Late the next afternoon, Subaru and Emilia rode Patrasche toward the city limits of Picoutatte with Celene and Geoffrey riding beside them. The day was dark and heavily overcast with black clouds that threatened a storm.
Celene and Geoffrey had talked a blue streak the entire journey which had quickly made Subaru seriously annoyed and he began to ignore them.
Emilia had indulged their conversation at first but ultimately even she grew tired of their constant babbling about whatever topics happened to cross their minds and she withdrew from the conversation as well.
The pair didn 't even seem to notice. They just kept talking to each other, regularly making comments to Subaru and Emilia but they appeared to be indifferent whether or not they actually got a response.
Picoutatte was an enormous city located on a large island in the middle of a wide river.
Subaru frowned at the city as approached the bridge that forded the river.
This city is weird. The architecture and even the local clothing remind me a little of the movie Aladdin. It 's like someone is trying to make a city inspired by middle age Arabia. But this city isn't in a desert, it's sitting in the middle of a river on a green, grassy plain. That feels strange.
I guess it 's because I was trained to associate medieval Arabian costumes with the desert but it feels odd to see it here.
There were no walls around the city itself but there was a huge mass of people waiting at the far end of the bridge, a huge line of merchants in wagons who were waiting impatiently to enter.
"Master Lucas!" Geoffrey called. "My friends warned me about the crowds in Picoutatte! They suggested that it would be easier to navigate the city if we left our dragons at the stable outside the city!"
Subaru looked at the large crowd waiting ahead of them and then gave an abrupt nod. He scanned the area and saw a large stable just before the river 's edge.
He turned Patrasche and made for it. Geoffrey and Celene followed them.
They all dismounted and led their dragons inside. The stable was enormous and could easily hold dozens if not hundreds of animals. A fat man wearing overalls was mucking out one of the stables with a shovel. He had a walrus mustache and a sweaty, florid face.
"Welcome," He said, struggling to sound enthusiastic as he shoveled large amounts of dragon dung. "What can I do for you?"
"We're looking for a place to stash our dragons for a bit," Subaru said.
"How many days?" The man asked. "Or are you looking for a half day?"
Subaru glanced at Emilia. She shrugged. "One day for us," Subaru answered. "Then maybe we'll see."
It could easily take us a day or two just to search the city. Especially since we have only the vaguest idea of what we 're looking for.
The man nodded. "That'll be half a silver noble," He said as Subaru handed him the reins.
Subaru reached into his satchel and pulled out a few copper coins, handing them to the man.
The man looked up at Patrasche with a pleasantly surprised expression. "Well, hello there, girl! Aren't you beautiful?" He cooed.
Patrasche snorted and gave Subaru a smug, side-eyed glance.
Subaru looked up at his dragon incredulously.
Geoffrey cleared his throat. "Um," He said, sounding like he was struggling not to laugh. "I guess we'll only need half a day. We'll probably be heading out later this evening-"
"We shall not be leaving until tomorrow morning," Celene corrected him immediately. "I have half the dust of the continent caked in my hair and I would very much like a wash, thank you."
Subaru saw Emilia reach up and self-consciously touch her own silver locks which were now matted and gray with dirt after spending weeks on the road.
He gave her a sympathetic look.
Geoffrey snickered. "Very well. Whatever the lady wants," He shrugged.
Subaru and Emilia walked out of the stable as Celene and Geoffrey finished settling things with the stable hand. They looked across the river to where a veritable sea of people stood on the bridge, waiting to enter Picoutatte.
"Where do you think that we should start searching?" Emilia murmured.
Subaru shrugged. "Well, we really only have one lead: The quest for the Book begins with the Silk Merchant of Picoutatte . So I guess we start by finding him and hope that the Gospel wasn 't trying to trick us."
"But there have to be hundreds of silk merchants in this town," Emilia murmured. "Maybe thousands! This place is an enormous trading hub for all four kingdoms. How will we find the silk merchant that we're looking for?"
Subaru shook his head. "I… I really have no idea," He admitted. "But we have to start somewhere! Even if the Gospel is complete bunk, silk merchants travel the entire continent. If there's a flying island out there, one of them will have heard of it."
"I wonder if all the silk merchants work in the same area of town," Emilia murmured.
"That'd be nice. I doubt we'll be that lucky though," Subaru admitted. He squinted up at the sky. "It's getting late and it looks like we'll have some bad weather coming soon. Maybe we should find a place to spend the night and then start our search in the morning."
"Should we separate from Celene and Geoffrey now?" Emilia wondered.
Subaru mulled it over. "Let's not do that yet. If the authorities really are looking for us here, they're looking for two people. Not four. It might help us blend in."
"I know that, Subaru," Emilia said pointedly. "My concern was that staying with us might place them in danger and they don't strike me as the kind of people who can take care of themselves."
Subaru made a face but before he could respond there was a rumble of thunder overhead. The pair glanced up as long sheets of water began to fall from the heavens.
The crowd waiting for entry into the city made a low moan that was so loud Subaru could hear it from across the bridge.
"Well, that's just perfect," Subaru grumbled, instantly soaked to the skin. "Of all the provisions I thought to buy for our trip, I completely forgot about an umbrella."
Emilia sighed. "Well, I suppose this is the best shower that I've had since we left the forest," She admitted.
Celene and Geoffrey emerged from the stable before Subaru could reply.
"Whew!" Geoffrey said, racing over to them with Celene. The pair appeared to be trying to shield themselves from the pounding downpour with their hands. They slowly abandoned this idea as it sunk in that there was no shelter from the storm anywhere close by. They lowered their arms and just accepted getting drenched.
"Well, friends," Geoffrey said grandly. "Picoutatte awaits! Shall we?"
Subaru glanced at Emilia with a question in his eyes.
Emilia sighed but nodded.
"Let's head in," Subaru agreed. He paused a moment. "Have you two been here before?"
"Oh, many times!" Geoffrey laughed. "I have lots of friends in the area."
"This may be an odd question," Subaru said slowly. "But do you have any idea where we could find silk merchants?"
Geoffrey cocked his head quizzically as the group began to walk across the massive stone bridge, easily steeping around the dragon-pulled carts that stood there like statues, waiting for their goods to be inspected.
"You want to buy silk?" He asked curiously.
"Well, we're… investigating something," Subaru said vaguely. "Making contact with a silk merchant is our only lead."
Geoffrey shook his head. "Investigating? What could you possibly be invest-"
"Geoffrey!" Celene called pointedly over a clap of thunder. "If they wanted us to know about their plans, they would have told us. It is not safe to bandy matters of import casually with virtual strangers that one meets on the side of the road at night."
"Oh. Right," Geoffrey said ruefully. He glanced at Subaru. "I suppose that we all have our own little secrets these days, don't we?"
Subaru just shrugged. They were approaching the entrance to Picoutatte. Pedestrian traffic was moving quickly, much to the drenched travelers ' relief.
The guards were barely glancing at the people on foot before allowing them inside. Comparatively, the guards were carefully going over each wagon and every good inside of them, item by item.
Geoffrey thought about it for a minute. "I guess that if I were looking for silk merchants," He began doubtfully, "I'd probably start by heading down to the exchange."
"The what?" Subaru asked.
"It's the major trading hub in the city," Geoffrey explained. "We're actually going that way ourselves. We could show you where it is."
Subaru nodded. "Thanks, Geoffrey."
Subaru tensed as the group approached the entrance.
The guards quickly looked over a group of poorly clothed pedestrians in front of them with a bored eye and then jerked their heads to tell them to keep moving into the city.
Subaru and the others moved forward and a lowered spear quickly blocked their way.
Subaru looked at the guard and saw that he was looking at the foursome suspiciously. "Names?" He asked, glancing at a book sheltered from the rain by a small guard booth.
