One could've sworn that there'd been a natural disaster outside.
The number of people in the store increased drastically throughout the conversation with Perse. Most of these people are most likely the plainclothes guards she mentioned. They were far too muscular to be civilians, and they all only appeared to be browsing rather than paying.
Yakti would walk behind the cashier who was watching the guards and tap him on his shoulder. Jumping in surprise, upon turning he would see the pretty blonde "woman" from before.
He... Well, he didn't know what to think about the chinchilla man anymore. He did find the blonde woman in front of him attractive, but after seeing the truth, he only felt sexually confused.
While the cashier remained lost in thought, Yakti waved his hand in front of his face. "Hello? Mr. Cashier? Oculardis to cashier, are you hearing me?"
The cashier would again jolt up and apologize before opening the gate to let Yakti out.
Luckily, Kentei was right across from him, sitting in the seats with the medicine box, staring at the guards just as the cashier was doing. Yakti would walk up to him, and he'd face him in turn.
"Kentei, your aunty has gotten what she needed." He shook the bag before continuing, "Let's go home now!"
Kentei smiled while picking up the crate and jumping down from the chair, but before the two began to leave the store, Yakti noticed something, well, the lack of something. Where did the lioness guard go?
"Say... Before we leave, do you know where the kind lady from earlier went? I don't see her anywhere right now."
"Oh, Miss Guard? She went there!" Kentei pointed to the Royal Library across the street before continuing. "Apparently she said there was something she needed to do there!"
He squinted his eyes, suspicious about the situation while beginning to mentally count.
One, two, three, four, five... Why are there so many plainclothes guards here? Did all of them come from the Royal Library? If so, why are there so many here? It doesn't make any damn sense! He shook his head before sighing and turning back to Kentei, who was randomly beaming with joy.
"What a shame then! I really would've loved to give her some pastries from the bakery! It seems like we'll have to eat them all by ourselves..." He faked a glance down in despair as the child laughed.
"You're funny Aunt Yakti! You're really funny!"
He snapped up, realizing that he's... He's actually enjoying this outing now. Just an hour ago, he was swearing he would kill this child, but it was entertaining to play and talk with him. Is this what Aorin felt when she was raising him before he came into view?
Useless thoughts. He doesn't need them. Turning to Kentei, he began speaking again, this time with a tone that had much less emotion.
"Alright, let's head out then."
Kentei noticed something was wrong but didn't dare to ask what it was and would follow without any commentary on his behalf.
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Capitol West Street
As soon as the two left the bookstore, it seemed like all of the guards would leave the shop and begin following them. During this process, the guards began to rendezvous with each other.
It was a bit of a comedic scene for an outsider. It wasn't as if the plainclothes guards were hiding the fact that they were guards whatsoever, and seeing what must've been a dozen of them follow a woman and a young Shirah was quite the scene.
Initially, the guards tried to be subtle about breaking up any crowds that began to form, but with how many people would leave their stores to see the commotion outside, and wondered about the true nature of the lady who needed so many bodyguards (at least that's what it seemed). At some point, it was too much effort, and they just outwardly claimed they were actual city guards.
With so many city guards following this single lady, the fact that she had what seemed to be an exotic servant carrying some of her luggage, and her lack of care for the dirt on her dress, she had to be some form of an imperial princess. It wouldn't make any sense for a mere baron, countess, or even a duchess to have this many odd people following her, after all.
Seeing how she was probably human, many suspected that House Hastep might have needed to head down to New Raastia earlier than expected.
Perhaps something went wrong in Port Almano, and they needed to resolve the issue with the aid of the Raastian dutchies directly rather than relying on some mere marquise to handle it.
Initially, Yakti had many creative ideas on how to utilize this crowd for his benefit and try to bolt into it and blend in. Sadly, the guards had made it very difficult for him to do that since whenever it looked like a flash mob could form, they stepped in and broke it up.
At least, this was until he reached the Capitol West and Altain intersection.
This intersection was unique: now and then, it'd be flooded with people who dressed similarly to Yakti walking away from the Three Courts. Of course, these were the Free Serfs who belonged to their respective court leaving to return home. If he could blend into this crowd, then he could lose the guards, as they should not be able to break up a crowd of people as important as court members.
