Sam’s unplanned and unwanted second workout of the day was, of course, not that big of a deal. He could handle two workouts in a single day at this point. The problem wasn’t with doing that once in a while, but every day. His body wouldn’t survive that change in his routine, even if his mind could. So he still had to wait for the new magic to come along and open up some new possibilities. After that point, he should have the physical capability to spend so many hours of the week destroying his own body, and all that would be left is to question the mental capability and utilitarian necessity.

  Despite the divergence from his usual schedule, Sam hadn’t really lost anything by spending those evening hours exercising instead of studying, as he had spent more hours than usual with Dan today. Well, besides sleep, that is, but that was sleep that Erianna’s arrival had already cost him. Of course, there was still the loss of the opportunity to have studied more in the day, but Sam would drive himself crazy if he started considering opportunity costs in his day-to-day life. That is to mean, if he started to dwell on them for more than a minute or two, when the intrusive thought forced its way into his brain.

  At least the day ended the opposite to the way it began. Anticlimactically, with Sam alone in his room and the sole occupant of his bed. Yvessa wanted to keep the evening going longer, spend more time with Erianna and suggested they visited her new apartment to see what it was like. But the princess shut that suggestion down, saying that she still had to organize it before she let people see it. But she promised to spend some extra time with Yvessa tomorrow, which did make Sam heave a mental sigh of relief.

  All of Felix’s joking aside, he was a tad uncomfortable about the fact that Yvessa’s best friend had spent her first day reunited with Yvessa, with Sam. He didn’t like the idea of Erianna sacrificing her personal life or enjoyment for the sake of his development. A familiar apprehension to him at this point, of course. One that he had held, in differing intensities, towards all three of his friends.

  But something about Erianna’s case felt different, maybe even was different. She was here for a job. It was her duty to help Sam, and while he could divine duties owed to him by each one of his friends, those duties would’ve stemmed from a different source. A social-emotional one, rather than a… professional, or at the very least, impersonal one. Hadn’t Erianna said it herself? She was here under the orders of the Sarechi military, in her role as an officer in training.

  All that to say, Sam sincerely hoped that his role as Erianna’s job wouldn’t come between her and Yvessa’s ability to spend time with each other. Then again, Sam probably didn’t need to worry all that much. Both Erianna and Yvessa were grown women, not jealous teens, and they had both spent their entire lives carrying burdens and responsibilities that would’ve prevented them from interacting as much as they might’ve liked.

  He shook the thoughts away as he stepped out of the shower. It was just like him to start worrying about stupid stuff like this. Also, a little egotistical. It wasn’t up to him to decide the nature of Erianna and Yvessa’s friendship. He had his own duty, becoming as strong as possible, which didn’t include helping best friends spend more time with each other.

  “Still,” he breathed out as he sat in front of the screen, ready to read yesterday’s journal entry and write today’s, “it has been a very hectic day. Hopefully, tomorrow will be a little more grounded.” He shrugged. The most important thing was for him to get a full night’s sleep today. He had an inkling losing those few hours last night wasn’t really going to hurt him, but he wasn’t going to tempt his shitty lifelong luck with sleep by not immediately going back to his strict schedule.

  Thankfully, his luck held (or kept withholding), and he was off to unconsciousness in mere minutes, the time passing in the unblink of an eye and delivering his mind straight to the next morning. And a knock on the door just as he finished meditating.

  “You timed that, didn’t you?” he asked Erianna as he opened the door.

  “If by timed you mean looked, then yes, I did. One thing you should know about people like you, creatures enslaved to habit, you need defenses the likes Farris gave you more than anyone else.”

  Sam rubbed his chin. “And why is that?”

  “You’ll find out later. Maybe not today. We might not have enough time, but soon.”

  Sam didn’t miss the implication. “So we’re starting on threads today? You decided already?”

  She nodded. “Figured there really wasn’t a reason to put it off for any longer. It would always cost you time away from some other ventures. And it’s not like you’d be more ready to study in a week than you are now. Maybe even less, considering you might have some other stuff to worry about, new avenues of study.”

  “So what does it cost me today?”

  “Your morning session with Dan. Maybe the whole day even, we’ll see. Don’t worry, I already let him know.”

