Wednesday, February 18th, N.E. 807, 19:04

Pine Family Carriage, 4th Circle, Royal Capital Arvas, Fredirin Kingdom.

Olivia Pine Fredirin.

“Welcome back My Lady.” Carla greeted me as she helped me back into the carriage.

Captain Nev managed to get me back to the bridge with only minutes to spare, I only had to wait in the rafters for a short while before my carriage with my Guardian Knight Carla and Uncle Jop passed under me.

“Olivia… no, nevermind. How did it go?” Uncle Jop asked.

“As expected. I didn’t achieve everything I wanted, but it was sufficient.” I replied as I sat back down on my bench, Carla again taking a seat next to me. “How were things on your end?”

“Er…” Carla said with a wry smile on her face. Even Uncle Job had a similar expression on his face.

“What is it?” I asked curiously.

“Did you know… that the Young Master Varsin is… crazy?” Uncle Jop asked.

I scanned my memories just to make sure, but I had no recollection of him being strange. He was a dedicated craftsman, and he seemed a bit sensitive if people looked down on his craft, but that was relatively normal.

“No? What was wrong?” I asked while directing my glance at Carla, after all, she had been there with me many times in the past.

“Young Master Varsin felt that he should… entertain us as we waited.” Carla said slowly. “At first… it was normal. But he started talking about stuffed animals after an hour…”

“And he never stopped.” Uncle Jop added.

“Never stopped?” I asked bewildered.

“No, he never stopped. He talked about them, every aspect of them, for hours.”

“He… got animated.” Carla mentioned.

“I now know far more than I needed to about stuffed animals.”

“Yes… me too.”

The two of them had the look of a defeated soldier on their face.

“Hmm… I guess I should apologize for asking you two to do this?” I said apologetically.

“No, it’s fine.”

“Right, it is my job to serve My Lady.” They both rejected my apology.

“Still, you spent the entire time with Varsin? So you did not hear about anything else?” I asked.

“No.”

“Should we have?”

“Hmm…” I thought to myself.

I was sort of hoping that I could see how much information about today had spread, but they apparently knew nothing. The Canyon Family had probably concealed information in regards to Michael, but something may have already leaked to the average people.

As for the raids on the various schools, that should have spread everywhere, but at the same time, that wasn’t the news that normally gets transmitted to a shop that makes stuffed animals for the wealthy.

“Well, let us head home.”

Wednesday, February 18th, N.E. 807, 19:49

Pine Family Carriage, 3rd Circle, Royal Capital Arvas, Fredirin Kingdom.

Olivia Pine Fredirin.

As our carriage advanced towards the main gate of the Pine Estate, I was lost in thought. The trip was mostly silent, I had things to think over, and my two guards seemed mentally exhausted from spending a day at Varsin’s.

The early part of the ride was spent thinking about future plans, but the latter half, I spent doing something else.

As the carriage progressed, a faint hint of anticipation was welling up within me, and it took me a while to figure out what it was, but when I did, I couldn’t help but frown.

I was excited to return home.

Home…

When had I last felt like that? My domain before I died, that was my possession, my territory, but it wasn’t my home. Not a place I could relax in, at least not fully.

Had I ever considered a place home? I did have a family before, but no, never a safe place that I could call home.

Even now, it wasn’t until I made this realization that I had even noticed I considered this my home. My family, yes, Timothy, Pamela, even my mother and father along with my two other siblings who I haven’t met yet, I considered them my family.

A part of me was concerned, these were all potential weaknesses. At least in the past, my family members had their own power, they couldn’t be killed easily. But that wasn’t the case now, I needed to protect them.

And now, besides just a family, I had a home I needed to protect too.

In the past, my family and I would be forced to flee, sometimes from enemies, sometimes from allies, and sometimes from the very land itself. Because we didn’t have a home, we were able to simply pack up and move. But it was different now.

I needed to change my plans now. Before, I thought just protecting my family would be sufficient, and that was something that if the worse came to pass, I could see to myself. Now, that wasn’t the case.

“My Lady, we are almost home. Do you want to wear your coat?” Carla asked as the carriage passed through the gate and entered the Pine Estate’s courtyard.

“Mmm.” I nodded in the affirmative.

In the time it took Carla to ready my coat and get it on me, the carriage had already rolled to a stop in front of the main entrance. I disembarked into the cold air of dusk, my guards coming out from behind me.

