Author notes; 

Please see previous chapter's 'not a chapter survey'. Thank you. 

PS; This chapter is over 12,000 words...this chapter is a book by itself. Hope readers get the driver to have a big story with a big world. ;) 

Thanks. 

 

 

 

Chapter 164

Shun point of view;

Before waking up I fed some more.

We replenished my shrinking supply of canteens of (pet type) ghoul breast milk. But we always worry that it’s not enough. It’s like having fries or a drink with no other parts in the combo meal and getting small sizes only, because I need more and more. And I’m always thirsty, so much that I can hardly stand it.

The information on the effects of my fluids on Doppel-chan for now is inconclusive. We have kept trying to dose her but she’s still too dangerous to be let out of the cage but there is definitely a freaky excited reaction now.

I was partly disappointed in some ways but excited in others. There is some reaction but she’s not converted yet. And Doppel-chan clearly is a demon.

My reasoning is trying to figure out;

Can with proper conditioning Doppel-chan be turned back towards the light?

This is also an idea Asakura and Sylvie want as well.

But it’s clear that Doppel-chan is clearly too dangerous to let go. Were I to let her go in a human city, I’m not even sure there would be a single survivor. She’s really that strong and that evil at the moment. But she’s also too much for me to handle in most ways, ...except with both milk and pheromones together.

She needs coaching to become good.

She currently has a lot of homicidal thoughts and intention to do harm against humans it seems, but not to other demons. She is unable to resist the pheromone ‘elixir’; therefore we have a chink in her armor that we can try to exploit for goodness and being an ally of justice. And since she’s stronger than me, then shouldn’t it be appropriate that I would try to also train her also to become an ally of justice?

By working with and trying to dose Doppel-chan with pheromones I can also introduce subliminally good thoughts and good tendencies into her personality with positive reinforcement, and positive imagery when she feeds or gets fed my pheromone ‘elixirs’.

When we feed her the ‘elixir’, she’s become greedy for it after the first dosage.

The first dosage went like this;

She did thrash around like a drunk cat for a good minute or so. Then she bounced off the walls, and peed herself while banging on the bars of the cage like someone had shot her full of a huge dose of sugar and adrenaline at the same time.

But then she passed out after going through a violent tantrum. And she’s too dangerous for us to go look at her up close or risk touching her so we don’t know how far this has gone yet, nor if she will have mood swings. Her eyes are rolled back in her head with an open fish mouth look on her face with her tongue lolling out to the side as her naked body lay on the floor, still looking very much like a smaller version of Sylvie at the moment.

She’s too strong for us to feel sorry for.

Jeez, what a monster!

How many forms does she have anyway?

We still don’t know if she has some secret form that she hasn’t shown us. If she does I hope it’s not some ugly critter.

“That was…unexpected,” Asakura said in a very tight lipped dignified way. She’s dressed mostly but still has milk leaking through her tight shirt, from just finishing getting us the milk that we’d used on her.

“I guess that means it works?” Sylvie teased while touching me in a certain place. Sylvie is also barely dressed now if you can call it that. She’s got the tight short booty shorts on now but because of her height there’s an added effect of them looking more like daisy duke style extreme risque shorts that pretty much show all her ass cheeks. And her school uniform blouse is being worn but none of the buttons are done up.

“I didn’t do that did I? That looks so undignified,” Asakura noted.

“Oh no, trust me you are fine,” I said.

“Thank goodness,” Asakura blushed.

“But having an experience like that sounds fun,” Sylvie said with an excited squeal.

“Oh that’s so true huh? I guess I was over thinking things. As long as there’s love its OK?” Asakura also squealed in delight.

“You guys are funny. Thanks for being with me,” I squeezed both of their hands affectionately.

Sylvie and I giggled at her reaction.

Now we wait.

It will take time to get Doppel-chan ‘domesticated’. We’ll have to do this every day probably for weeks even.

...

After falling back asleep I find myself in the room at the Inn when morning hits.

Right…

Busy day…

When I wake up a very hot, young looking busty Sunghee is naked and giving me a blow job in bed. Between strokes of her jaw trying to obscenely take on my huge size it her breasts shake and wiggle like jell-O every time she goes down. It also looks like she might dislocate her jaw because of my size but she’s managing it somehow, and enjoying it.

So was that why I woke up? I think it’s slightly earlier than normal.

“What? Is something wrong?” she asked while giving me a wicked smile.

“No, no its nothing. Please go ahead,” I said.

“Good, because I wasn’t going to shhhhtop anyway,” she slurped. She goes back to licking it like a Popsicle. But she almost choked trying to take too much of it.

“Try to ease up. You don’t have to try to take so much at one time. I don’t want you to get hurt,” I said.

“Easy for you to say. I can’t help it. I missed a few turns while you had me put away and that’s unfair you know? This thing is addicting,” she said with a smirk.

After a few more hours of feeding and making Rina beg for it we go down to the inn to settle my bill.

We’ve also had to go down later and with more preparation. My name is starting to become a bit known in the city so we have to make sure there’s a bouncer in the inn dining room lately to keep away beggars and attention seeking people. Some of them have taken habits of trying to sell stuff to us like themselves, their children, or adventurer newbie groups begging for me to take them out to fight and help them earn money. And there are others that are worse than that, which seem sinister in nature like wanting duels.

It seems like I can’t really get much rest lately and it’s become annoying so we have to be more careful moving around town. But it also means that the Inn has been giving us luxurious wines and fruit with our breakfasts at no additional cost to keep us here. And having famous people in your inn means others want to eat their and stay there too, which is their main goal.

While the girls are eating breakfast I’m talking with Gyle, who has already stuffed himself silly.

As usual Gyle has been helpful in being a pretty good attendant.

I had to keep nudging Sunghee under the table while they are eating because she had this shit faced grin on her face the whole time from the euphoria of recent sex. Sometimes she stares at me too long, so I need to be careful of that. People notice if you have this spaced out look for too long; although if its only small burst then they think you are just in love.

“Any new business that hasn’t been addressed yet?” I asked, doing it like I usually do it, which is kind of like how a bunch of managers in a top company management and executive meeting might go over orders of business.

I expect Sunghee and Rina to listen and contribute even though they are eating. There’s the chance Sunghee’s vast experience will contribute somehow too and she can think of things that I don’t.

Rina has less chance to be able to contribute but still is very energetic and wants to do so. Actually being energetic and wanting to contribute has set a good mood for this kind of dialogue.

“Three new adventuring teams have requested team up sessions with you through officially done written offer letters. They look impressive on paper for some of them but not all,” Gyle said.

“Oh this sounds fun,” I said.

“EH?” Rina is surprised.

“Its so early to be in demand. I guess this is a surprise,” Sunghee is shocked.

