"Never have I ever fought another woman over a man."
The hand holding Sonia's bottle paused slightly, and without any expression, she drank a quarter of it.
Yet a second later, everyone—including Sonia—turned to stare at the other person drinking: Adele.
"Adele, don't you have a childhood fiancé?" Ingrid asked.
"Yeah, that's right," Adele said, spreading her hands. "But that was when we were little. My family moved once during grade school, so we didn't see each other for years until I ran into him again in middle school."
"And what happened next... was pretty much the plot of *True Love*."
Sonia chimed in immediately: "That drama where the male lead and the female lead played by Daidalos secretly crush on each other, but he has to pretend to date the second female lead?"
Adele licked the rim of her bottle and nodded. "Exactly."
"So were you the female lead?" Lois asked curiously. "Secretly crushing on each other and ending in mutual love?"
"No, I was the third female lead—the one who transfers in and launches a relentless offensive." Adele shrugged. "The only difference is, the third lead lost in the drama, but I won."
Ingrid asked, "Then how did you deal with leads number one and two?"
"All I can say is, when a teenage boy isn't doing homework, he's basically a beast driven purely by instinct." Adele wagged her finger. "There's no way he could be like a drama, keeping passion within the bounds of propriety. So... the pure, innocent lead and the tsundere second lead had no chance against a cute, proactive, romance-savvy legendary third lead who's watched countless dramas!"
"Compared to you, being the student council president in middle school feels like an utterly mundane, everyday affair," Lois remarked.
"Must be nice," Sonia said softly, swirling her bottle. "My impression of school only exists in dramas."
Unlike universities, all primary and secondary schools in the Stars were private institutions, with varying durations across different regions; in fact, one could consider them daycares plus social clubs. Sonia's hometown naturally had no school, so she had completed all her coursework by watching online videos. Compulsory education in the Stars operated on a 'voluntary principle'—the educational resources were simply there for anyone willing to learn.
"I don't know if this will make you feel better, but I only attended middle school for thirteen days," Ingrid said. "During those thirteen days, there were quite a few mass brawls. In the worst one, someone even shattered the window of the principal's office."
Adele clicked her tongue. "Are the folkways back in your hometown really that 'simple and rustic'? What happened next? Did the school suspend classes?"
"Classes were suspended," Ingrid shrugged, "for me alone. And all thirteen middle schools in the surrounding area rejected my admission applications."
*Turns out you were the culprit behind those mass brawls!*
"You don't need to tread carefully around me," Sonia said with a faint smile. "If it were the old me hearing you talk about your school lives, I would have cursed you out of sheer jealousy. But it's different now."
"You can let it go now?" Lois asked.
"How could that be? I still curse you out of jealousy." Sonia shook her bottle. "It just lasts a few seconds, and the curses stay inside my head instead of being put into action."
"Wait," Adele noticed something keenly amiss, "Sonia, did you actually put them into action before?"
The country girl blinked, shifting the topic with supreme naturalness: "So, whose turn is it next—"
"Wait, Sonia, you drank just now too," Ingrid pointed out. "Whom did you fight over a man with?"
"Ah, I almost forgot, I should drink too." Lois tilted her head back and took a sip. "Ingrid, don't you remember? There was a time when Sonia and I were jealous rivals. The guy we fought over was called... what was his name again?"
Sonia also had a vague recollection: about half a year ago, seemingly to spite Lois and test her own charm, she had deliberately seduced Lois's admirer, making Lois fume with rage. Even though only six months had passed, she could no longer recall the details, much like a child forgetting their childish past.
It was not just Sonia; the others felt as though a lifetime had passed as well. Half a year ago, who could have imagined that Sonia would advance to the Sanctuary realm? Who could have imagined that Ingrid and Lois would become sorcerers in their second year? Who could have imagined that Adele would actually shatter the record for the most failed courses in the history of Sword Flower University?
Who could have imagined that in this dorm, where hardly anyone had exchanged a few words during their entire first year, they would one day gather together to drink and chat?
Adele could not help giggling. "Winning flirtatious glances from both of you is probably that nameless guy's greatest achievement in life."
"Back in our first year, plenty of guys got glances from us," Lois rolled her eyes. "Anyway, whatever I did, you'd copy it, Sonia. You were practically a tagalong."
"After all, I was still learning how to be a proper pretty girl back then," Sonia said candidly. "I wasn't familiar with any of the other classmates yet, and the only role models around me were you, Adele, and Ingrid, so..."
Adele chimed in, "Then you could've learned from me!"
