This Novel is not my Novel

"That makes sense too. Then Fjodora..."

"No! I'm taking ☆Pretty Girl☆."

Professor Bjorn accepted Reisir's argument and began to mention the name of the person who had obtained the third-largest amount of ingredients.

But Reisir hurriedly cut him off and spoke the title written on the headband I was wearing.

When a particular person's form of address suddenly changes, isn't it an unwritten convention in fiction to use the old one first, then correct yourself once...?

He said the cringeworthy, humiliating term so naturally that I was too horrified to point out the contradiction in his statement in time.

The others, however, were not.

"But ☆Pretty Girl☆ became ☆Pretty Girl☆ because he didn't have any ingredients."

"Exactly! Reisir, you're contradicting yourself! To balance the teams, both ☆Pretty Girl☆ and ★Cool Guy★ should join mine!"

Professor Bjorn looked puzzled, while Pret protested.

And of course, they both repeated the words ☆Pretty Girl☆.

Because of that, I had to focus on ignoring whom that term referred to, leaving me unable to join the conversation yet again.

"You demanded the right to choose first in the name of balance, and now you're trying to take ☆Pretty Girl☆ before anyone else. That's underhanded! Do you hate the idea of me taking ☆Pretty Girl☆ away from you that much?"

"Hm? You wanted to be on the same team as ☆Pretty Girl☆ too? You were like this last week as well. Why are there so many people who want to be on ☆Pretty Girl☆'s team?"

Exactly.

No, more importantly, who was ☆Pretty Girl☆ supposed to be again?

I did not know anyone like that. Nor did I want to.

This had nothing to do with me, so I decided to stop paying attention.

"Professor, Pret's claim is nothing more than baseless speculation, so please don't listen to him. I'm not wary that ☆Pretty Girl☆ might grow closer to Pret while cooking with him. Nor did I choose ☆Pretty Girl☆ simply because we're close and I thought cooking together might be fun."

"Then why?"

"If no one knows how to cook, having a wide variety of ingredients will only make things more difficult, won't it?"

"I suppose so. Preparing every ingredient is already work, and the cooking methods become more complicated too."

"Exactly! So I was merely trying to secure someone who knows how to cook."

Apparently, this ☆Pretty Girl☆ person knew how to cook.

In that case, it was only natural for him to be the first choice.

"What?! ☆Pretty Girl☆ Karvaldr, you know how to cook?!"

"......"

"Karvaldr?"

"......"

"☆Pretty Girl☆ Karvaldr. Stop escaping reality, accept that you're ☆Pretty Girl☆ now, and answer my question."

I truly did not want to answer.

I wanted to keep pretending I had no idea who they were talking about and treat it as someone else's problem until the very end.

But now that he had even mentioned the name of my possessed body, that was no longer possible.

A sigh escaped me.

"Haaaah... I don't know how to cook."

"Then why is Reisir so certain that ☆Pretty Girl☆ knows how?"

"He must have jumped to another conclusion on his own."

I had an idea why.

But rather than explain everything at length, I dismissed it with the single word "conclusion."

"Hm? Why are you denying it? Was knowing how to cook supposed to be a secret from everyone else? Why? I think it's a very good hobby."

The protagonist of someone else's novel bombarded me with questions.

And judging from the way he slipped in the phrase "a very good hobby," he seemed to have concluded that I regarded cooking as an embarrassing hobby.

I had only denied it to preserve the characterization of my possessed body.

"What you think is irrelevant. I said I don't know how because I genuinely don't."

"Then what was that handmade drink you served me last time, with jujubes cut into flower shapes floating on top?"

"Did I not clearly tell you that Yor made the drink? And making flowers from jujubes didn't require any extraordinary skill. I merely removed the pits, rolled them up, and sliced them."

"So Yor knows how to cook, and ☆Pretty Girl☆ knows how to use a knife?"

If I denied even that, Reisir would become certain that I was lying, so I had no choice but to agree.

Still, Pret would not find anything strange about that much.

Even if he knew that Karvaldr had never learned to cook before.

He could not know whether Yor had any interest in cooking, or what Yor and I usually did together in our room.

"Well... I ended up learning that much... while helping Yor."

"That much? Is there some problem?"

"......Could you not simply call me 'you'? Without using that strange term."

"Puhahahaha!"

I had set aside my embarrassment and made the request cautiously, with complete sincerity.

Yet the protagonist of someone else's novel laughed with far too much delight at my reaction.

He found it so entertaining that I began to suspect he had fallen under the delusion that I was deliberately trying to make him laugh.

"Anyway, I'll take ☆Pretty Girl☆ with me. That's all right, isn't it, Professor?"

"No, no! Reisir, you're the one who said that the more ingredients a team has, the more it needs someone who knows how to cook. So ☆Pretty Girl☆ should be on my team..."

"You know how to cook too, don't you? Because of that... dumping leftovers on you? In the circus."

"Well... that is true. My older brothers and sisters made me cook even though I was young...! Ahaha! You really are perceptive, Reisir!"

Pret looked conflicted for a moment, but eventually admitted that he knew how to cook.

That made sense.

He had just tried to deny knowing how to cook, but if he still failed to get on my team after that, he would be unable to step forward throughout the entire meal preparation.

