Kalender and Jyn were transported to a fort city, about 5 days away on a prisoner carriage.
It was a proper military base in the center, with a castle surrounded by barracks, training fields, and stables. A stone wall surrounded all those, and around even that, were markets, homes, blacksmiths, and shops. The “city” part of the city grew around the base, and another wall eventually sprung up around that.
This wasn’t a tour, though. They saw little of the outside of the carriage, with the only light coming from a skylight crystal in the ceiling. A set of bars, covered by a curtain, separated Kalender and Jyn. Neither were allowed to speak—a fact that was magically-enforced.
The carriage stopped inside a compound in the base. Kalender and Jyn stepped off into an alley between two buildings—no doubt, this was the discreet entrance.
The buildings on either side were three stories tall. There weren’t any windows. It was just wall.
Four knights ushered them through a door immediately ahead of them. Strangely, given the gravity of the curse, Kalender had expected rougher treatment. Did Inquisitor Yal put in a word for him?
Be nice to those who are nice to you. He’d make sure to give back to the inquisitor at some point, assuming he was as respectable as he seemed. That, however, would only matter after things here were settled.
They were led to some stairs, and then an underground space, not unlike a dungeon—if dungeons were well-lit and well-furnished.
What struck Kalender was the quietness. The knights’ footsteps didn’t echo severely, so it didn’t feel like they were in some cavernous, underground space from which they had no escape. It felt more like… a hospital’s hallway. The walls were properly made of brick, and there were slots in the ceiling that blew air, too—proper ventilation.
Instead of a prison, it was a carefully-planned health facility, even if a little on the pre-modern side of architecture.
They were led to an office where someone, dressed like Inquisitor Yal, but in white, was waiting together with a scarlet knight. The original escorts left and closed the door.
“Please. Sit.”
Kalender and Jyn sat some distance apart on one side of the long table. On the other, the inquisitor-apparent had a pen ready over a stack of papers. His guard stood just over his shoulder.
“Introductions are not necessary. Actually, do not mention any names at all.”
The way the man started struck Kalender as a bit… Were they trying to depersonalize things? It probably made sense if you didn’t want your employees thinking too hard about the type of work they did.
Inquisitor Yal’s description of the Carmine Test fogged up Kalender’s attention. They’d basically just wait and see if sexual assault was on a man’s mind at all. He wasn’t worried about himself, really, but the woman that had gotten tangled up in this mess with him—she hadn’t been looking too well for the past few days. Her name was Jyn, wasn’t it? Her squadmates mentioned her name a few times.
“We will have both of you understand the procedure. It will be dangerous, but we have failsafes.”
The white-robed inquisitor removed the cover from a small case on the table that had nearly gone unnoticed.
"This serum will bring out your truest desires. Ordinarily, it will not work on a person, but the curse can be exploited, to an extent.
"This does not necessarily mean that your primal, animal desires will manifest. The serum specifically avoids targeting those, hence it should be biased towards the Cursed One’s favor.
"However, I must inform you that the most common result is that of depravity or violence. If you show any sign of which, we are constantly monitoring you; our male guards will be dispatched to arrest you, and you will fail the test.
"The test will be carried out over the span of 10 days. Similarly, the serum will remain in effect for 10 days. Food and water will be served three times a day through a portlet. You will not be allowed outside of the test chamber for the entire duration of the test.
“Also, generous furnishings are provided. Changes of clothes and such are provided every day. You are expected to take care of yourselves. Any questions?”
Kalender raised his hand. The inquisitor nodded.
“Any books?”
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
“Already provided.”
“Alright.” Which was to say—alright! He was banking on the distraction to get him through, but apart from that, he also just didn’t want to disturb Jyn.
She had been in a downcast mood the entire time. He couldn’t bear to look at her. Better not disturb her.
***
The syringes in this world weren’t much too different to his first life’s, surprisingly. Things were made of glass instead of plastic, and gaskets were leather instead of rubber, but don’t sweat the details too much.
“The serum will take effect in full force in 30 minutes. Make yourself comfortable before then.”
After explaining, the white-robed inquisitor left Kalender and Jyn in the room.
The room itself had a dining table, a private toilet and shower room, a bookshelf, a reading table right beside that, and least conspicuous of all—a single bed.
It was a pretty huge bed that would easily fit three people, but that wasn’t the point.
The color drained from Jyn’s face. While Kalender—
“I- I’ll take the floor.”
[+1 Affection]
Fucker. How did basic courtesy turn into that?
They’d removed his magic cuffs, so actually, Jyn was now in constant danger.
