Okay, I used the first line so you can read it. If it's not too much trouble, could you go to my Patreon and donate for my breakfast? It's not an obligation, and I won't stop uploading; I'm just asking for a little help. Obviously, the Patreon is about five chapters ahead. Please be kind. Support this poor soul.
https://www.patreon.com/c/Panoli
-------
The third day of work at the Roswaal mansion began with Subaru Natsuki discovering that stairs were public enemies of any apprentice servant.
Not because the stairs did anything especially evil. They did not move, mock him, try to drain his mana, or open his stomach with curved blades. They simply existed in far too great a number inside a mansion far too large, and Ram seemed to possess a supernatural talent for sending him to the exact opposite wing every time Subaru believed he had finished a task. If he carried clean clothes to the second floor, he immediately had to go downstairs for a tray. If he went down for a tray, Ram remembered that a side hallway had to be inspected. If he inspected the side hallway, Rem would appear with another perfectly reasonable instruction that involved crossing half the building again. By noon, Subaru was convinced Roswaal did not need magical defenses: forcing an invader to work as a butler for one morning would be enough.
"This mansion is designed to break legs and hope," Subaru murmured, climbing a flight of stairs with a pile of folded cloths against his chest.
Ram walked ahead of him with her hands folded in front of her apron, carrying nothing and showing not the slightest sign of exhaustion.
"Barusu confuses a wide layout with personal persecution."
"When architecture makes me suffer more than three times, it becomes personal."
"Then the mansion's architecture will have to live with the disappointment of not considering Barusu important."
"Even the walls despise me. Incredible. I'm growing as a victim."
Ram stopped in front of a door and barely turned her head.
"If Barusu had less energy to complain, he would have more energy to work."
"My complaining is spiritual fuel."
"Low-quality fuel."
Subaru opened his mouth to answer, but the door opened before he could commit another verbal imprudence. Rem appeared on the other side carrying an empty basket, her blue eye quickly scanning the scene before stopping on the pile of cloths Subaru was holding. She did not need to say anything. Subaru immediately straightened his back.
"Rem, good morning. Or good afternoon. Or good whatever. I've lost all sense of time between stairs and humiliation."
"Good morning, Barusu. Those cloths belong in the north hallway closet, not this wing."
Subaru went completely still.
Ram closed her eyes.
"Barusu walked in the wrong direction for six minutes."
Subaru looked at the pile of cloths. Then he looked at the hallway. Then he looked at Rem, searching for mercy in the only face in the mansion that did not seem to actively enjoy his failures.
"Is there any chance the north hallway moved magically?"
"No," Rem answered.
"And that Beatrice altered the mansion to humiliate me?"
"Beatrice-sama does not need to alter the mansion for that," Ram said.
Subaru lowered his head.
"The defense has no objections."
While Subaru was being defeated by domestic geography, Link was discovering that his work as a gardener had two very different faces. The first was almost pleasant. Waking up early, going outside, feeling the fresh morning air, carrying tools, watering plants, moving sacks of soil, and cleaning paths gave him a kind of exhaustion he understood. His muscles worked, his mind settled, the world reduced itself to concrete tasks: this gets moved, this gets cut, this gets cleaned, this does not get broken because Rem said it in that calm voice that turned any instruction into natural law. It was the kind of routine that he could come to like.
The second face was that gardening was full of small enemies disguised as details.
The hedge had to have an exact curve, not a "more or less heroic curve," as Subaru had called it when he passed by the previous afternoon. Not all flowers were watered the same way. Some plants wanted shade, others sun, others an intermediate point that Link interpreted as "vegetal whim." The tools needed care. The soil had to be loosened, not attacked. Roots could not be torn out by accident, something that was complicated when his hands could squeeze too hard without him realizing. Every time Rem said "less strength," Link felt the phrase had become the official motto of his new life.
"Less strength," Rem said that morning, just as Link was trying to remove a stone embedded beside a path.
Link froze with the stone in his hand.
"I haven't broken it yet."
"Rem is referring to the edge of the path."
Link looked down.
