[ToM] Side Chapter 3 – Bubble Attack (Patreon)

For the first time since Alistair's arrival in Sunglow, it was his free day. No training, no patrols, and best of all—no monsters. In these last few weeks in Sunglow, he had already gained more levels than he had in the last year training in the Church. It just proved just how much more valuable actual combat experience was.

But even with all the levels he had gained, Alistair did not feel particular joy killing monsters on a daily basis. He understood that it was necessary—for the protection of people living in Sunglow. He could accept fighting monster that deliberately attacked the town, or which were especially dangerous. But he often had to fight even those that weren't a particular threat simply so other monsters wouldn't get to them first and evolve.

Alistair would have liked nothing more than to rest for the day and recuperate his strength, however, there was one thing that forced him out of bed early in the morning. Two things actually.

First, was still that mysterious skill that he'd gotten a week ago <General's Echo>. The System refused to give him any information beyond the meager description that he already reread a thousand times. 

Second, was the dust. It crawled into his nose and made him sneeze. Annoyed, he threw off his blanket and took a look around his room. It was an absolute mess—clothes, armor, and weapons were thrown haphazardly all over the place while motes of dust danced around them. Alistair grimaced in disgust. 

This cannot go on. I can't live in this pigsty. Ideally, I'd hire a maid, but my budget has been severely limited to that which I earn as an adventurer. Father really has gone too far this time. I know that I'm by no means his favorite child, but this is not how a nobleman should live.

With a sigh, Alistair dug out the last clean shirt and pants that he had and began sorting through the mess in his room. The dust flew around him in clouds as he piled the dirty clothes in one corner, and several clumps of it stuck to his feet like glue. He tried to shake it off, but in the end, gave up and just grabbed the pile of clothes.

If I remember right, there was a washing machine downstairs. I know that servants back at home use it to wash clothes, but I wonder how exactly it works. Couldn't be that difficult right?

Trudging through dust, Alistair made his way downstairs and headed into one of the smaller rooms. It had a few magitech machines in it as well as all the cleaning supplies one could ever need. Or at least he hoped so—most of the things here were foreign to him.

Much to his dismay, there were two magitech machines in the room, each clearly made for a different purpose, but both covered with a thick layer of dust. Alistair put the dirty clothes into one of the large laundry baskets he found on a shelf and then took a look at the cleaning supplies. There were mops, brooms, rags of various sizes, and various cleaning agents. 

"What do I even use?" he asked himself, lifting the various bottles. Among them he found what was labeled as "Detergent for clothes" so he put that in the basket along with the dirty clothes. The rest of the cleaning agents however made no sense to him—one was for wood, one for furniture, one for tiles, one for floors, one for sinks and there was even something to clean the inside of the magitech machines. 

For now, I'll just try getting rid of the dust and then continue from there.

So he took one of the smaller rags and began to wipe the surface of one of the machines. Much to his dismay, some of the dust began flying around the room as soon as he tried to sweep it aside. Alistair tried to keep it contained by covering the dust with the rag, however, as soon as he tried to move the dust into a nearby bin, it began flying all over the place.

"Curse you dust," he covered his nose in an attempt to protect it, but the dust still somehow managed to get inside and force him into a violent sneezing fit.

Okay, sweeping the dust with a dry rag clearly doesn't work. Maybe I should wet it first.

He did exactly that, washing out the dust that was stuck to it in the process. Satisfied to see the dust wash down the drain, he went back to the magitech machine, wiping it with the soaking wet rag. The water dripped everywhere, gathering dust alongside it and creating some kind of nasty sludge.

"No, no, no! Why do you do that?" Alistair whined, trying to catch the dripping dirt water with his rag, but all he managed to do was create a dirty puddle on the floor. He glared at the created mess, then returned to the sink washing out the rag and squeezing out the water this time.

The third time's the charm, right?

Alistair began wiping the machine again and much to his relief the dust was being contained by the rag, neither flying around nor pooling on the floor. It only took a few swipes for the rag to be completely dirty, so he had to rinse it clean every few minutes. With each rinse, the room got a little bit cleaner.

Once the dust was successfully wiped off all the surfaces—a task which took far too long—Alistair decided to turn his attention to clothes. He opened the lid of one of the machines and peered into it. There was a large round cylinder inside it. Then he peered inside the other machine which just had a large basin in it.

Which one do I use? Is there an instruction or something for these things?

He looked around the room again but didn't find anything of the sort. Perhaps, the servants were taught how to use these machines, but how was he supposed to know which one to use? Annoyed, Alistair inspected the machines again and noticed that one of them had two pipes connected to it while the other one only had one pipe.

The one that has two pipes must be the one used for washing because it would require to both pump the water inside and then expel it outside right? And the one with one pipe only expels water. Why would you need only to expel water? Do you have to pour the water in yourself first?

Alistair stared at the machines for a while longer, then decided to just dump the clothes inside the one that had a large rectangular basin and two pipes and also added a bit of the washing liquid to it. 

One-fifth of the bottle should be enough right? Okay, I'll add a bit more just in case. It can't hurt to have more.

He then closed the lid and pressed the button in front of the machine. The crystal which sat at the base of it began faintly glowing with blue light, and a loud noise came from the machine. Alistair feared it might be broken, but listening in closely, he realized that it was merely the sound of water being pumped inside.

"Alright, I know this will take some time, so I'll go get some breakfast in the meantime."

With a satisfied nod, Alistair left the machine to its own devices and headed to the Fireside Inn.

