Chapter 14: Girl, Schemes

 

 

 

Chapter 14: Girl, Schemes

 

CLOUDS drifted over the blue moon, scattering shafts of light over the red fields. Oswald enacted their plan as the tepid winds played with the hem of his jacket. The elusive ball masked their presence extremely well, but it didn’t turn them invisible. Risk of discovery increased with every move, and speaking was a dead giveaway.

So master and apprentice decided on a set of hand signals. Oswald signaled for Nichika to come after he checked around the corner. Her quiet sprint over was ruined by slipping on a pebble. She flapped her arms and narrowly managed to avoid the epic fail of falling flat on her face.

Relieved, she looked up to find her exasperated master rubbing circles in his temples… That wasn’t one of their predetermined signals, but the meaning was clear. She stuck out her tongue and received a flick to the forehead.

Now was seriously not the time for them to start a fight.

They made sure no one was around before slowly opening the front door and slipping inside the mansion. A dim and dark corridor split to the left and right. They snuck up the wide staircase directly in front of them and headed to the deepest section of the west wing. Fortunately, they didn’t pass anyone on their way to the guest room on the second floor. After confirming that no one was there, they quickly slid inside and exhaled.

“We snuck in surprisingly easy,” Nichika whispered. “I thought there’d be more servants.”

“Doesn’t seem like the place is cleaned much… Maybe they don’t have the means to employ servants.”

They chatted as they searched high and low. Nichika didn’t even fuss about them breaking and entering. She would have stoutly refused rummaging through someone else’s house before, but now she moved without even questioning it. Wolfie being taken prisoner—at least, that’s what she thought had happened—was a piece of it, but it was also a fact that her master was slowly rubbing off on her.

Nichika swept her eyes around the room for the second time. It was a typical fancy room with a luxurious canopy bed, sofa, and table set. Did the other door lead to a washroom? She pinched what she found while examining the exotic red rug and held it up for Oswald.

“Oswald! Look at this.”

It was a tuft of stiff, tough brown fur. Oswald frowned at the familiar color and texture.

“Isn’t this Wolfie’s fur?” Nichika asked, almost positive it was.

“…Those guard furs are definitely his.”

Then that settled it: the fake Spirit Priestess had kidnapped Wolfie, after all. Why hadn’t he run away though? Could he not get away? And why wasn’t he in the room?

The questions racing through Nichika were interrupted by the echo of footsteps coming down the corridor. From the sound of it, there were probably two people walking in this direction.

“N-Not good!”

“Hide!”

Obeying Oswald’s quiet instruction, Nichika crawled underneath the bed. The door clicked open when she opened her mouth to complain about him shoving her head down.

“Oh my spirits, you are one persistent nag! You have wholly ruined my perfect after-bath mood.”

The first thing Nichika saw from under the bed was long, slender legs ending in a pair of classy white mule slippers. The feet shuffled across the floor with the same annoyance heard in the girl’s voice, and the mattress springs squeaked. Dust rained on Nichika and Oswald’s heads.

“I understand, my lady, but what will you do if that girl was the real thing?!” Another pair of feet followed that pathetically whiny male voice.

Oswald shoved Nichika’s face into the floor when she opened her mouth to cry out upon spotting the four tawny, furry legs trotting into the room after the man.

“Hm? Did you hear something?” the fake priestess asked on top of the bed.

“Please do not change the topic, my lady!”

“Like I’ve been saying, we don’t have a problem. Even if that girl is the real deal, what can she do from prison? Besides, we have her staff.” There was the whirring sound of the magic orb attaching to the staff, followed by the girl’s entranced voice. “Hehehe. I got my hands on the perfect item right after securing a dog. What power it holds… Perhaps I should stop earning chump change now and become the real deal.”

“Lady Angelica!”

Angelica? Nichika’s eyes went round at that awfully familiar name. Could it be? It couldn’t, right?

“Haah. I should have forcefully dragged you to Elminage instead of letting it come to this… All hell will break loose if His Lordship finds out.”

The butler’s melancholy grousing caused the pair hiding under the bed to bring a hand to their aching heads. Who would have imagined that the two people they had disguised themselves as to enroll in Elminage had stolen their identities outside of school? What an ironic coincidence.

Infuriated, the spoiled young lady stomped her feet. “Shut your trap! Who in their right mind would ever enroll in that boring school?!”

Nichika was trying to figure out the next best move, when Wolfie broke his silence and began snuffling.

“Huh. Could this smell be…?”

Nichika stiffened under the bed. Their wolf friend was an acknowledged genius at incorrectly reading the situation. He was extremely capable of barreling toward the bed, wagging his tail. Praying he didn’t, she stayed perfectly still.

