“Losing control?”

  Arnold tilted his head. This was the first time he’d heard of such a thing. Well, it wasn't as if he had been here long enough to know the ins and outs of this world. Still, the idea unsettled him more than he expected.

  In a world filled with extraordinary beings, it seemed a plausible consequence.

  “What does that mean?”

  “It is the curse of becoming a monster, master.” Davis’s voice was grim. “If ya drink a potion, ya risk turning into a Curse. They say it happens because ya are trying to take the path by faking the Monarch’s favor, ya get punished.”

  Davis shook his head and raised the tankard to his mouth, swallowing another mouthful of ale before wiping his lip with the edge of his dirty sleeve.

  “Each Curse takes a different form. Some remain humanoid, while others twist and deform, and some don't even resemble living things, instead being objects that move and kill on their own. But one thing is always the same. They lose their mind completely. All they want is to kill, hurt, break, and destroy.”

  ‘Object?’

  *thump*

  A cold throb pulsed through Arnold’s chest, the heartbeat pounding harder inside his ribcage. Even through the vessel, Izzy’s consciousness felt the tremor of his heart, beating frantically.

  Did that mean they… did that mean Isidora… was a Cursed being?

  ‘No, that can’t be true,’ Izzy contemplated within the vessel. ‘Both of my minds still function. Then what is the difference?’

  Davis finished his ale and set the empty tankard aside. He wiped his mouth again, then leaned forward.

  “There are several ways a man can fall to the Curse.”

  He raised one finger.

  “If ya have already begun to walk one path and try to drink the potion of another, ya will be Cursed. Even a Bless would turn into a monster if they dared such a thing.”

  He raised another finger.

  “If ya come into contact with a specific Curse, one with the power to taint others, ya will also be affected.”

  He held up a third.

  “And if ya see something ya should never see, or hear something ya should never hear… well, ya will either die on the spot, or turn into a Curse.”

  Finally, he opened his hand wide, a smirk on his face.

  “There are plenty of reasons that turn you into a Curse, master. That’s why the old wives' tales warn ya not to linger when strange things happen. Run, they say. Run, and do not look back.”

  Davis coughed and picked up his fork. He rested the metal against the side of his neck.

  “A Curse cannot be reasoned with. They have already lost their minds. The recommended action is to kill them before they show any more dangerous signs.”

  Then he slowly drew the fork across his own throat in a slicing motion.

  “The church, specifically the White Inquisitor, known as the Seal, is often dispatched when a Curse is spotted.”

  ‘Curse…’

  Arnold took a sip of water. The coolness managed to cool him down.

  ‘I see. So that is why extraordinary beings are called Bless. Because the opposite, the cursed ones, exist.’

  “Sometimes a Curse can affect an entire area. When one is spotted, it’s recommended to evacuate the region. Common folk… they tend to go missing in such places.”

  Davis continued, as he glanced at Rudo and frowned, annoyed that the man was still leisurely drinking his ale. He leaned forward, placing his forearm on the table and lowered his voice.

  “I don’t know much, as I’ve only heard tales from the outside, but… for hundreds of years, the churches across the world have created another secret organization.”

  He whispered in a serious tone.

  “The Institution. A secret, official coalition formed by all the major churches. Their job is to discover, observe, contain, and… exterminate them.”

  He shook his head.

  “That’s why, ya don’t want to become a Stagefarer, too much trouble, too much danger. If ya even losing control, or have even a little symptoms, ya going to be on the Institution’s list.”

  He lifted his hands and smirked meaningfully.

  “Ya wouldn’t want to hear what happens if ya found yarself on that list.”

  He leaned back in his chair, relaxed again.

  “In recent years, life for the common folk has become more stable. Daily life is normal again because the churches work in the shadows to keep these things under control.” Davis smiled and chewed another dry meat.

  “That is the extent of my knowledge, master. What do you want to know?”

  Arnold stroked his chin and leaned back into his chair. There was a great deal of information to sift through, yet among all of it, one point caught his interest more than the rest.

  “Tell me about the Curses that take the form of objects,” He raised his voice carefully.

  “Objects?” Davis tilted his head. He lifted his gaze toward the ceiling to pull a half-forgotten memory from his mind. After a moment, he answered with an awkward tone.

  Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  “Curse objects are simply items that possess extraordinary power. I’ve seen a few in my time, but how they come to be… that part I am not sure about.”

  He shook his head and spread his hands helplessly. His shoulders rose and fell in a shrug.

  “Truth be told, master, we know very little about them. Most of what we know comes from hearsay, tales swapped between thieves and other Stagefarers. Perhaps if I climbed higher in the ranks, I might learn more.”

  ‘So they don’t know. A shame,’ Arnold dejectedly put down his fork. He tapped his finger lightly against the table, then looked up again.

  “Is there any Curse that people can talk and reason with?”

  Davis nearly jumped from his seat. “By the Monarch’s grace, master, you must be jesting! If a Curse could hold a conversation, that would be the most terrifying of all!”

  Arnold raised an eyebrow at the man’s exaggerated reaction. “And why is that?”

  Davis leaned forward, his voice rising with urgency and fear.

  “Because if they can talk, it means they can pretend to be normal, catch ya off guard! They can trick people, lure them into a trap, and then... kill them when they drop their guard!”

  Arnold grimaced. In one sense, the logic made perfect sense. In another sense, when applied to themselves, to ‘Isidora’, it did not make sense at all.

  ‘Does that mean I am pretending to be normal now, to catch them off guard, then kill them?’ An amusing thought flickered through Arnold’s mind.