“My Lady, welcome home.” Came the voice of Lisa, another one of my personal maids.

Lisa, along with two other maids, were waiting at the entrance for us.

“Mmm, I'm back,” I said and couldn’t help but smile.

“Dinner has passed, but if you haven’t eaten, the kitchen can provide a meal, or is there something else you need?” She asked.

“Where is Pamela? And Timothy?”

“The Miss is in her art studio, and the Sir is in the library.”

“I see, then I will go see my sister. Could you have a meal brought to me there?”

“As you wish My Lady.” Lisa motioned to the two adjacent maids who both hurried away after giving me a short bow. “I shall guide you.”

“Okay.”

I, of course, knew the way, but it was impossible for myself, or any of us siblings, to ever go anywhere by ourselves, even if it was within the estate.

However, before I followed Lisa, I turned back to my two guards.

“Thank you for accompanying me today,” I said.

“You are welcome.”

“You are welcome.”

For nobility, to give thanks is something that should only be done at important times, or to a superior noble. For others to serve us, it is only natural. Nobles do not offer thanks lightly, even to their equals, much less their subordinates. Likewise, a subordinate should instead reject the thanks, saying something like, those words are too much for me.

However, the Pine Family does things differently. Just like our family meals, the rules are that we must give thanks, at least when it is appropriate. For our servants, most of them will just silently acknowledge our thanks, some who hold some degree of prestige themselves will offer their gratitude in return. It is, however, against the rules for the servants to demean themselves and say that they aren’t worthy. In my Mother’s words, if they aren’t worthy to receive our thanks, would that not mean we wasted our time giving it?

While musing on how strange our family is, I followed Lisa as we went through the estate and finally arrived at Pamela’s art studio.

Pamela actually had several studios spread through the estate, while some of them were devoted to different forms of the arts, most of them were set up near different windows giving different views. This particular one was on the third floor, and the roof was a glass dome that allowed one to see the sky almost unobstructed. Unfortunately, because glass tends to not be the best insulator, this room would have normally been rather cold. To combat that, the surrounding rooms were redesigned to be a boiler room and also a large spa like bathroom. The heat, and humidity, leaked into the studio, making it rather comfortable, at least during the colder parts of the year.

As we approached, one of my sister’s maids, whose name I didn’t know, nodded to us, and then knocked on the door and announced us. Without needing to say anything, she opened the door and let me in.

“Welcome home… Olivia… How was… Your… day…?” My sister asked while shifting her focus between me and the painting she was looking at.

“Good. What are you painting?” I asked as I moved around towards her side.

My sister was not bothered by clutter, so moving through the room was actually easier said than done.

“Sunset.” Was her reply

Now that I was able to take a look, I saw that the painting was barely half-finished. The canvas was rather large, but only the left half was being worked on. From what I could see, it depicted a group of birds flying over the setting sun. Hues of red and orange painted the sky while the sun itself was a dull gray.

However, the painting was only half finished, so I couldn’t tell for sure what it’s final form would be.

“You do not like it?” I asked, knowing that Pamela would only stare this intently at it if she felt something was wrong.

“It’s the sun. Originally, I wanted it to be darker, almost black, but not quite. But then I realized it would blend into the dark red of the sky near it, so I made it lighter. But… it’s not right…” She sighed and then sat down.

“You won’t continue it?”

“No, I am still only at the start for this child, but I can tell it won't be good.” She said despondently.

“I see…”

I looked around at some of the other paintings here and frowned. Generally, my sister could paint anything, landscapes, historical scenes, animals, plants, people, buildings, anything. However, since this studio was focused around the large window, and the various plants that Pamela grew here, nearly all of her paintings were landscapes showing the horizon, or smaller paintings of various plants and flower.

But even the best ones, the ones that Pamela framed and hung on the wall, were only half finished. All of them only contained a left side, the right side was blank canvas.

Looking back at my sister, I saw her sitting on a small stool, her paint stained figure hunched over as she absentmindedly rubbed the area around the eye patch that covered her right eye. She didn’t even notice she was smearing orange paint on the side of her face while doing so.

“Does your eye hurt?”

“Hmm?” She looked at me in surprise. “No, not at all.”

“Really?”

“Well…” She smiled wryly at me. “A bit. It is just… a soreness that comes by every now and then.”