The stone had come out along with a good portion of soil and three pieces of the decorative border.
"Ah."
Rem crouched beside the damage, observed the mark, and then looked at him.
"You must first separate the soil around it. If you pull directly, you drag out more than necessary."
"The stone looked loose."
"It was not."
"The stone lied."
"Stones do not lie."
"That one did."
Rem did not answer immediately. She took a small tool, removed the remaining soil with precise movements, and showed him how it should have been done. Link watched attentively, holding the guilty stone as if it were evidence in a trial. Rem's patience was not warm in the usual sense, but it was constant. She never told him he was useless. She never exaggerated his mistakes. She pointed them out, corrected them, and expected him to learn. That had a strange effect on Link: it made him more embarrassed to fail, but also made him want to do better.
"I understand," he said at last. "Loosen before pulling."
"Yes."
"Don't fight the stone."
"Also."
"Even if the stone starts it."
Rem looked at him.
"The stone does not start it."
Link sighed.
"You're never on my side in my mineral conflicts."
"Rem is on the garden's side."
"That's fair, but it hurts."
After fixing the edge of the path, Rem assigned him a task he could perform with relative dignity: carrying several medium pots from the side greenhouse to a prepared area near the east wing windows. Link took the first two carefully. Then another two. Rem watched him, waiting for the exact moment when he would try to carry six out of male pride, exhaustion, or stupidity. Link felt that gaze and decided not to give fate the satisfaction.
"Only two," he said.
"Correct."
"I'm learning."
"Yes."
It was a small word. But coming from Rem, it was enough for Link to walk with his back a little straighter.
The routine continued for hours. Subaru crossed several times through the hallways visible from the garden, sometimes with trays, sometimes with cloths, sometimes with the expression of a man who had left part of his soul in the laundry room. Every time he saw Link carrying something heavy with apparent ease, he raised his thumb or made dramatic gestures of envy. Link answered him with a dry look, though deep down he appreciated those moments. Seeing Subaru alive, complaining, exaggerating his domestic tragedies, and being corrected by Ram made the mansion feel less like an unknown place and more like a strange stage where both of them were trying not to fall apart.
At noon, the service dining room became a field of truce. Subaru sat down carefully, as if each muscle had its own lawyer and was preparing a lawsuit. Link arrived with dirt on his boots, a green stain on his forearm, and his hair somewhat tousled by the wind. Ram served portions with efficiency, and Rem placed in front of Link an amount of food slightly larger than Subaru's. Subaru noticed immediately.
"Culinary discrimination," he said, pointing at the plate. "I work hard too."
Ram looked at him.
"Barusu works noisily."
"That consumes energy."
"Not as much as moving stones, carrying pots, and repairing the mistakes the secondary guest causes through excessive strength," Rem said.
Link raised a finger.
"I appreciate the defense, but I also felt the blow."
Subaru crossed his arms.
"Rem just said you're useful even when you're a disaster. That's favoritism disguised as work evaluation."
"Rem does not show favoritism," she replied serenely.
"That is exactly what someone so professional that even her favoritism would wear a uniform would say."
Ram placed a plate in front of Subaru.
"Barusu will receive less bread if he continues analyzing Rem."
Subaru immediately fell silent.
Link smiled into his glass.
"Coward."
"Food strategist," Subaru corrected.
During the meal, Link was quieter than usual. Not because he was sad or upset, but because an idea had begun moving through his head since the previous night, after talking with Subaru before sleeping. The horns had been able to appear without him losing control. It had hurt, yes, and Beatrice had needed to give him instructions, but in the end they had come out and disappeared at will. That meant not everything in his new body was a bomb waiting for tragedy. There were parts he could learn to handle.
The problem was the other thing.
The kagune.
The word still felt absurd in his mouth, too tied to an anime that was no longer only a fictional memory. But he had seen it. He had felt it. They were not simple tentacles attached to him; they hurt when Elsa cut them, responded to his fear, moved by reflex to protect, and retracted when his body exhausted itself. If they were part of him, then he could not allow them to keep acting like drunken snakes every time something threatened him. If he lost control again inside the mansion, he could hurt someone. He could hurt Rem, Subaru, Emilia, even Ram or anyone nearby.