He would have no choice but to stand by and watch helplessly while people who knew nothing about cooking floundered around.

Since he could not deliberately ruin the food, he had been forced to give that answer.

"Does anyone else know how to cook?"

Professor Bjorn looked away from the bickering Reisir and Pret and swept his gaze across the other students as he asked.

Unfortunately, not a single person raised their hand.

I had thought Sveinn might know how to cook.

According to the information Pret gave me, Sveinn's parents run a small inn, and it said that Sveinn helped them with their work...

Apparently, he had only cleaned and served food without ever touching the cooking.

Or perhaps Author Senna had originally intended to give Sveinn the ability to cook.

But after Yor and I turned out to know a little about cooking, she might have discarded that setting at this very moment.

The thought suddenly crossed my mind.

"Still, it's fortunate that we have someone... and a cat? Anyway, two who know how to cook! Then Karvaldr will join Reisir's team together with his familiar..."

Privately, I had hoped to join Pret's team, since it had both plenty of ingredients and someone who knew how to cook.

But my wishes went unconsidered, and I was ultimately sent to Reisir's team.

"Pret, it's your turn to choose a teammate now."

"I'll take ★Cool Guy★. Controlling the heat is the key to cooking, after all."

"Funny how the people with no ingredients are the popular ones."

Professor Bjorn clicked his tongue, expressing his surprise at Pret's answer.

But I had expected it.

After all, the people choosing the teams were none other than Reisir and Pret.

I knew they'd want to drag the people who received punishments onto their own teams, if only because teasing them would be entertaining.

As Helga moved behind Pret, Reisir looked deeply disappointed.

Even so, he did not insist that Helga should join our team.

Apparently, he believed that after subtly claiming first pick for himself, interfering with the other team's choice as well would be improper.

It would have been nice if the team selection had continued smoothly like this.

But the moment Reisir noticed Professor Bjorn's gaze urging him to choose his next teammate and opened his mouth, I could not help objecting.

Because the protagonist of someone else's novel said—

"Sveinn, come over here."

—and beckoned to the traitor from the original work.

"Why Sveinn?"

"That's right...! Why... me?!"

Fjodora had plenty of ingredients, but perhaps Reisir had excluded her because being around her was uncomfortable and awkward.

Even so, he could have chosen Lissy, who had six ingredients.

Or if he did not consider the quantity of ingredients especially important, he could have chosen Vigdís or Ríolíkin, both of whom he already knew.

And yet, Sveinn? Out of nowhere?

Sveinn seemed just as bewildered by Reisir's decision.

He pointed at himself with his index finger, wearing an expression that asked whether Reisir had truly meant him.

"Sveinn, I did choose you. I don't know what we'll be cooking, but seasoning is essential, isn't it?"

"Ah!"

When Reisir repeated Sveinn's name and even explained his reason, Sveinn reacted with understanding and came to stand beside us.

But I still could not escape my confusion.

Surely Reisir had not been comparing Sveinn himself to some sort of seasoning.

Does he know that the treasure I handed Sveinn was the Seasoning Set...?

Which meant—

"Did Sveinn tell you what treasure I took from him?"

"Yes. I was planning to take every treasure you had, ☆Pretty Girl☆. Sveinn and Vigdís both said you'd taken their treasures, so I asked what they were and remembered their answers."

"......"

"Now you understand, don't you, ☆Pretty Girl☆? I really did go easy on you."

He was boasting that he could have searched my body until he found the note marked Seasoning Set, but had refrained out of consideration for me.

Knowing how persistent he was, I understood that he truly had gone very easy on me, leaving me with no way to argue.

But I still did not want to thank him.

"Hmph!"

So I had no choice but to make that sound and whip my head away.

At that, the protagonist of someone else's novel laughed with tremendous delight, as though this were precisely the reaction he had wanted.

My face was already burning because of the nickname, making this even more embarrassing than usual.

The one saving grace was that Reisir's laughter did not continue as long as it normally did.

"Let's hurry up and finish choosing teams so we can cook. I'll choose Ríolíkin... Actually, I think Ríolíkin might resent me if I did, so I'll take Lissy instead."

Pret passed the turn by saying that.

Reisir calmed his laughter and resumed choosing his teammates.

"Then I'll choose Ríolíkin."

"Hooray! At last, I get to be on the same team as Karv... No, ☆Pretty Girl☆!!"

Ríolíkin followed the convention of using the [N O V E L I G H T] old form of address once before correcting himself and expressed his joy.

I could not understand why merely cooking with me was important enough to make him cheer.

Even if he joined Pret's team, no one would ignore him or treat him poorly...

That left me puzzled.

Still, I did not entirely dislike seeing someone express such pure happiness at being with me.

But I had no idea how I was supposed to respond in a situation like this, so I decided to remain silent.

More importantly—

"That leaves Fjodora and Vigdís, right? Personally, I'd like to choose Vigdís since she's a swordswoman and probably knows how to handle a kitchen knife. But it wouldn't feel right to deprive an engaged couple of the chance to cook sweetly together, so I'll choose Fjodora!"

—I had no idea what Pret was thinking when he said something like that.

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