Ultimately, it was Kang Jiesu who intervened.

  "Interpreter," he stated firmly. "Need interpreter."

  He had evidently gotten tired of being left completely out of the loop. He could obviously infer that the ongoing conversation was reted to him, and it must have been frustrating to have no idea what we were saying. Of course, we would have never been in this mess to begin with if he hadn't gone around trying to use his poorly phrased Galuterican in order to 'rescue' me. Ultimately, he had caused a lot more harm than good. This situation was a cssic example of how the Dunning-Kruger effect could lead to disastrous consequences when a self-assured individual overestimated their own abilities.

  "我会解决这一切" (I'll fix all of this), he tried to reassure me on the side.

  He seemed to recognize that all of this was his fault.

  "不用当心，一定会解决的" (Don't worry, I'll definitely fix it).

  Meanwhile, the royal official seemed to be at a loss.

  It wasn't entirely obvious what he could do.

  The birdkin interpreter was currently pre-occupied with the Prince of Xandu's critical medical condition. There was an ongoing endeavor to convince my cssmates to heal him, and from a matter of basic reasoning, any government official could immediately see that the foreign prince's health was far more important than a random side-story involving an insignificant maid. Clearly, we weren't the priority in this scene, and it was completely unreasonable to demand that the interpreter shift their focus to a non-urgent issue.

  However, Kang Jiesu didn't seem to grasp the political nuances of the rger story.

  He grabbed my hand tightly.

  This made my stomach churn inexplicably with discomfort. I didn't like the sensation of his fingers on my hand, and it gave me with this strange feeling of repulsion as if I was touching a slimy eel with a weird texture that was covered with mud. Bizarrely, I could see with my eyes that my childhood friend's hand were perfectly clean, but my brain seemed to think that I was touching semi-liquid waste in a trash can.

  It was extremely strange.

  Were these really my own thoughts?

  Regardless, I couldn't summon the strength to recoil away from him.

  The Obedience Crest could be customized with a rge number of effects depending on the pattern of the magical tattoo, and virtually all varieties made the servant incapable of resisting their master. The original purpose of this spell stemmed from the fact that there were many circumstances when a sve might be stronger than their master, and the crest guaranteed that a servant could never rebel or overpower their owner. For example, a popur variant could make a powerful warrior as weak as jello if their owner tried to wrestle with them.

  Kang Jiesu pulled me to my feet, and I winced as my bandaged feet stumbled a few steps on the floor.

  A brief look of concern fshed across my cssmate's eyes. Apparently, he hadn't realized that that I was still injured, and I saw his gaze travel up and down my body in order to quickly evaluate my medical status. He might have paused for a brief moment on my chest, as I wasn't wearing any underwear underneath the flimsy white infirmary gown, but he didn't hesitate long enough to make it obvious that he was staring inappropriately. Apart from the bandages that wrapped all the way up to my mid-thighs on both legs, I didn't have any other obvious injuries. At the very minimum, I was still able to (gingerly) bear weight and walk on my feet.

  He eventually reached the conclusion that I was probably okay.

  Looking away somewhat awkwardly, he reached for a spare bnket that was on top of a portable supply cabinet inside of the room, and then he passed it to me without saying a word.

  The implication here was that I wasn't wearing enough.

  After Kang Jiesu ensured that I was better covered, he pushed the curtains aside and pulled gently on my hand.

  Evidently, he wanted me to step out into the open so we could go speak with Hong Rei and the birdkin transtor.

  However, I had a feeling of imminent dread. Hong Baiye and the rest of my cssmates were outside, and I couldn't predict how they would react if they learned that Kang Jiesu was doting on another girl again. Furthermore, with the way that the Obedience Crest worked, I would have preferred it if he never learned how to use it. If he didn't know about the existence of certain icky functions, there was no way he could ever use them, right?

  My heart was filled with insecurity.

  + + +

  Fortunately, none of my other cssmates seemed to notice that anything was amiss on the sidelines.