That idea took away his appetite for almost ten seconds.
Then he remembered he was still himself and finished the plate.
Subaru watched him from the corner of his eye.
"You're thinking too much. That never ends well with us."
Link drank water.
"I need to practice."
"Gardening?"
"The other thing."
Subaru did not make a joke. That was enough for Ram and Rem, even without looking directly, to understand that the conversation had just changed weight.
"Your horns?" Subaru asked in a lower voice.
"No. Those already came out once without destroying anything. I'm talking about the kagune."
Ram stopped arranging cutlery.
Rem did not move, but Link noticed that her attention had completely focused on them.
Subaru swallowed.
"You want to bring out those red things voluntarily?"
"I don't want to. I need to."
"That phrase is usually the beginning of a terrible decision."
"I know. But if they appear again because someone is in danger and I don't know how to move them, I'm going to repeat what happened at the Loot Warehouse. Random strikes, broken walls, allies ducking so they don't end up split in half. I can't depend on losing my head every time I need to defend someone."
Rem spoke then.
"You should not do it inside the mansion."
"I wasn't planning to do it here."
Ram narrowed her visible eye.
"Nor near the main garden. Roswaal-sama appreciates the hedges."
"I wasn't going to practice on the hedges."
"The secondary guest has prior history."
Subaru raised a hand.
"I propose an open place, away from expensive objects, away from Beatrice, away from Roswaal, away from anything that could sue us for property damage. Does the mansion have a training area? An ugly courtyard? An official field for breaking things?"
Rem thought for a few seconds.
"There is a maintenance clearing beyond the outer storage buildings. It is used to chop firewood, dry materials, and pile branches before transporting them. There are no important decorations nearby."
Ram nodded.
"If the secondary guest insists on being reckless, that place will reduce the damage."
"Thanks for the vote of confidence," Link said.
"Ram did not vote for you."
The practice was set for after they finished the basic afternoon tasks. Rem did not exactly approve, but she agreed to supervise the distance and make sure no one entered the area by accident. Ram informed Roswaal, because hiding from Roswaal that an anomaly with red tentacles was going to train on his grounds seemed like a terrible idea even to Subaru. Roswaal's answer arrived with a smile so wide that Link immediately regretted being responsible. The noble only said it would be "veeery interesting" and recommended that Beatrice also be present "for magical safety," a comment that made Beatrice appear later with the face of someone who had been dragged from her library by a personal offense.
"Betty is not a babysitter for poorly coordinated monsters, I suppose," Beatrice said when she arrived at the clearing.
Subaru, who had managed to get permission to attend after promising he would finish his pending tasks before dinner, pointed at Link.
"Technically, he's the poorly coordinated monster. I'm moral support and witness for future lawsuits."
"Barusu is annoying too."
"That is already a universal classification."
The maintenance clearing was isolated enough for Link to breathe a little easier. On one side were stacked logs, woodsman's tools, and dry branches. On the other, an open area of compacted earth, with wheel marks and empty spaces where materials were usually left. It was not beautiful like the main garden. There were no delicate flowers or decorative stones that could accuse him of crimes. It was a practical, ugly, resistant place. Perfect for trying not to destroy the mansion.
Rem positioned herself at a certain distance, attentive. Ram stood beside her, apparently relaxed but with very watchful eyes. Subaru placed himself closer to Link than Beatrice considered prudent, so she forced him to step back two paces with an "if Barusu wants to be crushed, he should do it after Betty leaves." Puck appeared on Emilia's shoulder, because Emilia had also wanted to be present when she found out. That made Link feel much more nervous than expected.
"You all didn't have to come," Link said.
Emilia smiled at him with concern.
"We don't want you to practice alone."
"That's kind, but it also increases the pressure not to make a fool of myself in front of half the mansion."
Subaru patted him on the shoulder.
"Relax. You already made a fool of yourself by calling Rem a goddess. Nothing here can top that."
Link looked at him with deadly calm.
"Subaru."
"Moral support with historical memory."
