Mina

The initial deposit, just like the governor said, arrived the next day. It was the first week of fall and I was told that I’d have one month before the first children arrived. I needed to get all of the furniture ordered, get more food, and get plenty of books and toys for the children. I needed something for the children to play with or read while they were here. They’d obviously need to do some chores around the house, but I didn’t want them to get bored with nothing to do all day. There was a school in the city, so the children would be enrolled there, but that only helped children between the ages of 5 and 15 and school only happened four days out of the week for eight hours. In this world, there were ten grades. You started at grade 1, then advanced to the next grade every year. After that, you were expected to either get an apprenticeship, join the researchers at the magic tower, or get a job. Orphanages accepted every child from birth to age 18. If you had nowhere else to go, you’d be sent to the orphanage. That meant that there were children under five and between 15 and 18 who didn’t have school to go to. Also, it was only because the city paid for the education of all the orphans that they were able to go to school. That meant that many of them hadn’t been to school during the time there wasn’t an orphanage in Katka.

Anyway, my first order of business was to order anything we needed. I was given 100 gold coins as a deposit. Buying 7 bunk beds, 14 chests for each child’s belongings, and 14 desks would only take about 20 gold. After getting a bigger refrigerator from Sara and Elias, we had 75 gold left. Enough food to feed 17 people would cost about 2 gold per week. We’d be getting 10 gold per month, so that should be doable, but one of those 17 was Roy, who was already eating a large roast on his own every day, so it would be a tight squeeze, financially. With the remaining 75 gold, I decided to buy any and all toys and children’s books I could find in the city. I went out, spending a full day buying blocks, balls, stuffed animals, dolls, crayons and paper, and as many books as I could find. By the time I was done, I’d spent most of that 75 gold. I decided to leave the remaining 13 gold in the safe in my office as savings for a special occasion.

When I got home, however, I saw that the toys and books I’d ordered weren’t the only things that had arrived. Whenever you ordered a bulky item or a large number of items from the market in Katka, you could pay a small fee to have a courier bring it to your house. Because of how far it was from my house to the market, I typically tried to have couriers bring most things I ordered. Couriers had carts they could use. I hadn’t bought a new cart since my parents sold the one we previously had. However, with certain bulky items, the couriers would also offer an additional fee to install the item in your house. When I saw two muscular orcs standing outside of the house, I was confused. I hadn’t ordered anything too large, so I wouldn’t have needed something installed.

“Are you Miss Alice? We were told to ask Miss Alice where to install this.”

“I’m not, but she’s my fiancée.”

“I’m sorry, but we were given strict instructions to ask Miss Alice, not her fiancee.” Now I was more curious than confused. The courier’s cart was covered with a large canvas tarp, probably to prevent me from seeing, if the instructions didn’t let me pick where to install it. “I’ll go get her and she can help you.”

Alice had been in my bedroom with Roy. He had apparently woken up earlier today than normal. He was in his human form, so Alice had been holding him in her arms, rocking him back and forth, trying to get him to sleep. After I told Alice what was happening outside, I took Roy from her and started rocking him myself. I noticed that his hair was starting to grow in. There were pale blue wisps of hair growing from his scalp. If he kept growing at this pace, he should have a full head of hair the color of the sky by the time the other children showed up. That said, I wasn’t exactly sure how dragons aged. I’d heard that dragons could live up to 1000 years, but I didn’t know if that was true or not. I’d also heard that dragons, in their human forms, could choose what they looked like. If that was true, then I didn’t think that Roy’s human form would ever truly age at any normal pace.

I heard some clattering from the room next door. Roy stirred, but he didn’t start crying. He also didn’t turn back into his dragon form, so I knew he wasn’t close to falling asleep yet. His eyes were closed, but he couldn’t be sleeping, right? I’d heard that dragons needed to maintain concentration on their transformation magic in order to sleep in human form. Roy was barely 11 days old, so there was no way he’d already learned how to do that, right?

Eventually the clattering stopped, leaving the house silent again. By the point I was about to accept that Roy could sleep in human form, there was a puff of clouds and he was back in his dragon form. Maybe he’d been able to concentrate on his form for a bit, but he’d obviously been unable to maintain it yet. Alice walked back into the room as I was putting Roy down on the bed. As I smoothed out the sheets, he almost snapped his teeth at me, but I’d been bitten a few too many times to be caught off-guard anymore.