“Didn’t I order you not to speak without permission?!” Angelica’s critical voice sliced the air, stopping the wolf from coming any closer. “You must not want to eat again!”

“Noooooo! Anything but that! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! Please fowgive meeee. I can’t take another day without fooooood!” Wolfie whimpered.

Nichika sympathized with the whimpering wolf. Okay, so he was threatened into not running away. The way Oswald pressed his hand against his forehead conveyed his internal oath to “whack some sense into that dork later.”

“Fine, fine,” Wolfie murmured, his bushy tail falling flat against the floor. “You’re Lady Angelica, he’s your butler Will, and I’m your pet Jon. I’ll fall in line, so feed meeee.”

The door swung open and Wolfie hastily leapt out of the way before it could hit him in the butt.

“Oooh, Holy Maiden!” a voice so loud everyone present went partially deaf thundered into the room. “Your performance was most splendid! Your dance was truly beautiful and graceful like a swan. And your singing sounded like it descended from the heavens!”

Plump, hairy legs swept into the room while a high-pitched voice layered exaggerated praises on the sham priestess. Butler Will quickly stepped in his way before he reached the bed.

“Mayor! You mustn’t! How could you enter a lady’s room without knocking—”

“My! You watched my performance? I’m so happy!” The spoiled princess upped the pitch of her voice to a sweet, girly tone and welcomed the mayor by taking him by the hand and seating him on the sofa. “Also, I’m not a saint, but the Spirit Priestess,” she corrected in an enticing voice.

“Hahaha! There’s no difference between the two. Moreover, Holy Maiden sounds even better.”

“Ufufufu!”

The “Holy Maiden” returned several steps back to the bed and muttered under her breath, “There’s a huge difference, pig.”

Wow, this girl is two-faced… Nichika discerned in just a few minutes of listening to her.

“Holy Maiden?” the mayor suspiciously called to her back.

“Yes, yes. How may I help you?” Angelica whirled toward him and responded in her nice-girl voice. “Oh my!” she proceeded to exclaim, withdrawing another step. “You mustn’t, Mayor! I could never accept such a large sum of money…”

“No, you must. This is a token of my gratitude for putting on such a wonderful show. It would greatly honor us if you accepted these funds for your holy journey to save the world.”

“Ohohoho! In that case, I must accept your kindness so as not to be rude.”

Nichika’s eyes bulged at the wad of cash she glimpsed exchanging hands. She glanced to her right; Oswald had dollar signs in his eyes as he looked her over. Th-This guy isn’t possibly considering making me become an idol, is he?

Unaware of the delicate psychological battle taking place under the bed, the village mayor rubbed his hands together. “And so I hope you will protect this village the same way you did Windy Village,” he hinted with a sticky smile.

“You’ve got it. Leave it to the Spirit Priestess. You can expect an extra serving of protection to be granted to this village the day the goddess is resurrected.”

How can she promise that? A bunch of dust balls kicked up off the unclean floor when Nichika slapped her hand on the ground. Ah, crap. It was too late for her to stop from sneezing louder than a backfiring car.

“AHHCHOOO!”

Silence fell over the room. Nichika thought she heard the sound of her blood draining.

“Wh-Who’s there?!” Angelica’s cry reverberated through the room.

Realizing the direness of the situation first, Oswald grabbed Nichika by the collar and fled from under the bed with her. As she was being dragged away, her eyes collided with a shocked Wolfie’s. An unfamiliar yellow collar had been snapped on his neck. He barked once and jumped up and down.

“Nichika? Master?!” he exclaimed.

“Wolfie!”

The tawny wolf ran toward them but was yanked back by the leash in the butler’s hand. Nichika considered roasting the leash off with a fireball, but her master stopped her.

“How did you escape from prison?! Capture them!” Angelica wailed, causing a purple crystal to swing at her chest. But before Nichika could confirm what it was, she was tossed out the window. Oswald’s simple order stole her whole attention.

“Fly!”

“Eeek!”

Nichika unleashed the broom from her belt out of sheer instinct. They were zooming into the starless night at full speed before anyone really knew what happened.

***

MASTER and apprentice landed in the grove they had escaped into earlier in a free fall. Oswald roughly jumped off the broom and an exhausted Nichika fell head over heels off the broom beside him.

Hair full of leaves, Nichika tried to calm her pounding heart as she took her grievances out on Oswald. “Haaa…haaah… Please quit it with the reckless requests like suddenly asking me to fly! For that matter, you can fly too, so why don’t you start carrying a broom on you!”

The man who was firmly against flying instantly shot down her proposal. “I refuse. I don’t like working up a sweat.”

“That’s not a good enough reason for you to piggyback off me!”

Their roles when it came to physical labor were always reversed.

