I HELPED OUT A PHANTOM THIEF
One big difference between this world and Japan was you could always see the wide, vast sky no matter where you were. As a result, I could spot any wyverns flying nearby long before they got close to my home.
Well, okay, I probably could’ve seen wyverns in my old world if they existed and if I’d stood on a mountaintop. The point I’m trying to make is that there weren’t any huge skyscrapers around to block my view.
At any rate, one day on my way home after a shopping excursion, a wyvern touched down in front of me. It had probably had an easy time spotting me, too.
“Good day to you, Miss Azusa,” said Fatla, the wyvern’s rider, as she climbed off her mount.
“Hey,” I replied. “I guess wyverns are the fastest way to get around even if you can fly on your own, huh?”
Getting around in leviathan form must not be very efficient. They look pretty slow, after all.
“That’s right,” said Fatla. “There was a wyvern free today, so I thought I might as well use it. As for why I’m here—well, my companion can tell you the details.”
A second rider descended from the wyvern’s back: a snake-legged naga wearing a pair of glasses.
“It’s a pleasure to see you again,” said the naga. “My name is Sorya, and I’m the proprietor of the antique shop Ten Thousand Dragons, as well as one of the Appraisal Knights.”
This is certainly an unexpected visitor! I gave Sorya a polite bow. “I remember, yes! You were a big help when we had to get Nintan’s offerings appraised.”
The Appraisal Knights were one of the demon lands’ knightly orders. They weren’t the sort of knights that went out and fought with sword and shield, though. The Appraisal Knight before me wasn’t carrying any weapons at all, in fact.
No, this knightly order was composed exclusively of specialists in appraising treasures and antiques. I’d been told previously that they were only considered a knightly order as a formality, since they were a unit under the direct control of the demon king. They traveled all around, performing appraisals far and wide, and had once come to Flatta. The appraisals they’d carried out then had led to Halkara founding her museum.
I didn’t often have ancient or rare items that needed appraising, of course, so I hadn’t had very many chances to encounter the Appraisal Knights in the past. As for Sorya’s appearance now…
“Seeing as you came all the way here, I’m guessing there’s some sort of problem involving an antique that you need help with?”
“You’re quite quick on the uptake, I see! In short, this letter arrived at my store the other day.”
Sorya handed me a letter, which I saw had been carefully written out in both Demon and human script. Something about the penmanship looked awfully familiar to me.
“It’s that phantom thief again?!”
The Phantom Thief Canhein was a dark-elven woman who, frankly, was so poorly cut out for her chosen occupation that it hardly felt accurate to call her a phantom thief at all. The fact that her only motivation for her crimes was obtaining and disposing of items related to her distant ancestor Marquis Macosia the Sore Loser certainly didn’t help with that impression. The idea of profiting from larceny never seemed to have crossed her mind at all.
On the other hand, I guess nobody ever said that phantom thieves have to be motivated by getting rich… Not sure what the rules are here—it’s not like there are all that many phantom thieves out there setting precedents.
Oh, and for a phantom thief, she was also extremely conscientious. “Did she seriously write out her full address as contact information…? Isn’t that something she should be keeping secret?” I said with a sigh.
I didn’t know much about demon law, but I had a feeling that if the Vanzeld equivalent of the police decided to arrest her, they would have an extremely easy time of it. It was also interesting to know that an elf was currently living in the demon lands. Maybe her phantom thief work meant she couldn’t live in the human kingdom anymore…
“Perhaps we should keep walking while we discuss the situation?” Fatla suggested.
I agreed, and the three of us started making our way toward the house in the highlands. Even if we wrapped up our business before we arrived, I figured I should at least serve them some tea before they went on their way.
“You haven’t told me what you want me to do yet,” I said. “but let me just cut to the chase and see if I have the right idea: You’d like me to protect that painting in your storehouse from the phantom thief, right?”
I wasn’t sure why Sorya would go out of her way to ask me to take on the task, but since she’d shown me the calling card, I had to assume that was her plan. Running the antique shop was her primary trade, after all. Knowing Canhein, I had a feeling Sorya’s usual security measures would be more than enough to protect her belongings…but it wouldn’t be that strange for someone in Sorya’s profession to want to err on the side of safety.
“That’s close to correct, but I’m afraid you’re a little off,” she said. She was off to my side, more slithering than walking with her snakelike naga tail. “You see, we were actually hoping you’d be willing to help the other side.”
“‘The other side’? What other side?” I asked, so confused I stopped in my tracks.
Fatla pulled out a second letter and held it out to me. I took it and gave it a read.
“The phantom thief wants to hire me?!”
My incredulous shout echoed across the highlands. The name the Witch of the Highlands had spread fairly far and wide (much to my displeasure), but this was the first time that fame had led to a phantom thief reaching out for help. In fact, I was pretty sure most people went their whole lives without something like that happening to them.
“And there you have it,” said Fatla.
There I have what? What part of this made sense to you?
“Assuming you don’t have any other obligations, would you be willing to lend a hand?” she continued.
“Wait, what?! Think about this logically for a second—you’re asking me to take part in a crime! I don’t want to be a criminal! Not to mention that the store’s owner is right here with…us…”
My words trailed off as I turned to look at Sorya. Come to think of it, why did she come along? Something weird has to be going on, right?
“No need to concern yourself with my store,” said Sorya. “We’ve given this endeavor our official approval.”
“I guess you wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t, but why, though?!” What possible reason could they have for approving of a crime?!
“That’s rather a long story, I’m afraid. Perhaps we should wait to discuss it until we’re inside?”
Oh, I guess we are almost back to the house. If it’s a long story, then maybe Sorya and Canhein have some sort of deep, complicated connection. I guess it wouldn’t be strange for a phantom thief and an antique dealer to have a history.
“All right, then,” I said. “Come on in, and I’ll listen to the whole story…”
One thing’s for sure: This request is one big mystery from start to finish.
I made some tea for everyone, and Sorya resumed her explanation.
“The location the phantom thief intends to raid is the storehouse for the Luxurda branch of my business. It’s quite a fair distance from the main branch in Vanzeld,” she said.
She is a member of the Appraisal Knights, so it makes sense that her business is successful enough to have multiple locations.
“That warehouse requires periodic cleaning. And so…”
“And so?” I repeated.
“…I thought it would be convenient to assign the phantom thief that task.”
Hmm…? Okay, that’s not what I was expecting to hear. “So, um, you and the phantom thief aren’t rivals or anything, then?” I asked.
