The Quantum Wanderer

Next morning, after the girls and I have some fun, we go down for breakfast. Her parents are already there, eating.

We sit down. In a little while, the food starts coming. Charles is looking at the amount of food placed on the table. We all start eating. Charles looks at the steaks that are being served to him and to us, and he notices that they are a bit different. He whispers something in her ear. I can hear that, because of my improved hearing.

“C, why is our food different?”

She tells him in a low volume.

“Pa, the stuff we are eating would be bad for you. It has too much mana.”

I smile. Lucille is just devouring her plate, as if it was her last meal on Andrea. Apparently Charles is going to be harder to work with. I let Cecilia handle the situation. I don’t know if inviting them over was a good idea after all.

He looks at Muninn and Huginn, they are also consuming their share of kraken. Charles whispers back at Cecilia.

“But even the birds are eating it, it is not poisonous, right?”

“Ok, pa. Have your way. Don’t blame me on how you are going to be like later today. And tomorrow, for that matter.”

Cecilia shares her steak with her father. I gesture to Rudolph, and ask him to get some more kraken meat prepared for them. I am not going to cuddle.

The first time they try the mana rich meat, they have this pleasure expression. As expected.

“By the gods! This is…” He stops talking and puts another piece in his mouth. He finishes chomping on it, and swallows. “This is absolutely incredible… What is this?”

Lucille is making all sorts of expressions. She had been shooting daggers at him with her eyes for a long time. At some point, she just gave up. Charles didn’t even notice, he has been looking everywhere but her face. Too many new things, plates, food, chairs. I answer his question.

“It is kraken.”

“What is a kraken?” He asks, mid chomps.

“Do you know what a giant octopus is?”

“Yes.”

“Well, kraken is one of those, but big. Really big.”

He stops eating for a moment, then looks at me.

“How did you buy this meat?”

“CHARLES!!” “FATHER!!” Both Lucille and Cecilia interject at the same time. I raise my hand, this is actually fun. Although the questions are a little rude, they are of a sincere rudeness. I will trade malicious politeness with sincere rudeness any day of the week.

“I hunted it.”

At this point, Lucille is shaking her head, and Cecilia slaps herself on the forehead. Her father ignores them.

“How big are they? How did you hunt it?”

“Well, that one, with the tentacles… I don’t know, perhaps close to 900 feet? As for the how I hunted, it was… Complicated. I got hurt in the fight, but everything turned out fine.”

“900 feet? Where could something this big be?”

“In the middle of the ocean. The ocean can be pretty deep. That spot was a little over 6 miles deep.”

“But, but… but… HOW?”

“I had a good magic teacher, so I learned a trick or two.”

He looks back at his plate, and increases the speed he is eating. I decide to remind him that these things are a secret.

“Just please don’t mention these things with anyone, we keep this kind of information under wraps. I want to avoid people coming after us.”

“Of course.” He puts his right hand over his heart, making a solemn face. “But… did you already have someone after you?”

“There were a couple of spies here and there. It is expected, they wanted to investigate the owners of this place.” I answer, while smiling.

“Where are we?”

“We are in Ironhold, Pa.”

“Ironhold? But we were going towards Orora. And even that was going to be a several days trip. How are we in Ironhold?”

“There are a couple of tricks that I was taught in magic. Again, please don’t comment on this with others.”

“Of course. What adventurer tag are you?”

“We are all mithril.”

He turns to Cecilia, now a mix of pride and joy.

“Even you, C?”

She takes out her mithril tag, and shows him.

“Wow! Congratulations!”

Lucille is happy with this as well. She is smiling while nodding at Cecilia. There is this happy silence while Lucille and Charles are digesting all the information they just collected.

“Cecilia, are you not going to invite your sisters to the wedding?” Lucille asks.

“You know I can’t, ma. Not after all that happened.”

“Do you have sisters, Cecs?” I ask. Everyone is now staring at Cecilia.