It must be our clothes that caught their interest, Subaru realized. They 're probably on the lookout for nobles that are fleeing the capitol.
Subaru opened his mouth to warn Geoffrey and Celene but-
"Geoffrey Monmouth and Celene de Feir," Geoffrey said cheerfully.
The guard quickly flipped through the book and his face darkened. He gestured to the other guards and they drew weapons and spread out around them.
"You're under arrest," The guard captain. "Wanted for questioning on charges of treason, conspiracy, and witchcraft."
"For what?!" Geoffrey gasped.
The other pedestrians quickly backed away as the soldiers surrounded the foursome.
"Now, wait just a moment!" Emilia shouted.
A thunderbolt exploded in Subaru 's head and he crashed down to the ground. His cheek hit the ground hard and he felt like his head might shatter.
His face lay in a puddle on the stone bridge and he felt his wrists seized from behind and clamped together with manacles.
He struggled to lift his head out of the puddle. He blearily looked behind him to see that one of the guards had struck him from behind with an iron club.
What 's wrong with me?! Why didn't I assume that the guards might just beat us up rather than politely asking us to surrender?!
"Subaru!" Emilia cried out, darting over to him and falling to her knees by his side.
Subaru shook his throbbing head. His vision swam. "What the hell?!" He slurred.
I don 't want to trigger Indomitable yet. Maybe we can still talk our way out of this , Subaru thought.
"You're under arrest, son," The guard captain said smugly.
"On what charge?" Emilia protested, holding Subaru in her arms.
The captain 's eyes narrowed as he saw Emilia. Her hood had fallen back revealing her hair and ears. "You're traveling with known seditionists," The guard said flatly. "So you're under arrest on suspicion of conspiring against the kingdom. Both of you."
The captain nodded at one of his men and the guard pulled manacles from his belt, marching toward Emilia.
Subaru took a deep breath. I 'll wait to trigger Indomitable until they're all close.
Emilia looked coldly furious as the guard approached them.
Subaru fought his way back up to his feet, his hands still clamped tightly behind him.
Subaru suddenly felt his shoulders pushed down and he doubled over. Emilia vaulted over Subaru 's back, using him as a springboard to kick the approaching guard full in the face. The guard cried out in pain and went down rolling.
Subaru felt a wave of piercing cold sweep down his back and then he heard a snap as his manacles broke.
Subaru looked down at the severed chains hanging from his wrists and then at Emilia who stood beside him with her ice-sword drawn.
Emilia must have frozen the metal to make it brittle and then snapped it with her sword, He realized.
The pair shared a quick glance as the dozens of guards surrounded them in a ring with more guards arriving on the scene all the time.
A group of guards rushed at them.
Emilia waved her hand and the wet stone underneath the guards was suddenly covered in ice.
The guards skidded but before they could regain their balance, Emilia made a throwing gesture and the pounding raindrops all froze in midair. Like some strange CGI effect, Subaru watched as thousands of tiny balls of ice reversed direction and flung themselves at the guards like an avalanche, smashing into the guard formation with great force and knocking them down.
Emilia made a graceful pirouette and raised her arms above her head. Dozens of the closest guards cried out from the penetrating cold as the rainwater laying across the bridge flowed up their legs and then froze solid, locking them all in place from the waist down.
Emilia quickly helped Subaru steady himself. "Are you alright?" She shouted.
Subaru nodded quickly as the remaining guards started working to break their fellows out of Emilia 's ice prison.
The guard captain 's face was pale as if some dreadful possibility had just occurred to him. "Loose arrows! I want them, dead or alive!" He shouted, quickly backing away from Subaru and Emilia.
"Get out of here!" Subaru screamed into Celene and Geoffrey's faces.
Both looked shocked but they nodded quickly. They dashed across the bridge and into the city. The pair desperately looked for a place to hide. More guards were racing toward the bridge but fortunately, they seemed to have no interest in Geoffrey and Celene as long as Subaru and Emilia were fighting back.
Why didn 't those idiots just run out of town?! Subaru thought incredulously until he looked back toward the shore and his heart sank. Hundreds of soldiers were coming across the bridge from the other side.
"Subaru! Look out!" Emilia shouted and Subaru spun around again.
The guards standing by the guardhouse on the stairs beyond the bridge all drew their crossbows, aimed, and then released hundreds of arrows in one smooth motion. The arrows flew toward them like a solid wall of crossbow bolts.
Subaru stepped in front of Emilia and triggered Indomitable. Then his heart nearly stopped as Emilia stepped around him.
She stared grimly at the crossbow bolts and then clenched her fists.
A million drops of water leaped off the wet stones and into the air. The falling raindrops arrested their downward flight to arch in a new direction.
A million drops of water slammed into the bolts from all sides and then froze into an ice ball the size of a boulder. The ball fell to the ground with a thud and slid sullenly across the pavement stones, hundreds of crossbow bolts all frozen inside.
Subaru blinked and stared at Emilia in disbelief as Indomitable timed out.
Emilia shot him a proud grin then her eyes widened as she looked over his shoulder. "More are coming!" She shouted, waving her arm and sending thousands of water droplets leaping off the ground. The droplets merged together and then stretched and froze into long spines of ice like thousands of slender javelins.
Emilia gestured and the spines suddenly threw themselves at the guards nearly as fast as the crossbow bolts. The ice darts smashed into the guards ' armor and broke harmlessly against the steel but several guards were knocked off balance by the sheer force of the impact.
"Subaru! We need to get out of here!" Emilia screamed.
Subaru nodded and scanned the area. It 'd be better to get out of town but with all those soldiers coming across from the other side, that isn't going to happen right now. We need to find a place to hide!
Subaru pointed toward one of the many stairways leading into the city, a stairway that, like the others, was now overflowing with guards.
Emilia saw and nodded. She planted her feet, spread her arms wide, and closed her eyes. Her brow furrowed in concentration.
"Mili! We need to get out of here!" Subaru shouted as more guards charged toward them.
There was a low rumble as Emilia 's face strained and twisted with effort. Water flowed toward Emilia from all directions, leaving her in a steadily deepening pool on the bridge that refused to spread out along the flat surface. The water just incongruously kept stacking taller and taller in a small area.
Emilia stood in water up to her waist. She opened eyes that blazed like stars as she extended an arm behind her and then pulled it slowly forward as if dragging something ponderously heavy.
The river beneath them exploded out of its banks. Thousands of gallons of water crashed toward Subaru and Emilia in a wave nearly twenty feet tall that swept up all the guards in its wake like driftwood.
"Come on!" Emilia shouted, grabbing Subaru and slinging him over her shoulder as she bolted toward the city. The great wave followed them on the bridge, its path as straight as a rail.
Emilia dashed up the stairs no more than a few paces ahead of the towering wall of water. The guards all melted out of her path, desperately trying to flee the colossal wave.
Emilia reached the top of the stairs and then spun in a graceful circle. She raised her hands and then made a slow, squeezing gesture.
The rushing wave 's motions grew ponderous and then ceased altogether as the wave crystallized and then froze solid. Dozens and dozens of guards cried out in dismay as they found themselves partially frozen in the standing wave.
Emilia was panting for breath and her face was pale. "I can't do this for much longer, Subaru!" Emilia gasped, gently putting him down on the ground.
Subaru stared at her and then at the ravaged battlefield in open-mouthed wonder.
"Subaru!" Emilia shouted urgently, swaying from exhaustion where she stood.
Subaru blinked, suddenly remembering what was going on.
He nodded and took her hand as the pair dashed away from the bridge and into the city.
The guard captain, who had managed to avoid being frozen, stared at the vanishing pair with his jaw hanging open in shock. "Subaru…" He whispered almost inaudibly. Then the captain shook his head and recovered himself. "Stop them!" The captain thundered to the guards.