“...” I said nothing, but I could feel my hands clenching at my sides.

“It isn’t bad, don’t worry. It hurts sometimes, and at its worst, it's not much different from a light headache.” Having seen my expression she tried to reassure me.

“We do not even know who did it.”

“Olvia, it was an accident. An accident.”

“Indeed. Instead of containing a magic stone capable of emitting low-grade mana signals, the box accidentally contained a high-grade magic stone with the sunburst spell inscribed within.” I said sarcastically.

“...” Pamela just looked at me sadly.

Our mother, Duchess Isabella, was a daughter of the current king. Our father was only the third son of a baron, which should have consigned him to a lifetime of mediocrity. However, according to their family’s history, his great grandfather had earned the favor of a Fairy. In return for whatever it was that he did, he was blessed with a unique magical skill called Fairy Eyes. His eyes could literally see the mana flowing in the environment. While a detect magic spell could also do that, the detect magic spell did not come with different degrees, and in a high mana environment, the spell would overwhelm the caster. Fairy Eyes were like normal eyes, able to adjust to different degrees, so a holder of Fairy Eyes could detect even trace amounts of mana, and could also distinguish different mana flows even in a high mana environment.

With those eyes, his great grandfather who was only a foot soldier was able to rise up and become a knight, and then when his son, our father’s grandfather, was born with Fairy Eyes, they raised up even further and became a baron household.

During the next generation, two of my father's uncles and aunts inherited the eyes, but not his father, our grandfather. The eldest son had the Fairy Eyes, but he died from an illness when young, and one of the daughters also held them, but she eloped out of the family and was never heard of again.

Father ended up inheriting them, and of his five children, Pamela inherited only one Fairy Eye, and our younger brother, Vincent, inherited two of them.

Being able to see the mana was already a useful skill, it allowed one to determine a great deal about what kind of spell another party was using. But, as Arcane Magic began flourishing, it was discovered that the Fairy Eyes could allow a much greater control over the spells being cast.

Casting Arcane spells was like weaving the mana into the spell, instead of just using brute force to emit it and shape it. Most people weaved the spell blind, but with Fairy Eyes, a caster could do the weaving with much more finesse, casting spells faster, and getting the same effect with far less mana. At a young age, my sister was already an accomplished arcane mage, even having never opened her magic core, she simply didn’t need the extra mana to cast spells due to her exquisite level of control.

However, that came to an end one day.

While at school, she was undergoing a test to determine how fine of a magical spell she could see. A small magic stone was brought out that emitted different types of mana at incredibly small levels for short periods of time. The test was to determine both if she could sense them, and how fast she could sense them.

So having focused her Fairy Eye to the max, they activated the stone. But, instead of only releasing trace amounts of mana, the stone was inscribed with a sunburst spell, a spell that creates a massive flash of light.

To put it in perspective, if used at night time in our courtyard, the flash from the Sunburst spell would be spotted by the entire capital city.

The light and the mana was so harsh that it burnt out my sister’s eye, the magical vessels that made a normal eye into a Fairy Eye were completely destroyed, and even then, her eye lost almost its entire ability to see normally. She could see vague shapes and light, but if she was only using her right eye, she could barely differentiate different people.

And then the worst parts came later.

Because she was used to having the Fairy Eye allow her to see what she was doing when she cast an Arcane spell, without that, she lost her ability to use magic. She could technically cast spells, but they were so inefficient that they were barely effective at anything. Because of this, she gave up her magical studies, and instead focused on her only other passion, art.

Pamela always loved painting, but even that was taken from her. With one eye effectively blind, she couldn’t paint at all. Eventually, she discovered that if she blocked the damaged eye's vision, she could still create half a picture, but that was all she could do.

“Well, little sister, what did you come to find me for?” She asked, breaking me out of my brooding.

“Right…” I said as I swallowed down my anger. “I was hoping you could paint me a picture. Just a draft, I do not need anything extravagant.”

“Oh, what is it that you want?” She asked looking excited.

“Do you know my stuffed sheep, Gimmy?” I asked.

“Um… Gimmy… Gimmy… Is that the purple one? Or wait, it was blue?”

“That is the one. Could you paint a picture of Gimmy, but as if he… grew up?” I asked, not exactly sure how to word my request.

“Grew up?” Pamela asked, clearly not understanding me.

“As if he were an adult. Make him look… tall, and more… human.”

