Kiara

TL: SupremeTentacle

ED: Exkalamity

After taking us deep into the heart of the castle, the maid responsible for guiding us stopped in front of a door with a red carpet and turned around to face us .

“We have arrived at Lady Kiara’s private bedchambers,” she said . “Please wait a moment as I seek permission to enter . ”

Fran and Guendalfa nodded as the maid turned around and knocked gently on the door .

“Lady Kiara? Guendalfa and the Black Lightning Princess are here to see you . ”

“Yeah, come in,” said a voice from inside the room .

The maid opened the door for us . There was a desk with a chair next to the window, a full length mirror next to a vanity closet, an armchair in the corner, and a king sized bed in the middle . All the furniture and interior was done with gold or gold leaf, but the designs weren’t gaudy . Rather, they were carefully crafted such that they appeared subdued and pleasing to the eye . The curtains, carpet, and bedsheets were all made of luxurious cloth or silk . The entire room was cleaned and tidy . It was obvious that its inhabitant was being treated as a guest of honor .

An old, black catkin sat upright on the bed . We knew that she was supposed to be a black catkin, but she didn’t quite look the part . The hair on her ears and tail had long turned completely white . Her posture was good, which indicated that she was probably still active in spite of how haggard and thin her body appeared . She was tall too . It looked like she could probably reach 170 cm when standing . She definitely did not give the impression of a frail old lady whose body was wasting away .

She looked at Fran with a gaze of such intensity that I was intimidated for a brief moment . I felt like my heart stopped and that I was pierced with daggers . If I were still human, I probably would have instinctively prostrated myself on the ground out of fear . Fran, however, was completely unperturbed .

“You’re Kiara?”

“And who exactly told you that you could speak to me so bluntly?”

“Beast Lord . ”

“Hah!” She slapped her knee . “Good to know . I’ll be sure to smack him hard next time I see him . ”

Whoa she definitely speaks pretty brusquely . But, surprisingly, it fits her quite well .

“To answer your question,” she continued: “Yes . I am Kiara . I know the snot-nosed brat over there . ” She jerked her chin at Guendalfa .

“Snot nosed? I’m already 22!” retorted Guendalfa

“Quiet you!” yelled Kiara . “Everyone under 40 is a snot-nosed brat to me . So, who’s the girl?”

“Master Kiara,” said Guendalfa, surprised . “Have you not heard of the Black Lightning Princess?”

“Lady Kiara just woke up today,” said the maid who guided us to this room . “For the past twenty days Lady Kiara has been in a coma . ”

Holy shit! A coma for twenty days!? If she was out for that long it’s not too surprising that she hasn’t heard of Fran yet .

I took a closer look and saw that her cheeks were a little sunken and her lips were really dry . Her arms looked rather thin and brittle, indicating that they had been out of use .

“She is-” began the maid, but Kiara interrupted her .

“Hold up . ” She gestured to Fran and said in a gentle voice, “Come here dear . ”

Fran trotted over to the bedside .

“What’s your name?”

“Fran . ”

Kiara opened her arms and Fran embraced her . At first it was a light hug but after a few seconds, Kiara suddenly pulled Fran tightly into her .

“All these years I feared that the goal I sought was unachievable,” she said . “Now I have proof of success standing right before me . Thank you Fran, for coming to me and showing me that my journey was not meaningless . ”

Kiara buried her face into Fran’s shoulder . I felt my heart twist when I heard what she said . Her whisper, which carried the weight of 50 years of doubt, uncertainty, and resolve, seemed to reverberate throughout the room .

After a few moments of silence, Kiara eventually calmed down and released Fran .

“Can you give me the details?” asked Kiara . “How did you do it? Unless there is some reason you can’t tell me . I won’t force you . ”

“Of course,” Fran nodded . “But heard Granny Kiara should already know method . ”

“Who told you that?”

“Dias”

“Wha…? So he still remembers me…?”

“Nn . Aurel and Rumina too . ”

Kiara’s eyes began to waver, and she smiled .

“Those fools,” she said . “They should have forgotten me and moved on long ago . ”

“They didn’t . Always looking for you,” said Fran .

Kiara sighed, “What I have is just a hypothesis . Let me get more comfortable first . ”

Kiara turned and got out of the bed . Guendalfa frantically held his hand out be she shooed him away and sat herself down in her armchair .

“So it all started back in the day in Ulmutt . I ventured into the depths of a dungeon, only to discover that its master was an evolved black catkin,” she said . “That was how I met Rumina 50 years ago . She was really too sweet for her own good . She offered to help me evolve, but her method was too contrived . It required her to turn herself into an evil being . ”

Fran blinked .

“Turn into evil being, how?”

“In the past, one of the Black Cat Tribe’s chiefs invoked a ritual to drown our species in the power of the Evil God,” said Kiara . “It was for something stupid like for the sake of strengthening the tribe . Like many members of the tribe, Rumina had also been caught up in the ritual’s processes . She too had the power of the Evil God embedded into her . ”

She grimaced at this point .

“So she told me to stand back, and I did, and suddenly my Evil Presence Detection skill went crazy . I felt a disgusting presence coming from Rumina, one that only grew stronger and stronger as I stared it down . She was probably using her powers as a dungeon master to unlock some tainted part of her soul or something . Anyway, I knew whatever she was doing was bad news, so I ran over and punched her . Told her that I didn’t want to evolve if it meant losing a friend . And that was the end of that . ”

“But why turn into evil being?” asked Fran .

“I wanted to find that out myself,” said Kiara . “After thinking about it, I recalled the research I did on our clan’s inability to evolve . There was a lot of misinformation being spread about at the time . Some of it was by our own tribe members trying to save face or keep the morale of the younger kinsman up . Some of it was spread by blue catkin that just wanted to mess with us . And there wasn’t much written evidence wherever I searched . ”

She sighed .

“One of the few items that came to mind was an old, torn-up scroll that was barely readable . The parts that I could read said that our tribe invoked the Gods’ wrath and we were cursed . We needed to defeat something on the level of the Evil God to break that curse . I think Rumina was trying to become that evil thing herself . She wanted to let me defeat her so that I would evolve . ”

Rumina folded her arms and leaned back as she wrapped up her explanation .

“So, that’s my theory,” she said . “How does that match up to your experiences?”