New World, New Life: I Became A Bigshot In The Ancient World-Chapter 184: RISK OF BEING EXPOSED

"Oh no! What should we do?" Aristia asked with the same fervour, an expression of horror on her face.

One look at her face had Leilani bursting into laughter. She quickly regained her composure.

"We have to cleanse the princesses in the river." She said seriously, then chuckled. "They need a bath."

"Alright, this princess has forgotten where the bath is. Can princess sister show me?" Aristia asked.

"Oh, forgetful princess. I will show you. Look there!" Leilani pointed at a small bucket of water some distances away.

"Oh! I remember now! How could I be so forgetful?" Aristia patted her forehead, causing Leilani to giggle almost endlessly.

Leilani quickly went over to the bucket. "Come quick, princess sister. We have to wash so that we won’t smell. Hmm, she’s already starting to stink." She pinched her nose and blew the air away with her other hand.

This time, Aristia laughed heartily. [This girl. Really.]

She followed to the bucket and waited to dip her doll.

"I’ll just dip a little," Leilani began. Then her expression changed. "Oh no! I cannot swim. I’m drowning." She flailed her doll about in the water and shouted dramatically.

Her loud voice drew the attention of the other children.

"Isn’t that Leilani’s doll Ari’s is holding?" A girl asked, pointing in their direction.

"And that’s the one she likes most! Last time I took her doll to look at, she bit me!" A little boy complained.

The water splashed on Aristia’s face and on some parts of her gown, but somehow, she didn’t seem to mind.

"Help me!" Leilani shouted and Aristia reacted quickly.

She plunged her doll into the water and used it to wrap around Leilani’s doll, bringing it out of the water.

"Don’t worry. I’ll rescue you from the evil ocean, my princess." She said in a heroic voice.

She took out the doll and placed the soaked toy on her lap. She pressed her hand on the chest multiple times.

"Hehe, what are you doing?" Leilani was both confused and amused by her actions. She chuckled, then coughed. "Ahem. Thank you. You’re my saviour. How can I repay you?"

"Nothing much. Just one of those delicious mud cakes will do." Aristia replied.

"I will be right away." Leilani poured some water in sand and began to mix it to form a cake. She looked up at Aristia who was watching her curiously. "Come and help me!"

"Eh?" Aristia couldn’t help but ask. She had never played with sand like this before when she was little. Except for trying out pottery with clay.

[Oh, and making sand castles in the beach with El. But when the triplets were born, they made me play with sand a lot. It can’t be considered when I was little because I was already a teenager, almost an adult.]

But looking at what Leilani was doing made her curious and she couldn’t resist trying. [There’s no harm in trying.]

She pulled up the commoner clothes she was wearing and bent down beside Leilani, making sand cakes and keeping them to dry.

Looking at her sandied hand and the girl beside her whose lips were pouted seriously, Aristia only had one thought.

[This is...fun.]

Owen was long forgotten, just quietly going over to stand under the tree Millie was perched on.

He looked up at Millie, out of earshot of the other children.

"I guess we’ve been forgotten."

One long stare from Millie and he looked back forward at Aristia.

"I’m sorry for saying that." He apologized to Millie.

***

"Thank you for staying with me." Leilani smiled as she held Aristia’s hand. They were standing outside the open gate. "Will you come again?"

Aristia slowly nodded. "Yes. I really enjoyed playing with you, Leilani."

"Really?" Leilani asked.

"Really." Aristia responded seriously.

"Bye, Aris." Leilani waved.

"Bye," Aristia paused from entering the carriage. She turned to Leilani and suddenly hugged her, whispering softly. "Leila."

With that, she quickly turned and entered the carriage.

Hearing that, Leilani’s eyes shone. She waved and waved until Aristia’s carriage was out of sight, almost jumping in her spot.

During the training with captain Hugh the next day, they didn’t discussed much about daemons because it was up to her to create a connection with her daemon.

Meanwhile, Aristia herself didn’t know how to. The captain had said that there was no particular method of seeing the chains.

Each daemon owner had their unique experience when it came to breaking the chains. She thought to ask Wilson about his own experience, but kept pushing it to later.