  Sam released a breath. “Damn… Luckily you haven’t told me about this yesterday. I would’ve gotten all worked up about this. Maybe even ruined my sleep.”

  “I wouldn’t have wanted to be the cause of that two days in a row. But as much as I would like the credit of being so thoughtful, I hadn’t considered that effect on you. I only decided to start today yesterday evening, after we parted and I had the while night to spend running thorough all the different thoughts in my head.”

  “Well in any case, I’m grateful that we’re starting already. I’ve waited a really long time for this. It’s good that it’s finally happening.”

  Erianna suddenly took a step back. Worriedly, she asked, “You’re that… excited about this?”

  “Excited isn’t the exact word. It’s more… anxious. But both in a positive and a negative sense. All this time, I’ve been the special one of a kind Thread-Weaver Taken, but besides being inclined to gather by seeking I haven’t…” He suddenly gulped, realizing he was headed towards a lie, would still have to head there.

  “I haven’t really utilized that aspect of my uniqueness,” he continued. “It’s not that I’m worried that we’ll suddenly discover that I’m not a Thread-Weaver or anything. But it’s just that an attribute has been forcibly etched into my identity, what I think of myself, and yet I haven’t done anything with it. It’d be like if you knew you were a princess but spent the first years of your life on a farm somewhere, not being taught anything that you had to know for that role, not doing anything to act the part.”

  Erianna’s shoulders relaxed. “While I dislike the analogy, I get where you’re coming from. And don’t worry, after today, you’ll finally be able to call yourself a Thread-Weaver without reason for hesitation.”

  “And would I know why we’re called Thread-Weavers, despite not being able to weave threads?”

  Erianna laughed. “If you want, I can tell you about this right now. You’re not going to like the answer, though.”

  “I imagine I wouldn’t.” He clicked his tongue. “Nah, save it for after the spear-fighting session, after breakfast, I mean, as we walk back. I assume we’re still heading to eat?”

  “Honestly? It’s a little insulting that at this point of our acquaintance, you feel the need to ask me if I’m planning to skip breakfast.”

  “Gotcha. Let me just get ready then. Ms. couldn’t have waited two more minutes until I got fully dressed.”

  “It would’ve made less of a splash if I had waited to knock until then instead of straight after the gongs went off and you opened your eyes.”

  “Pervert. Looking through doors.”

  She held her hands up. “My motives were pure. At least pure of perversion. But if it makes you feel better, I’ll turn around and put my hands over my eyes while you dress.”

  “You’re not even going to leave the room?”

  “Then how would you know I’m not peeking?”

  “Ah. That’s a good point. Unfortunately, I don’t know enough about threads to know what exactly it is that you would see. Alright, turn around. Eyes closed. Hands on your ears and cluck like a chicken.”

  She turned around and gave him the middle finger as she exited the room and closed the door behind her. Sam laughed. Another point for me. He quickly got dressed, although, it’s not like there was much required from him to do so. Just change his shirt and put on socks. He didn’t even have to change the shirt, but he liked having clothes that were just for sleeping in. Taking stock of his bag, although he knew full well that it was all there, he picked it up and joined the princess waiting outside his doorstep for the second day in a row.

  Lin was already waiting for them when they arrived and acting as though the new guest didn’t merit any change in routine or behavior. Whether that’s what he really thought or whether it was just what he was trying to portray, didn’t matter one whit to Sam, who hasn’t treated any royal he had met so far with anything approaching decorum. Erianna, for her part, took a less active part in this part of Sam’s training than she did the day before with Dan, content to mostly sit by the side and watch the proceedings.

  She did join at the end of the session for a series of spars against Sam. Without a doubt, she was the best fighter he had ever fought. Of course, he had only fought four other people (since Lin couldn’t count), but that still made Erianna the better physical fighter than probably any Terran at their age-range. Something told him (Erianna, after they had finished) that she was also the best elven fighter in their age-range. All that to say, he had a long way to go to catch up with his counterpart in terms of applied skills.

  “He’s nice,” Erianna said after she finished informing him of her superiority as they were on their way to meet the others at the usual mess hall.

  “That’s such an empty statement.”

  “Don’t be an ass. He seems like a nice person and he’s a good instructor.”

