Chapter 141
Morning duties. Prison beautification activities.
Clara approached me as I pretended to pull weeds on the yard while actually searching for poisonous herbs.
“You’ve been neglecting Furball lately.”
With a grave expression, she thrust the Furball she’d been cradling right up to my face.
“Didn’t you agree to be the godmother who raises it with all your heart? Has your allergic rhinitis flared up again? You’ve always been defenseless whenever the seasons change.”
“Meow.”
Furball yawning was unbearably cute, but I fought down the urge to make a fuss and maintained my composure.
Come to think of it, the rhinitis symptoms that used to visit like clockwork every autumn-to-winter transition hadn’t shown up this time.
My episodes of coughing up blood had decreased too, and my stamina seemed to have graduated from ‘hazardous waste’ to at least ‘recyclable material.’
I dusted the dirt off my hands, stood up, and said:
“I can’t help it. I don’t want Furball being put in danger because of me.”
Now that Viviana and Enoch had arrived, I couldn’t afford to have my weaknesses exposed.
Prisoner Number 25 had already used Furball as leverage to threaten me once before.
“You’re talking about Number 10, right? Number 8 and I gave her a thorough lesson. Wasn’t that enough? Or is this about Number 6, the love-life turncoat?”
“I can’t exactly carry Furball around with me at all times. Unless it has the strength of a first-class demonic beast, it’s an easy target.”
“Eliza and I have been training it rigorously. Recently, Numbers 20 and 21 joined as training instructors too. Tree-climbing and guerrilla drills to build muscle, hunting games for faster reflexes, scratching posts to hone those tiny claw-weapons, and so on.”
Clara pressed Furball’s plush paw to display its pointed little claws.
There was a dilemma: you had to protect the weak, and if you lacked the strength to do so, they became your vulnerability.
On top of that, if anything happened to Furball, Clara would grind Viviana to dust before I ever got the chance to harvest Viviana’s ability.
I sighed and stretched my aching back.
“That’s why Johann’s been looking after it in my place. With his years of experience as a cat butler, he’s a specialist with a deep understanding of felines.”
Eliza suddenly appeared, carrying a toy made from crow feathers and thread, and butted into the conversation.
“That’s right. He looks scary, but he absolutely adores Furball. There’s no such thing as a bad person among animal lovers.”
“Uh-huh, sure.”
Eliza, the fragile little sunshine character, occupied the same vulnerable position as Furball, so there was nothing to be gained from chatting with her at length.
Eliza grabbed me as I gave a half-hearted answer and tried to quietly slip away.
“Kido, it feels like you’ve been avoiding not just Furball but me too lately. Did I do something wrong? Tell me and I’ll fix it. We’re friends, aren’t we?”
‘Being weak is what’s wrong! Go toughen yourself up!’
‘Your existence could blow my cover at any moment!’
But if I cut Eliza off in front of Clara, the whole purpose of connecting those two as friends would be lost.
“Oh, it’s lunchtime. Johann! Let’s go eat with Furball!”
I waved toward Johann, who was sitting in the shade chewing on a blade of grass.
At my call, he rose to his feet with a look of reluctance, lumbered over, and looked down at me.
“Eat together? Or are you telling me to take Furball?”
“Together. Is that a problem?”
He blinked with an odd expression, then gave an unusually gentle smile.
“No. I just figured you liked eating alone, since you never asked.”
“I was either sleeping in or running late finishing my labor quota. You were the one who always left without a word.”
“Really? I won’t forget from now on.”
Johann, who had just treated me like a piece of luggage to be ‘remembered,’ walked over to Clara and snatched Furball from her arms.
“Number 7, you know what? This one likes me more than you.”
Johann scratched under Furball’s chin and flashed a smug grin.
“That’s…”
Clara trailed off as she gazed at Furball, who was purring contentedly.
Why was he suddenly provoking Clara, who was on our side? Was the man simply incapable of distinguishing friend from foe?
Johann set Furball on his shoulder and strode toward the dining hall with all the swagger in the world.
He looked exactly like an insufferably doting cat butler who wanted to show off his cat to the entire universe.
“Number 1, sir, that calico cat… you didn’t bring it here to eat it, did you?”
The prisoner who’d asked in a trembling voice, as if unable to fathom how anyone could do such a thing suddenly found the little topknot on his head bursting into flames.
“Aagh! My fashion’s pride and joy!”
“This happens to be a familiar of darkness and light that I’m raising. It’s not food, so watch your mouth.”
He pointed at Furball’s white fur and black markings and spoke with stern authority.
“You command familiars too? It just looks like a common stray…”
“Common? Stray?”
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