Chapter 105: Isn't just that

But it isn't just that. Potential isn't just might and power. Or let's say that it is, but it should never go without being fulfilled. It couldn't be wasted. At any cost, it couldn't. This was the golden rule of potential. As a matter of fact, wasted potential was potential no more, the royalty explained.

Take a river, for example. What is a river? It's flowing, pouring water so fast and so strongly at a given location, then it's running down and down for hours on end, shaking every little obstacle that would find itself onto the river's way, at last digging and carving channels of water through the earth, ceaselessly flowing. The river, carved deep into the earth, is "potential"… but without its flowing torrent of water, that potential amounts to nothing. It is wasted.

That analogy speaking of potential and its fulfillment was about the royalty's first point. Basically, I was the carved river, and she would let the water flow, letting me grow even bigger and larger day after day. That, I think, was about the gist of it. That was just a fancy way of the lady telling me she could be useful to me. Incidentally, she didn't forget to mention that the river would also be useful to her in return.

To bring her reasoning outside of the theoretical realm, she told me she saw potential in me in that I was a powerful soldier. For her to answer my earlier question, then, she explained that what she respected above all else was strength. That's why she wouldn't want to be my enemy or bring me down. It wasn't just her—even her family, her home, her kingdom, and her every acquaintance respected strength above all else. I didn't think that philosophy of respecting strength would be especially true for anyone, but I guess the point was that strength had the final say in that, too, anyway.

That's how I, the monster who was born into the world just a week ago, was respected by the royalty. So the world was essentially like this—when you had strength, you were either respected or hated; you were either a friend or an enemy. That brought her closer to uncovering her proposal: I could be useful to her. As a friend, not an enemy.

The question I asked then was, useful in what way? To accomplish what, and how? Taking back the analogy of the river, briefly, the royalty told me that a river could serve many a purpose: You could drink from it—drinking was necessary. You could wash in it—bathing was good. You could play inside of it, with your friends and family, splashing water at each other's faces, under the hot sun and blue sky, sharing a fun friendly moment and memories with your friends—that was good in its own way, too.

And finally, and this was where she was getting at, you could drown your enemy in the river. Drown them till they didn't bother struggling and flailing around in the water in hope of breathing and living again anymore, as you seized them by the back of their head and pushed them down, down below the surface, witnessing life leaking off their body, satisfied that your job has been properly done.

My brows were raised and I chuckled. Now, she speaks my language, I thought.

That's what she needed the river for anyway. To drown people in it. Creepy! Both she and I together, she said, that's what we needed. I asked her how she knew what I needed when I didn't even know myself. She replied by asking me a question herself: what was my story so far?

The royalty had guessed it. My age really was less than one-year-old. That's how she knew. At first, she couldn't believe it, but seeing how I behaved minutes ago, ignoring the moment I missed to traumatize her senseless, she said she didn't really know much about monster-biology or anything, and the technicalities of said science belonged to the experts, but she could tell that I was an irregularity.

How, she had no idea. Why, she also didn't know. She had so many questions, she said she was a big fan of the 0-year-old me who was so unusual a monster she couldn't begin to comprehend how I even "was"... but she asked none of those and stuck to the point of her speech. So she knew I was an irregular monster. The System said "unique," but I guess both meant the same term.

And that's, again, how she knew what I wanted. What I needed. Of course, she said she couldn't know better than me if I said otherwise, but, after a few minutes of back and forth talking about some of the things I did so far in my life, she easily guessed what my goal was: to grow.

She needed the river. And I, the river, needed to expand. Both needs were pointing in the same direction. So we could be teammates, basically, from what she said. I guess it was just as plain as that, then, when she told me earlier bluntly that "We could work together."

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But what was the use of me, then?

It was to play around as I always did.

She didn't exactly phrase it that way, but the royalty made it clear to me that she needed a soldier. A soldier was a weapon. A weapon took lives. That was it. She asked me whether I wanted details about the work she proposed I do. I said that I didn't care for now. It wasn't like I agreed to whatever deal she would propose to me anyway.

The third princess of the Roerden Kingdom walked me further through her bright reasoning: I had potential as a powerful soldier, I possessed strength, and I could be used… but should my work be unpaid? Certainly not. One very important detail, that was important to both of us, according to her words, was that just like everything else that was even remotely precious and useful, I had a price. So the question was, with what, and how, would my strength at the royalty's service be rewarded?

To her knowledge, I entered the battlefield for a reason. "Correct me if I'm wrong," she rubbed her thumb together with her index finger, grinning at me, "it's money you desire, don'tcha?"

She was wrong and I didn't correct her. If I entered the battlefield, it was because an old man forced the poor me to go and fight under the pretext of assessing my abilities before we went about exploring the Outside World together. Also, the System guided me here with the quests, so… that was that.

According to the lady, I wanted money. Gold. Lots of gold coins. She told me that's what she was all about herself, so she could know. That was basically the first reason why I should work under the royalty. Yeah, she got used to saying "work under" instead of "work for" by now. There was a difference between the two terms, and she, who already was like my boss in her head, liked to emphasize that difference.

Also, as she wisely pointed, as, around the world, the human civilizations were more or less the cradle of all technological and magical advancements—that basically meant life was better lived where the human races lived, surrounded by mostly humans—it wasn't uncommon for demi-humans, demons, irregular monsters, or the like, to long for the "privilege" to live in a human society. Again, said human society was where the good stuff was, after all.

Because of the perks that went alongside it, you should want to be of the higher society, and that was just natural.

She began again: "What we respect above all else is strength, monstrous one. To my knowledge, both you and I will profit from my offer. Thus, I trust it is simple enough. Being acquainted with the aforementioned conditions, work under me and me alone."

"Hm…"

"What do you say?"

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