While Count Laroy was waiting for an answer from the capital, we lived in the castle for a whole week and all this time we tried to occupy ourselves with what we could. During this time, we were settled in the chambers of the castle, but from time to time we still gathered in the barracks where we were first settled in order to resolve some issues.

Granid asked the Count for the right to leave the castle, after which we began to often go for walks, but continued to remain vigilant, always carrying weapons. All week, Hippolytus and I studied the Lakuus language while listening to lectures from Incartia. Thanks to the ring of Babylon, it was quickly possible to avoid misunderstandings in some aspects of learning this new language, however, the learning process was quite productive and the result was obvious.

The Lakuus language itself was complex, it had so-called generic verbs and even generic numbering, almost every word had its own characteristics and because of this this language seemed too complex for us. It must have been strange for Lakuusians to hear us refer to them and each other in a gender-neutral manner, but that is the structure of our English language.

We started learning a new language from the simplest things, with «I», «you», «he», «she», «yes», «no», «hello «, «bye» and so on and so forth. Further, the complexity of the study gradually increased, and we began to study not only pronouns, but also directions, tenses, concepts, adjectives, prepositions and simple phrases.

The most difficult part of the Lakuus language is the attempt to pronounce a number of new sounds that were unusual for the human earthly language to pronounce, at least for my language, it was very difficult.

"Ehkra…eh-kra. Right?"

Incartia sighed sadly, hearing how I couldn't pronounce one specific sound correctly, which is why I always pronounced entire words incorrectly.

"Ekhrra."

"Ehkra... ah~!"

My stupid attempts to pronounce this incomprehensible word infuriated Incartia so much that she hit me on the head with her palm, however, it did not hurt me. She, obviously, like any ordinary teacher, was unhappy that she could not teach her student, so she lost her temper, attacking the students almost with her fists.

“Why can’t you pronounce such a simple word?!”

The young sorceress was angry, and in time she put a ring with the Babylon spell on my finger.

"What's wrong with saying «Hello»?"

"It's hard to pronounce."

I answered, stroking my “sore” forehead with my palm, where the young sorceress hit me.

Incartia, in turn, shook her head in displeasure.

“This is not true! Everyone can pronounce it, but you can’t!”

"Can everyone say it?"

I turned towards the platoon and saw how all the soldiers, one after another, repeated this greeting, not ideally, of course, but they did it as needed.

Ehkrra

Just like Incartia said. However, I could not pronounce this word normally, even though it was considered almost the most basic in the Lakuusians language. Princess Niana, who also studied the Lakuus language, decided to help me in this matter. She was able to learn a new language much easier than me, apparently she and her friends were helped a lot by English lessons from Itami, or maybe her native origin and perhaps some similarity between the languages of Hippolytus and Lakuusians helps her in learning a new language.

"Your language does not have the sound «Hk».

Said Niana.

“Try to pronounce it separately first, like this.”

"F… f… sh… damn!"

I never managed to pronounce this strange sound on which most words in the Lakuus language are based.

It seems that I won’t be able to learn a new language without the ring with the spell of Babylon, however, I noticed this problem back at the Academy of Natural Sciences on Earth, when I was trying to learn Latin.

"I need practice."

"Listen."

Incartia nodded wearily, returning to our lessons.

"So where are we?"

Suddenly, at that moment, the count's servant entered the barracks and made a warning cough, diverting our attention from the lesson on learning the Lakuus language. Apparently, the king’s answer to our proposal finally came when a servant from the count himself showed up.

"Sorry for disturbing your studies."

Said a man in a black jacket and turned to me, recognizing me as the leader of the group, despite the fact that Granid was here.

"Mr. Boris, excuse us, but the king was unable to respond to your proposal."

Hearing his words, I wilted a little and at the same time decided to ask:

“This is of course sad, but can I find out what the reason is?”

"Yes."

The servant nodded.

“His Majesty passed away from this world three days ago to the garden of the great Sod. Only now has a messenger arrived with a message about the death of His Majesty. The letter with your proposal is still on His Majesty’s desk, and it will be considered by the future king of the kingdom of Lakuus.”

It was unpleasant to hear that we had lost a whole week waiting for an answer from the capital and instead received news of the death of the king. Do we have to wait again?

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"My condolences."

I answered sincerely about the death of the king and added:

“About the proposal: we can wait another week, but if there is no answer, then we will go to the capital ourselves.”

"I will convey your words to my master.

The count's servant said and turned around to leave the barracks.

"I hope you have a good time."

"Thank you the same."

After this, the count’s servant left the barracks, and with a sad face I turned towards the platoon soldiers, reporting the unpleasant news:

“Well, you’ve heard it all already. The king is dead and we’ll have to wait a little longer.”

"We'll die of boredom here."

Will sighed irritably, clearly tired of learning the Lakuus language.

“And I have no desire to walk around this city at all, the castle looks much better.”

Indeed, the city looks inhospitable and, based on Granid’s words, it used to be much better here than now. Another question was what to do with ourselves all this time. If we knew the language of Lakuus, we would ask the count for permission to enter the library to study the geography, history and politics of this world, but unfortunately for us, the capabilities of the Babylon spell ring are limited, and they do not allow us to read words in the native language.

Apparently «singing of the soul» are just thoughts, and not some kind of reproduction of the senses of hearing and vision, at least that’s what Fred thought out loud when he learned that the ring does not allow us to read the Lakuus language.

Another thing is Granid, he seemed seriously concerned about the fact that his spell on our rings was not working correctly and from time to time asked us to give the rings to him for correction. Honestly, I don’t know why he’s trying so hard, I don’t think he just wants to help us.

