Chapter 17: When you break a biscuit, you get two of ’em

What’s an emergency cookie? Jyn and Kalender shook their heads. Ah, wait, that emergency cookie? Kalender thought.

“Kalender, Miss Page, I just remembered that we have critical business with a certain person—though my own presence should be enough. I would like you both to continue training so as not to waste time.”

“Oh right, we were supposed to meet with her today, right?” Kalender said.

Jyn nodded. “I will be back within the hour with the news.”

She waved goodbye and started off to find Priestess Tak. Page was now alone with Kalender.

She slowly turned her head to the man who had charmed her. They met eyes. Now that they were alone, would his true personality come out? Was he just putting up a front for Jyn because he couldn’t bully Page with her around? Did—

“Hehe. Emergency cookie.”

[+1 Affection]

“W-what—” I knew it! He’s gonna bully me!

Faster than Page’s eyes could track, Kalender pulled something from his belt. She instinctively shielded her face with her arms and cowered.

But nothing happened.

She peeked past her arms and saw Kalender, standing there, finger guns out and biscuits pinched between his fingers.

“Care for an … emergency biscuit?”

“W-what—” He also has emergency crunchies?!

[+1 Affection]

“You never know when you need to munch on something, am I right?”

This … this wasn’t, at all, what Page had imagined the man to be. She timidly received the biscuit—should she eat it? Her anxiety was pushing her to do so. Even if it came from the same man she was nervous about, a biscuit was a biscuit, and she was all out of cookies. With accumulated stress and holy vendetta, she crunched down on it.

W-wait, this taste… No way?! “Did you get this from Emergency Bakery?! O-oh, I mean, uh—”

Kalender chuckled. “Yeah. In my opinion, it’s one of my better finds in this town.” Yep, that’s it, I’m totally going to ignore all of your nervousness. “Actually, wanna go there? That’s my last biscuit and I’ve got some extra Notes. We can talk chant pronunciation on the way.”

Profiting from stress eating habits since the first generation of bakers, Emergency Bakery was just a few streets and turns away from Knight HQ. You weren’t from Clarinet if you didn’t know about it.

They started off, passing by Lens and asking her if she wanted anything.

“Heh, you think you can buy me?” Lens said, shooting them defiant looks that professed her loyalty to the kingdom. Before either Page or Kalender could say anything about it, Lens continued, “… a box of brownies?”

Kalender looked down and had his hand covering his face. Page looked up to the sky with dead eyes, her hand covering her mouth. They sighed. ““Damn it, Lens.””

[+1 Affection]

Page and Kalender nervously laughed off their synced remarks and waved bye-bye to a smirking Lens.

The streets were sparse of people. It was mostly just produce vendors setting up for the day, but there were buyers prowling about as well.

“That was kinda funny, though,” Kalender said. “I didn’t even know you could mispronounce {bullet} like that.”

Page ballooned her cheeks. “It’s just a little mistake…”

“Did you know?” Kalender continued, distracting Page from her mood. “Chants are just words in another language?”

“Hm? Hm, well, I guess that would make sense…”

Page didn’t say anything more. Kalender had hoped she would, but, he guessed, that’s just to be expected from someone who was nervous around him.

So, he pulled out one of his conversational shotguns.

" ‘Make sense’? " he parroted. Normally, this would make the other party explain their choice of words.

“Well—yeah? It makes sense?” She didn’t know what to think of what he was trying to get out of her.

Damn, she didn’t bite. She also sounded a bit wary. Gotta fix that. “Sorry if the topic’s a bit underwhelming. Got a linguistics degree or something?”

“… What’s linguistics?”

Huh? “You don’t have that here?”

Page looked at Kalender all puzzled, until she remembered that he was a reincarnator. “I’ve never heard of that, but there are language teachers.”

