The adorably cute Jusis bounced up and down on Gaius’ lap, making baby words as he tried to pick up the now-unwrapped statue. Occasionally, he would grab Gaius or Isabelle’s finger, only to be disappointed when he found out that there was some unexplainable power preventing him from chewing on them.
“What a little fun guy,” said Gaius.
“He seems really interested in the sculpture,” Isabelle observed quietly. “But why would he be interested in a boring old sculpture? It’s something meant to elicit emotions, not as a toy.”
“A toy, huh?” A stroke of inspiration entered his mind. “Isabelle, get Nexus’ sculpture out, and then call him over. He’ll be a great playmate for little Jusis.”
“That’s a good idea!” Isabelle got up and retrieved the sculpture. “Nexus, come here. We need your help.”
With these words, she returned to Gaius, before passing the sculpture in her hand over to Jusis. The toddler made a few odd sounds, and then released Gaius’ gift, clearly attracted by the better made sculpture.
Nexus took over a moment later. “At your service, master Gaius—eh?! What’s this adorable lifeform?”
“That’s a toddler,” Gaius replied.
“I know, master Gaius. But do me a favour and stop pointing out my figures of speech.” Nexus turned back to Jusis, joy radiating off every wooden fibre of its being. “High-five?”
“High-five?” Jusis stared at Nexus’ outstretched hand, and then met it with one of his own with a delighted squeal. “High-five!”
Gaius stared at the sight, and then extended his own hand too. “High-five?”
The toddler turned to look at his hand, before turning back to meet Nexus’ hand once more. Gaius felt something in his heart shatter, and he turned away bitterly to look at Isabelle, who was clearly suppressing her mirth.
“There’s a reason why I’m the older brother, Gaius. Get that into your head, master,” said Nexus. “Right, why did you call me here?”
“We wanted you to meet my cousin,” Isabelle replied. “Isn’t he a cute little fellow?”
“He is.” Nexus wriggled out of Jusis’ grip, and then began to hover in mid-air. With eyes as round as saucers, the little guy got to his feet and waddled towards Nexus.
“What that?”
“That’s Nexus, Jusis. Nex-us.” Isabelle glanced at the floating sculpture, who was now making some heroic poses in mid-air, and hid a smile.
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“Nex-us?”
“That’s right! Smart boy!” Isabelle rubbed his head. “He can fly. See?”
Nexus did a few loops in mid-air, and Jusis laughed. A moment later, the toddler raised his hands and tried to feel for something above and underneath Nexus. From the looks of it, Jusis wanted to know why Nexus was capable of flying, and the befuddled expression he had when he couldn’t find anything made Gaius and Isabelle laugh out loud.
Jusis held Nexus in his hand, and then asked, “Why can fly?”
“Master Gaius, how should I reply?”
“Just reply with a kid’s answer.” Gaius hadn’t quite overcome the pain in his heart yet, so he made do by cuddling Isabelle instead, who reciprocated the gesture. It wasn’t like the toddler would know what he was doing anyway, and—
“Ah,” said a wizened voice. “Am I disturbing something?”
Gaius felt Isabelle freeze up.
“No,” he replied. “Definitely not. We were just having some…us time, g-grandmother.”
The word was a bit foreign to him, but since she insisted on Gaius calling him that way, there wasn’t really much he could do about it. More importantly, after he said it a few times, there was this nice fuzzy feeling in his heart, so he really didn’t mind.
“Well, as long as you don’t get too frisky in front of me or Jusis, it’s okay.” She let out a small chuckle. “Who’s usually the initiator, Isa?”
Isabelle made a little noise, and then buried her face in Gaius’ chest. That sight made her grandmother burst into uproarious laughter, drawing the attention of little Jusis, who toddled over to her immediately, while waving Nexus.
“New toy!”
“Toy?”
Master Gaius, what do I do? Do I say hi? Or do I just statue on?
Gaius cleared his throat. “G-grandmother, this is my intelligent artefact, Nexus. Nexus, this is Isabelle’s grandmother.”
“Oh, we’re just laying it up front?” Nexus replied. “Okay. Hi, Isabelle’s grandmother!”
“Hmm. You can call me Amelie.”
“Madam Amelie, then.” Nexus inclined his head. “Nice to meet you.”
“So, you’re his intelligent artefact, eh? They’re really rare,” said Isabelle’s grandmother. “Most of them don’t last that long, but you seem a bit different.”
“Don’t last that long?” Gaius repeated.
“They’re usually targets of…assassination, for lack of a better word. I’m not sure about the other nations, but the Southern Assembly fears intelligent artefacts and has policies targeting them. The same goes for the Holy Temple.” She let out a slow sigh. “As beings that are functionally immortal, have impeccable memory and unlimited potential, they’re strong pieces in deciding hegemony over the Five Lands. The great gods don’t want that.”
Gaius exchanged glances with Isabelle, shocked at her grandmother’s words.
“You…didn’t know that?”
“Nope,” Gaius replied. “In fact, I’ve never heard about the bit about the Assembly targeting intelligent artefacts to begin with.”
In the first place, however, Nexus was older than pretty much almost everything else on Orb. Gaius didn’t even know what his true body looked like, but it was almost certainly the entire Library of Ancients. If the Assembly really learned about Nexus…
“Well, now you do. You shouldn’t neglect us old people.” Her eyes twinkled. “Some of us have information that you’ll never expect us to have. Anyway, thank you for playing with Jusis. He’s always a little handful.”
“Really?” Isabelle got up from Gaius — an act that made him feel a bit sad for some reason — and walked over to Jusis, who beamed in response. The little fella didn’t seem all that happy when it came to him, even though Gaius felt that he was objectively handsome enough to make babies smile, so it was probably personal preference on Jusis’ part.
Cheering himself up at that thought, he joined Isabelle and her grandmother in playing around with Jusis.