Don’t Take Life Too Seriously; You Might Wander into an Awkward Situation

I followed Amilia on her next handful of obligations. She protested the entire time, but it left most of the afternoon open to her every whim. Apparently, her head buzzed with fancies today, and she couldn't settle on an activity. Instead, she dragged me all over the mansion, showing me this and that, none of which were of any interest. Her wardrobe, the gardens, the kitchen, and more importantly, the things you could snack on between formal meals... I pined for the library—which I was sure they had—but that place bestowed less enthusiasm in Amillia than an outhouse. She considered taking me to the village, but an idea struck her before it could be realized.

"I know! Let's play hide and seek!" She said as she spun around to face me, an eager grin on full display.

"...Hide-and-seek?" The idea didn’t thrill me. Like playing hide-and-seek in a skyscraper. It would take me forever to find her. I readied my objection when I realized... it would take me forever to find her. That would give me, well, forever to wander about as I pleased.

"Do you play hide-and-seek often?"

"Not really." Her posture deflated. "Sistilla does sometimes..."

"Does she find you?"

"Yes!" she said, reinflating. "She is really good!"

"Well... Okay, I guess we can play hide-and-seek," I said with disinterest. Couldn't reveal my excitement for the chance to explore. Got to keep up images.

"Okay! Count to 100." She clapped her hands together.

"100? Isn't that a bit high?" I wanted to say it should be ten, but who's to say if they did it the same?

"Yeah, but Sistilla says 100 is better for such a large house." I guess that made sense... If you wanted to kill an entire afternoon on one round of hide-and-seek. Which suited me just fine.

I began counting, and I heard Amilia run off with a giggle. I took my time counting, and when I finished, I opened my eyes. "Oh, where could Amillia have possibly gone in such a large house?" I robotically announced to nobody in particular. "I guess I will have no choice but to go systematically through the house in order to find her." The words echoed down the halls. That should ensure somebody heard me. If anybody apprehended me in a place I shouldn't be, I could plead ignorance and have someone vouch for my intentions.

And so my "search" began. Amilia must have run off to some distant corner of the house—it seemed in alignment with her personality—but I would start my search right here. I needed to be thorough, so I took my time. Was there a secret room hidden behind this portrait of a chubby matriarch? Did this ornate suit of armor conceal a secret lever? No way to know unless I investigated, which I did at length... Unless the object in question was uninspiring. I might have just given those a quick one over.

More legitimately, I peeked in through every door, unless something was going on inside. I was pretty sure that would be a faux pas. It impressed me how they found so many purposes for all these rooms. Granted, I couldn't tell you what those purposes were, as I was not in the habit of misappropriating hard-working citizens' money. The rooms ranged from completely empty to jam-packed. From humble washrooms to pretentious museums. From pious chapel to... a place for exploring one's more carnal desires. I think somebody forgot to lock that last room, at least I hoped. Slowly, I closed the door and pretended I had never seen it, lest my perception of the manor's occupants shift completely.

The one thing I did not stumble upon was the library, to my dismay. However, I did find something equally as intriguing. With most of the rooms, I did not find the need to enter. But when I opened the door to what looked like a scientific workshop, complete with arcane instruments and diagrams, it couldn't have been more inescapable if it had a tractor beam.

Its majesty entranced me. So many wondrous devices and tools! For every one that I could identify: A beaker, tongs, various writing implements... several were completely alien. Round orbs surrounded by concentric circles, spikes mounted from triangular scaffolding, and bejeweled wheels, to cite a few.

A blackboard sat at the back of the room with a series of equations written in a hand so meticulous and uniform I half suspected a machine had made them. Now this I could understand, well, the math at least. While examining the equations, I noticed that whoever had written this up had made a simple arithmetic mistake. Blameless really, can happen to the best of us. As all the equations followed from the preceding evaluation, they were all off. Being the helpful sort, and because this mistake would nag at me all day, I went ahead and corrected the error and fixed the following equations, in a comparatively maladroit scrawl.

There, the final answer was not 42, but 38. What did that mean? I read some of the notes, which said something about mana load and dynamic depth contrast, which meant nothing to me. However, I surmised a hozenlo had written it, as it was written in Hozelovian.

Feeling proud of myself, I continued to scan the facility like a kid in Willy Wonka's chocolate factory, when my eye fell onto what I could only construe as a cutting implement, a saw. I immediately felt like a dullard when I realized I had lost the plot. This place had tools. Tools that perhaps could forcibly remove this collar! What the fuck was I doing fixing computational errors?

Wasting no time, I grabbed the saw and examined it. It resembled a hacksaw, the kind made for hacking through metal. Metal, like the kind this collar was made of. Would it work? Well, no time like the present to find out.

