“You are what you eat.”

‘Crackle, Crackle, Bang!’ Her mouth quivering, she stood frozen. The sound of crackling and the sweltering heat crowded her senses. However, she took no notice of her seared flesh. Nor did she take notice of the hairs on her skin burning up. Or anything else except for the scene that laid before her eyes.

“Tell me what you eat and I will tell you who you are.”

Two silhouettes. One familiar, one not. One on the ground, the other above. The ominous and overbearing glow of the crimson flames which surrounded them. The child was young, yet she was forced to witness the sharp fangs dig and gnaw away at the flesh of her only family member.

“The pleasure of the table belongs to all ages, to all conditions, to all countries, and to all areas; it mingles with all other pleasures, and remains at last to console us for their departure.”

Long hair swayed with the fire as it stood up. At first glance it looked human, but anyone to see it would suggest otherwise. The young girl met eyes with the creature. Red and full of blood-lust, it stared back for a prolonged amount of time. But despite the intimidation, the young girl did not scream. Instinct perhaps, but something told her, ‘If you want to live, do not scream.’ And so, she held her mouth shut.

“Gah?!” Mari suddenly sprang up, sweat trickling down her neck and a bitter taste plaguing her tongue. Clutching her chest, she tried to slow down her rapid breathing and her out of control heart rate. “Hah… That dream again?” She coughed, frowning as she observed her clothing. Which had been drenched in sweat.

“I need to wash myself…” Pulling the sheets off her body, she slowly stood herself up. Not only had her clothes, which she had been sleeping in, become soaked, but the sheets on her bed had also been soaked. Meaning they would have to be washed as well later on.

It wasn’t rare for her to have this dream. The same one recounting a childhood memory she would rather forget. But the most inconvenient thing was that she would always sweat buckets whenever she had it. Mari lived with a maid, so she didn't have to clean them herself. However, she disliked inconveniencing her every time she had this dream.

Jumping off the large bed, she stood herself up and looked around her room. It was the same spacious room she had been living in for years, but it always felt unreal to her. Her past self would have never seen her to be able to live with such luxuries, in a mansion that no commoner would ever dream of acquiring. After taking off all her clothing, she opened the doors to her room and exited.

As she left, she immediately was met with a woman standing beside her door. “Did you have that dream again?” She asked with an overly polite tone, turning her head to look at Mari. The woman had long gray hair, but still looked incredibly young. And most notably, she wore a classic black and white maid outfit.

“Yes, I did. Sorry Taliyah, but can you take these?” Mari responded with a slight bit of shame sprinkled on her face. Held in her outstretched arms was the clothing she had slept in, which was quickly accepted by Taliyah. With a polite nod, she left with the clothing. Seeing Taliyah depart, Mari quickly headed over to the baths.

With a turn of the handle, water flowed out from the shower head. The ambient pitter-patters of the water drops helped drown out the still-resident sound of the fire crackling. Other than washing off all the sweat, this was the main reason she always took a shower after having that dream.

The shower was powered by a mana crystal, allowing warm water to trickle down her skin and steam to fill the entire bathroom. Mari wished she could have gone into the baths instead. However, she didn’t have the day free to do whatever she wanted so after thoroughly cleaning her body, she turned the shower off and left.

Grabbing a towel, she wrapped it around her body and picked up her toothbrush. Raising her head, she met her own gaze in the mirror. Or at least, that should have happened. Her lazy eyes shot wide open as the gaze she met was not her own but the creature from her dream. Standing where her reflection should, it stared at her with the same red and blood-thirsty eyes from the dream.

“Guh-!” Mari flinched as the toothbrush in her mouth nearly fell out of her hand. She only barely catched it before quickly turning back to the mirror. But the only thing remaining there was her own reflection, as there originally should have been. “What the hell?” she muttered as she quickly finished brushing her teeth and left the bathroom.

“Am I tired or something?” Woken up because of the dream, she had been forced to awake earlier than originally intended. But even with the premature wake-up, it still wasn’t much of a difference compared to how long she was going to have slept originally. Was it really enough to make her see something like that? She certainly hadn’t had that happening to her before, which gave her a bad feeling which she quickly shook off.

As Mari walked through the hallway, she looked out from one of the many windows. Many men and some women as well were spread about the court. The most notable thing about them was the matching knight’s armour they all wore, the swords they held and the poor training dummies that were exposed to the wrath of said swords. Despite it still being fairly early, they all looked incredibly energetic. “I’ll quickly get suited up and head down.” Mari commented after seeing them, before heading over to her room once more.

. . .

Two men wearing full knight’s armour stood on the side of the court, looking out onto the other knights and chatting away. “Rookie, what do you think of Captain Mari?” Looking towards the other, one of them asked.

