Senli kept drifting in and out of consciousness. For how long, she didn’t know, but it could have been a few minutes or several days. She had so many dreams—weird and wonderful dreams of fancy clothing and the most ornate antiquities she’d ever seen.

During one of her brief periods of lucidity, she heard the following conversation. Though it was hard to discern whether it was real or not due to the absurdity. “You know I don’t like you using my chest to transport living beings, Mr. Xard,” spoke a woman’s voice.

“Yes, sorry about that. It was just the quickest way to get her here safely. But… for your troubles,” the man replied.

“Ah yes, I see…” the woman paused as she took a deep breath. “Just, uhh… don’t let it happen again. But if it does happen again, I am in the mood for pottery.”

When Senli properly came to, she was sitting upright in a chair, a new bright light shining in her face. “Where’d you hide the body, huh?!” A woman with blue hair confronted her aggressively from the other side of the table. Looking around, it seemed Senli had been brought to an interrogation room for some reason.

Before she could even mentally process the baseless and boggling question, she was asked several more. “Why did you only beat up one conjoined twin but not the other?! Where were you on the night of October 11th, 2023?! How did you break into the car dealership without being seen? When was the last time you saw Duke Doggington in his cage?! Who stole the cookie from the cookie jar?!”

None of that made any sense. Senli had never heard of such a dog, and 2023 was well before she was even born! The rest didn’t have enough details and weren’t ringing any bells either.

For whatever reason, this woman was wearing sunglasses despite being indoors, and they decided to chime in as well. 🕶️Don’t hold back, this chick is nuts. Make it easy on yourself and spill your guts!🕶️

Senli tried to say something in response, but she wasn’t able to spout a fully complete word. This was just insanity. Maybe she was still dreaming? That’d make more sense, so she’d just settle on the idea for now and go with the flow. But then the thermos attached to the woman’s hip said something to both assuage and amplify her confusion at the same time.

☕Relax child, you’re not going crazy. These two are goofing off and just being lazy.☕

There were so many followup questions. And if this was in fact reality, it seemed wholly inappropriate to do to someone who had just been… kidnapped? Senli was still unsure of her situation. And while she didn’t appreciate being messed with, the bizarreness made her forget about her problems for a bit at least.

“What the hell are you doing, Kada?” A familiar redheaded man entered the room and immediately scolded the woman with sheer disappointment on his face.

“Ope, time for me to skiddaddle!” Kada looked over to Senli with a look of surprise and panic. “But I’ll be back, criminal! You can’t keep your secrets forever!” She then scurried out of the room like a child running from their parent’s discipline.

“Sorry about her,” Xard apologized as he sat down on the other side of the table, placing a tray of food down in front her. “Help yourself. I’m sure you must be starving.”

She was starving now that she had a minute to think about it, but she still eyed the food suspiciously. “These are all of my favorite foods. Not even those closest to me know all of them. So how did you know?”

“You’ll find we know quite a bit about you, Senli.” Xard pulled up her profile on a tablet and handed it over for her to see. “One of our members has a way of finding out basically anything they need to about a person.”

“So you all have been stalking me then?” she started to eat, her stomach not as worried as her brain.

“Well, not you specifically,” he gave a half-answer. “But before we get into it, why not change the scenery a bit.” He went over to a panel on the wall, changed a few settings, and then sat back down. The interrogation room changed into a quaint cafe with a lovely view of the beach.

“Nice, isn’t it? We’re not actually at the beach just to make it clear. This room lets you change it to whatever you need it to be. We call it the Utility Room because of all the utility it provides, and to confuse people, I guess.”

If everything in the room was fake, that would explain why no other objects, besides what the woman had been wearing, had tried to talk to her.

“Now back to the orphanage. Believe it or not, our leader has actually been keeping an eye on it for quite some time. Maybe you remember, or maybe you don’t, but about two years ago a woman would have been coming to your orphanage to try and buy it.”

A memory flashed in Senli’s eyes. “Oh yeah… she was… terrifying. She had so many guards and didn’t even look at us like we were humans. I really thought we were going to end up on the streets for a while. But she just didn’t come back one day, so I figured she gave up.”

