At the Northern Fort V1C17

At the Northern Fort V1C17: Free Time at the Lounge

I really am bad with fire. I’d rather be as far away from it as possible.

While having such thoughts, I gazed at the fire in the fireplace from a corner of the lounge.

Right now, the knights that had finished eating dinner were gathered in the barrack’s lounge, enjoying their free time before bed as they liked.

That being said, normally at this time they’d be reading books, or playing games with their friends, or having lively conversations about silly things. However, today they weren’t focussing on their respective activities.

The reason being that today, I was here!

No, it’s not like I’m being conceited or anything. I’m just saying the truth. Since everyone’s watching my every action to an uncomfortable degree……

Every time I moved, their gazes followed me. Well, an animal in the room does catch the eye. All the more so when I wasn’t used to being in such a situation.

After finishing eating dinner, the One-Eyed Knight was going to bring me back to his room, but Tina-san, Kix, and the Scary-Faced Squad stopped him. Rather, they petitioned him, saying that they wanted more time to interact with the fox cub.

I’m sure that everyone is tired from work. They probably wanted to be soothed by having contact with an animal. That being the case, I was all for helping them out with that, and the One-Eyed Knight also needed someone to watch over me while he was in the bath, thus he left me in the lounge as he went to wash off the sweat. 

Especially after the ink incident that happened today, the One-Eyed Knight was worried about leaving me home alone. Rather than being concerned about me laying waste to his room, he was more worried about me getting hurt in the process.

There were a lot of knights in the lounge, but everyone had taken off their jackets, and were lazing around. Thus, they didn’t have as intimidating a presence, compared to when they were sharply dressed in their uniforms with a sword at their waists. 

In addition, the lounge had a lot of faces I recognised – Tina-san and Kix, the Scary-Faced Squad, and the Anikis who helped me remove the snowballs on my fur in the afternoon. Because of that, I was unexpectedly calm even in the absence of the One-Eyed Knight. The guys sitting on the sofa over there were people I saw in the morning when we went to the dining hall, and I’ve passed by the people who were sitting in front of the fireplace previously in the corridors.

There might be fewer knights than I thought at this fort. It didn’t seem like there were several hundred people working here, so it looks like I’ll eventually be able to remember everybody’s faces.

Incidentally, it seems that everyone uses the large public bath located in the barracks in shifts. I wonder if Tina-san goes in on her own when it’s completely free?

For a Japanese person, it was only natural to take a bath every day, but for the people over here that wasn’t necessarily the case. It was cold after all, and as long as they didn’t do some hard training, they won’t sweat much, so it should be okay but……

At the very least, for now my sensitive nose wasn’t scrunching up, so everyone should probably be washing their bodies before they got too dirty. Let’s believe that.

After the One-Eyed Knight finished training this morning, he brought some hot water back to his room and wiped down his body, but it seems that he properly bathes in the evening every night. I know that because Kix said, “Isn’t it a pain to go bathe every day~?”. 

And based on what I heard from the knights’ conversations, the bathwater here comes from a hot spring. But, it did not have any particular scent to it, like the [scent of rotten eggs] that was characteristic of sulphur, or the scent of metal. I suppose it didn’t have those kinds of components in it? I didn’t have much interest in hot springs in my previous life, so I don’t really know much about them.

“Shake!”

As my thoughts about hot springs ran about, a hand was suddenly thrust right in front of me. It was Kix.

“Shake!”

I gazed at that hand, unamused.

If I really wanted to, I could ‘shake’. I was a human in my previous life after all.

But Kix doesn’t know that. For a fox cub who still wasn’t completely used to humans, sticking your hand out in front of it and demanding it to ‘shake’ without teaching it anything was just unreasonable.

I ignored Kix and scratched my head with my hind leg.

“No good huh……”

Of course it’s no good. I won’t do it. It’d be weirder if I could do it.

The surrounding people also said, “Without any training, there’s no way she could ‘shake’” to Kix. Kix grew a little sullen in response as he refuted them. 

“I thought she’d be able to do it~. Because Mil does seem kinda clever.”

“Really? She’s still pretty young, and she doesn’t look all that smart…….or rather, she doesn’t seem like she’s thinking about anything……”

“Yeah yeah, she seems a little silly. But you know, that’s what’s so cute about her.”

“Ahh, I get that. Despite having lived in the wild, she has pretty peaceful expressions.”

……what?

It may be true that I don’t know much about the relentlessness of living in the wild. There weren’t any enemies at the mountaintop, and being a spirit, I do not hunger, nor do I feel the cold.

But what do you mean by a little silly! To think that someone other than Kix would think that I wasn’t good with my head. Even Tina-san is giggling.

My opinion of Kix went up a little. He has a discerning eye to say that I seemed clever.

However, I could not accept the boyish actions that he sometimes exhibits towards me. Even now, because he suddenly extended his hands towards me in an attempt to lift me up, I hastily ran away.

“Ahh, don’t run away.”

“Kix, you still haven’t learned? If you’ll just be hated if you keep trying to forcibly hug her like that.”

Tina-san admonished.

“Is that so? I’ve never had a dog before, so I don’t really know how to interact with her. Though I’ve always hoped to have a dog ever since I was a kid.”

As he explained, he stared fixedly at me with glittering eyes. I’m not a dog. Rather, it’ll only trouble me if you hoist your childhood dreams onto me. It’s too heavy.

But, for the time being, Kix listened to Tina-san’s warning and became more docile, so I also lowered my guard and started to leisurely walk around the lounge.

