Page thanked Helma for her time. Despite appearances, the Priestess was actually a busy person, and her original business only coincidentally brought her to this place. She disappeared up the staircase just past the counter.
Lilia cupped her chin. She was a nonparticipant, but the whole exchange had been interesting. She’d promised Page she wouldn’t tell anyone about it, and why would she? She was an outsider at the moment.
The door opened again, and Jyn came in. Kalender and Minimine followed close, holding hands.
Page thought it was adorable—then she remembered what she was supposed to do. That’s how he’s gonna look like with our kid, oh no. She hid her face. This piqued Kalender’s interest. They all sat down.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
There’s no time like the present! Page shot up from her seat, to everyone’s surprise, with fire in her eyes. Kalender stared into the eyes of a warrior. “Kal!”
What could she possibly—
“Let’s go bonding!”
Kalender let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “I thought it was something serious, damn.” He chuckled. “It’s been a long day. Ah, we actually met the Harem Priest a while ago. He was having a duel with some Priestess, though it got carried over to tomorrow afternoon. Maybe we can all watch it tomorrow?”
At the mention of the Priestess, Lilia immediately connected the dots, but she said nothing about it. It’s all just a handful of coincidences, anyway.
Page pouted. “Noo, just you and me!”
“Oh? You wanna go on a date?” Kalender said. “Sure. Not tomorrow, though. It’s a long day today, and a long day tomorrow…” He yawned.
“A date?” Jyn had her own thoughts on this. “Is that not something lovers do?”
Page’s face turned beet red. She hadn’t thought about that.
“Huh? No, not really? Well, usually yeah.” Kalender said. “Don’t people go out together around here? Like, just taking a walk or doing groceries together?”
Jyn shook her head. “It is strange to do groceries together. It makes one appear as if you are not an adult who can do things on your own.”
Kalender frowned. “That’s just sad.”
“I don’t see how.”
“Well, where I come from, you don’t get a lot of opportunities to socialize with people you actually like.”
“That is sad.”
“And we know it.” He shot her his finger guns. “Which is why, when we do groceries, we’ll ask around if anyone’s free to come with us, maybe even do their own groceries together. Any opportunity we can take to talk to someone, we’d take it, really, someone else’s thoughts on how our lifestyle should be be damned.”
“Because your relationships with those people are more important—is that what you mean?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Wow,” Page said. “I just wanted to go out on a date and it turned into some sort of cultural exchange.”
Everyone around the table chuckled.
Kalender turned to Page. “We’ll go out sometime soon, alright? We just need to get our bearings around here so we actually know where to go.”
“Do we need to know where to go?” Page asked.
Kalender raised a finger, then fell into thought. “Point.”
Jyn squirmed in her seat. There they go talking about dates right in front of me—wait. Why was she having that thought? It didn’t feel wrong, but it was sudden. Was she jealous? Mildly … but why? The attention of a group, compared to the attention of just one other … it was different, truly. She found herself staring at Kalender as she pondered, but when she realized that Kalender was staring back with arched eyebrows, she turned her eyes away. He was still looking at her, though, eyes asking for answers. She waved it away, claiming it nothing. Kalender shrugged, mentally filing away this interaction for future reference.
From her seat, Minimine tugged on Kalender’s hem. He looked down to her. “More potato,” she said, holding a paper wrapper, devoid of potato, demanding the rectification of this issue.
“Anyone else hungry?” Kalender asked. Everyone assented, and plates flew in and out for the next half-hour. Minimine got a small lecture about nutritional balance by the end of it, and how eating just potatoes was the least balanced thing in the world.
Guh. How dare. Potatoes are the best thing in the world. She dived into her divine communications link for just a second. Goddess of Agriculture, why don’t you have universal-nutrition potatoes? This world needs them in this instant.
—I can’t. The ###### God took my GMO powers.
Tsk. How dare.
***
The room was finally prepared. The owner led them upstairs and showed them into a rectangular studio. There was a sleeping space, a table under some shelves, and a washroom—all squeezed into a 30-square-meter space.
The washroom was just a toilet-shower combo stall, and the sleeping space was partitioned off with a paper screen. The actual bed wasn’t a bed. It was more a thin mattress on the floor, not unlike a futon.
There was only one mattress. Granted, it was big enough to easily fit everyone.
Jyn, Page, and Kalender started helping each other out of their armors’ dozens of straps. It made Kalender want to introduce velcro to this world, but they would stand out too much. Nothing shouted “I’m a reincarnator from Earth” louder than velcro straps going krrrkk, and he just didn’t want to risk having another reincarnator hear that for a little bit of convenience.
