Mia stood in the training grounds for a few hours, alone and left unattended. she had judged this time based on the sun’s movement. This time alone granted her some time to do some self-reflection and now that she had this time she found it odd how calm she had been in her current situation. Minus the one moment during the goblin fight where she panicked, she felt like there should be more there.

Not only during the recent fight but also with current events. Of course, being a slave didn’t leave her much room to voice her opinion on matters but… she found it hard to even focus on such issues. she looked back on her past masters, even the temporary masters that only lasted a day, and remembered several situations that should have caused her more stress or outbursts but just like now it all felt subdued… in fact she betted the only reason why she noticed it now was because she had been granted time to do so after such a recent outburst.

But even with this time she still felt that subdued feeling. She glanced at the goblin’s corpse, still dead on the ground in it’s own blood with a fresh hole in it’s chest. What did she think of it? She felt anger and fear towards it, it almost killed her after all, she recognized that much but anything past that? Nothing.

She was alone with not many orders restricting her movement. If she was afraid of the corpse she could move further away from it but she didn’t, she didn’t feel the need to. Likewise, she was angry at the goblin and could relieve some of her stress by stabbing or kicking it but like the other example she didn’t feel the need to. That was what the subdued feeling was. She had a sense of what she wanted to do based on her emotions, but did not feel the need to act on them.

She looked away from the corpse and towards the door, the open, unguarded door. Was this feeling also what prevented her from wanting to escape? Granted, she had previously convinced herself that it wasn’t a good idea but even without doing that… it was almost like she lacked the desire to free herself, no, it was exactly that.

Her breathing quickened, surely that was not the case, right? Why would she want to still be a slave after everything she had been through? Though, looking back on it now… there had been several chances for her to make a run for it, she had a hard time remembering when a master ever told her not to leave an area she had been left in. Even now, that door is open… So why hasn’t she left?

She found herself panicking, how come she didn’t realize anything was wrong till now? Surely she had a plentiful amount of time to think before, how was this time any different? The open door? The open door she should be running out of right now? The door that offers her freedom? That door?

With her emotions rising she took a step towards the door, casting her worries to the side she took another step. Something was seriously wrong, she had to get away now while she had that fact in her head, before it was subdued again. She had to act, she was at the exit now and looked down the brick hall to her left and saw nothing but a series of large wooden doors. She looked to the right and the same sight greeted her, the only difference being the hall ended 5 doors down.

She started to second guess herself, her supposed sense of reason reminding her she had no where to go, she didn’t know the layout, and it was over if she was caught. She shook her head, getting rid of the thoughts as she clutched her fist close to her chest. She had to go now while she had these feelings, before they were shoved inside her again. She closed her eyes and braced herself, then looked down the left hall, her heart sank.

She saw two figures making their way down the hall, one she had recognized as the hero and the other the princess, it looked like they were arguing. Mia ran back to the center of the room, already she felt what she had now slipping back now that she had seen her master. She clutched her chest “Don’t forget…” she whispered to herself, she had recognized something was terribly wrong with her after so long, she didn’t want to lose it.

“It is absurd, you are a hero, you can not waste your precious time baby sitting her.”

They were now in ear shot, Mia guessed it was the princess talking by the voice. She stared at the door but felt nothing, she then brought her gaze to the corpse. Still her memories of it caused her to both fear and hate the creature it was, but she felt nothing more towards it… but she recognized that, she knew there was supposed to be more there. What ever caused her to be subdued did not get rid of her recognition of it.

“She is my partner! She needs to be training with me, we both need to be training outside. It is too stuffy in here!”

That was the hero, obviously. Mia sighed, now that she was aware something was subduing her emotions, her desire, she was a bit more alert. It was also causing a bit of a headache, she essentially had to second guess her every thought. Even now after just finding this out she was reevaluating her opinions on the hero and the princess.

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“You are not ready yet, and the girl is certainly not ready” The two had made it to the training grounds, the princess entering first and glanced at Mia and the goblin’s corpse “She has killed one goblin, something a villager could do if it was one on one.” She then pointed at the hero who entered after her “You can kill more then twenty, enough to wipe out a small village, alone.”

