What happened a few days ago was like a distant memories now. He had decided to stop moping and move forward. He knew that it was useless to be depressed about the things he couldn't change, while he had all those time to adapt to his new life. To adapt, he needed to know about this world. Well, at least about the country he currently lived in.

Just a few weeks ago, Hyde had helped him registered his name as the citizen of this country at the administration office. Hikaru had to met the head of the town to pledge his vow and he also had an interview. Of course he had to lie about coming from the other world, instead he told them that he had lost his memories when Hyde found him, except for his name. Hikaru also had to lie about his age because he was supposed to had a flower mark at the age of 15. They would never believe him if he said he was 16. So, legally, Hikaru was 14 because he had Doctor Noon's confirmation letter about his about-to-bloom flower mark based on the progress of his maturing womb. (Maturing womb means he was nearly 15.) It was unsettling to claim his age as two years younger, but he had no choice.

As of now, Noon had given him permission to read any books in Noon's collections when there was no customers to tend to. Ah! I didn't tell you this before, but Hikaru was assigned to tend to the counter in the pharmacy. He was still new to this job, so he wasn't allowed to treat patients. Once he was experienced enough, Noon would allow him to help them treat the patients as Noon's apprentice. Hikaru was happy that Noon trusted him enough to let him work there.

Right now, Hikaru was reading about the history of The Kingdom of Astradan. Hikaru knew about the alliance that Astradan and two other countries created decades ago. Hyde had told him that before. But, Hikaru couldn't hear the rest.

He flipped the first page of the book.

The Kingdom of Astradan consisted of twelve fiefdoms, governed by twelve feudal lords, also called the 12 Aristocrats or the 12 Families. The King was the ultimate ruler, with the 12 Aristocrats as his advisors.

The town where they currently lived in, Lowell Town was under the supervision of Earl Ethelwolf. The Ethelwolf fiefdom included two small towns and three villages. Hikaru had heard that the Earl was a competent lord who loved his fief and his people. The heir of Ethelwolf was still a child, at the age of 10, but he was already famous as the genius heir after he had solved a few problems that emerged in the fiefdom. Hikaru didn't know what the problems was, but if that was true, what kind of life did that kid lead until now? How could a 10 year-old be so reliable and mature enough to be helping his father governing the territory?

Anyway, the Earl's mansion was located in Soavest. That was where Reese worked as a knight. Usually, the time taken to travel between Soavest and Lowell was around a week by carriage, or only around 3 to 4 days if they chose to travel by cosmien, an animal that looked like a professional track athlete alpaca which was as tall and big as a horse.

Hikaru flipped to the next page. Now that he remembered, the first time he came here, he was amazed by how the foreigner-looking Hyde and the others could talk fluent Japanese. He thought that maybe he received a special skill such as language translator like most protagonists in an isekai (a/n: when someone transmigrate or transferred to another world ー literally means, "different world") manga. But, then he realized that the people there was really talking in Japanese when he saw the shop signs in town and couldn't understand it.

After a few days of observation, he finally noticed that the writing system in Astradan was similar to Latin alphabets in Earth, which had 26 alphabets. Only, the difference was that they use a bunch of completely different shapes from the usual ABCs. So, if he could learn and compare which alphabet is which, he could just read them like reading romaji. That was how he learned how to read and write.

Hikaru put down the book and checked the pharmacy just in case there was any customer walked in when he didn't notice. When he was sure that there was no one there, he picked up another book. This time, he wanted to know more about the people in Avalleon so that he could compare them with the people on Earth.

From what was written in the medical book, the knowledge about human body weren't that advanced compared to what we discovered on Earth. Probably because there were lack of modern technologies. They could only labelled the area where the organs were when they detected it with mana. Hikaru wondered if they had used a body donor to dissect for the sake of learning the human anatomy. Maybe it was a taboo here?

The information here was mostly based on what they could learn while using mana detection. They didn't really had a very detailed anatomical drawing of human body, so the knowledge Hikaru could gain was limited.

Regarding the extra organs of Fehu and Uruz, which were the horns and tails, Hikaru remembered reading about it somewhere. Ugh! Noon had too many books that Hikaru couldn't even remember which one was the right book.

Perhaps it was one of the social studies books. They said that the people tend to think that the bigger a Fehu's horns were, the more attractive the Fehu seemed to be. It looked like the horns were a symbol of grace and also it was different in shape depending on their race.

Hikaru rubbed his tiny horns and pouted. It seemed like the curse of mini size followed him everywhere. At least, these horns wouldn't be a problem for his movements. It would be hard to change clothes when someone had a huge horns.

It was also written in the book that it was rude to touch a Fehu's horns except for fellow Fehus or their mates. Hikaru wondered why. Were those horns an erogenous zone like Uruz's tails?