  “I’m not being an ass. Either could’ve been inferred from your laconic two words. Don’t blame me for not knowing how to take it. It’s not like ‘nice’ isn’t one of the words most frequently used in sarcastic comments.”

  This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  “Did I sound sarcastic? No? Then what does that have to do with anything? Are you just picking a fight for no reason?”

  “No. I do have a reason. To pass the time more enjoyably.”

  She sighed. “Of course. Well, I’d be a hypocrite if I chided you for starting an argument in order to have fun.”

  “Don’t let Felix hear you say that. He’s already on our case with his stupid jokes, as it is.”

  “You let me take of Felix Polaris. I assure you, before too long, he’ll be back to helping you make bigoted jokes and nothing else.”

  “Come on now, that’s selling Felix short. He also has sexual jokes in his repertoire.”

  “In the presence of a fine lady such as I? I should think not.”

  Sam laughed, and Erianna narrowed her eyes at him in question. He held up his hands. “I just had the random thought that it’d be pretty damn interesting to go brick by brick and compare our childhoods.”

  “How did you get on that? And why did you find it funny?”

  Sam gave her a condescending look. “What’s a major part of growing up for us short-lived races?”

  “And you call me a pervert.”

  “Hey! This is sociology… or childhood psychology. Or something else, I don’t know. It’s gotta be a field of a formal, legitimate science.”

  “Just because its science doesn’t mean the people conducting it aren’t perverts.”

  “That’s a very good point,” Sam conceded as they arrived at their destination. Last, of course, as Erianna’s arrival hasn’t changed the fact that Sam’s schedule was built around arriving late to his engagements with his friends. “Should I even bother taking my phone out and checking where they are?”

  “You do you,” she said as she entered the building.

  “Definitely looks like news have begun to spread,” Felix said as they sat down to join them. “It’s like we’ve gone back half-a-year, and a new arrival has caused our little group to be the center of attention.”

  Erianna shrugged. “Then you should be very used to that by now. For what’s it worth, I think my arrival will spark much less curiosity, and last much shorter. Unlike Sam, they’re not interested in who I am, but simply in the fact that I’m here. That’s something people don’t need a long time to get used to.”

  “Have you had any strangers approach you yet?” Yvessa asked.

  “No, thankfully. But we both know that it’s only a matter of time. At least the military environment will control the frequency and behavior of such interlocutors. Besides, you know that it’s nothing I haven’t dealt with before.”

  “Doesn’t mean that I’m happy that you have to deal with it. At the very least, you’ll have Sam to fend off any pertinent or particularity intense annoyance.”

  “Oh?” Erianna turned to him with a questioning look. “And here I thought you did not enjoy the limelight, such as it is.”

  “I don’t,” he said. “Especially not when it’s not earned and the people approaching me don’t… want to talk with me but with the idea of me.”

  Sarah smiled. “Nevertheless, he has been dealing with random strangers approaching him out of nowhere very skillfully. At least after the first few. They all leave rather quickly and with a smile on their face.”

  “That’s an exaggeration. They just don’t leave in a huff. At least most don’t.”

  “So how do you do it?” Erianna asked.

  Sam shrugged. “It’s not like I’m doing anything special. I’m not trying to be an ass, nor do I want to, because those people don’t really deserve to be treated that way. At least most of them don’t. And there are a few, like our graduating friend that are… really heartfelt and deserve to be treated as individuals.

  “But basically, I’m just trying to act like the Bizzaro Conan. It’s what I imagine he would act like if he went sane and stopped wanting to bask in the adoration of every random person. I act super high energy, very thick on the humor, and while trying to make as little sense as I possibly can. Then I just steer the person away using any excuse imaginable. It was incredibly easy during the time I was suffering from magical withdrawal. As I didn’t even care about not acting like an ass.”

  “Or making really dark jokes.” Sarah frowned.

  “I could make those same jokes now and you wouldn’t consider them as dark. The important thing is that both you and I knew that they were jokes, so there’s no reason to be angry.”

  Sarah ignored him, as that line of argument had already failed to convince her before. Turning to Erianna, she asked, “So, what are your plans for today?”

  Erianna smirked. “Are you asking about what I’m going to do with my day? Or what I’m going to do with Sam’s day?”

