Magic Academy Bans Harem

Chapter 156 Gift
A few days passed in a flash. It was the day of the Latras family banquet.

Although the dinner officially started in the evening, at noon, the entire East City District of Spring City became extremely bustling.

Looking from afar at the various glamorous convoys that blocked the area around the Latras Chamber of Commerce, Ritas was thoughtful.

"Dear Sylvie, I have helped you solve a problem."

Although it was an ordinary day, the Bathing Goddess was still online early. Ritas did not ask too much about this, but felt that her recent obsession might have affected her real life.

"Solve the problem? I hope so."

As usual, Ritas remained noncommittal about the Bathing Goddess's words.

A few days ago, Sylvie took the initiative to visit Ritas and canceled the previous birthday party agreement between the two. On the surface, this did save Ritas a lot of trouble.

After all, if Sylvie hadn't canceled the agreement he had made with the two heirs of the Latras family, he would have had to think about how to split himself that day.

"I think Sylvie asked Miriam to be her gift giver. After all, the nature of this birthday party has spiraled. Unlike Platina and you who will have the 'Star People' as a bond, if it's just a teacher and student, it would be difficult for Sylvie to invite you."

The Bathing Goddess analyzed rationally,

"Don't think that Miriam is just a silly boy now. He has a more promising future than a professor like you who is basically a 'finished product'. Since Latras is a merchant family, they will definitely evaluate the investment vision and so on, right? Then Miriam may be a more correct answer."

Ritas, who doesn't care much about the opinions of almost everyone, not just the goddess of the bath, naturally doesn't mind that Miriam is "better" than him.

He just continued to look down from above at the bustling Latras Chamber of Commerce headquarters.

"What a weird family."

"Well, if you think about it carefully, it is indeed very strange. In the game, their presence is so low, and they are occasionally mentioned as the 'shop family'. However, in the later stages of the game, especially after the world changes, they can still serve as a shop next to the protagonists. If this is put into reality, it is actually quite remarkable and incredible."

The Bathing Goddess sighed,

"Besides these, there's the strange thing that the elder sister is younger than the younger sister. Also, since all the sisters' birthday parties were held on the same day, does that mean they were all born on the same day? No, should their birthdays have been changed afterwards?"

"I think the so-called family order has little to do with sisterhood. As far as I can remember, Platina never called Misley 'sister'. As for the birthday issue, as a huge chamber of commerce spanning the continent, it is not difficult to collect babies born on specific dates every year. Moreover, from my observation, Latras seems to be very particular about blonde hair. Therefore, the heirs of the Latras family may not be adopted, but actually have some blood relationship."

Ritas thought about it for a while and came up with many feasible ways.
"As a long-established chamber of commerce, it's no surprise that the Latras family owns a town made up entirely of 'Latras'. And as long as a rule or reward is set in this town to give birth to an heir on this day, it would be easy to get a dozen or so heirs who meet the requirements."

There might not even be a need for rules or rewards. The fact that their children are eligible to become the heir of Latras should motivate parents who have the desire in their hearts to follow the rules more than anyone else.

“By the way, do you remember the little Sylvie that appeared in the Latras Nursery in the CG background of Engri? In other words, there are many more candidates who meet the conditions of being born on this day and being blonde girls than expected, so they need to be screened and cultivated in the Nursery?”

Ritas nodded.

"Tsk tsk. It's said that rich people spend more money than you think, but I didn't expect them to spend money this way. However, what's the point of sticking to these restrictions to choose an heir? Since Sylvie is involved, it may not be appropriate to say this. But even if it's for fun, it has to be fun, right?"

"Based on the information we have so far, this rule may not be a consistent one for the Latras family, but a unique quirk of this generation of the family head. In addition, there is an inseparable connection between the Latras family and the 'People of the Stars'. Therefore, there may be some mysterious rituals behind it."

Of course, it is also possible that the Latras family is simply mentally ill.

After watching for a while, Ritas asked the goddess of bathing softly,
"Do you remember what we agreed on? Bathing Goddess."

"Ah! Don't worry, isn't it just pretending to be holy? Small problem. No, what do you mean by pretending! I am holy, dignified, noble and elegant, okay!"

"."

Obviously, the word "pretend" was said by myself.
After a moment of silence, Ritas turned and left.

Before the dinner started, he also needed to prepare some things to deal with some possible situations.

At nightfall.

On the second floor of Laplace Mansion, Platina Latras was chatting with the distinguished guests.

On this day, the Latras sisters and their presenters were undoubtedly the protagonists. But in addition to the "protagonists", there were also many "supporting roles" of status who came to participate in this so-called family banquet open to the whole world.

Even though she knew that many people in front of her were not in her "camp", Platina, with a smile on her face, still used her superb speech skills to try her best to make every distinguished guest who talked to her feel happy from the bottom of their hearts.

Although they all came from the same breeding facility, the Latras sisters' personalities were obviously different.

Some are like flowers on a mountain top, looking down on everyone from above. Some are self-willed and don’t care what others think. Some are gloomy and taciturn, not liking to get along with others.

Among them, Platina is a socialite.

Moreover, Platina often criticized her other sisters in the past.

For example, as a businessman, why do you always put on airs? As a businessman, who are you trying to please? As a businessman, can you do big business by looking poor?

But this Latras girl who has been actively spreading her net and expanding her network recently made a rare huge "mistake". As a result, she could only ask others to become her gift-giver.

In fact, if Platina wanted to find someone "almost" good enough to offer the gift, she could find a large group of people. If necessary, she could even try to line up the gift-givers from the entrance of the mansion to the city gate.

But unfortunately, what the gift givers value is not “quantity” but “quality”.

