After dinner.

I was sitting on the only bed in our room while Keith stood in front of me.

“Hmm… Keith, there’s only one bed. So why don’t we share it?”

“N-no!”

“Why?

I wondered why he didn’t want to share this bed with me.

I thought if it was because I was a girl and he was a boy but dismissed this thought.

Why? It was because he was my friend; I trusted that he wouldn’t do anything to me even if we slept on the same bed.

“No means no!”

“Why are you so adamant about refusing me? Do you hate me?”

“Of course not!”

“Then why?”

Tilting my head to the side, I continued to interrogate him.

“…. It's cause I wouldn’t be to control myself if we did that.”

“Huh?”

“Nothing! I’m sleeping on the floor and that’s final.”

“But, I’ll feel bad if you do that. See, doesn’t this bed look comfortable?”

I patted the place beside mine to indicate that the bed contained cotton.

Keith turned his back on me and started sleeping.

I could hear the sound of snoring from my position.

“…”

I stared at his back for a while before I covered my body with a blanket and went to bed with a grumpy mood.

***

I woke up because of the sound of the chirping birds.

While sitting on top of the bed, I stretched my arms high.

“It has been a while since I’ve slept this comfortably… hmm?”

I looked at the direction where Keith slept last night and found that he wasn’t there anymore.

What I saw in his place was a set of clothes.

I picked the clothes up and found out that it was a green colored dress and its size was quite close to mine.

“Now that I think about it, I haven’t changed for a while huh.”

I smiled when I thought that it was Keith who prepared this dress for me.

When I was done changing my clothes, I headed downstairs and found a basket of bread with a plate of cheese on its side.

I walked closer and saw Keith who was working hard in chopping the wood with an ax.

Max suddenly appeared out of nowhere and waved at me.

Returning his wave with an awkward smile, I started eating the bread he prepared for me.

When I was done eating, I walked to the place where Keith was.

“Hee, you’re working really hard even though it's still early.”

“If I don’t exercise at least once a day, I would become weak.”

“Is that so?”

Since I wasn’t a servant anymore, I didn’t have anything to do.

So I sat on a chair silently overlooking Keith as he chopped wood after wood.

When I judged that it was almost lunch, I stood up from my chair and headed for the kitchen.

“Umm, Max, is it alright if I used the kitchen again? I wanna prepare lunch.”

“Yep! Go ahead!”

“Thanks!”

I quickly gathered the ingredients I needed and prepared lunch.

***

I was washing the plates that we used for lunch while Keith and Max sat at the dinner table with a satisfied expression.

“You sure are lucky to have a little sister like her.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s cause you get to eat this kind of food every day! I’d do anything just to eat this food!”

“Hahaha…”

“I’d even kill you for it! That’s how delicious her food is. Man, I really envy you!”

“Hahaha…”

Because Max’s voice was very loud, I was able to overhear what they were talking about despite being far from them.

I also made a small laugh when I heard Keith’s awkward laughter and wondered why Max said that I was his little sister.

I didn’t remember introducing myself as his little sister though.

However it’s too troublesome to clear up his misunderstandings, so I decided to stay quiet.

When I was done washing the dishes, I approached where Keith sat.

“Keith, let’s trade some of the things we gathered in the forest for some money. The amount we currently have won’t be able to cover our future expenses.”

“That’s true… Umm, Max, can we borrow a cloak?”

“Cloak? Why?”

Max sat opposite to Keith made a puzzled expression as he answered him.

“Eulalia’s uncomfortable with crowds.”

“Is that so? Well, it’s fine for me.”

Max stood up from his seat and opened a drawer in the kitchen.

“Here!”

“Thanks!”

He threw a large brown cloth to Keith. Though there were some holes in some places, it was okay as long as it can cover my hair.

“Then we’ll be back to get our things later in the afternoon.”

“Owh!”

I accepted the cloak that Keith gave me and used it to cover myself before walking towards the exit.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

***

The two of us were quite shocked as we walked around the village in search of a merchant.

The houses were quite run down and lots of people were quite malnourished.

Most of them didn’t even bother to cover the holes that were in their clothes.

It was as if we were back in the slums.

Since the two of us grew up in the slums, I had thought that we were already quite used to this sight.

However, when I moved my gaze to Keith, I saw that he was quite disturbed while looking at them.

Seeing him make a face like that, made my heart ache.

So I only walked quietly by his side.

“Eulalia, can we go to the fields for a moment. There’s something I wanna see.”

“… Sure.”

Keith suddenly hastened his steps and because I didn’t want to get left behind, I also tried catching up to him.

The more he saw how the people lived in the village, the faster his steps became.

“Ahh!”

I fell to the ground when I couldn’t catch up to him any longer.

“Oh?”

“What do we have here?”

Some of the villagers that saw me fell down approached me.

“…. A—a….”

I tried calling out to Keith, but my voice wouldn’t come out.

As his silhouette became smaller and smaller, a villager suddenly stood in front of me and covered my view.

“What’s wrong?”

“Is there a problem?”

“Are you hurt?”

The villagers continued talking around me and as time continued to pass, the more insecure I felt.

My only solace in this situation was the fact that my face was covered by the cloak.

My hands suddenly started shaking.

(I can move away from this spot, but what if I get lost? If I get lost, there could be a chance where I won’t meet Keith again. If we won’t meet again, then I’d lose the only friend I have here.)

My thoughts became erratic and were going down a spiral of negativity.

Just when I was about to run away and hide in a back alley like I used to in the capital, I suddenly felt a hand holding my arm.

I raised my face and found that it was Keith.

“… Sorry, I didn’t mean to leave you behind.”

“…”

He pulled me out of the crowd and walked to a place where there wasn’t a lot of people.

“Did you fall down?”

“…”

“Are you perhaps angry?”

“…”

“Ummm… Eulalia?”

I didn’t answer any of his questions and only stood rooted for quite some time.

An awkward atmosphere suddenly enveloped the space between us.

“Uhh, let me go get something to wipe your body with.”

I quickly reached out and grabbed his hand when he was about to run away.

“Eulalia?”

“Let’s go like this.”

“Eh?”

“Let’s go to the fields like this so that we wouldn’t be separated again.”

“Ahh… un… okay.”

Through the sense of touch, I could feel that the he wasn’t just an illusion that was created by my mind.

The warm sensation that passed through my hand was my evidence that he was there, that he still hasn’t left me and that we were still together.

All the fears, anxiety and the negative thoughts that I had earlier were blown away.

I strengthened my grip as we proceeded to the fields.

(I won’t let go of this hand again.)

[… lalia… li… Eu…]

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I'll reply to the last chapter's comments here

@Arphadax

Eulalia is a 'she' with memories of her past life. Just because you have memories of a past life, that doesn't neccessarily overwrite your personality. Though you'll have some changes.

And my image of Eulalia is that of an innocent bullied girl... >: D

@Naoki

Well, I won't give them too much sufferings though... but what I will do is make more cheesy situations, like in 'With the lake and the moon' and in Chapter 5... :D

And also, more chapters like this... small realizations

@VesperOz

Well, if you don't work, that doesn't necessarily mean you don't know the recipe right? I mean I have a cousin here who's really lazy and hasn't entered the kitchen once and still know more recipes than me....

And the place where she experienced how to do housework were the 2 years she spent as a servant of Lord Stuart's castle.

***

Longer chapter huh... well that'd be good to cause they're more fulfilling... but I'd need to spend 2-3 days working on it though. And I can't guarantee that it'll have a regular schedule... :D

I'm off to dream world... goodnight