Rem lowered her gaze slightly. Subaru smiled. Ram sighed. Emilia did not fully understand, but from Link's reaction, she decided it might be better not to ask.
Beatrice stepped forward.
"If you are going to try, do it already. Do not force the horns at the same time. Do not mix too many sensations. The organ on your back, or whatever that thing is, previously responded to threat and exhaustion. Now try calling it without anger."
"And how do I do that?"
"Betty does not have a manual for impossible creatures, I suppose."
"Your instructions are becoming less and less useful."
"And you are becoming more and more demanding for someone who does not know how to use his own body."
Subaru raised a hand.
"I have an idea. A bad one, probably, but an idea."
"That is redundant for Barusu," Ram said.
"Thank you, Ram. Link, you said it hurt when Elsa cut those things, right? And that you felt them as part of you. Then don't think of them as weapons. Think of them like sleeping arms. Limbs you forgot you had."
Link frowned.
"That... isn't so stupid."
Subaru brought a hand to his chest.
"I'll accept that lukewarm praise and keep it with affection."
Beatrice looked at Subaru as if it irritated her to admit it.
"Barusu's idea is less useless than usual."
"I'm unstoppable today!"
"Do not exaggerate," Ram and Beatrice said almost at the same time.
Link closed his eyes.
He did not seek the heat of the horns. He did not seek Elsa's rage nor the memory of Felt running. He tried to think of his back, of the lower area of his waist where those limbs had been born. At first, he found nothing. Only tense muscles, exhaustion, and the discomfort of knowing everyone was watching him. He breathed slowly. He tried to imagine an arm he had not moved in years, a numb part waiting for a clumsy order.
Nothing.
"This is stupid," he muttered.
"Continue," Rem said.
It was one word.
Enough.
Link breathed again. He focused less on the idea of "bringing out" something and more on listening. His body was no longer what it had been. That terrified him, but it also meant there were things he had not learned to feel. He tried not to push. He tried not to call the monster. He only waited, like when he searched for the right smell among ingredients, letting the sensation separate from the noise.
Then he felt it.
A wet pressure beneath the skin.
His stomach tightened.
"There it is," he said, his voice tense.
Emilia took an involuntary step, but Puck stayed attentive on her shoulder.
"Slowly," Beatrice said. "If your eyes change, you stop."
"I don't know if I can stop."
"Then learn quickly."
The fabric of his shirt tightened across his back. Link clenched his teeth, but did not scream. The first kagune came out slowly, far less violently than in battle. It tore the fabric near the back of his waist and emerged as a dark red limb, flexible, trembling, covered in that organic shine that made Subaru feel the need to look and turn away at the same time. It did not hit anything. It only rose a few centimeters, like a heavy tail that did not understand balance.
Link opened his eyes.
They were still normal.
"One came out," Subaru said, with a mixture of fascination and horror. "And it didn't destroy anything. That's progress."
"Shut up," Link said, sweating.
The kagune moved.
Everyone tensed.
It was only a small movement, an awkward shake to one side. Link felt it like a new muscle trying to obey a badly translated order.
"I felt it," he murmured. "It's weird. It's very weird."
Beatrice watched attentively.
"Try moving it upward."
Link tried.
The kagune went down.
Subaru raised a finger.
"Maybe his controls are inverted."
"I'm not using a controller, idiot."
"But if you were, you'd be losing to the tutorial."
Link tried to move it again. This time, the kagune rose too fast and almost struck a log. From her spot, Rem spoke calmly.
"Less strength."
Link let out a desperate laugh.
"Even this needs less strength."
"Yes."
He tried to move it gently. The kagune trembled, rose, lowered, curved left, and finally stayed more or less still. Link was breathing as if he had run a long distance, though he had not moved from where he stood. Sweat ran down his temple.
"Good," Emilia said. "You're controlling it."
"Don't say that too loud, or it'll find out and contradict me."
Puck floated a little closer, keeping a prudent distance.
"Your mana is moving, but not as much as with the horns. This seems more physical than magical."
"It feels physical," Link said. "Like having an arm attached to my back, but the arm is drunk."
