Following the curiosity spirit’s edict, Chara immediately tried to protest but found herself completely unable to. Realizing what had happened, she glared at the greater spirit full of anger and indignation. She had never felt so wronged in her entire life.

Why bother teaching me a skill, if you were just going to forbid me from using it! Are you the Devil? I would have rather not learned it in the first place!

As the little spirit glared at her brimming with petulant indignation, demanding that she return her ability to speak, the curiosity spirit felt a mix of both exasperation and frustration at the same time. Just when everything had been going so smoothly, she just had to go and undo all her previous work.

This little baby is really too clever! How am I supposed to imprint myself onto your sense of curiosity if you can resolve your curiosity so easily? At this rate, you’re just going to end up taking all of my secrets and then run away!

As the curiosity spirit inwardly complained, she desperately tried to figure out where it all went wrong.

Although Chara wasn’t aware, the reasoning behind Curiosity’s strange behavior could be more or less boiled down to one reason; she was looking for a friend. However, she wasn’t looking for just any friend. Ideally, she was looking for a spirit with an inquisitive nature that she could drown in her curiosity so they could be all for herself.

Unfortunately, her journey towards achieving this seemingly straightforward objective had been plagued with roadblocks, hardship, and betrayal. It wasn’t even until recently that she had started making visible progress.

And it was while bearing such a dissatisfaction that she ran into Chara.

Curiosity could not believe her luck when she found a newly spawned spirit just loitering around all by herself. Fate must have seen it fit to finally reward her for all her efforts, even after letting her down countless times.

After making sure to cut off all of the little spirit’s means of escape, Curiosity put on a quick show, easily mesmerizing her unsuspecting target. As Chara looked around cutely with astonishment and disbelief, Curiosity knew it was her lucky day. Without a second thought, she activated her Bond’s power, ordering the little thing to stay by her side, where she would never leave again. From here, she would gradually mold the little spirit to her liking, until she had the ideal “friend” she always wanted.

Contrary to her expectations, the little spirit was such a smart cookie, that she ended up having to throw away all of her initial plans almost immediately!

To stimulate her curiosity, she had given the little baby only a small amount of information, and yet, the little genius was already speaking and asking questions before they had even arrived at their destination. It was a huge miscalculation!

In her original plan, when the little spirit couldn’t figure out how to communicate, she would get curious as to why she wasn’t succeeding. Then she would get frustrated and pester the more knowledgeable and amazing her for a more complete explanation. In response, she would gently teach her, let her ask questions, give her little challenges, etc. All in order to stimulate the little spirit’s curiosity as frequently as possible.

But now that her little baby had figured out how to speak so soon, Curiosity was left at a loss for what to do. She was both really happy because she would have a kindred spirit to discuss all kinds of things with, and also really frustrated that nothing was going according to plan. Sadly, curiosity spirits gain just as much joy from relieving curiosity as inflicting it, a behavioral trait that occasionally caused her to make… less than suboptimal decisions.

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Now that you can talk, how will I be able to resist answering when such a cute, smart, and curious little baby starts peppering me with questions? Aaah! I’ll run out of material to make you curious in no time!

Curiosity didn’t know what to do.

Ideally, she would both order the little spirit to follow and forbid her from speaking, but to Curiosity’s dismay, she could only enforce one order at a time. This limitation has been the source of no small number of frustrations for the greater spirit. Alas, all attempts at circumvention have been met with failure.

From the curiosity spirit’s perspective, there were two diverging paths ahead of her.

The first path is one where she orders Baby to follow. In this scenario, what would likely follow is Curiosity being unable to resist answering all the little spirit’s questions, and eventually running out of new things to share.

Distressingly, curiosity had diminishing returns. Someone could only be interested in so many rocks before they stopped caring about what was so interesting about the next one. As for how long it would take Baby to reach that point, she wasn’t sure. However, if the little genius’s earlier display of intellect was any indication, then probably not long enough to execute her plan.

The second path is one where she orders Baby not to speak. In this scenario, she can take her time teaching the little spirit at her own pace. However, she would have to either figure out a way to string along the little spirit or persuade her to follow willingly.

All things considered, she didn’t think Baby following voluntarily was very likely, especially after impulsively restricting her ability to speak for no clear reason. She could try “persuading” her using violence, but she wanted the little spirit to be curious about her, not the next time she would get bullied.

After weighing her options, the greater spirit uttered a sigh full of disappointment.

Hah… Where else will I ever find such a curious smart baby? I won’t give up on you so easily. No choice… I’ll just have to forbid you from speaking so you can’t ask me any questions…

For the sake of her plan, the curiosity spirit went against her nature and resisted her curiosity, sealing away the little spirit’s cute voice.

In the meantime, I can just use a different method to keep you from wandering… And for that, she had a very simple solution. She would use magic!

As the swirling of her mana grew more controlled, a large portion flowed toward one spot. With a quiet gurgle, the amorphous cloud of iridescent water element mana rippled violently, forming a new appendage.

If Chara was still here, then she would have immediately screamed and ran, because although the curiosity spirit didn’t intend anything weird, the new appendage inadvertently ended up resembling the limb of a certain animal that was featured in many 2D adult-rated videos. It was a tentacle!

Curiosity was about to reach out and grab the little spirit when she had a sudden realization.

Where did Little Spirit go?

***

Unfortunately for the curiosity spirit, Chara had already realized she could move and had left ages ago. She couldn’t read minds nor was she interested in her kidnapper’s backstory. How could she not take advantage of the greater spirit’s inattentiveness to make her get away?

That evil spirit has finally shown her true colors! Hmph, how can a stranger who forces me to follow them using strange tricks possibly be a good person?! She only wants me for my pure body (mana)…

Technically she wasn’t wrong, but Chara wouldn’t have any way of knowing this without getting caught.

Now the question is, where was she going? And the answer to that is; as far away as possible!

Although Chara had never been pursued by a spirit, she wasn’t dumb either. According to her experience, even if she tried using ploys like changing her route or leaving behind false trails, if the curiosity spirit realized she was missing before leaving her area of perception, then Chara would be detected almost immediately. Not that she knew how to do any of those things anyway.

Aside from the previously mentioned examples, there was one stunt she was willing to pull since it wouldn’t waste any time, and even if it was seen through, the worst that could happen was still getting caught.

Uwahaha! That dumb spirit would never expect that I would actually escape in the direction she was going! Let’s see how she will find me now…

She didn’t have a grasp of how large the other spirit’s area of detection was; however, she didn’t think it could be that big. While it was true that the greater spirit was many times greater, at the end of the day they were both spirits, so how big could the difference possibly be? Chara’s own perception was so pitiful, that even if the difference turned out to be ten times, then it still wouldn’t be that far.