The silent disciple's eyes remained snapped shut—his pupils veiled behind the two thin membranes of flesh which were known as his eyelids.
This state of being was a forced obligation, tyrannically decreed by the overwhelming burden of amassed and ignored fatigue fathered through Rue's journey.
He felt like shit.
He wanted to move, but quite frankly that want seemed to be more of a distant mockery at this point.
In the instant after the tube-like device deposited Rue onto the Reigner estate, his mind had accidentally flickered into a millisecond-long trance.
In the heartbeat he had lost concentration, he had severed his iron gripped control over his Will. As a consequence for losing focus for that short intermission, all of the built-up, dormant fatigue that he had stubbornly transgressed into his muscles and ignored during his relentless, unabating pace through the Crimson Planes and the Gloomy Forest was now crashing over him at once.
It was only a mere millisecond, but that mere millisecond was all his body needed to fully express the complete wrath of its underlying fatigue.
His four appendages now felt like unimaginably heavy lead weights whose only intention was to keep him pinned against the silky fabric-clad softness below him.
Rue's subconscious pleaded with his stubborn mind to stay still.
To relax.
To heal.
But the stubborn portion of his mind, birthed through a lifetime of trepidation and distrust, found the notion of relaxing or resting in foreign territory to be preposterous—ludicrous even!
He knew nothing of this place; rather than lazing on his ass due to mere fatigue, he should be scouting his surroundings—documenting the exact layout, determining any threats, analyzing the social cues of the people of the Reigner house, and finding out more information about Terminus.
Rue had a lengthy laundry list of tasks to complete.
However, this trudge would have to wait due to his body's current prevailing suspended animation.
Of course, with this all said, the information he desired would be gathered with time, and his current feelings of irrational scrutiny towards his benefactor was uncalled for and nonsensical, since they made no literal sense.
I should really situate my feelings more often, geez, I'm far too distrusting of others. At least give them the benefit of the doubt…
Why would someone of Livia's status torment him? Rue asked himself.
For shallow amusement?
Very unlikely?
This was especially a given when he thought about all of the favors this woman had brought.
Livia had illegally given him a mark which, in turn, gave him full-fledged citizenship into the Syndicate, but Rue had oddly become the disciple of one of the legitimate heirs to a duchy.
When Rue thought about it, he was very lucky that those two had attacked him.
If Rue had taken a longer route in order to avoid them, then he would have not only lost out on meeting his master but, more importantly, wouldn't have obtained citizenship as easily as he had.
'When I look back at it… I'm extremely lucky, Rue chirped internally. If Livia hadn't been as merciful as she was, then I would've been killed without even knowing what hit me.' He gave a deep sigh within his mind.
This was such a bizarre series of events.
Rue started to feel extremely tired as a powerful wave of the odious washed over him.
The sand man had come.
When was the last time he had felt this lethargic, excluding when he reconstructed his Initial?
His mind felt slow.
His thoughts drifted, and his mind slowed to a point where even the smallest of thoughts became too complex to fully access or retain.
Maybe a little rest would do him some good.
~~~
~~~
~~~
An unknown amount of time had passed since Rue had passed out on that fateful day.
Days?
Weeks?
Months?
Who knows.
Stirring from his prolonged rest, Rue—now feeling like a riled youth before their mate—felt heavenly in contrast to his earlier fatigued self.
His senses were heightened.
Hell, he even felt better mentally and obviously physically.
Groggily closing and opening his eyes to adjust to the steady stream of multicolored sunlight filtering through the hetero-colored stained glass from the window installation allocated into the wall behind his bed, Rue slowly returned to awareness.
Stepping fully out of his comatose-like state, Rue's gaze set on a royal peach-colored tapestry of the ceiling.
"....Ughhhh! What the hell, man?!…" murmured under his breath.
Laying on the bed for several seconds more, Rue propped his upper body up against the headboard of the bed which had accommodated him during his stay.
Raising his forearm, Rue stared at his hand for a couple seconds before closing and opening it a few times in order to determine any atrophies in his body or delays in his motor function.
After wriggling his toes, his vertebrae, and several other parts of his body, it became apparent that such deterioration had not happened.
With a hearty yawn—which seemed to be an indirect "thank you" from his body for the much-needed rest—Rue stretched longitudinally to unknot any muscles.
As the disciple did this, his Initial, like a magnet to iron shavings, began to instinctively command the latent Will within the room to seep into his muscles and bones.
His muscles gained cat-like flexibility which would make gymnasts scorn in envy, and his bones' total dexterity and resilience increased.
Rue's eyes narrowed.
Why had his general specs increased to such an extent?
Scratching his chin in thought, Rue eventually shrugged.
'Well, I feel as good as new. More power is good, I guess? Whelp, with that situated… where am I?' he thought as he scouted his surroundings.
'Wait… this doesn't feel like the infirmary at all. And if it is some infirmary, it's gotta be the fancy-ass exclusive kind, but no way in hell they'd waste the resources or manpower on a place like this just for me. Screw it, I'm calling it I'm in a guest room! Maybe it's in some dusty unused annex? …Well, whatever. I don't CARE. It's free housing, that's all that matters.' Rue reasoned with a firm nod.
The place had a subtle yet deafening regal air to it.
The furniture was limited, as the room took on a more modern aesthetic with scarce furniture and an open space which gave the feeling of emptiness and shallowness.
It was so bland.
After finishing his sweep of the room's general exterior, Rue found nothing worth a second glance—except for a petite, black-haired woman whose upper body was leaned against the bed, her head resting in her folded arms, with her eyes closed as she slept.
The woman dressed in a laced white-and-black uniform, one typically seen on the maids or servants of nobles.
Rue had seen many such uniforms during his time as an inquisitor for the Church Sun-Goddesses.