It was strange to hear myself curse with Isabella’s voice. Oh, I had cursed aplenty within my head just today, but aloud? I think that was the first time I had done so. I didn’t know exactly how I sounded since I couldn’t exactly replay my voice back to myself, yet I could still tell that her voice was decidedly the type that could probably silence a room if she so much as yelled ‘fuck’. It was that soft and melodious, probably akin to the gentle caress of the wind whispering at people.
And so incredibly different from my own voice.
I sighed as I closed the door to my fath- Jean’s study. My frown deepened at the slip in my thoughts. Jean de Brienne was not my father, but Isabella’s. I’d have to call him father in public, but within the sanctity of my own head there were no such expectations. I couldn’t forget that while I was in the body of Isabella, I was still Derrick Johansen. That we were separate people and I just happened to have her memories, that we weren’t the same person. So many things had been taken from me in quick succession. Losing my sense of self, the heart of who I was too? That would be unacceptable.
After all, there wouldn't be anybody else to remember that in my stead if I ever let myself forget.
For a moment after that melancholic thought, I simply stared out the window within the study and into the manicured gardens of the castle. Then I shook my head and forced myself to remember the bastard of a Bishop who I could rely on to never teach me a thing about how to read simply because I was a girl. Because anything was better than letting those thoughts fester.
I felt my annoyance begin to boil over again while I walked over to the shelf filled with a decent number of books. I knew that I was within the Middle Ages now and having to deal with everything that entailed. That each and every step here was going to take painstaking effort to make. But would it have killed the world to throw me at least one bone?
I had tried to prove to the bishop that there was more potential in me than there had seemed in the past without straying too far from how Isabella acted. Showing some potential had seemed like the best way to begin my idea to have him teach me the language so I could be literate which would open many different doors for me.
The girl had loved asking the man questions aplenty in the previous sessions so I thought why not transform the more aimless nature of her questions into sharper ones from someone who really wanted to understand the lesson. I knew from past experience that any good teacher would appreciate it. Sprinkle in some politeness that he always had to correct Isabella on by making use of the vexingly long lessons on courtesy the servant woman had me doing and I believed it’d at least be a way to make him consider the idea of pushing his lessons a little beyond the envelope.
However Bishop Érrard turned out to be the equivalent of a high school teacher that only used videos and worksheets for their lessons. He was not a good teacher.
In fact, he seemed to grow more and more annoyed with each question I asked him during the lesson. Or well, a tale about an envious count that I was half sure actually existed in some way and how that Sin led him to ruin. I’m sure it was something I would’ve enjoyed better had I been mindlessly listening. As it stood though, it was quite marred with inconsistencies and the barely hidden stink eye he’d begun to give me halfway through didn’t help much.
I probably should’ve stopped asking questions at that point, but I just couldn’t help myself. It had been fun poking so many holes in his tale with just some thoughtful questions. And compared to the previous lessons Isabella had with him, it had been so much more informative too!
In the end though, I had at least tried to salvage it by trying to appeal to the religious side of the bishop. Crazy, I know. Tie the question to learning how to read the Bible, show some interest in a religion I really couldn’t be all that bothered to care about in actuality which absolutely nobody here needed to know, and slide in a compliment to him while I was at it. Maybe he wouldn’t say yes to it right now, still it would sow the seeds for a future where he might agree to it.
What I had gotten in its place was nothing close to that. In response he gave me a lecture on who could study religion, what my duties as a girl were, and a threat to punish me if I ever asked the question again.
His words had made my blood boil in the moment, but I wasn’t foolish enough to think that showing him that anger would result in anything more than an expedited timeline for his threat.
For being a queen, I only had a smidgen of the respect and not even a smattering of the authority I’d thought the position would’ve had before this experience. Considering the era, that royally sucked.
Didn’t stop me from complaining and cursing about him in private though. Maybe I could find a way to get him in trouble while using Isabella’s innocence as a guise to prevent the fallback from coming back to me. I wasn’t normally this petty, but today was already firmly at the top of my ‘bad days’ list. Him adding to it just because he got so worked up about me wanting to learn basic literacy in the new language I found myself speaking here hadn’t helped in the slightest.
Really, I wouldn’t be surprised if in the game he’d have had the Wroth Trait, which was just a fancy way to say he was a wrathful and angry person. It certainly would’ve fit the bishop.
Di-Ding!
I froze at the startling familiar sound of a ringing bell just when I had reached for a random book on the shelf to see if maybe I could glean even just a little bit of the language from self-study. For a moment I wondered if I had lost it and was starting to hallucinate sounds now or if I had been hallucinating this entire day from the start. The golden envelope with a red seal hovering at the very edge of my vision decidedly didn’t help matters.