“What were the couriers installing?”

“It was something that Governor Crayford sent us.”

“Oh, really? What did he send us?” Instead of responding, Alice decided to motion for me to follow her. She brought me out of my bedroom over to hers.

Before she opened the door, she stopped and told me, “If you don’t like it, we can move it to a different room.” As she opened the door, there were two beds in her room. They’d been put side-by-side, so at first glance, I’d thought it was just one bed.

“Did the governor send you a bigger bed? Where did you put the other bed?”

“No, he sent us a bed for you. He said that he wanted me to pick where you should sleep.” I was stunned, but as I began to process what she was saying, my face grew redder and redder. “I’m an idiot. I should’ve asked you if you were okay with this, first. I’ll ask the couriers to move it somewhere else.”

I ran over to hug Alice. “I don’t mind. I didn’t want to sleep in your room unless you were okay with it. I don’t want to make you do anything that you aren’t comfortable with.”

“Thank you, Simon. There’s only one thing you were wrong about. It’s not my room. It’s our room.”

It was that day that Alice and I began sleeping in the same room.

The next morning, the toys and books all arrived. I spent most of the day putting the books onto the shelves in the living room. I’d ordered more books than I originally thought.

“Count Westwind, you look tired. I do hope that you’re getting enough sleep. I heard from Miss Alice that you’re sleeping in the same room, but you still need to get your sleep.”

I didn’t like what Sir Garret was implying, but I didn’t have the energy to correct him. Nothing happened between us. I’m not lying! I was just tired because I was too nervous to sleep when Alice was right next to me. Whenever I looked over, I saw her laying there, also unable to sleep. Her golden eyes eventually stared back at me. Our eyes met for some time, but we both turned away. We both said that we were going to sleep at that point, but neither one of us fell asleep. This same pattern repeated a number of times over the course of the night.

“Sir Garret, I don’t believe this type of conversation is appropriate for a work environment. I may need to file a formal complaint with your supervisor.” That got him to straighten up his posture and go back upstairs to the office. I couldn’t exactly make a complaint to his boss, given that I was his boss, but the threat seemed to work.

As the month passed by, the bunk beds and the other furniture slowly arrived. As the other rooms in the house were slowly filled, Alice and I started getting a bit nervous about who the children might be. The governor had said that the orphans had a habit of running away, often leading to the other orphanages having to shut down. As the days passed and our nerves started to get to us, eventually the day came. We were greeted by a knock at the door.

Outside of the door was Father Paul from the cathedral, along with four children. Each of them were younger than Alice and I, but they couldn’t have been younger than seven. There was a small orc boy who looked to be the youngest of the group. He had pale green skin and a shaved head, like most orcs, but he was skinny and didn’t have his tusks fully grown-in yet. Next to him was another small boy, but this one was a human boy. He looked a bit older than the orc boy, but he had a mischievous look in his eye. He had tan skin like he’d been out in the sun for a lot of his life and messy black hair. The next one looked younger than the other two boys, but only in appearance. His pointed elf ears made me unable to guess his true age. Though he looked no older than five, his blonde bowl cut and babyface adding to that impression, he had a look in his eyes like he was older than the other three. The last one was the only girl of the bunch. She was the one who looked the oldest, not only from her appearance, but also from the way that she seemed like the leader of the bunch. Her shoulder-length orange hair and long rabbit ears weren’t the thing that caught my attention first. What caught my attention first was her smug expression and haughty stance. Her legs were spread shoulder-width apart and her fists were planted on her hips like she was an action hero.

“Thank you for taking these children in, Lord Simon. We’ve made sure to keep an eye on them at the cathedral whenever we can, but that’s no replacement for an actual place to live. Now, children, if you would introduce yourselves.”

At Father Paul’s request, the first to introduce themself was the young-looking elf boy. “My name is Peter. I am an elf and I am 17 years old.” WHAAAAATTT? He was older than me? I guess it made sense, given he was an elf. Elves could live up to 400, so they didn’t age at the same rate as humans. Elves also didn’t start puberty until 18, which didn’t end until they were 40. By the time humans were considered adults, elves were just starting to mature.