  But he set the idea aside. There was too much he needed time to digest.

  Davis shook his head.

  “The study of the Curse, the Stagefarer, and the Bless… it is a forbidden matter, master. None dares study them openly. If they try, the church hunts them down. Perhaps the highest echelons of the faith, the Archbishops and the like, hold the true knowledge.”

  Arnold blinked slowly at the words “hunt” and “church.”

  ‘So secretive?’

  Davis smirked, lifting the corner of his mouth in a playful grin.

  “Or, you could seek to join the Church yourself for a peek at the Institution, master. As a highly respectable gentleman, I wager ya could join their ranks in no time.”

  ‘Joining the church?’ Izzy, who had taken control of Arnold, considered the idea for a moment.

  Could their vessels enter the Church? It seemed ridiculous. Arnold wasn't a real, living human to begin with. Churches were sacred places. There was a possibility their vessels might be purified or extinguished the moment they stepped inside.

  And could their vessel even become a Bless? The thought was tempting, but Izzy was skeptical. The process relied on the blessing of the Monarch. What if they discovered their existence? Wouldn’t that be a bad thing? They weren't a Curse, a Bless, or even a Stagefarer. They were something else entirely.

  The Curse, the Bless, the Stagefarer… All of them were a headache.

  Arnold stroked his chin, lost in thought. For now, he stored the information deep inside his mind, to be sorted and analyzed later.

  There was another matter that interested him. And since Davis was a Stagefarer, Arnold figured he should know about this.

  “What about the orange bottle?” he asked while shifting one leg over the other.

  Davis tipped the empty ale tankard toward his mouth, realizing it was dry. He frowned before thunking it down on the table.

  “About that,” he said, wiping his mouth with his sleeve. “Since we’re only at the earlier stages, we’ve not much use for them.” He scratched the side of his head before continuing. “They are called ‘Yan essence.’ I heard they can clean the mind, detect things, and offer protection.”

  “Hmm,” Arnold nodded in confirmation.

  As he suspected, they did have such functions. But protection? That was new. And ‘Yan essence’… why did it sound so familiar? Had he heard of it before?

  Davis studied Arnold’s expression and smirked, lifting his fork and pointing it at him like a teacher revealing a secret.

  “And here’s a morsel for ya, Master, free of charge. There’s another sort of bottle, too. A blue one.”

  ‘!’ Arnold widened his eyes. It was one of the vials that had poisoned Benjamin!

  “That one’s called… ‘Yi essence.’ As for what it does, from what I’ve heard, it’s for hiding, for obscuring what’s plain to see. Restores a man’s sanity and calms his mind, they say.”

  “?” Arnold tilted his head. No mention of poison?

  “There was no poison in it?” he asked again.

  Davis tilted his head in return, mirroring Arnold’s confusion.

  “Poison? I have never heard of it”

  ‘What, no poison?’ Arnold blinked. What was that about? Then how did Benjamin become so weak, so aged in such a short span of time?

  ‘Ugh, headache incoming’ he stroked his forehead beneath the bandages.

  “Ah!” Davis suddenly clapped, startling Rudo. His eyes shone with admiration as he leaned forward.

  “Just as I thought! A master of your caliber! Even without extraordinary abilities, without any knowledge of the underworld, ya managed to best those Stagefarers!”

  “???” What was this about? Arnold tilted his head.

  Davis eagerly explained. “Well, ya see, master. Those bottles only show their true worth when ya spread the essence around, inhale them, or trigger them in a specific way. A man doesn’t just… drink them straight.”

  He jabbed a thumb at his chest.

  “Especially in our Faction, the Violence Faction… we’ve a terrible constitution when it comes to the blue essence, the ‘Yi essence.’”

  ‘What?’ Arnold stiffened. Allergic? Was that why…

  Davis continued with increasing enthusiasm.

  “To us, the blue essence is like poison. If we were to drink it, we’d grow weak as a newborn kitten, though the effect is but temporary.”

  ‘That’s interesting…’ Arnold stroked his chin. So Benjamin was weakened because he was from the Violence Faction. Not because the essence was poison, but because it reacted violently with the Faction itself.

  Davis added with another shrug. “But then again, we’ve no need to drink it to activate the essence’s power. We simply spread it around, just like we do with Yan essence.”

  ‘Mmm’ Arnold now finally understood the reason why Benjamin was so weak that day.

  Although, there was one thing still on his mind that wouldn’t disappear.

  ‘Yan and Yi? Really?’

  Inside Arnold’s mind, Izzy crossed her legs and folded her arms. She fell deeper into her velvet chair, her brow scrunched in growing suspicion.

  The reason? She found it absurdly similar to the terminology from her original world. Specifically, from those hairless monkeys of the Eastern Republic, Co.Nest’s annoying enemies in the Colonial War. Were they even related?

  ‘No. It can't be,’ Izzy shook her head, dismissing the thought.

  For now, that was all Izzy wanted from them. The sun outside had already begun to descend, casting orange shadows through the narrow Snug window. While she still had many questions, she doubted they would know much more.

  ‘Wait… maybe I could…?’ A light bulb lit up in her mind, as she controlled Arnold to ask one last question.

  “One last question. Do you know the way out of this…”

  Before Arnold could finish his sentence, a soft knock echoed on the hatch.

  “?”

  The wooden hatch slid open, and a barmaid whispered through the gap, her voice laced with urgency.

  “Begging your pardon, sirs, but the Inspectors are here.”

  Izzy is very racist.