It was the sound and visual for whenever you got a high priority message within the game, so why would it be here if I wasn’t hallucinating?
My mind focused on it while trying to discern whether or not it was real when suddenly it flashed and a small letter that both was and wasn’t transparent opened up to display its contents in front of me, the words on it notably written in a language that I less read and more just knew what it meant alongside a familiar image of a fist swinging downwards on a red background.
The insight of the young queen is a great thing, as expected of one of her upbringing. Due to your budding intrigue and understanding of people, you’ve discovered that one of Bishop Érrard’s Traits is Wroth!
“What the-'' The words left me unbidden and I found myself inadvertently stepping back from the ethereal letter, only to find it following me when I did so. For a moment I wordlessly stared at it. Eventually, I remembered that I had a body I could move around in and shakily moved a hand towards the letter and boldly poked it.
My finger went right through it and when I tried the same with my hand it had the same exact result.
Taking a deep breath I lightly shook my head, my eyes never leaving the parchment all the while I did my best to figure out how, why, and what exactly was happening.
A full minute passed like this with nothing seeming to change from the ethereal parchment. I groaned and covered my face with hands that were far too small. “Get it together.” I whispered to myself with Isabella’s soft voice, “There’s already a far too lengthy list of things that’ve changed for the worse today. You really cannot afford to add ‘becoming insane’ to that list.”
I let those words sink into myself for a second before uncovering my face and finding the ethereal parchment declaring Bishop Érrard to definitively be an angry man gone without a trace.
I nervously laughed to myself. “See, you’re just letting the stress of everything get to you. There’s nothing weird going on but the obvious, so focus up and stop hoping that this is all just some weird fever dream when it’s clearly not. It’s as real as can be despite its impossibility, but you can handle this. Somehow. But you won’t even have the chance if you go insane on the first day.”
It probably wasn’t healthy that I had felt the need to give a motivational speech to myself. However this time, I’d give it a pass with how I could feel my resolve to make it out of this fucked up situation begin to lightly burn again.
It was a lot like the time when I had nearly been financially screwed out of college due to some unforeseen crippling medical debt. This was arguably a much worse situation than that had ever been, but if I had managed to come back from that, I could come back from this.
My thoughts drifted back towards what I thought I’d been seeing and I properly laughed this time, a small fragile smile sprouting from it. “Heh, certainly wasn’t hallucinating notifications that would’ve fit right into place within a game back then either. Though, it would be nice if that was actually real somehow. In a weird sort of way at least. If that was real maybe I could view my own character sheet too. I wonder what that wou-”
The words shriveled up and died in my throat while my smile shattered and my mouth fell open. They had somehow seemingly summoned a much larger ethereal parchment that opened up in front of me, complete with an authentic unfolding sound. And against any sort of semblance of either sense or reality, it was filled with many things that I might expect to find if I was viewing a character’s sheet within Crusader Kings II.
It even had a portrait of Isabella within a token at the top of it, complete with a star tacked onto its golden borders that signified that I was indeed her like I’d somehow forget that fact if it wasn’t there.
I found myself staring again before I forced myself to close my eyes and count to five. My eyes managed to still twitch when at three I heard what seemed to be the parchment roll up, but when I opened my eyes the space in front of me was blessedly clear of my newest hallucination.
“Okay, that’s your free pass Derrick. No more going crazy and seeing imaginary character sheets anymore, starting-”
My eyes widened in disbelief as the same transparent parchment unfurled in front of me like it had been waiting for me to let my guard down to open up again.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
I found my gaze slowly drifting across the parchment and silently taking in everything on it, a part of me beginning to wonder if this was more than just a hallucination at this point. In response to that thought, I performed the same trick I had used before to close it and barely flinched this time when right at three once more, I heard the sheet roll up again.
I took a very deep breath and opened my eyes to a world without imaginary parchments floating in the air. A full ten seconds passed by and when nothing else happened I let out a sigh. “Jeesh, I swear it’s like it’s just waiting specifically for me to let my guard down. I wonder if that’s weird for a hallucination.”
I idly shook my head at that thought. What had gotten into me lately? The situation I was in was stressful for sure, but for me to be constantly hallucinating shit like this was a game was a little much. Both times too after trying to joke to myself about character sheets. How weird.
A moment passed before an intrusive thought hit me like a truck with enough force to halt every other thought within my head. That maybe it was those words that had summoned the imaginary sheet in front of me. Normally, I think I would've dismissed the thought and forgotten it like they were an annoying advertisement. Today however, I couldn’t help but feel the urge to at least try to satisfy my curiosity on if this could be what was going on with these hallucinations. If only so I could rule out the outrageous idea.
