Not Unjustly Accused

The next morning, after Hesta finished her early class, she arranged to have brunch in the cafeteria with Cheng Xiaoshu. Both of them had appointments to meet Teacher Chen that afternoon.

Cheng Xiaoshu was a very interesting person. Although she spoke Common Tongue fluently as well, when she realized that Hesta's Southern District 14 language skills were still limited to discussing the weather and asking for directions, she immediately switched to her native tongue to speak with Hesta and solemnly reminded her, "Don't let Orange Town's language environment spoil you. You really need to live here using Common Tongue."

As a result, their previously smooth conversation suddenly became halting and stumbling.

Hesta liked this new friend very much. Even though their conversation was clumsy, she remained thoroughly engaged. But several times during the meal, she noticed that although Cheng Xiaoshu was speaking to her, her eyes were looking diagonally behind her.

Several times, Hesta glanced to the side—there was no one there at all.

"What are you looking at?" Hesta asked.

"...Looking at what? I'm looking at you."

"But you..."

"Oh, I get it." Cheng Xiaoshu covered her eyes, and when she opened them again, they had returned to normal. "Haha, I'm a little cross-eyed."

Only during their subsequent conversation did Hesta learn that Cheng Xiaoshu was mildly nearsighted in her left eye but had around six hundred degrees of myopia in her right. Her family had been poor when she was young and unwilling to buy her a desk lamp, so she did her homework beneath the dining table's hanging light. When she began having trouble seeing clearly, her family insisted that wearing glasses would worsen her nearsightedness and kept putting off getting her glasses, telling her to just endure it.

As a result, the nearsightedness had caused strabismus...