“No, we’ve never met,” said Sorya.
So your only connection is that you want her to clean for you?
“Incidentally, we sent a contract putting her in charge of cleaning the storehouse to the address written on the calling card I showed you. Said contract was returned to us, signed. In other words, the agreement has already been formalized.”
So she’s literally their janitor?! She’s officially employed! “Okay, but you know that phantom thieves are, well, thieves, right? Aren’t you afraid she’ll only say she’s cleaning up the storehouse, then use it as a chance to steal a bunch of stuff? This could turn into a huge loss for you!”
“Thankfully, the phantom thief in question only ever steals items associated with Marquis Macosia the Sore Loser, none of which are at all valuable,” Sorya said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.
Oh, right. That’s true… All she cares about is gathering up the items associated with her family’s shameful history and locking them away for good.
“If I consider any items associated with the marquis as her fee for the cleaning work, it comes out to quite the advantageous deal on our part,” said Sorya.
“Fair enough, but what if she doesn’t even clean? For all you know, she won’t even bother dusting the place.”
Sure, they were dealing with a remarkably careless phantom thief, but wasn’t the antique dealer being rather careless as well? Then again, I can imagine Canhein actually doing the clearing. She’s weirdly honest, after all…
“I’m afraid there’s something far more troublesome than dust in that storehouse. Dealing with them is to be part of her cleaning duties,” Sorya said before pausing to take a sip of her tea. Her mannerisms were very elegant.
“The storehouse, you see, is infested with monsters known as mimics.”
“Mimics?!”
I’d heard of those before. They were monsters that looked just like treasure chests but bit you the moment you tried to open them.
“A storehouse packed full of antiques is the perfect environment for mimics. Oh, but no need to worry—I hear they’re almost never seen in human territories these days, so your museum is almost certainly not infested,” said Sorya.
Well, that’s a relief. Guess I don’t have to worry about Halkara ending up as a mimic’s lunch when she goes to sort through the museum’s inventory.
“It’s very rare for anyone to go inside the storehouse in question, and even entering is something of a trial. That said, the mimic infestation is at risk of spiraling out of control. We have to do something to bring down their numbers.”
“And if a phantom thief breaks in and does that for you, it’d be just what you needed?”
Sorya nodded. “Our contract doesn’t specify anything about how many mimics she’s required to exterminate, but I’m quite certain she’ll fight back when they attack her. That, and some light cleaning, is all we’re expecting from her.”
“However,” Fatla interjected, “I doubt Miss Canhein will be up to the task on her own. If a group of mimics were to attack her all at once, she might not survive. And the storehouse is remote and unstaffed, meaning no one would be around to save her.”
“I’m pretty sure once a phantom thief starts shouting for help, that’s it for their career… But I suppose I’m starting to see where I fit into this picture…”
The pieces had all fallen into place. The phantom thief wanted me as her accomplice, while the antique store wanted me to help exterminate mimics. It seemed both parties’ interests were aligned.
“But why me? Couldn’t you hire a demon to help out instead?” I asked.
“We were concerned such an individual might plunder the storehouse’s contents, and as such, we decided someone familiar would be our safest bet. They will be around many valuable items, after all,” said Fatla. “We’re well aware that you aren’t interested in amassing vast sums of wealth, Azusa, which makes you an ideal candidate.”
I heaved a sigh. She had a point, but it also sounded like she was just foisting the task off on an acquaintance because it was easier.
“If you don’t object to the details of this arrangement, we’d like you to make your way to the town of Luxurda, where the storehouse is located,” said Fatla, acting like this was already a done deal. She could be surprisingly pushy about this sort of thing, but I knew all too well how nothing ever got done in a job like hers if you didn’t know when to be assertive.
As it happened, I did object to some of the details. It would be shocking if I didn’t. That said, I did owe the Appraisal Knights for helping out with all those offerings. I hadn’t expected their involvement to inspire Halkara to found a museum, but I had been afraid that a portion of my house would be eternally occupied by a heap of offerings that I had no clue how to put a price on. The Appraisal Knights had taken care of that for me, for free, and I felt a responsibility to pay them back for that favor.
“All right, I’ll do it,” I said. “It doesn’t sound like it’s going to take that long, so I’ll just take care of it and be on my way.”
“I greatly appreciate it,” said Sorya. “And while I’m at it, I’d like you to have this.” She handed me what looked like some sort of medal.
“Huh. What is it? An antique?”
“Actually, it’s a brooch modeled after the Appraisal Knights’ coat of arms,” said Sorya.
“Quite!” agreed Fatla. “After all, you’ll be an official member of the order for the duration of this job.” The leviathan gave me a quick round of applause. “Congratulations, Miss Azusa. Welcome to the Appraisal Knights!”
“I guess if you live long enough, you’re bound to end up in a knightly order or two…”
It feels like I’m a lot more receptive these days—or perhaps I’ve just resigned myself to my fate.
Azusa joined a knightly order!
“Well then, I’m expecting great things from you as an official member of our order,” said Sorya.
“Right, sure… Though it kind of feels like an empty title…”
“I’m sure you’ll face plenty of difficulties both reaching the storehouse and clearing it out, but I’m also certain those tasks are both well within your capabilities.”
Oh, right. She said something about it being hard to get to before, didn’t she?
“Um, so, I hope you’re not about to tell me that the storehouse is at the top of a sheer cliff or buried deep underground or something…”
Sorya took a sip of her tea, then set her cup down before speaking.
“No, not at all. It’s in the middle of a town, as you’d expect it to be.”
Okay, then why is it hard to reach? I’m getting some mixed messages here!
A few days later, I traveled into the demon territory and arrived in Luxurda. Countless waterways ran through the town, which made the scenery quite striking. It was so lovely that I immediately felt the urge to do some sightseeing, but I held it back and made for the agreed meeting place instead. There, I ran into a familiar face.
“Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! The Phantom Thief Canhein takes the stage…and thanks you profusely for coming all this way, Miss Witch of the Highlands! It’s a pleasure to work with you today!”
“I can’t tell if you’re trying to sound pompous, polite, or both! Pick one!”
“Once again, I will snatch away my target with grace and finesse! Oh, and I brought some snacks from back home for you. Just a little gift. I hope you enjoy them…”
“I can’t believe you’re talking yourself up and handing out souvenirs in the same breath…”
Now that I think about it, she was like this last time, too, wasn’t she? It’s like she can’t quite settle on a personality… This must be what happens when someone earnest and diligent at heart insists on becoming a phantom thief.