Most of his guards were now frozen in place and they could only look at the captain incredulously as they shivered violently from the cold. Their faces were turning blue and their teeth were chattering violently. The men beat on the ice with their weapons but the ice was hard as cement and no matter how hard they struck it, nothing helped.
The captain ground his teeth. "Any men who can move, get after them! Company C, go get sledgehammers and free the others from that cursed ice! Sound the alarm! Call for reinforcements! "
Subaru and Emilia were already well out of sight by the time the guards managed to climb the stairway and resume their pursuit.
Bells were ringing all over the city and Subaru and Emilia fled down the streets with only the vaguest idea of where they were going.
Subaru and Emilia cowered beneath a small wagon full of straw. They hid on a narrow, deserted street somewhere in Picoutatte.
The wagon was partially hidden under a great stone underpass which increased their concealment from prying eyes. The rain had stopped but the pair were both still soaked to the skin. The sounds of jingling chainmail and the heavy tread of booted feet could be heard not far away.
Subaru looked around, trying to get a sense of where they were. The street was narrow and crooked, full of what looked like brownstone buildings that contained dozens of small stores and workshops.
"Pretty impressive, right?" Emilia asked suddenly. "I held off a whole platoon with my magic!"
Subaru glanced at her. Emilia looked exhausted but she was grinning from ear to ear.
Subaru nodded, a rictus grin on his face. "That was… amazing , " He said honestly.
Emilia giggled. "I told you that I could hold my own in a fight," She said smugly.
That might just be the biggest understatement of the century …
Emilia was incredible back there! Anyone with half a brain would rather have Emilia on their side than a whole frigging army!
A tiny, mean voice whispered from deep inside Subaru, When did this start? Emilia isn 't supposed to be saving me! I'm supposed to be saving her! Emilia needs me!
Subaru swallowed hard. Well … she used to at any rate… Looks like she doesn't need me much anymore…
Which is good! Subaru forced himself on. I should be thrilled that Emilia is becoming more capable and competent! I should be cheering her on! That 's part of being a supportive partner.
Even if it means that she doesn 't need me anymore…
Emilia was looking intently down the darkened street. "It looks like we've lost them," Emilia murmured.
"Hm?" Subaru murmured, shaking off his train of thought and trying to focus on the present crisis. "Well, we've lost them for now," Subaru corrected. "These guys don't look poised to give up the chase any time soon."
"Do you think that Geoffrey and Celene got away?" Emilia worried.
Subaru hesitated. "I don't know. I hope so. "
Emilia shook her head pensively. "Now what do we do?"
Great question! What the hell do we do now?
The smart thing to do would be to get the hell out of the city while we still can. This is a huge city, probably even bigger than Ganaks and it must have hundreds of guards. Maybe thousands of guards if we 're also counting any soldiers stationed near here to keep an eye on the Vollachian border! And now, they're all going to come looking for us.
We don 't know this city, we don't know any good hiding places, and these guards look like they're poised to continue the search all night! They'll find us by sunrise at the absolute latest and then what do we do?
No, there 's no choice. We need to get out of town immediately. But how?
There 's no point in running toward the city gate, that's where everyone will be looking for us to try and make our escape.
Maybe we 'll need to find a place to slip into the river and then swim across. We could circle around the city, get Patrasche out of that stable, and make our escape.
And go where ? Subaru thought in despair. Picoutatte was our only lead! We don 't have any other clues about how to find the Book! And we still don't have the slightest idea where the spirits are either!
No. I can 't focus on that right now. We need to get out of here. Emilia's exhausted, she won't be able to save us if we get caught again.
For right now, getting us out of the city safely needs to be my only concern.
Alright. First things first …
"OK. I think we need to get out of the city, Mili," Subaru said.
Emilia nodded slowly. "And go where?" She asked solemnly.
Subaru took a deep breath. "I… don't know yet…" He admitted. "But we need to get somewhere safe so that we can regroup and come up with a new plan."
"Should we head for the bridge then?" Emilia suggested. "Maybe we'll find a crowd that we can mix with and then we can just slip away."
"I really doubt that we'd be that lucky," Subaru sighed. "It's the middle of the night so traffic leaving the city is probably all but nonexistent. They might even have already closed the gates. Besides, right now the guards must be going over everyone trying to leave the city with a fine-toothed comb to make sure that we can't sneak away!"
He thought for a minute. "Mili, the only thing keeping us on this island is the river. If we found a deserted spot along the river, do you think that you could freeze a patch of it and let us run across to the other side?"
Emilia looked dubious. "I don't know, Subaru," She admitted. "It's a wide, strong river and I just used up most of my magic in that fight. I'd be worried that I'd run out of power halfway across."
Subaru nodded. "Well… maybe we could swim it?" He suggested. "It's only a mile or so."
"Only?" Emilia asked incredulously.
"You're not a good swimmer, huh?" Subaru asked.
Emilia shook her head. "I can drag myself through the water but that's about it."
Subaru made a face. "Yeah. Me too," He admitted.
Emilia chuckled.
He thought for a moment. "Alright. This place is an island. There's got to be plenty of boats that we could… borrow."
"Borrow?" Emilia criticized. "Do you plan to bring it back when we're done with it?"
"No… but we'll leave it somewhere that it will be easily found."
Emilia did not look impressed.
Subaru sighed. "OK, fine! We'll just find… a floating log or something that we can hang onto while swimming across the river. We'll get wet but we'll make it across the river just fine as long we have something to keep us afloat."
"And we can't get much wetter," Emilia murmured, shaking out her hair.
She thought the plan over and finally nodded. "Alright. That sounds like a good plan."
Subaru made a face. "I don't know about 'good' but it's the only plan that I've got right now," He admitted.
Emilia gave Subaru a tired smile and then stood up. "Which way is the river?" She asked.
Subaru grinned at her. "That's the genius of my plan, Mili! Picoutatte's an island. Just pick any direction and start walking. You 're guaranteed to hit water sooner or later!"
Emilia snorted with laughter. "Subaru! That's-"
"There they are!" A voice screamed from behind them.
Subaru and Emilia spun around and saw a guard standing above them on the overpass, frantically blowing his whistle.
"Shit!" Subaru grabbed Emilia's hand and they both took off running through the underpass.
The pair bolted down the street, taking a corner at full speed and then dashing through an alley as the whistles and the sounds of running feet pursued them from behind.
Shit! Where do we go?!
I can already hear running and whistles from all directions! They 're going to converge on us any minute now and even if Emilia wasn't already exhausted there's no water nearby to amplify her ice magic! I have Indomitable but we still can't fight a hundred armed guards!
A door in the brownstone ahead opened and a hand frantically beckoned them.
Subaru winced. Well, we 've got nothing left to lose!
He sped toward the open door, pulling Emilia along.
They bolted through the door and slammed it shut behind them.
Subaru braced himself against the door and tensed as he heard the whistles and charging footsteps approaching.
Then the footsteps raced past them and began to fade in the distance.
Subaru let out a deep breath.
He quickly looked around.
They appeared to be in a dusty storeroom of some kind. Crates and boxes were piled up from the floor to the rafters in a haphazard pattern that gave no indication of what might be inside any of them.
Subaru turned to face their rescuer, a young man who looked around Subaru 's age.
The young man stood there with a worried look on his face, watching the crowd of soldiers through a small window as they finally vanished around a corner.
Subaru took a deep breath. "Listen. Thank you-"
He was cut off as the man exuberantly threw his arms around the startled Subaru and pulled him into a tight embrace.
"Mister Subaru! Hello!" He cried out in joy.
Subaru looked at Emilia with a stunned expression but hers was equally flabbergasted.
Subaru squirmed his way out of the tight hug and inspected their rescuer more closely.
The young man was wearing a loose, green tunic over brown leggings and he wore a green cape. He had a green hat that reminded Subaru of an enormous fez and his long white hair spilled out from under it.