“I see? So you want him to look, like a Goatfolk? I can do that I think.”

“Can you? Thank you.”

“Not a problem, whatever my cute little sister asks for, I will strive to do.” She said with a smile. “Still… how … sheepy do you want him? Covered in wool? Or with a mostly human physique?”

“I will let you decide that.”

“Haha, leave it to me then. I will do it right now.” She said and then stood and tossed the canvas she had been working on aside.

However, after she put a blank canvas on the easel, she instead walked away and grabbed a sheet of paper and clipped that over the canvas. It wasn’t paint that she took, but a pencil as she started sketching.

“I’m just doing an outline and rough draft first to get some ideas.” Having seen me look confused she offered an explanation.

“I see.”

I watched her work, and slowly but surely, the left half of an adult, more human looking, sheep appeared on the paper. Since it was just an outline and lacked any color, I couldn’t say for sure, but it looked pretty good.

My sister was a skilled artist after all.

“By the way Olivia, what are your plans for tonight?”

“Hmm…”

I didn’t really have plans per se, but there were some things I wanted to focus on. I needed to continue reforging my body, but that would likely take a back seat towards dealing with the crystal that contained my cousin's soul that was still inside of my heart. Both of those required simple meditation for the most part. I also wanted to analyze the results of today’s raids, plan out options for the different responses the Canyon Family might make, finalize what I want from Michael, plan for any encounters with Shannon, prepare my future moves, and now I also needed to consider what could be done to protect my home. Not to mention, I needed to go to school tomorrow.

“No, I do not have any plans.” I lied.

Despite what I needed to do, I knew Pamela wouldn’t have asked the question if she didn’t want something from me.

“So you are just going to go back to your room and sleep?” She asked.

“I guess.”

“Hmm…” She paused her conversation while she made some last minute changes to the sketch. “How is it?”

I looked over her work once more and found nothing wrong with it.

“It looks good.”

“Good, then now I'll move to the paint.” She said as she took the paper away and then tacked it to the wall near her.

“Thank you again,” I said.

“Nothing is too much when my little sister asks. Hmm, so… I am thinking I will give him a mostly human appearance, but I will dress him up in armor, and then use blue fur around the edges. He might look like a barbarian, is that okay?”

“That is fine. But why armor?” I asked.

“Ha, well, I can’t very well leave him naked, can I?” she said with a laugh.

“Why not?”

“Er…” She stopped painting and looked at me for a second. “You are too young for that.”

I quickly scanned through my memories trying to figure out why that mattered, but I came up blank. I understood why a person would not want to be seen naked, it being an issue of pride and dignity, but this was a drawing, it had no pride or dignity.

In fact, the human need to be clothed was somewhat confusing to me. I understood the need for protection, human bones were somewhat frail, and human skin was paper thin. They were susceptible to the elements, the climate, pretty much everything. Even internally, their organs were weak, clustered together, and had few, if any, redundancies. And if the initial damage wasn’t fatal, human recovery was slow, and that was only when it worked in the first place, many injuries, while not instantly fatal, would still kill a human in time.

So while I understood the need for clothing and armor, I found the human obsession with it to be too extreme, why were there so many varieties? Colors? There were far too many. And when the immediate protection requirements were met, they still wore them. Even now, this room was a comfortable temperature, but it was still required to wear clothing.

I didn’t understand it.

“Oh, I almost forgot, I think Timothy wanted to talk with you.” Pamela’s voice brought back my focus.

“What did he need?” I asked with a frown.

“I do not know. He probably has some second thoughts about what we talked about last night.” She said without stopping to paint.

“Second thoughts?”

“Well, I think he agreed in the heat of the moment. Now that he has had time to think it over, he is probably wavering. This is a major choice after all. That said, I for one, think you are probably right. But what do I know? I paint, Timothy is the one training to be a knight.”

My brother changing his mind would be a problem, especially since I've already made my opening moves.

Before I could say anything, someone knocked at the door.

“My Lady, it is Lisa, I have brought you your meal.”

Leaving Pamela to continue painting, I went over and opened the door. Lisa promptly pushed a cart with several trays of food into the room, but then stopped.

There simply wasn’t enough room to push the cart in any further.

“Pamela, is there a table somewhere in here?” I asked not being sure what else to do.

