Chapter 74: ~Chapter 25~ Part 1

I opened my eyes and exhaled. Well, it was actually more of a gasp, really. The breath escaping my mouth felt heavy, almost like it was trapped in my chest for months. After refreshing the insides of my lungs a couple of times, I closed my eyes again and carefully massaged my temple. I had a feeling I had a weird dream just moments ago, but when I tried to recall what it was about, it felt like dry sand slipping through my fingers. It was something about rooms and heads and stars or something...

Anyways, after a few short minutes, I decided to stop being lazy and I sat up. Since my eyes were already adjusted to the darkness, I quickly found my clock and realized it was past one in the afternoon. Did I sleep in?

“... That sounds subtly wrong,” I muttered under my breath as I was trying to get my rusty brain to start working properly, and after a few seconds of prodding, it finally switched into gear.

Right. That made no sense because I never sleep in. As in, it is logically impossible, since I do not sleep. At all. In the past, I stayed awake for more than a month straight. But if so, then why was I sleeping in my bed anyway and dreaming about star-stuff or something?

The answer came to me with a flash of stinging pain in my abdomen. Right, I remembered. I poked my nose into a climactic fantasy battle and got an ice-spike shoved into my stomach for my trouble. I cautiously rolled up my pajamas to check the damage. It wasn’t particularly gory as far as I could remember, and I received magical emergency treatment, but something like that should've left a mark.

To my sincere surprise, all I found was a single patch of pink skin on my abs. I let out a soft ‘huh’. I supposed magical first aid was even better than I imagined. The spot was a little tender, but considering I had the equivalent of a spear stuck in there not too long ago, my recovery still blew all my expectations out of the water. I allowed myself a satisfied smile before it withered as a new question appeared in my head: I said ’not too long ago’, but for how long was I unconscious?

My first idea was to look the date up on my phone, but I couldn’t find it in arm’s reach. As such, I groggily threw off my blankets and put my legs down the side of the bed. For a moment I felt a little lightheaded, probably because of the blood rushing to my head after lying down for too long, but I still rose to my feet without much of a problem.

First I walked over to the window and opened the curtains, then after a few seconds of thinking I did the same for the actual windows as well. Some fresh air never hurt anyone. Since now the room had better lighting conditions, I looked around again and finally found my phone on my desk. I turned it on, and while the battery was low, it seemed to be in working condition, which was surprising after all the abuse I put it through that night.

Speaking of ’that night’, what was the date again? That was the whole reason I looked for my phone, wasn’t it? After some fumbling, I opened up my calendar and grunted in surprise. It was the 15th of October, meaning I was out cold for... let me see... three days? That wasn’t too bad.

Still, it meant I didn’t take a shower for three days, so I decided to rectify that. It also provided me with a great opportunity to check the rest of my body for scars, so I picked up a clean set of clothes and headed for the bathroom.

My house was incredibly clean, as always. By the looks of it, my theoretical ninja maids worked overtime even while I was unconscious. First I headed for the toilet (for obvious reasons) then I walked over to the bathroom right next to it. There, I stripped down to my underwear and stood in front of the mirror.

My face was smooth without a hint of stubble, which wasn’t surprising. I didn’t have to shave or cut my hair once since I woke up for the first time, so I figured this would be the case. It must've been because of the whole either-simulation-or-a-dream-or-whatever nature of this world, and while I had many discussions about its implications regarding my biology, it was still pretty convenient. I checked my skin and found that, besides the already mentioned pink spot on my stomach, I had a couple of similarly colored scars on my left calf and my left shoulder was a little bruised. Aside from those, I was completely fine. I did a few simple warm-up exercises, just to make sure my body was really all right. It was better to be on the safe side about these things.

First I did a few squats, then I leaned forwards to touch my toes, I circled my waist, then my neck, and then finally I stretched my three arms. Everything seemed to be in—

“Three arms...?”

I froze mid-stretching and I slowly loosened my posture. I looked at my right hand. Yep, that was definitely one arm. Same on the other side. Two perfectly normal human arms with perfectly normal human hands topped with perfectly normal human fingers.

“So what the hell is this?”

I waved around my ’third arm’ or whatever, and the longer I did, the more squeamish I felt. I couldn’t see it, either normally or through the mirror, but I was completely aware of its position the same way I could feel where my ’normal’ hands were even when I closed my eyes. When I moved it around I could feel some wind resistance, and I could even faintly hear a whistling sound as it cut the air, though the latter part might've been just my imagination. More importantly, whatever it was, it didn’t have any joints. In fact, it felt more like some kind of invisible tentacle rather than an actual human limb. It could also pass right through solid objects, such as my actually visible limbs. When I did that, it delivered a strange sensation akin to my skin being jolted by a mild electric current.

