While Kobayashi was researching at the library, Alexander found himself exploring the northern part of the city.
This part of the city is particularly not very busy compared to the rest of the capital. There aren't many shops or streetside markets. However, Alexander visited dozens of shops and markets before he arrived in this part of the capital.
This part of the capital is instead occupied by the royal family's palace.
The royal palace is a beautiful castle at the north end of the city. It's surrounded by nothing except beautiful trees that wave with the wind to the east, beautiful ponds with dazzling, exotic fish to the west, an orchard full of fruits to the south, and mountains to the north.
Contrary to what it might appear, the area is open to the general public entirely, but the inside of the castle is an exception.
It took Alexander a few hours to walk here, as the center of the capital is a large place where crowds get congested often. However, it was still worth the walk in his heart.
"Looks like I can't go in there..."
Alexander sighed, putting his hand on the castle wall in disappointment. Alexander had always loved castles since he was a child. Yes, it's a bit childish to hang on to such things, but Alexander couldn't help it. Castles also played a major role in his early childhood.
"Well, I might as well take the time to walk around and get a look of the outside of this place."
Alexander walked around the outside of the enormous castle, a large shadow looming over him and blocking out the sun.
"Leave it to the royals to ruin the fun in everything. These constipated old men who are in charge could seriously be replaced at any point!"
Alexander never experienced positive change from relationships with higher-ups back in Europe. Most of the time, he was bossed by the old men in high positions to do either something extremely immoral or extremely dangerous, both of which disturbed Alexander deeply.
To put it into his own words, they were 'constipated old men who carelessly wasted their time fantasizing about any woman they had known in the entirety of their life.' To put it lightly, Alexander disliked nearly anyone who had high power or authority in the political system.
"Stained glass windows? Do they have a church here?"
Alexander took note of the stained glass windows that looked nearly identical to that of a church. He remembered the stained glass windows in the church he attended alongside his father as a child. However, there was a slight difference with this stained glass's pictures.
"Kobayashi? When did they decide to put you on their windows?! Who have you been coercing all this time we've been here?!"
The windows mostly illustrated images of things like the palace, wildlife, and so on, but a few of them presented illustrations of Kobayashi.
Of course, this is because of the prophecy of the ancient king, but Alexander didn't know anything about this prophecy.
"And where's my special window?! You people are spawns of Satan himself!"
Alexander began looking like a child who was throwing a tantrum because they didn't get a toy from their parents.
He was angry because Kobayashi had a 'special window' but there wasn't anything similar for him.
Alexander looked up at the window again.
"What are you smiling for?" Alexander bitterly asked the stained glass window that presented Kobayashi smiling in the center of the window.
"I better get back now..."
Alexander looked at the slowly setting sun and back to the palace before ultimately deciding he should begin to head back. He didn't want to find himself walking in the dark while someone could have watched him.
"Stupid old men..."
Alexander let out one final statement about his disliking towards the people he believed to have decided no civilian could enter the castle. He then proceeded to leave the area, making his journey back to the inn.
He found himself, around an hour into his walk back to the inn, stopping at a nearby shop for a break.
He walked into the market. In the evening and morning, the shop would've been extremely busy, along with the surrounding shops and markets. This time of the day is when the city's crowds begin to slowly decrease. Thus, the shop is currently near empty, only Alexander and the shopkeeper being present.
"Seriously?"
Alexander looked over to the shopkeeper, who had fallen asleep on the job. He didn't get a good look at them, but he could tell that they were asleep. He could also tell they were a female.
"This world's shopkeepers and citizens are seriously strange. Even if I haven't had many interactions with some of them, I think they far outweigh me in terms of unlikability."
Alexander said this in both disappointment that he probably can't even buy anything at the moment because of the shopkeeper, and in self awareness of his attitude that wards off any potential friends or acquaintances.
"Well, I might as well look around here. I might be able to find something I'd like or need."
Alexander began to look around the shop. There wasn't much here, and it was really just your typical shop. There were a few food items scattered around, along with some different types of medicines in the back of the store. It seems to be more of a pharmacy than a shop.
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"I really should've had Kobayashi tutor me on reading this last week..."
Alexander looked around at the different medications. Recently, he's caught some type of a disease or sickness that's causing him symptoms like—random nausea, headaches, cold sweats, dizziness, etc.
As of now he's mostly certain he doesn't have any type of life-threatening disease that could cause major problems or complications, but it's still annoying for him to get nauseous in public out of the ordinary. He even vomited on his way to the royal palace earlier. The sickness was only worsening as time passed, and he knew it needed to be treated soon. Then again, a small part of him wondered if he possibly did have something dangerous or fatal. His symptoms only worsened and never got better.