I began sawing away, taking less care than would have been prudent, considering I was wielding a sharp cutting implement within an inch of a major artery. Sawing away, I realized even if this worked, it would take a while to cut through and probably require two cuts. It could take several sessions. Would they notice a large cut? Maybe I could get some kind of neck wrapping to hide it…

"What in Driskal's name are you doing!?" I nearly shit myself when a booming yet nasally shout assaulted my eardrums. Thankfully, my sphincters remained resolute. Only because the speaker stood at the same height as me did I realize the voice had come from a rather small body, a hozenlo with pointy ears, a selectively receding hairline, and a prominent nose. He wore goggles pulled up over his forehead, and what I assumed was once a white lab coat.

He marched over angrily and pulled the saw from my hand. "What do you think you were doing, damaging my saw!?" He inspected it with growing disgust.

"Well, I..." I tried to conjure a legitimate excuse, but could think of none. Luckily, he cut me off before I could forgo my right to remain silent.

"You can't cut alvoloy with steel!"

"You can—"

"Only alvoloy can cut alvoloy!"

"...Rea—"

"Yes," he said, sounding like his temper was running out of steam. "I suppose there are magical means as well."

He sighed, turning the tool over in his hands a few more times, but then saw the blackboard. The saw dropped from his hands as he rushed over as if his only beloved son had just collapsed. "WHAT DID YOU DO!?!?"

"I just—"

"Out with you!" He reached over and grabbed a nearby object, preparing to throw it, before thinking better. Well, I took the hint and got the Hell out of there.

I pulled the door closed behind me, hyperventilating like I had just escaped a knife-wielding clown. That man's anger had been so intense that I had nearly forgotten about the ramifications if he informed them of my collar removal attempt. Well, that seemed far down on his list of grievances. Would it be too much to hope he wouldn't say anything? Probably.

Due to this sudden traumatic event, it was forgivable that I failed to notice the woman standing before me until she began to laugh hysterically.

"Well," she said, still laughing. "I see you have met Linglang."

My head snapped forward as I fell back against the door. "...You are... Lady Sistilla, right?"

"Glad to see you remember me. It has been a long time since breakfast." So she had a little bit of an edge to her. She shared in her sister's red hair, only a bit darker, and she wore it in a long, tightly woven braid. As for the rest of her appearance, if I said she looked like an adventure, you would probably envision something fairly close. Well-worn brown boots, tightly laced pants, leather jerkin. Definitely the look your noble father would disapprove of.

She wiped the tears from her eyes. "What were you doing in there anyway?" I tried not to panic when I remembered I had prepared an alibi.

"I'm looking for Amillia. We are playing hide-and-seek."

"Does she still like to play that game?" She tilted her head up. "Well, there is a secret to finding Amilia."

"There is?" I wasn't looking for a cheat code, but it would look suspicious if I turned it down.

"Yep, just ask the servants. She isn't very stealthy, and anybody within several passages of her passing will be able to point you in the right direction. She also tends to laugh when you are close, so you should be good to go once you find the right area."

"I see..." I said, as she continued to look me over. Finishing, her eyes softened and her smile shifted. "Is something wrong?"

"Oh no, nothing," she said, and then added, "Amilia can be a bit much sometimes, but she isn't so bad, she is still just a child."

"Yeah, well, so am I," I said, turning my head. Sistilla's smile shifted again. Okay, that definitely meant something.

Following Sistilla's advice, it proved of little difficulty to fox out Amilia. As much as I wanted to keep roaming about unchecked, my run-in with that hozenlo had my tail tucked squarely between my legs, and it wouldn't be extricating itself any time soon. As for Amilia, she had hidden in a cupboard... In the kitchen... Snacking on some kind of dried fruit. No wonder she was willing to play a game with such a long wait time.

However, one round satisfied Amilia, though she never offered—or even considered, from what I could tell—to find me. I had no desire to play, but couldn't help but feel slighted. Instead, she continued to drag me through the chateau, showing me taxidermied animals, animal skeletal displays, animal rugs... Basically anything to do with animals, and mostly dead animals at that. One might believe this a veiled threat, but I doubted her capability of that level of subtlety. More likely, she considered me an animal and, therefore, interested in other animals, in some form of assumed stereotype. I suppose I should give her points for trying.

Dinner eventually came and put an end to our curated tour, which Amilia enjoyed with alacrity despite having snacked heavily earlier. Afterwards, I was spared any further insights into how to display an animal corpse as Amilia was forced off to her nightly bath. Undoubtedly, she would have wanted to resume our interactions afterwards, but Tissa threw down some cover fire and said I would need to eat and wind down for the night. Good to know somebody had my back.

Speaking of baths, I should take one as well. I had no idea what spoke to good bathing protocol, but I did know I never wanted to see Mimka and a basin of water in the same room again. If the upper crust considered bathing once a day good enough, then it was good enough for a self-aware house pet.

Dinner for the servants was much the same as breakfast, with Mimka at the other end of the long table, now that Valarina wasn't present. I wondered if she was salty about that. I took that bath right afterwards—much more pleasant when you do it yourself. Tissa drew Amilia off, so I had the rest of the evening to myself. Unfortunately, we never came across that library—I might have had a book to read.

