NOVEL NEXT Chapter 39: Dreamlike Days in a Dreamlike Castle
Alex and Breireicht finally reach the canteen, where Alex grabs a tray of food. Breireicht quickly excuses himself, saying, "Sorry, I still have things to do… I already showed you our sleeping quarters and the room you'll be staying in, so you should be fine, right? I really need to go. Bye!" He nearly sprints away, disappearing from Alex's sight.
“What a coward," Alex mutters, amused. "That necklace combined with my new armor is almost too effective. It’s not like I was bullying him, he was the one trying to intimidate me and steal my gear.”
As Alex eats, he finds himself pleasantly surprised. The food in front of him is recognized by the system as [Grill Plate]. It restores a bit of HP, MP, and Stamina but can’t be taken into the inventory. “Not bad,” he thinks. “This way, I’ll always refresh my HP, MP, and stamina with each meal, and it tastes great too.”
After finishing his meal, Alex decides to take a peek into the kitchen, which sits just behind the castle’s dining hall. Naturally, only the nobles dine there, while soldiers like Alex aren’t allowed. He sneaks a glance inside and sees the bustling kitchen, with weird looking chefs manning individual stations under the command of a rather odd-looking head chef, none other than Quina! Seeing Quina in person, rather than through a screen, is a surreal experience for Alex.
He waits until the dinner rush slows, then approaches her.
“Hi, I’m a new soldier here in the castle,” he says, “and I just wanted to tell you that the food is really great!”
Quina stares at him with a wide-eyed expression and responds in her characteristic broken English, “I… so happy. Soldier like my food. Still, castle bad place. No yummy-yummies anywhere.”
Alex suppresses a grin, already knowing what she considers “yummy-yummies.” Still, he plays along. “And what’s a ‘yummy-yummy’?”
Quina practically sparkles with excitement as she replies, “FROGS!”
Feigning surprise, Alex responds, "Ah, a fellow lover of frogs! I used to be a hunter before coming here, and I always caught the best frogs in the marshes around Alexandria. How about I try to get some for you?"
Quina jumps up, barely able to contain her excitement. “YOU WOULD?”
“Sure,” he says casually. “I’ll do my best to find you some frogs. I can’t promise anything, but I’ll be back in a few days.”
Disappointed that no “Side Quest,” “Hidden Quest,” or “Special Quest” prompt appears before him, he heads to his room to rest, knowing training begins early the next day.
His assigned quarters are surprisingly spacious. The room looks like it was designed for at least four soldiers, but since there are only eight knights besides the captain, who, naturally, has his own private room, Alex gets this large room all to himself. He settles in, preparing for the intense days ahead.
He immediately lies down, about to drift off when he hears his door creak open. “Damn, I forgot to lock it,” he thinks, suddenly alert. “Is that thief back to steal my armor?”
Alex quickly grabs the [Barbed Dagger] he left under his pillow and pretends to be asleep, eyes half-shut, scanning the doorway. What he sees is anything but a thief. The figure has flower-shaped eyes, four petal-like formations around each eye, and a slit mouth with a tongue almost longer than Alex’s… let’s not go there.
“No yummy frogs yet. No can smell them!” mutters Quina in obvious disappointment, stepping back and closing the door.
“Seriously? That’s going to give me nightmares,” Alex mutters, once he’s alone.
He gets up, locks the door this time, and even pushes an unused bed against it for extra security. After such an exhausting day, though, he soon manages to fall back asleep.
When Alex finally wakes, it’s still dark outside, and he isn’t sure what time it is. He knows the castle bells ring at 6 o’clock sharp, signaling the start of the day. Getting ready, he quickly washes up and dresses in his armor, just as the bells begin to toll. Timing couldn’t be better.
He heads to the training hall, where a motivated Steiner stands waiting. The Captain gives him an impressed look, eyeing his new armor with obvious curiosity. “This is surprising! What kind of armor is this?” Steiner examines the patterns and notices a small symbol, one that he recognizes as the mark of Pluto. “Unbelievable! You found this in the armory? I ordered my knights to clear it out and bring me any decent equipment, and they’ve done nothing but pretend to work hard for two months. Those lazy bums... I’ll be docking their pay.”
Alex can’t help but smile. He wouldn’t have spent time crawling around dusty corners if it hadn’t been for the possibility of finding powerful gear. If that’s what it took to uncover this armor, he can hardly complain though.
Steiner finally stops grumbling and nods approvingly. “That sword you chose is good—it’s a knight’s sword, fitting my own specialty. The swordsmanship I’m teaching you works best with larger one-and-a-half-handed and two-handed swords. You can even use a shield in this style. Now, pay attention, recruit!”
After a grueling two hours filled with intense training, memorizing complex sword forms, and performing them under Steiner’s watchful eye, Alex is exhausted. They move from forms to basic sparring, testing his technique. It takes everything out of him, and by the end, he’s both worn out and starving.
They head to the canteen together, and as they eat, Alex notices a notification he must have missed during sparring, too focused to realize it had appeared.
You have temporarily learned the skill Inferior unknown Swordsmanship lvl 0.
Alex, surprised, suddenly realizes, "Who said you can only learn skills from skill books? Maybe if I give it my all, I can actually learn a skill from Steiner since I got this one after just one lesson!”
After a quick rundown of his new duties, which mostly consist of “Guarding this place” and “Guarding that place,” Alex can only laugh. Volunteering for city patrols, he notices how the current soldiers avoid any work outside the castle and are more than happy to sit in front of the same doorway day after day.
“This job... I can either stroll through the city as much as I want or just stand around like the others," he thinks. "This might be the easiest job I’ve ever had.”
The next few days pass in a flash.
Alex decides to patrol the city regularly, hiring kids to catch frogs for him, spending only a few hundred gil in total. He "patrols" bars as well, using his work-hours to play Tetra Master, where he builds up a solid collection of cards to turn into FC after the mission: one light purple and nine others ranging from light green to dark green quality.
In the evenings, he delivers frogs to Quina, who receives them with pure delight, and returns for sword training with Steiner. When not training or wandering the city, he often chats with Jaine and Neira. The two female soldiers now look at him with new respect, particularly after seeing his new armor. Even the other Knights of Pluto seem impressed, especially Weimar, who praises him for his success with Jaine and Neira, slyly telling Alex that they’re “in the upper third” of his own rankings.
Surprised that this lazy knight keeps track of every beautiful woman in town, Alex finds himself unexpectedly entertained by Weimar’s “advice,” though he has to admit his own dating experience is almost nonexistent.
As the days pass, Alex feels himself growing as a swordsman. Just one week after learning Inferior Unknown Swordsmanship lvl 0, the skill evolves into Unknown Swordsmanship lvl 0, a testament to his dedication.
These days in Alexandria are some of the best Alex has ever had. He trains with Steiner, learning techniques and principles from a true sword master. He explores the town, builds his Tetra Master deck, exchanges stories and banter with Jack, jokes with his “girlfriends” (though to him, it still feels more like friendly teasing than anything serious), and enjoys Quina’s cooking, a thank-you for the steady frog supply he brings her. In the evenings, he practices with his new Sword of Pluto, pushing himself to internalize every lesson Steiner has shared.
Checking the date, Alex calculates, “Three more days until my hidden training quest with Steiner ends, and about twelve days after that until Garnet’s sixteenth birthday. I’m giving it everything I’ve got!”