“You know, it was just the other day that I discovered Ten Thousand Dragons had one of Marquis Macosia the Sore Loser’s relics in its catalog! I was all ready to break in and liberate it, but then it struck me that there’s only so much one thief can do on her own, so I sent a letter to the proprietor, Sorya, to check up on the state of things.”
“You sent a letter of inquiry to the owner?!” And you call yourself a thief?! Just how honest can you possibly be?!
“Well, yes, but don’t you think checking in advance is a big step forward in my case, considering, well…”
“Oh, right. I guess people did call you the Afterwarner for a reason…”
Apparently, in the past, Canhein had decided that maintaining the mystique and style of a phantom thief was worth less to her than successfully stealing what she wanted, and so she had adopted the weird, backward system of sending warnings announcing the items she intended to steal after she’d already made off with them.
“Miss Sorya works as an Appraisal Knight under the direct supervision of the demon king,” said Canhein. “She used that connection to get in touch with Miss Fatla the leviathan, who recruited you to the cause.”
“So I have Pecora’s network to thank for this, huh…?” Considering their order’s at the beck and call of the demon king, I shouldn’t be surprised that my name came up.
“Between my unflappably tenacious thievery and your brutal physical violence, no storehouse will stand in our way!”
“Stop trying to make physical brutality my thing!”
Also, don’t act like tenacity is a phantom thief’s greatest strength! You’re supposed to be refined and mysterious, not stubborn as a mule!
“Well, whatever. Where’s this storehouse anyway?” I asked.
That information hadn’t been part of my briefing. In fact, Sorya hadn’t told me much of anything after I agreed to take on the job. I got the impression all that stuff had been left to a certain phantom thief to figure out.
“We’ll have to travel the waterways to reach the area of the city where the storehouse is located. So first things first, we need to find a boat.”
Oh, we get to ride in a boat? That kinda fits the phantom thief image.
“But since I don’t have a boating license, I can’t operate one, so—”
“You’re not even willing to break a law like that?!”
No doubt about it—this phantom thief is just a decent person! Or maybe just a regular law-abiding citizen.
“I’ve enlisted the help of someone who does have a license and can take us! Our boat’s moored just over there.”
We headed for the waterway and descended a small staircase of about seven steps, leading down to a dock. Then, as we walked along the dock, I heard a voice.
“Ooh? If it iiisn’t Azusa.”
Wait a minute. I know that drawl…
It was Captain Imremico the mermaid!
“Captain! What happened to your ghost ship?” I asked.
“Oh, thaaat ship? It’s docked at the shipwriiight’s, going through maintenance,” said Imremico. “I caaame here for a job ferrying someone arooound the waterways.”
Considering Pecora’s involvement, I should have expected that I would know all the personnel selected for this mission. It was better than working with strangers, though, so I couldn’t complain.
Imremico’s boat was crewed by an assortment of skeletons, each carrying an oar. I figured they’d be paddling us along the canal.
Canhein and I climbed aboard.
“Weeell then, time to cast off!”
The boat began to move, and we cruised gently down the waterway.
“It almost feels like we’re on a sightseeing gondola,” I commented. I was enjoying the view of the town from our vessel.
“Wah-ha-ha-ha! I’ll be carrying out a spectacular raid on that storehouse…and I’ve already informed its owners that I’m hoping to start work just a little past noon, so I’d really like to arrive by then!”
Of all the pointless things to be conscientious about! I knew that was just the sort of person she was, so I wasn’t going to complain out loud, but there was one thing I felt the need to double-check in advance.
“So how are we supposed to get to the storehouse using these waterways?”
“Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! I have no idea!”
Excuse me?
I laid a hand on Canhein’s shoulder. “Wait. What do you mean, you have no idea? Did you seriously set out for the storehouse without knowing where it is? How were you even planning on getting there?”
“Um, would you let go, please? You’re scaring me… I have a very good reason, so please let me explain. I intend to take full responsibility!”
“If you have a good reason, you should’ve opened with that!”
And so Canhein explained the circumstances.
“The waterways in this city form a complex, netlike structure. To make a long story short, if you don’t follow the precise route to your destination, your boat ends up looping all the way around to the beginning again.”
“I’ve definitely seen this scenario in an old game!”
“According to the shop’s owner, the route to the storehouse—and the layout of the storehouse itself—are both trade secrets that she can’t reveal to me. She said there’d be no issue with me figuring out the route and breaking in on my own, but that if I drew a map in the process, I would have to destroy it after I was finished to keep that information from getting into the wrong hands.”
“I think I get it. Well, that’s a pain… But wait—didn’t they formally contract you to clean the storehouse?”
“Yes, but they told me they were too afraid that I’d lose the map and didn’t want to provide one.”
“They don’t have much faith in their phantom-thief-for-hire, do they?”
“The opposite, actually. They told me that if I was good enough to call myself a phantom thief, I wouldn’t need a map in the first place.”
“I mean, I guess that’s fair enough…”
Well, that explains why Sorya was so convinced I’d have a hard time getting to the storehouse. Getting there will be easy if we manage to stumble our way onto the right route, but who knows how long that’s going to take? At this rate, scaling a mountain might have been easier.
“No neeeed to worry!” Captain Imremico’s voice rang out. Her boat was small enough that we could hear her just fine, and she’d presumably overheard our whole conversation as well.
Though if Canhein wants to call herself a phantom thief, I think she should try to be a little more discreet…
“In shooort, all you need is to memorize the route, yes? Well, my memory is seeecond to none. I paaassed the written exam for my boating license in only seeeven tries, you know?”
This time, I laid a hand on the captain’s shoulder.
“Wait. That means you failed six times, doesn’t it?”
“A true caaaptain must know no fear and fooorge ahead into the unknown!”
That sounds good out of context, sure, but I don’t think it’s very impressive in this situation!
“Yes!” exclaimed Canhein. “You get it, Captain Imremico! Even I’ve had moments where I couldn’t pick a lock to save my life and nearly lost heart, or got bitten all over by a guard dog. But I never gave up, and thanks to that perseverance, I’m still at it to this very day! The drive to keep going is more important than anything!”
I’d never say this out loud, but it feels like I’m witnessing two people bond over their mutual incompetence! Is this really going to work out…?
Then again, it’s not like we’ll be trapped in the waterways for eternity even if it doesn’t, so whatever. Plus, Imremico did get her boating license eventually, even if it took her a few tries. That means she’s a certified professional. Surely a pro can handle navigating a waterway without too much trouble, right?