“Yesss… But there was this huge fight, 5 years ago. In our village, girls get married really early, and I wanted to be an adventurer. While ma and pa supported me, my other 2 sisters felt that I wasn’t helping the family enough when I said I didn’t want to get married. I had some proponents, but I wanted to follow my own path before deciding on that.”

“Was that enough to stop talking with them?”

She makes a face to me, as if this was a really stupid question.

“You do realize that marriage is a serious thing, right? On their side, they just went with the flow, but I skipped on that.”

I stop to think for a moment. This is a different land. Divorces here just don’t happen. And women don’t really have all the rights. Not even men have all the rights, only nobles actually do. Of course, things vary a little on the country, but there is no country that would have as many rights as on Earth.

I can see that the sisters would get pissed that she wouldn’t conform. Cecilia continues.

“Besides, there is no way they would be able to keep their mouths shut. You would have to end up killing additional spies.”

Charles face is an inquisitive one.

“Killing spies?”

“Yes, pa. What did you think happened to the spies we caught?”

He takes a more formal stance. He looks at me. I smile and shrug. 

“Oh.”

Lucille plays a little bit with her final piece of steak. After some silence, we go to living room.

I feel Rajesh’s Comm Gem vibrating. I distance myself a little bit, and I answer him.

“Good morning, Rajesh.”

“Good morning, friend! How are you?”

“We are well. How are you?”

“We are well as well, friend. I heard there was a group of dragons outside the land of dragons… Was it you?”

“Actually, yes. Don’t worry. Anyway… What can I do for you?”

“It’s actually what we can do for you! We are a week away from the wedding, right?”

“Yes.”

“I was talking with lord Dávrin, can we have your bachelor party tomorrow?”

I look at the girls, and they nod. I look at Charles.

“We can. Can I bring Cecilia’s father?”

“Of course, friend!”

Charles is looking at my hands, then at me.

“Is that a Comm Gem?”

“Yes. It is the way I talk to with some friends.”

“I never thought I would ever see one. Do you have any idea on how rare they are?”

I giggle a little.

“I think I have an idea, yes. But if you want to look check this one instead.”

I hand him the one that the girls and I use.

“This pendant is absolutely wonderful. How does it work?”

“You pour some mana into it, with intention. It can either shake or carry your sounds to the other Comm Gem.”

Cecilia takes hers out, and hold it in her hand. The one in Charles’ hands shake.

“Wow, this is so cool. It is a pity they are so expensive. Normally, not even nobles have them.”

I smile and shrug. He hands my Comm Gem back to me. A short silence settles. After that, I turn to him and Cecilia.

“Cecs, what do you say you take them to get some better clothes? Do you have coin on you? There is going to be the bachelor party tomorrow, with Rajesh, Dávrin and the others.”

“Sure.”

I pick a platinum coin, and put in her hand.

“There, this should be more than enough.”

She looks at it.

“Sometimes even I forget how off the normal we are. Did you just hand me a platinum?”

“It’s ok, I got a couple of them from the giant squid quest a couple of days ago. Besides, you know how expensive those things are in the noble district, right?”

She shrugs.

“As you wish, my villain…” She smiles with that quirky expression that I love.

I turn to the other girls.

“So, what are we going to do today?”

“My lord, shouldn’t you invite your other men friends to the bachelor party?”

“That is actually a good idea, “ Muninn agrees and continues “I have to spread out tales of sir Shitaton.”

“Who is that?” Charles asks.

“It’s a tale I learned recently, of a knight that defended his family against dragons.”

“It sounds interesting!”

Cecilia and I are staring at Muninn, with a sour face. He knows exactly what he is doing. I cough, to distract everyone. I turn to Muninn.

“Is Leopold available?”

Muninn opens his four eyes, then close them, concentrating.

“He is, father.”

I open a small portal, just enough to let my voice through.

“Leopold?”

“Oh, hi, Marcelo. What is going on?”

“I was told by Rajesh that he and Dávrin are preparing a bachelor party for tomorrow. Do you want to come?”

“Sure. Would bringing Aymon ruin the mood or something?”

“I don’t really see how.”

“Ok. We are going to be ready. I will let the guild know.”