Maybe magnetic locks? Clips? Maybe clips can work. Magnetic locks might be too modern—and more importantly, too weak to stand up to the demands of combat—but artistically-crafted brass or steel clips could be passed off as something from this world. Alright, time to find a blacksmith … not to make the clips, of course. He could do that on his own. It’s just, y’know—broken swords and rusted steel were cheap in the face of technology exchange.
Even now, Clarinets sounded a lot different with the steady proliferation of certain steelwind instruments, and the Inquisition was interested.
They finally got their armors off, which they stashed, along with their bags and weapons, all along the shelves. They avoided putting too much stuff on the table, since Kalender mentioned wanting to work on a few things.
Jyn sighed. “I need a bath.”
“Well, there’s a shower,” Kalender remarked.
“It’s not the same.”
Kalender chuckled. “No, it’s not.”
Fresh clothes in hand, Jyn opened the washroom door, realizing that she couldn’t change in there. There was nowhere to place her clothes; all options led to drenching them, instead.
Kalender noticed her hesitating on something. He walked up to her, and when he looked inside the washroom, he saw the issue. He first thought of turning around, but he remembered her reaction to going into the same bath as him. He wanted to make the conservative decision, so he thought about waiting outside, but the corridor was cramped, only wide enough for one person to go through—or two, if both were courteous enough.
“I’ll wait downstairs,” he said.
“No, you need a guard,” Jyn replied.
Huh? “Since when?”
“Kalender, be aware of the time. How much alcohol is flowing through the floor right now? How would you deal with an aggressive woman? I doubt neither Page nor Mi … Mimi look intimidating enough. I wouldn’t push that role onto Lilia, either.”
“I—” … don’t want to deal with that, actually. “I’ll just turn around, then.”
He set out to busy himself by the table, his back facing Jyn. As layers of her clothes came off, she became oddly conscious of Kalender.
It was strange. During the Carmine Test, she hadn’t had these issues. They even took solace in being beside each other for sleep.
Wait, there was a difference. The washroom in the Carmine Test was bigger than here. She changed in there rather than out in the open.
This was the first time she had ever changed in the same room as him.
Unsurprisingly, she slipped out of her clothes to no fanfare. She went into the shower, took the shower, asked for a towel and her clothes, patted herself dry, slipped into new clothes, and came out of the shower. The end. The next time she and Kalender met eyes, it was proof he was unperturbed. [+1 Respect]
Even if Lilia had no memories, deep in her soul, she was impressed. She had observed Kalender through the whole “ordeal,” and there wasn’t even a twinge of strain on the man’s face, as if he were fighting against some inner demon—no, there was none of that. He was serenity as if he were an ocean cliff, living peacefully amidst day after day of violence flung at his face.
***
Everyone ended up taking a shower. Page ended up going in with Minimine, and even Lilia was subjected to the experience of changing in the same room as a man. Unfortunately, she had been catching Kalender taking glances at her. Maybe … something was finally amiss.
She came out of the shower. Kalender turned around and stole a glance—no, his eyes locked onto her!
“Ah, right, I’ve been meaning to bring this up,” he said.
That’s all that was, all this time!
Kalender continued, glancing to Minimine as well, “I feel that we owe Lilia a bit of an explanation.”
The topic shift was heavy enough that Lilia unwittingly froze, not knowing that she’d stopped breathing.
“Lilia?” Jyn called. She snapped out of it, taking a seat that was offered to her.
Minimine frowned. She wanted to see how much further they could’ve gone without Lilia knowing, but Kalender’s sensibilities shone through. She was mean to want to see how far they could take it. She nodded.
“Lilia,” she said, “I am Minimine, Vice-Goddess of Reincarnation.”
Anyone else wouldn’t believe her. Anyone else would’ve been utterly shocked, but Lilia asked, “‘Vice’?”
Kalender and Page snorted.
“I’m substituting for my sister,” Minimine explained. “That’s not important. Do you want to know about yourself?”
Lilia nodded. These people around her were the closest to the truth of who she was. Even if they were lying, their lies would be closer to the truth than someone could ever make up. Whatever they said held value—true or untrue.
“You are a reincarnation of a Hero of the past. Etched into your soul is her will—to see the world that she had helped to leave behind.”
“Then, who is my family?”
“None. You are magic-born.”
“Oh? Is that what I’m called, too?” Kalender asked. It sounded kinda cool. I am Kalender! Champion and magic-born! Muwahaha!—or something like that. Hopefully, Minimine couldn’t read his mind.
