Mu’s Morning

Mu’s day begins in bed.

Three days after all the events of the Sky Island had ended, Mu rose from the bed where she had been lying, with sunlight piercing her eyes through the window.

“The morning has dawned.”

Rustle──

After pushing aside the blanket that had been covering her body and getting up, Mu checked her physical condition, which was no different from before she went to sleep.

She wiggled her shoulders and clenched her fists. Only after moving a few times like this did Mu nod.

Hmm, there’s no problem.

Some might say it’s unnecessary for a homunculus who always returns to optimal condition after sleeping, but Mu was Mother’s homunculus.

If this inspection that takes less than 10 seconds could prevent any possible issues, she couldn’t skip it even once.

Only after finishing the 10-second self-inspection did Mu neatly arrange the messily strewn blanket behind her, put on Mother Meiyel’s clothes that she had taken off, and then open the door to step out.

“Mother… It seems she’s already gone out.”

As Mu was placed right next to Mother’s room thanks to the Pope’s consideration, she could check Mother’s room after just a few steps, but the room she checked was already empty.

It seems she had already had breakfast and headed to the academy.

Thinking that Mother was still having a busy day even though it was only 7 AM, Mu transformed her appearance.

“Today’s schedule has magic class as the first lesson after morning assembly, so I shouldn’t be in Mother Meiyel’s form today. Then… shall I take on Mother Kama’s form?”

Her body swelled up bubbling, and Mu moved her essential clay to transform into the form of Kama, another one of her mothers stored in her memory.

The morning assembly before the academy classes start and the first class after that is magic class. In other words, Mother would be using Aria and Meiyel’s forms, so she herself had to be in the form of another mother.

That’s why she chose Mother Kama’s body.

And once Mu had completely transformed into Kama’s appearance, she fidgeted a few times, still not used to the much larger body compared to Meiyel’s form.

“It’s not that I dislike the bodies of the other mothers, but…”

For some reason that even Mu herself didn’t understand, Mother Meiyel’s body felt more comfortable than the other mothers’ bodies.

If it was because Mother Meiyel’s body was easier to move, then Mother Aria’s or Mother Yujia’s body should be better, so it was strange even to Mu herself.

But well, since she loved all her mothers equally when it came to love, Mu thought that this feeling would become fair someday too, and put this issue back into her mind as she turned her steps towards the dining hall.

“I’m looking forward to what food I’ll be able to eat today.”

Originally, Mu didn’t need to eat food, but the temple’s breakfast was always prepared in advance by Mother, who woke up early.

Thanks to this, the temple’s dining hall was bustling from the moment Mother entered, and Mu was also eating without missing a day.

She persuaded herself that there was no loss since any food that entered her body could be utilized as additional energy somehow.

On the way to the dining hall like this.

Suddenly, Mu noticed the back of a girl walking towards the dining hall just like her, with messy hair and a face that looked like she might fall asleep, and approached her.

“Oh my, Miss Pina. Are you on your way to have a meal?”

“Eh, yes?! Ah, yes! Lady Mute!”

The girl, Pina, answered with a start at Mu’s voice acting as Mother Kama.

As the Pope’s daughter, she was a girl with a serious and cold atmosphere in many ways outside the temple, but inside the temple, she was just a ditzy girl of her age.

Pina, realizing that she was in a messy state having just woken up, hurriedly tidied her bed hair and disheveled priestess robes, and Mu, watching this, reached out to help her.

“Ah, thank you.”

“No, these things end faster the more people help. It’s only natural.”

“Ahaha…”

Pina laughed awkwardly at Mu’s words.

As Mu helped tidy up together, it didn’t take long to finish, just as Mu had said.

Pina, who quickly tidied her hair and clothes, soon smiled brightly and began walking to the dining hall with Mu.

“Has the Traveler already left?”

“Yes, it seems she’s already gone to the academy. I was planning to go to the academy too after finishing my meal.”

Since she couldn’t be resting while Mother was working, she planned to go straight to the academy after eating breakfast at the temple and finishing all the tasks she needed to do.

After walking for about a minute while having such a formal but enjoyable conversation, Mu and Pina opened the door of the dining hall they had arrived at and entered.

Murmur murmur───

As befitting the grand temple serving the goddess Iriel, the dining hall was comparable in size to Lua Academy.

And as such a large dining hall, inside were numerous priests and priestesses who had filled their plates with food and were eating their meals.

Upon arriving at the dining hall, Pina looked around as if searching for the Pope, and soon found the Pope far away and bowed slightly to Mu.

“Then I’ll go have my meal now. I hope you enjoy your meal too, Lady Mute. May the blessing of goddess Iriel be with you.”

“Yes, may the blessing of goddess Iriel be with you.”

Pina ended with the temple’s greeting, filled her plate with food, and walked to the table where the Pope was, while Mu looked around just like Pina had just now, to fulfill the new order given to her since three days ago when the Sky Island incident ended.

The new order given by Mother since three days ago was to act together with Isolde starting from the morning dining hall.

Morgan was being managed by Mother herself, and Isolde was entrusted to Mu’s management.

Therefore, Mu looked around to find Isolde, but such action proved unnecessary as she could find Isolde by the murmuring heard from several tables.

The third table at the very back of the dining hall. There, only a single woman was sitting, and the priests sitting at the surrounding tables were quietly whispering while looking at her.