Of course, Alexander could always wake up the shopkeeper and ask them what would typically help in his situation, but his pride was holding him back at the moment. He didn't want to appear as if he was ignorant of something so simple, like medication for a cold.
He also didn't know how to read, making it impossible to read what the bottles of medication said.
"I don't want to do this...but-"
Alexander finally decided he would wake up the shopkeeper and put his pride aside. A part of him felt bad for deciding he would wake her up, especially considering she was probably exhausted from the evening crowds. Another part of him wanted to call her an idiot for falling asleep on the job after waking her up. He felt a bit conflicted.
Nevertheless, Alexander ventured back to the entrance where the sleeping shopkeeper was. He hesitantly reached out and shook her shoulder.
"Ma'am, I need some help with the medication in the back. I don't know what I should purchase for my illness and thought you might be able to assist me?"
His hand retreated as the woman turned around. She was roughly middle-aged and didn't look special or mesmerizing. She looked like a normal girl in her early 30s.
"May I help you?" She asked Alexander in a tired voice while stretching her arms.
"I already told you. I need help with finding medication to treat my illness."
"Follow me..."
She took Alexander back to the medication.
She didn't seem very friendly or professional whatsoever. Alexander didn't know if it was because he woke her up or if it was because she just had a terrible personality. He was leaning more towards the reason being she was in a bad mood because he woke her up.
"What's your symptoms? Are they severe or are they minor?"
"I'm having nausea, headaches, cold sweats, etc. My symptoms were nearly nonexistent in the beginning, but they're getting worse by the day."
"Then I don't know how to help you out."
She's an idiot, thought Alexander.
He was about to lose his temper any moment now. How do you get hired to work in a pharmacy when you can't even diagnose simple medicine for a sickness?
Alexander knew a pharmacist or a pharmacy worker wouldn't have a complete understanding of things like a doctor, but he still expected her to know something.
"What do you mean, 'you don't know how to help'? Your job is to help people find out what could help them recover!"
The girl looked at him dumbfounded and shrugged.
"I don't get paid enough to help people this much. I'm just asking the routine questions."
"Seriously?! You 'don't get paid enough'?! You might be the laziest person I've ever met!!!"
Alexander finally lost his temper. He couldn't believe this woman could be so casual about turning down even helping him.
"I swear, you-"
Alexander was cut off and began coughing repeatedly, each cough growing more intense than before. His sickness was continuously worsening. And, just with his luck, he happened to have the worst pharmacist in human history assisting him, if you could even consider it 'assisting'.
Calming his cough, Alexander regained his speech.
"I will NEVER come back to this excuse for a shop again! Your business makes experience agony comparable to what you would experience in hell! I'd rather die a slow and painful death than support your pitiful and pathetic example of a shop!!!"
Alexander stormed out in anger, shaking the building with each step from his anger. He had always had a habit of being loud and getting angry easily, but it took a lot to make him this angry.
There were only two things Alexander couldn't bear: anything that threatened the health of his father, or anything that threatened the health of himself. In this situation, Alexander perceived it as a threat to his health if the shopkeeper refused to help assist with recovering from the sickness.
Alexander would rather stay ill than buy medication or treatment. It was overreacting, yes. But Alexander always had the tendency to overreact.
"Have a good day," said the shopkeeper with no trace of sincerity or kindness as Alexander stormed out. She was a fine example of laziness...
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Two hours passed and Alexander finally made it back to Raferu no Hoteru.
"I should really try to invest in some sort of transportation..."
Alexander was out of breath after walking for hours. He had walked the entire two hours from the shop back to the inn with no breaks at all. He also vomited twice along the way...
"I'm so tired... I really need to sleep. I don't even feel this terrible when I have a hangover..."
Alexander crawled at the pace of a snail into the rundown-looking building. He didn't even pay attention to the exterior and its repulsiveness. He usually made a remark to himself about how revolting its appearance was at least. He was extremely exhausted. He still had the energy to walk into the hotel, however.
Even though he was previously a knight, Alexander never got any sort of physical activity accomplished during his service to the royals. He typically got assigned guard duty to random lords by his superiors. The guard duty only required him to stand around all day while he got to gaze upon the lords' wives. Afterwards, he usually got drunk and repeated the cycle once more the following day.
"We are glad to see you have returned..."
