I take a half-written page, then use my feathery pen with unlimited ink to complete it, after it's done, I look over it one more time and sigh, with my hand I erase the mistakes that I made and redo the writing, and after three more checks I was satisfied with the result, the page was put in a book that had two more pages stored in it. With a satisfying *poof the book was closed.
"Great, now I need 5 more books like those. It's harder to do it without the prince pointing out the mistakes as soon as they appear, but it's also quicker than the way I did it."
I decided to take a break now, I've already enchanted 4 books, and my stomach was starting to complain about it.
I opened the door to leave when suddenly a powerful light attacked me, the sun was already up in the sky, and it was almost noon from what I could tell.
"And this is why I don't like to work in dark rooms."
I looked to my side and I could see the guard not having any reaction. I narrowed my eyes, it must be a pretty common thing to happen if he didn't even react.
That made me feel a little bit better.
The next stop was the kitchen, and this time nobody panicked when they saw me, they just asked what I wanted, not bothering to show their annoyance, it didn't bother me too much since I left with a cooked chicken and bread in my inventory.
I then went outside and ate my lunch while looking at the palace garden. It was a peaceful moment, I could hear the wind dancing through the exotic trees and from time to time the splash of a fish from the pound.
"What a peaceful place."
I sat there and closed my eyes relaxing.
After a few minutes, I heard some steps coming towards me.
"Oh, it's not too often when I see a new face in the garden."
I opened my eyes and saw princess Cleopatra, the one that forcibly brought me here. That didn't leave a good impression, but at the same time, she was just ordered to do so, without any input from her side.
Didn't make me less mad though.
"I'm sorry princess, I didn't know this was your usual place. I'll leave if it's a bother to you."
I got up ready to leave.
"No, there's no problem if you stay here, I was just surprised to see someone else in the garden. It's a shame that not many people stay and appreciate the beauty of it."
That is true, I come here from time to time, but there's almost nobody in here. You would think that people living in the desert would be more curious about this kind of place, and probably it was at the beginning, but with time when people get used to it, they don't pay too much attention to it, some stuff can even be forgotten.
This makes me think about the big cities in my world, you can live somewhere all your life but still be surprised with new information about your hometown from visitors that live in another country.
"I'm sorry that I brought you here."
That put my train of thought to a full stop, I looked at her confused.
"I know they don't treat you like a guest of honor as promised. At most, they tolerate you on your face and talk behind your back. If you need something that I can help with, you can ask me."
I looked at her with surprise, her face was apologetic, and the tone was a mix of regret and firmness. I guess it's pretty hard for someone on her status to apologize.
"You can let me go home. That would be nice."
"Sorry, I can't help you with that, my father is pretty stubborn about keeping you here."
"It was worth a shot. How about showing me where Froggy does his training?"
"I can help with that! Can't believe they try to keep you separated as much as possible, that doesn't leave a good impression on us. Then they expect you to help us? I wouldn't be surprised if you ran at the first chance."
With a sigh she turned around and left the garden, I was not too far away from her.
With heavy steps, we walked around the hallways, where servants were bowing to us, finally after a few minutes we arrived at the part where I'm usually not allowed to visit. The guard looked at me but didn't try to stop us from passing him.
I walked in front of him with a big smile on my face, which I'm sure he did not like, he couldn't do anything.
After a few more steps I started to hear the sounds of swords clashing and loud yelling.
"What is that attack supposed to do? Do you think the enemy will wait and see how much damage you do?"
"Am I fighting monsters or humans?!"
The answer was not given, instead more clashing sounds continued. After a few more steps we finally arrived somewhere where I could see what was happening.
There was a small arena with shoveled dirt, there were two entrances and you could see anyone training from the balcony, where we were.
Inside the arena, there were two people, Froggy in leather armor, a wooden sword and a shield desperately gasping for air, and on the other side, a man with dark skin and black hair with only a wooden sword, he looked relaxed but still sweating. Though I don't know if it's from the training or because it was so hot in the desert. I could also hear some giggles coming from the other side of the balcony, some men were enjoying the show of Froggy struggling.
The trainer must've heard us coming since he turned to look at us, and then he half bowed.
"Hello princess, with what occasion do I have the privilege of your presence?"
"Oh Omar, always the flowery language, didn't I tell you to stop a long time ago?"
The name took me by surprise.
"I can't do that princess."
"The same response as always. As for why I came here today, it's to show around my GUEST OF HONOR, since he didn't have the chance to see the full glory of our palace. I hope he won't have the same problems as before from now on."
Omar opened his mouth to say something, before closing it and gave a defeated sigh.
"Of course princess."
He bowed again, and Cleopatra gave a satisfied smile.
"Trader! Thank you for coming here, I think I would've died if we continued."
Froggy somehow managed to come up here while the conversation was ongoing, of course, he was panting when he arrived.
"And here I thought you wanted to become a fighter instead of staying all day at the brewing station."