They met eyes. She snickered. Damn it.
Lilia, meanwhile, fell into thought. Being told that she was a reincarnation of a big-shot was the sort of mind-numbing news she didn’t want to think about.
“What am I … supposed to do?” Be someone great like my past life? “Am I just supposed to follow the call of my soul?” Something that someone else set for me? She felt it when she saw Harmony. Go there, it said.
“You are your own person,” Minimine said. “It is often easy to follow the call of your soul, but it is your right and privilege to sculpt it before it passes to the next bearer.”
“So it’s still my choice?”
“It is.”
“But what if I fail?”
“Fail what?”
“What my past life expects of me—”
“Nothing.”
“What?”
“Nothing happens.”
“But it’s so … important, isn’t it?”
“Your past cannot complain, for your past is long gone.”
“But won’t it be passed on to my future lives if I don’t accomplish it now—”
“Then bury it for them.”
“What?”
“Your futures will be more grateful if you uncover a more truthful truth.”
“A … truth?”
“Discover, innovate, create. Leave not wills, but tools for the future, truths that they can trust.”
“So what about my past?”
“What did she tell you?”
“To explore the world, right?”
“That is the will. What is the embedded truth?”
“I—don’t know what you mean.”
“She means, ‘I have changed the world. It should be better, now.’ That is the truth in her will. It is your right to do with that information as you wish.”
***
Lilia slept at the very edge, beside Jyn, who was beside Kalender, who was beside Minimine, who was sandwiched between him and Page. The night was warm, and the moon was bright. No one snored, and that was great—or a bane to her, and her noisy brain.
Being told all those things by a small child was surreal.
Right. The child was a goddess. Hopefully not all goddesses incarnated as small children.
A baby didn’t pursue purpose right after the day it was born. She wasn’t a baby—but babies got along fine without it. She would, too, hopefully.
Purpose, purpose … her head hurt. It hurt to think about it. Suppose, maybe, she didn’t need to … she didn’t need to think about it.
She was just a newborn with no one to … cling to…
She buried her … head … in … Jyn’s … shoulder…
KeeperAbra (2022-12-04) Sorry for the delay! I've been doing a lot of thinking to give all the new elements a deeper point. All that's left now is execution—w-huh, Inquisitor?! Why are you—
Page thanked Helma for her time. Despite appearances, the Priestess was actually a busy person, and her original business only coincidentally brought her to this place. She disappeared up the staircase just past the counter.
Lilia cupped her chin. She was a nonparticipant, but the whole exchange had been interesting. She’d promised Page she wouldn’t tell anyone about it, and why would she? She was an outsider at the moment.
The door opened again, and Jyn came in. Kalender and Minimine followed close, holding hands.
Page thought it was adorable—then she remembered what she was supposed to do. That’s how he’s gonna look like with our kid, oh no. She hid her face. This piqued Kalender’s interest. They all sat down.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
There’s no time like the present! Page shot up from her seat, to everyone’s surprise, with fire in her eyes. Kalender stared into the eyes of a warrior. “Kal!”
What could she possibly—
“Let’s go bonding!”
Kalender let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “I thought it was something serious, damn.” He chuckled. “It’s been a long day. Ah, we actually met the Harem Priest a while ago. He was having a duel with some Priestess, though it got carried over to tomorrow afternoon. Maybe we can all watch it tomorrow?”
At the mention of the Priestess, Lilia immediately connected the dots, but she said nothing about it. It’s all just a handful of coincidences, anyway.
Page pouted. “Noo, just you and me!”
“Oh? You wanna go on a date?” Kalender said. “Sure. Not tomorrow, though. It’s a long day today, and a long day tomorrow…” He yawned.
“A date?” Jyn had her own thoughts on this. “Is that not something lovers do?”
Page’s face turned beet red. She hadn’t thought about that.
“Huh? No, not really? Well, usually yeah.” Kalender said. “Don’t people go out together around here? Like, just taking a walk or doing groceries together?”
Jyn shook her head. “It is strange to do groceries together. It makes one appear as if you are not an adult who can do things on your own.”
Kalender frowned. “That’s just sad.”
“I don’t see how.”
“Well, where I come from, you don’t get a lot of opportunities to socialize with people you actually like.”
“That is sad.”
“And we know it.” He shot her his finger guns. “Which is why, when we do groceries, we’ll ask around if anyone’s free to come with us, maybe even do their own groceries together. Any opportunity we can take to talk to someone, we’d take it, really, someone else’s thoughts on how our lifestyle should be be damned.”
