"What do you think they're talking about, Dyne?" The human warrior asked the human druid.
"Probably about Ninya's reasons for crossdressing, but it could be something else entirely." The human druid responded.
"Yeah, you're probably right." The human warrior lowered his head in consternation.
"Why do you think Ninya-chan did that?" The human garbage interjected, making everyone roll their eyes.
"Hum, I think I can understand why she did it." Enri Enmot drew everyone's attention to her, but Lupusregina struggled to pretend to care, even as Enri began to list the difficulties a commoner woman has to deal with when dealing with strangers.
It was not that Lupusregina didn't want to watch the show happening in front of her.
Watching the agonized expressions of humans as their bonds fractured in real time brought her great joy, especially when it was the result of her own actions.
But this joy was eclipsed by her overwhelming sense of guilt for displeasing her master.
She gazed at the two figures sitting 15 meters away from the bonfire.
Maybe Sebas-sama was right.
Ainz-sama is a compassionate man with a kind heart.
She didn't believe it at first, considering that her superior was simply projecting his own feelings onto their master, but after spending a day with him and seeing his interactions with these humans, she had to admit that Sebas' evaluation of Ainz had some truth to it.
And it was this very realization that now filled her with guilt.
This was the third time her willful behavior had displeased the Supreme Being.
The first time was when she pranked Decrement.
While she felt that her joke was not that serious, she could still understand why Ainz would be angry if she did this to someone from Nazarick.
The second time was when she directed her bloodlust towards the human party.
The ranger in the party asked her a presumptuous question with the clear intent of competing with her master for her affection, something that all but screamed that he was questioning her loyalty to Ainz, and he even did that in front of him.
By impulse, she almost slaughtered them all, only intending to spare Enri Enmot, the audacious human who dared to stop her master when he slaughtered the goblins.
Her master had shown over and over that he cared for this human girl, so she wouldn't make the mistake of targeting her.
Unfortunately, Ainz stopped her, which she could still rationalize as him trying to preserve their cover, but this last mistake left her confused.
Exposing Ninya's gender didn't seem to compromise their mission in any way. If anything, this was an internal problem for their party to deal with.
When she saw Ninya walking away from the camp by herself, it filled her with delight, to the point she struggled to control her laughter in anticipation of the drama that would unfold, but before she could savor the feeling, her master, now playing the role of Momon, followed Ninya, covering her with his cape, before pulling a rock and sitting by her side.
The humans could only guess what they were talking about, but as a werewolf, she had very sensitive hearing, and as her ears twitched under her hat, Lupusregina heard their conversation.
***
"My mother was born as the only daughter of Baron Veyron in the Baharuth Empire."
As she looked at the dark warrior sitting by her side, Ninya, without even understanding why, began to tell him about some of her most important memories.
"Yes, she began her life as a noble, having as happy a childhood as someone from low nobility could aspire to."
She remembered how happy her mother looked when she spoke about the fields, especially the beautiful orchard full of orange trees where she played with the serfs' daughters.
Her mother said that there was very little difference between a Baron and a commoner at the time, a reality brought forth by generations of emperors targeting the nobility.
"The problems started with the transition of power to the Blood Empress' father, the former emperor. Baron Veyron was bold enough to support one of the other princes, and because of that, the family was caught in the storm that followed, losing their land and most of their assets."
"From there, the Baron quickly amassed many debts that he tried to pay by taking loans, which only increased his debts, and after a few cycles, it became hard to even pay the interest, which was when my mother's personal hell started."
" She was sold into slavery by her own father to pay a part of the accumulating interest."
She mused that if it weren't for the fact that her grandfather had died many years before, she would very much like to kill him with her own hands.
"From there, she passed from hand to hand until she reached the Re-Estize Kingdom, where an important noble took interest in her."
"That was the man who would become my father, Marquis Blumrush, one of the 6 Great Nobles of the Re-estize Kingdom, and a perverted man in search of someone to satisfy the kinks he couldn't subject his legal wife to."
Was her family line cursed to have only monsters for fathers?
"Mother was pregnant with my older sister at the time, which attracted that monster, and I think was also the reason why she was allowed to give birth to me."
She wasn't very sure about what happened in the years that followed. Her mother had always been secretive about what she had gone through, trying to spare them the details, but it wasn't hard to imagine.
