[The fierce liquor burned all the way down your throat. It felt less like drinking a liquid and more like swallowing a flickering thread of flame, which instantly burst into a cloud of heat in your stomach.]
[Since you had no habit of drinking at all, this mouthful of extremely potent, aged local liquor instantly exceeded what your body could handle. The strong alcohol suddenly went down your windpipe, making you cover your mouth and cough violently.]
["Cough, cough... cough!"]
[You coughed so hard that involuntary tears even welled in the corners of your eyes, and your fair cheeks flushed an embarrassing red from the violent coughing and the alcohol.]
[Yet this entirely unguarded, even somewhat flustered display of embarrassment genuinely confirmed that your earlier polite refusal on the grounds that you "didn't have a habit of drinking" had been no excuse.]
[At the sight of you, Naobito Zenin's originally knife-sharp gaze faltered slightly, before a trace of amusement he himself failed to notice flashed through his eyes.]
[Where was this? This was the Main House of the Zenin Clan, one of the Three Great Families, a place where everyone began wearing thick masks from birth, with calculation and hypocrisy etched into their bones.]
[To an old fox like Naobito Zenin, the "authenticity" of someone who turned red and choked simply because he couldn't drink instead became, in a sense, an unexpectedly significant point in your favor. At least it proved that you weren't some slippery veteran who acted respectful while secretly harboring ill intentions.]
[Stroking the beard on his chin with a somewhat playful smile, Naobito Zenin watched you finally catch your breath, your brows tightly knitted, and slowly posed the question that had occupied his mind from the beginning.]
["Earlier, when that presumptuous brat Satoru Gojo negotiated with