One hour later…
“You knooow, I have a feeling we’ve been here before.”
“That’s because we’re back where we boarded!” I shouted. “We’ve looped all the way around to the start again!”
Unsurprisingly, our venture through the waterways had proven to be a struggle. In all fairness, it wasn’t just the captain’s fault. The waterway branched off in multiple directions on a regular basis, so we had to constantly decide which to go next. Exploring the whole system thus required an infuriating number of trips. The captain’s skeleton subordinates were handling the rowing, so we weren’t physically tired, but failure after failure to reach our destination was starting to wear on my mental state.
“I’m starting to wonder if we’ll even make it there today…,” I grumbled.
“Ha-ha-ha-ha! When one lives as long as us, it’s only natural to get lost from time to time! That’s the spice of life! There’s no fun in a path without any forks in it! It’s only by getting lost and wandering that we find our own answers to the questions that plague us! That’s what it truly means to live, don’t you think?”
That sounds really cool and all, but right now it’s just irritating. “Hey, Canhein, you’re a phantom thief. Don’t you have any, I don’t know, phantom thief skills or something?”
I was pretty bored with this whole situation, so I decided to turn the subject to Canhein herself. The cityscape I’d been so fascinated with when we first boarded the boat was already old news to me.
“Indeed I do,” said Canhein. “I’ve sent out many a warning letter in my day, and whenever someone reads one, they always say the same thing: My penmanship is excellent!”
“That has nothing to do with being a phantom thief!”
“Every once in a while, I’ll meet someone who’s embarrassed by their clumsy handwriting, and I always say to them that what’s most important is to write carefully! Rough and rushed writing is a far greater problem than handwriting that’s careful but unskilled. So long as you pour your heart into your penmanship, you’ll improve in the long term!”
“I mean, yes, good handwriting’s better than bad handwriting, but are you sure you want your handwriting to be identifiable, period? Isn’t that a problem for a phantom thief…?”
“Most of the time when I write something, it’s a letter of warning, so it’s actually better if the reader can immediately tell it’s me! Plus, I refuse to run or hide. My home address is a matter of public record!”
“I don’t know if that’s a sign that you want to get arrested or a sign that you haven’t been doing any real phantom thievery…”
Canhein and I kept chatting until suddenly, I noticed that something was wrong. The captain was gone. Her skeletons were still rowing away, but Captain Imremico herself was nowhere to be seen.
“Huh? Where’d she go…?” I wondered aloud. “She didn’t fall off the boat, did she?”
“C-c-c-c-c-calm yourself! The flow of the waterway’s weak; she’s f-f-f-f-fine!”
“What kind of phantom thief freaks out the second something goes even a little wrong?!”
Captain Imremico was a mermaid, so I didn’t think a little dip in the waterway would pose any danger to her. More concerning was the question of why she’d disappeared.
There aren’t any dangerous monsters in these waterways, are there…?
Canhein and I glanced at the water in unison—and a moment later, the captain herself broke the surface with a splash!
“I saaaw some nice-looking fish, so I caaaught them!” Captain Imremico called out. She really did have a fish in her hands—one in each, in fact. I couldn’t believe she was holding something that wet and floppy with her bare hands. “They’re niiice and lively, too, so they’ll be deliiicious if we cook them right away!”
“Um, Captain? I’d really appreciate it if you’d let us know before you jump ship…,” I grumbled. “It’s not exactly fun to realize you’re sailing on a captainless boat…”
“Well, do you waaant one?” the captain asked, holding a fish out to me.
I mean, I’ll eat it, sure. That’s a whole different question.
I used a bit of fire magic to cook the fish on the spot, and Canhein and I dug in. The captain, for some reason, had salt and plates at the ready, which helped. I got the impression she treated her passengers to fish on the regular.
“Ooh! If this isn’t scrumptious!” said Canhein.
“Yeah, it’s great!” I agreed. “It’s so soft and flaky!”
“Weeell, I am a mermaid! Caaatching a fish or two is a piece of cake,” the captain said with a smirk. “I’m not the caaaptain for nothing! Heh-heh!”
One little win, and she’s already acting full of herself.
“And that meeeans even if we don’t find the right route, it all cooomes out even!”
“No! No, it doesn’t!” These fish being tasty doesn’t mean it’s fine if everything else goes wrong!
I didn’t get the chance to question her logic any further, though. “I’ll go fiiind some more fish!” the captain said, diving back into the waterway before I could get another word in edgewise.
“She ran away! That’s not fair!” I shouted. I don’t mind her being laid-back, but we really need to get to that storehouse! Please try to remember what we’re actually here for, Captain!
The captain, however, reemerged from the water just a moment later.
“Hey, Captain…?” I said. “I’d really appreciate it if you’d make finding a path to the storehouse your first priority, and save the—”
“I just found a weeeird switch in the waterway!” said the captain, much to my confusion.
“Please don’t change the subject! I’m saying that—”
“I’ll puuush it and seeee what it does!”
And just like that, she dived back under the water.
“Uuugh, it’s so hard to deal with people like her…”
“You’ll get wrinkles if you keep scowling like that, you know? You should try to smile more! Wah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!”
“Nobody asked! Why am I the only one here who actually cares about reaching our objective?!”
Just then…
Tnk, tnk, tnk, tnk, tnk!
…our boat began to sway in the water.
“Wait, what?! What’s going on?” I shouted.
“Whooooooa…! Ooooooh noooooo…! Are we sinking? Somebody, save us!”
“Little quick to panic, aren’t we?!”
Canhein had lost all composure, but a moment later, her gaze settled off to the side of the ship, perpendicular to the waterway.
Is she looking for a place she can jump to? It’s not like there’s a hole in the hull, so I don’t know why she’s freaking out like this in the first place.
“Look, to the side! A waterway that wasn’t there before is, uh…is there now!”
A waterway? But there wasn’t a branch to the side here before! There was just another wall—, I thought, but then I turned to look and saw that what had been a wall moments before had suddenly opened up, revealing a tunnel.
“Gaaaaaah! A hidden passage?! Am I seeing what I think I’m seeing?!”
Just then, the captain once again broke the surface of the water with a splash.
“I preeessed the switch, and a route opened up! I guess you reeeally do have to check every nooook and cranny for this kind of thing,” she said, raising her hands overhead in a half-hearted display of defiant confidence.
Yeah, okay. She earned that one. But really…
“How was anyone other than a mermaid ever supposed to find that?! Secret passages shouldn’t be so hard to figure out!”