***

The atmosphere in the inn's cafeteria was surprisingly pleasant as Alistair sat in the far corner of the cafeteria, enjoying some warm bacon and eggs. The place was slowly growing on him, especially since the local taverns were nothing more than glorified brothels. It was mostly the drunkards and sailors who went to have some fun while regular folk preferred the inn.

However, as he ate Alistair noticed that there was an unusual cheer to the innkeeper as she made her rounds from one table to the next. The woman was always smiling, hospitality clearly being part of who she was, but today she was especially excited. Eventually, she made her way to Alistair's table as well.

"Good morning, Lord Sinclair. Always a pleasure to see you in my inn," Erina greeted him.

"Good morning," he returned the greeting. "It's a pleasure to be here."

"I'm happy it's up to your standards. I do know what I will ask of you is rather presumptuous, so feel free to reject me right away," she chuckled, pausing for a brief moment. "But would you like to attend a party?"

"A party?" he raised a questioning eyebrow. The word "party" instantly made him think of a large gathering of noblemen and noblewomen dressed in their best clothes. But that surely couldn't be the case here—he was the only nobleman in Sunglow right now.

"Yes! You see Master Gilbert has finally accepted an apprentice and we're throwing a party to get her acquainted with our town," Erina said excitedly.

"Master Gilbert?"

"Right, you aren't acquainted with him yet. He's the local baker, a rather well-known person in our town. I know the name doesn't mean much to you, but perhaps you could use the chance to get acquainted with people here as well."

Alistair thought about it for a moment. If he were to attend this party, then without a doubt everyone would try to cozy up to him. It's how it always was. Being sent to this place was punishment enough, he would at least enjoy a moment of respite from the social interactions. "I'm afraid I'll have to decline."

"It's alright. I figured I should ask just in case," Erina said, her smile never wavering. "Enjoy your meal then."

A party to greet a baker's apprentice. Must be quite the baker to throw a party just to greet his apprentice. Oh well, it's got nothing to do with me.

He finished eating his breakfast, and then hurried back home—there was still a mountain of cleaning to be done. Alistair wondered whether the clothes were already clean or if the machine needed more time.

But as he stepped inside the house, he felt like there was something wrong. There was an odd noise coming from the cleaning room. Alistair approached it cautiously, almost as if a monster would jump out at any moment. Behind the door, he could hear the distinct whirling of the washing machine, but it sounded oddly muffled.

He opened the door slowly, trying to first peer inside through a narrow crack. However, the moment Alistair opened it, a flurry of foam and bubbles exploded into the hallway. Shocked, he threw the door fully open—that was a mistake—and got instantly buried in a bubbly avalanche.

"What the hell is this?!" He exclaimed trying to fight back the giant foam monster that threatened to bury his whole body. However, it was pointless—the more he fought, the more he got covered in lavender-scented bubbles.  In less than a minute his whole clothes and body were soaked.

Resigned, he made his way through the foam. It wasn't difficult to walk through it—it was very light. However, it blocked out everything. Both machines were buried somewhere underneath the white flurry. Alistair tried to push the foam aside, but only more took its place. He pushed it back, but it stuck to his hand.

"Aghh! Get off me," he growled, trying to shake a giant foam mass off his hand, but only managed to grab more foam to stick along with it. Realizing that this wouldn't work, he somehow made his way to the sink and rinsed off the bubbles. Thankfully, the water proved to be a valuable ally. 

Alistair began to grab foam in giant clumps and throw it into the sink, rinsing it away. Slowly, one bubbly monster at a time, he managed to free the washing machine enough to turn it off. That stopped the formation of new foam and bubbles but sadly didn't erase the existing ones. 

"How the hell did this even happen?" he growled and looked at the washing liquid bottle which he had left in the sink. "They should put instructions with these. One fifth was clearly too much."

With a heavy sigh, he took a bucket and mop and began collecting all the rogue foam and dumping it into the sink. The clothes, which were previously covered in bubbles, were wet and sticking to his skin, making him feel almost as if he were covered in a slime of sorts.

This is just disgusting. How can such a small amount of washing liquid create such a big mess? And why does it feel sticky?

Alistair rinsed off his hands in the sink, but the rest of his body didn't feel any cleaner, the foam mass having made its way through his clothes.

"Utterly ridiculous," he muttered, throwing more foam into the sink. Some of it fell off and splattered to the floor. As he watched it fall, he got the strongest feeling that he'd seen something similar before.

Pain suddenly surged into his head and a scene flashed before his eyes. A small room, just like this one, with cleaning supplies and many mops. It was covered from top to bottom in what looked like green slime which clung to everything, including his body.

Alistair clutched his head and forced his eyes shut, unable to withstand the searing pain in his head. The vision disappeared and slowly the pain receded. He took a deep breath, trying to calm himself, but the scene was still fresh in his mind.

What was that? What just happened? 

He stumbled his way to a nearby wall and looked at the cleaning room again, most of it still covered in foam. This time everything remained the same, no weird visions, no headaches. But the uneasy feeling remained, weighing down heavily in his stomach as if he had swallowed a rock.

The room that I saw was a cleaning room just like this one, but the walls were darker and made of stone instead of wood. And there was green slime everywhere. I've encountered some slimes before, but never inside a building.

Was that just a hallucination? Yeah, that must be it. I must have inhaled some of the foam while I was cleaning it. It is made from herbs so likely one of them must have caused me to see something that's not there.

Calming himself with that thought, he took one of the clean rags and tied it around his nose to protect himself from any more weird hallucinations. Then he went back to cleaning the bubbly mess.

Wait… what do I do with the clothes?

< Previous Chapter | Table of Contents | Next Chapter >