He was staring at Subaru with unfeigned delight. "It's simply wonderful to see you again! " The man cried out, seemingly completely unfazed by his warm embrace being so completely rejected. "When we heard that you'd been sighted in Picoutatte, we all spent hours walking the streets looking for you! We finally gave up and assumed that you'd managed to escape so we came back home. Then I started putting some things away only to find you running right by my backdoor!" He laughed out loud.
Subaru just stared at him.
The stranger 's face grew grave. "Oh, Mister Subaru. We've all been so terribly worried about you ever since the Sanctuary! Miss Felt said that you had been… captured or… something like that."
Subaru blinked. Who is this guy? He knows Felt? Is this guy in my faction? Even if he is, why would he greet me as if we were best friends?
"Um. What exactly did Felt tell you?" Subaru asked hesitantly.
The young man looked slightly pained. "Err… Well, you see… I didn't get the entire message, Mister Subaru," He admitted. "When we last saw Felt at Arlem village, she… well, she had Garfiel with her and I, err … I didn't want to get too close…" He trailed off, his cheeks bright red. "You remember what happened the last time," He muttered in the tone of someone making an embarrassing confession.
I do?
"Otto!" A girl's voice called absently from the next room. "We just got a note. Lord Farquat wants to know when that shipment will be delivered."
Otto? That name sounds familiar for some reason …
Otto chuckled. "Coming, dear!" He called.
Otto silently gestured for Subaru and Emilia to follow him. He had a huge grin on his face and his eyes were excited.
Subaru and Emilia exchanged a wary look.
I get the funny feeling that this guy is setting somebody up for a practical joke and that we 're going to be the punchline, Subaru thought. But I don 't get the impression that he's dangerous. If he's just trying to lure us into a false sense of security, he's doing a really good job.
Subaru and Emilia followed Otto out of the storeroom and down a cramped, dusty hallway that opened up into the showroom of a small store.
The storefront was made of glass and there was a single aisle leading from the door to the counter. Shelves on both sides of the aisle were piled high with a seemingly random assortment of items for sale: everything from weapons to jewelry to toys to spices to bolts of cloth. The aisle was extremely narrow, two patrons couldn 't hope to walk down the aisle at the same time without bumping into each other.
In front of the counter, a small girl appeared to be laying out new merchandise on the shelves and humming a happy song to herself, oblivious to her audience. She barely came up to Subaru 's chest and she had long pink hair that fell down her back. She seemed familiar but what really caught Subaru's attention was her clothing.
In Subaru 's world, the girl's manner of dress wouldn't have been that unusual but in this world it was unheard of. The girl wore tight black shorts and an enormous white T-shirt that almost doubled as a dress on her tiny frame. Her T-shirt had a stylized triangle emblazoned on the front in bubble-gum pink. Even stranger, the girl wore a pair of what looked like black sunglasses on top of her head and the lenses were cut into the shape of stars.
Then Subaru noticed her pointed ears.
It can't be! Subaru thought in shock. There's no way that she'd ever wear an outfit like this! She's dressed like a teeny-bopper valley girl! Hell, she's dressed like a parody of a teeny-bopper valley girl!
Subaru stared at her for a long moment until he finally overcame his disbelief. "Lady Ryuzu?! " Subaru gasped.
The girl jumped and spun around to stare at them. Her face was frightened.
Otto exuberantly threw his hands over his head. "We have company, sweetheart!" He cheered.
"Otto! What are you-" Ryuzu gasped. "I… I would like to be informed before we plan to have house guests," Ryuzu murmured. As Subaru watched, her voice grew soft and flat and her face lost all expression. "I would have had… time to prepare."
Weird. Suddenly Ryuzu is acting more the way that I remember her. A moment ago, she looked more animated than I 'd ever seen her before. Although I have to admit, this flat, emotionless demeanor feels really weird when combined with the valley girl fashion that she's wearing. What's going on here?
Subaru glanced at Otto and saw that he suddenly looked worried. He wore the expression of a man who had just realized that he 'd forgotten something extremely important and was now in very serious trouble.
"Dear!" Otto called urgently. "This is Mister Subaru and…" Otto seemed to notice Emilia for the first time. "Um, his… friend, I think?" He said awkwardly. "Dear, you remember how Mister Subaru helped us escape the Sanctuary, right?" He said pointedly.
Subaru frowned. Hang on. Why does Otto sound like he 's trying to prompt Ryuzu?
Subaru looked at Ryuzu with mounting unease. But as soon as Otto had said Subaru 's name, Ryuzu's eyes lit up with understanding.
She didn 't recognize me? Why wouldn't Ryuzu recognize me? He wondered.
He pondered this until his mind suddenly shifted gears to a far more disturbing and incomprehensible concept: Wait a second! Are Ryuzu and this weirdo dating ?!
"Of course, I remember," Ryuzu said in a nearly robotic whisper. She gave a slow bow. "Welcome to our home, Mister Subaru-"
Mister? Ryuzu never called me that before.
"-We are eternally in your debt for aiding us in the Sanctuary. Please, forgive me for asking but is this the witch who took you prisoner? Miss Felt warned us that you had been bewitched by a silver-haired half-elf."
"A witch?!" Otto yelped, looking at Emilia in terror.
Emilia sighed and covered her eyes.
"Otto, dear," Ryuzu murmured, her flat and emotionless voice acquiring a slight edge of exasperation. "Weren't you listening to Miss Felt when she explained what happened after they escaped from the Sanctuary?"
Otto flushed. "Er. I'm sorry, dear. I was kind of trying to keep my distance from Garfiel, Del… Ryuzu," Otto stumbled over his words.
Ryuzu looked at him reprovingly for a moment and then turned her attention back to Subaru and Emilia. "Regardless, it is a pleasure to see you again, Mister Subaru. Please feel welcome here. However, I am somewhat concerned about you bringing a witch into our home," Ryuzu spoke as if this matter was of no great importance.
Subaru and Emilia both sighed in stereo.
"OK," Subaru almost growled. "I am thoroughly sick of having this conversation so I'm going to make it very brief. Emilia is not a witch. I am not bewitched, everyone else is. And for the record, this isn't a theory or a delusion on my part, I got this confirmed."
Ryuzu cocked her head. "Confirmed by whom?" She murmured.
Subaru looked pained. "We uh,… met a real witch the other day …" He admitted quietly.
"Wait. You met another witch?" Otto asked, looking like he was struggling to follow this conversation.
"Yeah," Subaru replied. "Look, the witch told me that Emilia had fallen under the influence of the Authority of Gluttony and that her name had been eaten. That's why nobody can remember her except for me."
Otto gave Subaru a pained look. The sort of look reserved for those who are hoping that a dear friend will realize how dumb their idea actually is so that they don 't have to be the ones to point it out to them.
Otto gave Ryuzu an awkward, questioning look but the tiny elf 's face was unreadable.
Subaru rubbed his forehead. "We just left Gusteko the other day where we spent time playing with another old friend from the Sanctuary: Capella."
"Hm," Ryuzu murmured. "I recall facing her. A most unpleasant business. I am not well equipped to fight a dragon."
Subaru frowned at Ryuzu. Dragon? We didn 't fight Capella as a dragon. She took her bear shape when we fought. It's a minor point but… why would Ryuzu's memory of that incident be damaged? Most of the fight with Capella happened after Roy ate Emilia's name.
Subaru shook it off. "Yeah. Well, you probably remember Roy. He's the one that ate Emilia's name."
"Ah yes," She murmured. "A truly formidable battle. I'd never faced an opponent so strong before. For a time, I feared that he was too much for us. I was astonished that we managed to kill him."
