Chapter 172

Chapter 172: Loli's favoured by world

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The strange realization made Fern feel uneasy.

She wanted to correct something, but there was nothing to correct.

The more she thought about it, the stranger her mood became. Eventually, she chose to ignore these thoughts and said with a serious face:

"In short, children and willful people need to be disciplined before they can change. Blindly pampering them is absolutely not the way to go."

"…You say that as if I or Frieren have actually changed over the years." Despite the risk of angering Fern, Ash couldn't help but refute.

It was an obvious truth, one that made Fern's purple eyes seem to lose their color.

"—How dare you say that?! I've said it so many times, about so many things, yet you and Lady Frieren have never corrected yourselves! Not even once! This is the first time I've realized just how unchanging a person can be!"

"…I can't say that I haven't changed at all. Frieren hasn't changed much, but at least I apologize much faster than before, and my attitude toward self-reflection has also—"

"—You've only improved in apologizing and reflecting! But the important things haven't changed at all. What kind of progress is that?!"

"But at least it's something, right?"

"It's nothing!"

…

What had started as a discussion had somehow taken a wrong turn, and the example he had given only made Fern angrier. Eventually, she ended up giving him a full-on lecture right there.

Finally—

"—Please reflect on yourself!"

With that, Fern slammed the door and left, still fuming.

Ash, dizzy from the scolding, shook his head to clear his thoughts. He turned to his closet, planning to gather his things and leave before any further trouble could arise that night…

Just as he opened the wardrobe, the door swung open again.

He froze as if struck by lightning.

For a long moment, he didn't dare to turn around, fearing Fern's return—fearing those sharp eyes, the ones that would surely look at him as though he were an insect.

But when he finally turned carefully…

It was Frieren standing at the door.

She was staring at the figurines inside his wardrobe. Her expression changed rapidly, shifting into something unreadable at a visible speed.

"Hmm…"

Ash silently closed the wardrobe, feeling that he should say something.

Frieren raised her eyes to meet his, waiting. She remained quiet, expectant.

The room fell into an eerie silence.

After what felt like an eternity, Frieren—who had originally come to talk about the gift she had been planning to give him—slowly raised her hand, pointed at the closed wardrobe, and asked:

"…Don't you have anything you'd like to explain to me?"

"…A statue with such fine craftsmanship is rare, right? Isn't it reasonable to want to collect it?"

"But that's the sealed replica, isn't it?"

"…You saw it?"

"Are you actually like what Master said?" Frieren narrowed her eyes, her expression growing suspicious. "That you claim to like the older one, but you actually prefer the younger one and are just using the older one as a cover?"

And then, as if suddenly recalling something, her face turned red.

"At that time… Fern used that potion to dissolve my clothes, and you just so happened to show up at that exact moment. That wasn't a coincidence, was it?"

Her voice wavered slightly as she stepped back, her expression now showing disbelief.

"I trusted you so much… I thought of you as my best friend… but you actually look at me like that?"

Her face was burning now, her gaze locked on his as she questioned in a hushed, almost betrayed voice:

"Or… did you already have these thoughts back when you first… looked at my underwear?"

"…Wait a minute. Calm down and listen to me sort this out for you."

Ash hadn't expected his former senior sister to slander him behind his back. Completely baffled, he held his forehead and said:

"You haven't forgotten that between our two meteor watchings, we didn't see each other for about fifty years, right?"

"So what?"

"A normal person would be almost driven mad after fifty years. And what happened after that? Before you, even saw Fern for the first time, Himmel had already been dead for twenty years. And we hadn't seen each other for another twenty years, right? What kind of logic is that? Are you seriously suggesting that we hadn't been in touch for that long?"

"To be honest... I don't know either!"

Frieren pondered for a long time before finally voicing the thoughts in her heart, her expression inexplicably serious.

Her strange statement made Ash look like he was enduring a massive headache. He covered his face, shaking his head repeatedly.

"Then why are you even bringing this up now? Aren't you just being completely unreasonable?"

"I just feel... sorry?"

"Forget it, forget it. I'm too lazy to argue with you. I have other things to do, so I'm leaving. Reflect on this yourself."

He patted Frieren's head with a look of disappointment and quickly left the room with a sigh and an expression of hurt. As he passed by her, his voice dropped faintly:

"…Frieren, I'm really sad that you said that to me."

His words made Frieren's pupils shrink slightly, and an inexplicable guilt spread through her heart.

Even after Ash had disappeared from sight, she remained standing in his room, lost in silent distress and self-blame.

But as time passed and the guilt gradually faded, a question arose in her mind—was Ash really that sad?

Based on her years of understanding him, she was fairly certain that even if he was genuinely hurt, he wouldn't have said it outright...

"So... I was fooled by that guy again?"

Frieren murmured softly, still unable to wrap her head around the situation. No matter how much she thought about it, she couldn't make sense of it.

After all, this kind of thing was just too difficult for her to understand.

....

....

Due to the conditions at the scene, it wasn't suitable to move the statue, so Ash had no choice but to leave the room temporarily, albeit with some regret.

On the way out, he felt like he might have gone too far, but he was still feeling somewhat depressed.

What Frieren had accused him of was completely unfair—at least, in his opinion. He knew he wouldn't have done anything so terrible to a thousand-year-old loli elf grandmother.

But if he were asked whether he actually had such preferences, then why, apart from the few strange men around him, were most of the women in his life all lolis?

That, even he couldn't quite explain.

Among the younger generation of strong individuals, the only normal girl was Fern.

Sure, he would tease her occasionally, but he still had a sense of propriety.

Among the powerful individuals of the younger generation, the only female was Sense. And both Sense and his master, Serie, had loli-like appearances. That had nothing to do with him.

Moreover, among the demons, there were plenty of normal girls and women. But for some reason, the ones who were valuable, powerful, or had close relationships with him were all incredibly small.

Was that really his fault?

Of course not. Maybe this world simply favored lolis? Maybe it was just that, generally speaking, smaller women tended to be more exceptional?