Kalender’s impression of the Carmine Test got thrown off. At first, he’d wondered if they were setting things up so that the chances of passing were as high as possible, but he examined the room and found some pretty questionable stuff.
The doorknob of the door to the shower room could be locked—but if he twisted it hard enough, the mechanism would slip, and it would open anyway. That’s besides the fact that the door itself had a pretty sizeable crack that a man could peek through.
The floor, clean and tiled as it was, was cold. Too cold. No one would want to sleep on it. He tried putting a spare bed sheet on it to insulate against the floor, but even the bed sheet turned cold just moments later.
Probably some magic stuff.
There was only one bed, one dining table—one of everything, save for chairs. There were an entire two chairs, which was … decent, actually.
Essentially, a good chunk of the set-up was to make it easier to fail the test.
More than likely, there was a confluence of opposing factions fighting over the philosophy of the test—whether or not they should make it harder or easier.
It was at that moment that Jyn slowly walked over to the bed, which was by the corner of the room … and slowly spread her legs.
“… What are you doing?”
It had only been 10 minutes. The serum shouldn’t have taken effect yet. Besides, the serum was given to Kalender.
“Just… Get it over with.”
“I have several problems with that—”
“Both our lives are forfeit. There has never been a case of anyone passing this test.”
“Again, I really can’t agree—”
“Even if you pass, and then what? I will be subject to your whims, no longer being led by my own will. Want as you might to venture out and fight this curse, but what are the chances of you actually succeeding? There is nothing left for me, so take me, have your fun, ask to be executed, and let the kingdom give me an early mercy. Better luck to both of us in the next life.”
Kalender’s face twisted into the deepest frown he’s ever had. It was clear that Jyn’s built a nihilistic shell around herself, deflecting anything he could possibly say.
So he pulled a chair to the reading desk, picked a book from the shelf, sat down, and read.
***
It had been 40 minutes. The serum should be in full force by now.
Jyn looked to Kalender. She couldn’t be upset for too long, her undirected anger converted into resignation.
But Kalender was still reading.
[+1 Affection]
“How does this curse work…” He sighed. He didn’t even do anything.
Maybe it had something to do with the fact that he was reading one of this world’s romance novels. There was a decent chance that what he was reading was considered trash, but in the absence of a conversible human being, he could only refer to such trash to get an idea of what was considered romantic—at least here in Lyrica.
Some forms of kidnapping are considered romantic… I should be careful about rescue missions.
He sighed. He pulled up his stats and looked at Jyn’s Affection. It was a 10.
Where’d the other three come from—ohhhh.
Yal did say that even if they were just Flagged, their Affection would tick up on their own as they thought about him.
It was likely the case that if he did something, the Affection uptick would show up on his system. Otherwise, if it were just the girls doing it on their own, then he wouldn’t get notified.
Good thing he could still keep tabs via the status panel, then.
He turned to look at Jyn—realizing too late that it was probably a poor thing to do unprompted.
He and Jyn met eyes. For a moment, a surge of emotion welled up in him.
It captured him.
He banged the table with his fist, sending Jyn’s adrenaline running. “Why are you like this!” Kalendar cried out. “Value your life more, dude!”
“… ‘Dude’ … ?”
His true emotions spilled out on the floor—
“Just because I’m a guy doesn’t mean I’m horny all the damn time! I ain’t out here to fuck around!”
—and utterly confused Jyn and the guards watching the security feed.
“Should we call this in?” one guard asked.
“I dunno. Look, he’s crying. Those are tears, right?”
“Huh, they are.”
They reviewed the guidelines. None of the test failure criteria said anything about ranting one’s heart out.
“Guess we’ll just wait and see, huh.” “Uh-huh.”
Jyn, on the other hand, was taking the brunt of it. A part of her wanted to do something about the fully-grown man—cultural definitions of ‘fully-grown’ notwithstanding—who was crying while saying strange things like,
“Just because you consent doesn’t mean I’ll attack you right on the spot!”
Preposterous. Are you even a man if you don’t? Or,
“This world will know the Platonic Agenda! A fulfilling lifelong friendship is a hundred times better than sex!”
‘Platonic Agenda’? What’s that, is that a pantheon? Is this man actually a herald from another world? As for the last part, she didn’t have a frame of reference, but the words “fulfilling” and “lifelong” had a pretty good ring to them, so she’d leave him the benefit of the doubt for that one.
The guards were also convinced that Kalender had gone into a spat of preaching. Nothing too crazy, but…
Something’s wrong with this guy. Jyn and the guards unwittingly agreed on this one point.
[+1 Affection]