“Captain Mari huh..?” The rookie paused to think before continuing, “I haven’t been here for very long, so there isn’t much I can say. What I would say is… I’m glad I’m on her side and not the enemy’s.” He hadn’t been under Captain Mari for long, so there were only a few things to say. She was a good leader, had the capacity to be kind and was very respectable. However, the main thing that filled the rookie's mind was gratitude for being on her side and not the enemy’s side.

“Haha, she can be scary sometimes can’t she?” The senior knight laughed. Most of the knights would agree on the rookie’s point here. As the senior knight continued to laugh, he slowly began to stop as he saw the rookie looking strangely pale. “What’s up?” He asked, furrowing his brows.

However, before the rookie could answer, someone else did. “I’m scary, huh?” The senior knight instantly paled before turning around to meet the intimidating stature of a woman in full armour except for a helm. Her fiery-red hair flowed down the armour like a lion’s mane and her aura was enough to make a monster run off in fear.

“Ah-! N-No, Captain! You aren’t!” The senior knight stuttered as he quickly took back his words.

“Oh? I’m not scary?” Mari tilted her head as she looked down at the soldier with a smile, who hurriedly shook his head. Seeing the senior knight shake his head, Mari laughed and then asked, “If I’m not scary, then surely you’d be willing to go for a quick spar?”

“Ah.” The senior knight lost his words for a moment, until someone else approached the two of them. By his short height, smooth and scarless baby face and his curly hair, at first glance he looked very silly wearing knight’s armour. However, anyone from the order would know this wasn’t just a boy. The senior knight felt relieved from the bottom of his heart to see the Vice-captain, the highest level knight here other than Captain Mari herself.

“Mari, you shouldn’t mess with the knights like that. You’ll give them a heart attack.” The Vice-captain said with a smile, pointing to the senior knight’s pale face and the rookie that looked like he was about to pass out. The Vice-captain was also one of the few knights here that dared to call Captain Mari by just her name.

“Ah, sorry Ventri. I went too far, hahaha.” The goofy look on Captain Mari’s face as she chuckled and scratched the back of her head with her gauntlet was in stark contrast to her from just a moment ago. Mari and Ventri had known each other for a long time and were a famous pair of childhood friends. It was also known that Ventri was a big part of what led Mari to the stage of honorary nobility despite being a commoner.

Normally commoners wouldn’t be able to have such status and most definitely wouldn’t be able to acquire a knight’s order. However, there were a few ways one could achieve such, with how Mari accomphished it being through her considerable accomplishments as an adventurer. Although, very few actually managed to reach that height. Naturally, the aristocrats did not like a commoner like her having the same status but the guild had that much power. Meaning, they could only complain about it amongst themselves.

“How are the preparations for the expedition?” Mari asked Ventri.

“Everything’s going as planned.” Ventri replied. Mari’s knight order made their money through various ways, including expeditions, protection orders and whatever else you may need highly trained knights for. Essentially, they were comparable to a mercenary unit. And today, they had an expedition to hunt down a monster they had been commissioned to kill.

“Good.” Mari walked through the court with Ventri following behind her. As she did so, the attention of the knights slowly focused on her as they noticed she had entered the court. Eventually, she reached a platform that stood about a metre above the ground. Once she had reached the top of the platform, she stood above the knights and held her fingers to her mouth. With a loud whistle, any knight that wasn’t looking at her was now looking at her.

“Attention everyone! We have a 20 man expedition today. Anyone Lvl. 60 or higher, please meet me here if you wish to participate in this one. Otherwise, continue training as normal. Dismissed!” Mari shouted out to the whole group with a commanding voice fit for a leader. After she had finished talking, the knights immediately began to talk amongst each other and shuffle around. Some returned back to their training and others gathered around the platform.

Mari set the minimum level for this expedition to be Lvl. 60 and above, which covered about a third of the knight order and generally held the more experienced knights. Every knight in the order was at least Lvl. 50, with the only exceptions being the rookies who were still very new. Lvl. 50 was generally a high level for human standards. While humans at this level aren't particularly hard to find, they were not by any means common.

Even though nearly every knight in the order was Lvl. 50 plus, the reason for that wasn’t that Mari only hired people at that level. It was simply that the training under Mari’s supervision was that good. This factor made becoming a knight here fairly sought after even from nobility, despite it being a knight order run by a ‘commoner’.

“That should be 20.” Mari said, looking over the knights that had gathered before her. With her and Ventri as well, the total number was 22 knights. In reality, they only really needed 10 knights other than Mari and Ventri. However, when they weren’t being overworked, Mari made sure to bring around double the estimated knights needed.

If there were more knights, the chances of there being a casualty would be reduced considerably. And beyond that, if the knights were to get injured or tired whilst fighting, they could sub out for each other. To her, not a single one of them was expendable. Everyone was valuable, so she would use as many measures as possible to ensure everyone lives. Survival can be quite hard when facing the monsters of this world after all.

“Then, ready yourselves and prepare the horses. I will explain after we set off.” announced Mari.