“Nice. What do they say?” Rina asked.

“Well they might not be all good,” Sunghee warned me.

I frowned though after I thought about it. Actually she’s probably right.

“You better turn them away,” I said.

“Is that wise?” Gyle asked.

“That one group was a mess wasn’t it?” Sunghee countered.

“I have to admit, that was a terrible group. They shouldn’t even be alive,” Gyle pointed out, not to be condemning but to simply state the facts so we could understand his point of view.

“And that team begging us last night after we got in was bad too. The inn bouncers had to throw them out,” Rina restated something that had happened after we’d gotten in last night.

“Right. I’ll take care of it. Um, also the Inn wants another deposit since the funds the government gave them as a deposit for your week of free chartered room and board will come to a close soon,” he asked.

“That’s reasonable. I suppose they can’t take care of us forever,” I said.

“Actually though the government just doing inn fees isn’t really helping us much. Inn fees aren’t that much of an expense,” Sunghee said looking at Gyle.

“I guess so…” Gyle dodged her focused look.

“Yeah they don’t work for free even if we’d like them too,” snickered Rina.

“Um, see if they have a preferred weekly rate that’s discounted,” Sunghee suggested.

“Is there such a thing?” I asked her.

“Yeah sometimes but no promises. It’s worth a try,” Gyle shrugged.

“How come you didn’t know about that?” Rina asked him pointedly.

Gyle looked apologetic. “Sorry but my family’s shop is in town. And I didn’t do adventuring full time but just like a couple times a week or month before because I wasn’t that strong yet.”

“Oh I see,” I said.

“Most town inns will prefer someone being there long term with guaranteed income. Having people always going as soon as they come in can be stressful during low travel months,” Sunghee said.

“That’s right,” Gyle nods.

“Good to know,” Rina chipped in.

“Next item of business?” I asked.

“Svinn is asking for you to coordinate with his attendants for the lunch schedule to meet with the lord of the city,” Gyle asked.

“Wow, you are moving up in the world,” Sunghee said while under the table she’s placed her hand on my knee affectionately.

“That is pretty cool actually. They don’t invite just anyone,” Gyle admitted.

Huh…this is a strange unexpected turn of events huh?

“Is that worth anything?” RIna asked.

“Heck yeah! It’s the Lord of the City, not to be confused with the Prince. Both are super important people and key players, not just titles. They have similar jobs but the Prince is even higher and is over several cities and the whole prefecture though he bases in one city to try to concentrate holding the troubled southern province together,” Gyle said.

“OK. Any idea what they’ll expect or want?” I asked carefully. This has me kind of stressed out. It could be both good and bad.

Gyle frowned, “well you being a human can’t be good. He will undoubtedly be jealous. A lot of dwarves may be that way in fact. It’s not that they are racist, but they are worried about having outsiders take over their town, which has always been a real danger to us. So you can’t fault them for thinking that way when they just want to protect our people. You have growing popularity. People identified you, Cassius, and Svinn with the ending of the siege when the goblins got in the wall. People will also be mad at the City Lord for blaming why they got in, probably citing defense maintenance neglect, etc. So he may feel competition with you at best, extreme rivalry or hate at worst. Also he’s from an old school family that is anti-human. So meeting with him can’t be good for you.”

“Damn,” I said.

“So in other words it could end up being a feast thrown in your honor publicly or something even, who knows. We’ll know more later,” Gyle said with a tight lipped business savy smile.

“Wait you said the ‘troubled southern province’. So does that mean other provinces might be better for us to work out of?” Rina asked raising the concern.

Gyle frowned. “Not for humans. You have to remember provinces that don’t have threat of invasion aren’t going to take to huge groups of armed humans suddenly coming in and disturbing how things have always been to them. The immigration policy is lenient if new settlers do defense contract work. Sorry if that sounds harsh.”

“Well if I were another race and kingdom I might feel like humans could be dangerous too,” Sunghee admitted but still frowned with her arms crossed.

So it’s like that huh…

“So what are you saying exactly? There’s no other areas we can go to?” I asked.

“He means that humans are only welcomed in war zones right?” Sunghee asked him.

“Well I wouldn’t put it like that but…look I don’t make the rules OK?!” Gyle said while frustrated, seeing our negative reactions.

“Well…we want to be able to have some kind of stability and settle somewhere,” Sunghee said to point out our concern.

“Yeah, and that’s why we have our immigration system. So I’m sorry about that. But this place is a good place to live. Yes there is war here. And there are good points too that you have to remember too. Towns with lots of defense spending have a lot of cash going through them,” Gyle whispered after leaning over the table. He nodded seriously with it.

“Cash is good,” Sunghee noted while nodding.

“Not just good, but very good,” Rina chirped happily.

“That’s a good thing. Paying bills is a good thing and not being homeless too,” I admitted.

“Ugh…don’t ever let us go homeless. That sounds so stressful,” Rina groaned.

“I agree,” Sunghee said.

“Yes, very. So for now just stay out of trouble until we get this Lord of the City meeting squared away. Try to look civilized and …sort of like you belong around dwarves. I’ll sort out the details for you,” Gyle said.

“I’d suggest you try to buy a little time. The longer you wait for someone with that the better. Shun I have to warn you this isn’t a good thing. Political factions can be dangerous,” Sunghee suggested.

“Wait, are you saying something bad about dwarves?” Gyle glared at Sunghee.

In return Sunghee, just tried to look more sincere towards me mostly but to Gyle a little too. “Sorry Gyle, any race political things can be trouble. I can assure you I only have appropriately positive feelings for the dwarven kingdom so far.”

“F-fine. I guess you are right,” he said. (Why does he sound disappointed? Was he going to try to rat me out?)

“But how do we prepare for something like this?” Rina looks stressed out. And she she should be because she brought up a good point.

Gyle frowned, but I objected. “Actually we don’t know anything about dwarven etiquette,” I said.

“We’ll get someone to coach you soon,” Gyle said. He’s writing down some notes for our to do list.

“We can do this. We just go step by step,” he noted.

“We probably should get a consultant thought right?” Sunghee asked him.

Gyle looked thoughtful like we’d just given him a calculus problem. “Uh…let me think on that and get back to you.”

“Just don’t surprise us with anything last minute. We want to not be crowded into something. Work with me on something like that. Also unless I’m mistaken they are going to try to find out if Shun is a threat to them or a boon,” Sunghee said to him.

“That’s…” Gyle stuttered.

“Um that’s actually an interesting idea,” I said. “Do you think that’s true?” I asked Sunghee.

“It wasn’t until you became a big player in this little dwarven city. In a larger city you’d still be a smaller fish but this is a dwarven state where they have lower populations than humans. So I don’t know for sure either but I wouldn’t rule it out. The more they know you the more easily politics can get involved,” Sunghee finished.