The next one to speak was the mischievous-looking human boy. “I’m Leo. This is my younger brother, Orion.” The orc boy was a bit shy, but he eventually said, “I’m Orion.” I must have had a confused look on my face, because Father Paul explained, “They’re half-brothers. They have the same father, but two different mothers. They ran away from home when their mothers found out.” I didn’t need the rest to be spelled out for me. I could only imagine how their mothers reacted when they found out their father cheated on them. If the situation was bad enough that they felt the need to run away, I felt for them.

My train of thought, however, was interrupted by a girl laughing a diabolical-sounding laugh. “MWAHAHAHA! I’m the Evil Queen of Darkness and Destruction! Beware my presence! I will destroy everything that you hold dear!” If the words were coming from anyone but a small rabbit girl, I’d probably be scared, but with her orange hair, orange ears, and carrot hair clip, I could only feel the desire to pet her like the bunny my class had as a class pet in elementary school. “Now, my minions, go forth and destroy everything you see!”

The other three didn’t listen to her. Acting like nothing had happened, the girl went to try and run past me, but was quickly stopped when Father Paul grabbed her by the collar. “Now, now. Don’t make trouble for Count Westwind. I’ll be leaving these four in your care, alright?”

“Yes, I’ll take good care of them. Thank you, Father Paul.” As he turned to leave, the girl tried to follow him, but he quickly brought her back.

“This is your new home. Like Father Paul said, I’m Count Westwind, but you can call me Simon. I hope we can get along. We’ve got rooms for all of you. Let’s start by giving you all a tour of the place.”

As I started to show the four around the house, I made sure to keep an eye on the girl who hadn’t told me her name. During this process, I’d told Alice to walk around the city for a bit with Roy. She’d left earlier that morning with Roy in his human form. Roy’d been getting better at staying in his human form, but he still had moments where he randomly got bursts of energy. I didn’t want to deal with trying to chase Roy while I was also trying to get these four comfortable with their new home.

The house tour went smoothly. Peter and Orion were quiet, so even though Leo and the girl were rambunctious, it was enough for me to manage. Leo always seemed to stay beside his brother, asking lots of questions that seemed odd for someone with his mischievous eyes. “Can Orion and I share a room?” “We get three meals a day?!” “Can we read all of these books?” At a certain point, it almost seemed like he was speaking for his brother. Peter didn’t ask any questions. Even when I asked him if he wanted his room to be on the top floor or the bottom floor, he didn’t answer, just shrugged. When I ended up picking his room for him, he went into the room and didn’t come back out. The girl was the most trouble, obviously. Anytime I showed the group a different room of the house, she went into the room, found something to knock over, then laughed her same maniacal laugh. First, she tried to knock over the refrigerator, but it was too heavy for her, so she tipped a heavy bag of flour over. It was the same thing in every room we entered. It was a couple of books in my office, a single chair in the dining room, my box of laundry soap in the bathroom, every time it was something that wouldn’t cause a real problem, but just enough to be annoying. I didn’t find it annoying, though. It was almost endearing.

“That should end the house tour. There’s a clock in the living room. We’ll have dinner at 6 PM, so make sure to take a bath before that.” Alice and I had thought about the fact that we’d have a large number of children living here now, so we had the bathroom downstairs remodeled. Now, the bath area was split into two rooms. The front area of the bathroom had a large sink with a mirror for the children to brush their teeth, brush their hair, and wash their hands. From the front area, there were two doors to the bath. There was a section for the boys and a section for the girls. Alice and I had a private bath in our bedroom, so we’d be using that one. Not together, though. Finally, the downstairs bathroom had two rooms with a toilet. This downstairs bathroom was previously designed to be used by the house staff, so it was designed to accommodate a large number of people. That meant it was perfect to accommodate all the children we’d be taking care of. There were also two toilets upstairs, one was in the master bathroom for Alice and I. The other was at the end of the upstairs hall, so the children who lived upstairs wouldn’t need to go downstairs to do their business.

