Language class

Soon after the day of the speech, Emp found himself in a large classroom like the schedule had asked him to. He had come with Celtine and left Harriett to do the laundry. He would have left Celtine as well but their first class was about letters it seemed and he wanted her to learn as quickly as possible.

Around him, all of those he had met the other day gathered to meet the person who would teach them letters and of course learn.

From what Esther said and the schedule, it seemed like they would have many teachers for the many things they had to learn. The disappointing part for Emp was that everyone needed to know their numbers and letters before they were thought anything else and since he already knew about those things, he would have nothing to do.

According to the paper, the name of the teacher was Glenda and she took care of both of those basic subjects so they would see her often for a while.

"Does anyone know what kind of person is the teacher?" Asked Mable, stuck in the arms of Aglaya again. (1)

Mable had a different hairstyle than on the speech day but it was just as complicated looking as the first one. Emp had thought that she had done something special for the speech but it was apparently not the case. Maybe she just didn't know what to do with all that hair, without all those pins and clips, it would probably snake on the floor behind her. Emp knew of only two other persons with hairs that long, Love, for whom it wasn't a problem since they just hovered over the ground and Celtine who had no way to tell him why her hair were so long or if she wanted them cut a bit.

While Emp was lost in thoughts, Ivar answered her question.

"All those that stayed from last time do. She is a lady of over forty. She is strict and a bit of a complainer but she isn't that bad."

The others had mixed reactions towards her description but the conclusion remained the same.

"Don't bother her and she won't bother you."

Emp nodded like the rest and soon after, the teacher arrived. She walked to the front of the room and asked everyone to sit down.

All around the group C, there were unassigned tables and chairs so they all sat wherever they found a place. Emp found himself sat between George who didn't want to be here and Penny who wore overly heavy clothes and a serious look. Celtine stood behind him in silence so as to not disturb the others just like some other slaves that had been brought along.

"Alright group C, welcome. I see some familiar faces but I'm going to introduce myself anyway. You can call me miss Glenda, I will be in charge of teaching you all the letters and numbers used in our empire. I would like you all to be sat down and ready to start when I come here in the future. I will accept no fooling around and no disturbance, I see you Frits over there, get away from that poor miss. See? That's what I call a disturbance. What are you doing here anyway?" (2)

"Well, they told us all to get here."

"I don't care, all the old faces, everyone who knows all their letters and numbers already, get out, I'm done with you." The teacher said flatly.

"But, I'd like to be-"

"Yes, I can see you'd like to be with the young lass but this isn't the place for this, you will just be in the way of my teaching so get out."

Dejected, Frits left with the rest of the older students, leaving a panicked Rica who didn't know what to do alone. She looked like she was about to cry but the teacher ignored it and moved on.

"So, how many are left? Two, five, seven, ten... nineteen? How come so many of you don't know your letters? Here, by raised hands, who knows their numbers?"

Almost everyone raised a hand, Only Cyril Lowfield and the stuttering Zoran didn't.

"Alright, could you please go to that corner over there so I can see more easily who needs what kind of teaching?"

The two boys nodded and went to stand in one of the corner of the room.

"Again, by raised hands, this also goes for you two, who knows their letters in the common tongue?"

Fewer hands were raised this time, the two boys still didn't but with them, there was Brenia, Rica, George, Norval Windslow, Gervaise and of course, Emp himself.

"Those that didn't raise their hands, please go into that corner."

Emp stood up with the others and grouped with them over there.

"Finally, those that know how to write and read in the noble tongue raise their hands."

This time, only Emp rose his hand to the confusion of the teacher and most of the class.

"Wait, did you somehow misunderstand one of the questions or do you really not know the common writing while still understanding the noble ones?"

"It is true" Answered Emp "I cannot read or write in the common tongue and I cannot speak it either, I do not understand it. You could say I was raised with only the noble one."

"That is fairly strange but everything is possible in this world." The teacher said with furrowed brows. "Go to that other corner then, I'll give you a test later to see if you speak the truth or if you're just shamelessly propping yourself up."

Emp did as he was told and Glenda swiftly rearranged the seats of everyone to her own convenience. He ended up last in a row with Norval as neighbor.

"From here on, When you come here, you will all sit where you are currently to make it easier for me, all right? Now, a final thing before we truly start. Of those that brought their slaves with them, how many did so hoping I would teach them as well?"