“What she said, might be true,” Gyle admitted while looking like he didn’t want to do so.

Good. This is turning out well. Sunghee has more experience with this, so I agreed. Gyle puts it in his notebook with the other things we’d marked down to follow up on. Gyle puts down some notes in his calendar of some things to follow up on including finding someone to give us social hierarchy and etiquette lessons the dwarven way. I’d almost balked that it’s a stupid waste of money but apparently dwarves DO things VERY differently than humans, especially the higher up the chain of command you go. And politics get in the way too.

Gyle is suddenly a bit red faced… “There is another order of business besides that…”

It takes us a few minutes getting it so he can manage spitting it out. It turns out Gyle is anxious for us to send that letter of introduction to Deinan on his behalf. He doesn’t have any female acquaintances and wants to try his hand at pursuing a few.

I was about to warn him Deinan wasn’t that great of a catch, but Sunghee stomped on my toe under the table.

Vetoed? I can’t believe I was vetoed.

Then Sunghee stomped on my toe again. “He needs this Shun. It’s good for us too,” she whispered in a low tone while leaning to whisper in my ear with her arm over my shoulder. That also prompted Rina to also drape her arm and upper chest against me on the other side like Sunghee was doing just now.

Ah right…I guess Gyle really does need this but is it really OK for him to pick a girl like that? Oh well…

OK, I’ll let the dwarf choose his sad fate. Sigh…

We spend another fifteen minutes working out what to say in the letter. You would be surprised how much flowery language and random poetic verse the dwarves put in a social introduction letter. I got lost on half the stuff. And to dwarves calling her well built doesn’t mean she’s fat like it would with humans so there are all kinds of things that confused me. I ended up getting tired of sitting at the table as the four of worked on this letter while Gyle looks happy as a kite on a windy day. The whole time Gyle is smiling like a lottery winner. He’s burning like he’s on fire with embarrassment however.

But dwarves take introduction letters seriously, as evidenced by the curiosity of other male dwarves on tables near ours that can’t mind their own business, though they are trying to be subtle.

…

“Finally we’re done!” Sunghee said as she and Gyle wrapped up the last touches of the letter. Naturally we also had to transfer the content to special beautifully made watermark paper that the dwarves have for social cards and so on and so forth.

Thank goodness. I didn’t think I could bear it any longer.

The costs today for mailing letters and sending errand runners will be a pain in the ass. After we finish it and Gyle comes back from the restroom and for sending some errand runners for us I pull him back to reality.

“What about the response from the guild on the money split from last night’s work bringing in the rancher refugees?” I asked.

Gyle snapped his fingers quickly. “Oh right that. Just a sec.”

He rummages through the mail we received in our inn mail box, which is basically the inn employees receiving letters for us. He goes through a few which he sets to the side before pulling the envelope in question out.

Then he’s interrupted by Rina, “what are all those other letters that you are treating like junk?” Rina asked.

“Oh right. Those are just sales offers from businesses trying to sell weapon and armor services to adventurers and mercenaries. You know, you can’t expect me to let you have junk mail, besides my family’s shop is so much better. Someone gave them your names and from now on you’ll get junk mail from them probably twice a month,” Gyle said with a casual tone in his voice.

Sunghee and Rina are giving a ‘what’s up with that’ look suddenly.

Why does Gyle start most of his responses with ‘Oh right’ anyway?

“So even in this world you can’t escape junk mail,” Sunghee said to Rina carefully in whisper. Gyle didn’t hear it but I did. The girls have a dead look in their eyes.

“Well let’s go onto the next one,” I said.

“Right…” Gyle cracks open the wax seal with a small knife and unfolds the parchment carefully. He carefully read.

“To the esteemed Miss Sunghee and Team;

As you know our decision wasn’t easy regarding a judgment of work conduct and performance in the recent bodyguard escorting job your team performed. We took into consideration the needs of both teams and who did what and when. We both believe both teams accepted the contract for escorting and saving ranch villagers back to the fortress with integrity, courage, and admiration. We wish you know to know that…blah blah…let me skip that nonsense part,” Gyle said.

He moved down a few lines and began reading again.

“We did count that over two hundred orcs were slain by one team, while less than twenty slain by the other team. Please note that we don’t want any further conflict or bad feeling among teams. Both teams will be paid for their hard work in defending the dwarven kingdom. We’re glad both teams could be of use with very few losses in manpower.”

“We have concluded after consulting with the city guard, myself, and my knowledge of both teams, and several acquaintances of both teams that the gold from rescuing the 2^nd ranch bounties (which would have gone only to the Akira team) will be split in half evenly among both teams for the gold that would have gone entirely to the Akira team.”

Akira team and Company; 7 gold 17 silver

Sunghee team and company; 7 gold 17 silver.

Thank you for your brave service on behalf of our nation and people,

Svinn

Newly appointed Military Advisor to Prince Malthiir

Oh…looks like Svinn just became some big shot too. I couldn’t miss that part.

This is good.

This means we get our own cut, plus +50% of that other teams cut!

Gyle finished reading.

The girls cheer and so does Gyle.

“Actually wait a minute. There’s a problem,” I said.

They all look at me strangely.

“How so?” Gyle asked.

“We didn’t hire the guys that helped our team. Those dwarves assigned by the military to keep our team numbers up,” I said.

“Eh? That’s true,” Sunghee said.

“Who did hire those guys anyway? And what are their terms?” I asked.

Gyle goes through his letters and documents for us.

In short, we have to pay those guys too. This is not cool at all. I don’t like it a bit. Actually how do we know some official didn’t just pocket that amount and give some few coppers or short change to those dwarven escorts while pocketing the rest?

Crap.

Now our money got split a bunch of ways differently than we originally thought it would go.

“We have 12 people to divide among,” Sunghee reminds me. “The group consisted of me acting as team leader, Gyle as acting team secretary, Shun, Rina, and eight newly trained but low on experience young dwarven recruits,” she counted off.

“They aren’t going to charge us to make us pay back for the lost horses are they?” Rina asked.

I held my breath. We shouldn’t be charged for that. Hell if we did it would bankrupt us, but the problem is if you had greedy tyrant pig they might come up with some bullshit like that just to want to not pay you.

“No. On that we’re safe,” Gyle concluded after going over it.

“Thank goodness,” Rina said.

“But if it weren’t a state sponsored emergency it might have been a different story,” Gyle said.

Somehow that doesn’t make me feel good. Horses don’t seem to do well around orcs I guess? I should research more on this. I know if I was a horse like hell I’d want to stick around when orcs are around, even if I did ditch my owner.

