Chapter 136: Cute Cat or...Noah?
Noah’s footsteps slowed when he spotted her.
Arisha was crouched near the edge of the pathway, her uniform skirt pooling neatly around her knees, her golden eyes fixed on something in the grass beside the street. She hadn’t moved when he approached, hadn’t stiffened or glanced over her shoulder. As if she had already sensed him coming.
He walked calmly toward her and knelt down beside her, following her gaze.
There, standing on the green lawn was a cat.
Noah blinked.
It was a striking little creature — fur as dark as obsidian, each strand catching the faint afternoon light with an almost liquid sheen. Its eyes were a vivid, burning yellow with narrow vertical slits running through the center, reptilian and sharp and completely at odds with how small and soft the rest of it looked. Its tail curled loosely at its side. Its posture was still, composed, unbothered by the world around it.
It was, without question, one of the most elegant cats Noah had ever seen.
Noah tilted his head slightly, a smile pulling at the corner of his mouth.
"Wow~" he said softly. "He’s cute."
Arisha didn’t look at him. Her gaze remained on the cat.
"Hm." A brief pause. "She’s... it’s female."
"Ohhhkay!" Noah corrected himself easily. "She’s cute."
"Yes," Arisha agreed quietly. "She is."
There was something almost tender in her voice. Noah didn’t miss it.
He extended his right hand slowly, reaching toward the cat’s small dark head.
The cat’s yellow eyes snapped to his hand immediately. She took one step backward, her ears flattening, and then hissed- sharp and sudden and utterly unimpressed.
"Hisss—!!"
"Meoww!!"
She glared at Noah with the full, unfiltered contempt that only cats were capable of producing.
Noah yanked his hand back.
"Damn!" he exhaled. "She’s scary!"
Arisha let out a quite breath which shows her amusement. "I’ve been sitting here for a while now," she said, still watching the cat with calm, patient eyes. "She hasn’t let me touch her once."
The cat had already returned to her original composed stance, tail swaying once, as if the entire incident had been beneath her.
Noah watched Arisha for a moment. The way she was looking at that cat. That was steady and unhurried, genuinely fond — was not something he had expected. Not from her.
"Aww~" he said, the teasing note creeping into his voice before he could help it. "It seems like you really have a thing for cute animals."
Arisha’s brow dipped. She turned her head slowly and looked at him sideways.
"So what?" she said flatly. "I cannot like cute things?"
"Hey, hey." Noah raised both hands slightly. "I never said anything like that. It’s just surprising. You carry yourself so cold and composed all the time, so serious and mature. It gives you this whole untouchable aura. I just didn’t picture you as someone who crouches on the side of the road to stare at a stray cat."
She turned back toward the cat and said nothing for a moment.
"Hmph."
A small pout settled onto her face. The kind of expression she probably didn’t even realize she was making.
Noah looked at her.
The evening light was catching her hair. Her cheeks held a faint color from the cool air. The pout made her look nothing like the composed, untouchable person she usually presented to the world.
"Hehe~" he said, without really thinking about it. "Honestly, I think you’re cuter than this cat."
The reaction was immediate.
Arisha’s hand shot out and her fingers closed around his wrist, pinching — hard.
"Owch—!!" Noah pulled his arm back sharply, cradling it against his chest and rubbing the spot with his other hand. "What was that for?!"
"That," she said, her expression returning to its usual calm indifference as though nothing had happened, "was for flirting."
"I wasn’t flirting with you!" Noah protested, still rubbing his wrist. "I was just saying what I genuinely thought when I saw your face just now. That was an honest observation."
"Honest." She repeated the word like she was tasting it and finding it unconvincing.
"Yes. Honest."
"Hmm." She looked ahead. "Then your honesty is awful. Just like your face."
Noah stared at her.
Then he smirked.
"You mean," he said smoothly, "my sweet mouth and my handsome face."
"Tch." Her tongue clicked against her teeth. "You’re being a narcissist now."
"I’m being truthful."
"There’s a difference."
"Not in my case."
She clicked her tongue again, a sharper sound this time. "Hmph. Whatever."
The cat had been watching this exchange from her patch of grass with the expression of a creature who had seen too much. Her yellow eyes moved slowly from Noah to Arisha and back again, her tail still, her gaze carrying the unmistakable energy of someone wondering why the entertainment had shifted away from her.
Noah glanced at the cat, then sighed with theatrical weight.
