Just a Man's Chest

The sky was turning dull as the sun was touching the edges of the hills on the horizon. Artie needed to save the maiden before sundown, but she was now stuck in a dilemma. These two ducal knights were speaking of getting some good credits from the archduke and were on a break even if the day had yet to end. Based on the rules Miel had told her, ducal knights were not supposed to be on break before sundown if they work in the morning.

A lot of things were telling Artie that she might be able to unlock something by following these two, but she also had this salvation task about the maiden in the dungeon. If she couldn't look for Larkin in time, she might have to force her way into the dungeon, save the maiden, and have her trust meter suffer.

"Stupid, stupid! How can you be so stupid, Artie Shen?!" The rat squeaked repeatedly as her nose moved up and down as if finding something. Then, she found a hallway leading closer to the marker placed on Larkin. She mounted on the helmet's ream and tried to jump off, but Callum held her down.

"Hm? She seems to know where her master is." Callum walked in the direction where Artie was looking and trying to get to.

"She? Are you certain the rat is a girl?" Dragen hummed as he followed his friend. They were only walking around earlier and had no one to ask. Just when Dragen spotted a guard soldier, Callum walked away. He then stared at the shape of the rat. "...might be from the curves of her body?"

Callum glanced at the other knight before chuckling. "Keep those words to yourself if you don't wish for anyone to misunderstand." He then started to jog while holding down the rat as if afraid that she might be thrown away. "Did he go this way, milady?"

The rat didn't visibly shudder, but Artie was scared. What if Callum knew that it was her, the archduchess herself, that was disguising herself as a rat? Would he tell everyone that only angels could transform into other beings? Wait, wouldn't Larkin be careful of that if that was true? However, he was not hiding the fact that he was keeping a rat; he only wanted Artie to avoid Miel while she was in rat form…

'Huhu, I should probably ask Larkin about this...'

Artie's mind was too small to process everything in the meantime. She could only move around to have Callum and Dragen run around the castle to hunt down the archduke who seemed to be walking around so much. He wouldn't normally stray around, but today, he was going around the castle as well.

'Aiyah, could it be that he's looking for me?' Artie would facepalm if she was in human form. 'Larkin baby, use the eyes of your heart to find me!'

"Cal, we've been running around. Are you sure milady knows where she is going?" Dragen sighed as he kept up with Callum in running. He wasn't exhausted since they didn't have their heavy armors on, but he was quite annoyed. He then got a glimpse of the hanging sun. "It's almost sundown. We are to stand guard during the execution, yes? The assassin from earlier will be burned in the grounds..."

"We are, but I mustn't wait till then. Would you prefer the archduke's chilly gaze if he saw you present his pet rat to him in front of the masses? What if he decided to throw you in the burning stake along with the assassin?" Callum nearly scolded Dragen for not thinking too far into the future. "Listen, Lady Wessel must behave like Marissa a lot. Even if they care not to come back to House Ellis, they will loathe you who disgrace their father.

"If you wish for Lady Wessel's hand, try to use your brain outside of fighting."

Dragen wasn't insulted; in fact, he even sobbed. "How much change must I go through to become a man worthy of Lady Wessel? If this were to continue, House Princesley will take hold of House Wessel first! That would leave my House Stonefable with nothing… and me with a broken heart! Why must I compete with you, Cal?!"

A sigh escaped from Callum as he rubbed his forehead from a headache. He then used the same hand to pinch the rat's head gently as if covering her ears. "Listen not to him, milady..."

From another part of the hallways, Miel was heading back inside. He just returned from rushing to see off Alfora. Her words continued to ring in his ears as he kept on thinking about them. It seemed that their secret was revealed to Alfora, but she decided to not make it the most important matter to her at the moment.

She only had one month to complete the wedding dress, and it was her most important task.

"She seemed to be very invigorated. I wonder how Lady Shen spoke to her. Madame Alfora didn't even wish to enter the castle again previously." Miel was murmuring to himself when he began to hear Dragen's loud voice.

Since they were coming to the corner, he only waited for them to walk out before he asked them about their loud conversation. It was not an everyday thing to hear Havina's ducal knights speak about his sisters. It's just that when they did, his body immediately froze. '...a rat… why are they bringing a rat around?'

Callum headed in the opposite direction since Artie was sniffing in that direction. It was Dragen who held his head down and noticed that Miel was staring in their direction. The other ducal knight received Miel's wide-eyed stare, and the former misunderstood his gaze.

In a hurry, Dragen grabbed bowed down to Miel. "Seneschal! I have no impure designs on Lady Wessel! Please forgive me!"

Callum twitched and hurriedly spun around to acknowledge the seneschal with a bow. It was Marissa's older brother, and they were caught speaking about the estranged sisters of the seneschal. They must apologize immediately. Not only would it displease Miel, but even the archduke would probably punish them slightly for it.

However, Artie stared straight at Miel's paling face. Her small rat eyes widened so badly that she panicked inside her. If Miel fainted because of her, she could only kowtow outside Larkin's room for the night. Then again, she remembered those times that Miel had seen her.

Quickly the gears of her small brain turned. She noticed that Callum and Dragen were bowing down so lowly. She then stared at the gray shirt and gulped down the lump forming in her throat. 'It's fine, it's fine. It's just a man's chest! You surely love Larkin's man chest, don't you? So this is no big deal! Yes, Artie Shen, we're doing this!'

Jump!