“Next time we do a job like this we better make sure that’s accounted for in the contract. But for now we have an understanding,” Sunghee said.

“This is good dialogue. We know what to look for in the next contracts because of this,” I said.

The others agreed.

We run the calculation and look at the economic loot contract. It’s already divided and calculated with a breakdown but we went over it to be sure.

The 7 gold 17 silver divided among 12 people became, 51 silver 21 copper. It would have been more for the grunts, but the fact that Sunghee and I had adventurer’s licenses make it counted as if it were 14 people with her and myself counted as two people each, thus lowering the total to 51 silver 21 copper for Gyle, and the other recruits from what should have been a huge stack of money going to us.

That pissed me off still that we had to give bonus money to people with no experience and who had just been coasting along for the ride with no loyalty to us. If they’d had loyalty to us that would have been a different story however. Gyle thought it was unfair too, because he thinks he, me, and the girls are sort of the real team and the others grunts. We were obviously cheated.

I keep Rina’s, Sunghee’s, and my portion which totals 2 gold 56 silver 07 copper after the license bonus is factored together for both us and Rina’s portion; (51 silver 21 copper X 5), (51 silver x 2 (license) plus 51 silver x 2 (license) + 51 silver). For us to both have adventurer’s licenses did help a bit in preserving some of the leak in the money boat.

Gyle looked a bit forlorn seeing my huge gold stack and his little 51 silver stack.

But 51 silver is still a lot of money for him. That’s like a whole 2 months worth of work pay for just 1 day of work for him!

Amazing!

Defensive magic is really the way to go. Because I can mitigate all the risks, we’re in a position to make some serious money all the time with less fear of dying or getting bad injuries when we go out!

But there were some losses too for surcharges and stuff on some small change. I needed to give some money to Gyle for mail delivery funds, inn fees, and other bookkeeping fees that he’s doing as part of his secretary duties. The total reduces a little down to 2 gold 54 silver or maybe 53, I forgot which after I had to break a silver piece tipping Inn employees and settling small charge fees too. I probably gave him a bit too much but it can’t hurt for him to remember that gold is his boss and I’m the one who has it.

We quickly go over the next letter which shows the adventurer guild’s payout and accounting of funds letter for the economic contract for the 1^st ranch that we’d saved people from, which was a separate matter and not to be divided up at all. This is our real original reward breakdown. This is our real job and where our real accountability is.

Breakdown of our rescue (not the other team’s shares we ‘inherited’ via performance; 16 food producing dwarves, with 7 children;

16 gold 7 silver total to be divided in 14 shares (12 people with 2 licenses);

Each share comes out to approximately 1 gold 14 silver 78 copper. Gyle received his share. The other funds are already sent to the other recruits. And I like that this amount is way bigger somehow.

My portion comes out to 5 gold 73 silver 90 copper.

Am I becoming a gold demon rather than a sex demon? I seem to be pulling it in all the time. And it’s a big deal to pull in even 1 gold. With just 50 gold I can buy a small homestead right? So to make 5 gold just like it’s nothing…

But to be fair, I still think 50 gold for a house is way too much. It’s like that because this is a hell world where people get exploited and still there are people that are working their days out like serfs in a way.

And we had to have the inn bouncers keep nosy people away from our table when it was time to go over the gold break down too.

In this world you can buy a lot with gold.

So today from both teams reward money, the total comes to, 8 gold 29 silver 97 copper.

My gold bag = 183 gold 59 silver 22 copper + 8 gold 29 silver 97 copper.

New gold bag total in demon inventory box = 191 gold 89 silver 19 copper

“That’s my money tree shun!” Gyle patted me on the back breaking my thoughts. His heavy hand pounded my back so hard it was hard to breathe though it wasn’t on purpose. Dwarves are just freakishly strong and don’t realize their own strength sometimes.

“I’m not a money tree jeez,” I shook my head.

“Be careful Shun. Now you’ll have to watch out for thieves more carefully from now on,” Sunghee said. Already she’s looking about on guard slyly.

“Dang, she’s right,” Rina and Gyle both said at the same time.

I didn’t say it but who treats their friends like a money tree to be shaken when they want something?

“So there’s one more matter to be discussed…did you notice that the other team’s leader was named Akira?” Rina asked me.

This is something I’d wanted to address AFTER going over the gold. The gold is way more important to me than that guy. But what does that mean actually?

“Hmm, do you think it’s the same guy? I haven’t analyzed naming practices around here in this area. What are the chances of it being someone with a similar name? And what if it got mispronounced in the letter and isn’t Akuru or Akra instead of Akira?” I asked.

“Who?” Sunghee is confused. So is Gyle actually.

“It said the other team’s leader was Akira. We know an Akira. And we don’t know if this is good or bad to run into one,” Rina explained.

“So you think it’s the same guy?” Sunghee asked.

“Possibly. But what are the chances of someone else having that same name?” I asked.

“I don’t know. It’s not a dwarven name. So that makes it harder to figure out,” Gyle said.

“Is it good or bad that we’re seeing a name like that?” Sunghee asked me.

“I actually don’t know. There were a lot of problems with some of the other people that came out here with us,” I said to Sunghee, who nodded. She understands I’m hinting at coming to this world, but thankfully Gyle doesn’t.

“I don’t know. That guy was selfish,” Rina sighed.

“We won’t know right away if it’s him or not. We better not get our hopes up either way. Gyle see if you can find out something on this before we do anything about it,” I said handing him some change for some errand runners to find out more.

“Got it,” he said slipping the money in his jacket.

...

After breakfast…

I was going to find the restroom when it happened.

There was a sharp pain filled sensation in my back. Turning quickly I find my magic runic shielding has completely collapsed. I dodged to the right, and then realize I’m bleeding by some kind of sneak attack with a dagger. I felt lightheaded but hurriedly got my runic shielding buff back up and then spammed heal and cure poison/disease like ten times each just to be safe because it scared the shit out of me.

!!!

That was an assassin sneak attack!

WOW!

The figure ran off in the dark some time ago, gone before I even knew what happened.

I find myself on the floor sweating like crazy. I feel sort of weak, and the floor here seems to be trying to pull me down. Oh wait, that’s just feeling weak huh?

I’m alive?!

Yeah…I am.

I risk a few more heal, regenerate, and other basic spells just to be safe. My physical stamina still seems not good right now. Actually I’m damn lucky to be alive. Whatever that was killed my runic shielding in one quick strike that was so well done I barely noticed after it was too late.

But who was it?

A dwarf? Or something else?

Hmm as I think about it, I go over it in my mind. I only felt this shadow moving behind me. It might not be a dwarf at all, and might be tall or short.

But who?

He probably thinks I’m dying.

