I'll save myself some effort and skip forward to the next month. The irregular sleep patterns made it hard to discern when one day ended and the other started, so I couldn't be certain of exactly how much time had passed. Whatever the case, these days were filled with gruesome work.
Yes, gruesome work. I didn't say that just because. Part of that was to try and get a glimpse of the Holdred Secret Flirting Style. Unfortunately for me, Roy keeps the secret well guarded. It's also somewhat difficult to understand a thing when you don't even know the language in the first place.
So, setting aside the importance of continuing my bloodline, I decided to shift my efforts into deciphering the local language.
Like I said before, trying to learn a new language without neither anything to compare to nor the ability to ask questions is... "Hard" would be an understatement. The first few days, I felt like quitting over the feeling of overwhelming helplessness.
But.
If I quit here, can I say with absolute certainty that, when I grow up, I will look back and not regret giving up half way?
Not a chance.
I told to myself that I would life a life without regrets. I might have taken this second chance lightly, but I'm not about to abandon the decision that I made on the brink of death in the spur of the moment.
I'm not that fickle.
So, after a day of consideration, I came up with a sureproof method to tackle the translation.
Whenever Elise or Roy picked me up to give me a walk around the house, I would start blabbering as soon as we got near a new object. If I was close enough, I would flail my arms as well. I deduced the names of those things from the repeating words in their conversations. Just in case, I tried to reproduce the sounds myself. I might have been a newborn, but even I could emulate the proper accentuation.
Eventually, I managed a good grasp of the nouns. After those, verbs, adjectives and the rest of the language came easily.
Am I a genius or what?
Well, I can't say someone else wouldn't have come up with the same solution easily. In any case, that's one major problem solved.
Fortunately, at about the same time I managed a decent grasp on the local language, my body started to act up less and less, and my sleep schedule started following regular patterns. I could finally stay awake for two or three hours at the time without falling prey to that sudden drowsiness, and managed to wake up nearly at the same time every day.
I'm proud of my biological clock. It's got convenient such convenient features! Come and see, come and see! Schedule alarms, measure time! Get one for yourself! Special offer, 50% discount!
"I'm home!"
Someone rasped on the door. Looks like Roy is back from his morning forest walk. He took longer than usual today.
"Welcome back, dear!"
Dropping me into the cradle, Elise heads over the door and lets a smiling Roy through it. "You're late. Did something happen?"
"Well, I couldn't find some of the ingredients I was looking for, so I took a little detour..."
"Again?! Roy, dear, how many times have I told you to stick to the main route? The forest is dangerous!"
Roy shrugged at Elise's scolding with a smile. "Come now, honey. I needed these plants. You know Barrick is down with sweat fevers, and the ingredients for the antidote don't just grow anywhere..."
Well, he doesn't appear a little bit flustered. That's a surprise. I thought Roy would be the type to constantly apologize to his wife, but... Evidently, you can't judge a book by its cover.
Well, that said, Elise isn't backing down either. "Even so! It's dangerous! What are you going to do if a monster attacks you again?"
Hmm?
Did I hear right? She said 'monster.' Roy and Elise didn't strike me as superstitious folk, but was I expecting too much from people of the Middle Age? No, but even so, Elise's tone matches more with 'preoccupation' than 'fear...'
"In that case, you'll save me again." Before I'm allowed time to think, Roy leans forward straight into the angry wife's defense, and gives her a kiss in the cheek before dropping his basket in a nearby table. Critical! Unable to reply, a blushed Elise closed her. "Hmph!"
Ohhh, she's pouting. Cute! Ah, now she's touching the place Roy kissed her in with her hand... I didn't know an adult woman could puff her cheeks like that.
I bow before you, Master Roy. Your mastery of the arts of husbandry is absolute. Is this the famed Holdred Secret Flirting Technique at play? I must write it down! The future generations of this bloodline are counting on me...!