“Great. See you tomorrow.”

I close the portal. I was thinking of visiting him, but it wasn’t needed, apparently. I am imagining that he must be really busy, with his new responsibilities and all.

Next one to invite is Andrew. I do the same. I ask Muninn to check if he is alone, available to talk and proceed with the invitation. He also accepts it.

The girls decide to spend the day with me. We take this very long walk through the city. Funny enough, it is not something we do often. The day goes faster than expected. The girls are not particularly interested on any shopping. The thing they value most is food, and we have the best one in the planet available at home.  It is not like it can get better than this. We just watch everything, and enjoy a bit of local tourism.

We visit the guild a little bit, and then visit the new church of Wrax, has been recently remodeled. It is a lot more imposing now. We pass by the door, and the priest is going on with his speech. He is the same person I had helped on the aftermath of the dragon parade. When he realizes it is me in the crowd, I put my index on my mouth, indicating that I don’t want him to say anything. We leave the chuch, and move forward.

Time passes way faster than I expected, and at some point it is already time to go back home. We go back. Cecilia is not back yet, the girls and I go up to wash up, we play a little bit. We get ready for dinner.

Cecilia arrives with her parents. Each of them is carrying a big bag, with a lot of stuff. They are talking very excitedly. Rudolph comes by with a couple of maids, that take the packages from them. They are going to organize those in their room.

Cecilia sees that we are already washed up.

“I will clean up and get ready for dinner, my villain.”

They split going, their way.

During dinner, Charles and Lucille end up eating too much kraken meat, and they get drunk on mana. Cecilia carries them upstairs, and we all retire for the night.

Next morning, we again all meet at breakfast. Charles and Lucille are not looking good. They have some mana hangover.

“Good morning!”

Charles massages his head, that is hurting. Lucille has both elbows on the table, she is massaging the sides of her head, looking at her plate.

“Good morning. Do you know why I am like this? I didn’t even drink yesterday…”

“It was the meat. You have a mana intoxication. You ate more kraken at dinner than at breakfast.At some point, we replaced the meats with something with a smaller amount of mana. With your level, it might become dangerous.”

Charles is now looking with some suspicion towards the kraken meat.

“So, what will it be today? More kraken or just Fenrir? The way Roberta cooks, I guarantee you are going to love the Fenrir.”

He sighs. Lucille doesn’t even move.

“Fenrir, please?”

We all eat. Charles and Lucille are both quiet. The dragonesses decide to go to knight school for the day, specially because I am going to have the bachelor party later on. Cecilia decides to stay behind because she is going to keep company to her mother.

In the living room,  I start to break the news to Charles.

“Charles, there are a couple of things that I have to mention… Things can start to feel weird from this point…”

He looks at me, a panicked expression.

“What would YOU consider weird?”

I giggle a little, to try to make him at ease.

“True, true, somethings in this house can be a little atypical…”

“Atypical?”

He gives this maniacal laugh. I let him calm down a bit.

“As I was saying, some friends are preparing a bachelor’s party for today.”

“That sounds like fun! Which whorehouse are you going to go?”

“It’s not so much of a whorehouse. One of my friends invited me to his home. But he is not human. He is a demon.”

Charles makes this face that this is not something he expected, but he doesn’t phreak out.

“You do realize there is a war going on, right?”

“I do, but I don’t see how this should affect me. It’s not like I am someone else’s property. I have nothing invested in this war. Why should I fight to get someone else rich? It is not like I am defending my home.

“Don’t get me wrong, I kill anyone that threatens me. Even if they don’t really pose a threat, I always say that if you are willing to kill, you should be willing to die. If another adventurer, even a steel tag, tries to kill me, it is going to be a fight to the death. I don’t care who he or she is.

“That being said, I don’t know if the demons did anything wrong. I don’t know who started this war. Considering what I know from the way the church behaves, they might have something to do with it.”

Charles is thinking about my words.

”This is way above stuff I think about… But… Isn’t this kind of treason?”

Cecilia and Lucille react at his question, same way they always do when he asks some stuff that is kind of rude. I don’t mind, though.