I’m almost afraid to check, but the cloaked and hooded figure is already gone. I have to heal myself again, since there’s some residual effect leftover, probably some poison that didn’t quite all clear yet even though I’d gone through all kinds of heal spell spam right after.

Did someone just try to assassinate me?

I think they did.

Wait, I’m going through one of those mental moments like, ‘that couldn’t happen to me right?’ denial phases. Like when people think it can only happen to someone else.

Whoever it was they sucked. And my money is still here because I keep almost everything in the magic inventory box that thieves can’t get into. I do think that person did try to pick pocket me though.

As I think about it, they were very good. In fact this was top notch. They just didn’t expect me to always be wearing my runic shielding spell buff.

Wait…are Sunghee and Rina OK? What if they are targeted too?!

FUCK! I have to make sure they are safe too!

I ran out back to where they were but they are fine. My heartbeat calmed down about three notches once I see they are safe.

I tell Gyle and the girls.

They help me track through what happened but there’s no sign of who it was. Only Sunghee and Rina are trying to stick to me like cement now to make sure I’m safe but Gyle wants to go home early.

For now we’re going to find some money opportunities and visit some shops. But we’re more guarded than ever now. Rina and Sunghee are hanging onto me like I’m the last man on the planet and very worried.

The girls decide that miniskirts are impractical.

I almost cried. I liked super short hot miniskirts but that darned assassin is making them think more practical now.

I liked seeing them in short miniskirts but they suggested maybe pants might be better while in dungeons and around town. I think Gyle was saddened too. We both wanted to weep but they are right.

New expense; trousers… 20 silver each, one for Sunghee and one for Rina because this is nicer stuff and quality clothing with something in it that makes it extremely durable special clothes. Otherwise it would have probably been in the 3 to 4 silver each range.

I just lost 40 silver total…

(-40 silver)

But I will make a comeback in trying to create and think up excuses for them to wear the miniskirts or less as much as possible. I still have the summon equipment box spell ability too so there are a lot of fun options to try out. I can even play dress up with Sunghee and Rina if I want. Actually they do want that.

Gyle is checking the job board while the girls are going through the street shops. Each area is pretty interesting as we look around. There are all kinds of different styles available.

It gives me some ideas.

Dwarven trousers aren’t bad though I had to admit. There are even some styles that look good. Rina and Sunghee both look great in just about anything really.

What has us on edge though is what’s going on around us. The army hasn’t called in any adventurer’s for jobs. They still are putting people in the dungeon?

What will happen there? What’s going on? We’re perplexed as we try to figure out a pattern to what’s going on with the adventurer’s guild job board. We ended up going over there to chat with them briefly.

“Is that weird?” I asked the adventurers’ guild receptionist as we explained our concerns.

She shrugged, “right now the orc and goblin armies have no way of getting in the stronghold yet and the walls are high and strong, being over ten feet thick on the more critical points. So don’t worry but be prepared. Most likely the military has something planned but doesn’t want to reveal their cards yet till they are ready.” She said it like it’s an everyday thing. I guess dwarves see this their whole lives.

“So it’s a waiting game? What will happen?” I asked.

Gyle is listening to. Doesn’t he already have an idea how this is supposed to work?

We keep worrying about it.

“Don’t look at me. Not even the locals know the military strategy. The whole point is to make it so its unpredictable or else the enemy will figure it out,” he said.

“For once I agree with Gyle on this,” Sunghee said to confirm.

“Hmm…but we still don’t know,” Rina said.

The receptionist was more helpful. “It’s best to just stay ready for anything. The orcs seem to have camped outside and they could try to siege the wall but they likely can’t do much yet. The military still wants adventurer’s going into the dungeon for food runs. Whenever there’s a siege, food storage and food preservation are as important as the fight between the soldiers.”

“I guess that’s right,” Sunghee admitted.

“I’m not sure what kind of job to pick yet,” Sunghee said looking at me.

“I’ll pick it,” Gyle offered.

“No way!” Rina and Sunghee said too quickly wrecking his self esteem.

Actually it was right that they blocked him. He’d probably pick something suicidal, blinded by the gold rewards. That guy still thinks I’m some kind of money tree.

“No, let me think about it. I need to do the choosing based on what we can do, not what we want,” I said.

He frowned.

“Shun?” a male voice called out to me.

I ignore it. I don’t know them. Probably some sales person.

We keep looking at the jobs.

Then I feel spears poking at my runic shielding. Not like a bad amount of stabbing but of like poking someone aggressively and being a jerk to get their attention.

Probing magic...of some kind.

I turned around, not liking this immediately. “Huh?”

As we turned I see a whole squad of clergyman with shields and spears facing us as if to make an attack.

“What the hell is this?” Sunghee said fiercely.

“That’s no way to greet someone,” I said pushing away the spear points.

“Is this a robbery?” Gyle asked holding his hands up.

“Help we’re being robbed!” Rina cried out.

Instantly everyone in the plaza is looking at them. Gyle keeps acting like it’s a robbery, and it’s giving them negative attention and annoying these guys. But they aren’t robbers I think…

Clergyman too? In robes?

Wait, these might not be robbers? But they look pretty shady still.

What the fuck is going on?

“Hold still, no sudden moves,” one of the soldiers commands. The others with him echo something similar.

“Shun, the mage, hold still and stop!” a suspicious looking guy is staring at us while he commands the twenty or so guys that have surrounded us and are threatening to kill us. He also has like four city guard people with him that are also armed and ready to stab us.

Weird there are dwarven city guardsmen with him too. They even have Sunghee and Rina at spear point which makes me mad. And they look extremely well armed. There’s no mistaking they have armor which marks them as some kind of government or state faction of one kind or another but I don’t know which. But most of this guys group are actually humans, so it’s a mix of two different government factions I think.

I almost tripped as I slid against the wall trying to not be stabbed.

What do I do? Am I being arrested?!

There’s too many people here to fight them. And it’s in the city where we were supposed to be safe.

“Don’t say anything,” Sunghee said to Rina and Gyle.

“What? What’s going on here?” I asked.

It would complicate our stay in this city if we kill them. But what’s going on?

“Shun, you are to hold your position and be ready for testing,” one of the city guard members said.

?

Testing? What the hell kind of testing?!

…

“Testing?” I asked.

All of us are totally nervous and while trying to keep a straight face Sunghee and Rina do look alarmed still.

“Um…this isn’t…” Rina started to try to make an excuse but was cut off.

“Shut up! Don’t move! If you even breathe wrong we’ll skewer you!” one of the fancy guards said. They look like some kind of clergy royal guards or something. And they are highly trained. I didn’t want to be stabbed so I played dumb while counting only three directions to run to if it goes south. These guys look totally unhinged actually.

We are all standing around wondering what’s going on.

“Are we under arrest?” Gyle asked.