  Incidentally, Ming Lina had taken a surprising stance in the main debate.

  "Hong Baiye..." she said in Mandarin. "Wouldn't it be better to help them first so they owe us a favor ter? We don't have any allies in this isekai universe... and they haven't treated us poorly, so I don't think we should be extorting them..."

  The ice queen shook her head disapprovingly.

  "Ming-Ming, you sweet summer child. You have to be a little selfish if you're ever going to win in life."

  Ordinarily, Ming Lina was about as assertive as a doormat, so most of my cssmates ftly ignored her whenever she said something that everyone else disagreed with. People seemed to think that she was naive and totally childish — possibly reted to the fact that she still had a huge crush on the same boy ever since sixth grade, and people tended to perceive that as the only defining feature of her entire personality. In the ruthless social environment of our high school, Ming Lina commanded very little respect, and people seemed to think that she was as meek as a sheep. In most cases, she backed down quietly without compints.

  However, Ming Lina was strangely adamant today.

  After Hong Baiye dismissed her, she turned to Lu Liwang and bypassed the vice president of our css entirely.

  Ming Lina had soft curly short hair, gsses, and a warm fuzzy aura. She had quite a lot of charm in her own unique way.

  "Lu Liwang..." Ming Lina cozied up next to the otaku. "Come with me."

  "Huh?"

  However, before he could react, Ming Lina was already dragging him off towards the infirmary bed with the foreign prince.

  Hong Baiye's attention had been diverted by Sha Guadi — the muscle-head who obviously couldn't resist the opportunity to be showered with more luxurious gifts — and they were arguing over the details of the reward they wanted from the King. Likewise, a flurry of activity was centered all around Hong Baiye, as she had obviously cimed a leadership role, and the Galutericans were desperately trying to appeal to her in this retively dire situation.

  She was too swamped to notice everything that was happening in the room.

  She failed to see the healer (Lu Liwang)'s sudden disappearance.

  "But Hong Baiye said—" Lu Liwang tried to protest on the far side of the room.

  Ming Lina silenced him.

  "Forget what she said."

  "...??"

  "We're not on Earth anymore. Things don't need to be the same as before."

  + + +

  "Hong Rei, do you have a moment?" Kang Jiesu called across the room.

  The foxgirl, incidentally, absolutely did not have a single moment to breathe.

  The birdkin was speaking nearly non-stop, and a magnificent peacock-like bird that was inside a golden cage between them was squawking continuously. The noise level inside of the infirmary was quite a loud racket, and I could only imagine that any patients that were previously sleeping had definitely awoken by this point. Furthermore, the size of the crowd was steadily increasing as more bystanders were drawn to the gravitational pull of this ridiculous spectacle.

  Hong Rei was so inundated with things to transte that she didn't even hear my childhood friend.

  Hong Baiye, however, did notice Kang Jiesu's call.

  Her eyes snapped into focus when she noticed that he was casually holding hands with a certain maid.

  I wasn't sure if I imagined it, but I think her eyebrows might have even twitched.

  From her reaction, I felt quite sure that Hong Baiye was not aware of the developments that had unfolded between Kang Jiesu and me. She had clearly been extremely busy running around with some kind of insidious plot she hatched st night, and there wasn't any way for her to know exactly what kind of movements that Kang Jiesu had taken independently on his own. Each of my cssmates evidently had their own pns for their new isekai life, and for the better or worse, she did not control all the pieces on the chess board.

  She looked especially annoyed and frustrated when she made eye contact with me.

  I realized at that moment that the mind control commands that she had given me must have had something to do with keeping my distance from Kang Jiesu. That being said, I hadn't really wanted to be anywhere near him in the first pce, so it was hard to say if I would have acted any differently. It wasn't like I had gone and wished for all of these things to happen to me.

  I truly did not want to be here, and I hated Kang Jiesu from the very start.

  All of this was one giant mess.

  The King finally lost all patience with the chaos that had unfolded.

  "Silence!" His voice thundered across the room.

  ?