The Archipelago (8)
Despite the discourtesy of showing up at his door late at night with an absurd request, the inn's cook treated us to a magnificent meal.
Not that he'd been brimming with enthusiasm from the start. If someone shakes you out of sleep and demands you cook for them, frowning is only natural.
But money in sufficient quantities has the power to transmute displeasure into happiness.
The cook had shouted for us to give him a moment, then rushed deep into the kitchen, raised a glorious racket, and emerged with some genuinely decent food. Truly, the old sages never spoke a false word. When someone seems irritated, the first thing you should ask yourself is whether you didn't pay them enough.
"By that logic, you ought to hang on my every word as well."
'Why's that?'
"Because I am a man who could rightly be called an old sage."
I let Grandpa's remark—that he'd once heard my friend offer prayers of worship using his sayings—slide right past one ear. The world held far better things to do than humoring Grandpa's sermons one by one.
Leaving him to click his tongue about how the youth these days were hopeless, I lifted my spoon and took a bite of the pasta.
It was nothing special—just seasoned with oil and salt—but after everything I'd been through that night, it was more than enough of a delicacy for me.
I was busy shoveling food into my empty stomach when Joy suddenly slammed her hand down on the table.
"This can't go on!"
What's gotten into her all of a sudden? Is a ducal young lady allowed to cause this kind of scene during a meal?
The insults rose naturally from my throat, but my mouth was stuffed full of pasta, so instead of speaking I chastised Joy with my eyes alone.
"That's exactly what can't go on! The young lady is way too cute right now!"
Um, airhead? If you're going to say something, shouldn't you make it something a person can actually understand? Because I have no idea what you're talking about.
"Listen carefully, Lady Aln! Up until yesterday, the young lady always wore this vicious, arrogant expression! It made it hard for anyone to even approach her!"
Well, yeah, because back then the Mesugaki skill was forcing my behavior. I couldn't do anything except what the skill demanded.
"But not anymore! The young lady's expressions are incredibly rich and varied now!"
Joy had a point. The Mesugaki skill's constraints still compelled me to hurl abuse, but they no longer shackled my actions. I could laugh, cry, rage, sulk, and grieve exactly as I wished.
"What's your point, airhead? What, am I so cute now that you're jealous? So this is how ugly a woman's jealousy gets."
"I'm not jealous! Do I look like some creepy person to you?!"
No, you don't. You're someone who can praise another person's happiness with a pure heart. I know that better than anyone.
When I answered with a silent smile, Joy groaned and writhed before burying her face in both hands and letting out a wail. There wasn't a single trace of noble grace to be found in the sight.
"Setting aside all the trivial details, my point is that the young lady's current appearance has way too much destructive power!"
"...Airhead. Have Aln's brain muscles been working you hard? How pitiful. You weren't this stupid before, though."
Why is she so bad at managing her emotions today? Did she get cursed without my knowing? Wondering if that might be the case, I tried to cast divine magic—and Joy countered my spell with her own mana.
Impressive. Back when we first sparred at the Aln Knight Order, she couldn't cast anywhere near that fast. Had she really grown this much in the short time I'd been away?
No. That wasn't it. Having stepped outside the common sense of the game and embraced the common sense of a player, she had been growing at an abnormal pace all along. The Aln Knight Order's training had merely taught her how to use the power she already possessed.
I smiled fondly at the surprise of Joy's growth, and she flushed crimson, ruffled her own hair in a frenzy, and shrieked.
"Just—please—be quiet and listen to what I'm saying! This is important!"
"Who told you to shut up? It's not like I covered your mouth, so why the tantrum? Honestly, airheads have no dignity. Pathetic."
"Gwaaaah!"
Unable to contain her frustration, she stomped her feet against the floor, then licked her lips and dragged a hand down her face. The anger from moments ago vanished, replaced by a settled calm. Now she almost looks like a noble.
"A hundred words are worth less than a single demonstration. Young lady, look over there."
Where Joy pointed, Carl lay sprawled out in a state of blissful ecstasy, for all the world like the Apostle of Perversion himself.
"What about the Incompetent Dog?"
It's not like this is Carl's first day acting like that. It's a little gross how increasingly able I am to sympathize with the Pervert Apostle's nonsense, but he's a good guy at heart. I can tolerate it up to a point.
"...I see. That one doesn't help your case, does it."
Joy seemed to understand Carl as a person well enough. She glared at him with world-weary eyes, then shook her head.
"Thank you for waiting! I've brought the next dish!"
Right on cue, the cook appeared at our side carrying his own creation. Flush with the single gold coin he'd earned, his face didn't show the slightest trace of fatigue.
"Perfect timing, actually. Sir Cook, one moment, please."
"Yes?"
"Young lady? Would you give this man a smile?"
It was a baffling request, but Joy was the one asking, so I happily obliged. It wasn't exactly a difficult task. Meet the cook's eyes and smile. He'd treated us to a fine meal—there was no reason not to gift him a single smile in return.
"I-I-I still have work to do!"
Face burning scarlet at my smile, the cook fled headlong back into the kitchen. Was something in there cooking in a desperate hurry?
"Even after seeing that, you don't understand?"
"Understand what?"
"...I understand now. Young lady, you have absolutely no self-awareness whatsoever."
I was chewing my meat while watching Joy clutch her face in despair over how on earth to convince me when Grandpa's voice sounded in my head.
"Do as your friend says."
'Why?'
"Even if I explained, you wouldn't understand, so I shan't bother. But tell me—when has listening to me ever cost you anything?"
