Conjunction Episode: The News
Torne Village, Paladin, Ray Starling
We passed the windstar-decorated road and arrived at Torne.
Being a village, it was obviously a far smaller place than Altea or Gideon. There were only about 400 or so houses spread out over a wide area, and the few windmills standing tall here and there made me feel like I was inside a painting of the 15-16th century Netherlands.
Torne and its surroundings looked crowded and lively, most likely due to tomorrow’s Windstar Festival. I could even see some people setting up tents to sleep in. They probably hadn’t been able to get a place at any local inn.
“I don’t think we’ll be any luckier in that regard,” I muttered.
“We can sleep in the carriage,” said B3. “Its interior space expansion makes it a bit like a camping car.”
Well, then. All that was left for us was to take Louie to his mom and call it a day.
...Alas, that wasn’t as simple as it seemed.
“Louie, are you crazy?! You’re not supposed to do that!” Farica scolded Louie as he cried, sobbing loudly.
A child, all by himself, had taken a stagecoach to the capital, passing the monster-filled Fadl Mountain Pass in the process.
It was fair to scold him for that. In fact, a scolding simply had to happen.
“Just how sad do you think I and your dads would be if something happened to you?” she demanded.
Dads. Plural. She was obviously referring to both the MIA Shijima and Louie’s late biological father.
With both of them gone, Farica was looking after Louie all by her lonesome, and I could barely even imagine the anxiety this incident had given her.
However, I knew enough to conclude that she’d been overdoing it. Apparently, she’d been waiting for Louie in front of their home ever since she’d found out he’d left for the capital.
Farica had spoken to the merchants she was acquainted with and many other people who were heading for the capital, and after figuring there was nothing more she could do, she had carried a chair over to the front of the house and just sat there until we arrived.
An environment with jobs and stats might make tians stronger than the average real-life person, but that still seemed like a bit much to a woman in the later stages of pregnancy. I could understand being worried about her son, but she shouldn’t compromise her health for that.
“B-But I wanted to find Dad...!” Louie cried.
“You know what he’s like,” said Farica. “How many times do I have to tell you that you don’t have to worry about him?”
“But we have to find him! When he found out about the baby, he was so happy he cried! Don’t you remember?”
“Louie...”
“He wants to see the baby! I’m sure of it!” Though his words came through tears — or perhaps because of that — his words were full of certainty.
Farica looked like she wanted to say something, but instead, she just gently wiped his tears and embraced him.
I stood silent. This was a talk between mother and child, and it felt like we didn’t belong here at all.
I considered leaving and letting them have their moment, but since she had been waiting outside, I couldn’t find the right time to do it.
Well, we also had a few things to ask her, so it might be best to wait it out.
“Anyway, Louie... Who are these people?” Farica asked finally.
“These are the Masters who said they would search for Dad!” he replied. “Mister Ray, Miss B, and Nemesis!”
“And why don’t I get a ‘Miss,’ if I may ask?” Nemesis grumbled.
Because you don’t look that much older than him.
“Nemesis... are you a Maiden?” Farica asked.
“Indeed I am.”
“I see. Just like Juno...” Farica suddenly became pensive.
Well, Ichiro Shijima, her missing husband, was a Maiden’s Master, so seeing another Maiden might very well mean something to her.
“They’re here to talk to you about Dad to help them search for him,” Louie added.
“Search for him...? But...” Farica said and momentarily fell silent. “Very well.”
“Excuse me,” B3 broke her silence and joined the exchange. “May I have a moment?”
“Yes?”
“We’re here to gather information that could help us search for Ichiro Shijima in real li— I mean, ‘on the other side.’ To that end, we wanted to question you about him and examine any items he’s left behind, but...” She paused and adjusted her glasses. “I believe it’s best to leave it for tomorrow. You seem quite tired today, and we wouldn’t like to stress you or your baby any further.”
I couldn’t agree more. It was already late, anyway, so all that business was best postponed to when Farica was in a better state.
“Thank you,” she said. “I appreciate... that... phew...”
While talking, Farica lost her posture and almost collapsed, but I ran up and kept her steady. The wait for Louie must’ve been more burdening than I’d thought. She seemed extremely tired and looked somewhat anemic.
B3 took Farica and, led by Louie, carried her over to her room and had her lie down. I wasn’t involved in this because we decided that a stranger like me had no place in a woman’s room. Instead, I took care of the chair out front and checked my inventory for any items that could help Farica feel better.
