Chapter 158: Interlude - Leene Tries to Help (1)
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When you are a child, hours pass by agonizingly slowly. But as you grow older, you can lose track of whole days. For extremely long-lived races like elves and fairies and demons, what was it like to lose decades? Why does this happen?
The older you get, the more in control over your own self you should feel, and days would blur past in events that you could deal with without thinking. Even pleasure and travel evoke previous feelings. So much is spent trying to recapture that feeling again.
But for a child, full of wonder, every day was a new adventure.
It had been entirely too long since Leene had been excited about something - to have that feeling of truly not knowing what the future could bring!
"We have seen many a fool haven't we, Paula?" she asked the plush bear in her arms. "What makes this one any more compelling than the others?"
The bear pointed up at the sky.
Leene winced and turned away. She rubbed at her eyes with one hand. "Good point."
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Leene landed lightly onto the balcony, completely bypassing the locked door. Elze and Linze had managed to persuade Zorah to shut up and just get to sleep. If it was too bright, then there would be a lot of people happy to help p̶̷̶̶̷r̶̷̶̶̷e̶̷̶̶̷s̶̷̶̶̷s̶̷̶̶̷ ̶̷̶̶̷a̶̷̶̶̷ ̶̷̶̶̷p̶̷̶̶̷i̶̷̶̶̷l̶̷̶̶̷l̶̷̶̶̷o̶̷̶̶̷w̶̷̶̶̷ ̶̷̶̶̷t̶̷̶̶̷o̶̷̶̶̷ ̶̷̶̶̷h̶̷̶̶̷e̶̷̶̶̷r̶̷̶̶̷ ̶̷̶̶̷f̶̷̶̶̷a̶̷̶̶̷c̶̷̶̶̷e̶̷̶̶̷ remind her that she had a canopy bed and it could be made more opaque.
Leene turned around and faced the miniature sun. "Well, this certainly is a unique piece of spellwork," said an impishly pleased voice. "What wonder - it's not even that hot!"
Paula, the bear, dropped from Leene's hug onto the floor. It turned towards the miniature star and shielded its face behind the shadow of its fluffy paws as in pain. It was not hot, but it was still terribly bright.
/'Bear, your eyes are literal ebony buttons. They do nothing.'/ Playa said silently with a tilt of the head.
Leene slowly walked around the glowing sphere to its creator sitting cross-legged and apparently meditating on the other side.
Her eyebrows lifted. Playa was almost completely naked except for his underwear, though she supposed that it made sense. This high up, night winds were supposed to be very cold - but now it was warm (but not too warm) like daylight.
But more importantly -
Leene smirked. "Well now, it turns out you were actually a nummy young boy after all, weren't you?"
Playa abruptly lost all composure, cradled his face in his palms and groaned. What a time to be reminded that while Monika's age and simulated body eighteen, his body was actually physically sixteen - no matter what muscle definition exercises he practiced.
"I also don't have time for YOUR bullshit, Leene..." he groaned.
Leene covered her mouth and made a 'fuh fuh fuh' laugh. "You sound like such an old man. It is an interesting dichotomy. "
"The bullshit, Leene. I will have none of it."
Then she put a finger coquettishly on her lips. "Ohh? Even when you have exposed to me your weakness?"
Playa twitched and the miniature sun pulsed. "Is that a threat?"
She raised up both palms. "Peace, young one, peace! I mean you no harm. As your teacher, there is no one in the world as determined to help you as me. There is no one that understands your present situation as much as I do."
"... Monika is nothing like Paula."
"When six hundred years you have lived, smell bullshit you can, hmm? Surely you cannot expect me to ignore that your spirit wife has for some reason not being as vocal and controlling as usual. This sounds like a perfect time as any to ask. Childe Monika… is she, after all - embodied within a physical object?"
Playa grimaced. What he hated most was that Leene was smart. Annoying and smart. Unlike Zorah who was just a meathead, Leene was annoying in how she pushed boundaries while knowing precisely to the millimeter where those lines were. That was the game of it. She could play the part of a calm and dignified teacher, but it was a lot more fun interacting with people as intellectual equals. Leene once riled up was never someone who could be safely ignored.
Playa could just feel her radiating smugness even through the heat of the miniature sun. He looked at her with blindfolded eyes that completely communicated a dry unimpressed stare.
Leene crossed her arms and raised her chin. "Boyo, do not be afraid. I will help you."
"Your [Protection] didn't help."
"You are the one who brought your wife into a magic eater battle."
Playa flinched.
Playa sagged, and whispered "That's right. It was all my fault..."
He leaned back against the door and looked up despondently. He breathed out "All that time preparing and being paranoid, but in the heat of the moment we were all just that dumb. Even Monika was overconfident..."
"So… is she?" Leene insisted.
Paula turned around and put its arms over its chest and bowed.
Playa's lips turned down. "She had a body once, and she will have it again," curtly and vehemently he answered.
Leene sniffed. "Mortal bodies… as much as befriending the short-lived can be interesting, it is inevitable they decay and die. Why you would give up immortality now for inevitable degradation is beyond me."
"... Monika is not a Lich, and this wasn't on purpose, you know. And you know the reason."
"... Yes, I certainly know the reason," Leene grunted and flicked back her short, chin-length silver-green hair in frustration. Her slim hips jutted out in a sultry but dignified manner.
They lapsed back into silence.
"Explain to me this… spell you have crafted. It is clearly not any mere fireball."
"It's [NUCLEAR FUSION]. It is a miniature star, giving all the qualities of light that comes from the sun."
"Why?"
He had a solar charging power bank, that's why.