“Her name was Kaselle Vinlot,” Xard gave some more context. “She was a real-estate mogul trying to buy up the neighborhood. But, our leader, Drim Drazah, killed her after finding out about some unsavory plans.”

“Drim Drazah…” Senli’s mouth wrinkled when she heard the name. “Isn’t he supposed to be like super evil or a god or something. I’ve heard a lot of things.” She really had—some terrible, some amazing, all hard to believe. It seemed before that the news only ever really talked about his sister, but lately he’d been in the spotlight. Maybe it was because the sister’s personality and motives were so cut-and-dry that everyone got bored and moved on.

“I’m sure to many people he’s both based on their perspective,” Xard played it off. “In my experience, it’s best for you to make those judgments about him yourself. And I’ll say he may not be quite what you expect at first glance.”

“But regardless, it is quite fortunate that they had that run in with Vinlot back then. She made some throwaway comment about your orphanage’s manager being sketchy, which I’m sure at this point you can attest to. This led Drim to keep tabs on the orphanage ever since. If he hadn’t, well… I hate to say it, but you’d be somewhere you definitely wouldn’t want to be right now.”

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

“I don’t even know where I am right now!” Senli argued. She quickly lost her appetite and plopped down the bowl of dehydrated ice cream pellets.

“That’s a fair point,” Xard couldn’t deny. “And we will get to that soon, I promise. But first, I’d just like to confirm a few things with you. Primarily, I’d like to go over the events of how you became a Fiend. It lets us get to know you better, and helps us understand your Curse. The police report gives the gist, but it isn’t very detailed. We think we’ve got it pieced together fairly well, so I’ll state what we have and you just let me know any corrections or additions.”

Senli nodded in agreement, not really wanting to partake. At least it was easy enough for her. She really didn’t want to spell it all out again herself. The emotions were still quite raw.

“You were the oldest orphan at the orphanage and essentially the assistant caretaker—helping to prepare meals, cleaning, taking care of the other kids, and so on. At some point, you discovered that the orphanage manager had been lying to the children and artificially creating drama between them for his own twisted amusement. At this point you killed him by spiking one of his drinks with… kale?”

“Yes, he was very allergic to it,” Senli admitted. “I snuck it into a milkshake he’d drink every day. And he wasn’t just lying to us, he kept a hidden diary in the wall of his office of all of our habits, our secrets, passions, issues, everything about us. He used that to prey on us, to make us feel vulnerable and angry. We’d all go to him with our problems, since he made us believe he was the only one who’d understand. And then he used that to betray us all!”

“Sorry…” she had to apologize for raising her voice. “I… don’t really want to talk about him anymore.”

“Of course, that’s perfectly fine,” Xard acquiesced. “But I would just like to confirm how your Curse works. Even the description we were given straight from the source isn’t super informative. Basically, you hear voices from objects around you and they tell you secrets. Is my understanding correct?”

“Correct enough, I guess,” Senli hadn’t thought too much about how to explain it, since she was abducted shortly after becoming a Fiend. “They don’t just tell me things, though, they care about me. Well, most of them. Some can be grouchy or unfriendly, but the rest are just glad to finally have someone who will listen to them. They’re my friends, and they got me through all that hardship.”

“I see,” Xard nodded along. “I can see how that would be rather comforting. Is it alright if I ask how well you can control it? Like, can you turn it off if you feel you need some peace and quiet? If not, we might be able to get our engineer to make a device that could do just that.”

“No! Uhh, it’s fine.” The idea made her panic a bit. “I’ve gotten quite used to them, and they can sense when I want to be left alone. And if they’re being extra chatty, I’ve gotten used to tuning them out. I’d rather they be always around and able to get my attention if they need to. I haven’t really met any so far that I don’t want to talk to.”

As if to spite her, the clothes she’d been wearing chose that moment to speak up. 👚You’re telling this boy too many secrets. Don’t trust him too much or you’ll be filled with regrets.👚

Senli decided to ignore the clothing for now, but she’d need to have a proper conversation later about what to do with them—and probably get some friendlier clothes.