If it’d been just me and the phantom thief, we’d never have found the right path in a million years!
We passed through the secret tunnel and emerged on the other side, where we were greeted by a very different sort of scenery. Up until then, the city streets above the waterways had been filled with shops and passersby. This new part of the city, however, seemed to feature no stores at all, and no people, either. There were buildings, however—big ones. As far as I could tell, the whole area was full of nothing but storehouses.
“Ooh! This is it! This has to be it!” shouted Canhein, her eyes sparkling with glee.
In a corner of the area, I could see a storehouse featuring a logo that looked like a large skull and a naga. That, I figured, had to be Ten Thousand Dragons’ building.
“We made it! Thanks, Captain!” I said.
“Oh, I didn’t dooo anything much. Just triiiial and error, that’s all.”
She was still smirking, but she was right: She really had just tried random options until something happened to work. I certainly hadn’t noticed her putting on a display of skillful helmsmanship or anything.
“And with thaaat, our job here is finished. The rest is uuup to you two.”
That’s right. Now we just have to deal with the storehouse itself.
“Oh, but heeere. Consider this a liiittle souvenir,” she added, handing me and Canhein a pair of what looked like small boxes. “They’re your captain’s speeecial-made fish lunch boxes. If you get lost in the storehouse, taaake a break and have something to eat.”
“Oh, thank you! That’s so thoughtful—I really appreciate it!” I said.
“Indeed!” agreed Canhein. “I’ll repay this favor someday, Captain! In fact, I’ll be sending a letter of thanks to you in short order, so I’d appreciate if I could get your address!”
She knows sending a letter like that is just going to make her address even more well-known, right? Then again, I guess nobody’s out to arrest her right now, so it’s probably not an issue.
After Canhein and I said a relatively touching good-bye to the captain, we made our way into the storehouse. Canhein had the key on hand—apparently, Sorya had mailed it to her with the store’s formal authorization to go inside.
About a minute after we stepped into the storehouse, I came to a stop.
“Hey, Canhein? One of us has to say it, so mind if I do the honors?”
“Go right ahead.”
“The captain is long gone, so why’re the skeletons still here?!”
Indeed—the skeletons that had been rowing the boat had disembarked and followed along after us.
“Oh, the captain explained that. She said they were interested in storehouses, so she told them to go take a look. According to her, they’re not slow enough to hold us back and won’t get in the way.”
“Right, I don’t doubt that. It just feels weird to bid someone an emotional good-bye, only to have her skeletons tromp in after us…”
I guess we were saying good-bye to the captain and only the captain.
“Anyway,” I continued. “I know this is supposed to be a storehouse, but considering how big it is, we might as well call it a dungeon.”
The storehouse’s interior was dimly lit, and the passageways between the boxes were narrow and convoluted. It didn’t feel cavernous, per se, but it did sort of feel like we were exploring an ancient, deserted tower.
“Well, this storehouse does belong to one of the largest dealers in the antique business,” said Canhein. “It’s no surprise that it’s so huge! I wouldn’t have asked for the Witch of the Highlands’ help if I wasn’t expecting it to be at least a little dangerous!”
Is it just me, or is she bragging about a lot of weird things this time around?
“By the way, Miss Witch of the Highlands, I— Wait, what are these suits of armor?”
“Armor? I mean, they’re probably antiques, right? Which ones?” I asked, turning around…to find Canhein surrounded by what looked like suits of living armor! “We’re in trouble already?! Seriously?!”
“Hmph! The likes of you could never apprehend the great Phantom Thief Canhein… Ah, wait, no, put away the swords, please! I can’t handle the sight of blood, so can we settle this with a game or something where I won’t get hurt?”
The second the suits of living armor drew their swords, Canhein started groveling. I guess it was a good idea for me to come along… Nobody wants a dead phantom thief in their storehouse.
“All right, I’ll take care of these. Shouldn’t take more than a punch to break them,” I said, giving my arm a few swings to warm up as I stepped forward.
“Ah, Miss Witch of the Highlands, wait! Don’t!”
“Why not? Did you come up with a plan to take care of them yourself?”
Canhein grabbed what looked like a tag dangling from one of the suits of armor.
“Look! It says these cost two hundred and fifty thousand koinne! Living armor’s expensive, and if you break it, you buy it!”
“Those things are merchandise?!”
“Sorry to ask this, but could you figure out a way to save me without damaging them?! I’ll have to pay a ton of money for breach of contract if you destroy them!”
“Aren’t you supposed to be a phantom thief?!”
“I am, but right now, I’m under contract to clean this storehouse! There was a clause about not damaging any of the merchandise, too!” Canhein pulled out the contract in question, as if I was going to stop and read it mid-crisis.
Apparently, getting formal approval for your break-in (if we could even call it that anymore) came with its fair share of difficulties. She had a point, though, so instead of punching the living armor to pieces, I put one of them in a full nelson.
“Now’s your chance!” I shouted. “Run!”
“Many thanks! Wait…agh! I’m pinned between two of the other ones now!”
What a weakling! This phantom thief’s pathetic!
When I heard the words phantom thief, I pictured a daring, capable criminal like You-Know-Who the Third, not someone whose only talent was her thickheaded stubbornness.
In fact, I’m starting to think that even Halkara would be more capable in a fight than Canhein… Maybe elves’ bodies are naturally weak… Come to think of it, I feel like whenever they showed up in games, they were always portrayed as being good at magic but bad at physical combat.
I took on the suits of living armor one by one, immobilizing them from behind and then gently laying them out onto the ground.
“This is such a pain… I could finish them off in an instant if I was just allowed to attack them,” I grumbled.
“Please don’t,” said Canhein. “I’m begging you, be merciful!”
“At this rate, you might as well just pay for Marquis Sore Loser’s relics and spare yourself the trouble!”
“W-well, I mean…I can’t! My pride as a phantom thief won’t let me!”
“Since when have you had any pride?!”
I’d seen plenty of people in my past life who’d destroyed their reputation for the sake of pride or who’d been too full of themselves to suck it up and apologize when they were clearly in the wrong, eventually just fading out of the public eye… But even with those people in mind, this seemed like a rare and extreme case.
“I’m well aware that I’m weak, but I’ll never, ever give up!” Canhein shouted. “Willpower’s all I’ve got! I’ll stay stubborn till the day I die, and that means as long as I’m alive, I’m still winning!”
“How big of a sore loser can you possibly be?!”