Well... fair point.
"Words of a sage past. Obey."
Grandpa's smug tone was less than pleasant, but I accepted his advice anyway and asked Joy what exactly she wanted to tell me. With a gravity more serious than I'd ever seen from her, she answered:
"I will teach you how to wear a mask. This is something you absolutely need, young lady."
The moment I heard the word mask, the memories of Lucy I'd witnessed today came flooding back. The childhood Lucy I had seen hadn't been forced in her actions—only her speech. Her expressions had always carried the innocent purity of a young child.
But that purity and goodwill had been twisted into malice by the Mesugaki skill's compulsion, and everyone struck by that malice returned it to Lucy in full.
At the end of that road, the young Lucy had chosen to wear a mask. Knowing that her purity and goodwill would never be accepted, she had chosen to be the one who raised the wall first.
Except in front of Benedict and Mira, she had always acted the part her venomous words demanded—as if, since she was going to be hated anyway, she'd rather not carry the burden of hope at all.
"Young lady?"
Joy's call pulled me back to reality, and I watched her mask slowly crumble as I snickered.
"Planning to teach someone when you can't even manage your own expressions? A heeere~tic scrub who can't read the room."
"Teaching it and doing it are two different things! Even for you, young lady!..."
A mask. Yeah. I suppose I do need one. I don't like the Mesugaki skill, but the skill itself is undeniably useful.
"Well, whatever. Watching how stupid our little airhead is should be entertaining, at least. I'll watch and see what you're planning to teach."
"...Oh. So you'll learn it?"
"In exchange—I'm suu~ch a good girl that I hate only ever receiving. So I'll teach you something suu~per fun too, airhead."
"Huh? Fun, you say?"
"How to blow scrub dungeons to pieces. Even that dimwit Pitiful Prince can sort of keep up, so an airhead like you can manage it too. It'll be hellishly grueling, but hey, not my problem."
Hearing this, Joy's eyes darted around before she hunched her shoulders and studied my face carefully.
"U-um. Do I have a right of refusal?"
"Want to try begging me no while sobbing your eyes out? If I watch the airhead make an ugly spectacle of herself, I mii~ght change my mind a little."
"Just tell me 'no' if the answer is no..."
The method of mask-wearing Joy taught me was a rather violent one—sensing each and every muscle involved in producing an expression and controlling them by force.
'At my family, we manipulate them through mana, but for a martial talent like you, young lady, your own senses should be more than enough.'
Joy had said it like it was nothing, but it was anything but easy. Do you have any idea how many muscles go into making an expression, and she wanted me to control each one individually?! Did that even make sense?!
When it proved utterly impossible, I turned to Joy for advice, and she tilted her head and replied:
'But it works when you do it?'
Before Joy could voice any further bewilderment at how I couldn't manage even this much, Karia—who had been smirking as she watched the two of us—offered her own counsel.
Don't curl the corners of your mouth. No bright, sunny expressions either. No humming. Just like always. Blank.
I suffered through doing exactly as Karia instructed, wondering why it even had to be that way, but I couldn't outlast Joy's whining about how a friend should be able to grant a friend's request.
Perhaps staying up all night practicing had borne fruit, because when I met Arthur the next morning, he failed to notice anything different about me.
No—to be precise, he never got the chance to.
The moment I saw him wearing that hopelessly stiff rabbit headband, laughter burst out of me on its own, and I ended up treating him exactly as I always did.
Arthur was too busy dying of embarrassment to have any spare attention for my changes.
"Lucy. Lucy."
"What. Stupid swordswoman."
"Something's different about you."
But Frey was different. I'd thought I was wearing the mask rather well, yet Frey saw through my change in an instant.
"Am I wrong?"
I answered by relaxing my face into a smile. Frey's eyes lit up at my smile, and she returned an equally radiant one—before promptly furrowing her brow.
I wondered what was suddenly wrong with her, but the instant Frey began manually forcing her face into different expressions with her hands, I understood her intent. She wanted to see my range of expressions.
"Against weak scrubs like me, this is where it ends."
"...Tch. Just you wait."
Pulling my gaze away from the grumbling Frey, I saw Arthur beaming brightly in his rabbit headgear beside Joy's exhaustion-ravaged face.
"Welcome, Joy. So you've set foot in this hell as well."
"'Set foot' is inaccurate. Please use the phrase 'was thrown off a cliff' instead."
"Haha. Well then, how was it? Doesn't your head feel like it's about to split open?"
"I honestly think I'd feel more at ease attending three extra magic-theory classes..."
"...What kind of insane thing is that to say."
Arthur's aghast expression was so funny that I burst out laughing—then caught Joy's razor-sharp glare and hastily rearranged my face.
Mmm. This is going to take a long time to get used to.
"What is it, Lucy Aln. Suddenly giving me the stink eye."
"Would you kindly take your attention elsewhere? The Pitiful Prince's gaze is a little filthy, and it's making me sick."
"What's wrong with the way I look at you?"
"And if you have time to worry about that, shouldn't you be reading more books? Even if the number of dimwit scrubs doubled, there's no way you'd win our bet."
"We're making a wager again today, then?"
"Why ask what's obvious? Is the Pitiful Prince's intelligence on the level of a goldfish? Or a chicken?"
"...And the penalty?"
At Arthur's cautious question, I answered with a smile instead of words.
Not the innocent smile I'd shown Frey—but the peculiarly insufferable grin that only a mesugaki could wear.