Published: February 1, 2026
In Astarnia, neither midnight nor early morning gets very cold.
Lizel, who had pulled the thin, sheet‑like down quilt up to his shoulders—not because he was cold, but because sleeping without it somehow felt unsettled—slowly opened his eyes. In a hazy daze, he wondered what time it was and glanced toward the window.
Most houses in Astarnia left their windows open, so the thin shutters were meant only to keep out wind and rain. The light squeezing through the gaps was weak. It was still early, it seemed.
(Should I just go back to sleep…?)
Once he decided that, he shut his eyes, intending to fall asleep again before he fully woke.
He absolutely must not start reading “just for a little while” here. Once he opened a book, that would be the end of his drowsiness, and he would inevitably read straight through.
He wouldn’t really mind that in itself, but tonight he had decided to sleep. He burrowed his face into the quilt with a small wriggle. He didn’t know how late he’d stayed up last night, but he’d read until a very late—or perhaps, more accurately, extremely early—hour.
For Lizel, who still strictly maintained at least the bare minimum of his health, reaching for a book now would not be wise. He was simply, properly sleepy.
“... …”
He let out a slow breath, slackening his body, and let his consciousness sink into the darkness instead of resisting the drowsiness.
Faint human murmurs, the Innkeeper’s humming growing gradually more upbeat as she hung the laundry, the clatter of cart wheels, and the wingbeats of a demonic bird passing overhead. If you listened carefully, you could hear that much, but it never rose to the level of actual noise. It was the kind of background sound that made a second sleep feel like a proper second sleep and gently lured him back down.
Rubbing his cheek lightly against the smooth fabric of the pillow, Lizel released his awareness.
“Monsters have appeared at the harbor!”
“I heard the cavalry and the ship troops went out!”
Through the sudden shouts, Lizel thought vaguely that he still hadn’t seen the sea up close yet, and drifted off again.
“Ah, good morning.”
“Not like it’s that early.”
When Lizel woke from his second sleep feeling refreshed and stepped out of his room, he saw that Gill had just returned from somewhere, coming in downstairs.
Gill narrowed his eyes and laughed teasingly. Lizel smiled faintly—It’s not that late, is it?—and closed the door of his room behind him. Gill wasn’t in his adventurer gear but in light clothes, so he’d probably just gone out for a smoke or something. Before his boots had finished clacking across the entryway and his figure vanished from sight, Lizel stepped to the railing and looked down.
Gill noticed and stopped, glancing up at him.
“May I join you for breakfast?”
“Yeah.”
He called it “not that early,” but it was still well within breakfast time.
Lizel descended the stairs at an unhurried pace. As he walked toward Gill, who had waited for him, he brushed the hair from his cheek back behind his ear.
“Come to think of it, things were quite noisy outside around dawn.”
“Weren’t that big a fuss that you oughta be waking up to it.”
“When I woke up the first time, I happened to hear something that sounded like that.”
Honestly, he’d been half‑asleep again right away, so he’d wondered if it was his imagination, but from Gill’s reply the disturbance had clearly happened. Relieved that he hadn’t just been dreaming, Lizel nodded and fell into step beside him.
The dining room was on the first floor. It seemed that this inn currently only had one other couple staying besides Lizel’s group, so the Innkeeper wasn’t too busy and would probably start on breakfast right away.
So he thought, and was about to cross the rather small front hall when—
“Huh, I didn’t hear about that.”
A voice suddenly dropped from above—and then with an absurdly light thump Eleven landed.
His slightly lifeless tone and unabashed yawning proclaimed that he had just gotten up, yet there was not a hint of sluggishness in the way he straightened his knees, which he had bent to absorb the impact. He raked up his bangs with a rough hand and yawned again, then, as if nothing had happened, walked along with them toward the dining room.