Fort Geranium

Seventh Chapter: Confrontation

[Mariana von Ulysses’s Point of View]

“Heh, I’m honestly surprised how quickly this escalated,” whispered a small black bird that nonchalantly took its throne upon my right shoulder. “I mean, it was such a breakneck change of scenery from peaceful afternoon shopping to full on confrontation.”

“I’m aware,” I gave a short retort as I eyed the three figures before me. Children really, though the fact that they weren’t exactly ‘human’ complicated things a little. The one in the center with a cocky little grin on his face seemed to be the leader of the bunch. A little brat with black hair and blood colored irises, although he seemed like he was around the same age as me I couldn’t really tell with these ‘non-human’ types. Perhaps it was due to his background race, but he let off a rather formidable and threatening aura. He smirked at me as if he just saw a premium piece of stake on the floor, a sentiment irked me a little.

For a kid to come close to making me feel some sort of anxiety- especially since I wasn’t really the emotional type- I had to commend him for it. However the same could not be said for the two other children hiding behind the first, giggling away like awkward schoolgirls. To his left was a bloated brat, almost twice my size in width, I wasn’t sure if it was because that was the traits of his race or if he was just ‘well-fed’. The one to the right was about the same size as the leader, if not a little scrawny.

I wasn’t sure of the exact species these children belonged to though I was sure that they were non-human. For starters the one in the middle- their leader- sprouted two black wings from his back and a thin black tail. The other two also had similar, non-human traits like horns on the fat one and shark-like teeth on the scrawny one.

So then, why was I here facing off against this small group of non-human bullies? The short answer was because their initial appearances intrigued me. Kind of like stray off the course when you see something fascinating while visiting a zoo. The proper answer was because they happened to be something that I had a little problem with.

I took a quick glance behind me. There was a small child, also conveniently around the same age as me, though the rags she wore looked considerably more ragged than mine. I didn’t want to make assumptions, but judging by her long and sharp ears, blonde hair, green eyes and baby-like face, she was probably from the ‘Elf’ race. She looked up to me with those two large, teary eyes, pleading for me to save her. Ugh, I couldn’t stop myself from walking away from something so cute. I mean you wouldn’t leave a puppy that was wondering around by itself in the rain while it was being picked on by vultures, right?

Well, it was kind of like that for me. “P- please… help…” she pleaded as she grabbed a hold of my cloak. Two little figures danced upon each of my shoulders, a small devil and a small angel.

“Hey, we should help her!” spoke the angel.

“I agree! We can’t just leave the poor girl to fend off for herself!” it seems the devil was somehow in agreement. Though if I had to say, there was probably an ulterior motive of what to do with her after I ‘saved’ her. In any case, I suppose we’ve come to a conclusion on the matter.

“Don’t worry, I’ll take care of this little problem for you~” I replied to the poor girl as I took off my cloak. After all that’s said and done however, this place was still within the domain of the Ulysses dukedom. This means that everyone within this place was technically supposed to be under our protection. Judging by the clothes of the three demonic children, they were probably nobles of some other segment of the larger Scarletheim Empire. “I can’t just stand around while my innocent people are being bullied in our domain.”

I walked forward towards the children, cracking my knuckles with a smirk on my face. Demon or not, these kids were still children. “Heh~ you think a girl could take on three of us?” the leader of the three spoke.

“Oh, you plan to fight three-on-one? Well, if that’s how you demons like to play, then I can’t say that I’m all that impressed.” I dismissed them.

“Tch, fine… stay out of the way you two. I’ll take on this bitch by myself,” the leader spoke as he moved forward, his smirk slowly shifting into a displeased frown.

“Children shouldn’t swear you know? Especially if you’re part of a noble family; it’s terribly inelegant.” I retorted.

“You know, it’s not like I’m complaining or anything but do you actually know how to fight?” the black bird, Aegis, asked me. I don’t know why he even needed to ask since he should’ve known everything about me at this point.

“Aegis… I’ve been a florist for the past 10 years of my previous life, so obviously I do.” I replied with a sarcastic whisper. Though I couldn’t say I would’ve run away from a challenge, there was never any chance for someone in my position to get into an actual fist fight. That being said, I did have one thing going for me.

“Bitch!” the leader-brat ran straight for me and with a level of stoicism only readily available to front-line, veteran soldiers I stood there, taking it like a man. He punched me straight across the cheeks, “heh! How do you like that bitch?!” honestly, he should’ve been using this time to kick me or continue assaulting me while I was preoccupied, instead of gloating like some cartoon mob villain.

That being said, his punch did genuinely hurt. I tasted a hint of liquid iron slush through my mouth for a bit before I decided to spit out the mouthful of blood. There were two reasons as to why I decided to take that first hit. The first was because I was curious in how strong these non-humans were. Suffice it to say, while they were stronger than the average human child, it wasn’t by all that huge of a margin.

The second, more important, reason was because I wanted to feel it for myself… the pain. See, I’m obviously not what anyone could call a ‘typical’ child. The fact that I could still calmly analyze my surroundings and situation even after taking a hit that made me bleed to this extent was proof of that. However the biggest ‘advantage’ I held was the fact that concepts of ‘pain’ and ‘mortality’ became relative.

It was because I’ve already experienced ‘death’, brutally at that. It was akin to how you couldn’t trip a paraplegic, or how it was impossible to verbally torment someone who was deaf. No amount of physical pain in the world would trump the actual experience of being brutally murdered, much less the puny punch of some mewling brat. This set up was almost comical to me; yeah, it still hurts but I’ve endured something infinitely worse. Knowing that I couldn’t help but let out a smirk as I stood back up, “eh… four out ten… is it my turn already?” I asked as I rubbed the trickling blood from the corner of my mouth.