"Oh! Little Zack's awake!" While I wasn't looking, Roy came to my cradle and leaned forward with a warm smile. "He's been up more and more these days...!"
He grabbed me by the shoulders and hoisted me up like a holy relic. Careful there buddy! What are you going to do if you break me? I'm expensive, you know? A one-of-the-kind, super-rare item.
As he hoisted me up and down (to my horror), Elise approached with a concerned look on her face. "Little Zack worries me... He isn't acting like the midwife told me. He's staying awake more often, true, but...!"
"It's been two months since he was born, and he hasn't cried once" Roy finished the sentence for her.
Oh, crap! I forgot! I was so focused in my own goals, I never thought about saving face! Babies are supposed to cry all the time, right...? Maybe I was careless. I don't want to be burned in the pyre for suspected possession or some other superstitious nonsense!
Luckily for me, Master Roy comes to the rescue!
"You're worrying too much, honey. It's true he hasn't cried, but he talks and moves just fine, see?" That's my cue!
"Agh... Ogh... Buh!" I tried to say "Don't worry," and give her a thumbs up. Well, my current body is severely limiting my communication skills, but I manage to convey the message appropriately.
"Yes... You're right, dear." Her frown disappeared, replaced by a smile. "He even spoke like he understood what we were saying... Maybe our child is just really smart!"
"Of course. He's your son... And mine!" Roy flashed a smile and unceremoniously dropped me back to the cradle before going to his lovely wife. "Oh, dear, you always know what to say...!"
"Honey..."
"Dear...!"
...
They totally forgot I was here.
You guys have a room, you know?! You could do that without forcing me to take part! Dear God, I can't even walk away and leave you two on your own!
I'm suddenly grateful the bedrooms are upstairs and not directly above me. If I had to listen to these too getting lovey-dovey every night, I would power through my powerlessness just to climb this cradle and jump down head first.
Just as I was thinking about it, husband and wife close the door and head upstairs with flushed faces. My good Roy, I hope you fall in a ditch.
Yes, I'm jealous. Problem?
That said, I came across some interesting information today.
Monsters, huh...? And Roy said Elise had saved him from one before. I don't think he meant it in a figurative sense.
There's still a lot of things I don't understand about this situation. Nothing time won't be able to fix, hopefully.
***
Another month went by. I made some significant advances in the comprehension business. I think I can safely declare I am now proficient in the local language. I'll have to take care not to let it show, however. Lest this new life of mine meets a sudden end at the center of an Inquisition pyre.
A three months old baby capable of perfectly understanding conversations? That's a big green mark in the list of possession symptoms.
Apart from that, I made another important breakthrough.
I can move!
No, I wasn't vegetative before. What I meant to say is, I can now crawl around the house without needing Roy or Elise to take me where I want to go. It is extremely exhausting, and I'm less crawling and more dragging myself through the floor, but it's a serious achievement nonetheless.
Among other things, I finally managed to take a proper walk around the house. As I mentioned before, the Holdred household looks like the place a middle-class couple of a medieval society would live in. There is the living room, of course, complete with it's own hearth and chimney, as well as a dining room, kitchen and latrine. The bedrooms are upstairs, as I said before. I haven't taken the time to explore those yet. Just thinking about climbing those stairs with my current strength sends shivers coursing through my spine.
I don't want to die, thank you.
Speaking of which, there's stairs going down as well. If my nose is anything to go by, that's Roy's workroom.
As I suspected, Roy is a herbalist. He's half way between a botanist and a doctor. "Apothecary" would be another term to describe him, but he's into plants as much as he's into making them into medicine, so I'll stick to the first term. His job is to stockpile useful ingredients from the forest and fashion them into medicine, herbicide, insecticide and other useful items for the village. Apparently, there's a priest residing in the village as well, but hiring his services can get extremely expensive, so people prefer to come to Roy for anything that's not life-threatening.
I'm somewhat relieved my father is a herbalist. I'm not sure how things work in this place, but a person who is knowledgeable about botany and anatomy is at least less likely to mistake intelligence for... demonic influence or whatnot. I think I won't have such a hard time living with Roy in that sense.