Perhaps he has some goals of his own that he is not going to reveal to us yet, I cannot say for sure, and if I try to ask him directly, he will simply ignore me. In short, Granid is a complex person with his own goals that are unknown to us, but if he wanted to harm us, he would have done it at our first meeting.

Another issue was replenishing ammunition for our weapons. We only have enough ammunition left for one battle, after which our assault rifles, pistols and machine guns will become absolutely useless pieces of scrap metal. I don’t think that in this kingdom there is a high-tech workshop for the production of ten-caliber shells and an advanced chemical laboratory for the synthesis of the necessary chemical elements for these same cartridges. This is a problem for us.

The structure of projectiles is complex and it is almost impossible to recreate them manually; moreover, it is necessary to use special materials that will be strong enough to withstand high flight speeds and fragile enough to burst after hitting the target.

In this regard, we turned to Granid, who, with the help of a strange spell, was able to literally duplicate the projectile. I saw how, as if from a watery haze, an exact copy of the cartridge appeared on the table and I thought that we were finally able to find a way to replenish our ammunition, when Granid upset us by informing us that this spell was too demanding of his powers. However, we were able to get some way to replenish ammunition, even if the old wizard could duplicate only 50 rounds per day.

Separate from everyone else were the adventurers: Camellia, Ashwani and Furgur. They were only with us because they were generously paid by Incartia and were still on a mission to go to the so-called dark ruins. It seems they were referring to our shuttle, which crashed in the rainy jungle and was destroyed by us after an attack by the Antigonians. I immediately told them that there was nothing more to do there, but they still continued to follow the sorceress only because they were paid.

Strange people.

I thought, especially looking at Camellia.

She was so timid and at the same time inquisitive as if she were not sixteen years old, but ten. I don't know why, but she found a common language with Lecite, a simple civilian who was an orbital technician and from time to time kept up a conversation with her on some various topics.

The essence of their conversations was unknown to me, however, this was not so important, because it seemed that their communication concerned only the two of them. Even Incartia could not find out more about what they were talking about, because Camellia's answers were rather awkward and shy, and Lecite did not particularly show confidence in the natives. I really didn't understand how these two could get along.

The most inexplicable and incomprehensible thing happened to Ashwani. I don’t know what exactly happened; this question has worried us until now. The first person to perish on this planet after the crash suddenly found himself among the natives, but with a completely different personality and a younger body. When we shared with everyone about who he was, all the natives were quite surprised, as was Ashwani himself. He continued to claim that he was a simple adventurer from the common people, but we did not believe in such coincidences. Something strange happened to him and until we find the real Ashwani, we will not get out of here.

Moreover, the nature of the erased personality of Ashwani from our memory and even from the digital memory of the shuttle’s on-board computer is still unclear, because mentions of him were also erased there. He was literally removed from reality and was remembered only by those who were next to him at the time of his disappearance.

If we had not been next to him then, we would never have paid attention to this native. That strange tree that swallowed our fighter, what is it? Is this someone's strange trap or some kind of natural anomaly? We don’t know this and are unlikely to find out soon.

This planet holds so many secrets, which makes me feel uneasy. Just thinking about it, I truly felt the transcendental horror enveloping my entire being. People have always been and will be scared by the unknown, along with ignorance of this or that phenomenon. Until we can find answers to our questions, we will continue to be afraid of everything and everyone on this planet, which means many will die because of our fear of the unknown. We cannot exclude the possibility that all the natives around us are our potential victims.

So, continuing to study the Lakuus language, Granid and I were invited after classes to the next count's dinner, where they prepared a luxurious table for us with all kinds of dishes, as always. This time, not only the count’s family was sitting at the table, but also some other representatives of the high society of this country, but compared to the count, they were dressed much more modestly and were discussing something separately from everyone else.

They didn’t even pay attention to us when we entered the dining room, and only after we sat down at the table next to the count’s family did they fix their gaze on us and whisper among themselves, clearly asking why we were so close to the head of this cities. However, neither Granid nor the count himself paid attention to this and continued their meal as if nothing had happened.

As always, I sat next to the count’s daughter, whose name was Diana, and this time she was dressed in a lighter and more open light dress, which raised some questions in me, because it was quite cool in the hall and I sincerely did not understand why there was such openness. She seemed to notice my gaze directed at her and asked me a question in a slightly angry voice:

"Do you care what I look like?"

"To be honest, yes."

I answered and immediately became interested.

"Aren't you cold?"

The girl shook her head and with a blush on her face, squeezing and hiding her hands under the table, answered:

“No. My father orders me to dress in front of everyone so that the guests do not think that I am supposedly a spoiled aristocrat. I am a noble person and must live up to my status as a count princess.”

It was interesting to hear this from her. It turns out that her father forces her to dress not at his discretion, but at his request. It seems that appearance plays a significant role here and therefore it seems that only the count himself with his daughter and wife look richest here. Even I, dressed in a camouflage jacket, don’t look so colorful, but I still stand out.

"I suddenly became interested."

I decided to ask a question.

“Recently, a king died in your country and, probably, another person will soon become king, am I right?”

Diana just smiled at my question, as if I reminded her of a happy moment in her life.

“Yes, you are right. According to the law of the kingdom, the new king should be the son of the late King Leff, Prince Monrid. He is a very handsome man, muscular, serious and very confident. He is famous throughout the country and high hopes are placed on him. And as far as I remember you are waiting for an answer from His Majesty, is that so?”

"Yes."

I nodded, answering the question, and Diana then continued:

"You will have to wait a long time..."