Three days have passed. I've been moving around a lot as Carine and Feyt, and I feel like I'm getting used to this now. I can now do things like eating lunch as Carine while watering the crops as Feyt, or hold two different conversations at the same time as both Carine and Feyt, what an improvement! I believe I can live a normal, peaceful life now. Sure, I can't do things that require heavy concentration like dancing as Carine and singing as Feyt at the same time... But I can never dance nor sing in my previous life anyways.

During the evening, after finishing work. Mom said she wanted to meet her friend who manages the pub across from our house.

"Feyt, want to come with me?"

Huh? Why would a kid like me go to a pub?

"I heard Ricent wants to play with you more~"

Ricent? Now where do I heard that name before?

 

 

"Hey Feyt! Kick the ball to me!"

It hurts, my ears hurts.

I covered my ears in order to reduce the pain, but it didn't help.

"Heyyyy! Kick it already!!"

Stop screaming so loud... I can't hear anything...

"Oi! If you don't want to play, just leave!"

No, I want to play, I want to make friends, mom and dad asked me too. But I can't play like this, why are they so loud? It hurts.

My parents told me to play outside with other kids, and try to make some friends. So I got outside and met a few other kids playing ball, most of them looked older than me. I introduced myself and asked if I can play along with them, they agreed. But then it became like this...

"Hey Feyt... You okay?"

One of the kids approached me. He has a shoulder length brown hair, and a similarly brown eyes. He seems older than me, as he was taller than me.

"Why are you covering your ears? Does it hurt? If it is, you shouldn't play."

"No! I need to play to make friends!"

"To make friends? If that's all you need, then I can be your friend!"

He smiled widely and proudly.

"Re-really?"

"Yeah! You can visit me if we want to play together!"

He pointed to a big house a bit away from where we were standing "See? That's my house! Big right? It has two floors!"

I pointed to my house in response to him.

"Um... Then, my house is there."

"Wait, we were living across each other?! I never see you around here though?"

"I... rarely left the house..."

"Oh... Okay then. By the way, why were you covering your ears back there?"

"It hurts..."

"Then you really shouldn't play."

I showed a small smile "That's alright, I already made a friend!"

"Yep! You got that right! Anyways, you should go home for now. Take care of your ears!"

"Thanks!"

As I was about to leave, I realized I've forgotten something.

"Oh! umm... My name is Feyt!"

"Oh right, I forgot too, my name's Ricent!"

Ricent was my first friend, I would go to his house anytime I'm allowed to by mom and dad, and we would play games like cards together in his house.

 

 

That memory seems to be from when Feyt is 9 years old. But Feyt's first friend huh? I guess I should go meet him.

"Okay mom!"

"Nice! Come on hurry up! I want to show her how tall you are now!"

It seems my mom is only concerned about bragging me to her friend.

 

I arrived at the pub, it was crowded and loud, my ears started to hurt. Ricent was there helping his mom at the counter, then he noticed me.

"Feyt! Oh uh... excuse me mom"

"Sure, Feyt's not good with loud places right? Bring him to your room."

Ricent jumped over the counter and walks up to me.

"Come on Feyt, you shouldn't be here for long"

"Have fun Feyt!"

"Okay mom"

I left my mom as she started to talk with her friend and followed Ricent upstairs.

 

I'm in Ricent's room right now. The room is bigger than mine, and the window actually uses glass instead of just a wooden door. I'm jealous... Wait, what am I jealous for? I live in a mansion as Carine for god's sake. The old Feyt must've been jealous about this room and that feeling is still bottled up in my body somehow.

"Are your ears fine?"

"Yeah, I'm fine, thanks."

Apparently, this body is not good at handling loud sounds.

Speaking of body, it appears that I'm almost as tall as Ricent now, even though I was tiny compared to him when we met for the first time. I see why mom wants to brag about me now. He's still taller though since he is 3 years older than me.

"What's wrong Feyt?"

"Uh, nothing! Let's play cards!"

"Sure! I'll beat you again, just wait for it haha!"

...

...

"Ugh, when did you get good at this?!"

We were playing a version of 'Old Maid' against each other, although in this world, the game is called 'The Bad Card'. This world has some good naming sense.

As I put down the last set of my cards, Ricent reveals that he has the 'Bad Card'... It's a simple name, but I really hate it.

"Hah... I lost..."

"Haha, I won!" I said triumphantly.

Of course, the only reason I managed to win was because of Ricent's poor poker face. I recall in Feyt's memories that Ricent does some weird faces whenever Feyt's about to pull the 'Bad Card' from his hand, past Feyt thinks nothing of it and because of that, Feyt lost most of the time.

Even though this is technically the first time I met Ricent, I feel like it's natural to hang around him, like we've been friends for years.

While we were playing, the crowd noises downstairs died down.

"Ah, the customers must've left already, let's play downstairs!"

"Um... Sure."

We headed for downstairs.

 

"Feyt talked back to me yesterday you know~ I'm glad he's growing up, but still~"

"Yeah... You're drunk... Oh, Ricent and Feyt! Welcome back!"

Ricent's mom is at the counter, with mom sitting across from her.