“Character sheet.” The words left me and not a second later the parchment unfurled in all its glory in response.
I gazed at it while waiting for my thoughts to settle on just what was happening. Once they had finally done that, I said the only thing that made sense to me in the moment.
“Sincerely, what the actual fuck world. Why are you like this?”
I was stuck in Isabella’s body with seemingly no reason as for why it happened other than I wanted to play some Crusader Kings II. However, I could still access her character sheet and likely some other similar things from the games judging from what had happened earlier like I was still playing it normally. Sure, why the hell not.
Since apparently this was the way the world had decided it should work now, I figured I might as well take a good look at the sheet and everything on it since it apparently wasn’t a sign of my deteriorating sanity and instead something I could call forth at will.
It was arranged quite differently though from how it was in the games, only seeming to carry the personal details of myse-Isabella on it instead of the plethora of different information it normally would.
Underneath the portrait of her lay her name and her title as Queen of Jerusalem. Curiously it contained both of her names, listing it fully as Isabella II/Yolanda de Brienne, the Queen of Jerusalem.
Her age was listed underneath it as the expected eight years old alongside her date of birth. Or at least it would’ve listed her date of birth had it not been followed up by a question mark like it didn’t know that somehow in place of any numbers.
After that, was the crest of her House, de Brienne. It was a very simple yet peculiar design, just a pure yellow background with three different circles on it. Each circle was a dark green with everything inside of it being filled with a pure white. I had no clue what whoever had created it intended for it to mean.
Underneath that were her Traits which in the game represented a character’s personality and influenced how they’d react in events, alongside a decent way to judge how an AI would react. Right underneath the Traits were any potential Modifiers which would be anything external affecting her, though Isabella was devoid of any of them at the moment.
Her Traits on the other hand did have two of its own icons filling it up, both of which were childhood Traits that had yet to become full Traits yet. Only transforming into them just a few years before a character turned sixteen which felt like it would be an eternity that came about.
The first Trait was Curious being represented by a magnifying glass and when I focused on it, was accompanied by a personalized flavorful description on what it was and did, the description popping forwards from the rest of the parchment while I read it. Just as swiftly it faded away once I stopped focusing on the words.
The young queen is filled with an inquisitive spirit, always asking questions and searching for the new and intriguing. Increases Learning by one. Can progress into: Shrewd, Cynical, or any Religious or Cultural Sympathy.
The second one was Playful which was represented by a paint brush, also accompanied by its own flavorful description when I focused on it.
The young queen is always on the hunt for fun and games, searching for a way to turn everything they do into new ways to play. Increases Diplomacy by one. Can progress into: Gregarious, Deceitful, or (rarely) Lunatic.
Both of which were Traits that when I delved back into the memories of how Isabella had acted before I took her place, fit the girl quite well. They were also both reasonably good Traits within the game that didn't clash with each other and progressed into some usually good Traits in the future, Shrewd especially being a terrific one.
Well, Cynical would be incredibly awkward considering Isabella was the queen of a Crusader Kingdom. And Lunatic… Well, she wouldn’t become a Lunatic on my watch any time soon. Though not for lack of the world trying to make me think I was one today.
Not that any of it would really matter apart from how they’d affect her Attributes. I was the one in control and as such they shouldn’t affect how I’d act. The whole having lived an entire life beforehand and becoming my own person within it thing.
Of course it was then a disturbing thought jumped forwards in my mind that sent a chill throughout me. What if they had already been affecting me and I hadn’t even realized it?
The questions I had asked the bishop had come so naturally to me when during my entire time in higher education, no matter what the class had been, I had always struggled to come up with good questions. And when I realized I was making him frustrated with the questions, I hadn’t stopped because I’d been having fun and had turned it into a bit of a game to see how many holes I could poke into his tale with thoughtful questions alone.
And while I had managed to mostly pay attention when the servants had been giving me the etiquette lesson, the urge to to ask questions or try and subtly shift them into doing something funner had been there, even if buried underneath the various dilemmas that my mind had been occupied with then.
The same curiosity had even pushed to check if the parchment in front of me now opened when I said the word character sheet aloud and it had.
My throat felt dry at the implications of that, with the one solace I could take being that Isabella only had two Traits at the moment. What would happen when she inevitably gained more Traits, or when her childhood Traits developed into proper Traits?