“Well, let’s move forward to your situation,” Xard changed subjects. “You’ve probably guessed it already, but you’re at the Fiends For Hire compound in Bisomote, a small town in Segrevide, a country in the northeast of the continent. We’ve brought you here in hopes that you’ll consider some of our offers. However, I’ll state firmly upfront, that if we can’t come to an arrangement to your liking, you’re welcome to leave, and we’ll assist you however we can with setting up a new life.”

“Of course I might be biased, but I’d like to believe that you can find a fulfilling life here. As you're probably aware, the Fiends For Hire at its core is essentially a mercenary group that takes requests to help others. And I won’t lie and say your Curse wouldn’t be quite useful in an organization like ours, but you don’t have to use it in that way at all if you don’t want to.”

“Now, you’re a bit young to be a member, but that route could be explored if you were interested. From my speculation, I imagine you’d be more interested in the resident route. You’d be allowed to stay here free of charge, with all of your needs met. The only caveat would be that you’d need to find schooling, or employment, or something else that either contributes to the organization or society.”

“Why we’re so interested in having you in particular… Well, I should probably start over with something else. I’d like to talk to you about children for a moment. That sounds weird, but I hope I can make my point clear.”

“I’ve always had quite the soft-spot for children. This was only exacerbated when I found out my best friend was responsible for one losing their life by selling them drugs. That’s how I ended up becoming a Fiend, but that’s a story for another time.”

“In fact, that same soft-spot is why I was the one who rescued you today. Well, last night at this point. Drim was actually planning to do it himself, but I had to practically beg him to let me take it. I couldn’t just let something like that stand so close to my own home… my old home. Especially not to someone so young in such dire straits.”

“But, I also believe you share a similar ideology with me, which is why you worked so hard at your orphanage even though it wasn’t your responsibility. You just wanted to be there for them when they had no one else. That is exactly the kind of person we need right now.”

“You see, there has been a group rounding up and capturing Lesser Fiends. As far as we’re aware, they don’t have any other regular Fiends detained. I'm guessing you were probably captured by the Red Eyes Gang, as were most of these Lessers. But unlike you, they weren’t sold to an auction house. No, they’ve been taken to a lab and are being experimented on.”

“In a few days, once we have all the details and everyone is prepared, we will be raiding this lab. By our estimations, there’s somewhere in the range of 50 to 100 Lessers being held captive there. And unfortunately, most of them are children.”

“For those that have places to return and parents to look after them, we’ll do everything in our power to return them home safely. Unfortunately, we suspect that many of them are orphans or were being raised in environments they’d rather not go back to. In such cases, we plan to bring them back here where they can live safe and fruitful lives.”

“Unfortunately, the issue is we don’t really have anyone to look after them. We have a teacher who will be overseeing their education at least. While we do have a butler, she has expressed her disinterest in being involved at all. The community will almost be welcoming and happy to help however they can, but we’d like to have someone dedicated to make sure they’re all being taken care of properly.”

“Now, I’m sure this is a lot. You’re still quite young yourself and have your whole life ahead of you. Regardless of whether you’d choose to accept the position or not, you’re welcome to stay on as a resident with full freedom over your choice. Though, we would still like you to at least finish your standard education too. And as I said before, if none of that appeals to you, you’re welcome to leave.”

“I… I don’t know…” Senli found it all quite a bit overwhelming. In less than a day she’d gone from thinking her life was over to now needing to figure out her entire future. Even though she’d just slept for who knows how long, she really just wanted to go lie down for a bit.

“Being the caretaker at the orphanage was never really something I chose,” the young Fiend admitted. “It just sort of happened over time. While I can’t say it’s something I ever disliked, I don’t know that it’s what I want to do forever.”

👚So picky now that you’re met with care. Better safe in here than struggling out there.👚 The clothes Senli was wearing quickly changed their tune. 👚This whole thing is sudden, and I know you’re shook. But at the very least you should go take a look.👚

Senli almost believed that Xard could hear it himself for a moment since he immediately offered something similar. “Well, if you’re unsure, why don’t I at least show you around? Hopefully then you can get a better idea of what you’d be signing up for.”