It was a difficult maneuver that forced him to hold onto Kentei's upper left right tightly and guide him through Altain without risking him getting lost in the crowd.
Sadly, with how slowly they needed to move and the lack of gaps in the crowd, it was incredibly easy for one of the guards to keep up with him.
By the time he had reached his bakery, that guard had been right next to him, and he needed to cut his losses. He was still on a timer and already burned through one of the three hours he could guarantee breaking off the guards completely. He decided to enter the bakery with Kentei.
Upon entering the bakery, Yakti immediately locked the door behind him and grabbed the box straight from Kentei's arms.
Without using the feminine voice anymore, he barked at Kentei:
"Do not let a single person into the bakery, okay? I need to do something here, and while I'm here, I can't have anyone interrupt me. Do you understand?"
The boy nodded, and Yakti would head to the back of the restaurant to enter the corridor that led to the hidden trapdoor and climb down it.
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Basement of Yakti's Bakery
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
The trapdoor slammed with great violence, breaking Aorin's concentration on Mihe as he plopped the medicine down on the table and began to remove the reconfiguration.
"W-Am I dreaming?" Aorin's eyes were wide after seeing Yakti remove his reconfiguration and return to his original form while still wearing the dress.
He gave her a face of pure fury before responding, "Bitch what do you mean: 'am I dreaming'!? Does this look like a dream to you!?" He was already far too exhausted with his act from earlier, and hearing her disrespect him like that was the last straw.
She didn't say anything as he began to berate her.
"Why the FUCK! Did you bring Kentei outside!? What the hell is wrong with you!? Do they cut off half of every Shirah's brains in Karinomaki!!!"
His constant shouting had broken Mihe's unconsciousness and brought him back as he continued. "Do you have ANY idea what it was like to have a gang of plainclothes guards following you!?"
Finally, the man would address the shaking Mihe "And why the hell aren't they wearing a damn blindfold!"
"I-I-I" She was stammering.
"You were what!"
"I couldn't find it in the pantry; I had searched through almo-" She responded with great fear in her voice.
"It wasn't in the pantry you dumbass!" Yakti exclaimed before realizing that if she searched through his pantry there was a chance she could've...
He bolted to the pantry as best he could in his heels and only found it in absolute disarray.
"What the hell did you do to my pantry!!!" He was infuriated as Mihe's pain had finally reached a critical level. He would shout to Aorin as well, despite her unstable state.
"Aorin! Quick! Knock me out again!"
That statement was the straw that broke the camel's back as Yakti rushed to Aorin and began choking her.
"Why are you knocking them out!?!?!?"
Aorin used all 4 of her arms to break out of his grip as she dropped and landed on the bed before Mihe finally spoke up.
"Please! Whoever it is that is yelling, stop doing that! Who even is yelling!?"
The chinchilla man finally relaxed and sighed before responding.
"It's me, Yakti. I'm going to have to debrief on the situation outside right now because it's looking really bad. For now, though, I need to figure out what in the world Aorin was thinking when she let Kentei out!"
By this point, Mihe's pain had neared the point of them entering a delirious state once again as he began to wriggle around to distract themselves from the urges to rip out their eyes.
"We'll talk about that when we can then, but I still need to be knocked out! This pain is too much!"
"Stop complaining, damn! I have medicine for you now." He opened the box as he looked through it.
"Aorin, catch!" He tossed a blindfold to Aorin.
She quickly used this opportunity to try to ignore the attempt on her life by instead focusing solely on Mihe's health.
"Monstrati Balm and painkillers, preferably in pill form." She said lacking any emotion in her voice.
Yakti nodded as he grabbed a tin and a small bottle before placing them on the bed near her.
Once the blood-soaked makeshift blindfold was removed, she opened the small bottle. "Does the receipt recommend a dose?"
He groaned as he fished around the box for a receipt and pulled it out, examining it carefully before finding painkiller dosages.
"One pill per day. If pain doesn't subside within the hour give a second dose, do not give more than three in a single day."
Aorin nodded as she instructed Mihe to open their mouth and dropped one pill as he swallowed it.