"As far as I remember, we lived in a small house in the slums of the capital. Our conditions weren't great, but I was still happy to live with the people I loved, and I even learned to love my father, whom I had never met."
She had been very naive back then.
She mistook the money her mother brought back every time she visited him as a sign of care for them, and the armed men who stood outside their house under his orders as concern for their safety.
"Of course, as the years went by, I slowly realized that we were all slaves. As the daughters of his slave, my older sister and I were also his slaves under the law, and me being his biological daughter didn't change anything."
The money was simply the fruit of her mother's efforts to please the Marquis, and the armed men weren't there to protect them but to prevent the three of them from escaping.
"With this realization came the fear. Fear of being sold to someone and going through the same hell my mother had, and most of all, fear of being separated from them."
It was in that period that she finally got her mother to tell her her origins.
She could no longer feel happiness while living there.
"But then amazing news reached us. The Golden Princess had successfully abolished slavery in the Kingdom. We were free under the law, and for a few days, we dared to be hopeful about the future, at least until the Marquis barged into our home with many burly men behind him."
Her first time seeing her father had none of the magic she expected when she was little.
He was a middle-aged man who was thin all the way through, from his body all the way to his mustache.
His gaze held no warmth as he looked at his own daughter, only the calculating light of someone appraising goods.
After he finished evaluating her and her sister, the man gave a crooked smile that did little to conceal his lecherous thoughts.
"He wanted to take my sister and me back to his mansion, saying that as I had his blood, it would be only right that we live under the same roof. My sister would come as she was my family, while he didn't mention my mother at any point."
She had been old enough to understand the weight of her mother's gaze as she looked at her sister for the last time.
Her mother had smiled, telling them to get their things in the bedroom before following the Marquis.
She didn't understand why her mother would say something like this, and it was only after they escaped through the window that she realized her mother had sacrificed herself to buy them a chance to escape.
"We made our escape through the night, ignoring the screams that came from our house."
To this day, she didn't know her mother's fate, but unfortunately, her mind was very creative at coming up with possible scenarios.
"For days, we hid ourselves in the capital, hoping to leave it with a caravan, but for two commoner girls to escape from one of the 6 Great Nobles of the Kingdom was bound to be impossible."
"My sister cut my hair and smeared my face with dirt, telling me to act like a boy, or we wouldn't survive."
At that time, she wasn't even a teenager yet, so it didn't take much for her to transform herself into one.
She wondered back then why only she needed to do this, but in retrospect, there was no way for her sister to be seen as a man. She was simply too pretty for that.
"I only understood why she did that after we were caught."
How dumb had she been not to understand that?
"The men who intercepted us were only looking for two girls, so the boy following one of the targets was treated as a simple nuisance."
The tears fell without stopping as she remembered that day.
Those men who looked like hardened criminals appeared suddenly and pushed them to the ground.
The one who looked like the leader then leaned down, pointing at her sister in excitement, saying something about a pouch of gold.
One of the others then pointed at her and asked what they should do with the boy.
The leader then yelled something she didn't understand and kicked her in the stomach, while another man yanked her sister from the ground.
As they were leaving, she caught sight of her sister, smiling at her even as tears stained her face.
"I felt glad."
How much she hated herself for that.
"Looking at her go, even as she smiled at me, I felt glad that it wasn't me."
Her mother sacrificed herself to give them a chance to escape, and her sister sacrificed herself to give her freedom, but she was still shameless enough to feel glad about it.
"I'm the worst, ain't I?" Ninya finally turned her attention to the man who had silently listened to her whole confession.
Momon looked at her for a good minute before asking.
"How old are you, Ninya?" His voice was even and peaceful.
"What does my age have to do with anything!?" She lashed out at him, feeling that he was purposefully changing the subject.
"Just answer the question, please." He continued, unbothered by her tone.
" I'm 17 this year."
" 17… And how old were you when the events you described happened?"
"It's been 5 years, so 12, but why do you want to know my age?"
She couldn't understand why he was asking her for something like that.
Upon hearing her answer, Momon stopped, looking up at the sky for what felt like a long time.
She could see that he was hesitating, but had no idea why.
"In my country, a person only becomes an adult after they turn 18. It is a somewhat arbitrary number, but life is full of these arbitrariarities that we grow accustomed to, coming to eventually accept them as the normal." Momon spoke while still looking at the sky.
For her, it seemed like he was almost talking to himself.
