I stopped asking Kaichen for advice on estate management after that. But whenever I did something related to it, he would always help even if he didn’t agree or understand it. Whenever I needed him, he would always be there. He frowned a lot while teaching me magic but never gave up. The genius who had a natural aptitude of learning magic didn’t know how to teach it to others, but that never stopped him.
“Why don’t you know this? Move your mana, take it out like this and take it in the air. All you have to do is mix it up properly and come up with a formula.”
“Teacher… I don’t know how to do it. And you need to explain the process to me.”
“Oh god! Being stupid also has a limit, you know. Didn’t you say you were a genius? You can’t even do this! Move your magic as much as you move your mouth. Maybe you will learn then.”
Kaichen had no mercy while teaching. He was a very strict critic. He was usually so sweet to me. But when he taught magic, all the sweetness disappeared. If I hadn’t learnt to gather my mana and mastered control, I would have never been able to learn from him. I didn’t think Kaichen could ever teach anyone at all. He sucked at explaining the process.
His explanations were so unhelpful that I went back to the books. I read and read and fished for information so that I could do better. It took a crazy amount of time to understand and apply myself.
“Countess? Shall we take a break?”
“I’m sorry, Mimi. Just give me a second.” I pressed my temples and waited for the nausea to abate. I tried not to think about things to calm my motion sickness. Angel sat next to me and Mimi sat on the seat across. She tapped on the carriage door to let the driver know that we were stopping. Even when I opened the door and got out of the carriage, the world still tilted.
Angel got a chair out of the carriage and set it up for me.
“I didn’t know you have motion sickness,” said Mimi. “If I had known, I would have prepared some medicine.”
If I had known it myself, I would have prepared a huge box of medicine. I couldn’t even say it aloud. Mimi placed a damp handkerchief on my closed eyes. It felt cool and fresh.
“Thank you,” I mumbled. The original Dalia didn’t suffer from motion sickness. In fact, women from aristocratic families have traveled by carriage since their childhoods. There was no way Dalia would have motion sickness. At least that was what I heard when Mimi mumbled to Angel.
Healthy punks! Not everyone was an aristocrat. They got to eat good food, wear good clothes, and have doctors at their beck and call. But they also had too many etiquettes and rules to abide by.
Even Dalia seemed to have lived a life that did not deviate much from such routine. Mimi had nagged me so many times when I had forgotten the social etiquettes. I made excuses that my memories weren’t back. How could I tell her that I wasn’t the original Dalia and didn’t have her memories at all? Our conversation went something like this:
“Oh my god! Countess! How can you come out dressed like that?!”
“Huh? Why? Can’t I even come out to the garden?”
“Not in your pajamas!”
“There is no one here.”
“No one?! There is an Archmage living with us! And Angel is here too!”
At the Willow house, I had practically lived the days out in my pajamas. But I couldn’t really tell her that lest Mimi got a heart attack. Kaichen had seemed shocked at first but he had gotten used to it. They were just loose-fitting shirts and pants. What was so vulgar about that? But Mimi was relentless.
“I’ve told you so many times. The countess is a noblewoman and we are commoners. We can never eat together.”
“Why not? No one is watching anyway.”
“It will become a habit! What will you do if guests arrive at the mansion and Angel makes the mistake of sitting down at the table with you?”
I had complained. Who would even come here? But her worries made sense in hindsight. I never ate together with Angel from that day forth. I made snacks and shared them with Angel.
“Don’t tell, Mimi,” I would whisper. All the rules and regulations were very tiring. I couldn’t even remember half of them most of the time.
I acted so freely that it occasionally shocked Mimi. But I needed to be careful, especially since Julius had called me to the capital. I needed to be aware of the etiquettes followed in their world. The Imperial Capital was supposed to be so huge that people frequently traveled by carriages. I was already feeling dizzy with such a short travel. How will I be able to take a carriage every time I went out?
Dalia’s body was the same as it always had been. How was it that just because the person in this body had changed, the motion sickness had become this severe? It was incomprehensible but I had no choice. I regretted accepting the offer to visit the Imperial Capital.
It was so astonishing that all these thoughts arose just because of something as ordinary as motion sickness. But one could only understand it if one suffered from it. The feeling of being inside a rattling carriage where the world keeps tilting sideways and you feel like you can’t hold the food down. That was the worst feeling in the world.