Around six hand rose including Emp. Since this was more work for her, she asked them why one by one and if the reason wasn't convincing, she refused to teach them. Emp had one of the most convincing.

"She is mute and cannot do heavy physical labor. If she does not learn, she will not be that useful. If she did, she could at least be a good secretary I feel."

"I see, you got the bad draw on slaves this year, fine, I will try to teach her but like I said to the others, I won't spend extra time on her and won't wait for her if the rest is ready to move on. She can take a seat."

Celtine smiled in thanks and sat beside Emp at the very end of the row. The lessons started immediately after.

The test the teacher prepared for him was a simple thing. There were around ten general questions written on a parchment and all he had to do was write an answer for each. It was easy but enough to prove he did understand that language well. He was praised by many at that moment because they all felt that the noble tongue was much harder to learn than the common one but from Emp's point of view, if they had all learned it first, they would think the opposite. Maybe all languages where hard to learn?

For weeks after, Emp spent most of his time in that room with the group C. The new students were always there but even the older ones came often to see the rest and discuss before and after the classes. Ivar said it was because they wanted to deepen their bonds with everyone but Frits clearly only came for Rica.

At some point he noticed that a small group of girls had formed itself. Mable, Aglaya, Gytha and Nessa were always together. They tried to include Rica as well but she seemed to be really afraid of hanging out with anyone but Frits and always disappeared as soon as the teacher released them all. Juniper sometimes spent some time with them but she seemed more interested in trying to sell glass to the teacher than talking about songs they had heard.

"Miss Glenda, you are a very knowledgeable person." She would say. "You must be really respected around here. A woman like you must live in some magnificent estate."

"That is true but why does this interest you?"

"I was wondering what sort of window you had."

"Windows?"

"Yes, you see, someone of your talent must have the finest of glass windows instead of those boorish panes."

"What do you have against wooden panes?"

"Don't tell me miss that you do have those! What a tragedy for someone of your stature but don't worry, I can help you have them all changed to glass ones easily. Since you are my teacher, I will even make you a friendly price! How about it?"

"I did not see that coming." The teacher said, incredulous.

"You seem hesitant for now but trust me, glass have many advantages. I'll show you, I always have some samples with me. I am confident that you will be impressed by their quality."

"I can't believe she's actually doing it to the teacher too." Said Kenneth to Emp while this was happening.

For a reason Emp didn't know, many of the boys seemed to gather around his desk like the girls gathered around Aglaya. Maybe it was because his desk was conveniently placed? Around him were Kenneth, Odilon and Zoran who seemed to have been dragged there by Kenneth. Aside from George, the other guys seemed to come and go often as well.

"What do you mean by too? Did she try to sell glass to other people."

"Yeah, she didn't just do it to you the other day, she tried it on the girls in class as well. She wanted to sell them teacups made out of glass."

"I wonder if this is even possible." Said Odilon

"Probably, I saw regular cups made out of glass in the duke's office last month. Maybe I'll buy her some, I wonder how it feels." Emp answered.

"Maybe you shouldn't, it's likely to cost you an arm for something you don't need. Buy them in silver like everyone else instead. Also, what were you doing in his office?"

"I was delivering a letter. He had all these glass bottle and cups everywhere."

"I don't care about what the bottle is made out of as long as the booze in it is good." Said Oliver from a table further behind.

While they were talking about that, the teachers face got worse and worse and in the end the group decided to send someone to distract Juniper a while before she angered Glenda. They selected Emp for the job because no one wanted to do it aside from him who didn't mind either way.

He ended up promising her to buy a cup and some glass jewels he had no idea what he would do with. He felt it was a huge waste of money, but since he had so much of it, it didn't bother him too much. Still, he would try harder to not be the selected person next time.

Besides that, he got into a fight again, this time with some other students. Everyone was coming back from the class and Emp had just left the rest of the group to go to his room when he came across half a dozen people he didn't know.

There were both boys and girls in their group but they all came to a sudden stop when they saw him with Celtine on his shoulders like usual.

"Hey you, you should really put that thing down. That's disgusting."

"She takes her baths properly though."

Celtine didn't seem to appreciate his defense because she hit the top of his head with her fist.

"She is a cursed-blood moron! No amount of scrubbing will wash away her beastly nature."

So it was about that again. It seemed that since he had met her, every single problem he had were because of that.

"Hey don't call him names!" Intervened a girl from behind him.

