Though the butler, Lanter, had told Achilles he would have a servant draw his bath, by the time Achilles climbed up the rich stairs of polished, dark wood and went down the hallway and found the room with the silver triangle on it, he found the bath was already prepared.
The tub was filled with steaming water, and the delicious scent of oranges filled the air. There was a little table nearby which had bars of brilliant white soap and a mug of hot tea upon it.
There was no servant in sight. Achilles frowned, looking around. Something seemed strange. “I don’t know how long it takes to heat all that water in a town like this,” he said, “but surely it takes more than the minute I spent walking up here.”
Virgil seemed amused.
“What, you know the answer?” asked Achilles.
Achilles pondered this as he walked to the bathroom door, closed it, and locked it. Then he took off all his clothes, folded them somewhat haphazardly, and dipped a careful toe into the water.
He had never taken a hot bath before, not one ‘this’ hot, and he was worried at first that it would scald his skin off.
However, the water was actually quite comfortable, and he slipped into the elaborate marble tub.
“I didn’t notice any system elements,” Achilles said thoughtfully. “So there’s something I missed. I’ll need to pay closer attention from now on.” He paused, then grabbed a bar of soap and begin scrubbing his skin.
Usually, soap made his skin extremely dry, but this seemed to be very fancy stuff. It left his skin feeling smooth. That was strange and felt somewhat girly.
said Virgil.
Achilles felt irritated that Virgil wouldn’t simply tell him, but he considered this to be part of his training toward eventually becoming an Imperial Knight, and he said nothing.
He gave up the soap, however, and simply scrubbed at his skin with his hands to dislodge dirt. The smell of the oranges was nice, but he didn’t need to have smooth, feminine skin.
“Something I just thought of,” said Achilles. “I haven’t seen your thousand eyes again. Or ‘my’ eyes, rather. Not since waking up. Why is that?”
“Why on Earth does it work like that?” asked Achilles. He had left Virgil on the table which held the bathing supplies, and he now had an urge to draw the sword and see the eyes again. However, the air was fairly cold outside of the bath, and he was too lazy to get out just for this.
Virgil laughed.
“That sounds like it’s intended to be some kind of limitation,” said Achilles, “but I’ll always be wielding you, so what does it matter?”
said Virgil, though his voice sounded begrudging.
Achilles smiled. “You consider them to have rescued you?” he asked. “How bizarre. Considering they chained you up and then sent you away so that no one could use you.”