"Feyt~ Fait~ Say you love me again please~ Hwehwehwe~"

Yep, she's drunk. Actually, she looks like she's about to fall asleep.

The pub is not empty, there are still some customers here and there, but there's no more screaming and partying like before, my ears are safe.

"Ricent! Clean some of the tables first before you play with Feyt, some guy spilled drinks everywhere."

"Okay mom!"

Ricent went and started to clean the tables with a wet rag. I sat on the counter beside my sleeping drunk mom.

"Hwehwehwe, Fayn~ Don't touch there~"

 Yep, I don't want to hear more than this. I left the counter and started to look around the pub

In the corner of the pub, I see a piano. I never played a piano before, but I've always wanted to try. I walked up to the piano and sat down in front of the it, I noticed that the piano was dusty. I wiped some of the dusts of with my arm and started pressing some of the keys for fun.

"Hm? Feyt's playing the piano? Haha, your kid's curious as always Teffa."

"Oh~ Fayn~ Not there too~"

"Yeah, I'm not letting you drink in front of your kid again"

I've always wanted to learn how to play a piano, maybe to use it to get some attention from girls and what not. But I never had any time to learn it due to work, my work prevents me from doing anything really. You know what? Let's play some music! Since I'm a kid, they won't laugh if I did terribly right?

I wonder what song should I play, maybe something happy to mark my new chance in life? Let's try 'Canon in D', heard that song in a commercial once and it's been stuck in my head since. I've unconsciously hummed it in my mind, even to this day. So I hummed the song as I press the piano keys away, doing it while closing my eyes to look cool. No doubt it will sound horrible, but I'm only doing this for fun.

~~~

~~~

"That kid... His piano skill is something..." One of the costumers said while looking at Feyt

"Yeah... It feels calming somehow."

"I've never heard something like this before, it's calming..."

Ricent watches Feyt from one of the tables

"Feyt can play that?! Cool!"

Ricent's mom is staring wide eyed.

"...Not even I can play something like that..."

And Feyt's mom...

"Hehe~ Fayn~"

Is having a blissful dream.

 

---

 

During the same evening, after watching the students practice some new techniques, father asked me to meet with him in his room.

"What is it father?"

"Carine, your birthday is next week right?"

"Yes father, the Fifth day of the Second month."

The date and time in this world is similar albeit a bit different to the ones in my old world. The differences are that the 12 months don't have names, instead referred to with a number. And that every month consists of 30 days. I learned that both Feyt and Carine share the same birthday, the Fifth day of the Second month, or perhaps 'February 5th'. What a coincidence.

"You will reach the age of 13 by then, and to follow tradition, you must see how the people live outside of mansions and castles"

Ah, is he telling me not to act spoiled? I'm basically living Carine's life like a princess at this point, so I understand how it's needed to make sure I don't act too much like a princess outside of the house.

"I know that your treatment in this mansion isn't that luxurious..."

Not that luxurious? What does that mean? I'm living the best life here! In fact, I'm blown away on how overly luxurious my life as Carine is. My room is big and elegant. There's a library full of books I can read if I'm bored. And, aside from the diet breakfast, I'm allowed to eat any food I like as long as I request it to the chef before hand. Though I only ever requested once, a burger. The chef was confused about my request, so I instructed him about burgers. I said lines like 'It's the best cuisine!' or 'No ingredients wasted! Everything compact!'. I then realized how cringy I was and never requested anything from the chef again.

"Father, I believe that my life is already luxurious. Actually, I would request that the chandelier in my room to be removed..."

It's annoying to be honest, the sun reflects off the gold and it hurts my eyes whenever I wake up. I feel like my eyes are very sensitive for some reason... Is this a side effect of [Enhanced Sight]?

"Haha, modest as always I see. I'll see if we can do that."

What part about Carine's life is modest??

"Anyways, you need to see how the commoners live. You would need that knowledge if you were ever to become an heir to the Sareid Family. So, I decided that it would be best for you if we explore a village in the kingdom together."

"Understood father."

"Good, you may leave."

I faced the door and two maids opened the door for me. Yep, nothing about this is modest.

 

---

 

Carine can be a bit less modest to be honest. As her father, I'm worried.

To commoners, she may live a luxurious life. But to other nobles, it's almost a joke how modest she is. She rarely want any dresses, and accepted any that we recommend without looking at it herself. She also never requested for something like a diamond chandelier, or a pool to be built in the garden like many other noble kids do. Of course, if she requested something like that, I would reprimand her, I even wrote some cool quotes I could use like 'A noble should think of the citizens first!'. But instead, she wanted to remove the golden chandelier in her room, removing any chance from me to use my cool quotes...

How modest can she be? I believe she's even more mature than me sometimes. I don't think visiting the country side to learn modesty is even needed for her at this point, but it's tradition.

Either way, I need to keep a close eye on her while we're there. Who knows if those mysterious group already caught the wind about Carine's Unique Talent. I heard that someone sneaked in the Capital's royal archives, though nothing was stolen. But they may have read the information about Carine, so I need to be extra careful tomorrow. This isn't what I usually do, but I'll assign some guards to monitor us discreetly and hopefully I won't have to unsheathe my sword.