Without waiting for an answer I quickly moved in for a counterattack. In an attempt to predict my moves the leader-brat held his hands and arms forward to cover his face. I was never a fighter, but it was amazing how many openings you could see if you had a clear mind. ‘Anger dulls the blade,’ those words rang in my mind. Taking advantage of his preemptive actions I decided to attack a little lower and swept his legs over.

“What the-?!” he shouted as he fell backwards. At this point I had two choices ahead of me: continue my assault while he was down or take this opportunity to retreat. While I was confident in my ability to take hits, it was clearly at a disadvantageous situation. I quickly turned back to the beaten elf child and grabbed her hand.

“Let’s go!” I ordered as I pulled her up.

“A- ah… okay,” she nodded meekly, but her grasp on my hands were tight. We rushed past the alleyways and through all sorts of vendor stalls in order to make our escape as efficient as possible. With every glance I took behind me, we had gotten a little further ahead. Eventually we took a sneaky turn into one of the side alleys and managed to lose them completely.

“Hah… haah… I… I think we lost them,” I commented with haggard breaths as I tried to peer out onto the shopping district. “Yup, I don’t see them.”

After making complete sure that those demon brats weren’t anywhere near, I turned back to check up on the condition of the elf girl. I tried to pull back her cloak to see her face a little more clearly but she immediately flinched back in a desperate hurry. “Ah! Ah… s- sorry… I won’t do it again!” she apologized as she crouched down near a corner.

“Huh? No, you don’t have to apologize for anything… umm, are you okay?” I asked.

“Y- yes… thank you very much for saving me… um,” not knowing my name she trailed off.

“Mariana, that’s my name,” as I saw the feeble Elven girl cowering in a corner like a scared deer I offered her a hand. “What’s your name?” she stared back at me for a good few seconds before answering with that stuttered and unconfident tone of voice.

“U- umm… my name is… Char… ‘Charlotte’,” she slowly reached for my hand. Upon just the slightest bit of touch she retracted but as I kept it there and waited patiently she started to grow ever so slightly confident. Eventually she took my hand and stood back up.

“I see, Charlotte, is it? That’s a nice name,” I honestly do think that’s a pretty name- not to say that ‘Mariana’ was any less.

“T- thank you.”

“Hmm, what to do now…” I peered back into the shopping district, those brats were gone but now I was lost. Not only was I unfamiliar to this place, Carol would probably extremely pissed right about now. “Ugh, I can just imagine her angered face…” I commented to myself.

“Her?” Charlotte asked.

“Ah, it’s nothing. Anyway, what about you? Are your parents…” I was going to ask where her parents were but given the state she was in and her ragged clothes it was highly unlikely she had any. “Do you have anywhere you need to be?” I asked instead.

Charlotte turned away for a brief moment before hesitatingly opening her mouth, “um… the slaver’s guild.” At that word I grimaced, but didn’t say anything else about it. ‘Slavery’ that this kind of system existed in this world should have been obvious to me just from the context alone, yet being locked up in a luxurious mansion I had forgotten. I wanted to kick myself for being so selfishly absorbed into my own fantasy until now.

My opinions on slavery aside, this girl were probably not going to last much if she went back there. “Hey, uh,” this was a rather awkward question but one that had to be asked, “do you already have a buyer?”

At my question she shook her head, “no… I, um, there was an auction tomorrow…”

“Hmm, I see…” a thought flashed into my mind. There was a good chance that slavery was a natural thing in this world where most people probably didn’t even bat an eye for it. As long as they weren’t slaves they lived their own lives, at least that’s how it was for me. From my twenty-first century high horse, I could say that slavery was bad, but for these people it was a way of life and something unlikely to change at any time.

As much as I wanted to, as a mere seven year old I had no power to help them. However that story could be tweaked a little if I were to abuse the position of my father as the duke of this realm.

“Lady Mariana! Lady Mariana?!” it was a Christmas miracle that I could hear in the distant Carol’s desperate shouts. I was very happy that she was so worried for my sake but at the same time I thought she was being a little dumb to so loudly call out for the daughter of the realm’s duke out in the open like that. “Lady Mariana?!”

I peeked out onto the side and softly called out to her, “Psst! Carol, this way,” I ushered her into the small side alley.

“Lady Mariana?! Where have you been all this time?!” the first thing she did was strike me, the lord’s daughter, on the head as punishment for worrying her. She just as quickly embraced me. I felt the rapid thumping of her heart slowly calm down as she clung onto me. “Serious… I was so worried.”

“Aha, sorry Carol,” I felt her hands wrapping around me even tighter. “I can see that you were worried and I’m truly sorry but I think if you don’t let go I’ll probably choke to death…”

“Ah! My apologizes!” she quickly let go. She let out a hearty sigh and finally she noticed the dirt ragged cloaked elephant in the alleyway. “This is?”

“Apparently a slave girl that’s to be on auction tomorrow.”

“My, how terrible, and she’s so young too… poor thing,” Carol took out a small handkerchief and wiped away some of the dirt and blood that covered Charlotte’s face.

“Her name’s Charlotte… hey Carol could we-”

“Absolutely not!” she rejected my question before I even got the chance to finish it. I mean, it was obvious as to what the question would be but still, she didn’t have to reject it so outright. I wanted to take Charlotte back with us to make her a maid back at the mansion or something but that offer was shot down. Well! Time to abuse my father’s authority, I mean that’s what noble daughters are supposed to do, right?

“Carol. I’m sure my father would agree to my requests,” I replied in an almost sarcastic tone.

“Ugh… f- fine, but we’ll have to do this the proper way. We’ll have to return this girl back to the slaver’s guild and then purchase her legitimately.”

“That’s why I love you, Carol,” I replied with a smile.