“Yes, under suspicion of being demons,” The clergyman said calmly.

“The fuck?! We aren’t demons,” Rina shouted at him. Gyle also shouted too until they were both punched hard.

I sort of want to kill them for punching Rina. She’s quiet and sort of hunched over.

We’re also attracting tons of attention. Everyone around us like pointing and staring and a lot of people are mad and starting to talk and murmur. I didn’t know I’d gotten a bit popular. Now people are shouting stuff and telling the clergy to fuck off. But the near riot conditions are making everyone more nervous. The guys holding spears on us are getting edgy. I’m worried if they get scared that they’ll just stab us.

In seconds the situation escalated enormously. The crowd is getting mad but there are more guards showing up. But the other city guards showing up start to back the clergy guys, which aren’t even dwarves anyway so I don’t get this at all.

And the spears they are carrying smell of magic. Some kind of probably an anti demon enchant and weapon damage increase I suspect. Will they also have something that hurts mages, I wonder.

“I’m innocent,” I said.

“We’re innocent,” Sunghee said while holding her hands up.

The clergyman keeps leering at Sunghee and Rina up and down staring at their curves. “Yeah we’ll see about that.”

Uh oh, that’s not good. I’m more worried now that he’s ogling the women. I try to remain calm and not do anything suspicious.

His leer alone told me all I needed to know.

“What’s going on here?” A couple more dwarven city guard members come by. Now there are like twenty of the human clergy faction spearman guys and six dwarven city guards. But the city gaurds people aren’t stopping the clergyman. Instead they are helping them, but the people around us are still pissed.

I guess demon testing is an accepted practice? Or is it?

Many of them recognize Sunghee and I as having saved the city a few days ago. They are a bit surprised that we’re being held up.

“These guys are the ‘Church of Gaia’,” Sunghee whispered to me.

Shit. Oh fuck. I’d been hearing about these guys ever since I came to this world. When she said it my blood ran cold.

How did they find us? How did they know? Did they have a way to track people?

“So you intend to do the standard test?” the head city guard guy asked the clergyman.

“Yeah pretty much. This shouldn’t take long. We can do it right here. If they are demons then we gut them and run them through with an instant execution,” he said.

I hope this isn’t like the witch tests in Europe in the 1700s…that would be awful.

He’s still leering at Sunghee and Rina though, mostly Sunghee. It’s obvious he’s a pervert and will do something with them if given a chance.

My mind is numb as I’m trying to think about what to do. But we’re totally surrounded by guards.

“Just stay chill. They can’t do anything to us if we’re not demons,” Gyle said.

That’s easy for him to say. He doesn’t have that worry. I’m not even sure what I am but I’m more worried about Sunghee now.

The clergyman approached us. “Which one of you is the leader?” he said as he put his spectacles over his nose. He’s also pulled out something that looks like scriptures. But It’s probably actually a spell book because I can smell magic coming from it.

“That would be me,” Sunghee said.

…

He frowned. “Not the young man here?” he asked me.

Suddenly I realize I have a huge advantage. It was right to mask my party under Sunghee as a false leader. And because of Rina having done the gene changer with Asakura, she looks like she’s about 22 years old now. And Sunghee was older already but still like looking low twenties something, while Gyle looks almost old enough to be my dad.

In short, I look like the small fry here, even though they may have information that I’m some kind of mage.

Especially as a ‘support mage’ I would be seen as a small fry kind of person here!

“What do you want us to do boss?” the grunts confirm with their leader.

Sure enough they lined us up. “OK, test the leader first,” The city guards decided after working it out with the clergyman.

“Which one is the leader?” the soldiers asked while we’re quiet as mice.

“Check their paperwork to see. Go by the paperwork,” the lead guy said.

They are ruffling through our documents that the dwarves gave us for immigration now roughly. “The seals and stamps look legit sir,” one of them said. But he’s frowning when he says it. It looks like these guys really want to get us even if we were human?

Wait, maybe I’m wrong…

I can feel my pulse sky rocket.

“I can do this in order of leadership, and then we’ll go with seniority,” the clergyman responded.

“Good, I like that. Stick to procedures and no funny business,” the dwarven city guard said nervously.

“Can we put our hands down? I’m tired,” Rina complained.

“Fine but just you, not the mage!” the city guard said.

“No, keep ‘em up,” the clergyman creepy old guy countered.

The city guard guy shrugged. “Fine!”

“So are you ready?” the clergyman asked.

He pulled out a knife.

Why’s he need a knife for this? His eyes look black and evil full of hate while he’s smiling at us like he just won the lottery.

“Whoah, wait a sec. The knife isn’t necessary, we’re doing standard government approved tests only. None of that shitty ritual garbage. We won’t tolerate any of that trashy ritual stabbing bullshit you do in human lands,” The dwarven city guards countered. They look at the clergyman nervously.

The clergyman looks innocent. “Oh I’m not doing any stabbing; we just have to remove their clothes. It’s necessary for the spell to work. I need skin to skin contact.” He moves towards Sunghee’s shirt.

“No way!” the dwarven guard said.

“OH? You know this is part of the treaty you signed to avoid war with us. The treaty of Esparath, twelve years ago. Demon testing and inspections are part of the treaty,” the lead clergy guy said.

“Yeah, we’re quite aware of that. But we won’t have any sexual sadist and molestation crap here. I don’t understand why your human populations aren’t up in arms all the time if that’s how you govern them with ‘the law’. Hell if the test was like that I’d be testing all the hot females in this city!” the guard shoots back at him verbally.

The other dwarves didn’t laugh though and are angry with him.

Unexpectedly I’m gaining a lot of respect for these dwarves. They really don’t tolerate any bull shit.

They are arguing for a few minutes, but it looks like the dwarven guards aren’t going to save us like we’d hoped. They won’t interfere with the test but just don’t want the test to have foul play. They just don’t want women being molested or raped, but killing them is just fine it seems.

Go figure…

We end up holding our breath.

The city guard leader stepped in front of him. “Wait. I’m telling you that sort of test is not regulation.”

“You fucking pervert!” some of the crowd is getting mad.

Others shout stuff right after. Then someone throws a rock. And just like that people are acting out. Other rocks follow, but not to the point of a full riot yet.

The city guard is now scared of a riot. People are still getting riled up. They can smell the pervy clergyman’s true motive while he leers at Sunghee.

“The law only allows you to conduct testing as approved by the dwarven nation standards. There will be no disrobing of clothing or torture. Torture is only allowed if and only if its already proven that a subject is already gulty and not before, though killing is approved if the person fails the test. And beheading is mandatory in the case of testing positive, as well as further death verification tests by drowning, acid, and more burning after that,” the city guard said.

“Fine,” the clergyman looks disappointed.