With that, the children went back to their rooms. That is, the three who were still on the tour with me. Peter hadn’t come back out of his room yet. I decided to check on everyone before I got started on my work for the day. It was already after 2 PM, so I didn’t need to make lunch, but I was behind on my paperwork for the day. Sir Garret had the day off because I didn’t want him to have to deal with the new children yet.

All of the children decided to sleep on the top floor. It helped that they were all close to each other so they could play together. The top floor, like the bottom floor, had a hall running down the center with rooms on either side. The bottom floor had the living room, one bedroom, and the bathroom on the left-hand side, while three bedrooms, the dining room, and the kitchen were on the right-hand side. The top floor could be reached by the stairs in the living room. From the stairs, you turned left to reach the upstairs hallway. The upstairs toilet was at the end of the hallway by the stairs. Roy’s bedroom and the master bedroom where Alice and I slept were on the left-hand side. My office was closest to the upstairs toilet, then as you went down the hall, Leo and Orion’s room was first, then Peter’s room, and finally, the girl’s room. I still hadn’t learned her name.

As I knocked on Leo and Orion’s door and waited to be given permission to enter, Leo was the one to answer, opening the door. “What?” He was curt in his response, apparently annoyed by something. Behind him, in the room, I could see Orion lying down on the bottom bunk of the bed. He’d grabbed a book from the living room and was reading it. I think it was a book of fairy tales called “Tales from the Witch’s Book”. It was filled with all kinds of fairy tales that were common bedtime stories in this world, but would be a bit creepy in my other world.

“I was just coming around to check on everyone. I see that you already picked your bunks. Did you have anything else you needed?”

“No.” As the door slammed in my face, I could hear maniacal laughter and the clattering of something falling down coming from down the hall. I decided to check on the girl first. I knocked on her door, only to hear a frantic scramble to put something away before I heard, “Come in! If you dare…”

I opened the door. She’d clearly pushed all of the wooden blocks she’d pulled out of her toy chest underneath her bed. “So, the valiant hero has finally come to defeat the evil queen of darkness? Well, try to defeat me, if you dare!”

I couldn’t tell if it was just me trying to play along with her gimmick or if it was some locked-away memories of my middle school days in Japan, but I struck a pose covering one of my eyes and proclaimed, “Evil Queen of Darkness, I am the Blade of the Crimson Moon and I will do battle with you! I call upon the sealed power of my Crimson Eye to summon the PolterBlade!” Behind my back, I touched a wind crystal I’d happened to have in my pocket, whispered “Ventus”, and struck a different pose like I was holding a sword. The puff of wind from the wind crystal was just enough to make my hair flutter slightly.

The girl seemed confused by what I was doing. I was about to play it off like I was just joking, but then the girl struck the same pose I’d done where I covered one of my eyes. “So, Blade of the Crimson Moon, you seek to destroy me and my minions. If you want to stop my destruction, you must first stop my Destructive Blast!” As she uncovered her eye, she used the same hand to launch a blast of dark energy at me. I was blasted back into the hallway, slamming against the wall to Roy’s bedroom. As the door to the Evil Queen of Darkness’ bedroom closed behind me, I stood up and brushed myself off. There was no Destructive Blast, but it was fun to play along with the girl. I could almost swear I heard some girly giggling coming from her room as I went to go check on the final room.

“Come in.” I’d knocked on the door, only to get an immediate response from Peter. As I opened the door, I saw him simply sitting on his bed. He hadn’t touched any of the toys like the girl did, but he also didn’t seem to be doing anything like Orion was. “Is everything okay? You seem bored.”

“If you don’t need anything, I’ll be taking a nap until it is time for us to have dinner.” His way of speaking was so formal and refined in a way that seemed unnatural for his age. But, as I thought about it, he was technically older than me. He just looked like he was less than five. As he went to lie back down on his bed, I wanted to say something more, but he didn’t seem to want to talk. “Well, as long as you make sure to get your bath.” I went to close the door, hoping he’d say something else, but he didn’t, so I went to go get some work done.

Alice got back about an hour later. She’d run into Father Paul in the city, who told her that he’d just finished dropping off the four children. He also told her that he would be back in a week to check on things. After talking, Alice made her way back. When she entered the house, Roy started crying. I went downstairs to check on him, only to find Leo staring at the baby. Alice was trying to calm Roy down, but Leo was still standing there, staring. He saw me come downstairs and ran past me, back to his room.