While making sure not to go near the fireplace, I sniffed the scents on the floor. The scent of all sorts of people were imbued in it.

I found the lingering scent of the One-Eyed Knight near the door, and my tail started to wag. When’s he gonna get back from his bath~?

Even as I could feel the curious gazes from the surrounding people on me, I continued to follow the scents from the door and along the wall, walking at my own pace. You can obtain all sorts of information from scents, so it was fun.

Hm? Just what is this smell? It kinda smells like an animal, but it’s a little dusty-smelling, or……

My curiosity peaked and I followed the scent, the tip of my tail growing tense. There’s another animal other than me in this lounge?

And then, I discovered a small hole in the area where the wall and floor joined together, a short distance away from me. The scent that was bothering me seemed to be coming from there. I tried to prod it with my nose, and in the next instant——-

“☆＊＃☆▲〜〜……!?”

I let out a soundless scream and made a large jump backwards. All of my fur was standing on end, puffed out like a cat.

“Uwoh, what’s wrong, Mil?”

Surprised at my strange movements, Kix called out to me from behind.

But, right now I didn’t have the time to deal with him. From the dark hole in front of me came a mo-…m-…mou-……

“NOO! A MOUSE!”

However, the only ones that experienced a fright seemed to be me and Tina-san alone. Including the Scary-Faced Squad, all of the guys in the men’s camp showed an incredibly calm reaction. Are they used to it?

The mouse was surprisingly obstinate, and brazenly exposed itself in such a bright room filled with numerous people. In actuality, it was larger than the mice in Japan and seemed pretty strong.

While flaunting its imposing teeth, it let out a few short cries as though complaining to me for approaching its [nest], and then went back inside the hole without any signs of panic.

“……………”

With my legs still trembling, I distanced myself from the wall. M-Mice are scary.

“We gotta close up that hole……”

Tina-san’s face was also pale, but she spoke with a strongly determined tone of voice.

And behind her, the faces of the men’s camp huddled together, stealthily whispering something to each other.

“Don’t foxes eat mice?”

“Yeah, probably.”

“Mil looked pretty terrified though.”

“She flew backwards, like pyon*!”

• *T/N: Pyon = the jumping sound that rabbits make

“So when foxes get startled, they make those kinds of movements huh……pfff-”

One person burst into laughter, leading the rest of the lounge to break into guffaws. 

My face blushed furiously as it grew hot. D-Don’t laugh……!

I bit Kix’s pant leg, who was the closest to me, and pulled it vigorously. 

“Wah, what is it? Angry? Or embarrassed?”

Pulling at his pants seemed to instead make Kix happy. His voice bounced excitedly as he continued.

“Look, Mil really is smart like I thought! She can feel embarrassed.”

“Is that so?”

“She does seem embarrassed at being laughed at. But those movements…….pfff-”

“Stop, you’ll make me remember it. Gufufu-”

The laughter that had temporarily settled once again began to spread. Waaah! Hurry up and forget it! Forget it already, all of you!

I barked, ‘kyan kyan’, in protest.

“You’re noisy.”

——suddenly, an exceedingly calm voice that was as cold as ice, doused the excitement in the lounge.

That voice was by no means loud, but it properly reached both my ears, and the ears of everyone around me. The room instantly fell into silence.

I slowly turned around and searched for the owner of the voice. Standing in the open doorway of the lounge was a black-haired beauty, fresh from the bath——or rather, the Branch Captain-san.

His brow was furrowed in displeasure, as he frigidly surveyed his subordinates.

“It is fine for you to enjoy your free time, but don’t be too loud.”

After the Branch Captain-san gave a short warning, he gave one last glance down at me, and quietly closed the door with a sullen expression.

H-He got mad at us……?

Until we couldn’t hear the sound of his footsteps as he walked down the hallway, the lounge was immersed in silence. I also kept silent, holding my breath.

Eventually, one of the young knights dispelled the tension by letting out a breath.

“How scary……as expected of the Icy Branch Captain.”

In contrast to that, the bearded knight from the Scary-Faced Squad responded calmly in an experienced manner.

“Well, it is true that we were a bit loud. There are probably people sleeping in their rooms already.”

“But, we should probably go apologise to the Branch Captain. He looked pretty mad……”

“No, rather than anger, that was more like……right?”

The bearded knight did not direct his question towards the young knight who had been speaking, but another knight that was around the same age as himself. And then, the knight who had the conversation directed towards him made a rather mysterious expression before nodding deeply.

“Yeah, rather than being angry, he was envious of us.”

Hearing those words, the other knights also nodded, going, “Yup, yup”. However, the young knight from earlier and Tina-san, as well as another portion of the people, seemed to not understand what was going on as they tilted their heads. I was also amongst the latter, and gave a similar reaction.

Could it be that the Branch Captain-san didn’t have any friends? And that’s why he was envious of how much fun everyone was having making a clamour?

Thinking that made me feel like crying. Next time I see the Branch Captain-san, let’s treat him nicely.

“Envious? Of us? Why?”

“Why, you ask. Don’t you know those rumours about the Branch Captain?”

Rumours? Could they be rumours about how he doesn’t have any close friends?

“What rumours?”

“You know, even though the Branch Captain looks like that——-”

“Mil, let’s head back.”

Just as they hit the part I was curious about, the One-Eyed Knight entered the lounge, and I was retrieved by him. Hence, I was unable to hear the essential details of the rumours.

No, even if I don’t hear them, I know.

Somebody, become the Branch Captain-san’s friend!

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