As a result of her earlier epiphany, Mia found it odd that the princess didn’t even question if she was here after being left alone. Which meant that it wasn’t even a question that Mia would still be in here. That means either the princess made preparations so that Mia couldn’t leave, she didn’t think Mia could sneak out, or it was impossible for her to even leave in the first place. The last one the most likely if the princess knew about the subduing effect…

“Wait, what part of that makes me unprepared? If I could take out twenty then I sure as hell am prepared.”

If the princess knew about the effect, then it’s possible all slaves have this effect. She suddenly felt the weight of the collar around her neck, reminding her of it’s presence as it donned on her.

The princess shook her head “No, while you can do that you lack the subtility, the elegance of a hero. You have yet to be fully educated on the common sense of this world, my hero. While she…” The princess turned her attention to Mia, snapping her fingers at her to bring her attention towards her “… lacks the power to accompany you.”

Mia snapped to attention, the princess looked clearly annoyed, a hidden anger behind her strained expression that she was trying to keep hidden from the hero.

“Which is why I want to go out, I can’t learn anymore here. Give us a mission outside the castle, anything! I saw you had planned a dungeon exploration at the end of the week, why don’t we go now?”

The hero… well Mia thought he was right about him not being able to learn anything in the castle. She didn’t know about the common strength on monsters but if he was able to take on a force of twenty by himself, he should be fine. Her headache pounded; she also didn’t want him to learn ‘common sense’ from the princess.

“…” The princes paused, her eyes darting between Mia, the corpse, and the hero. She pinched the bridge of her nose “…When you barged into my meeting and made these demands you showed you are not ready.”

The hero perked up “Aha! Right! Even though you said that the nobles there were overjoyed to see me! They also pleaded that I solve their problem, that would be a perfect first quest.”

Mia saw from her lower position the expression of the princess crack, before she quickly regained her composure.

“… That ‘quest’ can be handled by a few knights; we shall not waste a hero on such a trivial matter.” The princess said, “In the first place, you do not have a clue what their request was.”

The hero shook his head “Doesn’t matter! As a hero I can handle it, it will also serve as a good chance to get Mia some experience. Let this be a warmup for the dungeon.”

Mia questioned why the hero was so adamant on this. He was being very pushy and it didn’t seem like he was going to drop it anytime soon. The idea of going outside was enticing, it would also free her from Rowan but oddly she found herself questioning if that was a good thing. After the fight he was a bit different, and diligently showed her how to dissect the goblin to retrieve it’s core.

“No, It is too early.” The princess said, frowning “If you fail it will negatively effect your image, we can not afford to risk it.”

The hero stepped forward, picking up the princess’s hands and holding them close to his chest. “I won’t fail.” He said sternly, he then leaned in, forcing his face to be the only thing in the princess’s vision “I won’t fail, give us a chance.” He then looked down as if disheartened.

Mia had an interesting view, at first when John took her hands the princess was shocked, even blushed a little when he forced her view, but when he looked down… her true emotions showed, disgust and anger. She was looking at him like one would look at a bug they have found in their soup. Truly, it was impressive she hid that expression to make the other two.

The princess hid that expression, putting on the mask of a blushing maiden she sighed “Fine, hero… If that is what will satisfy you.”

The hero shot up and pulled the princess in for a hug “Thank you princess! You will not be disappointed!”

Shocked, the princess froze in his arms “I-I have faith that you will not.” She was then released from his grasp, turning away from him and hiding her face “The quest, my hero, is to find and contain some escaped slaves…” She glanced briefly at Mia, before returning her face towards the hero “I trust this will not pose a problem?”

The hero shook his head “Not at all! We will be departing in the morning, right? Come Mia, let’s be off!”

Mia found her hand gripped, and then pulled after the hero out of the room and down the brick halls, the loud yelling of the princess behind them telling them to stop.

John laughed to himself “How was that Mia? Now we are free to train together tomorrow! I can keep you all to myself, no longer will we have separate training after tomorrow! I’ll prove to them a hero needs a proper companion trained together through hardships!”

Mia listened to the hero’s shouts while staring at the hand that dragged hers. Her head pounded as she tried to remove her hand from his grip but couldn’t make it budge, the hero didn’t even notice her endeavor and continued to charge through the halls. She gave up, but escaped slaves… she didn’t like it, it felt wrong that they were going to recapture slaves, and the fact the hero didn’t seem to think anything was wrong with it didn’t help.

She sighed, bringing her free hand to the top of her head and gently rubbing it. She’d have to get used to the headache now, least she forget.