Since I had a tendency to get all sorts of debuffs on me, and because I had quite a fat wallet, I was now loaded with debuff-removing items. I even had a dozen Elixirs, which had a market price of 100,000 lir each.
Well, actually, half of them had come from my daily gacha rolls, but hey, they were a better hit than a Permit.
“Can a pregnant woman really drink items meant for combat use?” asked Nemesis.
“...Oh. I don’t really know.”
Though this world’s medicines came with descriptions of their effects, they never had warnings or anything like that. I’d yet to see any potion say things like “Ages X and up” or “Not for use by pregnant women.”
“I guess I’ll just give her some food, instead,” I said. “I’ll go ask if I can use the kitchen.”
I already had some ingredients on me, so that wouldn’t be a problem. Most of those had also come from the gacha, and though they were cheaper than the money I’d thrown in, at least they were useful.
Farica didn’t feel too good about us doing any more for her than we already had, but Louie approved of me using the kitchen, so that was exactly what I did.
The kitchen here had an oven, a gas burner, and lots of other expensive-looking cooking equipment, all of which had probably been provided for them by Shijima. It didn’t seem like I’d have much trouble making food in here.
I concluded that Farica needed something light, and decided to make some minestrone soup.
Might as well make something for Louie and ourselves, while I’m at it, I thought as I heard someone enter the kitchen. Upon turning around, I saw B3.
“I’ll help,” she said, already wearing an apron. She looked pretty good in that.
From how confident she seemed, I was guessing she knew her way around the kitchen. B3 might be unexpectedly good at homemaking.
“Ngh! I just felt another inexplicable surge of danger...” said Nemesis. “Oh! Ray, let me hel—”
“Not happening. You’ll eat most of it all during tasting,” I rejected her. “Don’t think I’ve forgotten how you ate half of the cookie dough when we were baking with Riser and Bishmal.”
“Nhogh... You don’t trust me at all when it comes to food.”
I have every reason not to.
“Ray,” B3 spoke up. “I’m more curious about how you ended up baking cookies with those two.”
“Well, this and that happened and it led to that.”
Basically, we had all been helping out at a certain arena charity event. One thing that had really surprised me back then was the fact that Bishmal’s cookies had been baked to perfection. In all honesty, as rude as that was, I’d expected him to completely burn his.
“Hmm... Well, I have some store-bought bread on me,” I said. “Guess I’ll make some minestrone soup and green salad.”
“Then I’ll make some Hamburg steaks with cheese,” said B3. “I’m quite good at those.”
We quickly started cooking, and in about an hour, we had a full course of standard Western food. Neither I nor B3 had the jobs for it, but Cooking was a sense skill, meaning that we could cook as well as we did in real life.
But then, I couldn’t neglect to mention that there were people like Marie, who couldn’t cook even if they had the Cooking skill.
“First you bring my son back, and now you make food for us,” said Farica, seemingly humbled. “I don’t know what to say...”
“Don’t worry about that,” replied B3. “We did this because we wanted to.”
“It looks so good!” Louie said with a mix of excitement and surprise in his tone.
By the way, since it had me curious, I’d asked about the medicine, and apparently, there was a type of magic medicine which didn’t give any side effects to pregnant women, which seemed really convenient.
“Wow! You’re Masters, but you can cook!” Louie enthused.
...What does that have to do with anything?
“Could Shijima cook?” I asked.
A moment later, my spoon fell out of my hand.
“This can’t be real...”
Nemesis? This Nemesis? Not hungry?! In what world could this happen?! Was this the portent of some cataclysm?!
“It vexes me that you’re more surprised by this than by Marie’s or B3’s identities,” she said.
“Well... You know...”
You’re Nemesis.
“I have no idea what you mean by that. And for your information, it’s not just lack of appetite. My body feels heavy, and I’m being attacked by drowsiness...”
“Are you sick? Do you have a fever?” I asked as I pushed my forehead against hers, which didn’t seem all that hot at first. Hmm, I’d say it’s standard... Perhaps even a bit below the average?
“Ah! R-Ray...?!”
Oh, wait, it’s a bit hot. You have a cold, don’t you?
“Embryos don’t get colds, you fool!” she shouted. “Anyway, my face feels warm, so I’ll just go to sleep! You take responsibility and eat my food!” Having said that, Nemesis returned to the crest.