“Did Leo do something to make Roy cry?”

“No. I walked in the door, Roy looked at the boy, and then he started crying.”

This was strange. Roy didn’t have much of an issue with any of the adults who visited the house. Whether it was Sara or Elias coming to check on my inventions, Governor Crayford coming to check on Alice and I, Garret and Rosella using my office as a place to flirt, or even Clare or Father Paul who only visited on very rare occasions, Roy had no problems with any of them. Even the couriers who came to install the new bed and the construction workers who came to remodel the downstairs bathroom were no issue for Roy. I couldn’t tell what the problem was, but I thought that I had an idea.

“Leo and Orion, these are Miss Alice and Roy. Miss Alice is my fiancee, so show her the same respect you show me. Roy is a baby dragon that we’re raising here, so you might see him flying around in his dragon form.”

We’d decided to go around introducing everyone to Alice and Roy. If Roy had a problem with all of the children, my suspicions might be confirmed.

Orion whispered something to Leo before Leo said, “Can Orion hold the baby?”

“Absolutely. Make sure you support his neck.” Alice went to hand the baby to Orion, only to have Roy turn into his dragon form as soon as he left Alice’s arms. Roy flapped his wings and quickly flew back to Alice.

“I’m sorry, Orion, but I think Roy might not be comfortable with others quite yet. He’s still young, so be patient with him.” Orion silently nodded while Leo looked away, almost sulking.

“Peter, these are Miss Alice and Roy. Miss Alice is my fiancee, so show her the same respect you show me.”

“Understood. I will be returning to my nap, if you do not require me for anything else.” Peter was still as closed-off as before.

“So, Blade of the Crimson Moon, we meet again! I see that you have brought allies with you. I will allow you to present these allies to me before I send you away with another Destructive Blast.”

“Evil Queen of Darkness, I present to you my allies. This is the Wings of Heaven’s Pride, Miss Alice. She is the wearer of my Heart-Sealing Ring. Then, this is the Cloud Dragon of Gluttony, Roy. He will roam these halls and fly through the skies of this palace.”

“Well met to the Wings of Heaven’s Pride and the Cloud Dragon of Gluttony. Now, I destroy you all with my Destructive Blast!”

I was slammed against the opposite wall with a beam of darkness. The Wings of Heaven’s Pride and the Cloud Dragon of Gluttony seemed to be unaffected. Roy started crying and Alice started trying to comfort him.

“The Cloud Dragon of Gluttony is letting out a Shriek of Madness! I must retreat, but you haven’t seen the last of me, Blade of the Crimson Moon!”

The girl closed the door behind her. Roy started crying as soon as it closed. Alice seemed mostly confused by the sight of my exchange with the girl, but also had a small amount of disgust in her eyes. I tried explaining to her that it was the best way I’d found to connect with the girl, but Alice didn’t want to look at me. I didn’t blame her. I’d shut away these memories for a reason. In the end, I was sent off to my office while she started working on making dinner.

Days started to go by. We eventually found a routine. In the mornings, I’d wake up at 6 AM, make breakfast, and wake up everyone else in the house. At 7 AM, we’d eat breakfast, then brush our teeth. Roy typically ate a large roast, while everyone else ate eggs, pancakes, bacon, and whatever else I decided to make that day. At 8 AM, I’d start working on any paperwork Sir Garret needed me to sign. Meanwhile, Alice would start playing with Roy. At 9 AM, I’d get all of the children to work on whatever chores they were assigned for the day while Alice and I tried to play with Roy outside. Roy still wasn’t handling the presence of other children well, so whenever one of them tried to join in, usually Leo or the girl, who I’d started calling EQD (a shorthand for Evil Queen of Darkness), Roy would immediately change into his human form and start crying.