Deep blue eyes, extremely long sunshine-blond hair held above her shoulders by an array of ornaments, fair skin, smaller than Emp and refined facial features, it was Mable, qualified as cute by Aglaya. She stood there angrily pointing her finger at the guy who talked. Her two servants nervously tried to stop her from her sides but she was deaf to them.

Celtine seemed just as surprised to see her there as Emp was. Neither knew if this was a good thing or a bad thing for her to be there. At least, she didn't scare Celtine like Brenia did. Emp didn't know why but despite the fact that Brenia was acting quite friendly towards everyone, Celtine seemed frightened every time she got close to her. Even those that clearly disliked her like Gervaise did not scare Celtine. In any case, now wasn't the time to think about this.

"It's impolite to point at someone girl!" One of the unknown students said.

"You were the one to be impolite first!"

"Just mind your own business!" The guy snapped angrily.

"Speaking of minding your own business, what does the way I carry her around have anything to do with you all? Just be on your way and let me through."

After all, if there was no way for them to agree, might as well go their separate way. Hearing that, the other side made some grimaces but still decided to comply since they could not find any arguments against that.

As they were leaving with some disdainful comment. Mable called at them from behind.

"Yeah, run away! There is no way you can win against Emp anyway! You bunch of mean hearted frogs."

Her two girl servants turned pale when they heard what their master was saying.

"What!"

The whole other group turned back and went straight at them. Afterwards, nothing Emp said could stop or appease them so after getting yelled at for a while, he lost his patience and decided to beat them. He told Celtine what he was going to do right in front of them and asked her if she wanted to get down. Like last time, she refused.

Those guys got even more angry at him saying he would beat them all and decided to be the first to attack. Since no one here had any weapons, the fight ended up being really short. None of them matched the speed of the mouse nor his resistance and it only took a couple of punch and kicks to defeat them all. One got knocked out with a bleeding nose while the others just got a bunch of bruises before they all decided to run away carrying the unconscious guy.

Emp, like Celtine, ended up unharmed, mostly because the other side didn't know how to act together and got in the way of each other more than anything else. He did have to block a couple of punches with his forearms but it wasn't nearly as painful as the wounds he had received before.

While they ran, the hearty laugh of Mable followed them as if to shame them some more.

"See, I knew it would end up like that. There was no way they could defeat you." She said with a big smile after they were gone.

On either side of her, the two servant girls were completely speechless.

"How did you know?" Asked Emp, confused. He didn't remember ever fighting in front of the class.

"My room is that way." She said pointing in the same direction Emp was going. "I would have liked to see the gardens from it but instead, the balcony overlook the training field. I saw you practice with a huge hammer the other day. Every time you swung it and hit the ground, dirt would fly everywhere."

As she was explaining this, she imitated it all with wide gestures of her arms.

"You are scary strong, you must have some strength magic you can cast on yourself. I'd say you are probably on the level of a trained soldier already and we haven't even started any of the training classes yet. I would have been really surprised if any of them could match that strength."

Her explanation made sense, she had lived longer than him in this world even if she appeared smaller, it was easier for her to guess the strength of other peoples. If she had seen him train with the thunder-chew hammer, she would know at least part of his strength. It also explained what she was doing there, if her room was the same way as his own, then she was just going back to it when she found them. But, there was something that didn't make sense.

"If your room is that way, how come I never met you on the way back from the class before?"

"It takes me a really long time to get rid of Aglaya." She said with a helpless look on her face. "You, don't laugh at the misery of others!" She said pointing at Celtine.

It must have been quite the face Celtine made seeing how depressed Mable became.

"I apologize on her behalf, I would also feel quite helpless if I was always imprisoned into those hugs."

Mable made several nods of approval while Emp followed up.

"You Mable, you sided for me earlier, does that mean you do not hate cursed-bloods or does it just mean that you knew I would win?"

She thought about her answer for a bit while tapping her lips with her finger before she told him how she felt.

"Aglaya and me do not really mind cursed-bloods. There aren't that many to begin with in Thronewoods." Thronewoods was the capital of the empire and also of the kingdom of Grandbois from where the two of them were from. "I think many of them are scary and dangerous but this one isn't. Instead, I thought what you said about protecting her at the entrance ceremony was very gallant. If someone like you says something like that about someone, that person can't be bad, even if she's not really human."

After that, they walked a bit together until their path changed from each other and Emp went back to his room. Maybe he should consider those girls as friends as well. They were taking his side after all. Still, the last part of her answer reminded him of what Chinui had taught him about cursed-bloods.