***

"Princess, what are you making?" Owen asked curiously.

It was the evening of the day after they had visited Dahlia and Dorothy’s home and Aristia had been making something after her classes that evening.

He had seen her embroidering something. He had been stunned as he had never seen Aristia embroider anything so seriously.

The only time he ever saw her embroider was for her embroidery class when it was needed. Aside from that, he had never seen her embroider of her own accord.

Who was she going to give the embroidered cloth to?

And when had she learned to sew? That was not the problem. Why were her seams so neat?

Aristia didn’t reply, causing Owen to stretch his neck to see what she was doing.

Adeline chuckled, but didn’t say anything.

Seeing how both of them kept silent, Owen pouted and folded his arms.

Aristia cut out the expensive silk cloth to the desired shape "Linny, where’s the cotton?" She asked.

"Here it is." Adeline moved quickly, handing Aristia the pile of cotton. "Princess, let me do it."

But Aristia shook her head. "No, I want to do it myself." She didn’t look up at Adeline, her hands never stopping. "And you’ve asked me this fifteen times, Linny. The answer’s still the same."

Now, Adeline pouted and folded her arms, moving to stand beside Owen.

"...."

Owen watched her, then he quietly released his folded arms and wiped the pout off his face.

He glanced at Adeline, then back at Aristia. "You’ve been counting?"

Aristia put down the things in her hand. "Isn’t it almost time for dinner? Let’s go."

She needed to have something in her stomach.

Millie had reverted into a fox, her first form when she first manifested. Aristia scooped her in her arms and headed to the dining table.

"Soon," she whispered to Millie. "I’ll find a way to feel the spiritual connection between us and form a connection with you. Then our bond will grow stronger and we’ll be able to speak to each other. Somehow."

Millie rubbed her body against Aristia as if she agreed with her.

Aristia’s smile widened, only to freeze the next second.

[Wait... Wasn’t Millie in cat form when we passed by the servants yesterday?]

Aristia froze. Yes. Millie had been in cat form. They had passed by many servants then and a lot of them had seen Cat Millie.

So wouldn’t it be very strange and suspicious if they suddenly saw a fox with same features as the cat. There wasn’t such a coincidence.

[Noble households like this usually have spies planted in other noble households. Some of these servants could be spies.]

It was normal to have a few spies planted in aristocrat families. Even if there weren’t, servants gossiped. That gossip would quickly spread between servants of different noble households, and eventually, reach the masters of the house.

[That means, Millie isn’t safe.]

She looked left and right. There were servants moving about. It wasn’t possible to tell which ones were spies and which ones were not, but any of them could be involved in gossip.

Most of the servants glanced at Millie in her arms before bowing.

Aristia was too carried away in her thoughts to notice each person’s pupils trembling from shock and surprise.

She hastened her steps and quickly arrived at the dining room. Owen and Adeline followed behind her in confusion, wondering what happened.

Aristia didn’t even wait for the guards at the door to open the door.

"Papa, I made a mistake!"

Immediately she pushed open the door to the dining room, those words left her mouth.

Wilson and Catherine looked in the direction of the door.

"You made a mistake?" Catherine asked.

Aristia nodded, moving hurriedly in their direction.

"Leave," Catherine looked over her shoulder, and the servants in the dining room quickly left with their heads still bowed.

Catherine then turned to Aristia.

After the last servant left and closed the door, Aristia turned to her parents.

"The last time I took Millie out of my room, she was in cat form. Millie changed to fox form and I forgot to ask her to change back."

"You’re worried because the servants saw Millie in another form?" Wilson asked.

Aristia nodded slowly. She looked back and forth at her parents’ reaction.

[Why aren’t they worried? Your daughter is on the risk of being exposed!]

"You have nothing to worry about, Tia. We’ll handle this." Wilson said.

Aristia nodded to show she understood.

But deep down, she doubted whether Wilson could really control such large amount of servants and keep them from talking.

She remembered something.

[Oh, yeah. Isn’t papa the richest in the kingdom or something? Maybe he’ll pay them to a shut their mouths.]

Thinking that, Aristia ate dinner in peace.

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