“Because your relationships with those people are more important—is that what you mean?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Wow,” Page said. “I just wanted to go out on a date and it turned into some sort of cultural exchange.”
Everyone around the table chuckled.
Kalender turned to Page. “We’ll go out sometime soon, alright? We just need to get our bearings around here so we actually know where to go.”
“Do we need to know where to go?” Page asked.
Kalender raised a finger, then fell into thought. “Point.”
Jyn squirmed in her seat. There they go talking about dates right in front of me—wait. Why was she having that thought? It didn’t feel wrong, but it was sudden. Was she jealous? Mildly … but why? The attention of a group, compared to the attention of just one other … it was different, truly. She found herself staring at Kalender as she pondered, but when she realized that Kalender was staring back with arched eyebrows, she turned her eyes away. He was still looking at her, though, eyes asking for answers. She waved it away, claiming it nothing. Kalender shrugged, mentally filing away this interaction for future reference.
From her seat, Minimine tugged on Kalender’s hem. He looked down to her. “More potato,” she said, holding a paper wrapper, devoid of potato, demanding the rectification of this issue.
“Anyone else hungry?” Kalender asked. Everyone assented, and plates flew in and out for the next half-hour. Minimine got a small lecture about nutritional balance by the end of it, and how eating just potatoes was the least balanced thing in the world.
Guh. How dare. Potatoes are the best thing in the world. She dived into her divine communications link for just a second. Goddess of Agriculture, why don’t you have universal-nutrition potatoes? This world needs them in this instant.
—I can’t. The ###### God took my GMO powers.
Tsk. How dare.
***
The room was finally prepared. The owner led them upstairs and showed them into a rectangular studio. There was a sleeping space, a table under some shelves, and a washroom—all squeezed into a 30-square-meter space.
The washroom was just a toilet-shower combo stall, and the sleeping space was partitioned off with a paper screen. The actual bed wasn’t a bed. It was more a thin mattress on the floor, not unlike a futon.
There was only one mattress. Granted, it was big enough to easily fit everyone.
Jyn, Page, and Kalender started helping each other out of their armors’ dozens of straps. It made Kalender want to introduce velcro to this world, but they would stand out too much. Nothing shouted “I’m a reincarnator from Earth” louder than velcro straps going krrrkk, and he just didn’t want to risk having another reincarnator hear that for a little bit of convenience.
Maybe magnetic locks? Clips? Maybe clips can work. Magnetic locks might be too modern—and more importantly, too weak to stand up to the demands of combat—but artistically-crafted brass or steel clips could be passed off as something from this world. Alright, time to find a blacksmith … not to make the clips, of course. He could do that on his own. It’s just, y’know—broken swords and rusted steel were cheap in the face of technology exchange.
Even now, Clarinets sounded a lot different with the steady proliferation of certain steelwind instruments, and the Inquisition was interested.
They finally got their armors off, which they stashed, along with their bags and weapons, all along the shelves. They avoided putting too much stuff on the table, since Kalender mentioned wanting to work on a few things.
Jyn sighed. “I need a bath.”
“Well, there’s a shower,” Kalender remarked.
“It’s not the same.”
Kalender chuckled. “No, it’s not.”
Fresh clothes in hand, Jyn opened the washroom door, realizing that she couldn’t change in there. There was nowhere to place her clothes; all options led to drenching them, instead.
Kalender noticed her hesitating on something. He walked up to her, and when he looked inside the washroom, he saw the issue. He first thought of turning around, but he remembered her reaction to going into the same bath as him. He wanted to make the conservative decision, so he thought about waiting outside, but the corridor was cramped, only wide enough for one person to go through—or two, if both were courteous enough.
“I’ll wait downstairs,” he said.
“No, you need a guard,” Jyn replied.
Huh? “Since when?”
“Kalender, be aware of the time. How much alcohol is flowing through the floor right now? How would you deal with an aggressive woman? I doubt neither Page nor Mi … Mimi look intimidating enough. I wouldn’t push that role onto Lilia, either.”
“I—” … don’t want to deal with that, actually. “I’ll just turn around, then.”
He set out to busy himself by the table, his back facing Jyn. As layers of her clothes came off, she became oddly conscious of Kalender.
It was strange. During the Carmine Test, she hadn’t had these issues. They even took solace in being beside each other for sleep.
Wait, there was a difference. The washroom in the Carmine Test was bigger than here. She changed in there rather than out in the open.
This was the first time she had ever changed in the same room as him.