When Chinui talked about them before, he had explained how sages and mages couldn't figure out what they were exactly, what set them apart from beasts if anything did. That time, Emp decided to not think about it because he wanted to see one for himself before he made his own mind about it.

Now that he had met one, and had spent weeks with her, he still could only see a girl. Maybe it was time to ask for the book of answer's help? That night, under the starlight, he asked the book.

"What are cursed-bloods exactly?"

<The human method of classification is inaccurate. Some are humans sub-species with high concentrations of magu trapped in their bodies and others are something else entirely, an original creation of the gods or a specie born from genetic manipulation.>

There were so many things he didn't understand in that answer! What were those words?

"What is magu."

<Even the gods don't know.> (3)

What a useful answer...

"Then, what is genetic manipulation."

<It is the act of directly manipulating the genes of an organism with the goal of achieving some desired changes in the target or its descendants.> (4)

Emp felt that if he was to continue asking things about that, he would come across more and more things he did not understand. If he did, he would likely be up all night trying to figure out what the book was explaining to him. Since it wasn't really what he was after anyway, he chose to brush over the subject and go back to what he was trying to figure out. What he could understand was that some were more human than what the rest thought since the book classified part of them as a human sub-species.

"How am I to know which are human sub-species and which are not?"

<Three solutions.

First solution: unachievable due to a lack of required technology.

Second solution: check crossbreeding compatibility. Possible crossbreed between species means a close link between the two.

Third solution: Ask a god.>

If the possibility of having a child with something not human meant that it was a human sub-specie, it meant that many creatures classified as monsters were some sort of humans as well. He could hardly accept that answer, he doubted anyone else would be willing to even consider this answer as truth.

But the book would not lie would it? However much he disliked the answer, it was still the truth. How very troublesome, what a pain. Maybe he shouldn't have asked. It wasn't a problem for him anyway was it?

Whether they were human or not didn't matter much as long as he was able to know if they were friendly or not. He had wanted to know what they were and maybe find a way to help everyone a bit but it was much too complicated for him, at least for now. It was best to give up until another day and focus on learning the common language instead.

Only one question really mattered for now.

"What is Celtine exactly?"

<Descendant of a race of half-ornaks/half-humans created in an attempt to save the dying ornak race. Experiment ended in failure, they are now classified as a human sub-specie.> (5)

So now he knew for sure that Celtine was at least part human, that was relieving.

***

It took the whole group a long while to learn the basics they would need for the rest of the classes that would come after. Of course, most were still not perfect at neither of the two languages but as long as they could read fluently, they would not have a problem with the rest of the classes. They would continue to come here as long as Glenda didn't decide they were done but now, they would have to go to other classes as well.

Those that didn't come from the nobility, like Cyril Lowfield and Brenia had an especially hard time learning how to write. Brenia in particular often complained loudly about how boring this all was and how much she wanted to go outside to do something more thrilling. The rest didn't fare too badly.

Emp felt it was probably because they often saw writings. Even if they didn't know how to write, they were already used to seeing the characters and could recognize at least some letters or words where the others couldn't.

Emp himself didn't do too bad. With the help of the teacher on one side and Marcelia on the other, his comprehension of the common language got much better. He even started to understand a bit what everyone meant when they said he spoke strangely. Because he was hearing them so often, it was easy to notice the difference after a time.

The others also often pointed out when he didn't use contractions.

"Why do you people say 'can't'? Do we not have a word for that already in the form of 'cannot'?"

"I don't know how to answer that."

"More importantly, you did it again. You said do we not instead of don't we."

"I do not understand why this is a thing."

"It's because it's faster and easier to say, normally you don't use the full thing unless you are speaking to someone far above you."

"Above as in higher or in a more figurative sense like in a hierarchy."

"The second one, why would you use a different speech for someone standing higher than you?"

"That is why I asked."

"You did it again..."

"I am sorry, I cannot help it."

Mable a few tables further burst in laughter hearing that, a loud screaming laughter that made the whole room turn her way. She was unable to stop and just did her best to hide her face behind her hands.

"Oh my, you definitely need more sleep Mable." Said Aglaya

"I'm sorry, I can't." She barely managed to say with tears of laughter rolling down her cheeks.

"You mean to say that you cannot." Said Nessa with a huge grin.

After that, most of the room was laughing. Even Emp was smiling seeing everyone laugh.