“Found her.”

And having found Isolde, Mu immediately picked up a plate and began filling it with food.

Clatter── Clank──

The food Mu chose was called spinach curry. For some reason, when transformed into Mother Kama’s body, she didn’t want to eat meat, so Mu picked out only the meat and filled her plate with spinach curry along with rice, then walked to the table where Isolde was sitting.

Mu’s footsteps echoed clearly as she walked. She walked straight to the opposite seat from where Isolde was sitting and plopped down.

“Ah, it’s you.”

“Yes, it’s me.”

“It’s the first time I’ve seen you in a form other than the magician’s, since you’re always in that form.”

“It would be good for you to get used to it soon.”

Isolde raised her head, swallowing the food she had been eating, only now noticing Mu as she sat down.

Answering Isolde indifferently, Mu glanced at her while mixing the curry with her spoon.

Isolde’s characteristically pale demon skin now had a human-like complexion, and other demon features like her teeth and eyes had also perfectly transformed to look human.

Probably no one who saw her would think Isolde was a demon.

Of course, the people inside this temple who knew she was a demon were whispering like that, but if someone from outside saw her, they wouldn’t even dream of thinking she was a demon.

Three days ago, Mother personally performed a semi-permanent procedure to seal the demonic energy of not only Isolde but also Morgan, so there’s no way ordinary people could notice.

Mu nodded, thinking this was natural, but suddenly made a disgusted expression at the pile of plates next to Isolde.

“Aren’t you full after eating that much…?”

Roughly counting, it’s already over 30 plates.

Moreover, seeing the sauces smeared even on the edges of the plates, it seems she filled each plate to the brim with food, but is she still not full?

Truly nauseated by that amount of food, when Mu asked, Isolde shook her head weakly.

“Mmm, I’m full, but I’m still eating. When I was in the demon army, there wasn’t such delicious food, so I always ate little. Especially this fox fire? Tteokbokki is incredibly addictive, I can’t stop.”

Is she saying she keeps eating because it’s delicious even though she’s full?

At this point, it seemed the reason the surrounding priests were whispering about her wasn’t because she was a demon, but because of this insane amount of food.

But after making such an expression for a moment, thinking differently, it meant that even demons were captivated by how delicious Mother’s cooking was, so Mu could understand Isolde a little bit.

“There’s no way food made by Mother wouldn’t be delicious. Of course, Mother is always perfect, so she wouldn’t waste even making such food. Yes, it might be natural to keep eating even when full.”

“…You’re severely afflicted too.”

“Pardon?”

“No, it’s nothing.”

When her heart momentarily burned with admiration, Isolde seemed to say something, so Mu asked her again, but Isolde just said it was nothing and started putting more rice cakes in her mouth.

It was quite an unsettling feeling, but thinking she must have heard wrong, Mu also moved her spoon that she had stopped to really start eating now, but just before bringing the scooped rice to her mouth, a priest wearing high-ranking priest robes walked up and handed Mu a small letter.

“Lady Mute, this letter came to the temple by mail. Since the Traveler has already gone to the academy, I judged that it should be given to Lady Mute…”

“Ah, thank you. I’ll read it and pass it on to Mother.”

The priest handed over a letter addressed to Mother. Mu put down her spoon and received the letter. Looking at the sender, it was none other than Dean Mira.

Seeing the familiar name, Mu immediately opened the letter as soon as the priest turned away.

Rip──

There was no hesitation since she had already been told by Mother that if she received a letter on her behalf, Mu should open it herself, organize the contents, and inform her.

“A letter?”

Perhaps curious at the mention of a letter, Isolde also put down the fork she was holding and fixed her gaze on Mu, and when Mu finished reading the letter and folded it back into the envelope, she asked Mu.

“Is it alright if I ask what it’s about?”

“Yes, it’s nothing much. It just says that the academy’s dean has been blocking the king’s summons coming to us for 3 days, but now she’s reaching her limit as other power holders have joined in. It seems the summons will come down tomorrow.”

The Sky Island incident from three days ago.

What happened on top of the Sky Island was known only to a very few and there was no risk of it being revealed, so that was fine, but publicly stopping the falling Sky Island couldn’t be hidden, so it was natural for the king’s summons to come down.

However, Mira had been blocking it as much as possible for Mother who wanted to pass it over quietly if possible, but it seems she was overwhelmed as ministers and nobles joined in.

It seems to be telling us to prepare ourselves as the summons from the king will probably come tomorrow.

And when Mu calmly relayed this content, Isolde tilted her head slightly as if surprised.

“Hmm… You’re not very tense even though it’s the king calling?”

“Is there a reason to be tense? Probably the ones the king will call are Mother Aria and Mother Meiyel, and in their place, Mother and I will go. If Mother is there, there’s no problem even if it’s the king.”

Even if it’s the king of the Kingdom of Puhara, the largest in scale on the continent, how could he be a match in front of Mother?

For Mu, Mother was like the existence of a monotheistic god surpassing even the goddess Iriel, so an endless wall of trust was built.

And seeing Mu like this, Isolde muttered with a small sigh.

“This is a severe case of mother addiction.”

But it was a mutter that Mu, who had been reciting words about Mother like a fanatic, couldn’t hear.