Embryos don’t get colds? But I’m quite sure I’ve heard of Guardians catching Epidemics, I thought. We have a pregnant lady here, so we can’t be too careful.
B3 was staring at me, not saying a word.
Was something wrong?
“Have you ever been called a ‘natural womanizer’?” she asked.
“No,” I replied. “Though, in high school, I’ve been called an ‘all-nizer.’”
And I still had no idea why. By what design could anyone ever call a person an “all-nizer”? What did that even mean?
“Is it because he ‘womanizes’ all? Indiscriminately?” B3 muttered something I couldn’t hear or understand.
Anyway, I began digging through my two portions of dinner.
Once I was done with that, we washed the tableware and excused ourselves from Farica’s home.
She’d offered to let us stay, but we didn’t want to bother her more than necessary and decided to sleep in the carriage, like we’d originally planned. However, we did ask to park it on their grounds, and she gladly agreed.
Speaking of which, for a family with such a modest house, they had a strangely large amount of land. I’d asked why, and apparently, Shijima had prepared it for his Aries Leo mount, Gringham. From what Louie told me, Gringham was a lion as large as an elephant, so having this amount of land made perfect sense.
Anyway, with Farica’s permission and more than enough space to park, we settled the carriage and prepared to call it a day.
Of course, we had the option of logging out and taking naps, but that came with the risk of oversleeping. Also, for some reason, sleeping in Dendro made me feel as though I’d gotten more sleep. It probably had something to do with the fact that three hours in real life were nine hours here.
Mind you, if you slept here and logged out, you could still be greeted by a feeling of drowsiness, making you aware that all the rest you’d gotten here was just an illusion. Strange how that real-life feeling wasn’t there as long as you were online.
All that aside, this carriage we would be staying in had an actual shower room.
There was a knob on a door, placed where nothing could possibly be behind it. But when you opened it, there was — oh me, oh my — a fully-functional shower room.
Space expansion was impressive, albeit trippy, stuff. Just what would happen to all this if the carriage broke?
I took a quick shower and prepared to go to bed.
Honestly, instead of showering, I could have simply logged out and logged in again, as that would have made all the dirt on me vanish — or, rather, fall off my disappearing body. However, over this past month, I’d realized that it felt better to sleep after cleansing your body in warm water. I’d bathed in real life before I’d met up with B3, so there was no problem in that regard, either.
As for where we would sleep, well... toppling... no, flipping the seats upside down caused beds to appear.
This carriage couldn’t surprise me anymore.
Hell, despite having the appearance of a slightly luxurious carriage, it had more space inside than a large camping car. That, too, was the mysterious space expansion.
“How much did this thing cost, anyway?” I asked.
“Who knows?” B3 shrugged.
...Excuse me?
“It was a random drop from our PKing,” she continued. “Apparently, it’s a prototype of a new magic carriage model created by a Legendarian fairy workshop. I don’t even know how it ended up in the hands of the person my clan PK’d.”
“...”
“I was curious myself, and after a bit of research, I found out that the market price for models from the previous generation of such carriages is 100,000,000 lir.”
“...”
That would destroy my bank account. Were we inside the Dendro equivalent of a Benz Roadster? Or was this more like one of those pure gold Lamborghinis bought with Arabian oil money? No, this was probably more expensive.
“One of my clan members said it costs about as much as a tank,” B3 added.
“Ohh...” Well, that did seem like a better comparison.
Whatever the case, the carriage was a stupidly great luxury, and I had to help make sure it didn’t get damaged.
Today’s incident was a close call, I thought.
“I’ll turn off the lights, then,” said B3. “Good night, Ray.”
“You too,” I replied. “Good night.”
Thus we fell asleep.
The hectic day had left me completely drained, and I slept soundly, with no dreams to disturb me.
The next day, I opened my eyes to see Nemesis staring directly at me.
“Morning, Nemesis,” I greeted her.
“You too, Ray,” she replied. “Anyway, I’ll get right to the point.”
She raised both her index fingers.
“I have good news and bad... or more like ‘mildly troubling’ news. Which do you want to hear first?”
“...Well, this is sudden.”
Good news and bad news, eh? Well, the bad news probably had to be dealt with first, but I didn’t want to start the day like that.
“Good news first, please,” I said.
“Very well,” Nemesis replied as she raised two more fingers on her right hand, for a total of three raised fingers.
Then she made the revelation.
“I’ve evolved to my third form.”
“…What?”
To be continued...
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