MPBAGS Chapter 3

"Meow?"

Pudding cried adorably. I want to bite him! What if he has three eyes? He's this cute. In my previous life I gave up due to circumstances, but I didn't expect to raise a cat here.

I tried to have him separately examined, but the butler brought holy water saying just making him drink this would suffice. What, a worldview where holy water cures all epidemics? Then why did they kill the cats? What’s going on with animal ethics in this Isekai world?

When I poured holy water into the water bowl, Pudding lapped it up deliciously with his tongue. But why is he keeping one eye closed? Maybe because of his fur thickness, he just looked like he had two eyes.

Come to think of it, he only opens all his eyes in front of me. Ah, so two must be the default and the third eye only opens occasionally.

The butler confirmed Pudding drank all the holy water and returned. Is that it now? Hooray!

"You drink water well too, how admirable."

I placed Pudding on my lap and gave him butt pats.

Pudding seems to see me not as his servant but as an innkeeper. One with free room and board included....

Pudding is a free spirit. I'm a room-bound hikikomori but Pudding is such an extrovert he went out every single day. Still, he always returned before bed to lie down together. Why does a cat love walks this much? Maybe because he was originally a stray?

I tried to put a collar on him so nothing dangerous would happen while he roamed. A maid provided the collar. Soft cloth with the Count's family crest embroidered on it. She suggested I personally embroider Pudding's name. Apparently the original Evangeline was skilled at embroidery.

But I'm illiterate plus I don't know how to embroider?

Before I could make excuses, the maid handed it over and fled.

The maid I asked to buy an alphabet book hasn't come for several days now. She said one day would suffice, but she's deliberately not giving it, right?

Since the servants just tremble, I thought she was a tyrannical villainess, but apparently there's also a setting of being subtly bullied. Well, recent romance fantasies have villainesses receiving tremendous bullying too. That's why when they transmigrate, they slap first and establish authority. Of course, I didn't slap anyone.

"I'm sorry for being an incompetent servant who can't even write your name...."

I want to learn letters quickly. This half-assed isekai transmigration is too much....

I woke up able to read letters.

What is this? After-sales service? If it's transmigrator compensation, why not do it earlier instead of only now! I was irritated, but decided to think positively that I received compensation now rather than never.

Crying about not being able to read my pet's name must have had an after-sales effect. Tears streamed down. Now I can read and write Pudding's name too!

I picked up the needle. Since I learned letters, wouldn't I be able to somewhat do the embroidery that Evangeline's body learned?

Right. I couldn't.

The result was disastrous. I wrote Pudding but it's unrecognizable.

Should I throw it away and redo it? I briefly considered it, but Pudding cried meowing, urging me to hurry and put the collar on. This angel cat!

I put the collar on Pudding. They say if a cat wears a collar well, you're a blessed servant, and whether originally gentle or not, Pudding showed no particular resistance to the collar. The size was just right, and just in case, I made the seam weak too. If Pudding applies some force, it'll break.

"Do you like it?"

Pudding went to the mirror and looked at himself. Then, apparently pleased, he cried meow.

Suddenly finding it strange, I thought carefully—Pudding can even look at mirrors. Isekai cats are incredibly smart.... Or not? Is our Pudding special? Well, of course my cat is the world's best.

Count Rohanson went down to his territory.

In truth, it was closer to fleeing. So urgently did he go that it resembled absconding in the night with just a few changes of clothing packed. While remaining within the mansion, he'd been terrified that 'eyes' kept watching him. Not only the Count but the maid named Daisy as well. That maid wouldn't even try to open her eyes.

When asked if he should write a recommendation letter to another household, the maid shook her head and said she absolutely wanted to go to a convent. Her posture with closed eyes and clasped hands looked exactly like prayer. Since the eyes apparently couldn't be seen upon leaving the mansion, she'd probably manage fine psychologically at the convent too.

With the Count absent, the mansion's duties were entrusted to the butler. The Count would handle family-related matters well from the territory, so what the butler needed to take responsibility for was just one thing. Regarding Young Lady Evangeline.

The elderly butler gazed at the weeping cherry tree outside the window. The snow-white young lady was walking in the rear garden, and a cat followed behind her. That must be the cat she said she wanted to raise. At a glance, it seemed a peaceful scene.

Yet on the butler's shoulder remained a bright red handprint. Could the cat raised by that young lady truly be an ordinary animal?

His vision swayed. The mansion where he'd lived his entire life felt exactly like a monster's belly.

