Regan was tired, very very tired. He also felt terribly wronged. Why did he have to go through that boring, not to mention torturous, horse stance once again!? This was simply unfair.

It was not that he did not understand. Horse stance was basics. It strengthened the lower body and provided stability to a fighter, which his body seriously lacked.

Not my body, this body, he corrected inwardly.

Back before in earth, sitting in horse stance for 5 hours was a piece of strawberry cake for him. Right now though, he couldn’t even maintain the stance for thirty minutes. This spoke volumes about the condition of this mute’s body.

A knock at his doors woke him up from his musings.

Come on in, he wanted to say but of course he couldn’t.

It was Old Tong, he had brought some food with him.

“Err… y-young master, how was the training today?”

Regan gave him this look that said it all.

“Y-yeah, training, fun… hehe,” he gave a nervous laugh.

“Anyways young master, here’s your dinner.”

He placed the plate in front of Regan. The Duke’s manor did not disappoint, the food was very very luxurious. Most of all, it was quite energetic. Regan could already feel his tiredness ebbing away.

Old Tong lingered a while as if he wanted to say something and was thinking how he should formulate his words.

“Young master, it’s quite incredible isn’t it? You even get to eat delicacies made of spirit ingredients… aah, if only I were so lucky.”

Spirit ingredients? What were those?

“Oh, I nearly forgot, master has asked me to teach you the words. I trust you don’t know how to read?”

That was quite interesting. All this while Regan had basically heard English but he suspected that the language of this place was quite different. Was the script different too?

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

“Let’s start with the alphabets,”

Tong sat beside him with a parchment and a pen. He drew a bizarre never-seen-before symbol on the parchment. It was apparently “awa” or something similar sounding.

Thus began an hour long fruitless task of learning to read and write. Fruitless because no matter how many times Tong repeated the symbols, Regan simply couldn’t grasp them. It was frustrating.

Tong sighed, “Alright, that’s it for now. We shall continue tomorrow.”

Disappointment was as clear on his face as the starry sky outside. After Tong left, Regan left his room and reached the courtyard.

It had been a very disappointing turn of events. From getting a job to dying and then landing at a dream-like place (for what else could it be?). Worst of all was that he was feeling terribly lonely. Regardless of his difficult life, he always had someone he could talk to. Even when he was on the streets, it was easy to make friends who shared similar difficulties. Now though, not only was he a stranger in this strange place, but he also could not communicate with anyone.

He lay beneath the stars in the courtyard and began contemplating.

“Who are you?”

A sound pierced the music of the crickets.

Regan got up and saw a beautiful girl looking at him with eyes full of curiosity. He met her eyes, for that was the only reply he could give.

“Did you not hear my question? Who are you? How did you come here? Do you even know that strangers in this place at this hour can be executed if found? I would leave the say way I came if I were you.”

Could you slow the hell down?

The girl was worse than Tong when it came to speaking.

“Well, don’t you sit there and stare at me. Go on, shoo, run the guards see you.”

Regan was too tired to move, let alone run anywhere. He just conveniently ignored the little girl and lied down again.

If this action infuriated her, she didn’t show. She just came by his side and peered down at him, determined to not be ignored.

He sighed. This girl was not going to leave him so easily. He got up, pointed to his neck and swayed his head left and right. There, that would tell the girl that he could not speak.

Apparently not.

“You’re funny,” the girl giggled.

“Are you angry at someone? You know, whenever I am angry at grandfather, I too don’t speak with him at all. He usually brings me gifts afterwards and then I start speaking with him again.”

That’s not the point! Regan exclaimed.

“Anyways, my name is Rune, I am grandfather’s granddaughter.”

Had he been drinking something, Regan was sure that he would have choked on it.

Rune found affront with the strange sounding laugh that Regan made.

“No, seriously, I really am his granddaughter. The entire city knows this, what’s there to laugh about?

“Anyways, I am forgiving you this time. Mother says that it’s rude to laugh at a lady. If you do, you might not get married at all. So you should learn to control yourself. I am saying this for yourself you know. Now then, I got to go. Nice to make your acquaintance stranger. Oh, and be sure to not speak until you get a good present. I once settled for the royal sweets from grandfather and the next time I was angry, he got me the same thing! Can you believe that? I am thinking of getting mad at him again so that he could take me to this year’s Royal Hunt.”

Would you leave already!?

“I mean, my friends are all going and even crown prince will be there! He is the most beautiful person in the entire continent. His hair… he has this wondrous hair color and his smile… I could go on and on about his smile.”

Go on and on she did for fifteen more minutes.

“I really got to go now. It was quite nice to talk to you, stranger. We should meet more often. Say, same place same time tomorrow?”

Regan nodded his head. He would have done just about anything to get the girl to leave.

“Alright!” She exclaimed and bounced back to god knows where.

Just what the hell was up with this girl? He didn’t know. She was nice though sans the part where she talked and talked and talked.

It is often the case that a man knows not of his emotions. Same was with Regan for had he known, he’d have found that he was feeling a bit less lonely.