The month was almost up, and they had already put in an extension for Max to stay in the community. Based on his good behaviour, contributions to Cy’s magic ability, and the delivery of two freshly invented computers in this world; it was almost guaranteed to be accepted by this point. Their plan for the future was simple. Max and Cy will meet with BB when she returns to port, and then they’ll continue with their progress.

Cy’s reading of fates had improved a little. They still couldn’t clearly declare why Max can change fixed fates. Max was no closer to creating a rune that could measure up to Cy’s vision. But Cy was remarkably talented at drawing runes.

When Max tried to teach others runes in the past, it was usually met with bitching and complaints. “Why isn’t it working?” “The lines look the same?” “What do you mean there is a fraction of a millimetre difference?” “Who the fuck decided the runes for death and teeth would be nearly identical?” Spewing gossip, Cy would dutifully copy incomplete rune after incomplete rune until Max felt confident enough that he wouldn’t kill both of them with a small stroke in the wrong direction.

“Did you hear the news?” Cy asked, as he tried to copy the incomplete rune for ‘heart.’ So far, he had been learning the runes deemed as ‘essential vocabulary’ by Max. Although exposed to the rune for ‘heal,’ it was far too complicated for him to replicate at the moment. It’ll be a long time until he was ready to reliably heal himself without causing more damage. “The Duke of Landrut will be visiting today.”

“Why is that name familiar…” Max muttered, as he stared down at his attempts to discover the runic names for ‘fate’ and ‘Cy’s existence.’ The best rune for ‘fate’ only revealed a very faint colour when Max used it on himself. It was pathetic. The colour wasn’t as accurate compared to the results of Cy’s internal magic. Knowing the broad category of Cy’s red fate wasn’t good enough, he needed to know the exact shade to understand a person’s general purpose in life.

“It should be familiar.” Cy spun his paper around for Max to inspect. “He owns the land Tsujuma is built on.”

“Does he? This line is too crooked in all of your attempts.”

Cy exchanged a look at Lurch, who seemed equally confused before shrugging it off. It was such a minor change compared to the original. Lurch let out a few beeps while hovering slowly towards the door. “Looks like it’s time for you to go.”

“Ah, fuck.” Max hated having to interrupt his train of thought, but cows were awaiting him. He couldn’t deny that looking after the familiar creatures was his favourite part of the day.

“See ya. By the way, Dad is making soup for dinner.”

Max grunted his acknowledgement before following Lurch out of the lab.

He made his way quickly through the community from Elder Nova’s lab to Farmer Bell’s fields. On his way, he made sure to yell at Elder Aris from the other end of the field. Although he never acknowledged his existence, this quick interaction suited both of them. Max hoped that checking-in more than two times a day on a consistent basis would leave a good impression, but there were no fruits from his labour.

Just as he was about to go through a portal, a familiar voice called out to him.

“Max?”

Surprise caused him to stop in his tracks and search for the voice. It didn’t take long to spot him. “I don’t fucking believe it, Kurt? The butcher’s boy?”

Kurt stuck out a fat lip. “It’s Lord Landrut.” The butcher’s boy couldn’t help cracking into a smile. “Nah, I’m just fucking with you.”

“You’re not a Lord?”

“Ah, I am,” he rubbed his freckled nose. “Turns out, the duke is my bio Dad.” Kurt pointed over to a man who looked as beautiful as the well-groomed horse he was sitting on. The ‘bio’ father and son pair were nothing alike. One had a long, black, flowing mane. The other had ginger straw. It didn’t seem to matter to the system or the story. “But I’m still Kurt.”

“Still the butcher’s boy,” Max smiled along with him. “Listen, it’s nice to see you, but I need to go to my part-time job…”

“Can I come? I don’t want to stick around and talk to the old Elder.” He pointed over to Elder Ji-min.

Max nodded. “Why don’t you want to talk to him?” he asked, while directing Kurt through the teleporter. After going through, it was clear that the ordinary butcher’s boy was now well acquainted with magic. “Is he trying to con you into cleaning his home?”

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“No? What the fuck? That sounds dodgy as hell.” Kurt looked around. Being in the fields must be nostalgic for him too.

“Then why?”

“He keeps talking about me leaving the Dukedom and joining the community. Apparently, I have some innate magic or whatever.”

“You do?” Max couldn’t hide his envy. Kurt’s decision must be a sub-quest or requirement for the story. Hopefully Kurt can make the right choices without a HUD guiding him along to the goal.

Kurt merely shrugged. “I’m not interested and, as long as the duke owns this land, I don’t have to join… I think. I’m not sure, to be honest. I don’t really get the politics of it all.”

“As a Lord, shouldn’t you be getting good at politics?” Max opened the fence for Kurt to enter. “I need to get this herd into that field.”

“Let me know if I need to move… I’ve been trying to get into it, but it’s hard. To be honest, I’ve been thinking about renouncing my claim and setting up a butcher’s shop. We’re missing some good meat where we’re at.”