I guess that’s just proof that the blood of Marquis Sore Loser flows through her veins. In that sense, maybe all of this was a genuine lifestyle choice on her part. I smiled.
“All right, then. Go ahead and be as stubborn as you want to.”
“Will do, but at the moment, I’m surrounded by another four sets of living armor…”
“Never mind! You’re too weak for your own good!”
You could at least work on some agility, for crying out loud! What a mess. She’s boxed in so perfectly, I don’t know if I’ll be able to get her out of there without damaging any of the suits of armor…
“I regret nothing! And having no regrets means I’ve emerged victorious!”
Stop acting like you’re about to die! It’s not that bad, dang it!
“I shall compose a verse to mark my passing: I have won / I say I won, so I won / I didn’t lose, which by extension means I won / If you die smiling, doesn’t that mean you won in the end?”
“You’re a terrible poet! Having a verse like that mark your death would make you a laughingstock for all eternity…”
“What?! I can’t have that! Someone ghostwrite a death poem for me!”
“Asking someone else to write your death poem would be even more humiliating than writing a terrible one yourself!”
This is hopeless. I might have to break a couple of them to open up an escape route. I can’t let her get killed when we’ve barely walked in the front door, and there’s no telling how many suits of armor there are. I can afford it, right?
Before I could put that plan into action, however, backup arrived in an unexpected form.
“A-all of you! You’re fighting for my sake…?!” Canhein gasped as the skeletons converged on the living armor, grappling with them and preventing them from attacking her! With their help, she was finally able to escape from the circle of armor she’d been trapped in.
“Nice work, skeletons!” I called out.
“Thank you!” Canhein shouted. “Thank you so much! Now we won’t have to damage them after all! I won’t have to buy any armor!”
Wow, you really hate the idea of paying for those things…
One of the skeletons managed to look away from the melee for just long enough to give us a nod. I figured it was trying to tell us, “We’ll handle these guys, so you two should go on ahead!”
“I swear I won’t forget this, skeletons… Don’t you dare go and die on me!” shouted Canhein.
“Um, so, I know this is a pretty heated moment and all, but for the record—”
“Yes, I know! They’re skeletons, so they’re already dead! It’s just good manners to say something like that when someone’s sacrificing themselves!”
Part of me thought that logic was downright farcical…but on the other hand, this whole job had been a farce from the moment we got permission from the antique shop to rob their storehouse, so I couldn’t muster up the energy to care.
Canhein and I proceeded deeper and deeper into the storehouse.
“You can tell this place is full of demon antiques,” said Canhein. “I don’t think I’ve ever felt so terrified before!”
“Yeah, if a normal person wandered in here, they might not make it out alive.”
The living armor probably would have been too much for most people. Not a lot of storehouses required you to risk your life upon entry, so it seemed my initial impression that this was more like a dungeon was right on the mark. The one big difference was that the encounter rate was much lower here. We hadn’t run into any enemies since the living armor.
Sure would be nice if we could make it all the way to Marquis Sore Loser’s painting without running into any other nasties.
“Oh, right,” I said. “Didn’t Sorya—the owner, I mean—ask you to do something else while you were here?”
“Oh yes,” said Canhein. “She said the mimic population in this storehouse was on the rise and asked me to deal with them. There was a letter about it in the same envelope as the contract I signed. The contract also specified that the mimics aren’t to be considered merchandise.”
Right, that! Sorya wanted her to deal with a mimic infestation! “Yeah, that’s what I was thinking about. Mimics are monsters that you might find when you open treasure chests, right?”
I’d asked Shalsha to tell me about mimics after my conversation with Sorya, and she’d confirmed that my image of treasure chest–shaped monsters was accurate in this world.
“In that case, I guess we’d better not open any random chests…though actually, we can’t exterminate them if we don’t find them, can we? I don’t really like the sound of falling into a mimic’s trap on purpose, but I can’t think of any other way to pick them out.”
In the end, however, we didn’t need to bother looking for them. They found us—by which I mean we came to a part of the storehouse where the path was blocked off by a veritable mountain of treasure chests.
“Not exactly trying to hide, are they?”
“All right, then! Why don’t I go ahead and open one up?” Canhein said as she quietly stepped up to the treasure chests. Before she had the chance to touch any, one of them snapped open.
“Rawr! Rawr, rawr!” roared the treasure chest. I could now see it had rows of what looked like teeth inside it.
“Yikes!” I yelped. “Those look sharp! I wouldn’t wanna get bitten by one of those things!”
They really have made this place into their breeding ground, huh? Not that I know how mimics breed, of course. Guess we should take these ones out, to start.
I got ready to mop up the monsters with some ice magic. “No need to bother with a magic circle. I’ll just freeze them all up, nice and quick…”
Using ice magic would let me attack the mimics with pinpoint precision, leaving the rest of the storehouse’s contents as undamaged as possible—unlike, say, fire magic. Or at least, that was the plan…
“Actually, wait a second.”
…until I realized something and cut off my spell.
“Huh? What is it?” asked Canhein. “I’m pretty sure this whole mountain of chests is made up of mimics.” Her confusion was reasonable, considering that it probably looked like I’d randomly decided not to accomplish our big objective.
“Well, I mean, I would take them all out if they were swarming in to attack us, but look,” I said, turning back toward the chests. Not even one of them showed any sign of opening up and trying to make a meal out of us. “The mimics aren’t going out of their way to attack us, are they? I don’t really like the idea of striking the first blow here. They’re probably pests from the owner’s point of view, but I just can’t bring myself to casually exterminate them.”
I wasn’t so arrogant that I believed I could go through life without killing a single creature, and if somebody told me I was stroking my ego by sparing the mimics, I wouldn’t be able to argue with them. I’d earned my keep for hundreds of years by killing slimes, for crying out loud, and I’d also culled boars when they were threatening to throw the ecosystem out of balance.
Killing was killing, no matter what reasons I’d had at the time. The way I saw it, not even converting to vegetarianism would be enough to escape that reality. Plants were alive, too, for one thing, and as Sandra and Miyu proved, the line between plant and animal could get pretty blurry in this world from time to time. In short, I knew very well that where I drew the line between creatures that were and weren’t okay to kill was entirely arbitrary…
…but I still couldn’t bring myself to attack the mimics.
“I understand,” said Canhein with a nod. Apparently, she was a phantom thief with a heart of gold. “It’s natural that you’d hesitate to attack something that’s just sitting there, looking like a plain old box—”
Then one of the mimics sank its teeth right into Canhein’s head!
