Chương 39: Paid In Exposure

June stood in front of his crystallizing old form of burden.

'No wonder Julian was scared of me.' June stood in front of the statue of flesh in heavy-duty work pants and his old crew jacket; his locker was where he kept everything, since he didn't have many belongings in the nightrealm anyway. Everything except the book on worm ovulation, it was destroyed along with the rest of the convoy. The bone filament armor he wore during his little disagreement with Mortimer was a skill he picked up during the trek.

It was a sad excuse for armor since it was more akin to plastic; it was less of armor that kept damage out, but kept it in, swords and teeth would sink into it and then get stuck, which made it easy to finish off prey, and blunt damage was disappeared easier since the filament was thick enough to absorb and distribute the shock around.

'It still hurt like hell, though.' Most tricks June picked up on the trek would either be improved upon or trashed once he gets the time to refine them. A decently large crowd of people kept their distance from the soulless flesh golem, but ever since June took a step out of the crowd has slowly gotten larger over time.

He did his best to ignore them, and the aviators June wore helped people not catch as many glimpses of his eyes as his old glasses did June observed his work for a good while before a platoon of knights arrived on horses, and they escorted two carriages, one was overly decorated and unnecessarily bejeweled, and the other behind the decorated carriage that was simply wood; it was plain with no bejeweling at all.

June turned around and walked toward the platoon of knights and their gigantic steeds with his arms clasped behind his back. He could have been mistaken for a general with his poise and emotionless expression if the horses weren't disobeying their riders and crowding to lick the short man despite the giant demonic statue of flesh behind him. It was almost comical that the noble knights were profusely apologizing as their uncontrolled horses surrounded the short man in a playful manner.

Eventually, the knights ended up dragging their begrudging steeds away from the now disheveled man. Some servants tried to roll out a red carpet, but even the carriage horses were trying to approach the man dressed in a mechanic's garb. The escort had to abandon all attempts at a gesture, and some of the knights made a circle around the poor man to prevent some of the horses that escaped their handlers from licking him again.

'I needed a shower anyway.'

June's mental image of an escort was in shambles; the red carpet actually happened just for the horses to go rampant. Every time he tried to have his fantasy moment of looking out the window wistfully and seeing the world go by as he evaluated tids and bits of the world's technological progress was ruined by a horse that had glued its face to the window. So, June, instead of having his prime fantasy moment, just awkwardly stared at a servant clutching the red carpet in their hands.

They weren't able to put it back in the cage's compartment, so they just held it awkwardly. Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. Little did he know, the situation outside the carriage was way worse than he could see outside the windowed doors; some knights were even bucked off their horses and were chasing after them on foot as the horses crowded together trying to get a peek at June.

June was hurriedly shoved into the servant's dorms as the rest dealt with the horses, they rushed him to take a bath, then they clothed him which he didn't like since it took a little too long, and now he stood beside Mortimer in front of a large dining table with the king and queen of the country at the end, Lilia was there which was nice, and four who June assumed were her siblings lined the table.

Despite June's pruned look and bath, he was disheveled and was wearing restrictive and tight formal wear that he quite evidently didn't like; he still had his aviators, but he had to fight off a horde of servants who kept telling him to take them off. Mortimer also looked a bit disheveled; his ducktail suit was covered in horse hairs, he failed to fully wipe off the horse slobber on his sleeves, his fancy shoes were muddy and covered in horse feces, and his coat was even coming undone at the back.

June himself saw Mortimer rushing towards the dining room, that were now standing from one of the upper stairs windows, as his ducktail got stuck on a screw on the stable fences. Despite all that, Mortimer looked professional, and oddly enough, June was able to smell joy from him. The kings spoke; his voice was stern and booming, and another was kind and soft.

"So, Mortimer, what was so important that you assembled the entire family?" The king at the moment was not wearing his crown; instead, he was wearing a larger, whitish woolen shirt, his legs were obscured by the table, but his face was chiseled, and his features were sharp, his nose was straight, and a faint stubble could be seen pattered on his face. He looked fairly young, but his hair was a frost white, similar to the tips of Lilias.

Mortimer had filled June in on the details of the royal family's split selves while he escorted June to the dining room. It surprised June, but that surprise only lasted on June's face for a few seconds; it wasn't much of a secret to the public anyway, since the royal family here was very open with the people, but to June, he had gotten tired of being surprised by everything the nightrealm offered a long time ago.

Mortimer answered in a jaded professional voice; he had a tinge of British in his accent, which was why June found it weird.

'Why isn't he fully British?' The kings both started laughing; the kind and soft voice was the one in control of the body.

"Do you hear that, brother?" The stern and booming voice was heaving while laughing, despite not controlling the body.

"Yes, yes, I do, brother." June was a bit confused. He fully zoned out. Why were they laughing? Are they laughing at me? No, Lilia, wait, no, Lilia's are also smiling?' June looked at his clothing and patted his hair to make sure he didn't have a chicken roosting on it somehow. The kings stood up with an ear-to-ear grin and walked over to June. Lilia was tall enough for him to have to look up to look her in the eye; her father, on the other hand, was almost as tall as the boss.

June leaned over to Mortimer and tugged on his sleeve to lean down, and he whispered.

'What was the punchline? Why is he laughing?" June moved his head back from Mortimer's ear to hear the king's whisper in his ear with a giddy voice.

"Whispering in front of others can be considered rude, and you need to speak quietly to whisper." June jumped when the stern king startled him with the sudden whisper. He thought he was in trouble until the king slapped him on the back a couple of times and started laughing.

"Boy, is it true you can sprout wings?"

"Y-yeah" The king slapped him on the back again playfully, and then the kind voice asked.

"Boy, is it true you can sprout bunny ears?"

"W-What? Probably?" June shrugged, and the king grabbed his shoulder, and the stern voice said in a serious tone while tightening his grip.

"Boy, is it true that you were smitten by my daughter?"

'That window looks nice to jump out of.'