"I would suggest not, milady." An elegant, smooth, yet worry-filled voice spoke in her ear, gesturing that her trusted companion finally found it appropriate to intervene.
"Oh, Julius-kun? Your lady was insulted by some little child and you're just gonna let it go?" Anastasia mused cheerfully and a little snidely from her seat.
The knight simply bowed his head and removed his hand from hers with a look of seriousness overcoming his expression.
"My apologies, Anastasia-sama. But that is no mere girl you were trying to finesse."
Anastasia's lips thinned once more, her expression calmed, her eyes softened.
"Ah, I guess it's true then."
Julius nodded his head to his lady as she muttered in melancholic acceptance.
"The rumors and my brother's reports were all true. Natsuki Subaru is a spirit knight. And that little girl is a great spirit." Julius said in a firm way required by any knight reporting to their master. Anastasia had to believe him, he was the only one in this room able to sense a spiritual entity since he had the protection to do so… maybe Reinhard could do that too but she couldn't have him in her camp… unfortunately.
Her eyes trailing back to the elegant spirit girl, Anastasia could only bite her lip in frustration as the need for information wasn't quenched within her. Making her mind run through hundreds of ways to get anything so she could end her greedy thirst to know more about this fascinating world of the boy's.
Luckily, she wasn't the only person who was curious about the subject.
"Betty-san… Do you know this place? Do you know anything of Subaru's home?"
The grand spirit only snorted at Emilia's innocent question. The amusement that this girl, hogging her contractor's arm as if he is precious to her while not knowing what Beatrice knew, truly delighted the spirit.
"I doubt Betty's Subaru would tell any of you, in fact. None of you have the same connection as his spirit does."
Emilia and Rem looked a bit taken aback as they both felt personally attacked by the small girl's proud tone and smug smirk as she continued to stare at the screen.
"So… Subaru told you about his home before?" Emilia asked her question with disappointment and hurt appearing on her expression.
"Hmph, of course! Betty's contractor would spend many nights telling Betty of his home and the many fantastical concepts his people have achieved, stories of wonder and pure creative imagination that Betty wouldn't believe had it not been my contractor telling them to Betty." As Beatrice crossed her arms and held her head high, she wore a dignified and proud expression, one telling of her elegant stature, as she noticed most of the people around her were looking at her with extreme interest.
"If I may, great spirit-sama." Beako turned to meet the questioner behind her, a polite, curious, yet stern, noble lady that sat far away behind Emilia's camp yet had her eyes firmly focused on them.
"I would like to know more about where this place is and why Subaru-sama left it for a country much less advanced."
Beatrice simply snorted at Crusch, her response completely deadpan at the duchess's demand.
"Betty's contractor told her of things you and these other ones around us wouldn't even comprehend, much less believe. A year's worth of tales every night only made Betty thirst for more knowledge and understanding of what he explained to me. He's special origins and way of life stays with no one but Betty because she's his spirit, in fact."
"B-But Beatrice-sama! We only want to know more about Subaru-ku-"
"I won't nudge on this matter, maid. It's Subaru's stories to share, in fact." Beatrice, completely shutting down everyone's questions about Subaru's homelife and refuting the hurtful Rem, sat in her seat with her face focused on the screen and a hand tangled with her sleeping contractor's arm. He's special. That's why she chose him.
"Could you at least explain what that metal carriage was, Beatrice-sama?" At the soft, curious, and innocent voice of the small maid sitting in the back and asking her nervously, Beatrice sighed and shook her head in annoyance.
"I can explain that, I suppose." Everyone, from the ever curious Reinhard, and the interested Julius to the excited Garfiel and anticipating Otto to even the quite upset yet still curious Emilia was now looking at the small spirit as she held her head high to explain Petra's question.
The small maid jumped in her seat with excitement.
"That metal box you saw moving on wheels was a new way of transportation that Subaru explained to me as the upgrade to what we call Dragon-drawn Carriages, I suppose. Subaru's people call it a 'car'."
"Da fuck's a car?"
"Garfiel!"
"What?"
