What did she just say…?
I was so flabbergasted that I doubted my ears; it was one thing if she didn’t recognize me but having amnesia would be worse. Not impossible but bad, nonetheless. While there was a possibility that she was only bluffing, her expressionless face made it hard to determine the truth.
Shoot, what should I do now? Wish that Tuilë is here to help…
Speaking of her, it had been almost half an hour, but no sign of disturbance could be heard from outside. Perhaps she was immersed in tinkering with Alfredo or something along the line. Indeed, the more I thought about it, the more it was likely to be the case.
Suddenly, Tuilë’s voice rang from behind me.
“Maxim! Are you here?!”
“Speak of the devil.” I let out a low sigh and briskly turned around, shouting, “I am! Just come here, will you? What took you so long anyway?”
“My bad!” She scratched the back of her head while making a carefree grin while walking toward me. “You see, I have to do some— Huh… Huh! HUH?! Y-You…!”
Her voice trembled, and her furry face blushed as she pointed at me; it was as though she had just seen something so preposterous.
“What? Have you seen a ghost or… Wait—!”
It finally came to me that I was sitting rather close to Lunaria… Furthermore— Oh, shit! Even if she’s a genius mechanic, she wouldn’t know about the cryogenic pod, so what she saw…
Here was the thing: it would look like I was doing something “inappropriate” to her… even though that wasn’t what was happening here.
“S-Sorry for the interruption!!” Immediately, she turned on her hills and sprinted even faster than when she got here.
“Wait, Tuilë! This is a misunderstanding!” I tried to reach out to her. “Let me explain!”
“You don’t have to explain anything to me! I get it! I will come back later…!”
“Tch!” To make her stop, I had to play her game. “This has something to do with a new, exciting invention!”
Just as expected, she instantly stopped in her tracks, freezing like she was frozen in ice.
“Really?” She flinched.
“Uh-huh! Don’t you see that big cylindrical pod over there? It is used to preserve the human body that is placed in there for tens or even hundreds of years until it’s finally melted down.” I gave her the basic rundown behind how cryogenic pods work in order to convince her.
“Ohh…! So that’s how it is! Why don’t you say so from earlier?” She chuckled with her hands on her hips. “I mistook you for doing naughty things, ya know.”
“Hey, please don’t misjudge me like that…” I facepalmed in frustration.
“Pfftt! My, to think that a simple stunt will bring about such a result.” Lunaria’s neutral mouth burst into giggling.
“So you do recognize me, after all!” I let out a self-deprecating laugh; this was just Lunaria’s trick to make fun of us. “Yeesh, what’s so funny about this?”
To begin with, I was genuinely worried about her. If she really got amnesia, the whole fault would be on me since I was the one who forced her to come out.
A bit indignant and in an attempt to get back at her, I pinched her cheek. Mm. Squishy.
“Oww, what was that for?”
“Well, it’s for lying to me.” I crossed my arms, nodding my head like I was on the right.
Rubbing her cheek, she retorted, “In the first place, I never stated a lie. If it’s about whether I recognize you or not, it’s neither a yes nor a no. While the digitized mind is more about cut and paste rather than copy and paste, this is the first time that we meet in the flesh.”
“I see…?” There was nothing to fault with her logic; let bygones be bygones would smooth things out here.
Lunaria suddenly sneezed. “Still, I must say that you’re such a foul man to dare keep me like this. Where do you think you’re leering your eyes on?”
“Ah… My apologies…” Of course, I didn’t do it intentionally; I just forgot that she wasn’t wearing anything save for my jacket.
“I don’t mind it, though,” she said in a low voice that was almost like a whisper that I wouldn’t have heard if I was still a normal human.
Hold on, what did she just say?
Before I was able to dig deeper into the meaning, she continued, “Now, bring me my clothes, will you?”
“Sure, milady.”
Without pause, I grabbed the set of clothes that I had prepared in advance and asked Tuilë to help her wear it, while I just stood nearby, admiring the devices and apparatuses around. Right… better to leave the task to those who are experts in their field.
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Once she was done with all that, she sat on the nearest wooden chair elegantly while emitting an allure similar to that of a fairytale princess. Stunning and flawless. With a black lace dress that reached her knees adorned with black ribbons at the hem and a black frilly headband with a white flower on each side, her charm radiated to the maximum. Also, I could see her black stockings sticking out of her dress and getting into her boots.
She gazed at me with emotionless amethyst eyes, as if nothing in this world could interest her in the least. If what she had told previously was the truth, she indeed had a status befitting for her demeanor. No questions asked.
Such a picturesque appearance, I was struck speechless to finally see her all dressed up in flesh… It would be such a waste if she was never painted and placed in museums for people to see. Hm? Is she a—
“Ahem!”
Tuilë’s cough brought me back to reality.
In retrospect, it was indeed rude to leer at her without discussing the matter at hand first… No, it was rude either way!
“Sorry, I got a bit carried away. Now, you just got here, Tuilë, so I suppose you don’t have a single idea why there was suddenly a… uh,” I scratched my cheek and resumed, “naked girl before me…”
She smiled at me with the kind of outgoing vibe that she always gave, but I knew that that was the least of her concern here. “Well, you know me. I won’t rest assured without knowing down to the last detail.”
