“Mawstewr, mawstewr!”
I could hear Kawaii’s voice, making me slowly open my eyes. Her amorphous slime form was wiggling all over my wall while she cried out my name.
‘Uugh, Kawaii?’
“Mawstewr!”
Elated by my response, she yelled my name with excitement. I sat up slowly, pushing her off my face so I could take a look at my surroundings. I was in the room provided by the princess earlier on. The place was as empty as it was first, so I quickly lost interest.
‘What happened?’
Just as I asked the question, my mind flashed back to what happened before. All I could remember was the Gate Keeper tapping my shoulder lightly, then I passed out.
‘Did he do something to me?’
<<The skill [Death Touch], but at a lower level so as to not kill you.>>
‘E-Eh?’
“Mawstewr! What happened?! You! Your heart wasn’t beating. I-I was scared.”
‘For real? I died!?’
<<No. You were simply put in a state of temporary stasis>>
‘Ah… that son of a-‘
“Mawstewr is safe! I’m so happy!”
Kawaii jumped on me once again.
‘Oh, come on, did you ever think I’d die?’
I started petting her gelatinous body gently, while she slowly took up a form. She had little slime tears falling out of her slime face which I found to be cute and amusing.
‘It’s alright, it’s alright. You can calm down now.’
I kept trying to soothe her. Speaking of which, why was I soothing a slime? They couldn’t feel any emotions, which meant this was just a play in her eyes.
‘I can’t believe I just fell for that.’
“What?”
Kawaii feigned ignorance after successfully fooling me. I’d have to do the same to her one day, although I doubt it would have any effect since, she had no emotions.
‘Whatever. Just tell me how long I was passed out for?’
“Hmm, not really long. A few hours at most.”
<<4 hours, 33 minutes>>
‘I see. Anything special happen?’
“No, not really. I spent the day with the Osveta guy, but he was really quiet although we were supposed to be planning for the invasion. After that, I heard you came back unconscious and I refused to leave your side. That spider on the other hand said she had some business to attend to, so she left with the princess’ permission.”
‘I see.’
I laid back on the bed and looked at the ceiling. While I was looking calm, I was really angry with the princess. The meal I worked my butt off for, she just came to snatch it from me like it was nothing. It reminded me of middle school bullies in my first year.
Sure, they stopped once I got to the second year, but still, having memories of such a thing wasn’t fun. I just rolled to the side of my bed, not in the mood for any sort of nuisance tonight.
Kawaii, of course, was just observing me curiously without saying a word. That made my intended self-loathing feel very, very weird.
‘Kawaii, can you go scouting for a bit?’
“What? No.”
‘Eh? Why?’
“Mawstewr will get hurt when Kawaii is not around.”
‘Oi, oi, do I look like some kind of kid to you?’
“No. But I failed to protect Mawstewr several times. I won’t allow another time.”
‘Several times? But I haven’t eve-‘
I had to cut the conversation short when I the doors to room were pried open. Coming through the doors was Sunalla, looking solemn. However, her expression lightened up once she saw me. A weird depressed smile formed on her face.
“I see you’re well now.”
‘What do you want?’
I was greatly displeased with how Sunalla had been treating me. And the way she tricked me the last time just so the Gate Keeper could knock me unconscious.
Here I was thinking she was actually a pretty chill person after she offered up help to us when Krull was attacking. Guess you don’t know a person till you spend quite some time with them.
‘Listen to me, there’s no time.’
She started using [Thought Communication] again as she came closer.
‘Get out of Atlantis and never return here. The princess will make you suffer.’
“The princess is summoning you.”
Once again, she was saying two completely different things. Was there someone eavesdropping on us? If there was, I wasn’t able to pick up on them with [God’s Wisdom], making them either masters of espionage or non-existent.
‘Explain further, or I won’t listen.’
“She is currently in her quarters, so if you believe yourself to be fit, you can go.”
‘What? Are you out of your mind? You could die at any moment and all you want is an explanation?’
‘Well, yes. It’s annoying not knowing what is happening. You’ve been keeping me out of the loop for far too long.’
