Chapter 123 – Critical Questions
A feline male staff from the inn was carrying a heavy box and passing by the reception counter. The problem was that the box was visibly too heavy for a rank 0 like him. He was wobbling unstably right in front of the lady who had gotten us our rooms the previous day.
Eventually, the obvious happened and he stumbled, bumping into the woman. Her face became enraged as she sent a big slap at him. He let a cry of pain at the sudden attack, depositing his load on the floor.
“Damn you! Can’t you look in front of you? How dare you touch me, you lowlife!”
Gone were her amiable manners and respectful conduct. She looked like she was dirtied by what happened, disgusted by the man in front of her. She sent him another slap, followed by a punch. The poor man went down to the floor and she kicked him a few times, letting her rage out without restraint.
“Incompetent! I can’t believe we work in the same place! Dirty male!”
The man was curled in a ball, shouting in pain at every hit but not daring to do anything. The woman only stopped hitting him when she noticed us arriving. She turned toward us, her professional smile back on her face.
“I’m sorry for the unsightly display, dear ladies and sir.”
I couldn’t help intervening at this point.
“Could you please forgive him as a favor to me?”
“Of course, sir.”
She looked back at the man and howled.
“Hey! Get up already! So useless! Get back to work!”
He stood back on his feet while trembling in pain, lifted the box again, and moved toward a back door.
If this was how men were treated in this country, it was no wonder they always rebelled. We quickly checked out, our mood dampened by the woman relieving her stress on an innocent worker. Selva let out a final remark when we were in the stables.
“I hate this country.”
I couldn’t help agreeing with her a little. The previous day, I blabbered about Makji conquering their neighbors and reigning supreme in the region but I didn’t think it could ever happen with the country’s current culture. There was no way a place that wasn’t stable internally could conquer others. Due to the constant internal turmoil, they also had the smallest population out of the three competing states. They liked to call themselves a country of fewer elite people but that was just basic propaganda. From my point of view, unless they dramatically changed their way of thinking, they would eventually implode.
I prepared the horses and soon enough, we were back on the road, now going sensibly faster due to a much lesser load. Six horses were too many to pull an empty carriage with only three people inside. At least, I was glad to see they didn’t struggle and trotted at a comfortable pace forward.
Now, the real problem was to avoid falling asleep after the sleepless night I went through. I decided to ask Wico some important questions I had been putting on hold for a long while due to being insecure about who I was talking to. Since we were now much closer, I believed there shouldn’t be a problem now.
“Master, you know about the dome south of Geola?”
My question attracted Selva’s attention too. We met while she was trying to break it, after all.
“What about it?”
“I’ve always been curious about the domes. You’ve seen a lot in your life, right? Do you know what it looks like inside?”
“How could I know? No one knows. The only thing we know is that it’s supposed to be inhabited by humans. Who knows if they’re still alive inside that stuff.”
It was the first time I heard the term human in the outside world.
“I’ve heard about humans but what are they? And why did they lock themselves inside the domes?”
“I don’t know much either. I heard they were just another species. Something happened a long time ago and they secluded themselves inside the domes.”
“All of them?”
“Yes, but who knows the truth? It happened so long ago.”
“I see.”
I had many more questions but didn’t dare ask too much in one go. I wanted to know how people felt about humans. I also wanted to know why I hadn’t seen anyone with space affinity. The answers to these questions were necessary before I could reveal myself for what I was in the outer world.
While I was lost in my thoughts, Selva took the chance to ask something too.
“Master, why did women here start thinking that men are lower than them?”
“It’s a stupid story. But before going into that, we need a bit of history for context. Do you two know about the Taende empire north of here?”
We nodded and she continued.
“Well, around 110 years ago, this whole region was part of the Taende empire.”
“The whole region? Do you mean, everything?”
“That's right. Makji, Taifau, Thuk, and even Geola, of course. But that’s not all. Many of the countries north of the empire were also part of it in the past. You could say the empire was dominating the continent. However, it was also old and very bureaucratic. And with age comes corruption. It was everywhere, from the lowest officials to the members of the imperial government. The population was oppressed and eventually revolted all over the empire. Since everyone took arms simultaneously, the empire was overwhelmed, especially because the ones leading the revolts were often the elites with high ranks. And this is when we go back to our topic. The ones who led the revolution in this part of the empire were a feline couple, a man and a woman, who took over the region and declared themselves an independent country. The couple were deeply in love with each other and chose to reign as a duo of queen and king of the newly founded Makji kingdom.”
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