After a while, Alice takes her hands off our heads. Then, she murmurs some meaningless gibberish with her eyes closed for a few seconds as a little bit of yellowish magic power emanates from her body. As for why we deem them meaningless, it is because we can't understand them even with our dragon language.
Alice has already changed out of her armor for a long, floor-length ultramarine blue gown adorned with intricate gold lace embroidery. She should have changed it while we were outside, watching Kay training. The fabric of her gown is pretty fine, though nowhere near as fine as our mini-dresses.
When Alice opens her eyes, three balls of pure water appear in front of her. We will call this magic [Water Ball]. She controls two of them to flow in front of us. What do these balls of water mean? We tilt our heads and look at her confusingly.
Seeing how we react, a look of pity flashes in her eyes. She definitely misunderstands something again!
She comes behind Shiro and guides the water to flow out from the ball in front of Shiro to her hands. The water is quite warm. Then, she picks up a hard white block and gently rubs it against Shiro's hands. After that, she rubs all the surfaces of Shiro's hands for about half a minute, and then she controls the remaining half of the water in the ball to wash away bubbles on Shiro's hands. Although Alice doesn't seem to be very reliable, she is still quite gentle.
"Go and dry your hands; the towels are on the table." Alice says as she walks toward Kuro and repeats the same thing she does to Shiro to her.
Shiro walks toward the table, picks up one of the towels, and dries her hands with it. Then, she picks up two more and hands them over to Alice and Kuro.
Alice puts away the hard white block and dries her hands. "You must wash your hands before and after every meal, alright?" She says. We nod to show that we understand.
"Alice, why do we have to wash our hands?" Shiro asks.
"Washing your hands makes you clean and healthy. It's the proper, civilized way to prepare for your meal." Alice answers.
Suddenly, a voice sounds from outside the tent: "Your Highness, the meal has been prepared as ordered."
"Good. You may enter." Alice answers.
The tent flaps are pushed open, and a group of five people in white ritual robes walk into the tent; they should be the members of the mages present in the camp since they wear the same style of robes as the mages who maintain the barrier. The first one carries a big silver platter covered by a dome-shaped silver cover. The second one carries a silver pitcher. The remaining three carry three sets of silver plates, goblets, and cutlery.
They place a big silver platter and a silver pitcher in the middle of the table, and each set of silver plates, goblets, and cutlery is placed in front of Alice and us. Then, they bow deeply.
"Rise. You may leave."
After hearing Alice's words, the group of five take a few steps back before turning to leave the tent.
Alice once again murmurs some meaningless gibberish with her eyes closed for a minute as yellowish magic power emanates from her body into the silver platter. The murmur coming out of her mouth sounds different from the one before, and the amount of magic power emanating from her body is much more than when she conjured water balls. We can feel the temperature inside the big silver platter increase sharply. We will call this magic [Heat Generation].
After Alice opens her eyes, she lifts the big silver platter, revealing a freshly cooked roast lamb leg emitting steam. She then cuts it in half and divides the cut half into three portions for herself and for each of us. She also pours the liquid in the pitcher into our goblets. It is diluted wine. Shiro wonders if it is normal for her to do this for us or if she thinks we are too short to reach the pitcher and the platter ourselves.
When our portions are on our plates, we remove the masks. We have to because our masks don't have a function that allows their wearers to eat through them. This is the first time we take off our masks since we put them on.
Judging by how Alice's eyes freeze at our faces for a few seconds, she seems to be stunned by our cuteness. Although there is indeed a tiny, insignificant chance that she is surprised that we don't have some hideous scars under our masks, such a possibility is outrageously low compared to the possibility of her being astonished by how adorable we are, so it is obvious why she is shocked!
The meal is barely edible. It is completely incomparable to what we normally eat, but Alice seems to be quite accustomed to it; she eats half of it by herself. Normally, Aunt Phyllis cooks for us. The ingredients are also created by her draconic arts. There is nothing impossible, only unimaginable. Of course, even if we don't eat, we will be fine; it's just that Aunt Phyllis' cooking tastes too good.
Dragons don't have to eat or drink; we are able to obtain energy directly from our draconic power. Though how exactly this process works is currently unknown to us. Aunt Phyllis definitely knows, but she refuses to tell us, as always. According to her, we either have to search for the answers ourselves or wait until we are old enough and she will tell us.
After the meal, we wipe our mouths and perform a weird human ritual called 'washing our hands,' according to what Alice taught us. Alice watches us washing our hands by ourselves; her smile seems to be filled with a sense of accomplishment. Alice can surely become a little incomprehensible sometimes. The water we use to wash our hands is, of course, conjured by her.