"A vulgar but understandable description," Beatrice said.
Subaru leaned toward Ram.
"I think that counts as praise from Beatrice."
"Barusu has low standards."
"Living lowered them."
Link decided to try the second.
It was a moderate mistake.
The pressure returned, faster now that his body seemed to have understood the route. The second kagune came out with a yank that made him lean forward. It was not as violent as in the Loot House, but it was far less elegant than the first. The red limb lifted and struck the ground with a wet sound, raising dust. Subaru jumped back. Beatrice did not even move, but her gaze made it clear that if that touched her dress, Link would lose much more than mana.
"Two," Link panted. "Good. Two."
"They are crossing," Rem said.
"What?"
Link tried to look back, which was a terrible decision. Upon turning his torso, the first kagune interpreted the movement as an order to partially wrap around his waist. The second tried to compensate and ended up passing over the first. Link felt both limbs pulling in opposite directions and lost his balance for half a second.
Subaru covered his mouth.
"Don't laugh," Link growled.
"I'm not laughing."
"Your soul is laughing."
"My soul has independent facial expressions."
Ram observed the budding disaster.
"The secondary guest looks like a badly tied package."
"Thanks, Ram. Very useful."
Beatrice sighed.
"Do not try to bring out the third."
Link went still.
Everyone looked at him.
Subaru widened his eyes.
"Link."
"I didn't say I was going to do it."
"Your face said yes."
"My face is busy surviving."
Rem stepped forward.
"You must first stabilize the two that have already come out."
Link tried to obey.
He truly tried.
The problem was that thinking about "stabilizing" made the first kagune tighten around his waist like an overly enthusiastic belt, while the second rose behind his shoulder and hung forward like a crimson nightmare scarf. Subaru made a choked sound. Emilia brought a hand to her mouth. Puck began laughing softly. Ram did not smile, but her silence was suspiciously satisfied.
"Don't say anything," Link said.
"I haven't said anything," Subaru replied.
"You're thinking it."
"I'm thinking many things. Most of them shaped like sushi."
Link opened his eyes wide.
"No."
Subaru was already lost.
"Sorry. But look at yourself. Red meat rolled around a core of furious Latino. All that's missing is rice."
"Subaru."
"And seaweed."
"Subaru."
"Ghoul sushi."
The third kagune came out.
Not by conscious decision. Link got irritated, lost focus, and his body decided to complete the partial transformation as if that were a reasonable response to being mocked. The third limb burst from the rear of his waist, thinner than the other two, rose with an awkward whip-like motion, and then, instead of attacking Subaru as Link perhaps would have wanted deep in his soul, wrapped around the other two. The result was immediate and humiliating.
Link was wrapped up.
Not completely immobile, but trapped enough to look like a badly made roll. One kagune circled his waist, another passed over his shoulder and down his chest, and the third had looped absurdly around his legs, forcing him to stand in a stiff and ridiculous posture. The red mass tightened with every attempt to move, squeezing him more as if his own body had decided to punish him for excessive confidence.
The clearing fell silent.
Subaru began to tremble.
"No," Link said, his voice deadly.
Subaru covered his face with both hands.
"I can't."
"Don't you dare."
"I'm trying."
"Subaru."
Subaru burst into laughter so loud he had to bend forward. It was not elegant. It was not restrained. It was full, desperate, almost therapeutic laughter, the kind that escapes when accumulated fear finds an absurd crack through which to flee. Puck joined in, floating in circles. Emilia tried not to laugh out of respect, but a small laugh escaped and forced her to cover her lips. Ram closed her eyes with suspicious calm. Rem, for her part, maintained her composure for three whole seconds.
Then she lowered her gaze.
Her shoulders moved faintly.
Link saw it.
"Rem... you too?"
Rem lifted her face. Her expression was still almost perfect, but there was a softness in her visible eye that betrayed her.
"Rem apologizes. The secondary guest's current form is... unusual."
Subaru, between laughs, struck the ground with one hand.
"She said it! Even Rem said it! Link, you are officially sushi!"