“In an ideal life, you’ll get your shop and I’ll be your supplier.” Max joked as he began getting the obedient girls to move. Farmer Bell treated his stock as queens. The well-fed, well-groomed, and well-messaged girls wiggled their fat bottoms as they gracefully moved to the neighbouring field.

“Do you think so?” Kurt didn’t seem to think it was a joke.

Max tried to think back to the prompt. If he had started a story, then he could access ignored story prompts he’d encountered in his HUD. For now, he was reliant on his memory, which had been bombarded by the stupid tables. Who knew how many stars the story had? It couldn’t be more than two if everything was going smoothly for him. But Max remembered the end goal.

“You should probably become the new duke first before opening your shop.” Kurt didn’t look pleased with the idea. “It’ll be easier for you to fund your shop during the quiet periods.”

Kurt thought about it for a moment as he eyed up one of Farmer Bell’s girls. She was damn lucky the butcher’s boy hadn’t opened his shop yet. “Maybe you’ve got a point.”

“And you can get access to better real estate.”

“True.”

“You could even make it an enterprise.”

Max could see the ambition in his eyes. Time to hurry up the girls.

“So, how long have you been here for?” Kurt asked, as he threw a handful of chicken feed while Max sorted out one of Farmer Bell’s broken gates.

“About a month.”

“Did you hear about the mayor?” The chickens ran to Kurt’s feet, unaware they were standing under a serial killer of their kind. The butcher’s boy would go from a benevolent source of grain to a monster if they knew. “He had a stroke. Luckily, his son managed to find him in time. I heard Bernedette was pissed; she had placed a bet for that day.”

“How do you know all that?” Max was a little perplexed. “Did you keep in contact with your mum?”

“And my dad,” Kurt said, with a nod. “Why do you look so surprised? He might not be my bio dad, but the man raised me for eighteen years and trained me in butchery for my future.”

“Nothing.” Max focused his face back on the fence, so it was harder to read. “He just didn’t seem like the type to write letters.”

“To be honest, I thought he was going to cut contact after everything came out. For the first couple of weeks, I didn’t hear anything from him. Because of the shock, I guess. But now, he sends more letters than mum, just about every other day.”

“That’s a lot of letters.”

“There’s a lot to talk about apparently. You know, both Adelaide and Aldwin have left the village.”

“What? Why?”

On cue, Adelaide’s prompt reappeared. “A few days after the mayor’s stroke, Adelaide left some kind of weird note about love before leaving with bags of her clothes. Liv thinks someone helped her pack-up and leave. Some think it was Aldwin.” Max gave a snort at the ridiculousness of the idea. “Exactly,” Kurt agreed with a smirk of his own. “So, it’s a bit of a mystery right now.”

“Did Aldwin leave the same day?”

“Nah, he left the morning after the mayor was found. He was supposed to go to Alan’s farm to help out with a harvest. When he didn’t show up, Alan checked-in on him. Apparently, everything had been left behind.”

“What do you mean everything? Like all of his clothes and stuff?”

“I mean everything. All his clothes, food, savings; even the trash was left behind to rot inside his home. Alan said he found some ‘obscene sketches’ out in the open on his bedside table! It was like he vanished.”

Max frowned. If Kurt’s gossip was accurate then maybe Max was the last person to see him. Even worse, unlike with Adelaide, there was no prompt to indicate he was still alive. Thinking back, there was never a prompt that was strongly connected to him. It was one of the reasons why it was easier to be friends with him.

“It is odd,” Max murmured. “I mean, Aldwin’s lived in the village his whole life. Where would he even go?”

“I don’t know either.”

“What about Bessie and Belli?”

“Bessie and who?” Kurt frowned in confusion. “Do you mean Bill?” Max fought the embarrassment showing on his face. Why? What the fuck was up with that farmers name? He could remember Farmer Bell just fine, but Farmer Billi was too much for his brain for some reason. “Max… how could you not remember his name? You guys lived together for so long.”

“I know. I just… misremembered for a second. So, how are they?”

“Same as normal.” The news came as a punch to the gut. Max couldn’t quite put it into words why his answer strung so much. “They finally got a new bunch of heifers as compensation for the ones taken by the aliens.”

“I guess that would keep them busy.” There was a slight bitterness to his voice, but it passed through Kurt’s ears without acknowledgement. “Have they started naming them? Bessie told me she was going to deviate from her pattern of berry girls.”

“Berry girls?” Realisation slowly dawned on Kurt’s face, at least Max didn’t have to put it together for him. How did none of them notice? Perhaps it was because Bessie didn’t seem like the kind of woman who appreciated subtleness. Or even knew subtleness was even an option. Once the surprise faded, a knowing smile was left on his face. “I think she’s moved away from berries. I know some of the names from my dad’s letters. Let’s see… There’s Martha, Mabel, Maisie, Maggie… I think there’s one that’s called Maxine….”

Max dropped the hammer he was using.

“I guess Bessie has a herd of Ma kids now.”