Zai Tianci was right all along.
This thing his father had ordered him to marry was a monster, a creature taken from the depths of the human genome and brought into existence by the crucible of blood that was the Ensolian Imperium. In a land where the word of each Imperial heir was measured with a silver sword to their necks, where each sibling would be at all times be planning the sick, slow deaths of their own kin; Sophia Elise came into existence.
A usage of that beauty and grace in the most compromising ways: each word spoken from her mouth and each movement of her body seeming calculated to grow closer to him with a blade in her hand.
Just three weeks into her studies and she was long past the initial basics of alphabetical memorization and knee deep into grammar. From sounding out words like a babbling toddler she was now stringing basic sentences as she slowly perused the newspapers that some of the maids brought in from town.
This was a mind that was honed with a deadly intellect like the lethal edge of a mono-molecular blade.
And Zai, as the weeks rolled by, was starting to truly fear her. How as the clock would slowly approach the second hour of the afternoon each day he would feel that knot in his heart tightening, his face flushing, an excitement from this strange corrupted desire of a stable schedule.
And today, as the sun was beginning to set to the west, Zai retreated as usual back to his room after a long, multi-hour long session of tutoring his own assassin the Tiancin language.
Desperate boredom was a terrifying thing, and like a sailor marooned on a salt lake he was beginning to drink from the very water that would kill him.
But there simply wasn’t anything to do here.
He used to live without pause; morning to night, in Landfall the moment Zai Tianci woke from his bed to the moment he fell unconscious he would always be doing something: reading missives, composing intelligence reports; subtly adjusting the spinning wheels of political maneuverings or dodging attempted assassinations; keeping the lid on national crises or even perusing mundane letters from foreign dignitaries -- but out here in Port Azuru there was nothing except the house, Sophia, and whatever entertainment could be gathered from the town.
Nearly a month in Port Azuru, and Zai Tianci was starting to crack.
He carefully opens the door to his room, watching as the thin shafts of light filters into the dark space through shut curtains. Clean to a razor's edge, his personal space left with practically no imperfections within its organization of clothing, furniture, bedding, and even his own personal tea set.
A tea set that was in the midst of brewing a fresh cup, wafting the flowery sweet scent of jasmine into the room.
He gives a small, obviously tired sigh. “What do you want, Mori?”
The voice comes from above, within the vaulted ceilings and their structural beams crossing one another lay a lethal predator in hiding. Guardsman Fushimi casually speaks, a twirl to her voice as she swallows something in her mouth. “Just checking up on you Zai.”
“You were just ‘checking up on me’ two hours ago.” He replies.
“Well at the time you were with your wife, and now you’re not.” She continues off handedly, remaining up in the rafters as she leans back on her roost. “So, need to check up on you again~”
Despite all her antics, she still followed protocol as any Guardsman did.
“Here I am.” Zai moves towards the table with the brewing tea, taking a quick moment to check the progress of the steaming leaves within.
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“Yes you are.” Mori confirms.
There’s silence for a while, Zai pouring out a measured forty drams into each of the two set out cups.
And from behind him she arrives. Like a cat she measures her fall from the ceiling with the most quiet of footfalls, Mori’s uniform trailing a black shadow before standing to her full height.
Highlighted by the limited light entering through the room, Zai could catch the circular form of that half eaten pastry in her left hand as she ever so casually strolls towards the small table and the now poured out tea.
An ensolian doughnut. Zai recognizes.
That deep fried breakfast pastry, brought nearly every morning by that creature from the Ensolian Church in town, was now not only found in the hands of Sophia Elise the Eighth, but consumed within Mori’s own purview as well.
The Imperial monster, in that horrifying, subtle way of hers, had already begun to compromise his closest guardian through the vector of that fluffy, deep fried sweet treat.
He asks her the question, keeping his tone even and measured. “What do you really want, Mori?”
“Just wanted to check in,” Her voice fills his blood like ice. “Make sure everything is going well.”
Every soul has their own little intrigue, and Zai catches more unspoken implications within Mori’s single sentence.
He watches her as she quietly strolls over to the poured tea, taking a long sip of the deep amber liquid. The Crown Prince of Tianci specifies this line of questioning to his guard. “If you’re referring to her…”
She interrupts him, a loud, satisfied sound coming from her diaphragm. “I am referring to Sophia, yes.”
“... then what is there to ‘go well?’”
Mori takes her own initiative, pouring herself another full cup of this quite sweet jasmine blend. “I dunno, you’ve been spending at least four hours a day with her. You tell me.”
He takes a centering breath, strolling over to the sitting chair before stopping himself.
Zai decides to stand, placing himself on equal grounds with this Guardsman. “She’s dangerous, all this time and I can’t even get a read on her. Feels like she’s constantly a few steps ahead of me, and no matter how hard I try she doesn’t break.”
Mori chuckles, watching Zai scan the dark corners of the room as if Sophia or her ceramic demon was watching; listening in to this most private conversation. The Prince continues. “I’ve never heard of anyone learning Tiancin this quickly before. Three weeks in, and she’s already onto intermediate grammar. You’ve seen her start to read the Port Daily haven’t you? The one that the maid, Soo-ah, brings in.”
Mori takes another bite of the donut in her hand. “Yeah, she’s a quick learner isn’t she? And you didn’t believe me when I told you to give it a shot. You thought she was just pretending not to know Tiancin~”
Prince Zai shutters, gazing at the wafting dust in this quiet room. “I still can’t believe it. I don’t even think she can even speak western Axial… and I tried to see if she could read Amorian…”
“Let me guess,” Mori drinks deeply from the cup, draining it completely in a gulp. “Couldn’t even tell the difference between Tiancin and Amorian script?”
She has his answer, and he nods quietly.
Mori smiles at that reaction. “Still think she’s still out to kill you then?”
“Of course, the Imperium is patient.” Zai speaks as a matter of fact, keeping his eyes now on the gaps between the furniture. “For matters such as this? I have no doubt that this is just the beginning.”
The Guardsman nods, finding a sarcastic counterargument to her leige’s line of thinking. “Yes, the famous Imperium of patience. So patient that they waited for the Kerelian breakthrough before leveling Kotimaa… or was that the other way around? I forget…”
It was the other way around, the Keralian Hegemony only pushing into the Axial Continent once their enemy’s entire international, allied congress had been reduced to unidentifiable, smoldering corpses in the putrid ashes of what was the City of Glass.
“Mori...” Zai chastises.
“I’m just saying, she’s had plenty of time to kill you since we got here.”
The Prince doesn’t laugh at the joke, watching for Mori’s usual smile but instead is greeted by an expression of absolute sternness.
She wasn’t joking.
“I can’t see everything, Zai.” She admits. “I still need to sleep, eat, drink. And I can’t be everywhere. If we had all four here—Wei, Ruoxian, or even Norbu—then maybe we could guarantee your safety. But with just me?”
It’s hard for her to even admit it, but she tells it honestly to this most trusted Advisee. “If she wanted you dead Zai, you would be.”
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