"I'm going to kill you when I get out of here."
"You can't! You're wrapped in yourself!"
Beatrice brought a hand to her face.
"What a lamentable spectacle, I suppose."
Ram nodded.
"The secondary guest has lost against his own body."
"That doesn't help, Ram."
"Ram was not trying to help."
Link tried to move one leg. The kagune wrapped around his legs tightened further and nearly made him fall. Rem reacted immediately and took one step toward him.
"Do not move. You may make yourself fall."
"Don't tell me that like I hadn't noticed."
"Then do not act as if you had not noticed."
Subaru was still laughing, though now he was trying to breathe.
"This is the best thing that's happened since we arrived at the mansion."
"You're exaggerating," Emilia said, though she was still smiling.
"Emilia-tan, you haven't seen his face from my angle. It's art."
Link closed his eyes.
"Beatrice. Help."
"Why would Betty have to do that?"
"Because if I stay like this, Subaru is going to keep talking."
Beatrice looked at Subaru.
Subaru was trying to describe the "house special Link sushi" between laughs.
"Argument accepted, I suppose."
Beatrice approached carefully, more to protect her dress than out of concern. She observed the red limbs, the way they had crossed, and the tension holding them together. She did not directly touch the kagune. Instead, she raised one hand and let a small amount of mana gather at the tips of her fingers, examining the reaction. The kagune trembled, but did not attack. Link breathed deeply.
"Relax the flow," Beatrice said. "You are trying to withdraw them by pushing. That only tightens them more."
"I don't know how to relax something that's using me as wrapping."
"Then stop fighting them. They are part of your body, are they not? If your arm cramps, you do not insult it until it obeys."
Subaru raised his hand.
"I might."
Ram looked at him.
"That explains a lot."
Link closed his eyes again. He was embarrassed, irritated, tired, and far too aware that Rem had seen him turned into a roll of red meat. But beneath all of that, there was something useful: he was no longer afraid. Not like before. The first time the kagune came out, it had been a nightmare. The second, a threat. Now it was humiliating, yes, but not deadly. There was no blood. No screaming. No Elsa. Only a maintenance clearing, Subaru laughing like an idiot, Beatrice irritated, Emilia worried, and Rem trying not to smile.
That helped him.
He breathed.
He did not push.
He thought of letting go.
The first kagune loosened slightly.
"Good," Rem said.
Rem's voice was enough for him to almost tense again out of embarrassment.
"Do not distract him," Beatrice said.
"Rem only encouraged him," she replied.
"That is the problem, I suppose."
Link would have protested if he did not need all his concentration to avoid turning into a knot. Slowly, the kagune around his waist lost pressure. The one over his shoulder slid backward, leaving a wet mark on his clothes. The third, tangled around his legs, was the hardest. Every time Link tried to retract it, it pulled the other way as if it did not understand the concept of an orderly retreat.
"Think of folding a rope inward," Subaru suggested, more recovered now. "Not like a limb. Like gathering cable."
Link opened one eye.
"Cable?"
"Yeah. When you store something long and flexible, you don't yank it all at once. You guide it."
Beatrice stayed silent.
So did Ram.
Rem looked at Subaru.
"That comparison seems useful."
Subaru straightened, excited.
"Rem approved my analogy! I'm unstoppable today!"
Ram closed her eyes.
"Barusu needs very little to lose humility."
Link, though it hurt to admit it, used the image. A rope. Cable. Something long that had to be gathered without knots. The third kagune trembled, loosened around his leg, and began to retreat. It did not vanish all at once. It retracted into his back with unpleasant but controllable movements. Then the second. Then the first. When the last red limb sank beneath his skin, Link remained standing in the middle of the clearing, sweating, his shirt torn across the back, his dignity in ruins, and his entire body trembling from effort.
But he had done it.
Badly.
Ridiculously badly.
But he had done it.
Subaru applauded.
"Bravo! The sushi disassembled itself!"
Link picked up a small piece of compacted dirt and threw it at him. Subaru barely dodged it.
"Attempted murder with a clod!"
"Culinary warning."
