Claud stared out of the window, his eyes fixated on the little shadows…waddling about. As for the reason behind his choice of word for those little fellows, it was due to their tendencies to act like a toddler.

In fact, they might actually be toddlers.

“Maybe we should bring one back here and examine it,” Lily suggested, swaying side to side and nudging him every few seconds. “How does that sound?”

“That’s too dangerous,” Claud replied. “I’ll rather use the Second Shadow and interact with them that way.”

He paused. “Actually, that’s a rather good plan, isn’t it? A lot of people must have examined those little shadow children with similar methods before, and the fact that Count Lostfon sent out a decree regarding interaction between us and those little shadows proves that the great Dark is at least open to the idea of us playing with them.”

“In that case, is using the Second Shadow actually necessary?” Lily asked. “I think going as our actual selves wouldn’t be a problem at all. In fact, being too paranoid might raise the Dark’s guard.”

Claud knew what she was referring to; sometimes, when the two of them mustered enough courage to have food in the tavern downstairs, a few shadowy children could be seen occupying the seats and swinging their legs like normal children.

“I suppose we can go down into the tavern as ourselves,” Claud acknowledged. “Besides, using the Second Shadow downstairs is odd. It’ll scare the poor old man and it’s pointless to boot.”

After all, the Dark had seen them in the tavern a few times already. If two shadows took their place, the entity known as the great Dark might just piece together two and two, thereby figuring out that the two of them could create shadows.

Not fun.

“And I suppose we can expand our range of movement now,” said Lily. “The great Dark doesn’t seem to care about us. Other than using this place as a venue to increase their forces, there’s virtually no limitation on us.”

“We can’t leave the city, though.”

“Do you want to?” Lily eyed him. “It’s a war out there.”

In the one month that had passed, Claud and Lily had seen troops of tri-coloured lunar light duke it out with shadowy soldiers. The soldiers of the Moons were far greater in number, compared to that of the Dark, but every battle had always ended in the utter annihilation of both sides. Was he looking at the design philosophy of both sides, or was it just their opening strategy? Claud didn’t know, but the fact that the war in Vacuos County was still a statemate was very welcome news.

In fact, given that the Dark was going to descend first, Claud had the feeling that the balance of power would tilt soon. The hourglass that represented the Dark had slightly less than one quarter left, and if he concentrated hard enough, something in his heart told him that it would descend shortly after Half Moon started.

“A season, huh.”

“Hmm?”

“I was just thinking of that odd method of measuring time,” Claud replied. “Usually we split the calendar into the phases of the Moons, right? And we don’t really have the four seasons, unlike the other continents.”

Nero had mentioned that fascinating fact one fine day over drinks, which had only resurfaced today when he abruptly thought of the intriguing choice of words behind this proclamation. From what he could tell, every two or three — it was hard to tell — phases of the Moons were equivalent to an entire season. He had a feeling that this was actually rather important for one reason or another, but he couldn’t place a finger on it.

“Why do you think it’s important?” Lily asked.

“I’m struggling with an answer to that question right now,” Claud replied, before poking her cheek. The springiness of her cheek was nice to the touch, but that little pout she created in response stopped him from poking her other cheek; the last time he did that, Lily had nibbled at his finger.

Therefore, to prevent himself from dying from cuteness overload, Claud opted to pat her head instead.

“Hmm. So it’s your instincts?” Lily asked, tilting her head. “We should definitely look into that.”

Claud opened his quest list and shook his head. Other than a bunch of question marks that were almost certainly personal quests asking for the immediate violent pacification of the remaining Bearers of Destiny, there was nothing else on them. As insurance, he even counted the remaining Bearers against the number of entries, and they matched perfectly.

“Nothing to do with a personal quest,” Claud replied.

“Those things are obsessions personified.” Lily’s eyes carried a hint of distance as she said those words. “It’s natural that we thought that it was a quest of sorts.”

“I’m not sure what to think of the fact that my personal quests all revolve around the Bearers of Destiny.” Claud’s vision flickered once. “And I have a feeling that something was messed up in the process too. From what you said, the quest log and one’s personal quests appear together, right? It definitely wasn’t the case for me.”

“Your Status is being manipulated?” Lily asked.

“It took me quite some time to come to that conclusion,” Claud admitted. “You’re a lot faster than me.”

“Well, you’re quite the normal person, a few quirks aside,” Lily replied.

“Hah! Isn’t that true for everyone?” Claud asked, flicking her forehead. “Everyone’s normal till they’re not normal, so I don’t really see the issue here. Anyway, should we check out the little shadow babies? My instincts tell me that they’re actually important.”

“Of course they’re important, dummy.” Lily rolled her eyes. “You’re stating the obvious here. In my opinion, though, they represent a deeper layer to the great Dark’s plans, whatever those plans are. If we play with them, get them some food…we might learn something.”

“I don’t think those little fellows communicate the way we do,” Claud replied, “but they sure carry an odd charm to them. Like babies and toddlers. Do you get the urge to feed them once in a while?”

“I’m not alone in that regard?” Lily paused. “Silly me. Of course we’ll have similar thoughts. But what would these little fellows like?”

“Your sweets!”

“You just want more chocolate pies, right?” Lily eyed him. “You’ve never stopped badgering me about them ever since I baked a few.”

Claud immediately put on his best ‘pretty please’ face, which made her laugh. Turning away from the window, she made a little noise in her throat and said, “I bake chocolate treats for you alone, though. Are you sure you want me to break this rule and share them with a bunch of unknown little shadows?”

“Ugh!” Claud reeled back from the window. “Never mind. I’m sure they’ll be happy with some raspberry biscuits and small sweets, right?”

“Right you are,” Lily replied, playing along. “And guess what? I’ve some here…oh, wrong one, sorry.”

She stuffed a red packet marked with the word ‘Danger’ back into her backpack, before pulling out a light red packet. Opening it a moment later to reveal a bunch of spheres, she tossed one into her mouth and handed another over to Claud, who popped it into his mouth immediately.

While he savoured the gentle tangy sweet, Claud said, “Maybe you should use a different colour to wrap your sweets.”

“I ran out of blue paper, okay?” Lily rolled her eyes. “Besides, all my explosives now have stickers on them. I’ll have to be crazy to open the wrong package, and even if I do, I think I can survive the—”

“Nope, nope, nope. Don’t say that,” Claud replied. “That’s called tempting fate, okay? I’ve seen lots of cases where someone said things like ‘I won’t need that’, only to end up needing it in the last minute. Proof? Me.”

“You?”

“Well, back when I was paying a nocturnal visit to Duke Istrel’s treasury…” Claud paused. “My memory is a bit hazy, but if I remember correctly, I took on a dare to show off that certain skill, and I ended up having no access to it during the heist itself.”

“Wait, what?” Lily looked at him. “That’s totally unlike you.”

Claud fell silent, and then hugged Lily once. He could feel his body trembling uncontrollably as he muttered, “Yeah, that’s what I thought so too.”

Lily breathed in sharply at those words, and soft hands patted his back for a moment. The memory of that heist was quite the blur to him, which was once again unlike him. All this pointed at the possibility that someone or something had indeed tampered with him at some point in the heist, because he could only remember vague details and his first and only haul from it.

He glanced at Crown, who was chilling away with Throne, and then shrugged. There was no point thinking about it now anyway. Unless he could peer into the past, any time spent on this optic would be better used with having fun with Lily.

“Come on,” said Claud. “Let’s check those little fellows.”