Slow Prison Life - Chapter 36

Monkey Goes For a Walk in the Royal Palace

Noticing the room had started to brighten up, Haley rubbed his half-open, sleep-weighted eyes. The outside light filled the stone room. Morning had come.
Right when he was thinking it was about time to get up, something lightly hugged his body, pulling him back in. It looks like he had slept last night while being held by his master.

“Ook (What to do……….)”

With how today was, there was nothing for him to do other than wait for his master to open her eyes. It’s not like his schedule for the early morning was jam packed. And besides, it would be too pitiful if he were to wake up to an empty bed tomorrow because he interfered with a cute girl’s snoozing now.

♠

After spending another two hours in bed, the master woke up and started preparing herself breakfast with Haley taking a seat next to her.
Haley has a very basic diet, consisting of mostly fresh fruit. There were also some vegetables he would pick himself from outside that could be eaten just as they were.
He was capable of eating meat or bread, but Rachel refused to give him too much cooked food. She would say something strange like, “Cooked meals are saltier………” even though saltier foods taste better.¹
One thing about this stone room that he didn’t fully understand is that there were no servants attending to his master like when they were at home. And so there were none of those beautiful older maids around to pamper him. However this did mean he could spend all day with Rachel instead. That was good in its own way.

Once breakfast is done and his master has finished brushing him, Haley is ready for the rest of the day. He might spend a little time afterwards playing with his master, otherwise he’d go out for a walk–especially if it seems like there was nothing else to do.
Today there were neither any errands for him to run nor anybody to play with. So he used body language to inform Rachel that he was going to go for a walk before heading outside through the ventilation window.

♠

For now, Haley walked through the castle’s backyard towards a nearby corridor while picking up trash off the ground and storing it in the basket always carried on his back. He made it a point to do this as much as possible when walking through a place with high foot traffic.

“Oh Mister Monkey, you’re picking up trash? How commendable.”

“So cute~”

While giving the girls sending him some encouragement a wave, Haley continued picking up any trash he found. It was always nice doing this where other people could see. His master’s reputation would go up when he did things like this, so he tried to do it as much as possible whenever he went outside.
As Haley threw the things he had collected into a garbage can he found, one of the blonde idiot’s minions passed by. He was together with a girl and the two had a pretty good atmosphere going. The type of atmosphere where they were probably about to start holding each other’s hand any second now.

“Huh? That monkey is surely, Miss Ferguson’s pet………..?”

“Eh? But that noblewoman, isn’t she in prison? Why is her pet in the royal palace………..?”

Now Haley was a clever monkey. This guy might be one of the blonde idiot’s minions, but he might get along better with Rachel if Haley were to give him something good here.
But what would be a good gift………..that’s it. Yesterday in a building filled with guys carrying weapons, Haley had picked up a book placed behind a shelf in a room lined with beds and kept it in his basket until now.

“Ook”

The man’s eyes rounded as the small monkey handed something to him. In order to increase his overall favorability rating, Haley made sure to give his biggest, most sincere smile. The emotion you project onto others is always important for things like this.

“Huh? What would a monkey……….um, A Hundred Ways to Bed a Naive Girl…….EHHHHHHHH!?”

“…………..Hey you, what exactly are you having a monkey go buy for you……….!”

“No, you’re wrong! What reason could I have to ask a monkey for such a book!?”

“I, just because I was born and raised outside of the city…….. Heh, so you thought I’d easily get up in bed with you……?”

“D, don’t be ridiculous! I never asked for this, truly!”

“Well then why, is this monkey handing you this………”

“I don’t know! It really wasn’t me!”

Haley watched as the woman laughed.

“Hey Mister Monkey. Did this guy ask you for that book?”

Not understanding what the woman was trying to say, Haley assumed she was overjoyed by the gift because of how large her smile was. Haley decided to do the man a favor and raise his stock even more. That’s why the monkey smiled back with a confident nod.

“Now, see! Why’s he even saying he got it for you!?”

“I don’t know! I’m not lying! There’s no reason why I’d do something to you with this book!”

“So what? You really were just trying to hit on some countryside girl who doesn’t know her right from her left!? You suck!”

“I’ve never thought something like that; I’m not lying!!”

It seems like these two humans were fighting over the book they had been given.
Was it a good thing that these two wanted to monopolize it until the very end………perhaps it would have been better to give it to Rachel after all. Haley was starting to feel a little regret, but he can’t just ask for it back at this point. Haley decided it would be best to just leave these two be and rush ahead.

But, why. Because it’s a book, can’t you just take turns reading it?