"Alright, I genuinely want to pat this cat. But she won’t even let me get close." She looked at the small creature with longing.
"I just want to touch the fur once." Noah said.
"That is your problem to solve."
"So unhelpful." He said with sour expression.
"I’ve been here longer than you and I have the same problem. Lower your expectations."
Noah thought about this for a moment. Then, without missing a beat, he turned toward Arisha with a grin that was already too pleased with itself.
"Well– you know what? If the cat won’t cooperate, you could just pat my head instead." He gestured vaguely toward his own silver-white hair. "I’m cute, after all. Practically more than this cat."
Arisha turned and looked at him with an expression so flat it could have been used as a table.
"For real?"
"Yup. For real."
She held the deadpan expression for few more seconds.
Then she reached out and patted his head.
Her fingers moved through his hair slowly, stroking once, then again — calm and slow, the way she had been watching the cat. The touch was lighter than he expected. Almost gentle.
Noah had said it as a joke.
He was not prepared for her to actually do it. he though she won’t do this.
And he was even less prepared for what happened next, because in leaning over to reach him, she had closed the distance between them.
Her face was close. Closer than he had thought, until just now, when he turned his head slightly and found her yellow eyes looking directly at him from a distance that was not large at all. Her expression was calm and unreadable. A faint, clean scent reached him.
His brain briefly forgot what it was doing.
"Aren’t you just the cutest," she said, her voice carrying the same quiet, tone she used with cat.
Noah’s fair skin betrayed him completely.
Pink climbed from his neck to his cheekbones in approximately one second.
"Wh — what?!" He stiffened. "What are you doing, Arisha?!"
And for the first time since he had sat down beside her — the very first time in this entire conversation — she smiled. Not a smirk, not a polite social expression. A real one. Small and soft at the corner of her lips.
"Guess you really are more adorable than this cat," she said.
The wind moved between them, cool and quiet.
Somewhere nearby, students passed along the path, glancing briefly at the two figures kneeling side by side in the grass before moving on. Neither of them noticed.
Noah’s ears were burning. He cleared his throat.
"H — hey. Okay. I think that’s enough." He shifted slightly away. "My hair’s probably sweaty from training anyway."
"It isn’t." She drew her hand back slowly, looking at her own fingers with mild curiosity. "It’s smooth. And cool." A beat. "Very silky, actually. I’m enjoying it."
’Dammit — this completely backfired on me!!’
He should have moved away. He should have laughed it off and stood up and changed the subject. That would have been the smart thing to do.
But it would have been a lie to say he didn’t like it.
"...Okay. That’s enough now," he said, with as much dignity as he could assemble.
"Alright." Arisha withdrew her hand and let out a quiet, amused sound. she chuckled. "Hehe~"
She looked sideways then, toward the patch of grass where the cat had been sitting.
It was empty. The cat was gone — slipped away at some point during the commotion, without ceremony or farewell, because she was a cat and had no obligation to anyone. This humans had dare to ignore her.
Arisha looked at the empty grass for a moment. A small sigh left her. Then she straightened.
"Well," she said evenly. "I did enjoy patting you anyway. So it isn’t a loss."
Noah clicked his tongue. "Tch! It was just one time."
They both stood. Arisha brushed her hands lightly over her skirt, smoothing the fabric back into place. She glanced toward the dormitory buildings in the distance, then began walking. Noah fell into step beside her without deciding to.
The path was quiet. The light was going gold at the edges.
As the fork in the path appeared ahead, boys’ dormitory to the right, girls’ to the left.
Arisha slowed down. She turned her head toward him, her golden eyes catching the last of the afternoon light.
"Bye, Noah." A pause, perfectly timed. "You were quite the cutie today."
Noah’s jaw tightened.
Every part of him wanted to bite back, to fumble, to turn red again and give her exactly the reaction she was aiming for.
Not this time.
He forced his expression into something easy and calm. Pulled up a smile that cost him considerable effort. And looked her dead in the eye.
"Of course I am," he said. "I already knew that."
Something flickered in her expression. Then she laughed. It was a quiet, genuine sound.
She walked toward the girls’ dormitory without looking back, her steps were slow, her posture as composed as ever.
Noah watched her go for few seconds.
Then he turned toward his own building, let out a long and thoroughly exhausted sigh, and dragged himself down the path with the heaviness of someone who had just survived something they hadn’t seen coming.