"I don't want to become a fighter! Even if I did, I prefer to use my potions instead of the sword."
"But you have to hit your target first to work!"
The man from the arena yelled while climbing the stairs.
"Yeah, but I don't want to be in that situation in the first place. So how are you doing Trader? It's been a while since we last talked."
It was last night, but they didn't know that, so I also had to act.
"It's been pretty good honestly, I even managed to level up my enchanting skill. The prince was a great help with his guidance."
The princess looked surprised by this, then suspicious before nodding her head in understanding.
"Ahh, I see. Looks like I wasn't the only one that worked hard."
"Not as hard as you look like, I'm guessing this is not the end of it for today, is it?"
"Unfortunately you're right, I'll do a few potions next and end the day with a history lesson."
He said that with a tired sigh.
Poor guy, I think he has to go through this every day, I'm starting to be more grateful that I'm ignored.
"I'm sure you'll pull it off, maybe we can hang out when you have some free time."
But his face was enough to tell me that he didn't have enough of that. But a sudden twist happened.
"We could end up early today, so you can have a brake."
Omar finally arrived and told us the good news, and I could see how much Froggy appreciated it by how quickly his face lit up.
"Tanks Omar! I think we should stop at the kitchen first then we can figure out what to do after."
Froggy didn't even wait for me and just left the training area. I looked at the princess and instructor in case they seemed offended, but it wasn't a problem from their looks.
"You two can go, I'm sure you have a lot to catch up on."
The princess reassured me. And I was glad they didn't want to stay with us since we now can speak freely. I had to run to catch up with the witch since he didn't stop to wait after me, but when we got to the kitchen we were both gasping for air.
"Did we have to run a the way here? They won't be cold no matter what, so what's the rush?"
"You don't understand Trader, after every training session, I'm only allowed to eat special cookies until dinner. Their not even sweet, just bland and crunchy. It's supposed to help me gain muscle, but what's the point of having them if I don't want to fight!"
He walked into the kitchen and demanded some chicken, bread, and pie. The staff there didn't seem too shocked by the sudden outburst, they looked happy to see him even. Very different reaction from me.
After we got everything he requested, he calmed down and started to talk normally.
"So where do you want to hang out, you managed to explore this place more than me."
"With how much they torture you I'm not that surprised. I think we can go to the garden, there's not a lot of people there."
Froggy nodded in understanding and followed my lead until we arrived the the exact place where I just left. I was surprised that we didn't have any guards following us, maybe they finally trusted us after a few weeks of supervising. I hope they'll also get rid of mine while they're at it.
"This place is amazing! I've always seen it from the window but didn't have the chance to see it, but it's truly an amazing place."
He sat down on the grass and started eating in peace with a smile on his face. That was until I started to speak.
"So Froggy, do you want some good news or the bad news first?"
He froze.
"Good news?"
"I know a place where I can find a fully enchanted diamond pickaxe."
His eyes were wide in surprise, there was some progress on our escape plan, if we used a diamond pickaxe I could break us out of this cage.
"And the bad news?"
"Well... "
I then told him everything that happened last night, with how I got in the factory, how I was found out and had to strike a deal, and my new mission to send a secret message.
"Seriously Trader? How do you manage to get yourself into so many problems, this is my second major event in my life, and it's pretty overwhelming. But I found you besides a black skeleton knocked out, managed to cure a disease though incurable, requested a noble to teach you enchanting, then getting caught by the palace where you found out one of their most treasured secrets. I think fate is playing with you at this point."
When you put everything like that, it does sound pretty overwhelming. Plus he doesn't know that I'm from another world, or that I know about the Nather which is another state secret of the Stone Kingdom, or the fact that I'm the owner of a tribe from that dimension.
I've been really busy this past year if I say so myself.
"*sigh, Anyway, can I see the message as well? Maybe I can figure out the code."
I didn't have anything to lose so I gave him the book, which he opened and started reading intensely. But after a few minutes, he closed the book with a sigh.
"I don't understand the code either, but I think I can figure it out in a week if I have the time. When did you say the deadline was?"
"Well she said tomorrow, but until tomorrow she'll get the results, so that means today, depending on what's her strategy to find out."
"I think my instructor Omar fits the description perfectly, if the name was not enough already. Do you want me to give it to him?"
"No, that would only get you more trouble than necessary, I'll most likely tunnel tonight to his room and leave it there. There's no need to know who is the messenger."
"Hmm... That's true, he lives with the other guards, I think he has the last room since it's the biggest, I'll give you another invisibility potion in case anything happens. Also, can you give me a copy of the coded message, I can figure out later if something."
Froggy helped me with a lot of this new information, so I took out some papers from my inventory and started to copy from the book, then I gave it to him which he quickly put in his inventory.
For the next hour we just casually talked until he had to leave to do potions, he told me to come to his room in about two hours so he could give me the invisibility potion.
With that I was free for two more hours, maybe I should get back to enchanting.