Waking up startled from a dream is never a pleasant experience.
That feeling of loss always lingers, regardless of whether the memory is good or bad. In that moment, the mind is a painful chaos of nothing but shattered dream fragments.
Bianka stared blankly, reaching out as if to grasp something, but the fragments were ephemeral, slipping away before her very eyes.
Just as a sourness began to well up in her nose, a hand gently took her own outstretched one.
The hand was slender and long, a size larger than Bianka's current hand, about the same as hers before she had shrunk.
She could feel that the owner of the hand took excellent care of it. There were no rough calluses, yet it wasn't the boneless, delicate hand described in novels. Bianka could clearly sense the strength within it...
Bianka: "?"
Bianka frowned. Bianka pondered. Bianka realized something was wrong.
It wasn't the hand that had appeared from nowhere, but the fact that she could only see half of the ceiling.
She tried to move the hand that was blocking her view, to see more of the ceiling's light.
The hand holding hers moved with it, but didn't let go, instead gently placing her hand to the side.
Still only half a sky...
The sensation behind her head was also wrong. It wasn't soft bedding, nor the shape of a pillow, but two elastic yet soft cylinders pressed together...
"Aieee—!!"
Bianka finally understood what was wrong!
Stan watched as Bianka shot up from the white-haired woman like a startled cat, practically scrambling on all fours across the bed and tumbling off the other side.
As expected of my boss, we do have some things in common... Look, even the way we get startled is exactly the same.
First, a cowlick, squashed from being pressed down, popped up from the other side of the bed. Then, a small, slightly flushed head peeked out.
"Who... who are you? How did you get in here?" Bianka, only half her head visible, watched the person who had appeared beside her without her noticing with wary eyes.
"Me?" The woman wasn't startled by Bianka's sudden outburst. She remained seated.
At Bianka's question, she pointed to herself, seemingly surprised by the question. Then, she genuinely seemed to ponder it before smiling at Bianka.
"My name is Cecilia. Cecilia Schariac." Her smile was surprisingly gentle, causing the wariness in Bianka's eyes to fade slightly. "Of course, you can just call me Cecilia."
"And you? What's your name?" After introducing herself, Cecilia smiled and passed the conversation to Bianka.
"I..." Faced with Cecilia's disarmingly gentle smile, Bianka was about to blurt out her real name, but then she remembered her disguise and had to force herself to lie.
"My name is Kiana." After saying that, Bianka looked at Cecilia's unchanging expression and suddenly felt she was being disrespectful.
The other person had given her full name; she should do the same...
Bianka squeezed her eyes shut and committed to the lie.
"Kiana Kaslana! That's my full name!"
She peeked open one eye. Cecilia still wore that same disarmingly gentle smile, but for some reason, Bianka thought she saw a small bubble appear next to Cecilia's head, with a tiny question mark inside.
After a full four or five seconds, Cecilia's chest suddenly heaved slightly.
"Kiana... is it?" Her voice sounded a little strange, but since she was a stranger, Bianka didn't notice. "Haha, what a lovely name..."
After that rather dry compliment, Cecilia fell silent for another two seconds before launching a surprise attack. "Did your father give you that name?"
Bianka's face was tense as she nodded, her expression stiff and almost twisted.
What is she saying? I don't know, just agree.
Cecilia's chest heaved a few more times. Bianka couldn't tell if she was taking deep breaths or trembling for some reason.
But things didn't go against her expectations. Her disguise seemed to be flawless, as Cecilia didn't pursue the matter further, instead returning to the original question.
"You asked why I'm here, right?"
Bianka's peeking head nodded. She was trying to figure out what her head had been resting on.
It had been so comfortable she almost missed it.
"Well..." Cecilia seemed to be thinking again. Suddenly, she raised a finger. "Because I... am the landlady here."
Bianka's eyes widened, and then...
"Phew... so you're the landlady..." She let out a long sigh of relief, but something still felt off.
Could a mere landlady get so close to her without being detected? Bianka suddenly felt that this world was full of wonders, and her knowledge was still too limited...
You ask why Bianka could accept a landlady being able to get so close? Hadn't she just met someone that morning who, through sheer hard work and sweat, was more formidable than she had been in the Fire MOTHs?
What's wrong with a landlady having a few special tricks up her sleeve?
Anyway, Bianka found it perfectly reasonable.
Cecilia's shoulders were shaking slightly. She watched Bianka's relieved expression and, as she stood up, quickly snatched something from the bedside table.
Bianka glanced over as she moved, only managing to see that it seemed to be a photo frame.
"You were having a nightmare just now, Kiana, weren't you?" Cecilia casually opened the bedside table, pulled out a drawer, placed the photo frame inside, and locked it.
Bianka nodded, a little embarrassed. By now, her head was fully visible, but her body was still hidden behind the bed.
She couldn't remember the details of the dream, but she remembered hearing a voice at the end, a voice that sounded very similar to Cecilia's.
She must have come in around that time, right?
Although she couldn't recall the exact words, Bianka remembered the emotions conveyed in them.
Thinking of this, Bianka couldn't help but whisper a thank you to Cecilia.
"Thank you..."
"You're welcome." Who knew Cecilia could hear such a soft voice? She turned back, smiling brightly at Bianka.