Strange answers

The man took out a folder and a pen to write down the things Klaus was telling him.

The first thing he did was to ask him for the name and basic data that, technically, he should already know.

Then, he moved on to more in-depth questions.

"When you entered the Energy Bath, what did you see? Were there any cities found nearby?"

Klaus frowned slightly and smiled softly slyly soon after. 'So the serious questions began.'

"The first thing I saw were mountains and the scenery was beautiful. I hadn't seen anything like it before, so I was admiring the scenery for a while. Also trying out the new things I was looking at. It was all very pretty." He replied, causing the man in front of him to frown and raise an eyebrow.

But Klaus wasn't finished.

"Once, when I looked at the beautiful landscape, a cursed beast appeared in front of me and tried to kill me. I had a tough fight against it, but it was a bit dumb, and in the end, it ended up hitting a huge rock itself and died that way. It was really disgusting, so the beautiful..."

"It was gross?" The man quickly interrupted Klaus, preventing him from being able to say 'beautiful scenery' again. Klaus hadn't spoken for 1 minute, and he felt his head hurt listening to those words.

Klaus nodded. "Yes, but..."

"I get it; it was a curse of disgust. You got lucky, kid. Those curses don't tend to be very smart or strong; sometimes they're dumb, too. Well, what do you tell me about the city?" he asked quickly.

Klaus thought for a moment again and nodded. "There was one, sir. It was very beautiful, and the scenery inside was beautiful..."

"Did you enter it?" he interrupted Klaus once again, feeling his patience wearing thin each time.

Although on the outside, Klaus took it as if it was a bit annoying that he was interrupted every time, inside, he was smiling slyly. This guy was too impatient to ask questions, and playing dumb is one of the ways to survive in the slums, something Klaus is quite good at.

"Sir, I didn't go in. There were too many people, and honestly, I don't get along with people." Klaus replied in a 'sincere' manner.

The man scrutinized him for several seconds before turning to look at his folder. "I understand. That's fine, then. But, if you didn't get into the city, how did you get that thing?" The man pointed to a thing that was covered in grime, full of dust, blood, and strange things that were already dry.

It was a backpack.

Klaus was surprised to see it here. 'What's that doing here? Hadn't it stayed on that mountain?'

Still, he revealed nothing on his face.

"Right, my backpack. I got that one from a corpse near the city, sir. The corpse was fresh and had clothes on it, so I took them off it, and to store them, I used the backpack. That helped me to be able to change clothes in that place. The clothes were quite beautiful, but..."

"Okay, that's enough." He interrupted him before he started talking nonsense. "Now, what did you eat in there? I understand we didn't give you enough meals for several days."

Klaus glared at him. 'You bastard, you didn't even give me a scrap of food. What do you mean you didn't give us 'enough'?' Still, he didn't reveal his thoughts.

Instead, he lowered his head.

"I don't think you're going to like hearing it." He replied, embarrassed.

"Oh? What is it?" the man asked, feeling curious.

"This..." Klaus hesitated for a moment but sighed in the end. "Remember the corpse I told you about? Well..."

Suddenly, a woman's voice interrupted him.

"Professor, could you please stop asking personal questions that make no sense? Answering some of those might offend his morals." Sua glared at the man, causing him to look back at her.

Still, the man nodded. "All right, forget about that. Let's move on to the next question. The mission, where was it taking place?" he asked, glaring at Klaus.

Klaus smiled at hearing this; somehow, his smile was uncomfortable to watch.

"Remember I told you the scenery was beautiful? Well, there were many beautiful mountains, in the most beautiful of them..."

Klaus suddenly found himself narrating a story that was indeed true, but he did it in such an eloquent and cloying way that it gave the man in front of him a headache.

'This bastard... Did he go crazy in there? What the fuck did he see to make him see everything like that? Was it so beautiful? A wonder of the world or what the fuck?' He was fuming his head off, feeling stressed.

Even more so when he noticed that Klaus wouldn't shut up, it was so stressful that he raised his voice.

"It's okay, I understand. Enough. Last question: what did you see before you left the bath? Did something unexpected happen?" he asked, speaking quickly.

Klaus frowned and shook his head. "When I was about to finish the bath, I fell almost unconscious once I completed the mission with some luck. It was difficult, but as soon as I saw that I was back in that big room from before, I fell unconscious until a few minutes ago. Did something happen?" he asked.

The man shook his head and stood up.

"No, nothing happened. You will be informed of several things later. For now you should know that you owe a debt to the kingdom, as it was the kingdom that paid all the expenses of sending you to have your Energy Bath. This is a receipt of how much you must pay; it is 1,250 Carter Coin that you must pay personally to the Records Office." He said and handed him a receipt.

Klaus didn't understand what Carter Coin was or how much 1,250 of those were, but he nodded after receiving it. Then, the man pulled out another receipt.

"You also owe a debt to our research center. It's an additional 1,500 Carter Coin. You can pay it at the Records Office, too." he said, but just before he handed the receipt to Klaus, Sua quickly grabbed it from the side and read its contents.

She frowned and stared at him. "Professor, I am certain that this receipt should not exist. The 1,250 pays..."

"Miss Vinanne." The man stared at her after saying her name and interrupting her. "May I remind you that I take care of the receipts."

Sua Vinanne fell silent after hearing him say that. 'This old bastard...' But, although she took a deep breath because of how angry she was, she didn't say or do anything in the end.

He grabbed the receipt again and then bestowed it on Klaus, who looked at it thoughtfully.

"You must pay that exact amount at the Office. Our Sorcerers will look for you even under the stones if you don't pay it. They are not as good people as we are, Young Klaus. They will possibly send you to work in the worst mines in existence, wearing shackles that will prevent your death so that you will pay for everything. You will never be able to get out of there." His threatening tone was nothing more directed at Klaus.

Sua felt that those words were also directed at her.

But Klaus nodded. "Don't worry, sir. I'll take care of paying for everything." Klaus said and smiled. "Don't you feel like hearing more about that world? I have a lot of things..."

"No." The man turned around after saying that firmly and quickly walked out of there as if he wanted to run away.

Once the door closed tightly, Klaus smiled.