Chapter 22: 21. One step at a time

And here we are… The dumb purple hair boy and I. Sitting in the classroom while the others were celebrating downstairs.

What a G R E A T baptism day!

That idiot ruined it!

I felt my stomach rumble uncomfortably and I put Darkie on my belly to calm the discomfort.

I didn’t even get to eat any of the delicious food! AAAARRRGGH! THAT DUMB DUMB DUMB FAT PURPLE BOY! I HATE HIM!

I banged my desk with my fist and glared in his direction. His face still swollen, he looked equally irritated to be here, but it was his fault!

Hare had one big rule: no fighting.

Fighting meant detention. He meant well, but now it felt like such an unfair rule! The purple boy had been starting fights with me for weeks, but no one saw and I couldn’t explain properly, so they just thought I was being moody.

By Shionaru

Annoyed, I took out the pouch again and placed the cube on the table. Hare had allowed me to keep the book and the pouch into the classroom. Probably because he considered it studying.

The cube remained unmoving on the table as I observed it. Beyond its habit to shock people, it was really an unremarkable piece of metal. I opened back the book and resumed my attempt at reading. I tried to recite the prayer as I followed the different words. The number of words really matched the prayer, so it must really be what was written.

It was kind of exciting to be able to ‘read’ even though I still didn’t understand individual letters.

After a while the boy approached me. He looked at the cube and asked me something. I looked at him. His forehead was swollen from the headbutt and his eyes were still red from when he cried.

I raised an unimpressed eyebrow.

I wanted to tell him off, but… Wait, maybe that could work!

I showed him the book’s first line.

[I will not be trampled!]

I said, trying to repeat the line.

It was his turn to raise an eyebrow. I thought that was going to be more effective, but maybe he’s too dumb to get it.

He shook his head and extended his hand toward me, motioning toward the book.

I reluctantly handed him the book. He read over the text and put his finger over a line. It took me a second to figure out which one it was:

“I will expose those who deceive.”

Uh? He thinks I’m lying about something?

[I’m not lying about anything! You’re dumb!]

I said before furiously reciting the prayer in my head to find something that would counter it.

He started talking while pointing at his ears.

Wait… Does he think I’m faking being…! Uh... What was the word Scorn gave me… Deaf!

[I’m not lying!]

I said, crossing my arm.

He pulled his tongue, threw the book back on my desk and went back to sulking on his seat.

I pulled my tongue in response and went back to trying to read.

After a while I got bored of trying to decipher the lines and eyed the cube on the table. Unsurprisingly, the boy hadn’t tried to pick up the cube again. I picked it up. The shock stung me immediately.

I grimaced at the pain but held on to it. I have to hate it right? That worked last time. Maybe that's why it hurts? To make it easier..?

Annoyingly, the more I thought about hating it, the harder it was to focus on changing the cube.

The boy approached again. Probably curious. He pointed at my hand with his chin. Probably curious about what I was doing. I wanted to show off to shut him off, but it still wasn't working.

I focused harder, ignoring his proding, but still no result.

That stupid thing is making me look like a complete…

Just as I thought about it, the cube turned into a spoon.

I quickly took the spoon and hit the boy’s forehead with it before it turned back into a cube.

He looked completely dumbfounded, trying to register what just happened.

After what felt like several minutes, he just started laughing.

He laughed so much he fell on his butt making me start to laugh as well. We laughed for several minutes for no good reason.

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Everytime one of us managed to stop, we would just glance at the other still laughing and start laughing even harder. It was contagious, very very contagious. My cheeks and chest were starting to hurt..

At some point Hare had entered the room and was now staring at us with a smug look on his face.

Looking like we had made up from his point of view, he invited us back downstairs for the festivities. As we were following him out, I waited until Hare looked away and landed a punch on the boy’s shoulder.

He looked surprised for a moment, but then a malicious smile appeared on his face and he punched back.

I couldn't help but chuckle again. I guess a bit of rivalry never killed anyone.

Once downstairs Jade scolded me strongly for misbehaving. She eventually relented when I looked sorry enough and took me around. We had some food and later opened gifts. From the look of our visitors, it seems they had been donated by different residents of the area. Some of them were well dressed, but not exactly rich. Perhaps some knights or minor lords?

The gifts weren’t extravagant, they looked mostly like used children toys and clothes.

After the gifts had been distributed. Jade insisted we go thank the people who had given them. I had received a brand-new pair of socks along with a small yellow satchel. I wasn’t particularly fond of them since they were things that I would have had dozens at hand in the past, but it would be rude to not say anything.

We approached a couple. From the man’s velvet coat and the trimming of the woman’s petticoat, I knew right away they had to be from an affluent family. Perhaps nobles?

I instinctively started to curtsy, but Jade interrupted. She shook her head and instead bowed her head and gave them words of thanks.

Oh… That’s right. An orphan girl shouldn’t act like a noble.

The thought made me slightly melancholic for a moment, but I shrugged it off. It was better that way. Anything was better than back then.

I bowed my head.

[Thank you.]

My words were probably ininteligible as always, but Jade made up for it by happily chatting away with the couple.

We then went to thank an elderly man for the second gift.

The festivities continued late into the night, at which point I couldn’t keep my eyes open anymore.

Days continued on and week went by. The winter raged on and the older kids went to play outside, while I was stuck indoors. I continued reading practices. A slight breakthrough came when I managed to explain to Hare and Jade I knew what was written on the first page of the Scorn holy book. We made some progress, but it quickly became apparent that I couldn’t really read the individual letter, I had just memorised the series of letters making up the word.

I made some rudimentary sentences with the words, but it was far from enough to actually communicate. It felt like a puzzle… With most of the pieces missing.

Jade tried teaching me other words by writing the words and drawing images and memorising the symbols. I could do it to a degree, but it was painfully slow, and sometimes I simply wouldn’t understand the image she drew or the action she did so I couldn’t connect the letters to a word.

One day, after coming back from one of his many errands, Hare brought me something. It was an old weathered book. On the cover a circle split in halves and an inscription could be seen.

Jade curiously looked over my shoulder and seemed to find the title interesting. We followed Hare into the classroom and he started showing us the book, explaining the content to Jade.

There were a lot of drawings in the book.

Actually, the book was mostly drawings and just a few words.

The drawings showed armored characters making strange hand symbols, beside every symbol was an object or another knight doing an action, and a word could be seen at the beginning of every set of drawings…

Was it a sort of… Hand language?!

I looked up at Jade excitedly and she nodded just as excited as I was.

We quickly started learning.

Apparently, the first few pages were directions on how to learn the language and so Hare began tutoring us on the content.

At first they were simple things like how to address one another with ‘I, you, they, them and us’, after that we learnt a few necessary objects names, and then actions.

The hand signals were complex and blended into each other. It required a lot of focus to properly signal them… Let alone understand them.

-I am food-

I signaled to Jade, but she shook her head.

She looked in the book and then signaled back to me.

-You are hungry-

I nodded and tried again

-I was hungry-

She hesitated for a second and replied.

-Am, not are-

Those exchanges became part of our daily life. At first we only practiced in the classroom with Hare, but eventually, we carried the book around and practiced even when playing.

Slowly, but surely I regained the ability to communicate.

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