Lois thought about it and nodded. "True, your only real option was to model yourself after me."
Adele protested, "Hey! Why are you ignoring me?!"
Ingrid patted Adele and consoled her, "They don't mean any harm. To use an analogy: while both you and Lois are pretty girls, Lois is a purer, canon work, whereas you're a fantasy-packed comedic spinoff written by a fanfic author. You're really not suitable to be studied as a role model."
"I don't know if they mean any harm, but I feel plenty of malice from you," Adele said with a dark line on her face. "Ing, that was a wonderful analogy. Never make an analogy again."
Sonia secretly breathed a sigh of relief as well. Fortunately, that old incident had covered for her; otherwise, she wouldn't have known how to explain having fought someone over a man.
What the country girl failed to notice, however, was Lois, Adele, and Ingrid subtly exchanging glances, doing their utmost to suppress the shock in their hearts.
"My turn!" Adele raised her bottle, cleared her throat, and announced, "Never have I ever had a kiss that tasted like love!"
"Making such an obvious statement means you'll have to drink!" Lois said immediately.
"I'm not lying!" Adele protested loudly. "Do I look like some fickle, uninhibited woman who'd hand over her first kiss without a shred of modesty?!"
Both Sonia and Ingrid, who were currently drinking, glared at Adele with murderous eyes.
"Wait, didn't you say you took the initiative in middle school to snatch your fiancé?" Lois asked. "How could you two never have kissed?"
"The farthest we went was holding hands! What are you thinking?!" Adele wore a look that screamed *how dirty-minded can you get?* "Or... okay, fine, I gave him a kiss, but it was just on the cheek! That doesn't count as kissing at all!"
"And your fiancé fell for that? Isn't he way too naive?"
"Even if you're Lois, I'll get mad if you keep underestimating me," Adele bared her teeth. "It's not that he's naive—it's that I'm too charming. All I have to do is stroke his hair and he can't even stand up straight in front of me."
"Let's assume that's true for now." Lois turned to look at the other two. "I didn't expect both of you to... Wait, Ingrid, you too?"
"Ingrid, you secretly have a boyfriend?! And things have progressed that far?!" Adele was shocked as well. "You have the right to remain silent, but if you don't say his name, you'll be sentenced to execution by tickling!"
"I don't," Ingrid said calmly. "The kiss happened before university."
"Whoa, a boy-and-girl first kiss?" Adele grew even more thrilled. "A childhood friend? I knew it! In the end, the world belongs to childhood friends; all others are heretics!"
"You could say childhood friends."
"Then how's your relationship now? Are you planning to marry in the future? Did you not look for a boyfriend in college because of him?"
"I forgot to ask earlier," Ingrid said out of nowhere. "A kiss that tasted like love doesn't have a gender restriction, right?"
Lois and Adele froze for a few seconds. Then, they silently turned toward Sonia, miming handing her a microphone: "We now invite Professor Servi to share her advanced relationship experience."
"You say that, but I haven't kissed that many times either," Sonia said with some bashfulness, though her voice involuntarily softened. "Only twice."
"The first time was your first kiss, right?!" Adele gripped her bottle tightly. "Was the setting romantic? Did it taste sweet?"
Sonia smiled and shook her head. "No, not romantic at all, and there wasn't any flavor. It was in pitch darkness. I wanted to turn my head and steal a kiss, and ended up touching his lips instead. That was my first kiss."
"Awww..."
"However, after the second kiss, he told me that he'd actually wanted to steal a kiss from me back then too." A rosy blush bloomed across Sonia's face, a natural tenderness gleaming in her eyes. "Even though it wasn't romantic, invisible, and had no taste, I still love that first kiss the most."
"Aaargh!" Adele bit her fingers as she listened. "I feel like a dog that just got randomly kicked—I'm so jealous!"
"You have a fiancé. Wouldn't it be easy for you to set up an even more romantic scene?"
"No way! How could contrived romance ever compare to that unspoken, heart-fluttering chemistry!"
"All right, all right... Then next up is Ingrid."
"Never have I ever..." Ingrid paused for a long time; her mind was not well suited for this sort of game. "...taken a shower with a roommate."
She had simply said it off the cuff, fully prepared to take a drink herself. Yet the moment the words left her mouth, Lois and Adele's faces changed instantly. They hurriedly scrambled to justify themselves: "The water was about to be shut off that night! We didn't have a choice!"
Sonia and Ingrid stared at them in utter shock. Lois and Adele gulped down the rest of their drinks, showing through their actions: *Don't ask any more.*
Chapter 754