"Of course, as you grow older, even an 18 or 20-year-old starts to look a lot more like a child than an adult." He let out a little laugh at this point.
"Despite the customs of your country that dictate that someone older than 16 should qualify as an adult, I struggle to see you as one, Ninya. To me, you seem like someone still with one foot in childhood, not to mention the you from 5 years ago."
Momon then turned to her.
"And I'm of the opinion that adults should cherish and protect children, especially if they are under their responsibility." His tone turned wistful.
"It doesn't matter if they are righteous, if they have evil tendencies, if they have strong emotional needs, or even if they like to eavesdrop on your conversations; as the adult responsible for them, you need to accept how they are while doing your best to give them safe and comfortable lives."
The words coming from the man in front of her didn't feel like ones that should come from someone in his 20s, but from a century-old sage who had seen everything there was to see in life.
But, strangely enough, they didn't sound out of place coming from Momon.
"I think your mother and sister were of the same opinion. To them, saving you at the cost of their own safety was a matter of course, and that was why, even as she was being dragged, your sister smiled at you. I'm sure she was thankful that you were saved, so don't waste her efforts by feeling guilty. Someone who could sacrifice herself for you with a smile on her lips wouldn't blame you for only a moment of selfishness."
Those were words full of care.
She knew he was right.
He had to be right.
But she still felt that they were hard to acknowledge, and even felt a flicker of irritation upon hearing them.
How dare he dismiss the guilt she had carried for the last 5 years?
Who was he to tell her how she should feel?
"What do you even know about how I feel?"
She felt pathetic even as the words left her mouth.
Lashing out at someone who had nothing to do with her and was simply trying to help made her feel like the child Momon seemed to think she was.
"What do I know about it? Probably more than you think."
Far from getting angry, Momon sighed.
"I was born in a poor household. My father was nowhere to be found, so ever since I came to be, it was only me and my mother.
She was a brave woman, hard-working to a fault.
She did her best to provide me with what I needed and even tried to give me things that I didn't need but wanted.
But I was blind to her efforts, not seeing what she gave, but only what she couldn't give.
The expensive toy a kid in school had, the comfortable house of the richest man in the neighborhood, the brand new clothes of a relative. These were things completely out of reach for our poor household, but I still wanted them, and seeing my mother refuse to give them to me made me very angry.
I resented the fact that I was born her child, and I told her so on many occasions. If I had been born in a different house, with a different family, I thought at the time, then I wouldn't need to be so poor.
I was a profoundly ungrateful brat, but my mother never yelled at me, only apologizing for not being a better mother to me.
Many times, I saw her crying in her room, but in my selfishness, I rejoiced in the fact that she was suffering, considering that if I couldn't have what I wanted, she too shouldn't feel happy.
Selfishness can blind you to anything that lies outside your own interests, and for years I lived this way, not seeing how heroic my mother's efforts truly were.
She continued working to raise her ungrateful child even as her body broke little by little every day, until one day she fell and never got up again.
Believe me when I say that there is nothing I wouldn't give to go back in time, even if just to beg her for forgiveness, to tell her how much I loved, and still love, her to this day, and to hear her voice that I have long since forgotten.
But life is not so convenient, and because of that, I must carry these regrets with me.
Back then, no one in my family wanted to take me in, so it was my neighbors who took care of me.
They were a sweet old couple who treated me as one of their own, and with time, some of the wounds in my heart healed, and I was even allowed some moments of happiness.
Their daughter was a few years older than me, and treated me like a beloved little brother, helping me whenever she had time.
But good times don't last long, and one day a 'noble' took an interest in the neighbors' daughter and took her away.
We were poor and powerless, so the only thing we could do was to pray for her safety.
And a month later, our prayers were answered with a body found in the trash.
Her death was ruled as a suicide by the authorities, and the noble never faced justice." Momon paused, his tone somber.
"So, Ninya, while I can't say that I understand how you feel about your situation, I think I can confidently say that I understand how it feels to be responsible for a loved one's suffering, and also how it feels to be powerless in front of an enemy that takes the most important things in your life." Momon then stood up.
"It's too late for me, but it may not be for you, so tell me, Ninya, what do you want to do?"
Maybe moved by his actions, she felt compelled to answer truthfully.
"I want to find my family, if they are still alive… And to kill the Marquis!" She stood up, looking directly at him.
"Very well." Momon took her hand.
"I will help you with that."