The boy rubbed his horns again. Nope. Couldn't feel anything. It was just like touching nails or teeth.

The tails on Uruzes were also the symbol of tribe and races. Different types of tails means different tribe and races. It also contained a lot of blood vessels and nerves, and that made the tail as a sensitive area for Uruz, especially at the base of the tail. Also, an Uruz could die if his tail was cut off.

Wow!

So that was why Hyde was panicking when Hikaru touched his tail.

Hikaru nodded, finally understood that the tail was similar to an Uruz's life. He didn't want to accidentally kill them, so next time he would be careful.

No, Hikaru. You're not wrong... but somehow you still got it wrong!

Hikaru did asked Noon out of curiosity about touching their tails, and Noon told him that it was okay to touch a family's or mate's tail like when brushing or petting, but it was really a crime to touch the tails of someone other than family.

By the way, “family" in general was the term of the group of husbands, wife and their kids. Someone like husband's or wife's family (their mom, dad, siblings) was not called “family", but in laws or relatives. But, your siblings and parents were still your family. Confusing? Even Hikaru thought so. Why don't they call all of them as family?! It was so irritating.

When Noon saw Hikaru's sparkling eyes directed to his tail, Noon smiled and said that it was okay for Hikaru to touch Noon's tail any time. Hikaru could even brush it if he wanted. That... was a very tempting offer for Hikaru.

•°•°•☆•°•°•

During lunch, Hyde came with lunch delivery from Ametrine to have lunch together with Hikaru and Noon. Noon teased Hyde, saying that Hyde only started doing this after Hikaru worked there. Noon jokingly saying that he was sad because even after their almost 20 years of friendship, it didn't actually made them close enough for Hyde to bring him food.

Hyde was flustered and blurted out that he really do care for Noon and he thought Noon as his own big brother. That cute reaction and sudden love confession made Noon and Hikaru howled with laughter until there were tears in their eyes. Hyde realized that he got tricked by Noon, so he narrowed his eyes in resentment at the dark green haired guy. Noon tried to calm Hyde down by giving Hyde his own share of food. Hyde grinned and took what Noon gave him gratefully.

Noon stared at Hikaru and made a gesture towards him. Hikaru noticed this and blushed. Noon cleared his throat.

“Hyde, Hikaru have something to ask of you,” Noon said and took a glance at Hikaru while his lips flashed a playful grin.

Hikaru's face was still tinted red. Hyde raised his eyebrows and lifted his head, focusing all his attention to Hikaru. “What is it?” he asked.

“Um...” The younger boy hesitated. “C- can I touch your tail, some time? Maybe brush it or pet it?”

This time, it was Hyde's turn to blush. “I don't mind it if it's Hikaru...” he mumbled, but was audible enough for Hikaru and Noon to hear.

Noon chuckled. “Told you he didn't mind,” he said, rubbing Hikaru's head.

“Really? YES! You see... I've brought a brush with me everywhere in case I would need it.” Hikaru showed them the brown brush that was kept inside his sling bag which he would bring everywhere he went.

“That was some dedication...” Hyde said, giggling at the ridiculousness of Hikaru's love for fluff.

“But, make sure not to lose yourself and touch other people's tail. You can only touch ours, get it?” Noon raised his index finger and pointed at Hikaru while showing the boy his serious face.

“I know... I've learned my lesson,” Hikaru said dejectedly. Looking at that sad puppy face, Hyde was seriously considering to find some pets for Hikaru to play with.

“Oi!”

The door was slammed opened. Noon winced at the thought that his door would break considering the force that was applied in slamming the door just now. He sent a death glare at the grumpy Reese who was standing at the door, while placing his hands on his hips.

“You dare to left me out!” He gritted his teeth, trying to make a scary face, but it was clear in his tone of voice that he was sulking.

Noon was visibly shaking. “You brat! I told you, you should use your stupid strength-"

Noon stood up in anger and tried to pull Reese's ears, but failed. Reese was faster. He dodge and took Noon's lunch as an offering to appease his own anger. He pointed at Noon who looked like he had a smoke on his head out of anger. Reese turned his head towards Hikaru.

“Look! Look! Hikaru! That was the usual Noon! He cursed a lot and he bluntly said bad things about people!”

“I only said the truth! You flipping muscle head! Why don't you think with your head instead of your muscle- Nyaa~♡!”

Noon fell to the ground as soon as Hikaru brush his tail. A purr slipped out of the green kitty's mouth while Hikaru calmed him down by petting him.

"There, there~" whispered Hikaru while his hands were busy brushing Noon's kitty tail. Noon continued to purr blissfully. 

Reese was also calmed down when Hyde petted him and brush Reese's hair using his fingers. Hikaru and Hyde looked at each other and smiled in victory. Hikaru shifted his eyes at the brush on his right hand.

Really, what a useful weapon this was.