I can’t help but be stressed out though.

How did these guys find us? What signaled them to us?

Fuck…beheading? I can’t heal that either…nobody can heal that. Not even the famous but now extinct Dragon Saint Monk Society group could heal that.

Actually I’d been wanting to ask more about those, but I’d been so distracted by just staying alive. This morning during rigorous sex with Sunghee she’d been telling me about them. They were a group that disappeared but that had healing abilities.

It takes another fifteen minutes of arguing between angry town’s people, the city guard, and the Church of Gaia people before the clergyman gives up on the idea of needing the girls topless for a test.

The crowd is getting riled up.

While doing so the girls and I stay silent while we sweat.

“Name please,” The clergyman asked again. He’s pretty firm about wanting to test Sunghee first. He even made a move with his hand to want to do the test by touching her chest but she took his hand before he could say anything.

When he tried to go around her to grab her chest instead the city guard stepped on his toe. “Get on with it or I’ll cancel the test. None of that sexual bullshit or we’ll arrest you instead. This is your last warning,” the guard said.

“Fine.” He didn’t seem cowed though even though there’s now like sixty dwarven city guards and his small team.

He chants some kind of spell sequence and is emitting mana like crazy. Then there’s a glow in the area between where Sunghee and he are conducting the test.

When he pulls his hand away he only gets a white light. His face scrunches up but looks puzzled. Then it changed again. He’s shocked and disappointed. “Weird. I thought for sure it was this one?” he whispered more to himself than others. He’s really thoughtful and wondering as he scratches his head.

“…was sure she’s the one. Party paperwork registered with Sunghee as leader, adventurer job class.”

The clergy’s lackey men look on in silence, their faces turning to ash. They look sort of wounded in their pride somehow. They really wanted to take Sunghee of somewhere, probably to some alley somewhere.

“I need to retest her. I think she faked her way through the test,” the clergyman said finally.

“What? But you just tested her!” the dwarven guard argued.

“I figured out how she faked the test! I’ll prove it! This time she’ll fail for sure,” he said a bit too confidently. He seems really fixated on Sunghee and her perfect boobs.

If Sunghee didn’t look like a porn diva then he’d have tested me instead I realized. So maybe I should only have super hotties in my party as additional camouflage?

“Can’t you see there’s something shady about this guy?” Gyle said to the city guard.

One of the clergyman’s lackeys kicked Gyle in the stomach with his booted foot. Oops, I don’t have shielding up on Gyle yet do i?

Gyle is on the ground groaning in pain. The guy had metal boots. What an asshole.

The city guard stopped the clergy lackeys but the clergy lackeys outnumber them 20 to 6 still.

“No violence unless they are guilty; may I remind his lordship that your group may be charged for disturbing the peace, assault and battery, and attempted murder if the charges you apprehend are found to be beaten and test to be true humans or dwarves,” the city guard leader said firmly.

Despite trying to uphold the law, this guy sounds like he doesn’t really want to help us at all. I worry he might just cave in because it’s so much pressure on one guy.

The clergy’s lackeys hesitate, but the clergy leader doesn’t.

He appears to be thinking.

The dwarven guards have sent runners for reinforcements but it doesn’t look like they’ll get here in time. They look a bit angry also.

“I’m going to test her again,” he said.

“Fine. Get on with it. But this is the last time,” the city guard spokesman said.

“Can’t we request another mage be present? What if he fakes the spell sequence just to carry her off? He’s had his lecherous eyes on us this whole time. He might fake it and use something that produces the same color as a demon test just so he can cart off women,” Rina said before anyone could shut her up. She managed to sound teary eyed and innocent and some people actually listened to her.

Now people are stirred up angry again. It takes a couple minutes to get them to shut up this time. And the dwarven city guards look like they might join them.

“Fine we’ll just make it really quick. This is the last straw, no more bullshit,” the city guard guy said again.

“So how does this work? White is human and some other color tests as demon? We should have the test rules explained fairly so you can’t just swing it to whatever you want right?” I asked politely.

“That’s correct,” the city guard leader said quickly. “Now get on with it,” he is looking at the clergy like they are prison inmates.

So is he going to manipulate the test color just so he has an excuse to kidnap Sunghee?

The clergyman starts the sequence on Sunghee again. With their hands joined. Sunghee looks terrified and I can understand why.

Then I noticed something is wrong with the spell sequence. I don’t know this spell. But I did recognize the sounds and pitch of whatever he chanted were different from the spell he’d cast before.

“He’s faking the spell! That spell sequence is wrong. The code was changed from before,” I blurted out.

The others looked at him suddenly and are wondering what’s going on. But probably not many can analyze magic could. Even I wasn’t that great at it, but I’d recognized the spell glyphs didn’t match the previous time even though I didn’t know each spell glyph in the sequence personally.

The spell sequence ended and the clergyman stopped. He smiled triumphantly holding Sunghee’s hand up. Her hand is covered in black tar.

“What the fuck?” Gyle exclaimed.

“Yuck, this is so gross. I’ll never get this stuff off!” Sunghee exclaimed. “And I am innocent!” she proclaimed looking to the dwarven guards to help.

The dwarven city guards look conflicted.

The clergyman look really happy and smug somehow with all the lackeys there. The city guard is confused.

“Guilty! Guilty!” the clergyman shouted. He’s trying to get the others riled up.

“Treason! I caught you!” suddenly a new voice shouted out. It was someone different from all the others. But it’s loud, confident, and has authority. It sounds like someone feminine but strong.

We turn.

It’s some unknown young looking teenage mage girl standing there covered head to toe in elaborate but richly made robes. She’s pointing at the clergyman instead of me? Whew. I was afraid I’d be caught for being part demon. But she’s pointing at the clergyman.

Weird, her voice didn’t match her appearance at all.

The clergymans’ lackeys tried to shut her up and grab her but she instead levitates in her red robes over fifteen feet in the air. “The Church of Gaia rep casted a summon black tar spell instead of the detect demon spell. I know both spells and have it recorded in my sight recording gem!” she shouted.

There’s turmoil.

Now everyone’s arguing. The crowd is more mad. People are picking up rocks now too...

They still won’t let us go.

There’s another half hour of arguing different points of view before two of the adventurer’s guild representatives show up.

“I can prove the Church of Gaia faked the result on the test,” the mage girl said. I think she doesn’t actually care about us. But she’s a half way decent looking woman, and knows if Church of Gaia people can run around kidnapping women accused of being ‘demons’ then she’ll probably be next.

The city guard leader listens to her explanation quietly with others. Around us there’s like a hundred dwarves gathered around now. They all look very angry. Whether it’s a demon or a Church of Gaia person that’s the real demon, they will have blood from one of them.