“Um…” Pamela stopped painting and look around the room before pointing towards a table covered with canvas. “That table should be fine, just throw out the paintings on top of it, they are all no good.”

While Lisa looked hesitant, the other maid who served my sister quickly came in and grabbed the paintings and then disappeared without a word. While she was going out, Lisa walked the trays the rest of the way to the table, placing the dishes and plates down one after another.

“Here you are My Lady.” She said as she was finished.

“Thank you, Lisa, I will call you when I am done.”

“Of course.” she said as she bowed and then left.

I went over and pulled a seat over to the table, besides an apple or two while out with Captain Nev, and a few pastries while I was in the carriage, I hadn’t eaten at all today. I didn’t actually need to eat, I could subsist entirely off of magic, but until my stomach atrophied to the point where it didn’t function, I would still feel hunger.

And… a lot of foods were rather pleasant to east.

“Olivia,” My sister called out from behind the canvas. “If you do not want to deal with Brother, why don’t you spend the night here with me?”

“Mmmph,” I swallowed a bite of bread, bread that was salted and had some kind of cheese melted on it. “Stay here?”

“Yes, you can avoid Timothy, and we can spend some time bonding.”

I guess this is what she wanted.

“Okay, let us do that.” I agreed.

“Good,” She said happily. “Now come over here and take a look, I have just finished.”

Putting down the rest of the cheese colored bread reluctantly, I headed back to her side.

On the canvas was half of a sheep-folk, he was standing in a simple green field with a small sun over his head. He had a human looking face, in fact, it was indistinguishable from a human, save the spiraled horn on his head above his ear. His body was like a human's too, he wore simple leather armor with some belts strapped across his chest. The tops of his gloves, the area around his shoulder, his boots, and the area around his waist was covered in fuzzy looking blue wool. Even his hair was blue.

“I was pretty sure his eyes were black, but I wanted to ask you since I did not remember,” Pamela asked.

“Black is fine, his eyes were just beads after all.”

“Okay, black it is.” She said as she swiftly colored in the two formerly colorless eye on the picture.

“This is really good, thank you, Sister.”

“No problem. Still, I wish it wasn’t just half… this is the first time you have asked me to paint you something.” She said forlornly.

“...” I didn’t know what to say.

I regretted that I never learned how to reassure a person, to comfort someone who was upset.

“Come, help me eat my dinner, then we can take a bath and go to sleep.”

“Mmm, Okay, I will help.” She said while smiling.

Wednesday, February 18th, N.E. 807, 22:13

Pamela’s Auxiliary Bedroom, 3th Circle, Royal Capital Arvas, Fredirin Kingdom.

Olivia Pine Fredirin.

Almost two hours later, after fighting with my sister over who should eat the carrots, neither of liked them, and who should eat the banana muffins, both of us enjoyed those, and after we had finished a bath, we were both now wrapped in blankets in the small bedroom Pamela sometimes used when painting in this studio.

Pamela wore a simple white nightgown, much like my own, the only difference being that since I wasn’t concerned about the cold, I left my legs bare while she wore a pair of long socks.

My sister could only sleep when she was covered in blankets, so the air in the room was rather chilly, but the layers of heavy blankets kept us warm. Even if they were insufficient, Pamela was currently treating me as a stuffed animal, she had wrapped me up in her embraced and pulled me close, into her chest.

It should have been uncomfortable, the steady movement as she drew breath should have been irritating, and the slight sounds she made as she lightly snored should have been annoying, but it wasn’t.

It was actually rather comfortable.

I couldn’t describe it, try as I might, but I felt… safe, wrapped up with my sister.

“Pamela…?” I whispered slowly.

“...Hmm…? What is it… can’t sleep?” She asked as her eyes fluttered open and she looked at me.

Darkness did nothing to hinder my vision, as close as we were I was easily able to look into her right eye. With my mana senses, I could tell that the basic foundation of her Fairy Eye had been completely destroyed, there was nothing left to repair, even if I was able to do so.

“No… it is nothing.”

“Hmm… okay then, go to sleep.” She said sleepily as she closed her eyes again.

“Okay.”

I watched as Pamela's breathing slowed down again and her movements stopped. Slowly, gently, I raised my hand and traced the area around her eye before moving onto her hair. I softly patted her head and I watched as her sleeping face slowly shifted into a smile.

“Sister… don’t worry, I will protect you.” I said to myself.