"Kuro, let's go!" Shiro pulls Kuro's hand and rushes out of the tent after putting on our masks. "Alice, we'll be back soon!"
"Hold on, you two!" Alice quickly rushes after us. "Didn't you hear what Kay and I talked about? You have to always be within my sight."
We slow our speed down after we leave the tent and look up at the starry sky. "Sorry, Alice. We are too excited to see a real night sky for the first time!" Shiro replies.
"A real night sky... First time..." Alice murmurs. We don't know what kind of expression she shows on her face, as we are too busy looking at the sky.
We don't see a beautiful starry sky as expected, though; instead, we see a bright round moon and a few faintly visible stars. We are not too disappointed; at least we get to see what a real full moon is like. We believe that as long as we stay in the main material plane, sooner or later, we will get to see a night sky filled with countless stars.
Then, our attention turns to Alice, who is showing a slightly surprised expression while looking at our eyes. It is understandable why she is surprised. Our eyes contain a reflective layer, which causes them to appear as if glowing when a light shines in. This reflective layer in our eyes can adjust its reflectiveness automatically according to the surrounding light condition to help with our night vision. Unlike our eyes' rods and cones inherent essences, it only takes a moment to change its reflectiveness.
The light reflected from Shiro's eyes is bright gold, while the light reflected from Kuro's eyes is bright red.
The surprise expression on her face only lasts for a moment before returning to normal; her fists are still clenched, though. Looking at her reaction, Shiro feels a little somewhat sorry for the surviving cultists and anyone associated with this whole cult thing. She has a feeling that Alice and Kay are going to make them wish they were never born.
"Alice, tell us about the starry sky!" Shiro's eyes sparkle with excitement. Sure, she has listened to the description of the starry sky from Aunt Phyllis, but who knows when the last time Aunt Phyllis set foot on the main material plane was!
Although time does not dilute dragons' memories, even we too have a limit to how much we can store our memories. So some old memories will have to be forgotten to give some room for new memories. Of course, we are completely in control of which memory will be forgotten.
"The sky..." Alice looks up at the night sky and loosens her fists. "Do you see the moon? It is said that when the moon is full, it will be the moment the magic is at its strongest. Mages will find it easier to draw magic power in the air, and their magic has stronger effects. Some people believe this legend is true, while others don't. The moon is also used by the peasants to mark when they will plant seeds and harvest their crops."
"What about you, Alice? Do you believe that the full moon strengthens your magic?" Shiro asks.
"Me? I don't believe in it; I never feel my magic strengthen under the full moon." Alice looks at us and answers.
"It's a pity tonight isn't a moonless night; otherwise, you would see a sky covered with countless twinkling stars. Speaking of stars, do you know that astrologers, the wise men who study the stars, believe that the movement of stars holds our destiny and even the fate of the kingdom?" Alice's fists clench as her eyes fill with burning determination. "But I don't believe in that nonsense! Our destiny lies in our own hands, not in the whims of gods or the positions of stars!"
Alice pauses a little before continuing. "Forgive me, little ones; I found myself wandering in my thoughts for a moment. Don't spread my words, alright? Let us return to the sky."
"The stars are also a great help to the sailors. The sailors use them to figure out north and south, east and west. It is said that experienced sailors can tell how far they have traveled and how much farther they must go just by looking at the stars!" Suddenly, Kay appears, causing Alice to pause. "It seems our storytelling time can only end here."
"Your Highness, the townspeople have all recovered." Kay bows deeply to Alice.
"Rise, Sir Kay. Thank you for bringing the news. It's good that they recover faster than expected. Take me to see the townspeople and the mages." Alice then turns to us. "Do you mind accompanying me?"
We nod. We are also curious about what exactly is going on with the residents of the town.
"Please follow me, Your Highness." Kay bows again before turning back to lead the way for Alice and us. Kay walks in front, followed by two of us, and Alice at the back.
After a 10-minute walk, we arrive at where the residents of the town are treated. It is located in the middle of the town square. At this time, there are basically no one except about 10 white-robed mages and 20 soldiers who seem to act as the mages' assistants.
"Your Highness, I am Lieutenant Alex of the third mage squad. We are honored by your presence." A leading mage, Alex, bows deeply; she tries to remain calm, but her attempt ends in failure. Her excitement is perfectly written on her face. Other mages and soldiers also bow. The mages quietly sneak envious gazes at the leading mage. They seem quite envious of Alex, who gets to talk to Alice. It seems Alice is very popular among the mages.