Subaru stared at her and the nagging suspicion in the back of his mind raised itself again. Ryuzu wasn 't with us when we fought Roy. She was fighting Capella. Then we all ran over to help her. Why are her memories twisted of events that happened after Roy ate Emilia 's name?
Subaru 's eyes widened. Wait a minute!
Subaru shot Emilia a warning look. She met it curiously but inclined her head in assent.
"It's actually good that we bumped into you, Lady Ryuzu," Subaru said pleasantly. "I had a question that I wanted to ask you."
"Oh?" She replied.
"Do you… have a sister or something?"
Subaru noticed that Otto had stiffened at this question.
Ryuzu didn 't answer right away. "A sister?" Ryuzu said, her voice growing careful. "What an odd question. Why ever do you ask?"
Subaru 's eyes narrowed. "Well, Garf told me that he saw my dragon being ridden out of the Sanctuary by someone who looked just like you."
"Ah yes," Ryuzu murmured, her placid expression and emotionless voice completely at odds with her valley-girl dress. "I remember him mentioning this. Very confusing, is it not?"
"Yeah, it is," Subaru agreed. "Garf needed to try to find out who it was, remember? That's why you had to run to the wagon alone for your escape. We all felt terribly guilty about that."
Out of the corner of his eye, Subaru saw Otto turn pale. The merchant desperately tried to signal Ryuzu but the little elf was already replying: "I bear you no ill-will for this, Mister Subaru. You needed young Garf with you for your own escape and you did well to keep him safe from the Archbishops during our flight."
Otto winced. His face looked faintly ill while Subaru 's expression was grim.
"Wrong answer, Ryuzu or whoever you really are," Subaru said flatly. "Garf carried you to Otto's wagon. You fought Capella in the form of a bear, not a dragon and you weren't there when we killed Roy."
Ryuzu hesitated for only a fraction of a second as Otto sidled over to stand beside her. "Perhaps my memories were damaged by the same mechanism that caused us all to forget your friend."
"Interesting theory," Subaru grumbled, looking at both Ryuzu and Otto accusingly. "But these memories are of things that happened after Roy was killed. You know what that tells me?"
"What?" Ryuzu asked calmly.
"That you're not Ryuzu," Subaru said intently. Emilia quickly moved to stand beside him, staring at the tiny elf with a fierce expression. "You don't remember what happened that day because you weren't there. You're the fake Ryuzu that Garf saw."
Ryuzu didn 't answer right away. "I take offense at that, Mister Subaru. I am not a fake. I am indeed Ryuzu, " Her formerly emotionless voice had shifted to a low growl.
"Then why don't you remember what actually happened?" Subaru challenged.
Ryuzu just stared at him, expressionlessly.
Otto 's face was conflicted. "Delta," Otto whispered. "I think that… maybe we should tell him."
Ryuzu glanced at Otto. Her placid expression grew reproving. "In spite of your connection to us, my love, it is not your secret to reveal," She chided.
"I know that," Otto replied, glancing nervously back and forth between Subaru and Ryuzu. "But he's already pretty close to figuring it out! I think that maybe it would be better if he heard the story from us rather than just… worked it out for himself. We know that we can trust him and he might even be able to help us find… you know who," Otto trailed off.
Ryuzu looked pensive for a moment.
Subaru and Emilia waited patiently but nobody said anything.
Finally, Subaru made a face, "Anybody want to clue us in here?" He growled.
Ryuzu sighed. She walked to the front door and locked it. Then she picked up a 'Closed' sign and set it in front of the window.
"Mister Subaru," Otto said awkwardly. "Could you… join us below? I think that would be the fastest way to answer all of your questions."
Subaru and Emilia glanced at each other and then nodded.
Without another word, Ryuzu and Otto walked down the stairs behind the counter. Subaru and Emilia followed. The staircase was a tight spiral that led down into a finished basement.
The basement was nearly as big as the shop itself and it had numerous couches and sleeping mats spread out across a carpeted floor. And on those couches …
Subaru 's jaw dropped. The basement was full of 'Ryuzus.' At least fifteen Ryuzus, each one the same size, with the same face, and with the same pink hair as the original. The only difference was that all of the little elves sitting down here were wearing white robes except for one.
The final Ryuzu was wearing the long, black robe that Subaru associated with the Ryuzu that he 'd met in the Sanctuary. The robe's high collar covered her mouth and nose. In her hand, she held an ornate staff that was taller than she was and it was crowned with a large blue crystal. She also wore a small golden pendant around her neck that Subaru recognized from his studies of astronomy as the Greek symbol Alpha.
"Lord Subaru," The Ryuzu in the black robe asked incuriously. "Is that you?"
Subaru looked in shock at Otto and the Ryuzu in the valley girl outfit.
The valley girl Ryuzu sighed. "Hm. Well, anyway it's very nice to finally meet you, Mister Subaru," She said awkwardly, "I've heard a lot about you from Otto and my sisters." With every word that she spoke, the valley girl Ryuzu seemed to shed a little more of her emotionless demeanor and become more animated.
The dozen white-robed Ryuzus just stared up at Subaru and Emilia with as much expression and interest as a plastic doll.
Is this what Santa 's workshop looks like? Subaru thought in bewilderment.
"Are… you all twins?" Emilia whispered in disbelief. Emilia seemed to be unsure which Ryuzu to direct her questions toward. "This must have been… a very hard delivery on your poor mother."
Subaru sighed.
Otto and the valley girl Ryuzu walked over to a small couch and sat down. "So, Mister Subaru, you, um… you must have… a lot of questions," He said awkwardly.
Subaru had to briefly step into Reason and Judgment to shake off his shock. "Yeah," Subaru muttered. "Maybe one or two… For starters, which one of you is the real Ryuzu? "
The valley girl Ryuzu grumbled something under her breath.
"To be candid, we consider that a very offensive question, Lord Subaru," The Ryuzu in the black robe said in the same whisper-soft and listless voice that Subaru had come to expect from the Ryuzu he'd known. "We are all Ryuzu."
Subaru sighed. "OK, fine. Which of you is the Ryuzu that I met in the Sanctuary?"
The Ryuzu in the black robe raised her hand. "I was one of them. However, the other Ryuzu whom you met in the Sanctuary is currently not here. "
Subaru closed his eyes and rubbed his forehead. "The other one? Can somebody please just tell me what the hell is going on here without all the clever repartee?! " He asked in exasperation.
Subaru glanced down at one of the Ryuzus dressed in an unadorned white robe who stared blankly back up at him. "And if you 're Ryuzu then who are all of these ? "
"Mister Subaru," Otto sighed. "Please. Let me try to explain. You see, everyone here is a 'clone' of the original Ryuzu: Ryuzu Meyer who was a servant of Echidna, the Witch of Greed."
Subaru started. "The Witch of Greed ?! " Subaru asked sharply.
Otto frowned at Subaru 's reaction. "Yes. She created the Sanctuary centuries ago for some… unexplained purpose. She also created the Ryuzus to care for it. Then she died. The Ryuzus have maintained the Sanctuary ever since. Every few decades, a new Ryuzu clone is produced by the Witch's apparatuses that work to maintain the Sanctuary. This new clone serves to replace any clones that might have perished due to accident or injury. The Ryuzus are, um… 'programmed'" Otto stumbled over the unfamiliar word and the valley girl Ryuzu beside him nodded encouragingly. "To take care of the Sanctuary and as a result, they're created knowing how to tend to it. They have no other purpose."
"What's a 'clone?'" Emilia asked.
"A copy," Subaru said before Otto could respond. "I read about them in books back home. They're duplicates of a living creature."
The Ryuzu in the valley girl outfit grumbled something under her breath. She folded her arms across her chest with a petulant expression.
The Ryuzu in the black robe didn 't even blink.
"Mister Subaru, the Ryuzus," Otto said awkwardly. "Prefer not to be referred to as 'copies' or as 'unreal.' They find it very offensive. At least, the ones who are 'alive' do."