“Ow! There was one behind me?! Why, you miserable little matchbox! Die! Die, damn you!”
“Never mind, they definitely attack people! Also, language, sheesh!”
Before I could react, Canhein had already yanked the mimic off her head and hurled it away. It promptly resumed acting like an innocent treasure chest. It’s a little late to try that again.
“Apparently, they think biting me is perfectly fine…,” Canhein grumbled.
I guess they’re more or less wild animals, so maybe they have an intuitive sense for how strong their opponent is… I’m obviously the more powerful one, after all…
“But I was not defeated—and thus, I emerge victorious!”
Good thing she’s so positive, I guess.
“For now, Miss Witch of the Highlands, I think we should proceed toward my objective, the painting by Marquis Sore Loser. We can think about how to deal with the mimics after we’ve obtained it, yes?” She must have realized I was conflicted, and personally, I was grateful for the suggestion. “Oh, and incidentally, I’d assumed it had been a while since anyone came in here, given the mimic problem, but this place doesn’t seem very dusty to me at all. In fact, it’s quite tidy.”
“Now that you mention it, you’re right. The floor’s spotless, and the antiques look nice and clean, too.” Overall, the place was much more well-maintained than I’d expected. “But yeah, let’s head for Marquis Sore Loser’s painting.”
Once again, we made our way deeper into the storehouse…and this time, we found what seemed to be the painting we were looking for without any trouble. Canhein pulled it out from the piles of antiques, and at a glance, it was a totally average landscape painting. The only thing that stood out about it was that it seemed rather flat.
“Ooh, this is it! There’s no mistaking it! This crude, unsophisticated brushwork! The utter lack of perspective! The choice of colors so profoundly conservative, it lacks the slightest spark of creativity! This is a painting that a true aficionado of the arts would have nothing to say about whatsoever—the work of an amateur bringing every bit of their nonexistent talent to bear! This could only have been painted by Marquis Sore Loser!”
Canhein smiled broadly as a torrent of scathing criticism poured out of her mouth. I know you’re happy we found it, but isn’t that a little much?
“Good for you. Nice that it was so easy to find, huh?” I said. It would’ve been an enormous pain if we’d had to check through all the boxes one by one.
“Indeed! Perhaps you’ve forgotten, but I am a phantom thief. I’m well trained in the arts, so I was able to locate it in an instant!” said Canhein, suddenly full of confidence. “I could tell that the paintings in this section of the storehouse were all nearly worthless, and that meant Marquis Sore Loser’s painting couldn’t possibly be anywhere else! It wouldn’t even count as an antique if it hadn’t been painted by nobility!”
“You’re really dead set on dragging your ancestor’s name through the mud, aren’t you?” I wondered if Marquis Sore Loser would be proud to have someone take so much interest in his paintings. “Is it really that bad, though? I feel like I’ve seen way worse paintings than this, personally.”
In my past life, I’d never been able to tell the difference between the paintings I saw in personal exhibitions in the city and the ones in art museums that were supposed to be masterpieces. I’m sure an expert could’ve explained why they were worlds apart, but personally, if one of my daughters had produced Marquis Sore Loser’s painting, I would’ve thought she had incredible talent.
“A few years after Marquis Sore Loser unveiled this painting, it was discovered that it was a rip-off of another artist’s work.”
“He was a plagiarist?!”
“And needless to say, in terms of artistic quality, Marquis Sore Loser’s painting was inferior. When he first unveiled the piece, it was widely perceived as somewhat unimpressive for an amateur’s work, and when it was discovered that it was a rip-off, people were aghast that someone could copy another artist’s painting and yet somehow end up with something so mediocre. Worse still, even though it was plain to see that the Marquis’s painting was the rip-off, he laid into the original’s creator and made all sorts of unreasonable demands…”
So he refused to accept that he’d lost, even after he copied someone, huh…?
“Thanks to this painting, he became known far and wide as a truly pitiful man. That cringe-inducing reputation, in a backward sort of way, actually enhanced the painting’s value—hence why the antique dealers bothered to obtain it, I assume… In short, it’s a mark of shame on my family’s history, and so I have to steal it…”
“Okay. Go ahead and steal away…”
Not like I have any reason to stop her, considering she’s stealing it with the current owner’s permission.
We headed back the way we came, Canhein dragging the painting along behind her.
“Now that we’ve been all the way to the back of the storehouse, I have to admit I’m impressed by how well-kept it is,” Canhein said on our way out.
“Right? I barely saw a speck of dust. Do you think they already have someone who comes in to clean the place up?”
In that case, was Sorya hiring Canhein to clean the place really just an elaborate way of giving the painting to her? Considering its lack of value, I could see her offering to give it away for free, but maybe she’d known that Canhein’s pride as a phantom thief wouldn’t allow her to accept it. She would’ve also known that if Canhein broke in on her own, she’d be attacked by living armor and mimics. That would explain why she’d called me in, using the story about the cleaning the place and controlling the mimic infestation as an excuse.
One thing’s for sure: If an ordinary person got boxed in by those suits of living armor, they’d be lucky to get out of this storehouse alive… Anyway, it’s only a matter of time before we get back to the mountain of mimics. I’ll have to decide if I should take out monsters even if they have no interest in attacking me.
Before long, Canhein and I arrived at the place where the mimics had gathered—and there, we witnessed a behavior we hadn’t seen before. The mimics were silently moving around, so busily engaged that they didn’t spare us so much as a glance.
“Huh. Well, that answers a lot of my questions about how mimics work.”
“This storehouse is an ecosystem in its own right, isn’t it, Miss Witch of the Highlands?”
That felt like a bit of an exaggeration to me, but on the other hand, she wasn’t totally off the mark. In any case, we spent a little while just watching the mimics do their thing.
After a while, Canhein exclaimed, “Oh, that’s right! I forgot about the lunch boxes the captain gave us!” We hadn’t found a nice spot in the storehouse to stop and eat, and more importantly, we’d located our target item so easily that there hadn’t been a suitable moment for it. “This seems as good a time and place as any to partake, don’t you think?”
I wasn’t about to argue with that. We cracked the lunch boxes open and dug in, watching the mimics all the while. It seemed that as long as we didn’t get too close, they wouldn’t attack us even if we weren’t keeping a careful eye on them.
That said, something slightly odd did happen after we’d finished eating and continued on our way.
Canhein and I—as well as the skeletons who’d held back the suits of living armor—left the storehouse and climbed aboard the boat once more. The skeletons were a little worse for the wear, but apparently, that wasn’t a huge issue for them.