Haley was unable to understand the mania behind rare books.
Of course, that wasn’t what was going on right now.

♠

After he finished picking up trash, Haley climbed up the tree with all the red fruits in it. He had been eating very well thanks to this tree, and there were still numerous fruits that had yet to ripen.
He made sure to only ever pick the fruits that had completely reached maturity, and shared them with others for their lunch along with his. There was that one plump, older human man he had given part of his harvest before for instance when he had noticed that human watching him. As humans get older, their motor skills dull and they can’t climb up trees like Haley can. Because he can grab the fruit without much trouble, why not hand some over so that those weaklings can eat some too?
After he finished picking his harvest, Haley jumped to the overhang of a nearby building, aiming to go visit that fat man’s room. Rachel’s mansion was quite large, but this place was even more so, making movement here quite difficult.

On his way, Haley came across a road where carriages frequently drove. Because such roads are often crowded with those carriages and even people walking on foot, great care must be taken whenever crossing one.
While thinking so Haley took a look around, spotting a rope tied to both ends of the street that would be perfect.

Just right. Let’s cross this and get to the other side.

………was what he thought.
When he reached about halfway across though, Haley realized his error in judgement.

The knot on the other side of the rope was slowly becoming undone.

Apparently the original knot wasn’t done properly, and the vibrations from Haley crossing over didn’t help the situation.
Even for Haley a fall from a height nearly three stories up would be dangerous. He might be able to do a ukemi if he were to throw away his back basket, but then all the red fruits he had collected would go to waste.
His body moved before his mind could tell it to, dashing down the line in the direction he was aiming for. Dropping down was out of the question and turning back would take up too much time, so the only choice he had was to push on through from the front.
Fortunately, while the knot was loose, it hadn’t given away completely yet. The rate at which the rope was becoming unfastened slowed slightly, and Haley was just able to make it to shore before plummeting to the ground below.

“Ook…….”

A cool chill had completely run through the monkey’s body. He would have to make sure to check more properly from now on.
Haley reflected on his lesson while wiping the beads of sweat that had formed off of his forehead before tying the end of the rope he was just able to catch before it fell to the metal fitting.
It would be difficult for a human to bring the rope back up to this height again. With Haley’s weight it would be impossible for him to make the rope completely taut again, but so long as the end remains it would be quick work for somebody to just do some repairs.
After finishing up his clever patch job, Haley once again departed for his destination feeling good about the service he had done.

♠

“Hahaha, it’s been too long since I rode a horse like this!”

The knight commander Sir Abigail was feeling hearty after pushing his horse into a run for the first time in so long, and was rushing his horse to go even faster.

“Captain, we’re still in the royal palace! Isn’t it dangerous to go so fast!?”

Hearing the vain cries of his escorts so desperately trying to keep up with him, Sir Abigail released a thunderous laugh.
It was only recently that his son had been faced with a problem and subjected to an exile-like punishment, and he was feeling rather depressed as a result. Thinking about it, it had been a long time since he had inspected the suburban troops garrison, and even longer since he had ridden a horse as hard as it could go. There is an invigorating feeling when you move your body, and even the sour knight commander was perking up with his blood pumping like this.

“Is this the selfishness of a royal officer? You’re likely to cause an accident with you galloping off like this!”

Even though he was far from the battlefield, the knight commander was an old-fashioned knight who refused to sit while riding, traveling every day down the commuter path towering over everyone else atop his massive war horse. From the condition of the road’s surface to every corner, he had become so familiar with the path that he could travel down the road without needing to pay any attention to his surroundings.
………..and because of that, he was too late in noticing the drooping rope that had not been there this morning.

“*GUFUU!!*”

The knight commander didn’t notice the rope until about two seconds before he hit it, and unable to react in time, it caught Sir Abigail right in the throat, forcing him out of his saddle and hoisting him above the road.

“Captain!?”

Their commanding officer haphazardly dangling on a rope by his neck high off the ground. Seeing that figure, the two escorts who had lost sight of him on the winding road for only a second had their nerves crushed.
Just what was this!?
What had happened, it was impossible for them to guess. Being suddenly confronted with something like this………you could say that would be natural. But because they were so shocked, they neglected to heel their own horses………and after a few seconds, they joined their superior in his fate.

♠

The Archduke was looking through the mountain of documents loaded up onto his desk that needed to be signed when the Prime Minister walked in.

“It looks like even His Highness is bogged down by paperwork.”

“Umu, it’s a lot of work just looking through them all.”

