I struggled not to scream and scurried away from the body as fast as I could.
That was when I realised her chest was moving and the red haired Mahun woman wasn’t actually dead. The reason I thought she was dead at first was the arrow that was stuck in her shoulder.
And as if that wasn’t the most surprising thing, for some reason or other, she was naked from the waist down as well.
“Mistress!” Katsuki cried out, hurrying to my side and helping me up to my feet. “Are you alright? Please forgive my ineptness!”
“I’m fine, I’m fine… Just a little surprised.”
I felt a pair of hands wrap around me from behind, “There, there my little one~ There’s no need to be scared. Mama is here now.”
Mary approached her and flipped the woman over with her foot, a dagger prepared in her hand while Odeta and Lisa stood nearby, both seemingly ready to attack if she proved hostile.
“It seems like she has fallen unconscious from shock. Although I’m not sure how she was stuck to the side of the ship,” Mary reported.
She then reached down to remove my fishing hook that had hooked itself onto the back of her shirt, which had torn quite a large chunk of it when I was pulling her up.
As though waiting for that exact moment, she suddenly woke up and reached up to grab Mary’s arm, only to have the maid slap her hand away to press her knife against her throat.
Instead of panicking however, the woman cried, “Help… Please… People… On ship…”
And the woman went back to being unconscious after that.
Mary turned to look at me and I quickly realised she was letting me decide on what to do with her.
Ok… From what I know so far… Those shoes I fished up probably belonged to this woman and she must also be somehow connected to the sack of weapons we found.𝑶𝒱𝗅xt.𝗇𝓔t
If I had to piece everything together, she must have found someone who was trying to sabotage the ship and got shot in the shoulder for it. The perpetrator then tried to dump both the woman and the sack of weapons overboard but they were caught at the side of the ship instead.
As for why she’s naked down below… I would have to assume that she might have gotten raped or something before being thrown overboard…
“We should help her,” I decided.
She must know who was responsible for her current state and it sounded quite serious too. So let’s just take care of her until she wakes up so that she can tell us who it was to catch the culprit.
Mary nodded and stepped aside, allowing Sebastian to pick her up in his arms before proceeding to our rooms.
I suppose with all this happening, the mood for fishing was already gone so let’s just call it a day.
It’s just a shame that we did not catch any fish but at least there’s a next time.
We returned to our suite where Sebastian had placed her in his room and Lisa had volunteered to help heal her with a healing potion.
The two of them disappeared inside the room while the rest of us sat in the sitting room to wait for her.
“Why did Mistress choose to help her?” Katsuki asked with a slight tilt of her head. “We could have simply given her to Prifa to deal with instead.”
I shrugged, “I just felt that it would be better if we helped her instead of leaving it to others… She did call out to us after all.”
“Wahaha! Sister Aster is always kind! Just like how you came to help big sister Ardi and the rest of us when we were attacked by the wyvern!” Odeta laughed heartily.
Well… I admit I kind of feel bad for her when I thought she might have been raped before being tossed overboard so I just wanted to help her out quickly instead of handing her over to strangers. Who knows if those people would do something to her?
She was quite attractive after all and the fact that she was naked from the waist down wasn’t helping either.
At least with Sebastian and Mary, I know that I could trust them not to do anything improper to her and she would arguably be in the most secure and safest place on this entire ship.
Mother just had to join in by carrying me and sitting me on her lap, “My little one is the best, after all~ Mama is so proud of you~”
She then proceeded to pat my head while hugging me with her other arm, going into her ‘pampering mode’.
I noticed that Katsuki seemed to be deep in thought, “What’s wrong, Katsuki? Are you feeling seasick?”
Katsuki shook her head, “No Mistress… I just felt that her situation was a little weird… If she was a witness to whoever was trying to sabotage the ship, why did that person do such a sloppy job of eliminating her? Were they an amateur or was she just lucky?”
Or maybe… She was shot in the shoulder to stop her from running and the guy decided to have some fun with her while she was alive. Then while doing the deed, someone else almost caught him so he had to hurriedly dump her overboard?
Well, this is just me using my imagination so it may or may not have been what actually happened.For all I know, she may have just tripped and fell overboard and the arrow got stuck in her somehow while falling down.
Odeta presented her own hypothesis, “Maybe she had a fallout with her party and she got betrayed and left to die? Oh, oh! Now that we’ve rescued her, she’s going to go and take revenge on them!”
I don’t think that’s what happened but I can’t discount that possibility either.
The door to the room then opened and Lisa stepped out looking rather concerned.
“How is she?” I asked.
“The wound has been healed but she’s quite delirious so I put her back to sleep. I think we should give her some time to sleep it off before attempting to wake her again,” Lisa reported professionally without any hint of her usual jovialness.
That kind of surprised me but I guess this persona of hers was similar to her usual self in class.
I shrugged, “I guess we’ll just let her rest here with someone watching over her. Guess we’ll have to stay in here the entire day.”
Mother smiled at me, “Ara, ara~ My little one need not worry about it~ Mary and I will stay here with Sebastian to watch over her. You can go to the party tonight~”
Eh?
Wait a minute… I didn’t even tell anyone that I wanted to go to the party yet, how does Mother know?
As though reading my mind, Mother giggled, “That Earl is a known sweet tooth so there will definitely be lots of sweets in his party. Surely my little one won’t be missing out on that?”
I gasped, “Yes! Yes! I will be going! Ah… But I don’t have a party dress!”
“Ufufufu~ I thought so~ Don’t worry, what kind of Mama would I be if I did not help my little one prepare a party dress?.
Mother clapped her hands and Mary muttered a spell before reaching her hand into a portal and pulling out a beautiful blue dress that I did not recognise.
Just when did she prepare something like this? And in my size too?
Lisa gasped and her serious facade collapsed as she started gushing over it, “Oh my gosh!! Aster will look absolutely perfect in that! Mama! You have such great tastes!”
“Ara, ara~ Of course I do~ I know my little one the best of course~”
Katsuki pursed her lips, “Madam… Does that mean I won’t be following Mistress to the party?”
“Unfortunately, yes. Servants aren’t allowed there and only nobles are granted entry,” Mother sighed.
I blinked, “Does that mean Odeta and Lisa can’t come with me either?”
“That’s right, my dear~”
“Umm… But I don’t know noble etiquette…”
Mother smiled devilishly, “Ara, ara? There is no need to worry my little one. You can simply do whatever you want~ There’s no need for you to care about such boorish things~”
I don’t even know what gave her that confidence… Even I know I would lose myself when I start eating sweets, what’s going to happen if I have no one to chaperone me?
Uggghh… Should I just not go? But the sweets… I want the sweeeeeets…
No! I won’t let this affect me! I’ll just go and learn on the spot! How hard could it be? It’s just acting proud and pompous while talking about nonsensical and pretentious stuff right?
I’ve already done some research back when I had to write noble types of characters so it’s just a matter of putting it into practice, right?
Yeah, that sounds like a plan! It’s all worth it for the sweets!
I have yet to eat any sweets today after all so I definitely must go to that party and eat all the sweets!