Celtine too managed to learn how to write and read, she gave it her all and made it quickly. She learned the common language faster than Emp and was the first to gain the approval of the teacher on her understanding of the noble language.

"This girl has a gift in languages, she is the best student I ever had. I feel a bit upset that she is just a cursed-blood slave but at least we still have Penny and Norval who are pretty close behind. You did an excellent job, you pass."

Celtine was really happy to get told her learning was over. She had worked really hard to get this approval. Even Emp who had nothing else to do than to learn could not match her focus. She busied every single moment of her free time to better her understanding of the two languages.

That day, after they got back into their room, Emp gave her the magic quill like he had decided when he had first bought it. After the supper expertly cooked by Harriett, he presented Celtine the quill as well as a small stack of papers and a wooden tablet to write on. He had prepared it in Dark-glint beforehand by piercing an end of it to pass a long string through. Like this, she would be able to carry it around her neck.

"Celtine, I wanted to reward your efforts into learning all that so I decided to give you the magic quill we bought that first time we went shopping all together. With it, the thin board and the parchment, you'll be able to write anywhere."

He pushed those three things to her and she accepted them with a giant smile. <Thank you master!> She wrote on one of the parchment before sending it back to him. Emp was really happy she liked it. Thinking it would be unfair to not reward Harriett as well for her hard work, he turned towards her while Celtine was quickly scratching something on a new sheet.

"Harriett, you too did an excellent job. You have been doing everything by yourself since I became your master. Without you, nothing would ever get cleaned and I would eat apples and fish every day. You also deserve to be rewarded, what would you like?"

Harriett seemed surprised by his question. She was just finishing cleaning up the table and the tableware. She wiped her hands on her large apron and got closer to answer him properly.

"Master would like to know what I would like? I have not thought of this before. It's unusual for us slaves to receive something from our masters unless it is something we really need like in her case." She said pointing at Celtine, still writing down something.

Emp wondered what she was writing exactly but kept pushing Harriett for an answer.

"But I still want to give you something, tell me, What would make you happy? As long as it is reasonable, I will do my best to find it for you."

"If master insist, in that case, I would like for master to..."

Her eyes drifted on her ring and she lost herself in her own thoughts for a short moment. Emp had noticed before that when she was thinking hard, she tended to spin the ring around her finger by using her thumb, which she was doing right now. He did not interrupt her and awaited her answer.

"I would like for master to give me an earring. I had one before, given by my father but I had to give it back when I was sold. Is it too much to ask?"

She had never talked about her father before. Thinking about it, He really had forgot to ask them both their stories. Celtine would not have been able to tell him anything but at least Harriett should have had something to say. He needed to ask her later.

"No, it is not at all too much to ask. I can certainly do that for you but I do not know a lot about jewelry so it may not be to your liking."

Thinking about this, maybe he should just gift her earrings made of glass since he would probably receive some soon from Juniper.

"Anything will do master, the last wasn't anything special either. It's just that I wore it for so long before that it feels lonely without it."

Emp did not understand what she felt but could easily see that it was an important thing to her by the way her eyes dodged his own.

"I will do my best and bring some to you soon."

"I offer my gratitude to master for this." She said with a deep bow.

Emp smiled to her before he felt a small tug on his clothes. Looking at the source, he found Celtine handing him a paper with a lot of text written on it. He wondered what it was she wanted to tell him and took the parchment to take a better look at it.

< Master,> The paper read. <Harriett said that you were a good man when we first met and I believe her. You took great care of me since we met, you let me rest and helped me as best as you could. I am sorry to not be that useful to you and deeply thankful for everything you did. I thought humans were all malevolent but that was not the case. You took my defense many times already and I like it when you carry me. You sometimes walk so fast it feels like I'm flying again.>

Emperor smiled while reading that part. He was very happy she felt he was doing a good job. Making a friend happy was very pleasant. He continued reading.

<I have two request for you master.

Please, let me help you somehow. I know that I am weak, I know I have no balance and I know I have no voice but please, I feel guilty receiving all those favors from you even though I have nothing to give back. I would like to help like Harriett. When I try to help her, I feel like I am in the way more than I am helping.>

He did not know Celtine felt that way. It wasn't his intention to make her feel bad. What should he have her do then? What was she able to do? He was fine with giving her work of course but he didn't want her to suffer for no reason if Harriett could do it easily. He needed to think about it more. He finished reading the message for now, He would think about it more afterwards.