By 10 AM, Roy was typically tired enough that he stayed in human form the rest of the day. Alice would typically work on any other housework that needed to get done until lunch. Meanwhile, I’d start working on whatever invention I was working on at that point. I still didn’t have any fire or ice crystals, so I was trying to make an automatic tiller and seeder for the vegetable patch we had in the front yard. The squash and pumpkins I’d planted had grown, so it was time to plant winter vegetables. Using earth crystals and plant crystals, I was starting to get somewhere, but the magic command for this invention was more complex than any of my others. At 11 AM, I’d start working on lunch. Lunch was typically a smaller meal than the others. Sometimes it was sandwiches, other times it was rice balls. I’d recently seen a shipment of rice coming from Sakura, so I ordered 50 kilos of it. I’d hoped that would be enough to last us a while, but I was probably wrong. Unfortunately, rice didn’t always make its way to Katka, so we’d need to make our supply last as long as we could until more rice found its way here.

At noon, it was time to eat lunch. Roy was typically asleep by this point in the day, so it was just Alice, Leo, Orion, Peter, EQD, and myself eating. At 1 PM, I went back to working on my inventions while Alice went into the city to buy any food or other supplies we needed. Sometimes, some of the children would go with her. Peter was never the type to leave his room, aside for meals, but Leo and Orion would occasionally go. EQD went once or twice, but she mostly stayed in her room or spent her time bothering me. By 4 PM, Alice would be back. She’d have any fresh food we bought that day, but because of our refrigerator, we could keep a supply of fresh food here, so she would typically only make these trips every other day. If she didn’t go into the city, she’d spend time with me or work on various projects she had. Recently, Alice had been learning how to sew and alter clothes, so she was trying to make clothes based on the ideas I gave her from my other world. She wasn’t at a professional level yet, but I was sure she’d get there eventually, based on how quickly she was learning.

At 5 PM, it was time for me to start working on dinner. At this time, the children would start taking their baths. Alice would help me with cooking because of how many mouths we needed to feed. By 6 PM, we were finished and ready to eat. Most days, we had three parts to the meal: protein, vegetable, and grain. On this particular day, we were having baked salmon, honey-roasted carrots, and rice. The previous day, we had spaghetti and meatballs. It seemed like there was a clear winner between the two among the children. Alice and I both knew it was important for the children to get a balanced diet, but none of the children seemed to like vegetables much. They loved the tomato sauce, which Alice would make once a week for us to use throughout the week, but as soon as a vegetable looked like a vegetable, they refused to eat it.

At 7 PM, it was time for the children to get ready for bed. They needed to brush their teeth and get changed into the pajamas that Alice and I had worked on making for them. Each one had their name sewn into the shirt pocket, but since I still didn’t know EQD’s actual name, I left hers blank. By 8 PM, the children were all in bed. Alice and I typically got our baths at this point, but we were still in bed by 9 PM. It was a tight schedule, but it seemed to work pretty well.

The next day, EQD was missing.

I noticed when I went to wake everyone up. EQD was usually the last one to wake up. She often needed me to shake her awake, so I’d knock on the door, wait to see if she answered, then went in to wake her up. When she first woke up, she didn’t have her Evil Queen of Darkness persona, so she just seemed like a normal girl. Until she started eating breakfast, she was never fully awake. After she finished, she was back to her regular self.

I went to shake EQD awake, only to realize that her bed was empty. I quickly ran back to my bedroom to get Alice up. She was typically awake around the same time I was, but she stayed in bed, resting her eyes for longer than I did. “Alice?! EQD is missing!” With that, Alice was fully awake. She quickly put on a cardigan over her nightgown, not wasting time to get fully changed. As Alice and I started asking the other children if they heard anything from EQD or if they might know something, we heard a knock at the door.

“I’m sorry I didn’t mention anything sooner. I should have told you about why these four have been the biggest troublemakers in the orphanages.” Father Paul had come in the door, carrying EQD by the collar. When we asked him where she was, he said that she had been seen in the city, standing outside of the Adventurer’s Guild. He brought her back here, even though she’d been screaming and crying the entire way back. After she got here, she went up to her room and started crying into her pillow. Whenever Alice or I tried to talk to her, she simply cried louder. Eventually, she cried herself back to sleep.

“Why are these four considered troublemakers and why did EQD run away?”

“EQD?” Father Paul seemed confused at my nickname for her, cocking his head quizzically.

“She hasn’t told me her name yet, so I’ve been calling her EQD, short for Evil Queen of Darkness, like she introduced herself.”