“Well, I’m glaaad to see the two of you were successful,” said Captain Imremico. “And you’re leeeaving with more than just a painting, I see!”
“Yeah, we have a little more luggage than we originally planned for,” I said. “The skeletons were a big help, by the way.”
While we were in the storehouse, Captain Imremico had apparently been fishing. She’d caught an impressive haul, and a bucket in the corner of the boat was full of fish, still swimming around.
“By the waaay, how were your lunch boxes?” the captain casually asked.
“Oh, they were great! We ate with the mimics.”
“With the mimiiics?”
Yep. That’s the truth, all right.
We made it back to the dock where we’d first boarded the ship and said our good-byes to the captain and her skeleton crew, pausing to thank the skeletons one more time. Then we boarded our wyverns and flew off toward the Vanzeld branch of Ten Thousand Dragons.
I’d never been there before, but the giant skull on their sign made it easy to find. I had to wonder why the store had dragon in its name, considering there was nothing draconic about its exterior whatsoever. It actually looked more like a haunted house. Then again, it was quite common for stores back in Japan to mash together unrelated words that just sounded sorta nice and call it a name, and when I thought about it in that light, it seemed perfectly normal.
Stepping into the shop felt like setting foot in a museum. The one big difference was that the merchandise was packed much more densely here. The point was to sell the antiques, not just to show them off, and the way they were displayed spoke to that difference in priorities.
Sorya was waiting for us in the store’s reception room. “Thank you for your hard work,” she said as we stepped inside. “I’m impressed that you managed to make it past the waterways.”
Yeah, that was no walk in the park… Was she expecting us to get so frustrated we turned back…?
“That branch’s storehouse is so inconvenient to get to that it’s been a very long time since anyone’s been inside it. I’m sure the dust alone was terrible, and I can’t imagine how many mimics you must have seen.”
“About that, actually—we decided that it would be better for the environment in the storehouse if we let the mimics be.”
Sorya’s eyelids fluttered behind the lenses of her glasses. She clearly didn’t know what to make of that. “I’d appreciate the details, please,” she said.
“The storehouse was spotless. Not a trace of dust to be seen.”
“What? But that can’t possibly be true…”
“It’s the mimics. They’ve been licking the floors clean. It turns out that mimics eat dust.”
Thinking back, there was basically nothing worth eating in the storehouse. Maybe there were a few mice or some bugs somewhere, but there certainly weren’t many of them—we hadn’t seen any traces of mice gnawing at the antiques, after all. That was what led me to a simple conclusion: The mimics had been feeding on the dust that built up on the storehouse’s floor.
If there hadn’t been any mimics in there, I had a feeling the storehouse would’ve been buried in dust. Sorya might determine that dealing with dust was better than dealing with mimics, of course—dust, after all, didn’t try to eat people—but I’d decided it would be better to wait and see how she reacted, as I now explained.
“I see,” said Sorya. “I think I understand the situation. We have enough people moving in and out of the main branch’s storehouse that mimics have never had the chance to infest it, so I had no idea they could be an effective means of controlling dust.”
To be fair, I think that mimics living in a storehouse is a bit of a special case.
“I think I’ll respect your decision,” she continued. “If those mimics really do eat dust, then we might even be able to train them to keep the main branch clean as well. That would certainly save us time and effort.”
I was relieved to see that Sorya understood where we were coming from. “Actually, about that,” I began.
At the same time, Canhein carefully held a treasure chest out toward Sorya…and moments later, it popped open to reveal a mouth.
“A few mimics followed us out of the storehouse. Would you like us to leave them here with you?” Canhein offered.
“If not, I figured we could just leave them in an abandoned house somewhere,” I said. Dumping mimics might have environmental repercussions, but I didn’t know if the demon lands had any rules about that sort of thing. If it was a problem, I certainly wasn’t aware of it.
It had happened right after we finished eating lunch. A few mimics had approached us from behind, hopping their way toward us. They hadn’t shown any signs of hostility, so we’d ignored them, and in the end, they’d followed us all the way outside. By the time we reached the boat, we figured the little guys were in it for the long haul, so we brought them aboard and then carried them on our wyverns.
Maybe that’s how mimics migrate to new homes.
“Well then, I’ll certainly give that a try,” said Sorya. “We demons have done very little research into mimic ecology, so this will be a valuable learning opportunity.”
If they subsequently discovered that mimics were more valuable creatures than previously assumed, that would be more than enough for me.
On our way out, Canhein handed over a payment of one hundred and fifty thousand koinne to me. We hadn’t actually killed any of the mimics, but it seemed that Sorya had paid her the full amount stated in her contract regardless. The Appraisal Knights were a generous order.
“Thanks to you, I’ve recovered another shameful trace of my family’s history,” said Canhein. “You have my gratitude.”
“No problem. Just don’t do anything too crazy, okay?” I replied.
“Worry not! So long as my family’s shameful history remains, I will never die!”
What an unpleasant thing to structure your identity around… But if it’s motivating her, I suppose that’s all right.
After that, it was time for me to head home to the house in the highlands with a little extra baggage in tow.
As soon as I got back, I picked out an unoccupied room in my house and posted a DANGER! DO NOT ENTER! sign on its door. I didn’t think just opening the door would put anyone in danger, but I figured it’d be better to err on the side of caution. Then I brought the girls in to observe our new resident while I watched over the interaction, just to be safe.
“Oh, look! It’s eating, it’s eating! ”
“That’s a behavior people would ordinarily never get to witness. This is a precious opportunity indeed.”
The creature Falfa and Shalsha were carefully watching was a single mimic that hadn’t wanted to stay behind at the antique shop and had instead followed me all the way home. I’d figured if it was that determined to come with me, I might as well take it home and leave it in one of our empty rooms. And the moment I set it down in its new home, it had started licking up all the dust its tongue could reach.
That settles it—they really do live on a dust diet.
“Don’t get too close to it, okay? It might bite you! We’ll have to see if we can domesticate it going forward.”
“This means we won’t have to bother cleaning the empty rooms anymore, right? ” asked Falfa.
Yep. That’s what I was after, all right.
The way I saw it, if the mimic kept the house clean and the house’s dust kept the mimic fed, that was a win-win relationship for the both of us. Plus, it was a living creature, so it seemed like a good opportunity to teach the girls about raising an animal, just like getting them a pet.
And so one of our empty rooms was given to our new mimic housemate.
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