Unsurprisingly, she slipped out of her clothes to no fanfare. She went into the shower, took the shower, asked for a towel and her clothes, patted herself dry, slipped into new clothes, and came out of the shower. The end. The next time she and Kalender met eyes, it was proof he was unperturbed. [+1 Respect]
Even if Lilia had no memories, deep in her soul, she was impressed. She had observed Kalender through the whole “ordeal,” and there wasn’t even a twinge of strain on the man’s face, as if he were fighting against some inner demon—no, there was none of that. He was serenity as if he were an ocean cliff, living peacefully amidst day after day of violence flung at his face.
***
Everyone ended up taking a shower. Page ended up going in with Minimine, and even Lilia was subjected to the experience of changing in the same room as a man. Unfortunately, she had been catching Kalender taking glances at her. Maybe … something was finally amiss.
She came out of the shower. Kalender turned around and stole a glance—no, his eyes locked onto her!
“Ah, right, I’ve been meaning to bring this up,” he said.
That’s all that was, all this time!
Kalender continued, glancing to Minimine as well, “I feel that we owe Lilia a bit of an explanation.”
The topic shift was heavy enough that Lilia unwittingly froze, not knowing that she’d stopped breathing.
“Lilia?” Jyn called. She snapped out of it, taking a seat that was offered to her.
Minimine frowned. She wanted to see how much further they could’ve gone without Lilia knowing, but Kalender’s sensibilities shone through. She was mean to want to see how far they could take it. She nodded.
“Lilia,” she said, “I am Minimine, Vice-Goddess of Reincarnation.”
Anyone else wouldn’t believe her. Anyone else would’ve been utterly shocked, but Lilia asked, “‘Vice’?”
Kalender and Page snorted.
“I’m substituting for my sister,” Minimine explained. “That’s not important. Do you want to know about yourself?”
Lilia nodded. These people around her were the closest to the truth of who she was. Even if they were lying, their lies would be closer to the truth than someone could ever make up. Whatever they said held value—true or untrue.
“You are a reincarnation of a Hero of the past. Etched into your soul is her will—to see the world that she had helped to leave behind.”
“Then, who is my family?”
“None. You are magic-born.”
“Oh? Is that what I’m called, too?” Kalender asked. It sounded kinda cool. I am Kalender! Champion and magic-born! Muwahaha!—or something like that. Hopefully, Minimine couldn’t read his mind.
They met eyes. She snickered. Damn it.
Lilia, meanwhile, fell into thought. Being told that she was a reincarnation of a big-shot was the sort of mind-numbing news she didn’t want to think about.
“What am I … supposed to do?” Be someone great like my past life? “Am I just supposed to follow the call of my soul?” Something that someone else set for me? She felt it when she saw Harmony. Go there, it said.
“You are your own person,” Minimine said. “It is often easy to follow the call of your soul, but it is your right and privilege to sculpt it before it passes to the next bearer.”
“So it’s still my choice?”
“It is.”
“But what if I fail?”
“Fail what?”
“What my past life expects of me—”
“Nothing.”
“What?”
“Nothing happens.”
“But it’s so … important, isn’t it?”
“Your past cannot complain, for your past is long gone.”
“But won’t it be passed on to my future lives if I don’t accomplish it now—”
“Then bury it for them.”
“What?”
“Your futures will be more grateful if you uncover a more truthful truth.”
“A … truth?”
“Discover, innovate, create. Leave not wills, but tools for the future, truths that they can trust.”
“So what about my past?”
“What did she tell you?”
“To explore the world, right?”
“That is the will. What is the embedded truth?”
“I—don’t know what you mean.”
“She means, ‘I have changed the world. It should be better, now.’ That is the truth in her will. It is your right to do with that information as you wish.”
***
Lilia slept at the very edge, beside Jyn, who was beside Kalender, who was beside Minimine, who was sandwiched between him and Page. The night was warm, and the moon was bright. No one snored, and that was great—or a bane to her, and her noisy brain.
Being told all those things by a small child was surreal.
Right. The child was a goddess. Hopefully not all goddesses incarnated as small children.
A baby didn’t pursue purpose right after the day it was born. She wasn’t a baby—but babies got along fine without it. She would, too, hopefully.
Purpose, purpose … her head hurt. It hurt to think about it. Suppose, maybe, she didn’t need to … she didn’t need to think about it.
She was just a newborn with no one to … cling to…
She buried her … head … in … Jyn’s … shoulder…
KeeperAbra (2022-12-04) Sorry for the delay! I've been doing a lot of thinking to give all the new elements a deeper point. All that's left now is execution—w-huh, Inquisitor?! Why are you—