Also, since there are no computers at the time, I can't exactly play games or watch anything to kill time. And the few books I've seen laying around the house don't look like they are meant for entertainment. In lack of something better, I'm thinking of learning the trade from Roy. That way I can both make myself useful and not get bored.
It's not as if I were a parasite in my previous life. I would help around the house as it was needed. But I'd at least like to take it a step further and make some money, to lighten the burden on my parents' back. I may not think of Elise and Roy as my real parents due to my mental age, but they are doing their best to support me and take care of me. The least I can do is be greatful and help them as much as I can. It's not their fault their son is a bit different from your average child after all.
As for Elise, if she has a job then it doesn't involve leaving the house. I sometimes see her reading an expensive-looking book and writing things in a notebook, but apart from that she's mostly dedicated to the house. The best wife a man could ask for! Though I personally wouldn't mind taking care of my partner instead. It's all about preferences.
Hmmm... Now that I think about it, most of the things I have been considering on the last few days require knowing how to read and write. I was thinking of waiting until I could speak properly to ask Roy to teach me, but... Since I can move on my own already, fetching a book for myself and getting a close look at the writing system in advance might not be a bad thing. If I'm really in medieval Europe, I'm at least bound to understand the language if it's some strange variation of English... Though, like I said before, the language of this place doesn't even closely resemble anything I've heard before. Even the semantics are different.
Well, whatever. That's no excuse to avoid trying a new thing! And I don't have anything better to do, aside from listening to Roy and Elise flirt until my brain melts into sweet candy, which I'd rather avoid.
So with that in mind, let's hunt for a book!
***
I'm done for.
My head hurts. My limbs are on fire. Every last fiber of my body is screaming in pain.
I never knew a baby's body was this sensitive. To all the brats I mentally mocked for crying at the slightest scratch, I'm sorry. Now I understand your pain.
To explain my situation... I fell down the stairs leading to Roy's workroom.
No matter how much I crawled around the house, I never managed to find a book at arm's reach. Whenever I tried to climb up and grab the ones in the shelves, Elise would pick me up and scold me before dumping me back in the cradle.
"That's bad, Little Zack! Climbing is dangerous! Making your mommy worry is a big no-no!"
For better or for worse, Elise takes her job as a mother very seriously. I couldn't tell before because I was almost always asleep, but she seems to be around me all the time. In fact, if it weren't because she's such an attentive person, I might not have learnt the language as fast as I did.
She talks to me a lot. I don't think she's aware I can understand her, but she's constantly telling me stories, or talking about Roy and her, or just saying how much she loves me.
I'm happy to have a loving family. Though being practically the same age makes it somewhat awkward.
Whatever the case, her stories were mostly either fairy tales about magic (for some reason, spirits are much more common in her stories than imps or fairies, along with monsters) or variations of "Your father is the best!" so I was forced to stoically go along with her storytelling. I'm such a good kid... Really, I even dropped the proper "Oohs" and "Aahs" whenever the story reached its climax.
I definitely don't have a hidden agenda, like conditioning her into accepting that I am smarter than the average and accepting that I can understand her more or less.
I really don't. So could you please stop looking at me like that, Elise?
Well, I got sidetracked. The fact is I needed some serious literature. I couldn't base my whole worldview on Elise's stories, lest I grew up thinking spirits making contracts with humans were a thing, and Roy was the best person in the world. Which now that I think about it, might be the typical reasoning of a child, so I'm probably the one at fault.
Sorry Elise! Your kid prefers arithmetics. Though I won't say no if you find a light novel for me to read. Even a crappy one is fine. It's the thought that counts!
The only place I thought I could find the books I was looking for without attracting the attention of Elise was Roy's room, so I armed myself with courage and decided to try and go down the stairs. Worst case scenario, I wouldn't be able to climb back up and Roy would find me asleep in the floor.