Successfully shrinking her broom, Nichika looked back at the mansion to see if anyone was coming after them. Judging by the torches glowing to life, the mayor had formed a search group and wasn’t going to let them just get away.

“Why did you stop me?” she asked, hiding in the tree cover. “Wolfie could’ve easily gotten away if I fried that leash off him.”

“No, that would’ve ended horribly.”

“How come?” The discomfort in his voice got her to look at him.

Oswald unnaturally averted his gaze and scratched the back of his head as if he was guilty of something. “Did you see the yellow string around his neck?” he asked in a thin voice.

“That rugged collar?”

Since he brought it up, she thought back to what she saw around Wolfie’s neck. Some sort of box had been hanging under his snout.

Oswald leaned over to her as if they were about to have a secret conversation and clenched his fist in front of her eyes. Then he quickly opened it, flicking his fingers out from his thumb. “Explosives are stored in that box. With a flip of a switch it will go Ka-BOOM…”

“……”

Nichika blinked. If he knows how it works after looking at it for less than a second… The instant she realized what his explanation meant, she thrust her finger at him and shouted, “YOU’RE THE FREAKIN’ INVENTOR!”

“Hey, pipe down! I never expected it to be used that way, either!” At a disadvantage, Oswald sullenly crossed his arms and began defending himself. “Just to be clear, that was never for sale. I made it as a hobby—”

“Please don’t make such items for the heck of it!”

What did he intend to use this creation that bordered a breach of ethics for? Nichika was really curious, but she regained her calm and redirected the conversation.

“How come it’s being used here if you never sold it?”

“That’s what I want to know. I had fun making it, but it just sat around collecting dust, so I gave two or three of them to Char when she took an interest…”

Both of them gasped then groaned at the same time. Didn’t Charlotte say that Angelica was one of her best customers back when she got the enrollment papers from her?

Nichika was the first to move on. She lifted her head with a determined look. “No use crying over spilt milk. Let’s just be happy we know what it is. We have to think positively.”

“Can’t we just leave him behind?”

“I’ll punch you if you really mean that.”

Nichika shot him a nasty look. Oswald was going to tell his apprentice he was just kidding but the words stuck on his tongue—someone was pushing their way through the shrubs.

“Uh, what’s wrong?” Nichika turned around toward where her master was looking and screamed at the person looming directly behind her. “Kyaaaaaaaah!”

“Aaaaaaaaaaaah!” he screamed back. “I’m sorry! I am so sorry! I was not trying to frighten you. Please forgive me!”

The young man ran around her, dropped to his knees, and bowed with his head pressed against the dirt. She recognized him. “I’m an underling” screamed from his plain features, flat brown hair, and drab black robe.

“Umm, Will…was it?” Nichika ventured, remembering he was the butler Oswald had impersonated. The young man shook harder than a sapling during a tornado.

“Eeeep! How do you know my name? I-Is this what I think it is?! You plan to report back to your superiors to have any fakers arrested! Aaaaaaaah! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I was forced into this by Her Ladyship! I had my doubts from the moment I left the mansion with her, but my parents have long since served hers and I couldn’t go against their orders. Please have mercy. Her Ladyship looks like a diva, but she’s actually an honest and good girl. Just that you might say she has let greed blind her. You could also say that she’s become desperate for money to support herself after running away from home. She absolutely isn’t looking down…too much…maybe just a little bit…quite a lot on the Spirit Priestess—no, no, no! She would never!”

“Oi, can I shut him up?” Oswald asked, growing markedly more irritated during Will’s never-ending apology.

“Things will only get worse if you do,” Nichika mildly rejected the idea and sighed. The butler repeatedly smacking his head against the dirt didn’t seem like he planned on shutting up any time soon.

 

***

NICHIKA feared if she let the butler be, he’d start banging his head against a nearby tree while rattling off his incessant apologies, so she let Oswald tie him up and sit him on the ground. She couldn’t shake the feeling that their positions as hunted and hunter had been flipped.

“Okay, let me make sure I have this right,” she said, going over what he told them. “Angelica started acting funny after she bought a purple crystal?”

The timid butler nodded his head like a broken bobblehead doll.

“Yeeessss, ma’am. I think it was somewhere outside Windy Village when a merchant in a white robe called us over and gave it to her for cheap. Ever since she accepted that pendant, Her Ladyship, while always having been a greedy person, became the ideal model for greed. She doesn’t bat an eyelash at scamming people, and even went so far as to use her looks to impersonate the Spirit Priestess…”

The more she heard the more suspicious she became. It matched up almost perfectly timing wise, so there was little reason to doubt his involvement.

“Wouldn’t you say that merchant was Phantom?” Nichika checked with Oswald beside her.

“I’d say so.”

Judging by everything he told her, the crystal was most likely “greed”. Nichika was racking her brain on how to destroy it when the shouts and angry footsteps of the search party came too close for comfort.

