Only a few moments after the room cleared out, the door opened, not flung wide, not dramatic, just pushed in with calm certainty.
Lilliana stepped inside.
She looked… composed.
Pink hair neat, uniform crisp, eyes focused, the faintest tiredness sitting under her professionalism in a way that made her feel more real than any game sprite ever could.
"Ah, you're still here, Soren," she said, tone soft but controlled.
He rose slightly, more out of politeness than necessity, then hesitated and settled back down, remembering his ribs and deciding that pride wasn't worth pain.
"Did I do something wrong?"
Lilliana blinked, then her eyes widened just a fraction, as if the assumption surprised her.
"No," she said immediately, and there was no teasing in it, only reassurance delivered with the briskness of someone who didn't want him spiralling into the wrong conclusion. "No, it's nothing like that. I wanted to speak to you, that's all."
Relief loosened his shoulders, but only a little, because "speak to you" still carried weight when you were a student, and when you had recently made a habit of almost dying.
Lilliana stepped closer, stopping at the desk in front of him rather than invading his space, hands folded neatly, posture straight, and she took a breath that looked, oddly, like she was preparing herself.
"I was wondering," she began, voice measured, "if you're free to have lunch with me."
Soren froze.
Not because lunch was terrifying, but because the sentence didn't fit neatly into his expectations of her, and he hated when expectations shifted under his feet, because shifting expectations meant uncertainty, and uncertainty meant the map in his head was less reliable.
For a second he thought he had misheard.
Her expression didn't change; it was calm and attentive, as if she had asked something perfectly ordinary.
He stared, then forced himself to speak before the silence grew awkward.
"Lunch?" he repeated, just to confirm reality.
"If you already have plans, then it's fine. I asked because you were badly injured, and I wanted to check on you properly." Lilliana said, and her tone stayed professional, but the quiet gentleness in it made him feel, unexpectedly, like she was offering him an escape route.
There it was.
A reason that made sense.
A reason that let him stop searching for hidden meanings.
Still, he felt that faint prick of anxiety, that uncomfortable thought that if she was willing to do something this personal, then she really might be different from the version he knew, and if she was different, then other things could be different too.
He could have said no.
He could have made an excuse, could have claimed he needed to catch up on notes, or claimed he had somewhere to be.
And in truth he did have plans with Felix, sort of, the loose "lunch?" that had become an awkward routine lately.
But the problem was that pushing people away openly was hard, and it felt worse when someone was offering care with such restraint, as if they were trying not to impose.
Soren had always been better at enduring discomfort than creating it for someone else.
"There's no way I'm busy," he said, and managed to keep it light without forcing too much humour into it. "I'd be happy to have lunch with you. It just… caught me off guard."
Lilliana's shoulders eased, subtly, as if she hadn't realised she had been holding tension.
"Thank you," she said, and the gratitude was quiet enough that it almost sounded like a formality, but he didn't miss that it existed at all.
He cleared his throat, then gestured vaguely toward his bag.
"I'll go buy something and come right back."
"No need. If I'm going to invite you, it would be impolite to do so without preparing something. I brought lunch."
The phrasing was so tidy, so logical, that it should have felt purely professional, and yet the fact remained that she had prepared food for him, which was not something a distant, strict professor had to do, and that contradiction tugged at his anxiety even as he nodded.
"…I see," he said, and he couldn't tell if he meant it as acceptance or disbelief.
Lilliana tilted her head slightly.
"Is that a problem?"
"No," Soren said quickly, because it wasn't, and because the idea of making her feel awkward over it felt worse than his own discomfort. "Not at all. Thank you, Professor Roseblood."
"Then come sit," she said, and tapped the chair beside her.
He obeyed, moving carefully, settling into the seat as she placed a large lunchbox on the desk between them, its latch clicking softly in the quiet room.
The moment she opened it, warmth and aroma spilled out, not grand or luxurious, but the unmistakable smell of real effort.
Sandwiches, neatly cut.
Omelettes, folded with precision.
Sautéed vegetables, still glossy, seasoned, and arranged with the kind of care that suggested habit rather than show.