After waving it around a little longer, I realized that it could either stretch a lot, or it didn’t have a spot on my body it actually grew out from, as I could ‘touch’ anything within a roughly two meters wide sphere around me. After a couple of short minutes I finally stopped messing with it and let out a tired groan. This was so typical.

When other people woke up after being asleep for too long, the worst they would find was a bump or scar they couldn’t remember. Me? I wake up with an extra bloody phantom limb! And the saddest part? This probably wouldn’t even break the top five on my ’weirdest stuff I experienced in the last two months’ list.

Since it didn’t feel like a pressing problem, I decided to temporarily ignore it and enter the shower, but then my ears picked up some sort of commotion coming from the outside. I pulled my underwear back up, and just in time, as a moment later the bathroom door was thrown open with a bang.

“Leo!” came the panicked cry from the girl standing in the doorway. I let out an unsubtle groan and frowned at her.

“What is it, princess?”

For a few long seconds, the familiar blonde girl only opened and closed her mouth repeatedly like a fish out of water. At last, after an embarrassingly long time, she let out one of her customary cutesy cries, covered her beet-red face with her hands, and hid behind the doorframe. The whole thing felt somewhat nostalgic; she rarely had these kinds of over-the-top reactions anymore. Anyways, at first I thought she might've run away, but a second later she poked her head around the frame while sputtering at record speed.

“S-S-Sorry! I wasn’t peeping! It wasn’t on purpose! I swear on the name of the house of Dracis! It was a completely honest accident and I…”

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And so on and so forth, her motor-mouth kept making excuses without end.

“Did you find him?” A question interrupted the princess. She glanced back and nodded twice. A moment later the face of Judy, my dear deadpan research assistant, also appeared from behind the doorframe. She gave me an outwardly expressionless look-over, though from the way the corner of her eyes twitched and her cheeks got slightly flushed I figured she was also somewhat flustered. After a long moment of silence, she pointedly cleared her throat and flatly greeted me with, “Good morning, Chief.”

“Back to you,” I answered off-handedly as I directed my frown at her. “So, what exactly are you doing here?”

“We were looking for you,” she answered immediately without averting her eyes.

“Y-Yes!” the princess nodded repeatedly, and it only just registered with me that instead of her usual ringlets, she now wore her long hair loose. It was a refreshing look that suited her just as well, but more importantly, she started sputtering again. “We went to your room to check your condition, but you were gone and the window was open, so we thought you were kidnapped! I didn’t barge in to peep, I was just worried! I swear!”

“… You know, I would have an easier time believing you if you would stop peeking through your fingers.”

The princess blinked in incomprehension, but after a few seconds she let out another cutesy yelp and she once again disappeared behind the doorframe. I shook my head and returned my attention to the other girl, who in the meantime came into the bathroom and was earnestly observing my abdomen.

“Does it hurt?” she asked while poking at the tender scar on my stomach. I let out a hiss, more in surprise than in pain, but she immediately retracted her hand like she was touching fire.

“Only when you poke it,” I answered a tad ruefully as I rubbed the spot.

“Sorry,” she apologized flatly, but I've known her well enough to understand that she was genuinely regretful.

“Hey!” The princess once again poked her head through the door and she blindly reached out for Judy, as her other hand was firmly clamped over her eyes. After a few misses, she finally managed to grab hold of the back of her blouse and firmly tugged on it. “No touching! We had an agreement!”

“What agreement?” I asked reflexively.

“You don’t have to worry about that,” my assistant answered just as quickly as she looked me over again, completely ignoring the other girl pulling on her, and ultimately she asked, “Are you all right?”

“Mostly.”

“Does it hurt anywhere?”

“As we already established, only when people poke me.”

“So you don’t need help washing yourself?”

“No, I’m fine.”

“… Are you sure?”

At this point, the princess grabbed hold of Judy with her other hand as well and she tugged on her hard. She lost her balance, and before I could do anything they both tumbled backward and fell on their butts by the door.

“Ow!” the princess whined while rubbing her hip, but then a moment later she raised her hand and pointed an accusatory finger at my assistant while still sitting in place. “Stop right there! You cannot offer such l-lewd services! It’s against the agreement!”

“Lewd?” I asked while trying to raise only one of my eyebrows. It was harder than one would think. Anyways, was she talking about Judy’s offer to help me wash myself? I’d say that was a fairly innocent thing to ask from someone who recently got bitten by a monster, fell off a roof, and then got skewered by an ice spear. But then again, the princess was always easily embarrassed, so maybe she read something into it.

Anyways, at this point I subtly rolled my eyes and said, “I would like to have a shower now if you don’t mind,” and closed the door. I could hear some kind of scuffle from the other side, and the princess repeatedly complaining about some kind of agreement, but I decided to ignore them and whatever love-comedy antics they were up to, even if just for a little while.

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