"Alive? What the hell does that mean?" Subaru asked in exasperation.
Otto made an awkward expression and gestured toward the dozen or so white-robed Ryuzus.
Subaru frowned, glancing back and forth between the vacant-eyed white-robed Ryuzus and the only slightly more animated Ryuzu in black. He then glanced at the valley girl Ryuzu who now appeared to be sulking beside Otto.
"I'm still lost," Subaru said bluntly.
Otto sighed. "Right. OK, then… remember how I told you that a new clone was created every few decades? Well, the clones are created already knowing how to tend to the Sanctuary and how to maintain it. And since they're elves, they live for, well they live for a really long time. They just … do their jobs every day and then they sit by idly. But every once in a great while, a clone… well, they wake up, " Otto said awkwardly.
Subaru frowned.
"We begin to think for ourselves," The Ryuzu in black clarified in a dead voice. "We become sentient and capable of self-direction. We continued to care for the Sanctuary as we were unable to cross the barrier but over time, we diverged from our sisters and developed independent interests.
"I was the first. I awoke almost one hundred years after our creator passed away. At first, I struggled. I did not know who I was. I did not yet know what I was. I continued to tend to the Sanctuary with my sisters and I began reading the vast collection of books left behind by our mistress. I learned. I evolved.
"I chose the name 'Alpha' to represent myself, a symbol that I found in one of my Lady's books. It seemed appropriate since I was the first of my sisters to 'live' and to think. As I poured through the books in the library, I began to understand the world around me. I began to experiment and investigate the plants and animals of the Sanctuary in a quest to learn and understand more. After all, there was a great deal of time in the Sanctuary and very little to do," She said matter-of-factly.
"My sisters had no independent thought and could not communicate meaningfully with me but they were willing to obey me when I instructed them. For countless years, every morning I would wake up and organize my sisters to care for the Sanctuary. And then one day… I did not wake up," She said simply.
"What happened?" Subaru asked.
"Beta gained consciousness," The valley girl Ryuzu chimed in.
"At first, it was difficult," Alpha continued. "For whatever reason, the magical apparatus that animates us appears to provide a constant amount of energy, thus it only permitted one of my sentient sisters to be awake at any one time in a constant cycle. If I awoke one morning, my sister did not and vice versa. It took me several weeks to realize that something was off. My possessions began to go missing. The garden in which I was conducting an experiment in vegetable crossbreeding grew unrealistically quickly. I went to sleep during a massive downpour but awoke 'the next morning' to a completely dry forest. I realized that I was experiencing 'missing time' and I searched the Sanctuary for an explanation. Finally, I found my sister's comatose body and we began to exchange notes to communicate. I named her 'Beta.'"
The valley girl Ryuzu snickered. "I always told her that she should be grateful for that name. After all, it sounds a lot like 'better!'" She chortled.
Otto laughed and put his arm around the valley girl Ryuzu and kissed her cheek. "Aw. That's my Delta!" He said fondly.
Subaru raised an eyebrow as he watched Delta and Otto cuddling on the couch.
"Beta and I were never awake at the same time," Ryuzu continued. "So we could only communicate through notes. Later, I managed to invent a crystal that used magic to record images and we began to communicate that way. We discovered that we were very much alike, unsurprisingly for two homunculi grown sentient, although I soon realized that Beta had a terrible temper. We took turns overseeing the others for years until we were joined by another sister."
"Gamma?" Subaru asked.
Alpha stared at him. It was hard to tell for sure since Ryuzu Alpha 's face was almost as expressive as a doll's but Subaru thought that maybe she was startled.
"Then," Emilia said softly. "None of you ever got a chance to meet your sisters, did you? Only one of you could be awake at a time."
Alpha nodded.
Emilia looked sad. "That must have been terribly lonely," She whispered.
Subaru looked at her sympathetically. She must be thinking of her own time alone in the forest with Puck …
"Perhaps," Alpha mused after a moment's thought. "We had nothing else to compare it to. So it did not seem strange to us. We all corresponded intensely with one another and later we had the Sanctuary residents to converse with. It was in Gamma's time that the first settlers began to enter the Sanctuary, fleeing the harsh cruelties of the outside world. I would learn sometime later that these people were actually led to the Sanctuary by Lord Roswaal, the descendant of our Lady's prized student. However, he did not deign to inform them that, once inside the Sanctuary, the barrier would quite possibly kill them should they ever attempt to leave. We ignored these settlers at first but over time, more and more arrived. They spread throughout the Sanctuary and threatened to find our Lady's secret places.
"My sisters and I debated how to deal with this problem. The barrier prevented these settlers from evacuating and, if we were determined to remove them from our Lady's Sanctuary, we would be forced to kill them," Alpha said matter-of-factly.
Alpha paused for a moment. "Gamma refused to even discuss this solution until all other options had been exhausted. She suggested that one of us attempt to integrate herself into their community and watch the settlers closely to ensure that they did not become aware of the other Ryuzus or attempt to probe our Lady's secrets. I informed Gamma that this plan would be insufficient. Keeping an eye on them for one day out of three would still allow for too much time for mischief in the interim. We would all need to integrate into their community as 'Ryuzu.'
"And so it was that I started to interact with the settlers who had migrated inside of the Sanctuary in the years since our Lady's death. The people did not know what to make of me at first. The Ryuzu homunculi are programmed to avoid interacting with strangers if at all possible. A few of the locals had glimpsed me or one of my sisters over the years but we were usually dismissed as simply tricks of the mists. I told the villagers that I had come through the barrier and was trapped there, just as they were. I began to dwell with the people and I learned more and more about them, cautioning them to avoid certain parts of the valley because of the great dangers located there. Occasionally, we even arranged 'demonstrations' of these dangers.
"As the generations passed, I became a respected elder of the community and I came to cherish its people as things to protect in the same way as I cherished my sisters and the secrets of our Sanctuary. And thus we went on for generations, taking turns being 'Ryuzu' for the villagers. Every day, we switched who was 'Ryuzu' and left a message for our sister so that she would know what had transpired during her slumber."
"Didn't anyone ever suspect that there was more than one of you?" Subaru asked skeptically. "I mean, you two don't seem to act very much alike."
"The first three of us behave very much alike," Alpha said calmly. "We are virtually indistinguishable."
Otto looked pained and he rocked his hand back and forth uncertainly.
Alpha noticed Otto 's disagreement. "Except to those who know us very well," Alpha amended. "This state of affairs continued until Delta achieved sentience."
"Yo," Delta said, raising her hand.
Subaru blinked at her.
"Even at first glance, Delta was obviously very different from the rest of us," Alpha mused. "I believe that this is likely because Delta awoke after the settlers came to the Sanctuary and only a few short years before Fredericka and Garf's mother left the Sanctuary and placed the children into our care. Delta grew up alongside the siblings and, while they treated us more like grandmothers, I believe they came to view Delta as a big sister and she became far more successful at copying their mannerisms and social behaviors than did the rest of us."
Subaru sighed. "OK, not to ask a dumb question but if that's all true, why are both of you awake right now? "
"You and Otto did that, Lord Subaru," Alpha replied. "When the Sanctuary's barrier was shattered, something changed. A day later, for the very first time, we all woke up together. We had no clear understanding of why. We theorized that perhaps with the Lady's devices that maintained the barrier no longer in operation, there was now enough surplus power to support all four of us at once."
Subaru nodded. "I guess that makes sense."
"It did. However, we later discovered that this theory was completely wrong," Alpha said placidly.
Subaru sighed. "Say where are the other two anyway? Beta and Gamma?"
Alpha stared at him for a long moment. "Lord Subaru, how did you know Gamma's name?" She murmured.
