Chapter 42

I was helping Truck-kun reattach Sycoran’s head to his body.

“You asked,” Truck-kun said as we worked, “if I could summon up another one.”

“Do you mind if I change him into an ice dragon? I really like ice dragons.”

He sighed, then looked over to where I was giving him the sad puppy eyes. “Fine! But it’ll take another two hours at least to redesign and stabilize him.”

I was going to slay an ice dragon! But this time we’d do it right, in a manner that fulfilled the prophecy. No dimensional cleave or any other epic ancient spells.

I left Truck-kun to his work and found Nyarin playing chess with the old green ghost king. Despite our work on the dragon taking hours, she was only a few moves into the game.

I found out why as I watched quietly from the doorway. Nyarin lost a piece. “No, that’s all wrong,” she said, ”not like that. Let’s start over again.” She began resetting the board for what was obviously not the first time.

“I used to be king over all I surveyed.” The ghost king said, mournfully.

“Do you want to go back into the copper disc?” She asked, then she noticed me. Her ears twitched in surprise. “You’ve gotten rather quiet at moving around.”

“Not to brag,” I answered, “but I’ve defeated like half a dozen demon armies.”

“That was mostly the Baku,” Nyarin said, smiling, ears forward and pleased.

I banished the ghost king into the copper disc and tossed it on the floor.

“Ahhh, the indignity!”

I sat down opposite Nyarin, ready to start a conversation I had been dreading for a while now.

Once or twice in my life I had tried to feed or even pet a street cat. They’d take the food, but they’d never let me pet them. Sometimes they seemed to want the attention. Sometimes I would get close. But the hard life on the streets and their natures meant that I could see them for a time, but never long. And they’d never be truly mine.

I had wasted so many years of my life being a man that didn’t say or do what he meant. I wasn’t that man anymore.

“I love you,” I said, looking right at Nyarin’s eyes.

Her ears stiffened straight up, perfectly forward, as if she had just detected a threat. “You don’t know me, what I am.”

“Tell me right now,” I said in a gentle voice, just like one might to soothe a hungry and scared street cat, “that anyone in this world knows you better than I do, and I’ll walk out that door and never bring this up again.”

Her ears flattened backward protectively like someone had hit her. “That’s not fair.”

I took the white stone out.

Truck-kun had explained to me that the stones were a key part of the Isekai spell. In fact, they were the only major part of the spell contributed directly by the goddess Kisshin herself. They focused and gathered worship energy. They were positioned at key points in every Isekai.

I held the stone and looked at Nyarin. It burned purple. And it also burned yellow.

Her ears flipped backward, cautious and threatened.

“This could never be what you want it to be,” she said in a whisper so soft I could barely hear it. It was so soft I wondered if I was meant to hear it or if she was talking to herself.

“Take the stone,” I offered, “and if it doesn’t burn yellow in your hands as you look at me, then I’ll walk out that door and never bring this up again.”

I set the stone down next to the chessboard at the edge of the table.

It sat next to a board game metaphor for war, and Nyarin’s hand reached out for the stone. She stopped, a hair’s breadth away. Her ears were wide back with attentive terror. “No, that’s all wrong,” she said, throat tight, ”not like that. Let’s start over again.”

She looked at me. Our eyes met for an eternity and I was certain that her heart was skipping a beat, just like mine.

“I can’t. I want to but I can’t,” she whispered.

I smiled and waited for her to touch the stone.

Her hand swept out, batting the stone off the table and across the room.

She ran out the door.

I sat, looking at the stone. It hadn’t been my imagination. For the briefest moment it had shone a bright, happy yellow where Nyarin had touched it. I was sure that Nyarin had seen it too.

“You look really surprised that the catgirl knocked the stone away.” It was the ghost king’s voice from the copper disc.

“Not now.”

“I mean, she’s a catgirl. You put something near the edge of a table. Right in front of her. What was she supposed to do? Do you know anything about cats? They knock stuff down from high places for fun. I thought everyone knew that.”

“Okay, I get it, I’m dumb and should have seen that coming. I think you’re oversimplifying why she refused the white stone. It was a metaphor for our relationship.”

“I mean, I’ve been dead for millenia, rotting in a tomb forgotten by time itself, and even I saw that coming. It’s been millenia since I could remember my middle name or how many children I had in life. But even I can remember that cats like to knock stuff off of tables.”

“Okay, I’m a special kind of dumb. I’m the dumbest man in this world. Are you happy now?”

The king was quiet for a moment as he considered this. “No, I miss my Poochi.”

I threw the copper disc out the window.

“Ahhh, the indignity!”