Finally, she would open the small tin, resulting in a horrid stench spreading throughout the room. Inside said tin was a brownish balm that she would scoop and gently apply over Mihe's eyelids.
She closed the balm and turned back to Yakti. "Urktos Oil."
He complied and pulled out another small bottle with a soft top. She removed the top to reveal that it was a squeezable dropper as she sprinkled the oil over their eyes.
Finally, after all of this medicine was applied, she wrapped a new blindfold tightly and unwrapped the restraints she had placed around Mihe's wrist to let them start moving freely.
Now, while the pain was still there, it had been greatly reduced in exchange for a slight cooling sensation, and they no longer felt like ripping out their eyeballs.
Aorin would get up and began to place the items back into the box while examining what's inside the crate. Yakti would take this opportunity to get away from her and sit next to Mihe, who would feel the cloth of his dress and would grab it tightly.
"...Who is this?"
"It's still Yakti. You're grabbing my dress, let go."
Stammering, they asked: "W-Wait! You mean to tell me the same Yakti I know is wearing a dress right now?"
He rolled his eyes. "Yes, the very same one you know. It's a light blue dress with white frills that I had found at a local boutique and I bought it to look like a noble lady."
There was nothing else to say as the three sat there in silence for a minute, until Yakti began to explain what had happened to them, omitting the meeting with Perse to save on time and to reduce panic.
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"In the process of trying to get me medicine, Aorin’s son managed to get a bunch of guards to gang-stalk you?"
Yakti nodded while Mihe waited for a response. It was only now he realized they couldn't see, so he verbally affirmed their question.
"Yes, this means we need to find a way to get the guards off my tail. I got a way to get them off me today, but they could still attempt to find us tomorrow, and we'll be pretty easy to find: we're right off a main street after all. Therefore, we need some way to get away from the guards permanently."
Listening to the possibility of being arrested brought enough fear to Aorin that she chimed in meekly.
"U-um, I have a meeting with the Imperial Court tomorrow... Maybe I could try to go to the Shadow Court and ask them to issue an order to stop any investigation into us? You know... Asking for diplomatic immunity?"
He went slack-jawed at this response. "Holy shit... Aorin is capable of making a good idea!? This is a goddamn miracle and a half! I always thought Shirah were dropped on their head as children, but it seems even a broken clock is right once a day!" Before beginning to laugh.
Mihe tried to ignore the cruelty of the comments to interject themself.
"If that fails, I did find a trapdoor under the Riverside Tebidnatic Church. I don't really know too well where it leads, but I think it's meant to be used by the churches to go from one church to another so if need be we can go there."
"So why would we want to go there then? Aren't you like an enemy of the church and everything?" He inquired.
"Well, it could lead to a church across the river, which lets us ignore needing to cross any bridges, so if they still think we're on this side of the city then..."
"Dear gods... You're also turning into a fucking genius! I can't believe it! Two genuinely good ideas in a row! If we leave through the church system, then the guards will spend all their time investigating this side of the city rather than investigating where we actually are!"
Yakti stood up and clapped before looking at the two. "Alright then! In that case, this is what we're going to do: Once I head out and get the guards off my trail, I'll come back in two hours we'll go to sleep and wait for Aorin to return from her meeting. If she is successful then we do nothing, and if she failed then we'll have Mihe make a distraction for us and-"
Mihe cut him off. "Wait, I never once said I volunteered to be the distraction, why does it have to be me?"
"Cause out of the three of us, you're the most expendable and the most guilty looking with your previous murders and all of that. Aorin and I have clean slates right now. So once they arrest you, they'll think we're not suspicious."
"I still didn't volunteer! Wasn't it you who said I could destroy this city singlehandedly!? Shouldn't that be worth something!?" They were hysterical.
"You don't know how to use any magics, and your physical strength is extremely low. As far as I know, you're less valuable than Kentei, so we won't need you if push comes to shove. Maybe if you prove you're more valuable than Aorin, I'll take you along, but as it stands, you're not." He responded.
Mihe sat there silently before asking: “Did you give me the hope of living a comfortable life just to sacrifice me in case something went wrong?”
Yakti didn't respond.