“Ah, I see… I haven’t learned her name yet, either. Apparently, no one knows her real name because she’s never told anyone. She doesn’t have any official paperwork with her name on it, either, so the other orphanages just called her ‘that rabbit girl’ or ‘the one with the weird poses’. I’ve been calling her ‘little Miss Rabbit’, but she never responds to me. If she responds to you, then you might actually be the one to connect with her. I think if you listen to her, she might explain what she wants you to do.”

I’d sort of figured out that she always said what she meant, even if she said it in a way that reminded me of an anime protagonist. It was a roundabout way of speaking, but I could translate what she meant because I’d lived a life like that, back in my middle school days. I knew that, if anyone could get through to her, it would be me.

A few hours later, while Alice and I were in Roy’s bedroom, we heard a knock at the door. As I went to open the door, I saw EQD standing outside the room. Normally, she was so full of energy and excited to run around and play, but now, she was just standing there, head downturned and unable to meet my gaze.

“Hey, what’s wrong?” I said, squatting down to be at eye level with her. She didn’t respond, so I decided to take a different approach. “Alice, can you watch Roy for a bit? I’m going to go out for a bit with EQD.”

I took EQD’s hand and began walking her downstairs. “Let’s go into the town for a bit. Father Paul told me that you were waiting outside of the Adventurer’s Guild earlier, so let’s go back there.”

The Adventurer’s Guild was in the center of town, a short distance away from the governor’s office and across the street from the magic tower. True to my expectations from anime and video games, it was filled with all kinds of adventurers. There were archers, knights, assassins, healers, mages, beast tamers, alchemists, and all different kinds of people. I had some memories of how the Adventurer’s Guild worked, but I’d never been inside the building. Everyone who became an adventurer signed a contract with the guild. This contract was how adventurers got their power. As you advanced through the ranks of the guild, you gained more and more power. This meant that the guild had a way to prevent strong adventurers from going rogue and causing destruction with their powers. However, if you were strong enough, this also meant that you could threaten to leave the guild, causing the guild to lose one of their strongest fighters. There was a legend of a mage gone rogue hundreds of years ago. That mage was so strong that the guild couldn’t afford to lose their power. The mage began experimenting on monsters, trying to create a magic crystal that was so large, it could power a magic item for eternity. The monsters were forced to grow at an abnormally fast rate, which needed the monsters to feed on anything they saw. The monsters rampaged through a town in the empire, only to finally be stopped by the empire’s first hero. The empire’s heroes were the only ones who had power not granted by the guild, so they couldn’t be controlled by the guild, but it did mean that the heroes had the ability to stop the guild if they ever went too far.

The building was a three-story circular building with a domed roof. The bottom floor was where the adventurers gathered, looking for quests to raise their rank. After 10 quests of their current rank, adventurers were allowed to take on a promotion quest. The promotion quest, if completed, granted adventurers the powers of their next rank. However, if you failed the promotion quest, you were permanently stuck at that rank, unless you chose to start over at the lowest rank. There were 10 ranks, from G to SSS. This meant that SSS-ranked adventurers had completed 99 quests to reach their rank. There were rumors of a 100th quest, but no one knew what that quest was.

As I stood outside of the guild hall with EQD holding my hand, I saw a woman sweeping by the front door. She was an older earth elemental woman with gems of all colors braided into her brown hair that fell over her shoulder. She looked over at me and EQD, then waved and walked over to us. “Little missy, are you back already? And who might this young man be?”

“I’m Simon Westwind. I run the new orphanage in town. What might your name be?”

“Oh, is that so? You must be the count. I do apologize if this young lady has caused you any trouble. My name is Safira. I’m one of the receptionists here.”

“Absolutely not. She’s been quite wonderful. I did hear that she was found over here earlier today, so I came back to see if I could help her finish whatever business she had here.”

Safira pursed her lips at that. “Well, you see, she does the same thing every week. At this point, we’ve gotten used to her being here. She does make people worry, but she doesn’t make any trouble here.”

“She’s here every week? What does she do here?”

“She just waits here for a while, looking for something, then eventually puts in a job request.”

“Is that right?” I turned to EQD, kneeling down to her. “If you want to wait out here for a bit, I’ll help you get that job request put in.”