Oh, languages! “Really? You ever had any?” He hadn’t bothered to ask Jyn about anything outside of Lyrica. He just knew they were in the middle of a continent called Terithia, and people from Lyrica spoke, well, Lyrican. This was a good opportunity to get to know a bit about Page and the countries around Lyrica at the same time.

She did have two names, so her educational level should be high enough to ask about the ghist of these things.

“Well, I took some lessons in Icassian and Artemian,” Page replied. The question was harmless enough. “Never got any good at either of them, though.”

“Wait, so those are from … Icasius and Artemia? Artem? Are those countries?”

“Oh, no, no. Icassian and Artemian are both spoken in Icasius-Artemia. It’s a pretty big republic on the western border.”

“Icasius-Artemia? Sounds like they united at some point.”

“Ah, well, they did. I’m not sure, but it was 200 years ago? It’s a young country, but it’s pretty powerful.”

“Figures you’d bother learning their languages… Are they peaceful?”

Page took on a complicated expression. “Up until 30 years ago, the kingdom had—had open borders with them. Ah, but they’re not expansionist or anything, it’s just … a difference in policy.”

She already wasn’t looking at Kalender when she spoke, but this time, she turned her head even further away.

“Does it have something to do with the Big C-word?” Kalender asked.

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“I-it does. Icasius-Artemia welcomes it.”

“A’ight. Say no more, I can already fill in the blanks mostly.”

Icasius-Artemia just accepting it—sounded really fishy. Lyrica treated it as a public health hazard, what with women guaranteed to go insane under the effects of the curse. Suffice to say, it’s like a virus that spreads just from words and presence alone.

Unlike a virus, however, it conferred extra benefits—namely, Companion Skills. The only justifiable reason for the higher ups of Icasius-Artemia to accept the curse was because their nation needed the extra power just to stay afloat, which was saying something since there was a good chance most of their higher ups were women. Why would they need the extra power, though, and in exchange for their own agency? Who were they preparing against?

People in Lyrica were tense about the curse, and even an already-powerful neighbor like Icasius-Artemia actively accepted it to bolster its existing strength. The peacefulness and ordinary bustle of the street that Kalender treaded betrayed the behind-the-scenes developments. The world might just be at a tipping point, and he lived in such an era.

It was all spinning in his head. “Damn it, I really need an emergency biscuit right about now…”

“D-don’t worry, it’s just around the next corner,” Page said. She’d noticed him take on a grave expression, having been silent for the past few moments. Seeing him slide from a happy-go-lucky vibe all the way to a serious mood that seemed to ponder existence itself—she adjusted her valuation of him.

Exciting stuff! The Inquisition didn’t give him a gold endorsement for kicks at all! The promise of adventure was written on Kalender’s face, and she might just accept the charm effects—if it meant taking on the world!

But—his face was still too gloomy for her taste. Unbeknownst to Kalender, she actually had an emergency butter biscuit in a different pocket.

She took it out and broke it, offering one half to Kalender. His eyes lit up. With a soft smile, he took the biscuit and nibbled on it.

“Ah, by the way,” Kalender continued, “since you took language lessons before, I think you should be able to hear the difference between {Shoot a bullet of flame} and {Shoot a flaming cookie}.”

Page squinted—then her eyes widened as she violently crushed her biscuit between her teeth. “Mh! Shtupid, I’m sho schtupid!”

If she came out of this learning anything, at least she now knew the magic word for {cookie}.

***

In the guard barracks, Jyn and Tak sat across each other in the private meeting room.

“How is it?” Jyn started. Tak shifted in her seat, hesitating for a moment.

“She is … more than I imagined,” Tak replied. “I have confirmed that she is a resurrected soul.”

“What? Then—”

Tak held up a hand. “She allowed herself to be captured, banking on meeting me or any of my sisters, as she bears a message from our goddess, hoping that it reaches Kalender.”