"I'm from beyond the Great Waterfall," He said matter-of-factly. "Alpha, Beta, Gamma, and Delta are letters of the alphabet in the world that I'm from. How did you guys know about it?"
"Your world?" Alpha asked, her normally apathetic voice growing sharp. "This language comes from your world?"
Subaru nodded with a frown. "Yeah. What's wrong?"
Alpha looked pensive and she thought for a long moment. Finally, she shook her head. "I am… uncertain. I will need to ponder this for a time…"
"That means, don't expect an answer to your question for at least a few decades," Delta giggled.
Subaru was about to ask Alpha more questions about how they could possibly know the Greek alphabet but he was interrupted.
"Mister Subaru," Otto broke in. "The Ryuzus were absolutely terrified when they found out that the Sin Archbishops were coming to the Sanctuary!"
Subaru snorted. "Them and everybody else!" He said.
"Well," Delta broke in. "Alpha was terrified. Or as close as she ever gets anyway. The rest of us were sort of out cold," She said matter-of-factly.
Otto continued. "The Ryuzus knew all about the destructive power of the Archbishops, both from stories told by the settlers who had entered the Sanctuary over the years and from the books in the Witch's library. It was possible, even likely , that the Archbishops would destroy the entire Sanctuary, including the Witch 's machinery that created the new Ryuzus."
"In utter desperation," Alpha continued without any inflection in her voice. "I broke our law. I brought Otto, whom Delta had taught me to trust above all other outsiders, to the Ryuzu facility and showed him the body of our originator, Ryuzu Meyer, sealed in crystal. I asked him to help me rescue my sisters from the Sanctuary, as many as he could. Because if the Archbishops did truly destroy the Sanctuary and all of its secrets, then we Ryuzus would be the last ones ever…"
Otto looked solemn. "Of course, I wanted to help," Otto said earnestly. "I told them that once we lifted the barrier, I'd bring them all to someplace safe and I promised them that I would keep their secrets. "
Otto suddenly grinned. "But I am a merchant after all, so I did ask for one teensy, tiny, little favor in return …"
Delta giggled.
Alpha showed no reaction to Otto 's statement whatsoever.
Subaru 's gaze flickered between the Ryuzus and Otto. "What… did you ask for?" He asked in the tone of a man who isn't sure that he wants to hear the answer to his question.
Otto laughed. "I asked for Alpha's blessing to marry my Delta!" He threw his arms around her.
The tiny elf squealed in delight and almost swam into his embrace where she covered his face with kisses.
Subaru and Emilia looked at each other incredulously. "Um. Congratulations," Emilia murmured.
Otto and Delta finally finished kissing. "Oh, Mister Subaru. I owe you everything , " Otto said sincerely. "You not only helped me find the strength to face the trials and free the Sanctuary but you gave me the courage to confess my feelings to Delta!"
Emilia stiffened. "Oh. That's right," She murmured in a cold voice. "I'd forgotten that. Everyone thinks that you were the one who freed…" She trailed off.
Subaru looked at her sympathetically. Emilia 's face was a mask of misery and frustration.
He took her hand and Emilia squeezed it hard enough to hurt.
Alpha looked at Emilia with an expression of slight confusion. Otto and Delta didn 't seem to have heard her at all.
Subaru sighed. "Otto, how exactly did you… I mean, you didn't know that there were four Ryuzus at first so how-"
Otto laughed. "Exactly! You remember how frustrated I was in the Sanctuary, right?! I couldn't understand it! For weeks, Ryuzu would adore me one day and just be friendly with me for three! For a while, I was certain that she was just stringing me along. I remember you telling me that you thought she was… what did you call it? 'Manic-depressive?'"
Subaru sighed and rubbed his forehead.
Otto gave Delta a warm smile which she returned. "It wasn't until Alpha told me the truth about the Ryuzus that I understood that Delta really did love me and that she loved me consistently. So, I just waited for her to wake up before I proposed! " Otto finished, snuggling with an exuberant Delta.
"It was a dream come true!" He declared. "I'd always wanted a big family, Mister Subaru. After all, my own family… doesn't really seem to know what to do with me…" Otto's voice became dolorous for a moment. Then he shook it off and put on a huge smile. "But when we escaped from the Sanctuary, I not only found a beautiful bride but three loving, wonderful big sisters as well!"
"We love you very much as well, Otto," Alpha said in a robotic voice.
"Er. Congratulations again," Subaru said awkwardly. "Um. So where are Ryuzus number three and four?"
Otto and Delta immediately stopped smiling. "We don't know," Otto replied in a somber voice. "Gamma went missing right after we left the Sanctuary. We fled the Archbishops and when we finally got far enough away from the Sanctuary to relax a little bit, we realized that one of us was missing! Gamma had just… gotten out of my wagon and left without a word! We weren't even sure if she had disappeared after we left the Sanctuary or if she might have still been trapped back there!"
Subaru blinked. "Didn't you even count heads before you escaped?! " He asked incredulously.
Otto had a pained look on his face. "Why would we?! " Otto protested weakly. "The only Ryuzu that was awake was Alpha and she was sitting right next to me! The other Ryuzus were either blank slates that could only follow instructions or they were fast asleep! We didn't realize that there was even a possibility that Gamma might wake up! Much less that she might just … wander off without even talking to anyone!"
Otto hesitated. "Beta told me that… she thought that maybe I'd scared her off," He confessed, hanging his head in shame. "She said that Gamma would have sensed the changes in me the moment that she woke up and that she might have panicked…"
"Otto," Delta whispered, rubbing his hand. "Even if that did happen, it wouldn't be your fault."
Otto shook his head. "Delta, I don't know if 'fault' really matters," Otto mourned. "She's still out there and she might be in danger and it might all be because of me ! "
"This theory seems highly unlikely to me. I doubt that Gamma would have been afraid of you," Alpha mused in a whisper. "Unlike Beta, Gamma's notes always suggested that she thought highly of you and enjoyed your company, Otto. Although she admitted to experiencing great confusion when you attempted to 'romance' her."
Otto flushed and gave Delta a guilty smile.
Delta frowned, looking confused.
Alpha continued, "Gamma had no reason to distrust you in spite of the aforementioned changes. She would certainly have asked you or myself questions before she decided to flee. And I could never believe that under any circumstances, Gamma would simply abandon her sisters if she truly believed that Otto was a danger to us. "
"Changes? What changes?" Subaru asked, struggling to follow the conversation.
Alpha seemed thoughtful. "When I brought Otto to the Ryuzu Meyer facility," She replied. "He touched the crystal that held the body of our forbearer: The original Ryuzu Meyer. Somehow, Otto must have received the favor of our dearly departed Lady because Otto became one of her Apostles. From that moment on, he had the power to command my sisters as he wished and we would have no choice but to obey. "
Emilia 's face was horrified. "What do you mean that you would have to obey him?! " She demanded.
Otto blanched at Emilia 's furious expression.
"We are bound by the magic that animates us," Alpha said calmly. "Our Lady's Apostles can order us as they please."
Subaru frowned. "That sounds… potentially dangerous," Subaru said slowly. He cast a hard look at Otto.
Otto looked crestfallen.
"Oh, don't worry about that, Mister Subaru," Delta replied cheerfully. "My Otto is a wonderful man. He never orders me to serve him. Except when we're role-playing," She amended.
Otto flushed bright red and Subaru slapped his own forehead.
Emilia stared at Delta. "…What does that mean?" Emilia asked in confusion.
"Oh!" Delta said brightly. "You see, some nights we-"
"No!" Subaru cut her off. "No. We are not going there!"
Emilia looked at Subaru in confusion. "Subaru, what-"
"We'll talk about it later, Mili," Subaru sighed. "Maybe," He amended.
Otto looked blindly grateful to Subaru for changing the subject while Delta just looked disappointed.