It wasn't "fancy," but it was… proper, the sort of meal that made the academy cafeteria feel even more depressing by comparison.
Soren's stomach reacted before his pride could intervene, a low, traitorous twist of hunger, and he realised with mild embarrassment that he was staring.
He tore his gaze away, reached for a sandwich, and took a bite.
The flavour hit immediately, not because it was exotic, but because it tasted like something made by someone who actually expected it to be eaten, warm, balanced, comforting in a way he hadn't realised he had been missing.
He ate slowly at first, then found himself taking another bite without thinking, the stiffness in his shoulders easing a fraction with each mouthful, as if his body was accepting nourishment as permission to unclench.
He hadn't been eating "poorly" per say, not exactly.
Cafeteria meals were adequate, but his daily habit had long been one proper meal a day and then whatever small snacks didn't require effort, not because he was starving, but because he had never had the energy to care.
This was different.
This felt like being looked after.
That thought should have made him uncomfortable.
It did, a little.
It also made him keep chewing, because his body didn't care about his pride anymore.
When he finally looked up, Lilliana was watching him, expression calm, attentive, not sparkling or exaggerated, simply waiting, as if she was checking whether he was managing to eat without pain.
Soren swallowed and set the sandwich down.
"Sorry," he said, voice quieter than usual. "It was… really good. I forgot to say anything."
He hesitated, then continued his words with honest bluntness.
"It's probably the best meal I've had since coming here. Thank you."
His tone carried no exaggeration, and because of that, it landed heavier than any polite compliment.
Lilliana blinked, then a small smile touched her mouth, restrained, genuine, and for a second something in her eyes softened enough that it didn't look like a "strict professor" expression at all.
"I'm glad," she said simply.
It wasn't a dramatic smile.
It wasn't "cute" like her flustered moments in the game.
It was warm, quietly pleased, and it startled him anyway, because he realised, belatedly, that he had never seen her look like that in the game, not even once, not as a scripted gag or a fan-service beat, not as anything.
For a moment, Soren just stared, his mind trying to reconcile the image with his knowledge, the way it always did when reality refused to fit neatly into the shape he had memorised.
••✦ ♡ ✦•••
They ate in quiet for a while after that.
Not an awkward silence, but more a functional one, the kind that let Soren focus on finishing without feeling watched, and let Lilliana keep her attention on him without making it obvious that she was monitoring every small wince, every slight pause between bites.
He noticed anyway.
He always noticed when someone was paying attention to him, even if he pretended not to, because he had learnt young that attention was rarely neutral, and Rena Forest had only reinforced that instinct in a different, uglier way.
Still, this attention wasn't sharp.
Nor was it invasive.
It was restrained, as if she was trying to be careful not to cross a line, and that restraint made it harder to reject without feeling cruel.
When the lunchbox was mostly empty, Lilliana closed it neatly, then folded her hands in her lap, posture straightening into something more formal, the shift subtle but clear.
"There was a reason I asked you to do this today," she said.
Soren nodded once, expression neutral, because he had assumed as much, as he couldn't see Lilliana inviting him without a purpose.
"The main reason," Lilliana continued, voice softer than her usual lecture tone but still professional, "was to check up on you properly. I know the priests here are capable, and I received the report of your recovery, but…"
She paused briefly, as if choosing the phrasing that wouldn't make her sound too personal.
"The state you were in when I found you was difficult to forget."
Soren's throat tightened.
He didn't let his expression change much, but his mind supplied the image instantly: mud, blood, shredded uniform, breath barely there, and the memory arrived with the same crystal clarity as everything else in his head.
He breathed out slowly.
"I understand," he said, because he did, and because it was easier than admitting how uncomfortable it was to be reminded that someone had seen him like that.
Lilliana's fingers tightened together for a second, then relaxed.
"It's rare to see a first-year student that badly hurt. Even throughout the entire year."
Her gaze held his, steady.
"Yet in your case it's happened twice in less than a semester," she added, quieter.
Soren blinked.
"Twice?"
————「❤︎」————