Ignoring the reprimanding Frederica and the confused Garfiel, Beatrice continued to explain to the ever, curious, excited, and jealous crowd with a stern expression of nobility and pride.
"It's what people in Subaru's home use for faster travel. They don't have ground dragons at all on his island so they created a metal box with wheels on it that drives faster and much smoother than a dragon, in fact." Beatrice explained to the amazed crowd.
"Subaru's home achieved travel faster than dragons?" Reinhard asked with astonishment and childlike awe at the information.
Julius, Anastasia, and Crusch all started scheming of a way to get their hands on such designs and information, finding such inventions to be revolutionary.
Garfiel and Otto were just wondering how cool it would be to drive one and race with it. Or that was the case for Garf… Otto wanted to know if there was a cup holder in them or not.
"Wow, Bro's home is for smarty pants huh." Felt mused while holding her hands behind her head and watching the scene with an amused smile.
Priscilla simply raised a single brow for a moment but then carried on fanning herself with disinterest, since she couldn't care less about inventions that didn't give her power to fight her wars.
After her explanation to the crowd, Beatrice held her contractor's arm dutifully and held a small smile of pleasant happiness… Not noticing how Emilia was glancing between her and Subaru's sleeping face with heartbreak in her eyes. The half-elven girl appearing heartbroken that her knight wouldn't share such details and cool stories with her.
"Does such a country exist on our world, Roswaal-sama?" A stern, yet truly surprised pink-haired maid asked as she turned to her clownish lord, who was watching the screen with nothing short of an awestruck expression.
"Hmmmm…" The man hummed as his multi-colored eyes were set around the boy. "Teacher would've loved this… or did she already know about this? Why hasn't she inscribed her gospel with this knowledge for me, I wonder… Could she have been looking for Subaru's world this whole time?" The clown remembered of days where his teacher spent most of her lifeline, looking for a Sanctuary, suited for her thirst for knowledge and the safety of everyone she loved.
Could this be Echidna's long desired destiny?
"We might have to start making Subaru-kun shaaaare his storytime with the rest of us… Please note this once we get out of here, dear Ram."
"Understood, Roswaal-sama." The pink-haired maid bowed to her lord's serious order.
The scene changed back to the slow-moving hand as it finally reached the limp one of the girl's.
Subaru's revealed to be the owner of the hand with his mouth bleeding and his face grimacing from the pain.
"Going to… " He voiced out through blood sprouting throat.
"I feel as if this is foreshadowing an event."
A great deal of confusion settled amongst everyone watching, whilst seeing the young man they cared for in such a dire position, the huddled camp of his closest friends only watched with baited breaths and disenchanted eyes as if the event truly held no form of emotion within them, except for bewilderment.
"If this is all fake, we can simply ignore it. If it's a telling of a future unforeseen to us, we might learn from it to stop said events from happening."
Seeing the huddled camp members of the bewitched and worried half-elf do nothing but stare at the screen with expressions raging from confusion, to disbelief, to sheer hurt and anger for Subaru's state, Julius Juukilius took it upon himself to fulfill the noble duchess's query with his own theorized answer as he watched with an apprehensive face.
If nothing could be explained to them, they shouldn't take this event seriously, though it hurt to see his dear impulsive comrade in such pain.
He would learn to stop this memory from existing. All he needed was to watch and understand what this warden was trying to show them.
"This all must be shown for a reason… But why is it about Natsuki-san… Why is he always the one dying…" Like Julius behind him, Otto Swen; the official head of the interior for Emilia's camp, has been staring at the screen with his blue eyes shining with determination to understand the entire cause of this. His hands gripped a small, hidden pocket that was malformed in the shape of a decent square thing. His fingers sliding across his cloth and touching the object in his pocket with varying brevity and hesitation. A need for this object to answer his frustrations and questions. As he watched his brother bleeding on the ground, not understanding a single thing happening either on the screen or in the real world, the merchant boy held the burnt gospel in his pocket and wished for it to tell him all of the answers he needed to save his dear friends from this warden and maybe explain what the screen was trying to tell them.