  Sarah blushed. “I’d like to know both, in any case.”

  Erianna laughed. “Then you’re in luck, because they’ll probably be the same today as well. At least the next couple of hours will be.”

  “You’re seriously going to join another of his sessions with Dan?” Yvessa asked.

  “That remains to be seen…” Erianna smiled mysteriously.

  Sam grunted. “God, I can only hope the rest of your family isn’t annoying as you and your uncle. She’s planning to teach me about threads. Until lunch for certain and afterwards remains to be seen.”

  Erianna stole a cookie from his tray. “Spoilsport.” She frowned at him.

  “It was pretty obvious what you meant,” Felix said. “And in any case, I, for one, am happy that you went down that road.” He mimicked writing on a notepad. “Yet another mark for Felix Polaris and his gut reactions.”

  “Is that what we’re calling them now?” Sam fanned his hand in front of his nose.

  “Really? Flatulence humor? For shame, Sam. For shame.”

  “What? No? I was talking about your… body odor.”

  “That’s not plural. You wanted to say something else, didn’t you?”

  “Yeah…” Sam rubbed the back of his head. “But another time. I gotta pace myself with the gay jokes.”

  “Did we ever get to the bottom of whether those are gay jokes or homophobic jokes?”

  “Well, I always thought the answer was clear. It’s both. When I say gay jokes, I mean jokes about the gays. If I said ‘women jokes,’ we’d all know whatever joke I’m referring to is going to be sexist.”

  “Yeah, but you made jokes about you being gay and stuff that portrayed being gay as a positive.”

  Sam shook his head. “You’re missing the point. It’s still a homophobic joke because I’m making it from a certain point of view. It’s like this: I’ll make a joke about how crying is for women and real men don’t cry, so I must be a woman for crying. I’m putting myself down and using sexism to do so. Double-sided sexism at that, the best kind. But just because I make being a woman to be superior to a man in that scenario—which, of course, as you all know… pshh—but just because of that, it doesn’t mean that the joke isn’t sexist in nature. It is. That’s what makes it funny. If we lived in a world without sexism, and I just said something like that out of the blue, people wouldn’t laugh, they’d point at me and call me a crazy bigot because they’d have no familiarity with the concept of making fun of sexists.”

  “Wait,” Erianna said, “so you’re saying than in order for you to be able to make people laugh, you need bad social conditions to exist? Wouldn’t that mean you’d want sexism to persist?”

  “That’s a very good question. One I admit to not having considered all that much. Let’s break it down. First, we have the first moral question which we’ll pen using a utilitarian lens: Is the price of sexism and other such bad social phenomena worth the good we are able to bring out of them using humor? No. Obviously, not.”

  “But what if it’s a really little amount of sexism?” Felix asked. “Like if we kept sexism in a jar, a sample of a virus for scientific purposes? People would still be aware of it, and thus able to laugh because of it, but it wouldn’t hurt anyone.”

  “Yes, but we’re assuming such a thing is not possible. We’re talking all or nothing. Well, not all or nothing, rather our current, best-in-history but still off the mark, social environment, compared to a utopian ideal.”

  “I don’t think there’s anything else to ask, really,” Erianna said. “Sure, you can break the problem down into other questions; ask whether it is possible to create jokes about sexism without sexism to be found. About the nature of comedy and art and all that stuff. But the point is, that by using sexist jokes, you might be propagating a system that entrenches sexism, because those jokes could not exist without it.”

  “That’s a different claim,” Sam said. “One which I did not argue for or against. The point we agreed on was that humor gained from bad social conditions isn’t worth maintaining those bad social conditions for. It’s a whole different thing to claim that by joking about those social conditions, you’re sustaining said conditions. In fact, that’s a very different question compared to the one you originally raised, much more complex in my opinion. Especially because to reach an answer, we would have to utilize empirical data.”

  “I thought you weren’t allowed to do that in Terran ethics.”