Instead, I climbed to one of the upper-floor balconies and looked out over the village and surrounding farmland. The warm evening breeze felt pleasant against my damp skin. Perfect for drying my hair, as I surveyed the land. From what I had seen heading into Reastera, there was no nearby human settlement outside of the village. The farmland spread across the hillside. Once they had planted the fields again, it would be a trifle to get lost in the vegetation.

As for the chateau itself, even from the balcony vantage point, you could see the ornate and ostentatious construct with many decorative protrusions covering nearly every surface. I could probably use that. Even without them, I could still fashion a rope out of any of the copious curtains or sheets. Of course, maybe I could just walk out the front door; I hadn’t tested their response.

No, the real problem was this blasted collar! It prevented me from using fox magic, could administer an incapacitating shock, and would prove difficult to remove by force—I had inspected it in a mirror after my bath, and the saw hadn't even left a scratch. If the collar's shock feature had a maximum range, then perhaps I could still escape and find a way of removing it afterwards. But I couldn’t guess how far that range could be, and I very well couldn't ask.

"A lot on your mind?" A soft voice caught me unaware, and for the second time today, I nearly shit myself. Thankfully, my britches remained unstained.

Nearly falling to the base of the railing and turning to face my attacker, I found... "Oh, it's just you, Valarina—I mean Lady Valarina."

"Just Valarina is fine. Sorry to have startled you." She walked up to the railing with the light wind rustling her sky blue dress and pushing aside her golden locks, revealing a slender neck. I pulled myself back up and looked off the balcony. Well, so much for planning my escape. Valarina's presence would make it awkward, but I couldn't very well leave at this point.

I hadn't seen much of Valarina, but from what I had witnessed, it went without saying she was a weirdo. Conroy must have really drawn the short straw in whatever political alliance had gotten him saddled with her. Well, she had to be better than a conspiring backstabber, but still. In Conroy's place, I suspected I would have gone mad. Well, perhaps that is a bit hyperbolic.

"It must be hard for you..." She said after a moment had passed.

"W-What?" My head swiveled, having been caught mid-thought. This was what I was talking about!

But wait... Did she just acknowledge the hardship of being a slave? If so, she would be the first to not pretend otherwise. Maybe she wasn't so bad after all.

"I'm sure you miss your homeland." No, never mind. She is just as dense as the rest of them. Only... Actually, that wasn't a completely irrelevant thing to say. I tried not to think about it much, especially since I had more pressing matters at hand, mainly this collar. But now that she had brought it up…

"...I don't really have a homeland anymore." Well, it still existed—presumably—but no one remained now. Everyone who lived there had either died or been enslaved. Well, several people were absent when it happened. I imagined Mesa, being a pragmatic guy, would have taken Morning-Sun Hunter and gone back from wherever he came. Then there was also... Moonlight Guardian.

I wondered if she had returned from her sojourn. She had promised to return even if she found a mate. What would she do when she saw the place? While drifting in my reverie, I recalled Moonlight Guardian's reason for taking up the sword. My hand clutched at my chest as a crushing pressure from the trauma of that day went in for the second press. I forced the thought from my mind.

"...I really am sorry..." Valarina had been saying something as my mind ventured elsewhere. "I know! Maybe this could be your new home!"

I drew away and targeted her with the most incredulous look I could muster. One could believe that some kind of cruel joke, but we were talking about Valarina, and one only had to look at her child-like visage of optimistic innocence to realize she truly thought this an inspired solution.

"..." I opened my mouth to reply, but no words came out. How do you respond to something so idiotically insensitive while the speaker is completely oblivious to this fact? I looked back over the balcony. "It doesn't work that way."

"Why not?" I saw her pout from the corner of my eye. "Everyone needs people to care about!"

I had intended to let this go, but since she had set herself on forcing the issue. "...I'm a slave," I said, and then pointed. "Maybe you missed the collar."

"Most people won't hold that against you!" she said with vigor and, by all appearances, sincerely trying to rally my spirits. The face was not designed for the degree I would need to raise my eyebrow to express my disbelief at such an ignorant statement. Who was I even talking to? This woman wasn't playing with a full deck, and I suspected several of the missing cards had been replaced by mahjong tiles. My broken expression persisted as the only appropriate and anatomically possible response to such a statement.

"Nobody holds the hougen being slaves against them. In fact, they seem to rather like it here," Valarina said, letting a self-satisfied smile spread across her face.

I have mentioned before a love of dumb, pointless arguments, but this was a bridge too far. For one, while the arguments may be dumb, they should be argued with solid logic. Second, slavery was not a pointless argument. Furthermore, with such supreme stupidity, she could probably interpret and twist my sound arguments into complete idiocy that would only strengthen her delusion... Was delusion even the right word? At any rate, I theorized anything I said would just waste my breath and only add wind to her sails. Of course, I could start slinging pejoratives and ad hominem attacks, but would it really be wise to insult one of the people holding my leash? I guess I would just bite my tongue for now.

"If you need anything, you can always ask me," she said while still smiling to herself, looking back over the railing.

"...Sure."