Sunalla sat down on the bed and kept quiet for a bit. Kawaii to my side, who trusted Sunalla, didn’t react to this at all. She was still staring at me creepily.
‘Fine… what exactly do you want to know?’
That wasn’t a difficult question at all. I had multiple questions to ask, but the most concerning one was…
‘Why does the princess seem unbothered by the war?’
When I asked this, Sunalla put her hands to her chin.
‘Honestly, I don’t have the exact details, but if I had to guess, it would be because everything is going according to her plans.’
‘Her plans?’
‘Yes. Her plans. The princess… she’s an utterly terrifying genius. A mind like hers has never been seen before. I’ve seen her plot so many things and all of them ended up going exactly how she planned, step by step.’
‘Is that so? So, you’re trying to tell me that everything that has happened so far has been a part of the princess’ plan.’
‘Well, not everything, but most of it.’
Wow, the princess was sharper than I gave her credit for. Now that I thought about it, Daxia did say she didn’t like how the princess did things. Was this what she meant by that? Being indirectly controlled by someone else was really vexing, so I could understand.
That meant, I somehow got factored into the princess’ plans?
Oh no… I roped Daxia into something she definitely won’t be happy about.
But, there is no way the princess could know Daxia wouldn’t kill me. That leaves two possibilities.
One, the princess had a backup plan to either involve Daxia and co. or she didn’t have a way to salvage her loss and saw my accidental intervention as a boon? Something like that?
‘Sunalla, has there ever been a time where the princess’ plans haven’t gone how she planned?’
‘Something… no. Every single thing she wanted, she got. But then there is that one time where everything was a mess.’
‘A mess?’
‘Yeah. I remember her complaining about her plans being in shambles. I believe it had something to do with the incident 5 years ago? That was the first time I’d seen her lose it.’
Sunalla just revealed something interesting. So, even this princess could lose her cool? This implied she was the control-freak slash perfectionist type. The slightest disorder and she would go bonkers. If I found a way to mess up something, I could use it to my advantage to take complete control of this situation.
I would stop the invasion, keep Daxia happy and get my Royal wishes, then leave quietly like nothing ever happened.
‘What exactly happened 5 years ago?’
‘Five years ago, huh? That’s when Hiro Ta-‘
“Sunalla, is the devil awake yet?”
The Gate keeper’s tweaky voice came through the doors. I looked at him, enraged by the fact that he interrupted at the most crucial moment.
He was clothed in a fine silk tunic, with beads around his neck and a golden belt around his waist. Generally, he still looked to be on the verge of death, but now he simply looked like a rich man on the verge of death.
Instinctively, my eyes went to his hands, scared of any stupid tricks he’d try to pull this time. As if he noticed this, he raised his hands amiably.
“No need to glare at me like that. Can you keep your pet down?”
The reason for him saying this was the fact that Kawaii was already next to him with her sword-tip against his neck.
“What are you doing here, old man?”
Sunalla was the first to ask this question.
“Kyohohoho, you were taking so long the princess asked me to come check up on you. Since the devi-” Kawaii pressed the sword even deeper, threatening to kill him at any moment. “-Uh, the fair lady is awake, we can proceed now, I believe.”
“Sorry. Hinotori just woke up, so I believed it was best to give her some rest period before proceeding with the princess’ wishes.”
“How kind of you. Still, the princess’ wishes come before a civilian’s health.”
“Hinotori is not a civilian.”
“Excuse me then, but she still needs to come now.”
“Just give her a few more minutes.”
‘It’s alright, I’ll go now.’
Looking at the old man, I realised this wouldn’t end well if we kept testing his patience. Sure, I could kill him, but murder of a princess’ servant was really bad.
‘Are you sure? You can still leave now.’
Sunalla privately suggested.
‘Don’t worry. Now I know that, I can fight against the princess’ commands properly.’
<A/N: Just got home from a long journey. Didn't expect to be able to write this before tomorrow, but hot damn. Also, I realised so much is happening in the story when we've not even gotten to the main parts of the arc. Anyway, please leave any reviews, comments, power stones and golden tickets if you want! Also, join the discord!>