He drew the curtains and took his seat. Across from him sat a maid drinking tea. The hand holding the cup trembled, but she looked better than Daisy.

"I hear cat sounds."

Henna was the child who took on attending Young Lady Evangeline after Daisy. After what happened to Daisy, no one would attend the young lady, so they raised the wages. Henna, who needed money urgently, took that position. But Henna too seemed unlikely to continue the work. The butler looked at the child sitting before him with pity.

A perfectly fine child returned with her mind disturbed in just one day, so finding maids would become even more difficult now.

The butler opened his mouth to address her, but to Henna only meowing sounds could be heard instead of human voices. Though Henna couldn't hear what the butler said, she opened her mouth hoping it would be the answer he wanted.

"The young lady asked if there were cats. I answered they were all killed, but they definitely were all killed, so why can I hear sounds?"

Henna had once helped dispose of the cat corpses when they killed cats at the Count's household. Though creepy, she volunteered because they paid extra. Several sacks worth of cat corpses attracted by food emerged. All dead, soundless cats. Now belatedly they were crying.

The butler couldn't hear cat sounds. While adding content to convey to the Count, the butler asked if he should write Henna a recommendation letter. Though a grateful offer, Henna's ears could still only hear cats crying. The butler wrote on paper and held it out. Henna shook her head.

Only now in this place where inexplicable events occurred could she speak of hearing cat sounds, but if she transferred elsewhere, she'd surely be treated as sick and fired.

"I'll continue working. Though I can't hear, if I read lips it should be fine."

Henna had a younger sibling. For the sake of her sick sibling, she needed to continue working.

A reply returned from the Count. Furiously demanding they feed the cat holy water to confirm whether it was a monster. Holy water hadn't worked on Young Lady Evangeline, so would it work on the cat? Though the butler harbored doubts, he followed his master's orders. Holy water's price was considerably expensive. Only nobility could purchase it without hesitation.

Henna was dismayed knowing this. If holy water were available, her sibling would recover. To feed something so precious to merely a cat.

"Do you want it?"

How long since she'd heard a human voice? Henna turned her head and looked around, but no people were present. Only a grooming cat. The cat?

Is that the cat Young Lady Evangeline is said to raise?

"I asked a question, so you should answer."

Huh?

"You said you want that water. You may have it. I'll tell you the method."

The cat opened its eyes. Three eyes looked at Henna.

Monster, it's a monster. Henna fled. She had to inform the butler. That Young Lady Evangeline's cat is a monster! If she reported it, couldn't she receive at least a reward from the butler?

And Henna stopped.

A mere reward couldn't buy holy water. What did the cat say? That it would tell her the method? She envisioned her sibling recovered, smiling brightly and running around. Then she retraced her path. As if expecting this, the cat was waiting for Henna in that spot.

Henna switched the holy water as the cat instructed. She didn't know how it was prepared, but it was identical down to the delicate pattern on the bottle containing holy water.

While the butler watched the cat drinking fake holy water, there was no reaction whatsoever. Unlike with Young Lady Evangeline, the fact that 'real' holy water worked on the cat—only Henna realized this.

The cat occasionally visited Henna afterward making various requests.

Last time, it ordered her to make the young lady personally embroider the collar it would wear. Henna, afraid the young lady would be angry, handed over the collar and embroidery set and fled. The young lady truly did take up needle for the cat. The cat proudly displayed and boasted about the collar messily embroidered.

The young lady wrote strange letters on the collar yet actually called the cat Pudding.

After attending during the day to the monstrous cat and the fearful young lady too dreadful to look at, her work day ended.

Attending the young lady paid extremely well. Even after covering living expenses for two people, plenty remained. Thanks to this, Henna could stop by the market on her way home from work and overspend on treats her sibling liked.

She'll be happy, right? Henna's heart melted sweetly. Her sibling who drank holy water was recovering day by day. Just days ago she struggled even with soup, but now she was making a fuss about being hungry.

Arriving home, her sibling sat in front of the door.

"Sis!"

"Why were you waiting outside in the cold?"

"Because I missed you. You worked hard. Let's go in quickly!"

"Alright. Kanna, stop fussing."

Her sibling leaped into Henna's arms. A dreamlike moment that could easily erase memories of attending the bizarre cat and frightening young lady during the day.

Henna thought she'd done well to listen to the cat's proposal then. Perhaps because she'd kept the cat in good humor? Now she couldn't even hear the cat's cries anymore.