Chapter Text
Currently a lot of thoughts were running through Subaru's head, he can guess how the following conversation is going to go, and it'll end with him locked in one of Anastasia's basements until he could get something, maybe not even a prototype, just something to get started, then she'll hire some people to figure out exactly how it works, create a steam engine and sell it under her company with her name attached to it, launching the world into it's first industrial revolution and winning the candidacy for Queen as an added bonus to all the money she'll get with it.
That's something that he will not allow, one of his goals is to make Emilia Queen, and just simply giving whatever little information about the steam engine that he has would be equivalent of giving up on the race, he cannot allow that.
But how? If only he didn't start rambling about things from his world he wouldn't be in this predicament, he has to get out of a hole that he dug himself and defeat a rival who not only had a lot progress by the time he started, but they get farther by the minute.
Subaru: (What do I do? There has to be a way to solve this…)
He had to make the best of this situation. He knew that no matter how things with Anastasia went, he'll have to bullshit his way into recreating a steam engine, but… why? He probably can guess how things will go, either she makes an offer so good, that benefits not only her camp but Emilia's as well, and that he won't be able to reject it…
Or she somehow convinces Otto with the same argument and he'll be the one to convince Subaru.
Either way, he has to make a plan, he has first hand experience when it comes to negotiate with Anastasia without a plan, and he'd rather not make the same mistake again after so many lives have occurred since then.
Subaru: (hmmmmm, the obvious plan is to drop more names of things that are reasonable for me to make here, if i describe something like a differential without the name, it won't be long until she recreates it)
Obviously, but assuming that things go the way he thinks they'll do, and also assuming that he manages to recreate a steam engine what would she use it for?
Subaru: (Maybe she'll try to recreate a car? I don't know, she looked rather interested at the prospect of a carriage that didn't need a dragon… I'll have to talk with Otto about this, but… I'll go with that)
And so, Subaru made plan while being tied with a rope and dragged by Julius, not his proudest moment, he's practically being humiliated here, even the maids noticed this particular situation, and then there was Ram, that upon noticing what was happening, didn't waste a second.
Ram: “he, it appears that Barusu will finally be punished for spying on the maids” of course she knew who Julius was and how he was when it comes to things like honor and such.
Julius: “Subaru… did you…?”
Subaru: “OF COURSE NOT, WHY WOULD YOU BELIEVE HER?”
Julius: “Subaru… you know that the lolimancer title that you hold is there for a reason, right?”
Subaru: “why are you making it sound like I wanted that title? Also what is your point “
Julius: “its just that after seeing petra-san and hearing Ran-san comments i finally realized tha-”
Subaru: “I'm going to have to stop you before you say something i don't want to hear”.
First: i don't spy on the maids
Second: I'm exclusively attracted to women that are older than me”
Ram: “i knew that you were a brute, but to confess that you spy on Frederica, i am disgusted, please die so that i don’t have to see ou again”
Subaru: “don't put words on my mouth!!…
Also why did you mention Petra?”
It made no sense… okay maybe it did, be he just wasn't going to let them have that, not only was he being publicly humiliated… again
But also Ram was being relentless when it came to insulting him, for whatever reason, who knows maybe she woke up on the wrong side of the bed
Julius: “Subaru…” he was about to tell directly that petra had feelings for her, but he knew that it was a bad idea for multiple reasons, he may already know, maybe he doesn't and he's just that dense, the possibilities are endless with his friend
Ram: “you surround yourself with little maids like the scum you are”
Subaru: “the only ‘little maid’ here is Petra”
Petra: “Beatrice-chan also counts”
???, Subaru looked at the direction the voice came from, it was right behind Ram
Subaru: “for how long have you been there?”
Petra: “since the beginning”
Subaru: “… of course, what do you mean by that?”
Frederica: “she means that the Great Spirit Beatrice works part time as a maid when you're not in the mansion”
Subaru: “seriously?”
Frederica: “yes, she even uses a uniform”
Subaru: “My lovely Beako, in a maid uniform? Why didn't she tell me? My heart's broken”
Ram: “To go as far as to corrupt the integrity Beatrice for your perverted fantasies? Not even her is safe from your perverted mind”
And so, this conversation went on and on for about an hour and a half, Julius was surprised of how quickly things got this lively is a short amount of time, was this because they we're all so incredibly close regardless of their position? From his point of view it was such an unbelievable thing for a maid to insult someone on their face let alone the knight of a royal candidate, if this was happening on any house that is not related to the royal selection at best that maid would've been fired, but here…
He has seen the triplets and Ricardo be this lively, but they're a family, that's to be expected…
Was this the effect Subaru had on people when he's not on a life or death situation? Or was the atmosphere in this mansion always like this and it would still be like this if Subaru never arrived here? These are the things that he'll never know…
What was this about again? Ah yes the steam engine.