Alpha, as usual, looked utterly apathetic.
"In any event," Alpha continued. "We all fled the Sanctuary. After spending a short time in Arlem, we found the goods which young Otto had been forced to abandon to make sufficient room in his wagon to carry the villagers away from Petelguese. To Otto's surprise and relief, the goods were still intact.
"We determined that staying in Arlem any longer would be most unwise, especially now that all of us were awake at the same time and all of the Ryuzu homunculi were with us as well. We could not hope to sustain the illusion of our 'singleness' any longer and we feared how the people of the Sanctuary might react upon discovering that we had been deceiving them for generations.
"Otto offered to bring us home with him as he considered all of us to be his family now. We agreed and so we brought the goods back to Picoutatte and completed Otto's contracted delivery. We three and all of the Ryuzu homunculi took up residence beneath Otto's shop and here we've remained ever since. Since we're all awake at once now, we've begun exploring ways to differentiate ourselves," Alpha picked at her gold pendant.
"Yeah!" Delta said. "What do you think of the clothes you designed?" She posed.
Subaru blinked. "That I designed?! " He asked.
"Don't you remember?" Otto sounded surprised. "You gave me the designs before we separated. I figured I could make a big splash in the clothing market."
Subaru stared at Delta 's outfit. I designed that? Seriously?
Subaru rubbed his forehead for a moment. "OK, let's try to stay on topic. So, if I have this straight, Gamma is the Ryuzu that Garf saw riding my dragon away from the Sanctuary. "
Alpha nodded. "So we believe. We have no proof but it seems to fit the facts as we understand them. We still do not know why she left or where she went. Beta has since returned to the Sanctuary in an attempt to locate Gamma's trail but she has not had any success so far."
Subaru debated with himself for a few moments and then mentally shrugged. "Well, I can help you out with one of those anyway, " Subaru made a rueful expression. "I don't why she left you guys but I can tell you where she went. Gamma went to the Elior Forest. Why she went there or where she went after that, I have no idea but she definitely went there. "
Otto and Delta both stiffened. "How do you know that?" Delta demanded, leaning forward intently.
"Because that's where I found my dragon," Subaru replied. He thought for a moment. "Hey, Gamma wouldn't happen to be a witch by any chance, would she?"
Otto and both of the Ryuzus stared at Subaru for a long moment.
"What a weird question," Delta muttered.
"Lord Subaru," Alpha whispered, her face unusually intent. "…Why would you ask such a question?"
Subaru sighed. "I met a girl in the Elior Forest who told me that she was a witch. And I think that maybe my dragon recognized her. She called herself 'Korë.'"
Alpha leaned back. "Korë?" She murmured.
"Did she look like us?" Delta asked intently.
Subaru shook his head. "I couldn't tell. She was using magic to conceal herself, wrapping herself in… shadows or something like it. I couldn't see her face and I couldn't even tell you if she was Ryuzu-sized, or Emilia-sized, or Garfiel-sized. That's how hard it was to see her."
The Ryuzus were both silent for a moment, their expressions pensive. Finally, Alpha raised her head. "I know the name 'Korë' from the Lady's library. It comes from a language that originated very far away from here. I 'm uncertain if anyone would know this name who did not have access to the Lady's archives."
Subaru frowned. "Then… would Gamma call herself that?"
Alpha mulled the question over. "Lord Subaru, in truth, I had been worried about Gamma for many years. When young Garf was still a child and shortly after his sister had departed from the Sanctuary, he sought to pass the Witch's Trials, most likely out of a desperate attempt to prove his masculinity," She said matter-of-factly.
Yup, that sounds like Garf. Was I ever that bad at his age?
…Yeah. I probably was…
"Young Garf was screaming in agony from the visions that the trial afflicted him with," Alpha continued.
Emilia and Otto both flinched.
Alpha continued. "Gamma adores young Garf and she could not bear to see him suffer so. She ran into the Tomb and attempted to pull him out. This violates one of our most sacred laws. We were warned to never enter into the Witch 's Tomb or it might damage us."
"And Gamma was 'damaged?'" Subaru asked.
Alpha hesitated for a long time.
Finally, she sighed. "I am… uncertain. It was subtle but she was never quite the same after that. The letters which she wrote to us became… colder and more distant. I recall that after she entered the tomb, she reported that she felt… something slip inside of her. "
"Like what?" Subaru asked.
"She was not certain," Alpha replied. "Nor am I. But the Ryuzu Meyer facility was created with the purpose to allow our Lady to obtain immortality by possessing a new body. Namely, one of ours. The experiment was ruled a failure but…" She trailed off.
Subaru frowned. "But… your 'lady' is long dead, right?"
"Our Lady is a witch, Subaru," Delta replied in an unusually somber voice. "Witches don't die the way that we do…"
Subaru stiffened. "I think that… Korë said something like that too. In fact, I think that she mentioned that witches can possess other individuals and that she had just woken up when the Sanctuary was breached."
"Lord Subaru," Alpha said, her quiet voice strangely intense. "I beseech you. Please tell us everything that this 'Korë' said to you."
Subaru thought about it. "Well… not much to be honest. She said that she wanted to work with me. She has some kind of 'Grand Design' in mind and apparently, she needs my help with it. She wouldn't tell me what it was. She told me how to lift Emilia 's curse and that saving Emilia would be my test to see if I had the power to help her."
Subaru hesitated. "She also told me that most of the Witches aren't actually dead , they 've just been sealed away or they're sleeping or something like that. And she said that some of them are beginning to wake up…"
The two Ryuzus stared at one another with looks of deep concern on their faces. For a moment, the pair looked almost identical.
"Lord Subaru," Alpha whispered, "There is another matter. When Beta returned to the Sanctuary, she fortunately discovered that all of the Lady's apparatuses and devices appeared to be intact and functional."
Subaru nodded. "That's good."
"But the Lady's magnum opus has been… reconfigured," Alpha continued.
"Her what?" He asked.
"One of the Lady's proudest achievements was her Mammon Machine," Alpha explained.
"A machine?" Subaru frowned.
Alpha nodded. "The Sanctuary has many of our Lady's most elaborate and complex devices and the Mammon Machine is by far the largest."
Subaru frowned. A witch that makes machines? Wow. I wonder how those work.
Are they based on gears or maybe something more complex like microchips? Or are they using magic to bypass either structure?
Damn, I 'd love to get a look at these machines!
Meanwhile, Alpha was continuing her story, "She claimed that the Great Machine was a device that could absorb unfathomable energy from the heart of Chaos."
"The what?" Subaru asked.
Alpha thought for a moment and then shrugged. "I am no more equipped to explain than you are to understand."
"Hey!" Subaru protested.
"Alpha!" Delta hissed, casting an anxious look at Subaru.
Alpha cocked her head curiously. "Did I say something wrong?" She asked in a placid voice.
Subaru closed his eyes and sighed. "Never mind, Alpha. Keep going."
Alpha gathered her thoughts and continued. "Our Lady claimed that the Chaos that lies beyond this world was the source of power for the Authorities just as the Od Laguna is the source of power for Divine Blessings. What this 'Chaos' truly is and if the Lady was correct in her analysis are matters to which I can only speculate. Nonetheless, the Mammon Machine is functional and it does indeed draw vast amounts of power from… somewhere . "
"Alright, so it's absorbing lots of power. What is it doing with it?" Subaru asked.
Alpha shook her head. "We can not be certain. Traditionally, the Mammon Machine has been left in largely a state of hibernation, gathering just enough power to provide energy to the various other machines located in the Witch's sanctum within the Sanctuary as well as to my sisters and myself. However, at some time during or immediately following our evacuation of the Sanctuary, someone entered the Lady's hidden Sanctum and proceeded to reprogram the machine. "
"The Witch Cult?" Subaru asked sharply.