I distracted myself from those highly disturbing thoughts of the future that were slightly less of a priority than avoiding Isabella’s historical fate by focusing on the last section of the character sheet that was visible near the bottom of the parchment, the Attributes.
Of them there were six, five major and one minor each aligned into different rows with their own unique color and symbol to represent them. The spread of their base values Isabella had was an interesting mix while staying in line for what a child in the game would have at her age, being a little better than average.
Diplomacy: 3 (Base 2 + 1)
Martial: 2
Stewardship: 1
Intrigue: 4
Learning: 5 (Base 4+1)
Prowess: 0
Diplomacy’s row was represented by a steel blue color and a parchment much like the one in front of me. Martial with a rusty red and two crossed swords. Stewardship by a sage green and a chest with gold beside it. Intrigue by a plum purple alongside an envelope and a dagger. Learning used a simple gray with an open book beside it. And Prowess had a sword interposed over a shield on an orange beige background
All of them correlated to the way they were presented within the game nearly perfectly. I focused on the outliers among them, starting from the highs before going to the lowest.
Learning was her highest stat and for whatever reason was highlighted. It made sense though considering the girl’s personality that it would’ve ended up there, if a little impressive she had managed it without being able to read. Absolutely nobody had been safe from her deluge of questions.
Intrigue being the next highest at four was well, intriguing, and I could only guess it was because of the shenanigans she had gotten up to with the servants in the castle in her search for some fun when she wasn’t in a lesson of some sort. And even then, she’d search for some way to make those lessons fun for herself.
Apart from that, the only other outlier was Stewardship which didn’t surprise me with how low it was. The Isabella in the memories I had gotten from her hadn’t really struck me as someone who’d seek it out naturally and there was very little of a pressing need for her to learn anything associated with the Attribute. She’d been taught how to do basic counting, but little else.
Oh, and Prowess was ‘low’ too, but frankly was pretty useless to a child in the game. And unless I was forced into a fight for my life or the castle was being sieged, I doubted I’d ever need to make use of it here. It was after all a very situational Attribute unless you were constantly getting into duels or leading battles which I wasn’t entirely sure I’d be doing considering how different it was when you were actually there and not just looking in at a screen.
Though I suppose it did have some effect in a few events which required some physical capability so it probably represented that as well. It still was something I didn’t care much about right now, as long as it didn’t dip into the negatives.
Both Martial and Diplomacy were average for the age so I didn’t think too much on either of those two.
All in all, it somehow turned out to be quite comforting to look at the character sheet apart from the implications of Isabella’s Traits potentially affecting me. It reminded me of long hours spent poring over other character sheets to figure out how best to maneuver in a given situation in other playthroughs before the hyperrealistic one I now found myself in. Though I did wonder why Isabella’s Learning Attribute was glowing. That wasn’t normal.
Right when I was about to do so though, a powerful set of knocks on the door jumbled me out of my thoughts and I found myself turning towards it. “Young lady, why are you still in your father’s study? Your lessons with the Lord Bishop are over and you know well enough that your father doesn’t like anyone being in there without reason. You’re late as well for your sewing lessons and don’t think that means for a moment we’ll be cutting them short. Now come on out and don’t make me have to drag you out from there and to the lessons again!” A stern woman’s voice echoed out from outside the door, one I recognized as one of the servant women overseeing my etiquette lesson earlier.
“I will, just give me a moment please Camille!” I found myself saying automatically, cringing involuntarily while memories that weren’t my own of the last time she had to drag Isabella out found their way to the forefront of my mind. I shook my head to shake it away before pausing for a second when I saw the parchment containing Isabella’s character sheet roll up and disappear into nothingness in the air in front of me.
How had that happened? I hadn’t even closed my eyes to make it go away.
I quickly decided it didn’t matter how it had happened when I realized I could hear the woman tapping her foot on the ground impatiently. I did spare a glance before leaving back towards the book I had nearly grabbed before the whole debacle with ethereal parchments and letters that shouldn’t exist. I let out a silent sigh. Maybe next time I could make some progress on teaching myself how to read.
I apparently had sewing lessons to get to. I didn’t even have to fake any excitement over it since I had clear memories of Isabella absolutely detesting them, in part because any attempt to make it fun had Camille yelling at her.
I had to agree with her, I wasn’t looking forward to them. I couldn’t even spend the time trying to fiddle with my new apparent ‘parchment summoning powers' because I wasn’t particularly feeling like so boldly testing if everybody else could see them or if only I could. Or enduring saying ‘character sheet’ in front of anybody else who would wonder why I said the seemingly random combination of words and ask about it.
Oh well, maybe I could at least make something out of the time in another way.