The innkeeper, missus Rafaeru's son-in-law, wore the normal look of misery as always. His friendliness slowly faded as Alexander and Kobayashi stayed at the inn over the last week.
Alexander was growing tired of seeing the man everyday with an even gloomier expression than the previous time.
"I don't need your lovely, warm, heart-filled welcome back," said Alexander with evident sarcasm.
"I thought you'd at least treat me with some respect after we provided you with a decent payment for our stay..."
Alexander couldn't even speak loudly or object anymore. He was drained of energy, completely exhausted.
Alexander eventually made his way up to the second floor. He looked down the hall, looking as if he were about to burst into tears any minute now.
"I don't want to walk anymore!"
Alexander fell backwards into a chair and let out a long, deep, and overly exaggerated sigh as he finally took his seat.
Only a few more steps and he would've made it to the room. He didn't want to walk anymore. He had finally given up on walking without a break.
There was one thing certain from Alexander's exhaustion. The Astral Vitality magic rank Kobayashi was studying today while Alexander was at the palace did not lie within Alexander. Even one might have thought the stained glass windows of Kobayashi weren't enough evidence, or Aisha Königin's mention of Kobayashi bearing resemblance to the prophesied man from the old king, this was a final blow on whether or not Alexander could possess such abilities. How could you possess such powerful abilities when you can't even walk down the hall?
Of course, Alexander still had no idea about any of the magical ranks or the ancient prophecy. The stained glass windows with Kobayashi, in Alexander's mind, was something Kobayashi managed to pull off while the two separated during the day.
"Time to get up..."
After nearly thirty entire minutes of just sitting in a chair, Alexander finally got up and began walking back to the room.
He reached on top of the door frame and grabbed the key before unlocking the door, placing the key back, and closing the door.
"Finally...some relaxation..."
Alexander sat down in the corner chair and sighed.
"Now...I can finally...go to sleep..."
Alexander began to shut his eyes before—
"Yes, this is me and my colleague's room. We can discuss the matter here if you don't mind, Aisha."
Kobayashi and Aisha Königin walked in, Kobayashi talking rather loudly.
"Oh, come on already!"
Alexander began getting angry and jumped up immediately before taking notice of Aisha and her small smile, his attitude instantly turning.
"A smile comparable to the Virgin Mary in pureness-"
"Don't even try anything, creep."
Aisha's smile changed into a frown at Alexander's words and she became rather unhappy. For once, Alexander wasn't even trying to flirt with a woman; he was only trying to compliment her.
"So you've been going out and getting lucky with the ladies while I'm gone, hm?"
Any previous exhaustion Alexander had was now gone, and he began trying to tease Kobayashi for bringing a girl back to the hotel room. Alexander thought that Kobayashi expected the room to be empty, which was partially truthful.
"No, we actually came here to discuss something rather important."
"I'm sure it's really important, isn't it?"
A cheesy grin was glued on Alexander's face. It was clear Alexander had a different idea of what the two were going to do in the room.
"Please pay no attention to my acquaintance here, Aisha."
Kobayashi sat down on the bed he had been lying in for the last week, while Aisha sat on the bed across from him.
"So, the prophecy? What does the prophecy foretell, and what's the history of this world? Why am I included in it?"
Kobayashi was asking many questions to Aisha, something he hated on most occasions. It was rare for Kobayashi to ask this many questions at once, but nonetheless he was doing it.
"What prophecy?"
Alexander's mood switched again, this time to curiosity. He was curious enough to interrupt Aisha, who was about to begin explaining everything. He drew closer to the two, but still refused to sit on the beds out of disgust for their repulsive appearances.
"Well, Alexander, it seems we were foretold to come here and save this world long ago. At least I was likely foretold to come here, anyway. It's quite interesting, right?" asked Kobayashi with a smile.
Kobayashi didn't find it very strange or unusual that they could've been foretold to come here centuries ago. He even talked casually in his summary of the situation.
"That's why these idiots have you on their stained glass windows!" Alexander turned to Aisha with a look of disappointment.
"I deserve a window of myself too! Make a window with me! I didn't come here out of my own free will, you know?!"
Alexander's request was immediately shot down by Aisha, who seemed more annoyed by Alexander than ever before.
"No! Enough of this nonsense already! Can't I just explain the whole situation and prophecy?!"
With her patience growing thin, Aisha finally lost her composure and scolded Alexander like he was a child.
"My bad..."
Alexander went silent and stopped complaining, and Aisha let out a sigh.
"Well, it's a bit hard to explain... But I'll start from the beginning."