“Where are you?! Stop your meaningless resistance and give yourselves up!”

“Uh-oh.”

Nichika and Oswald fled from the spoiled young lady’s high-pitched demands. Several minutes later they heard a loud “Oh dear! How could this have ever happened?! Do you all see this? Only foul cowards would do something so debase as tie up my attendant! I won’t let them get away with this. I shall punish them with the power of the gods!”

Aaaah, geez!

In any event, it didn’t look like they would get to sleep under a roof tonight. Nichika kicked the dirt to vent the anger she couldn’t take out anywhere else.

 

***

AROUND that same time, another incident was taking place on the northern continent, far from Brownie Village. Far above the northern continent, to be precise.

A stunning black dragon flew over the sea of ​​clouds. The boy, lying back on the dragon’s scales, exhaled white puffs of air as he drew the sides of his hood together.

“Uggh, sooo cold. Good grief, I hate the cold. Oh, but a hot spring would be awesome here. A hot spring where I can watch the snow fall! Now that sounds nice! I want one!” the boy exclaimed, rolling around on the dragon’s back. “That settles it! Let’s blow up a water vein and bathe in a hot spring on our way home, Vadnir.”

“Vuuu?” the dragon whinnied.

“It feels like heaven. In my world even the monkeys go in hot springs. It’s not that strange for a dragon to bathe in one. Hot springs are the greatest, I mean it. Boy, wouldn’t it be great if portable hot springs existed?”

The blue moon’s light reflected off the shiny black scales and rippled along the surface as the dragon flapped his wings.

The black dragon rumbled a warning to his master. Phantom sat up and discovered nine white, shining birds flying beyond the dragon’s snout. Their wingspan was wider than the black dragon’s, and their dead eyes appeared to be made of snow.

“Are those guardians? Figures they won’t let us have a pleasant flight into their space. Shouldn’t expect any less of the country that closed off its borders,” Phantom muttered then happily ordered, “All right! Get ’em, Vani! It’s flamethrower time! Haha!”

The black dragon exhaled black flames from his wide-open mouth. Three of the birds instantly evaporated. Two that barely flew out of the way disintegrated in the heat waves.

“Oooh? You’ve got a four times damage bonus for being opposite element types!”

The hit birds lost their shape and fell beneath the clouds. However, the rest didn’t show any emotion as they dispassionately attacked the black dragon. From the look of it, they weren’t living creatures, but attack dolls made of snow and ice.

“Tch,” Phantom pouted when he realized it. “We can’t collect any dark mana if they don’t have a soul.”

Holding onto the circling black dragon with one hand, he raised his other hand. A giant ring of fire spun at his fingertips.

“Well, I oughta get serious once in a while… Suck this!”

The released fire ring grew to ten times the size and minced up the remaining birds in one go. The boy openly rejoiced over crushing the guardians.

“Woohoo! I win!”

Standing up to brag about his victory exposed him to the strong winds, and he crouched back down shivering. With one hand he pinched his hood together, and fished through his belt pouch with his other.

“Aggh. Stinkin’ cold air. Let’s wrap things up lickety-split! Uhm, I think it should be around here.”

He pulled out a fist-sized crystal and stroked the surface before casually throwing it off the side of the dragon. The thick snow absorbed the crystal until it was out of sight. Lips curling into a sneer, the boy whispered in the direction of the white land far, far below him.

“Once upon a time, White Country fought equally against the entire southern continent. Actually, they were the superior fighters. They closed their borders and refuse to interact with other nations, but I’m willing to bet some deeply rooted desires are brimming under the surface.”

This was his last magic crystal. Phantom had been spreading them along the route he assumed the girl would follow, but this particular crystal was the one he wanted her to come across for sure. He knew she would have to come here eventually.

“She’s destroyed wrath, sloth, and jealousy. Four more to go…that girl is pretty persistent too,” Phantom said, thinking of his target.

The visage of that easy-to-deceive-too-good-for-her-own-good girl flashed behind his mind’s eye. He didn’t have a personal grudge against her, but she was guilty of the same crime the moment she joined arms with Ini.

The boy stared at his hands. The amusement that was ever-present in his voice gave way to the first hint of anguish he felt on the inside.

“There’s no need for a world that threw me away.”

The black dragon whinnied with concern for his young master. Phantom snapped out of it and hugged the dragon’s neck.

“Sorry. I love you, Vadnir. Come on, let’s get outta here before we’re discovered. Oh, and take me to a clearing without any foot traffic. Let’s dig up a hot spring. Hot spring, here we come!”

The black dragon sped up, relieved his master returned to his cheerful self. He plunged into the clouds while secretly looking forward to this hot spring thing his master spoke so highly of.