After remembering what he was doing he kept on dragging Subaru through the mansion until they arrived at the room where they were more than an hour ago
Knock knock knock
Julius: “Anastasia-sama, i have brought natsuki Subaru”
Anastasia: “come in”
After being dragged inside the room Subaru saw that everything was a complete mess inside, aside from the multiple pieces of glass that were on the ground and that a maid was cleaning…
Beatrice was eating something happily next to Otto who had a confident look on his face.
Emilia was also there, they've spent to much time talking with the maids, so Emilia had ample time to move here without Subaru noticing.
To the other side of the table were both Anastasia who was reviewing some papers for some reason, and Mimi who was eating the same thing Beatrice was eating.
Putting aside the papers she was reviewing she struck a familiar pose and talked
Anastasia: “so, now that everyone is here… shall we continue Natsuki-kun?”
Subaru: “why are you sitting like gedo ikari?”
…
Everyone looked at him, no wonder they did, he just blurted a random name as i everyone knew who he was talking about
Anastasia: “…who the… who is gendo Ikari? Is he someone from Kararagi by any chance, or is he someone from your ‘hometown’?”
She was looking for answers… during the witch cult assault to Pristela he and Priscilla's knight made some comments that just didn't make sense
It was one thing to throw some random reference or quote while being the only one that understands it, she would know, not everyone spent as much time as her trying to decipher the hoshin files, she would sometimes use bits of information gathered from the texts and make references to it
No one but her understood those references, it was supposed to be the same with Priscilla's knight, some kind of reference that only he got, but… Subaru Natsuki understood that, and not only that, but responded in a way that seemed too natural, as if it was a regular question of everyday life.
That piqued her curiosity, when he appeared she tried to investigate him to no avail, there was nothing about this guy, so given that he had made a bigger name for himself, she decided to give that another shot, and after going over the reports she started to think that he may come from beyond the great waterfall.
After adding that possiblity everything began to make sense, weird words, things that doesn't have meaning to anyone but him, wild ideas that would be too out of the norm, and most recently a metia that somehow turned heated water into motion.
It's not like they didn't have metias that did a similar thing, but they were too expensive to be worth the cost, they required insane amount of mana, or mana crystals to deliver lackluster results, so they were quickly discarded.
But now here comes this guy who can make the same thing but with water instead of mana, and the possibilities are endless, whoever made this discovery public, essentially already won the candidacy, it was no joke something revolutionary so she needed to get her hands on it.
Subaru: “doesn't matter”
Anastasia: “… So, about that metia that you mentioned, if you give me all of the information on it that you have, i can give you this much” straight to the point, she showed him a paper, turns out all of those papers she was reviewing were contracts
But, he wouldn't go down so easily
Subaru: “sorry, not happening”
Anastasia: “why??”
Subaru: “you think i don't know why are you doing this?, that I'm so dumb that I'll just give you the information you want just because you asked? No”
Emilia: “Subaru think about it”
Before letting her speak he dragged he along with Otto and Beako to a corner and began to explain
Subaru: “i did think about it and it's a bad idea to accept the deal, it would be practically giving her the candidacy on a silver platter“
Otto: “and why is that exactly i know that there were attempts to make something similar before but it got to nothing, why is this one so different?”
Subaru: “well to begin with, it works, and also it's not just the machine itself, but what comes after, my hometown called it the industrial revolution, it really complicated but the gist of it is that a lot of things that used to be hand made were automated leading to an extremely fast development of everything, but don't worry I've got a plan”
After a rapid explanation of years of development and plain ignorance on his part, as the industrial revolution was not something that interested him more that astrology, but they wouldn't know.
And so, Subaru sat down on his side of the table and began to think what his bargain chips were, he knows that it's not only the engine but a lot of more things that helped shape his world to the way it was before he got transported, and he was sure that given enough time, this one will get to the same or to an even greater point thanks to magic.
Anastasia: “so finally made a decision? What are tou going to do? If i were you i would sign it”
Subaru: “sorry… but i have no idea how to make it…”
Anastasia: “… What?"