<The other is much more important to me, and much harder to ask. Please master, would you show me your great kindness again and help me regain what I lost? Would you generously help me regain my wings, regain my voice? Would you please ask your magic book? Please, please, please, I will do anything in exchange.> (6)

Emp looked at her over the paper. She had a pleading look of overwhelming anxiousness written all over her face. She seemed really scarred he would say no, but he had no reason not to.

"I didn't even know you once had a voice before I read this. Sure, I will help you if I can. healing you can only be a good thing for us three. But, asking the book of answer isn't that easy, you need to be precise with your question or it will answer something crazy." Emp explained as he got the book out.

Relief and pure joy spread across her face as she heard his answer.

It really was working like Harriett had said! She had the urge to hug him but, not wanting to disturb him while he was helping her, she hugged Harriett instead.

"This one is curious." Said Harriett from her arms "What did she say? What are we helping with."

"We are looking for a way to restore her wings and her voice. What would be the best way to ask the book?"

She nodded smilingly in understanding. Passing an arm around Celtine, she answered her master with a question of her own.

"Couldn't master just ask the book directly?"

"I want to but I am not sure of the wording. I guess I could just try with the most simple question and go from there. What is the best way for Celtine to regain her wings."

<Pick up a shovel, go into the northern forest of Artefine and dig up Noey's grave.>

"Who's Noey?" It wasn't really what he was asking for, he decided to try something else.

From the side, Celtine shivered, the name must not be one she wanted to hear but anyway, it wasn't related to what he was asking.

"How does one regrow a lost limb?"

<Highly advanced and demanding magic or with the help of a god.>

That wasn't promising at all, he thought while reading it aloud for the other two.

"I see what master means now, it is hard to get a useful answer out of it."

"How about the voice then? How can we give Celtine's voice back to her?"

He read that answer aloud for them as well.

<The curse afflicting her was made by a god to silence the curse of truth. There is no way known to mankind for reversing it but some gods would be able to undo it.>

Celtine seemed devastated by those answer and tears dripped from her eyes but Emp was quick to cheer her up.

"That isn't too bad, both can be resolved in the same way just by meeting a god. I only lived for a year and already met five, finding one more shouldn't be that hard. It just means that you will have to be a bit more patient. At the very worse, my four creators will come to congratulate me when I'm done with their quest so we will at least see them then."

That would take a lot of time of course but there was no telling he wouldn't find another trial ground in the meantime, even more likely if he could somehow trick the book into telling him where they were. Celtine understood what he meant and dried her tears. She just had to wait and live, she would regain all that she missed at some point for sure.

She freed herself from Harriett and wrote another thing on a paper. It read: <What would you like in exchange of your help master?>

"I am not sure, maybe you could smile more often. I do not feel like I did anything that would need to be rewarded, at least not yet. In any case, helping you is like helping myself since you are my slave, is it not?"

"You heard master, do your best for him and he will do his best for you." Harriett said.

Celtine nodded with determination even though Emp felt it wasn't exactly what he was saying. He had just wanted to tell her he didn't need anything in exchange but it somehow ended up like that. Maybe people really didn't like to be helped just like that, like Galana had said. For him, it seemed like a pretty simple and normal thing to do but for her, it was clearly very important. Even if he felt like it was easy to help for free, maybe it was so valuable to her that she couldn't help but want to give something in return. Maybe words of thanks weren't enough.

After that, he had them both sit down and tell him their stories. Harriett went first while Celtine was writing her own answer. She talked about her mother and about her father who had also been her master, she told him what she used to do as work and how she had been driven away by the wife of her father, she didn't dare hide anything from her master.

It was true Emp had completely forgotten to ask them until now but he was still very interested to learn more about them. By now, he had spent as much time with them as he had with Chinui, they were both precious to him. Soon, he would have spent more time with them and Marcelia than any other person in his life. He felt attached to them. (7)

After her story was over, he understood a bit more about her but a question remained that he had to voice.

"Your father, Why did he not marry your mother as well if he liked her. He had only one wife after all."

She sent him a shocked look and said some incoherent things in a fluster before she managed to give a normal answer. Had he said something strange again?

"His wife would never have let him do that."

"Did I ask something weird."

"Of course not master, I just, I mean, very few people would do that."

Was it a bit like walking around with Celtine on his shoulder? Everyone would send strange stares then.

"I see, I still do not understand this wedding thing."