Later, once they had a chance to talk more freely it was explained to her that it was difficult but not impossible to create lights that were locally brighter than the sun.
In their previous world halogen bulbs have been a thing for a long time, and stadium lights were needed also for a long time. The brightest retail bulb available LED bulb was 20,000 Watts and certainly could light up a whole street and reflect off the clouds.
The micro star was a roiling ball of plasma jacketed by a shell of water and spinning wind, ejecting waste material straight upward in a bright jet which tempered the output of both heat and radiation. Light had wavelengths, and artificial lights were lacking or existed in only some of them. True starlight emitted on all possible wavelengths.
The light of Playa's miniature star gave a foggy glow to the night sky instead of turning it blue. It had all the wavelengths, but could not excite enough of the sky nor pass from the upper atmosphere to send blue light scattering down to the earth.
Monika didn't run on passive magic. She passively converted magic into electric current. This, among other concepts necessary to understand the process, he explained.
"So, you have a device that transforms heat and light into the power of lightning?" Leene leaned forward eagerly. "[Fire] creates light, but in itself is not [Light]. Magic is not something that can be transformed so easily."
Playa scowled. "What are you talking about? Energy transformation happens in nature *all the time*. Sunlight and nutrients become sugars and nutrients, which fuel chemical processes, which become motion. Potential energy becomes kinetic energy. Kinetic energy becomes heat. Heat evaporates water, heat from the sun stirs winds, and heavy droplets fall as rain."
Leene blinked. The eagerness in her eyes clouded over as she thought about it, then resumed with more brilliant fervor.
Then she sighed. "Truly, I do not wish for either of you to die before your time. For the long-lived, someone who can stay and grant a good conversation is a treasure. Know that you can have absolute trust in me, always I will strive for your well-being."
Playa scowled even harder. "Explain Charlotte then."
"There are a lot of perverts in the nobility and I want them to suffer for something they can never have."
"Sounds legit."
"Mmm-hmm."
Again, back to silence.
Breathe in. Breathe out.
Clouds go in. Clouds go out.
Trees sway in. Trees sway out.
Leene moved on. "So this… battery… is a store of energy that she needs to live. No, not to live - to *be alive*. To think and be aware, the power of electricity is needed much as blood is needed to drive air from the lungs all through the body. It makes sense."
Leene began nodding thoughtfully and brought a finger up to her chin. "But then… it is not really necessary for the battery to be 'charged' up to full for her to awaken, correct? She is asleep. If she has the power, then wake her up."
Playa bit his lips and said nothing.
"There was no need to wait this long."
Playa replied nothing.
"You are afraid," she said.
Playa remained still.
"You are delaying the inevitable."
Playa snarled silently.
He didn't need to see Leene's face to know she had a wide open leer on her normally placid and elegant face. Perhaps the fact that the young man couldn't see her, that with the miniature star behind her it was too bright for anyone to see her shedding her mask, encouraged her.
Two people wearing masks, one more literal than the other. No wonder Leene felt comfortable being so undignified. Playa was indignity personified. He had zero room to throw stones.
"So… what are you waiting for? Either your theory is correct, or it is not. Whether your love is fragile, or it is not. You cannot put off loss by denying it. A loss is a loss. If you were looking for courage, those two girls enamored with you would surely comfort you in the worst of outcomes. You are not the only one who fears the pain of loss. She is loved and appreciated by more than just you."
Leene poked him in the forehead with two fingers like she was Itachi Uchiha or something.
"You will break, or you will not. You are too much like the wind. But sometimes they can spin furiously around in place to no real purpose- and that, we call the whirlwind."
Or a super typhoon. Fecking typhoons. Why hello there, let me just reset all your economic activity for the year, hmm?
"I can see it on your face, you are doing everything to just avoid thinking about what hurts you. Know this, that a long life only accumulates regrets. I understand this also."
Paula the bear began spinning right around, then wobbled to a stop and swayed unsteadily on its feet as if dizzy.
"The hell are you trying to make me do, Leene?" Playa hissed. "This is how you are trying to help?"
"I have also known loss, and I have also slaughtered. Why do you think my rule over fairykind in Mismede is absolute? I can do whatever I want in this world, so let me share with you my insights." She poked me in the head again. "You are indeed a vigorous young hero - so of course you are also a self-centered chauvinistic young idiot."
"... whut."
"A man certainly must provide for his mistress, but a wife is supposed to be an equal in the home. More than equal - for as he spends outside, she is master of all that is inside. A mistress can only rely on grabbing someone's... meaty thigh. A wife needs must be able to protect herself and her household's interests! Those two girls who are so enamored with you cannot criticize you about this because they are still too young to understand life's pains. They see a relationship of equals as that of an adventuring household, not an estate."
"I have no idea what the heck you're talking about. Make your point cleanly, you silly fairy."
"You claim to love her above all but do not believe in her that believes in you. Is that love or is that ownership? Is she a woman or is she a thing?"
"For frak's sake, Leene! I am a healer! But Monika is *also* a wonder of technology that no one on this planet can repair! I am a mortal and I can die if something stabs my skull. She is also mortal in that she can be damaged and she can die!" Playa spat. "Flesh is weak but glass is brittle! We are all vulnerable in our own ways, and that's what makes it all real!"
He roared "SHE IS A WOMAN, NOT A THING!"
Leene pointed imperiously "Then you should remember that she is also… the brains in this partnership between the two of you."
Playa stopped and furrowed his brows.
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CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Bluepencil
Bluepencil AN:
Sorry it took this long. I first had this in the POV of Playa, but I was being creatively blocked so I thought... why not have it from the opposite POV instead?
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