”Don’t worry, the people who would be concerned about that are in the know.”

”Alright. Anything else I should know?”

”Those guys have a tendency to treat me with a little bit too much of deference. But nothing you should worry about.”

”Ok.”

Cecilia looks at Huginn.

”Are you going to stay with us today, Huginn?”

”Sure, aunty.” She gets close to Muninn, and holds his beak with her paw. ”Just don’t forget, hubby, I also am connected to little brothers.”

Muninn sighs. He gestures with his right wing.

”Dear, when have I ever have any thoughts like that? Besides, just look how ugly  they are…”

We talk a little bit about the shopping they did the day before. Charles was complaining on the price of the clothes. Lucille was trying to hide her face. I explain to him not to worry about that.

Around noon, I decide to portal the other guys here. I ask Muninn, and he checks on Leopold and Aymon.

”Hi, good afternoon.”

”Good afternoon, Leopold, Aymon. This is Charles, he is Cecilia’s father, he is going to be coming with us today.”

“Are you bringing you future father in law to your bachelor party?” Aymon asks.

“Yes…? I didn’t know this could be an issue…?”

Leopold shrugs.

“It depends on what you intend to do.”

I tilt my head.

“I don’t think Rajesh and Dávrin prepared anything too lavish… Let’s check it out.  Anyway, let me open a portal to Andrew. He is coming with us.”

I turn to Muninn, and he opens the portal. After a moment, Andrew comes through.

“Good afternoon, lad. How are you?”

“I am well. How have you been?”

“I have been well too. You know my life, I decided on the slow side of things. Apparently, your opposite.”

He giggles a little.

“I have already told this to Cecilia, but believe it or not, I don’t go searching for problems. They just happen to happen. There were not a lot of cases where I got something because I just wanted to create waves.”

“Right…..”

“Anyway, this here is Cecilia’s father, Charles. This is Leopold and Aymon.” Cecilia and Lucille were in another room, so I ended up not introducing her.

“And this one is Andrew. He is a very close friend and mentor, actually.”

“No need for all this, lad. You didn’t even stay with me all that long before you came up with your bullshit magic.”

Andrew is shaking the others hands. When he is shaking Aymon’s, Aymon starts to stare at him.  Like he is seeing something impossible. After some time, Aymon can’t help.

“Did anyone ever mention to you that you really look like some statues of the previous hero? The likeness is uncanny…”

“Really? Wow…”

Leopold takes Aymon to a corner, and whispers something in his ear. He had a small silence spell in place, so I couldn’t really make out what they talked about. They just joined us after this quick exchange.

Andrew clears his throat.

“Lad, are all the missus ok with the bachelor party?”

 “Yes. Well, everything was talked about in front of them, so I am guessing that yes. The only one that the missus is laying down the law is Muninn.” I turn to him. “How does it feel to be wipped?”

We all laugh. Muninn lowers his head.

“Everyone is a fucking comedian…”

We laugh even more. I turn to Leopold.

“Leopold, do you have any news?”

“News? I think we already have had this conversation. What could have happened that you were not involved?”

“I don’t know… There must be stuff happening in Arthuria or the Holy Kingdom, right? They are huge countries…”

“Well, there is some interest in this small baronate in Shoria, that the Empire has been supporting… Do you happen to know anything about that?”

I shrug.

“You are going to scare Charles.”

“A little fear will be good for him.” He giggles. Charles interjects.

“I am right here.”

Leopold laughs some more.

“Can I assume that He is going to be at the wedding as well?”

“Yes.” I answer.

“Did you already tell him about the other participants in the wedding?”

“I mentioned you guys, and Rajesh and Sidhu.”

“Not the audience?” He starts laughing.

“Not yet. I am trying to bring him up to date slowly.”

Leopold looks at Muninn.

“You are way too quiet on this…”

Muninn shrugs.

“It’s not like they are needing my help… I already had some fun…”

I was going to answer to that, but then Rajesh’s Comm Gem vibrates in my bag. I take it out.

“Hello, friend! Are you ready?”