Chronicles of Mysteria: Queen | Vol. 1

Chapter 1: Unease

Usually days like these are busy but quiet, but today was like no other.

I could hear everyone running around the halls. By this hour, Meiyao would be entering my room to wake me. This time she isn't here. "She's usually never late... everything okay out there?" I thought to myself. I decided to not worry and let the rest of my body wake up while I laid there in bed. A few minutes later, the commotion outside my room got even louder. To my best guess, it sounds like an assortment of objects were being thrown around and shuffled. Books? Plates? I couldn't figure it out just from bed. I let the noises go on, assuming it would stop, but it was a waste of my patience. The noises weren't getting louder, but more intense as it went on. My patience grew thin and motivated me to get out of bed. I sit up and stretch before standing, mentally preparing for what was happening out there. "What's going on out there...?" I mutter, staring at the door with my eyes half closed. I get up and begin to raise my hand to the doorknob. Right as I twist it, I pull the door open and step out. The moment I set foot outside my room, my ankle was quickly ensnared by something taking the shape of a coil around it. I look down and see a large snake tail wrapped around my left leg. Before I could even begin to react, the tail swooped me off my feet and dragged me across the hall. The rush wakes my whole body and puts me in an adrenaline rush. As I'm being dragged, my eyes follow the snake tail to the root and see Laila in such a hurry and/or panic.

"Uwahhh!!! How could I forget!!? Of all times to forget I forget now!! I can't believe it!!!" Laila says, yelling in panic. Whenever she's scared or panicking, her tail has a tendency to grab onto anything familiar and gets tighter with each second it gets its hands on. "H-Hey! Laila! Hey! What are you doing?!" I shout, holding my nightgown from being lifted. "You've grabbed onto me! Laila!!!" Her overwhelming fears and shock isn't letting my words get through, thus I'm helplessly being dragged until she stops. I spot some of the other maids on the way but I don't think any of them had enough time to react that Laila was dragging her master.

Somehow she's managed to drag me across the manor and into the kitchen where she originally stationed today if I remember correctly. "Ahhhhh!!! Please be okay!!! Please be okay!!!" She begs at the oven. She opens it slowly and smoke leaks out as it opens more. She coughs and backs up, then blows at the smoke. Although her efforts were overwhelmed by the burning object inside the oven itself. Once she realized her breaths weren't enough to subdue the smoke, she grabs some objects around her to fix it. Eventually, the sprinkler system goes off and wets the entire kitchen, myself and Laila included. At this point I've been dazed by how many times my body has been bouncing up and down from her tail. I'm basically helpless here...

Once Meiyao and her sisters stepped in the scene, they make quick haste in dispersing incident, cleaning up the mess. Once it was all over, Meiyao gave Laila a lecture about leaving the oven unattended. Laila profusely apologies and begins to slowly slither away once Meiyao was done with her. Before Laila made a full exit, one of Meiyao's sisters, Niiyawn, catches her eye on me and my situation. "H-Hey..." She says, pointing at me. "What are you... doing with... our mistress...?" Laila stops and turns around in confusion, then looks back at her tail. She finally noticed that she took me hostage amongst her panic. "Huh? Mistress? What are you doing here?" She asked with full confusion, completely oblivious to her actions.

I lose consciousness from the dizziness and wake up, my head lying on Niiyawn's lap. Niiyawn gives me her usual smug expression and gives me a good morning in a sarcastic manner even though it's probably the afternoon by now. My fatigue is quickly gone thanks to Niiyawn. Her ability to give and take others' fatigue still amazes me to this day. Though according to my memory, it only works whenever our fatigues are currently inverted, meaning in order for her take my tiredness, she can't be tired, and vice versa.

"Ohhhh!!! My tail seems to act on its own sometimes hehe~" Laila tells me. "Sorry bout that, master!" When I sit up and regain my balance, I give her a brief straight stare, then quickly brush it off and smile. "It can't be helped," I say in Native.