For the first time that day, EQD’s face seemed to light up, ever so slightly. She ran over beside the door and stood in the same pose she first introduced herself to me in. As she stood there, fists on her hips, she watched the crowds that passed, looking for someone. Safira and I went inside, where I had some questions that needed to be answered.

“I’m sure you must know why she does this every week. I’ve just met her a few days ago, but you’ve known her for a while, if you’re used to this by now.”

“I guess I should’ve expected this conversation. Do you know this girl’s name yet?”

“No, but I want to hear it from her.”

“That’s the right answer. Well, let me tell you when I first met her. I met this girl about 10 years ago, shortly after she was born. I knew her parents because they were both adventurers. Whenever they went on quests, I would watch their daughter for them. Eventually, she started to want to go on quests with her parents. Her parents were both E-rank adventurers. They failed the promotion quest to go up to D-rank, but never wanted to try again because they weren’t trying to make money or get powerful. The two had met on a quest and since then, they’d always gone on quests together. The way they showed their love for each other was by going on quests together. He’d protect her with his shield, then she’d heal him with her magic. Whenever they got back, they told their daughter all of the stories of their grand adventures together. I guess, over time, the stories got bigger and bigger inside their daughter’s head. She started to think that her parents were the heroes of some grand legend. Then, about 3 years ago, her parents didn’t come back. They’d finally decided to try again from F-rank. I guess they wanted to live up to the image in their daughter’s head. It happens more often than you’d think. Adventurers get too used to their power at their current rank, then when they start over without all that power, they don’t come back. The guild tells adventurers to be careful when they start over, but they never listen. Suddenly, they don’t move as fast or they can’t use a spell they’d previously mastered. They get caught off-guard and the monsters get them. Since then, this girl has been coming back to the guild, waiting for her parents to get back. I’d told her that they died, but she couldn’t believe me. She’s been waiting there, every week. The requests she puts in, they all expire after a week because she doesn’t have the money to pay for a permanent request that gets sent to every guild branch. Every week, it’s the same request: ‘Calling all heroes to defeat the Evil Queen of Darkness.’ After a certain point, the guild here gave up on trying to stop her. She’d always go back at the end of the day after she resubmits the request, but it didn’t stop the other people running the orphanages from worrying, thinking that she’d run away for good.”

When I’d heard that she was waiting outside of the Adventurer’s Guild, I’d had an idea that something like this was happening, but it still hurt to actually hear it. I excused myself from the counter after putting in the request. I’d dipped into my savings to pay for a permanent request. By this point, Safira had the request memorized, so she took care of finishing the paperwork for me.

I stepped out the front door of the guild hall to see EQD was still there, waiting for her parents to get back. I silently stood next to her. I’d wait here with her until she decided she wanted to go back home. As she heard me walk over beside her, she looked downcast. “Is it time to go back already?” It was the first thing I’d heard her say that day.

“Alice is taking care of Roy, so I can stay here a bit longer.”

“Are you going to tell me to stop?”

“Why would I? I know where you are, I know that there are people who will help you here, and I know you aren’t going to get hurt here. If you want to come here again, all I want you to do is let me or Alice know first, okay?” She looked to have a slight smile on her face, but there was still a lot of pain behind her eyes. “But, if someone comes here looking to defeat the Evil Queen of Darkness, they’ll need to go through the Blade of the Crimson Moon first.”

She finally went back to her natural pose with her fists on her hips. “Bold words from someone who is so easily defeated by my Destructive Blast. Though, if you desire to become my minion, I will allow you to pledge your loyalty to me.”

I knelt down before her, holding my hands out to her. “I, the Blade of the Crimson Moon, pledge my loyalty to the Evil Queen of Darkness. With this pledge, I give her my PolterBlade to cut down her foes.”

She took the non-existent blade and touched it to my shoulders, then tapped my forehead with it. “With this ceremony, you have become a knight of the Evil Queen of Darkness. You shall now be known as Sir Simon, Knight of the Crimson Moon.” I accepted the blade as she handed it back to me. I pretended to sheathe it at my waist. “With your position, you are granted permission to call your Queen by her name. I am the Evil Queen of Darkness, Mina.”