the table. "But It's quite easier than I expected."

"Well, it's because you're picking it up fast, Eris," Rudeus replied, showing a glimmer of pride in his expression. "At this rate, teaching you language will be a piece of cake."

Now that I think about it, ever since I took over Eris' body, I could speak and understand the language without any complication. It didn't exactly make sense, but who was I to complain? Another lucky break in this strange new life... even though I didn't deserve it.

"Eris, care to read this sentence aloud?" Rudeus instructed as he turned the book to me.

"Ah, okay," I complied, receiving the piece of literature.

As I examined the page, I noticed that the letters were different. They looked nothing like the English alphabet or Hiragana, but it's something foreign yet familiar at the same time.

Thanks to Rudeus' teaching, I could somewhat understand the words. Still, I chose to act like a beginner and read the sentence with deliberate slowness, keeping up the act.

"The... mountains rise… their sh...shadows… long, while... rivers... sing… their ancient… song."

I glanced up, hoping my performance passed for genuine struggle.

"Hmm, not bad," Rudeus remarked. "You could have read it a bit faster, but that's fine."

Scratching the back of my head, I offered a genuine smile. "Thanks, I did my best."

Rudeus nodded and took the book before flipping to the next page. He scanned the phrases, looking for something for me to read. While waiting, I noticed that we were sitting apart from one another, which made his job difficult by passing the book back and forth.

So, to resolve this, I stood up, walked toward his side, and sat right beside him.

"Eris?! Why did you change seats?"

Rudeus, noticing our sudden closeness, became quite flustered.

Amused by his reaction, I couldn't help but chuckle. "Calm down, it would be much easier to read the book if I'm next to you."

"Oh, I see..." he concurred, regaining his composure. "I just thought maybe you didn't want to sit next to Ghislaine anymore."

"Well, I don't think she minds," I replied, glancing over at our bodyguard. "Right, Ghislaine?"

Hearing my question, she nodded slightly. "Yes..."

"Okay then," Rudeus acknowledged, returning his gaze to the book. "Let's continue reading."

And with that, we resumed our lesson, our newfound closeness making things feel a bit more comfortable. Even though he was still flustered by this, Rudeus gradually came to terms with the new seating arrangement.