I overestimated my abilities.
As soon as I placed my tiny feet on the first step, I slipped and went tumbling down like a scaled-down sack of potatoes. Fortunately, I didn't bounce, so most of the hurt came from hitting the edges of the steps at uncomfortable angles. Nothing life-threatening.
I hope I don't get dumb for hitting my head, though. Dumber, I mean.
I dusted myself as well as I could, considering I was crawling on all fours, and raised my head to take a proper look at Roy's mysterious little room.
"Whoah..."
The sound escaped my mouth involuntarily. If I could, I would have said "Amazing."
It looked like a scene taken straight out of an alchemist's lair.
Shelves upon shelves filled with rows of glass jars, each filled with a more exotic content than the last. An old wooden desk littered with half-written notes and strange-looking glass implements. A strange item caught my eye: it looked like an oil lamp, but instead of the typical wick, there was a strange stone inside. It looked like quartz, but it was scarlet red instead of the normal chalky white.
The thing that reall caught my attention, though, was the giant copper cauldron, complete with its base and everything. Another of those scarlet quartzes was mounted below it, along with some strange apparatuses. All in all, it looked like nothing I had ever seen before.
Maybe Roy is some kind of genius gadgeteer? But if that's the case, how come I've never seen anything like this mentioned in my previous life? Maybe this never made it to the light. Or I'm in a different timeline altogether...?
"Zack?!"
Oh, crap! An angry Elise appeared!
I must have made some noise while falling down the stairs, because Elise threw open the door with a panicked look on her face, here eyes looking for me desperately around the room.
Um, Elise? Smart advice: If you think your infant son is in a room, don't open the door with enough strength to mash their head into mincemeat. Maybe be more careful next time?
"Oh, thank the Light...!" She finally found me crawling in the floor, looking back at her. I tried to put on my best innocent face, but she isn't buying any of it.
"Dear God, this Zack I tell you...! Are you alright? Does it hurt anywhere?"
Well, yes, but it's nothing you can fix straight away, so could you please stop touching me all around?
"Wait a second. I'll patch you back to shape in no time!"
Like I'm telling you, I just bumped myself some! Yoh can't do anything about it, so stop-!
"Mine name is mercy, children of the Light. Mine shape is radiance, warm and protective..."
... Uhm.
I'm sorry. What?
Is this an extreme case of that? You know, chuunibyou normally fades by the time one reaches highschool, but I have heard of permanent effects... Also, isn't the time frame a bit wrong?
But Elise doesn't pay me any mind and keeps chanting.
"... I offer mine power as sacrifice. I beg to thee, oh Mother, give strength to those who falter, knit flesh and cleanse blood... Heal with a purifying light: Greater Heal!"
Er, Elise, I'd say you're taking things a bit too...
Ring!
... Ring?
Wha–
Fwooosh!!!
Before I can think anything else, white light appears around Elise, little radiant specks coming from her skin, like droplets of sparkling water falling towards the heavens. The light, that mysterious power, gathers and swirls around her, making her hair flutter. As if signaling the climax of this impossible experience, the radiance coalesce in the outstretched palm of her hand...
A similar light envelops me, and the pain goes away, as does the exhaustion from having crawled all the day.
Then, the spell breaks, and I'm left in stunned silence.
As I was about to speak up, Elise wipes her brow and pats my head. "There, there! Healing magic isn't my forte, so I used Greater Healing, just in case... Good heavens, Little Zack is such a trouble maker! Don't scare mommy like that! I'll get mad, you know?"
...What?
"Still, in hindsight, maybe I should have paid more attention to Healing magic... I'm too used to Roy taking care of things for me. I'll have to be more careful!" She grabs me by the armpits and hoists me up. "And you, little rascal, are going back to bed! Reflect on your mistakes! Hmph!"
... What?
As my mind shortcircuits, I'm carried back to my cradle without resistance.
A single question repeats in my mind over and over again:
... What the hell just happened...?