The concept of someone having met him before only shocked him for one reason - he hadn't been here for long. Here being this reality, of course, but he just hadn't existed in this place for long enough to warrant even semi-widespread knowledge. So for someone to know him from before when he got here, it would mean that other people were hopping over to this reality, and that was just a whole other problem that he didn't feel like working through, even mentally.

He gave Aya a thankful glance, before returning his attention to Kiira, who seemed more at ease, thankfully not freaked out over his mere existence. "Does subject Kiira require anything? Food, water, tour, bed?" That line was something he had said so many times, talking to visitors and joiners at the border of a strange grasslands, trying to be as inviting as he could despite being a giant spider, although now he didn't have the benefit of a voice laced with emotional manipulation to make people calmer, or his presence exuding calm to those close enough to him, nor was he big enough to cross the threshold between "abnormally big spider" and "massive, unmistakeably giant spider."

He just had to adapt to the lack of helpful things he had built up over the years, he supposed.

tags - "speech"