  “You’re allowed to do anything in philosophy. People could just not agree with anything you said and call you stupid. But the popular conviction that I believe you were referring to doesn’t forbid us from observing empirical facts in order to make normative ones. Or descriptive into prescriptive, to use the original wording. The is-ought problem arises only when one makes a prescriptive statement based solely on descriptive statements. If you muddle into your final prescriptive claim both normative and empirical arguments, the existence of the latter wouldn’t invalidate your claim. After all, applied ethics couldn’t really exist if we couldn’t study the ramifications of our applications, yeah?”

  “Fascinating,” Felix drawled. “Almost as fascinating as the fact that we have a new arrival in our group, an esteemed royal personage no less, and we’re still talking about the same old bullshit.”

  “I do apologize, Felix,” Erianna said. “But I must also admit that this will probably keep happening.” She lowered her head with a regretful sigh. “I mean, this part of Sam’s personality is so central to him that it affected my uncle’s logic after only spending a couple of hours with him. I can’t fulfill my duty without engaging Sam in these questions of philosophy and politics. Even if I don’t like it and hold no personal interest in them. Different we may be, but as two fellow wards of my uncle, and as teacher and student, I must try to bridge this gap in our worldview. To truly understand how Sam thinks and operates.”

  Sam gave her an admiring look. What a brilliant maneuver, and wonderfully executed at that. Of course, even a master couldn’t have disguised it so that Felix wouldn’t have noticed the implications, leading him to immediately make his grumblings known. “I see what you’re doing, Your Highness, and it’s not going to work. You can’t bribe me into forsaking the truth. Literally can’t, as you don’t even have an incentive. There’s nothing you could do that would make Sam stop spewing bullshit about long dead weirdos.”

  “Can’t bribe you? Hm… maybe, I wonder. But you know what I can do? Intimidate, perhaps? Threaten you, maybe? Even if I can’t stop Sam from bringing up this John or that Dick, I can encourage him to bring them up more frequently. A philosophy discussion every breakfast? A history lecture at dinner? The political makeup of a bygone world on Saturdays? I assure you, Felix, my ability to endure through boring conversations and mind-numbing monologues is much greater than yours or anyone else at this table.”

  Felix gulped. “That would be… quite immoral… How unlike… anyone else at this table.”

  Erianna shrugged. “I am as my kingdom demanded of me.”

  “Speaking of which…” Yvessa sighed. “The reactions back home have already started. Only to your official reasons for the stay, of course. I think it will still take some time until the rumors start spreading. Not even sure any have popped up yet.”

  Erianna nodded. “It’s only been a day. And my mother wanted the rumors to be completely organic, so we’ll have to wait until human behavior forces itself upon the people privy or suspecting of the knowledge. But I feel like you and your mother will definitely have plenty to talk about on Monday.”

  “We already do. I messaged her yesterday.” She frowned. “Farris called her personally to apologize for not letting her know beforehand.”

  “Was he sincere?”

  “No.” Yvessa laughed. “But my mother seemed to find the humor in what he did much better than me. She is mad that you didn’t come to bid her goodbye, though.”

  “Couldn’t have, even without taking the… joke into account.”

  “I know…”

  “But I’ll join you on your call, see how it is from the other side. We also need to talk to Marin, anyway.”

  “Oh man!” Felix moaned. “I just realized that now that Erianna’s here, she can’t be the butt of all of our jokes for talking about her so much. How about this Marin guy? We only have the joke that we barely talk about him. Do you think we can pivot that?”

  Erianna and Yvessa gave him a blank stare. Sam scoffed. “Don’t be an idiot, Felix. Of course we can. Now that Erianna’s here, both she and Yvessa will talk about Marin. So you’ll have way more opportunities to comment about him and his appearances in our conversations.”

  “I do like his appearance. He’s a good-looking dude.”

  Erianna gave Sam that well-worn gesture and even accompanied it with voice over. “You see?”

  Sam shrugged. “That doesn’t count. Felix is a vain pervert. He judges everyone by what they look like and he likes looking at dudes. He even knew what my naked backside looked like before we met.”

  “Guilty as charged,” Felix admitted. “But I also knew what Erianna looked like. Cause I’m not a rude asshole.”

  Sam lowered his head and focused on his food. The best part of valor was knowing when you had to avoid engaging the enemy until you could gather enough ammunition to dispel their wrong arguments. He wasn’t going to let that princess get away with thinking that he was the odd one out. Not based on this one point of evidence, at least.