The Archduke started to clean up some of his clutter as he talked, taking a sip from his already cold tea with a weary look on his face.

“Since His Majesty isn’t hear right now, it falls on me to make the decisions around here. Originally all this should fall on Elliott’s shoulders…….but he thinks this all trivial and has allowed it to pile up like this.”

“The matter with His Highness the Prince really is troubling. He’s already an adult, yet he isn’t showing any practical work experience. Like this his investiture will……..”

“Indeed. Much of the funds that go to holding the harvest festival come from the fees for these business permits. Who knows what would happen if you were to leave them up to a minor chamberlain’s discretion. If Elliott can’t even keep track of these, then in the future……..”

When it comes to distributing work, this would fall under the purview of an assigned official’s duty. But with the King gone and Elliott throwing a fuss, it fell on the Archduke to take care of it personally instead.

Suddenly a chamberlain rushed into the room.

“Urgent report. Earlier in the road in front of the central gate, the knight commander and two of his subordinates were knocked off of their horses by a low-hanging rope and have been injured!”

The Archduke and Prime Minister shared a look.

“Really, what are they doing………they travel that way to work every day, so what could have caused all of them to get into an accident?”

The cause had already run away.

“It was only just the other day that that out of control girl left with the commander’s son, so perhaps the knights were just feeling a little off?”

“So the knight commander was careless and was injured by accidentally running into some rope……….seriously, what is Sir Abigail doing?”

The Archduke and Prime Minister rose up with a deep, deep sigh. What can be said about the knight commander, a high-ranking member of the administration, getting into an accident right in front of the royal palace? When it comes down to it, the Archduke had to investigate the incident otherwise he would never be able to explain this to the King.

“I wonder why there have been so many incidents like this recently.”

“It’s been like this, ever since His Highness Elliott asked that his engagement be terminated………”

The three men left the room with the chamberlain taking the lead.

A small wind blew through the Archduke’s now vacant office.
Haley had opened the room’s window, carrying his back basket with him.

Looking around and finding nobody there, Haley made a meek noise.

“Ook……….”

It looks like the old man wasn’t here. Apparently. Picking all that fruit must have taken too much time.
Haley climbed up on the desk as if it were natural and dumped out about half a basket’s worth of apples. Because Haley’s basket was small, it only amounted to fix or six apples, but that was still a good portion size.

No, perhaps it would only be a light snack for a man of that size………..

About to head back home, Haley noticed some paper underneath the red fruit.
He recognized this half-finished work. It was the same kind of documents that his master and his master’s father had to work through. All you had to do was put a signature in the space at the bottom, and you were done.
And Haley just so happened to be able to make such a signature.
There was one time when a large amount of documents that Rachel needed to sign had piled up, and after watching her from the side for a bit, he became able to closely mimic the way that Rachel would sign. His master had said to him, “Would you like to sign some yourself?” at the time…………..and if it’s that old man, the amount of papers here would probably be difficult for him to sign alone.
So Haley picked up the pen that had been left sitting on the desk, and after observing how the old man signed his name, Haley tried to copy it.
Haley can only recognize the characters as shapes like a drawing, but when he compared his finished work to the original, they certainly looked similar.

All right.

Haley silently moved his pen, putting the ones he finished in the neat, stacked up pile with all the others that had already been done. After four, five minutes he was left completely satisfied.

Yosh, that guy’s work should be reduced considerably with this.

After helping like that, Haley started to get hungry though. It would be good to eat outside somewhere in a well-ventilated place.
So Haley picked up his basket once again, reopened the window, and headed back out.

Later on, two events that the Archduke would normally have rejected at a glance, the “Royal Capitol Main Street Nudist Parade” and the “First Annual Strange Food Fighter National Convention”² wound up having their applications accepted with direct approval from the Archduke himself.

♠

A nice smell was coming from the first floor of the building where that blonde idiot lived. So Haley took a peek through the window.
A group of people all dressed in white were busily moving around, using various different tools to make something. Haley had traveled around and seen a lot at Rachel’s house, so he knew that these people were all professional chefs.

“His Highness’s lunch break is almost here, so hurry up!”

There was one older man who looked to be the leader shouting out orders while the rest of the younger workers moved around doing a number of different things at the same time.
One of those workers ran up to his boss while carrying a plate with something that looked very delicious on it.

“A main dish of sausage with gravy. In the recipe, the sausage is supposed to be liver, but…………?”

“Right, His Highness hates liver. He’ll have no problem if you use frankfurter instead though.”

“Understood.”