"It's alright master, you still have plenty of time to do so. I'm sure proposals will rain upon you at some point." Harriett said, averting her eyes.

Then, it was Celtine's turn. In her writing, she retold how she was supposed to become the next leader of her tribe and how she was ambushed. The loss of her wings, her time being sold again and again until she lost her voice and found her way here were written in a concise way without much detail but one did not need many details to understand how she had ended up here.

"You had it hard." Said Harriet. "You were all the way at the top and then you were thrown all the way down. In your place, I would've felt depressed as well."

<You too were forced to start over.>

"But I wasn't at the very top, I was only a step above the lowest. Still, we were more alike than I first thought, our stories are a bit similar."

<But you weren't maimed.>

"Yeah but I can't cast spells and I am essentially harmless. To be honest, the first couple of days we were here, I was afraid you would attack me in my sleep because you were a cursed-blood. I don't think so anymore though, now I just think you are adorable. My mother was a songstress too you know? I can't wait for you to regain your voice and hear you sing. You are not mad at me for being afraid of you, are you?"

<No, I'm not mad at all.>

Emp didn't know what to think about her story. Or more accurately, he knew it was sad, horrible even, but he didn't know how to react to it. Those were things that had already been done and the only thing he could do about it was to try and fix her wounds.

He felt it was sad but also, there was nothing to be sad about since everything would be eventually repaired. He could feel her pain and sadness but he had a hard time sharing it. In summary, he did feel bad that she felt bad but since he had never lost something himself, he couldn't wrap his head around why it was so painful for her.

He did think however, that what she had written, like the story Harriett told, was valuable to him to learn more about how the world worked around him. What Celtine had written was almost a small book by itself.

Speaking of books, he was pretty much done with Galana's books, he still wasn't the most fluent person in the common tongue but those books could not help him much anymore. He decided to send them back to her like he had said he would.

He asked around how to send something all the way to red-water and Esther the receptionist told him that he just had to leave everything to her and she would take care of it. All she needed was to know where and to who it was supposed to go. That was very convenient. With his thanks, he gave her the stack of books as well as a letter he had written just for Galana, with enough money included to pay in advance for a return letter in case she wanted to tell him something. With how money was such a problem for her, he didn't want to burden her with something as small as a letter. It read like this:

<Dear friend Galana,>

Nessa had told him that a letter should always start with dear.

<I managed to reach the school in one piece. I was attacked by a glutonek and some blood-spitters on the way but I was left mostly unarmed.

I do not want to bother you with everything that happened to me since I got here so I will not talk to you about all the nobles I met and the two branded slaves they gave me when I arrived, Celtine and Harriett. Still, a lot of them are friendly, it seems that not all nobles are as treacherous as the ones you know.

As you can see with this letter, I sent you back your books, I should be fine without them now. I still can barely understand what people are saying in common but at least I can read and write it just fine.

If I find any other books that are worthwhile, I may send them to you as well.

I hope you are doing fine and that your shop is working well.

Until some other time,

Emp.

P.S. I already paid enough for you to send a letter in return if you want but not enough for the books so you will have to pay yourself if you really do not want them.>

That was everything that happened to Emp in his time with the language class.

***

(1) Mable, no her name isn't misspelled. I understand it is usually written as Mabel but trust me, You will figure out one day why I spell it like that. If I write it as Mabel, it is a typo, please point it out and I will fix it, thank you.

(2) Glenda is usually used as a witch's name. Ours here isn't a witch. It is a real name, some people in real life are indeed named Glenda and have no magic powers.

(3) Of course, Magu is about magic, I may explain it a bit more when we reach the magic classes.

(4) It may seem like I'm foreshadowing High tech shit but I'm not, the book is just too knowledgeable for its own good. Gods don't need technology to tweak genetics. (although they could use it, it just has nothing to do with our current story, maybe another time.)

(5) Ornaks are long dead, it doesn't matter what they are or look like, don't even try to extract the info out of me.

(6) We aren't in some kind of anime here so he will not ask: "Anything?" first thing after hearing that.

(7) Not in a romantic way, Emp doesn't get that kind of thing, not yet. What he feels is more like how you grow attached to a dog. Even then, it's in an unconscious way, he would never be able to put those feelings into words, just like how he doesn't understand what empathy and sympathy are.

(8) To be clear, I will still come take a look to make sure everything is going as planned and check out comments but I don't intend on writing between the 22 and Jan 2 next year. There are too many family things and too many games I've had for years and still haven't even tried.