All these fruitless exchanges have taken place here, in this resplendent castle. The glitter of the chandelier on the ceiling feels so hollow now. This all went exactly the same five days ago.
I’m sure that magician by the door is wondering when this is going to stop already. If so, I wish he’d voice those thoughts, because I want to be done with this too.
At this point I have to wonder whether Rockmann isn’t doing this just to publicly harass me.
Concerned that those events in the past might be having at least some effect on our present, I once dropped by the school together with Satanás and Benjamine to check, and found that there was no record kept of us ever working as assistant teachers there. The principal’s daily reports from the day of the entrance ceremony and the following several days only mentioned three students getting bitten by a prycle on the day after the ceremony, and how the principal got scolded by the vice-principal for it. That’s it.
Those three students were Rockmann, Treyse, and me.
You could say the future has changed to an extent, but the powers of the Time Keeper have kept the changes minimal. I regret worrying so much about something so trifling, now that I’m getting picked on like this.
I pout. In the first place, what’s up with stabbing your own chest, anyway? The duchess should chew him out real harsh for that one. I mention it to Rockmann, trying to shift the conversation away from hounding me.
“That again?” He holds his forehead. “Would you stop changing the subject? Sigh... This isn’t going anywhere... Cammel, can you get us some tea?”
The man behind Rockmann leaves the room.
“The questioning stops today, for the time being. With that in mind, try to recall your conversation with her again.”
“Your ‘questioning’ turned into something else a long time ago in my mind,” I reply.
As the door clinks open, the magician returns with tea, which he places on the table without a word.
“She just won’t stop quibbling, yeah?” Rockmann asks his subordinate.
“I-If you say so, sir...”
“Who’s the one quibbling here?” I mutter, reaching out for my cup.
Still, if this really is the last time, I guess I can try to recall what the Ice Ancient said to me once more. First she told me she’s one of the ancients. Then she showed me how Städal was born. Finally, she told me how one shouldn’t create life. I’ve already reported all of this. Rockmann said I don’t have to bring up the spirit of Ice previously being deep underwater in the Land of the Sea, as that has to do with my mother, so we’re setting that aside for now.
I told him on the very first day how exactly Städal was born, so that leaves...
“But after one thousand years, that curse...”
I gasp, then stop leaning on the sofa and straighten my back.
“Oh yeah.”
“Did you remember something?” asks Rockmann, sipping his tea.
I take a sip myself, then tell him something I completely forgot about.
“She told me that, due to Städal’s curse, no child can be born of a union of fire- and ice-types.”
Rockmann does a glorious spit take. He coughs over and over as he wipes his mouth.
“You okay?” I ask him.
I feel like I saw a rainbow in his sprayed tea.
He furrows his eyebrows and looks to be in pain, but raises his hand and replies, “I’m okay.” Perhaps to cleanse his palate, he sips his tea again, holding his chest.
It’s pretty embarrassing to remember something after I insisted for so long that I’d told him everything. I quietly apologize.
Collecting myself, I continue.
“But it looks like the curse is lifted, so she said fire- and ice-types should get along and it’ll be fine.”
“Pffft!”
Another spit take. A bigger one this time.
Rockmann pounds on his chest and furrows his eyebrows. Is he really okay? I look at him with worry, concerned he might be ill.
Maybe the demon’s magic has made him unable to drink tea? Or he got a throat sickness after strangling himself in the past? Could any of that be causing this?
I insist as much, but he shakes his head in denial. Then what is it...?
“So, uhh, that might be partially why there’s so few ice-types? Because they have a harder time leaving offspring.”
“Ah... Yeah.” He coughs some more and gets up. “I’m fine now, thanks.” Cammel rubs him on the back. “Looks like there’s really nothing else, so I won’t ask anymore.”
“Um, you sure? I just remembered that, so I might remember something else.”
“I don’t think there’s anything left.”
What’s come over him now, after all the persistent questioning? This is kind of anticlimactic.
Rockmann looks strangely tired.
“What’s with you...?” I mumble as I leave the room.
A knight in a white uniform tells me he’ll take me downstairs, so I follow his back.
I stop by Benjamine’s house on my way back. She asks how things went today, I answer, and she does a spit take with her tea just like Rockmann. This is my third time seeing one today. I start genuinely worrying she might be affected by a demon or something too, but she flicks my forehead and calls me an idiot. Ouch.
After Benjamine explains what was so weird about what I said, I realize for the first time how outrageous it was, and plop my head down on the table without a word.