You could hear a woman’s voice from outside the room, and the head chef headed out to talk to her. Most of the other cooks left as well, carrying pots and the other dishes they had made, leaving just one person behind who ventured out the front door to one of the outside warehouses to refill their now barren supply of food.

Haley usually only ate fruits and vegetables, but he was able to eat just about anything. If he could get his hands on it, Haley could definitely enjoy a sandwich or even steak.
But recently Rachel had only been giving him fruit, with no meat being served at all.
And so, Haley broke into the now unmanned kitchen.
He immediately went for the dish the young chef had talked to his boss about.
It had a shape somewhat similar to a banana, and it looked delicious.
Haley’s mouth was salivating……….and so he picked up the hot sausage with his bare hand, a little steam coming from the juicy meat as he sunk his teeth into it.

As I thought, meat tastes different. The taste of steak is tighter and more filling while this is a stranger taste with no hard parts in it. I don’t hate it though.

Haley ravenously went after the sausage, and before he knew it, both of the sausages that had been on the plate were now sitting comfortably in his belly. He then turned to a white, soft moundbaked potato sitting to the side. The potato tasted like someone had kneaded milk together. This was also lip-smackingly delicious.
In the end, Haley finally noticed that the only thing left on the place were a few vegetables with some splashes of gravy here and there.

Haley patted his bulging stomach, when a realization suddenly hit him.

……….this, did I do something bad?

Even Haley knew you weren’t supposed to steal somebody else’s food. It is, even if that other person is that blonde idiot. And taking away another person’s food would assuredly look bad on the monkey’s boss as well.
The unusually upset Haley started to frantically take a look around the empty room. If he were to just leave it as is, he was afraid Rachel might punish him later.
Looking up at the workbench, he found several pots containing both the brown sauce and those white lumps……..after that, it would just be that meat that bends in the middle like a banana.
He searched all he could, but there was no banana. And the people who were making it before were probably going to be back soon.
Haley impatiently opened a nearby small door…….and found a lot of things that looked similar to what he was looking for hanging down from the ceiling.

Great! This will do fine.

The color was a little darker than what he had eaten, but they smelled the same, so he thought it would be fine. More than anything, there wasn’t any time to find something else.
Pulling down two of the fake bananas from the ceiling that were connected together, Haley made sure to properly cut them in half before setting them down on the plate. Un, the size was just about right.
From inside the storage room, Haley had retrieved some blood sausage (uncooked) and some liver sausage (obviously uncooked as well) and arranged them on the plate, pouring on plenty of gravy with the ladle he had pulled from the pot. There, now you couldn’t tell the difference.
As for the white lumps, they felt a little softer than what he had just eaten. Haley found some white powder sitting next to the pot however and poured it in, stirring for a moment, and when he checked the lumps again, they felt about as hard as the one he had eaten before. It should be fine like this.
Haley had mixed in enough flour into the pot that the boiling water hardened into its own white sauce which he added on as a little extra bonus.

It was just as the monkey was finishing up covering any evidence of his presence there when the chefs returned.

“Huh?”

“What’s wrong?”

“For some reason our main dish feels like it’s gotten cold……….?”

“His Highness has a cat’s tongue anyway, so it’s fine. Now hurry up and bring it to him!”

“Yes”

The cooks once again disappeared from the kitchen, allowing Haley to suddenly spring out from his hiding spot on top of a shelf.

Excellent……….now I wonder if Master……..”

Haley opened back up the room filled with the banana-looking meat, and once inside, he put back on his back basket. Since he was already there, he might as well pick another harvest.

♠

Having grabbed a couple of souvenirs as well, Haley decided to return to Rachel. He had had quite a few adventures today as well.
Just as the sun had started to fall once again in the backyard, Haley plopped along back towards the dungeon filled with a sense of satisfaction.

Haley returned home, completely unaware how his actions affected his surroundings.

♠

As Haley laid down, tired from all his playing for the day, Rachel was staring at him feeling quite puzzled.

“This child, I wonder where in the world he got blood sausage from……..for that matter, I don’t have a pot in here to cook any of it……….”

“My Lady, should I take it home with me?”

“No, Haley won’t be satisfied unless he sees me eat them…….just bring me a pot the next time you stop by.”

Hearing the conversation of the two in a half-conscious state………Haley started thinking about all the adventures he’d have tomorrow too before drifting off into the world of dreams.

1. Japanese monkeys have a serious obesity problem. Ones that live near people are about twice as heavy as ones in the wild. The little furballs will eat anything.

2. When they say ‘strange food’ here, they mean food you would normally hesitate to eat. Like bugs or cat meat.