Emilia approached a little, still smiling but with concern in her eyes.
"Are you okay?"
Link breathed deeply and nodded.
"Yes. Tired. Humiliated. But fine."
Puck floated around him.
"You managed to bring them out without losing consciousness. And retract them too, though the middle method was quite funny."
"Thanks for not softening it."
"You're welcome."
Beatrice crossed her arms.
"It was clumsy, dangerous, and pathetic, but less disastrous than expected."
Link looked at her.
"Is that a compliment?"
"Do not ruin it."
Rem approached with a light blanket she had brought as a precaution. Link did not understand until she pointed to his back. His shirt was torn open from the kagune's cuts, leaving part of his skin exposed and red marks where the limbs had emerged.
"You must cover yourself before returning to the mansion."
Link took the blanket carefully.
"Thank you, Rem."
"You must also change clothes. And wash the one you damaged."
"Yes, Rem."
Subaru raised a finger.
"I just want to say that, from a training perspective, this was a success. He brought out the kagune, didn't attack anyone, didn't break hedges, didn't faint in front of Beatrice, and only turned into sushi for, what, two minutes?"
"Three," Ram said.
"Ram kept count!"
"Ram wanted to know how long the spectacle lasted."
Link covered his back with the blanket and looked toward the ground, resigned.
"I'm never going to get over this, am I?"
Subaru smiled with unbearable tenderness.
"Brother, I'm going to mention it at your wedding."
"I'm not getting married."
Subaru looked at Rem.
Link grabbed him by the collar of his uniform before he could say anything.
"No."
"I didn't say anything."
"And you'll keep it that way."
Rem blinked, not fully understanding, while Ram seemed to have understood far too much.
The practice ended shortly afterward, not because Link wanted to stop, but because Beatrice declared that his mana flow was beginning to disorder itself and that only an idiot would insist after being wrapped up by his own limb. Subaru raised his hand to ask if that was a direct reference. Beatrice told him yes. Emilia suggested continuing another day more calmly. Rem recommended recording what had been learned to avoid repeating mistakes. Ram said the first point in the record should be "do not become rolled food." Puck supported the motion.
Link stopped listening after the third joke.
On the way back to the mansion, he walked with the blanket over his shoulders and the strange sensation of having moved forward. Not much. Not elegantly. But before, the kagune had been only terror, blood, and loss of control. Now it was also something that could come out in a clearing under supervision, move badly, tangle worse, and go back in without killing anyone. That had to count.
Subaru walked beside him, still with a dumb smile.
"Don't say sushi," Link warned.
"I wasn't going to say sushi."
"Or roll."
"Neither."
"Or food."
"You're limiting my creativity a lot."
"That's the goal."
Subaru looked forward, pretending seriousness.
"I was just going to say I'm proud of you."
Link glanced at him sideways.
"That sounds worse than the joke."
"I know. It's horrible when I'm sincere."
Link did not answer immediately. The hallway toward the mansion was approaching, and with it pending work, torn clothes, possible mockery from Ram, instructions from Rem, questions from Beatrice, and Roswaal's far too curious smile when he heard about the result.
"Thanks," he finally said.
Subaru smiled.
"You're welcome, sushi."
Link chased him.
Not too fast, because he was tired and the blanket almost fell from his shoulders, but fast enough for Subaru to scream through Roswaal's gardens as if a red beast were hunting him. Rem asked them not to run near the freshly repaired paths. Ram said Barusu deserved to trip for provoking the secondary guest. Emilia laughed, Puck floated after them narrating the chase as if it were a competition, and Beatrice disappeared toward her library, muttering that everyone was unbearable.
That afternoon did not end with a spectacular victory.
It ended with a torn shirt, a borrowed blanket, Subaru being chased for talking too much, and Link, despite having ended up tangled like sushi by his own kagune, learning something important.
His body was still his.
Problematic, abnormal, dangerous, and ridiculously clumsy.
But his.
And if he could learn to care for a garden without pulling it up by the roots, perhaps he could also learn to move those red limbs without destroying everything around him.
Though first, he would have to survive Subaru telling the story during dinner.