***

—I have become flesh, but split in two, as the Blessing of the ###### God ravages me and I cannot allow Heaven to be undone by it. One is me, the guide and lighthouse of souls. I have asked for the aid of heroes of old, and I am sorry to take away their peace, all to fight against me. Another is me, my will, and all of my Affection for you. I will savage my way to find you, and kill and slaughter in your name. I want you to be mine. I cannot allow it. Love between a goddess and a mortal produces strange results. Heaven does not want such to happen again. I do not want to summon new souls to fix Heaven’s mistakes. I will kill my Affection. Do not seek me, or you will perish in the battlefield.

***

“That is … cryptic. As Priestess, do you understand it?” Jyn paused. “Most importantly, Kalender charmed a goddess?”

“Her thoughts are scattered. It is difficult to form a complete picture with just this.” Tak shakes her head. "Also, we of the Priesthood of Minimine are aware that our goddess is under the charm of Kalender. He was nothing more than a soul at the time, so our goddess says, and so we find no intrinsic reason to take it against him for that.

“More importantly, and thankfully, the resurrected I had mentioned is here to aid us.”

Jyn hadn’t noticed her. She was all of a sudden aware of the woman sitting beside Tak. She instinctively stood and her hand moved to her sword, but stopped.

“I apologize,” she said before bowing. “My name is Knight Jyn.”

“I am Luceria,” the woman greeted. She was wearing a grey shawl and other simple vestments, disguised as Tak’s assistant.

At the mention of her name, Jyn nearly gasped. “You’re … a Hero of Rem?”

“It was a long time ago.” Luceria smiled. “I never thought I would come out of retirement like this, but here I am.”

“I see…” Jyn sat down. “Please, do help us.”

“Goddess Minimine is split into two incarnations right now,” Luceria explained, "one of which has the personality of a humming river pebble, and the other of a lover gone insane.

“I was summoned by the Pebble along with many others to subdue or at least tie down the Insane. You could say all of Minimine’s rationality and bare minimum responsibilities as a goddess went into one, and all of her emotion, along with the stupid Blessing, went into the other.”

Jyn nodded. “The goddess is quarantining the Blessing into a mortal vessel that can be weakened and fought against, I gather?”

"Precisely. Both her incarnations are equally-matched, but we Heroes do most of the fighting since Pebble Minimine has to keep the River of Souls flowing. She can’t spare the energy to fight at all.

“In all honesty, it is a high-level battlefield. We’ve already deforested a large part of the environment west of this town. I strongly suggest you do not attempt anything reckless like subduing the Insane Minimine with the power of love. She will most likely kill this Kalender she speaks of the moment they meet.”

“West?” Jyn thought for a moment. “The goddess is resurrecting and raising undead in order to fight against her insanity-incarnate?”

Luceria shook her head. “The undead are raised by the out-of-control divinity of the Insane. We resurrected are raised by the Pebble. Although we have tried our best to control the undead, some of them still leak through.”

It must be occurring far beyond the temple row if Clarinets’ adventurers are not raising a warning about it. Still, if such a battle has been going on this whole time, evenly-matched the two forces might be now, there’s no telling what could happen tomorrow.

Affection always ticked up, no matter how sluggish the pace. Eventually, the Insane might overpower the Pebble. There had to be a way out of this.

“How much do you know about the curse?” Jyn asked. “Kalender is somehow capable of subverting its dangerous features, as in my case.”

Luceria gave it a thought. “I know little about the curse, but I can’t ignore how it sounds like you want to take reckless action.”

“I doubt even Kalender would think to heedlessly approach a battlefield of divine incarnations and legendary Heroes, not while he is still Level 1.”

“He’s what?” Luceria shook her head. “Poor guy, going through all this while he’s still Level 1…”

Jyn stood up. “I shall consult with Kalender—or rather, I will bring him here. That mind of his functions very differently to any of ours. It would be foolish to not hear his opinion about this matter. I will return in 20 to 30 minutes.”

***

[Companions]

Minimine (Flagged)
Vice-Goddess of Reincarnation
Affection: 59

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