I bet she was only going for the science behind the cryostasis… That just worked for me, though.
“Yes, yes. Just hear me out for a second…” Thus, I retold her the story that Lunaria had told me.
There was a need to filter out some information regarding myself, especially pertaining to me not originating from this world. In return, the story became more focused on Lunaria and finished much faster than expected.
I didn’t know much about Lunaria’s background other than she was a member of a prestigious family before the apocalypse. Well, she had yet to tell me all the truth there was to the red fog that she called the “Crimson Apocalypse.” My suspect was that there was more to this than simply being manmade…
“Aha! So, it’s not just Maxim who’s a total weirdo, even Lunaria isn’t one ordinary gal…” Her voice weakened, and she stood frozen on the spot like a statue.
“Tuilë, you okay?” It was pretty likely that this much information would make her uncomfortable, but it wasn’t like I could keep it from her…
“This is so exciting!” She burst into laughter with her hands high in the air.
“Hush! You almost caused me a heart attack!”
“Oh, don’t sweat it,” she said, quickly turning toward Lunaria with shining eyes. “Hey, hey, hey!” She then quickly realized something, and her voice became polite, almost cringing me out. “Miss Lunaria, I beseech you to tell me more about the world before the Crimson Apocalypse. Please?”
“My, oh my. If you’re that interested, then I shall oblige to fulfill your desire.” Although her face didn’t show it, Lunaria seemed to enjoy doing this.
Oi, are you just going to ignore me here? Oh well… I was never a guy that took offense over petty things, just that I felt that my pride was hurt.
While they were busy conversing, I diverted my attention toward another matter. There was something that I sensed from Lunaria when I was in a trance, and that she was actually an evoker — a powerful one at that. Well, she might not be as “strong” as Spitzek, though that was only because her power was restricted by something that I literally didn’t have an idea about…
Just to make sure, I used [Identification] on her.
Lunaria arc Silveira Argentum
[…]
Source Level: Tier-2 evoker (restricted)
Source Element(s): Cosmic
Vocation(s): [Soul Binding]
Stats:
* STR: E+ (11 → 9)
* AGI: E (12 → 10)
* VIT: E (11 → 9)
* SRC: E (57 → 46)
* SPR: E- (42 → 38)
Accumulation Points: 23 → 20 [E]
Since Lunaria always controlled Luna-1, she never showed me her real body. As such, it was impossible to inspect her status through [Inspection] previously. Besides, I never told her about any of my Vocations — that would be my secret. Maybe I should tell her about [All Elements] sooner or later just for convenience’s sake, and since she already had some suspicions on this one.
More importantly, however, she was an even better evoker than me… Well, she never revealed to me that she was also one, other than the fact that she always gave me creative suggestions every now and then. I should probably inquire about this once there was a chance.
The next thing to note was about her Vocation… Ahh… So this is what she meant about why I was transmigrated to this world, into the body of a native. But how was she able to use her Vocation while in stasis?
Anyway, moving on were the small details regarding her…
Species: Human (celestial)
Condition: Cryosleep sickness (mild) | Weakened (moderate)
Sex: Female
Age: 16 years old (192)
Height: 161 cm
Occupation: ?
Huh?!
She’s not human…? Welp, it states that she’s still a human… but still… An urge to ask appeared inside me, but I suppressed it for a moment.
Besides that, her chronological age was something that made me speechless. No wonder she suffered from loneliness since no normal human would be able to remain sane for that amount of time — that was almost two centuries!
Even if she spent most of her time in hibernation… I couldn’t imagine just how lonely she was just by herself.
Still, the biggest mystery remained here, so I went ahead and asked, “Lunaria, are you a human?”
“What? Why with the sudden question?” She stared at me as though wasn’t expecting that question at all.
Crap. She didn’t know about my ability; I should have kept it to myself until I was able to come up with something as an excuse… Hold on, I do have one!
“Uh… No, you know… I saw it on…” I turned my face toward the monitor beside the cryogenic pod, implying something to her.
Lunaria raised one of her eyebrows and said, “Oh, you must have seen the monitor containing my private information. How unsurprisingly improper of you.” Well, not to that small detail, but I guess so…
“What, what? I can’t wrap my head around the topic that you two are discussing.” Tuilë scratched her head with her large hand, which looked a bit funny, to be honest.
“Fine. I will tell you: I am indeed not a human,” she stated flatly, her right hand resting on her chest. “There are a few key differences that distinguish me from a normal human. For example, I can suck your blood just like a vampire.”
Upon saying that, she looked at me and made a tiny mysterious smile as if eyeing a prey.
“Eek, you serious?” I flinched, and instinctively took half a step back.
“No, that’s a lie. But my fangs are sharp. See?” She showed me her teeth; although they were pearly white and arranged neatly, they were sharper than your average teeth, especially the canine teeth.
I slapped myself in the face, dragging it down slowly, “Can you please stop with your mundane jokes?”