So, Platina is actually taking a gamble this time.

The advantage of putting the chips on Ritas is that he really has a very strong "energy". But the disadvantage is that the young professor is really uncontrollable.
After having a pleasant conversation with another distinguished guest, Platina opened her iron fan and said "Excuse me", then went to the nearest balcony, looked down from above and covered herself with the iron fan, and glared fiercely at the butler Mount who was not far below.

As an old butler who has worked for the Latras family for decades, Mount was also helpless at this time.

What's the point of glaring at him? It's not like he's trying to stop the professor from coming.

Just as Mount was facing Platina's glare and wiping his sweat as if he was being stabbed in the back, as the banquet was about to begin, a figure with a rather strange outline from a distance slowly walked towards him from the gradually thinning crowd around him.

The person holding a gift box with a bow in his left hand and a white round plate in his right hand as usual is naturally Ritas.

"You are finally here, Professor Elson."

"finally?"

Seeing that Mount was sweating and looked anxious, Ritas asked in confusion,
"Am I late?" "Uh, no, I'm not."

Mount said, subconsciously taking out his pocket watch. Even if Ritas was really late, he couldn't say anything to blame him, so it was really just subconscious.

After seeing the pointer on the dial, Mount's expression was a little dazed for a moment.

Because, after a rough estimate, he found that if the time he spent talking to him was not counted, the time when Ritas arrived at the mansion would most likely be exactly on time.

Although the time is clearly written on the invitation, how can anyone arrive on time? What's the point of doing this?

While Mount was looking at his watch, Ritas handed Mount a gift box that was big enough to hold a whole watermelon.

"Although you will prepare a gift for me to present, I have prepared a gift for Ms. Platina out of courtesy. If it is not appropriate to appear at the gift presentation, please pass it on to me privately."

"Okay, please allow me to express my sincere gratitude on behalf of the young lady."

Mount said as he took the gift box, and then faintly heard a rhythmic "tick, tick, tick" sound coming from inside.

"Those who know know it's a metronome. Those who don't know think it's a time bomb."

Under Mount's guidance, Ritas came to the banquet hall of the Latras mansion.

On the way, the Bathing Goddess said so.

Although the content of her words was not much different from usual, by adjusting the volume, tone, and rhythm, she sounded like an intellectual woman, showing off her humor.

After arriving at the banquet hall, Ritas temporarily separated from the butler Mount.

Before the most important gift-giving session, Latras's family banquet was just an ordinary grand banquet.

Ritas took a quick look around the banquet hall, which was full of "I'm a Celebrity"-style people, and found that he didn't recognize most of them.

Latras announced that he would hold a "family banquet" in Spring City this year, so many celebrities from surrounding cities came to the party. On the other hand, it was because...
“I don’t need socializing.”

In fact, in this rather high-class banquet, Ritas's dress was somewhat out of place.

He was wearing the same dark robe as always, but with some badges, patterns and embellishments on the shoulders.

For Ritas, this professorial robe is formal attire.

While looking around, Ritas found two people who were also somewhat out of place like him.

One of them was Miriam, who was just as Ritas and the Bathing Goddess had expected.

On this day, Miriam combed her hair back, revealing her forehead, and wore a dark purple evening dress that particularly set off her long silver hair.

Although the evening gown, which was probably prepared by someone else, was impeccable, and Miriam's delicate face did not reveal his origins and current status, he looked like a different person in the midst of the celebrities chatting and laughing around him.

Seeing Miriam walking so stiffly that she sometimes trembled when she went to get food and drinks, Ritas couldn't help but sigh.
"He's probably wondering 'why am I here'."

“Didn’t Sylvie explain the situation to him? Did she trick him into coming here by telling him that he could eat well?”

“Probably not”

Right?
Ritas wasn't sure either.

Although Miriam sometimes makes some abstract moves, he is generally smart. Moreover, Miriam's face is obviously rounder than a semester ago, which also shows that he has never been hungry, so he will not be fooled by a dinner.

but
Shaking his head slightly and moving his eyes away from Miriam, Ritas saw an acquaintance in another corner of the banquet hall.

Moreover, this acquaintance's dressing style might be quite similar to Ritas'.

If the professor's robe is the formal attire of the class mentor Ritas, then this one should be treating the college uniform as the student's formal attire.

"Cecilia? Why is she here?"

Faced with the Bathing Goddess's doubts, although Ritas had some guesses in his mind, he did not give any answers.

He just glanced in Cecilia's direction and then in Miriam's direction.

"Is there any need to think about it? I'll definitely choose Cecilia."

Listening to the words of the Bathing Goddess, it wasn't her opinion that played a role, but Ritas finally walked to the corner of the banquet hall where Cecilia was.

"It's been a while since we last met, Cadet Cecilia. It seems like we always bump into each other unexpectedly during this holiday."

"T-Professor.?"

Cecilia, who had been focusing her attention elsewhere, apparently did not notice that Ritas was approaching her through a few shadows in the fully illuminated area, as if she was stepping on a shadow.

After seeing Ritas, Cecilia's expression began to change from the initial surprise.

She seemed to be trying very hard to prevent her expression from changing from surprise to delight. However, it was futile to try to control it.

only.
Ritas obviously didn't notice the girl's extremely complicated feelings.

The reason why he chose Cecilia's side was actually because he was attracted by the things around Cecilia.

He slowly and carefully reached out his hand to touch the metal device that looked like the Iron Maiden and was standing against the wall next to Cecilia.

"Why is there a Lido-style rack here? And it seems to be a genuine one?"

“.”「.”

Apparently, even without the need for restraint, the surprise had already disappeared from Cecilia's face.

(End of this chapter)