Alas, he wasn't in the water gate city and he had no way to turn this useless chunk of burnt crisp sitting in his pocket into the grand tome of foreseeing it used to be… Otto had no other way to help his friends but to keep a strong face and not break down emotionally from whatever they were seeing… He'd already seen Subaru die once… this was another time where his friend was bleeding out again. They were before all of these important and dangerous personalities that were considered to be virtually their greatest rivals for the throne.
Whatever this will show, Otto needed to keep this camp together and hide anything that may be revealed to the other scheming characters less they use such information against Emilia or Subaru.
He had to list all of these problems and start finding ways to instantly fix them while complying with the person placing them here. It wasn't really helping that his friend's origin was being revealed to all of the opportunistic and shrewd schemers sitting behind him. He had no power to face down Anastasia once she starts scheming to get her hands on Subaru's origin… He can see Roswaal's eyes shining with interest and that on its own set extreme red flags in his mind. The nasty noble lady in the back had such an intense glare as she watched the scene of Subaru's bleeding face, Otto couldn't help but feel disgusted that she maybe annoyed that she had to sit and watch his friend's death… like he wasn't significant.
Otto didn't like this at all… and his frustration was driving his desperation to get any sort of upper hand through this mental cold war that suddenly sprung up as soon as this warden guy picked Subaru as his subject.
The scene returned to Subaru as he walked out of the building's parking lot with a white plastic bag in his hand.
"Looks like it changed again…" Emilia said as her face held a very apprehensive expression towards the screen, not liking how she had to see Subaru bleed out while she was beside him as a corpse once again. The very first time was enough for her to vow that she will protect this boy at all costs, hence why she was holding his arm with both of hers while watching the scene in discontent. She didn't like how useless she appeared in both visions.
But she carried on watching with a strong facade to understand why this window always showed her knight in a horrible situation.
"We must find a way to free Subaru of this curse and get out of here!" Rem whispered harshly as her blue eyes shined with determination throughout the darkened theater, looking and scanning the room for any notable detail that might aid in her escape.
Deciding that he's had enough from standing there, Subaru began walking across the wide street with his hand in his pocket...
And then…
A sharp-clawed hand, coated in a mist of darkness was shown cutting out of a white wall of space and reaching right towards Subaru.
A fearful scream was heard from both, Petra as she held on to Frederica with her face displaying fright, and Hetaro as he held on to his oppositely excited twin, Mimi.
"What was that?!" Felt shouted as she stood in alarm at the sight of the claws coming for Subaru.
The sense of alarm filled most of the knights as Felix, Julius and Reinhard glared with varied descriptions of alarm, desperation to jump in and help, or fear of what may come for this version of the boy.
"Why is it coming for him?! Subaru-kun is just walking to his home!" Rem seethed as she let her search for an exit cease for just a moment. She really didn't want to dwell on anything this screen will show them since it was all fake with a hint of truth like Subaru's home and such, but the sheer fact that a subaru would be hurt in front of her was enough to make her heart clench in guilt and vengeful fury.
Beatrice and Emilia looked at one another with their eyes wide, and then glanced towards the boy beside them. Just to make sure that they both were holding his hands and keeping him strapped between them.
"Whatever, this is, it will not touch Betty's contractor, I suppose!" The small girl grumbled while holding the boy's hand and glaring at the hand in anger. Memorizing and looking for any information related to such magic inside of her brain since she knew the contents of her mother's library by heart… To her shock, she couldn't find anything relating to such a hand.
Something that made Beatrice tremble a bit as she saw another threat that she wasn't familiar with attacking her Subaru once more.
"If Subaru gets attacked here… If he… If he doesn't make it, how did he leave his island home and come to us?" Emilia's soft voice trailed as she thought back to all three visions that showed her knight either bleeding out to death, or now attacked in his own town. Her thoughts were jumbled and confused as she couldn't make sense of all of this, her only comfort was to attach herself in his warmth as she hugged his arm while watching with wide eyes.
"I'd advise not getting emotionally invested yet, Emilia-sama." Crusch spoke, monotonously, as she rubbed her chin while watching calmly. "This could be a hoax made by our captor."
Once again, the same sentiment filled everyone's mind.
This could all be fake.