Chapter 6 – First Conversation
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“Um, hello!”

The woman turned to the direction of the anxious voice that had reached her ears and replied shortly after.

“Oh? Hello there. Are you lost, little child?” She asked in a relaxed tone as if she were used to this.

“No, I am only wandering around. Sorry if I have worried you.”

Astonished by the child’s formal words, she promptly replied, “Oh my, how polite! Which village are you from?”

After a brief pause, the child answered, “Um, I travelled here alone from the North, as I am an orphan.”

“You poor child…” Her expression softened as she crouched to level with the child and continued, “Did you want to ask me something?”

“Yes. May I take a look around your village? It looked very pretty from afar.”

The woman understood the child’s intentions. “I see. No need to worry. Children are free to go wherever they like. Would you like a tour from me?”

“Ah, yes please!” The child who no longer had any trace of anxiety lifted her heels at the woman’s kind offer.

Charmed by the previously frigid child’s sudden cherubic reaction, the woman rose and sunnily gestured the child to follow her.

“My name is Canna Miller. What’s yours?” Canna asked while smiling.

“I’m Cerelious. Sorry, I don’t know my last name.” The girl looked down in shame, but Canna was fully accepting.

“Nice to meet you, Cerelious.”

Hearing those words set off fireworks in Cerelious’s mind. She held herself close together and beamed, “Nice to meet you too, Canna!”

Canna was delighted by the joyous child walking beside her.

“Our village is one of the smaller ones but we’re all very happy. Starting early in the day, we feed the animals and take care of the crops. Thanks to everyone’s efforts, our bellies are always full.”

Canna gracefully pointed to the crop fields where many villagers were cultivating soil and reaping crops. The most common crops were wheat, corn, rice, potatoes, and carrots. One of the male villagers noticed Canna pointing at his direction and gave her a shout.

“Canna! Who’s that beside you?”

“She’s a visitor! I’m giving her a tour of our village!”

“Welcome, young lass!”

Cerelious waved to him with a smile. The man had tanned skin, was muscled, and seemed to be in his late twenties. Canna continued with the tour.

“This river is the reason why we’re all here. We harvest a lot more than we need, so we sell the extras to the merchants from Runia.”

—Runia Kingdom. Its huge white wall could be seen all the way from the forest. Calculated by supercomputers to be the most prosperous territory on Planet Eyne, it was nothing to scoff at.

“Oh! Would you like to meet my children? I have a son and daughter around your age.”

Stars twinkled in Cerelious’s eyes. “Yes, of course!”

Talking with children? That was probably a better idea than talking with adults. Now she would be able to learn the way that commoner children spoke. After all, it was quite worrying when Canna had found her speech to be overly prim. And really, Cerelious already knew about the structure of the village from her microchip. She just wanted to meet people and have fun.

“Hmm, they should be around the barn somewhere. Perhaps they can learn a few manners from you.”

After a few minutes, Canna and Cerelious were behind the large wooden barn. There was a boy lying on the grass and a girl picking flowers near him.

“Clay! Claire!” Canna waved at them.

The girl ran towards Canna to hug her. “Mama!”

The boy waved back to Canna while continuing to lie on the grass.

“Claire, this is Cerelious. She’s visiting our village.”

Claire gazed at Cerelious, who was cloaked in a robe with only her face clearly exposed, and then shouted, “Hi sur ellie!”

Ah. The name was too hard to pronounce. But Canna looked pleased at her daughter, who tried her best.

Cerelious grinned. “That’s okay—call me Cere. Nice to meet you, Claire!”

“Sair!” Claire was radiating with innocence.

The three made their way towards the boy on the grass. Canna spoke first.

“Clay!” She rebuked him for his attitude but then continued calmly, “This is Cere, she is a visitor. Be friendly to her, okay?”

Clay moved his eyes to look at Cere. He then stood up.

“Hey, I’m Clay.” He spoke aloofly.

“Hi Clay, nice to meet you.” Cere tilted her head and smiled with closed crescents.

“Alright, I’m going to head back to the farm. You two take care of Cere, okay?”

“Okay Mama!”

“Yeah.”

Clay and Claire both had chestnut-colored hair and peachy skin. Clay was a seven-year-old boy with short and disheveled hair while Claire was a five-year-old girl with a ponytail. Although their clothes were plain, they were in good condition—it was easy to tell that Canna was a good mother.

“I wanna play tag!” Claire repeatedly leapt in the air with arms braced to her chest.

“Again?” Clay sighed, “Tomorrow, ok?”

Claire’s excitement evaporated, she lost all expression, and then said plainly, “What are we doing then?”

Clay was dumbfounded at his little sister's caprice. “Uhh, how about ‘rocks in a basket’?”

“Hmm, fine. Cere let’s play!” Claire said while tugging on Cere’s robe.

“Yes, lets! How do we play?”

Claire turned to look at her brother, expecting him to do the explaining.

Clay’s eyebrows wrinkled at Cere’s ignorance, but he spoke smoothly, “We throw rocks into a faraway basket. Missing means losing.”

After explaining, Clay went into the barn and brought out a sturdy tall basket filled with pebbles. He then poured around half of the pebbles onto the grass and placed the basket about four meters away.

“Here.” Clay offered a pebble to Cere.

“Oh, thank you.” She took it from his hand.

Clay then picked up a pebble for himself and threw it underhand toward the basket, to which it went in. He was expressionless but glanced at Cere to see if she was watching.

Cere’s eyes were glimmering, but not at Clay—she was just really excited to be playing with children her age, though it was impossible for Clay to know that.

Now it was Claire’s turn. With a clean pitch, the pebble landed into the basket flawlessly. Claire then placed both of her hands on her hips, puffed out her chest, and said calmly, “Your turn, Cere.”

“Rah!” Cere shouted as she hurled the pebble, to which it bounced on the basket’s rim before falling inside.

“Woow!” Claire was genuinely impressed.

Clay was impressed as well, but he didn’t show on his face. After all, the two siblings have played this game too many times. In fact, Clay only placed it at such a close distance for Cere’s sake, expecting her to miss.

But after each had taken ten more turns, it became clear that four meters was too easy for all of them. And so, Clay moved the basket one meter further.

Things started to heat up a little. After ten more turns each, it seemed that five meters was also too easy. So then, Clay had to yet again move the bask—

“Hey losers!” A new voice had appeared. At least, to Cere.

“Buh! Brother, it’s them again!” But the siblings knew that voice all too well.

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