Mobs are freaking scary.

The girl makes the Church of Gaia clergyman write the spell sequence for detect demons on the concrete ground of the plaza.

“Can I have to mage volunteers come forward to verify that the clergyman has indeed written the sequence for the demon detection spell?” she asked, not wavering despite several clergy thugs looking like they wanted to gut her.

Wow, she has courage.

It takes some time but eventually two guys come forward. She has them read it aloud. It’s a different set of symbols that I’m not used to, so it sounds like jibberish to me. She’s also playing the recording to match each set and show the differences between them.

“@#*$#(< NOKt*@(@ Sev@*@,” the first said. Despite using and having magic, it doesn’t mean I know every glyph system out there. It can look like jibberish to me if it’s also a different sub-class too, since I’m still learning.

But close enough. I didn’t get it but I did listen to the clergyman. I can still listen to the pattern and compare it.

“@#*$#(< NOKt*@(@ Sev@*@,” the second said.

It sounded similar to one another, though I still didn’t get it.

Am I not compatible to learn this? Or maybe I just need to learn more coding.

Is it some church or divine magic or something else? Is it a different system or the same as the Egyptian magic? I don’t know because both systems are so big that I don’t know every word pattern particle and ligature available to use.

“Now please over here write the spell sequence for summon black tar,” the mage girl said.

Summoning black tar? Is that…huh…

The clergyman refused. He obviously is now in the hot seat and doesn’t want to give it up. It takes several minutes of arguing. Finally he gives in after a few dozen dwarves are ready to skin him alive. Even then he only does it because of the threat of violence.

“Ok please read the pattern,” the mage girl in red robes said to the other two volunteers.

“TRIW&@ @&*@wak &WDW#@**** *** ***,” the first volunteer said.

I still had no idea what they said but it’s very clear when you listen to two sentences of sounds if they are similar or not if you have a half a brain. If I were to say ‘como esta amigo?’, and then ‘quiero un tamale’, even if I don’t understand them both they both sound different from one another.

“OK, now the second volunteer please cast Summon black tar,” the girl said.

“TRIW&@ @&*@wak &WDW#@**** *** ***,” the second volunteer said.

“Do you agree they don’t sound like each other?” the girl asked the city guard leader.

He nodded briefly but very carefully since he’s afraid of being manipulated. But he’s scared and avoiding looking at the clergyman, so even if the plot is in the open I’m not sure what will happen.

“I’m a clergyman of the Church of Gaia! You have no authority over me!” he screeched.

“Shut up,” the girl said. Somehow she had amazing presence and aura.

The clergyman made a sound like, “eep,” and shrank back. But it was partly the city guard gaining confidence as four more city guard personnel arrived to back up their other leader.

Weird…how did she make him so afraid with just a glance into his eyes?

“OK, so mages now I want you to use the summon black tar sequence and make the actual spell,” the mage girl said.

“TRIW&@ @&*@wak &WDW#@**** *** ***,” the first volunteer said. He’s holding his hand out, and sure enough a puddle of black tar appears in his hand identical to the clergyman. His tar continues to flow out of his hand and spill over the ground.

The second guy casted it too, but his spell manifested with only a small palm of barely anything. I don’t know if it was because he was weak or because he was trying to minimize the volume manifesting.

“Notice both tars look exactly like the Church of Gaia’s tar that he’d summoned on the girl’s hand. That’s not what the demon detection spell does,” she continued to argue. My heart skipped a beat when I could have sworn her glance was eye on me when she said that last part. But she makes no move to talk to me.

We need to get out of here fast. There’s no way I can control anything about what’s going on with this many people here and with all of them riled up. But there’s no chance to move yet.

The city guardsmen and the clergy people then argued back and forth for another fifteen minutes of threatening people and each other with violence. Then two more city guard people showed up and now the Church of Gaia people are looking more penitent.

“Well you know actually I think I may have made a mistake,” The old clergyman said. He’s bowing apologetically at everyone. “I’m really sorry. Sorry, sorry!” he kept putting up an attitude of being humble.

But he wasn’t like that until the other city guard people arrived and the mob was ready to go after people.

“No, sorry isn’t good enough. We demand the test to be finished,” the red robed mage girl said.

Fuck. I thought I was going to go home soon. I don’t want them to finish the test.

The red robed mage girl continued. “IF there are were demons here, it wouldn’t be right to just apologize our way out of it. We need to know.”

And what does this red robed teenage girl want really?

“But I made a mistake!” the clergyman said.

“But we want to know if you are just carting off women under the guise of demons. So we retest the girl and if she tests human then we cut off your hands,” the City Guard leader finally stated.

The mob of people is suddenly very quiet. The clergy’s thugs look suddenly really afraid.

The mob wants to know if he’ll really harm a clergyman in his fancy white robes.

Mobs are terrifying actually. I want to leave. Now.

“OK, you volunteers hold Sunghee’s clean hand and cast the demon detection spell,” the mage girl said again.

“But I’m sorry!” the clergyman said.

“Too late. I’ve had reports of you guys carting off women for some time now. I doubt that 99% of the people you walk with can all be demons and none of them happen to be males,” the red robed mage girl said.

“Shit no way!”

“Is that for real?!”

“So he’s like that huh?”

“Pervert!’

“Perverts must die!”

“Let’s have a hanging!”

“We should do to them what they did to others,” someone said.

“Yeah!”

“Let’s get ‘em!”

“Lynch them!” more dwarves cry out.

Its getting loud.

Shit, this whole plaza feels dangerous. There’s too many angry people everywhere. I want to get out of here.

“Hang the clergyman!” someone screamed.

“Burn him! Burn him!” the new chant started to take off like a wave. The dwarves want to burn someone it seems. I don’t understand why that would be fun to them but their eyes are shining like a gambling addiction right now.

“Now wait guys, let’s give him a chance,” the red robed mage girl said again while smiling.

What’s her angle anyway? She seems to really want to burn that church guy.

“@#*$#(< NOKt*@(@ Sev@*@,” the first said while holding Sunghee’s hand. While he’s chanting it everyone is so quiet you could hear a mouse crawl.

A white light shines on Sunghee’s hand where their hands are adjoined. The volunteer is puzzled. “Um did it work?” he asked.

The red robed mage girl nodded. “OK, next volunteer please,” she said.

“@#*$#(< NOKt*@(@ Sev@*@,” the second chanted and the energy takes off. Then a small pin prick of light shines. It’s similar in the spell effect but just much, much lower in power. It seems the second mage is a lot weaker than the other one which is why his effect is the same but on a much smaller level, now that you see them both doing two spells. Both of them confirmed together that Sunghee was in fact human.

Although they still didn’t know she was a high human but just that she’s not demonic.

Then they repeated the test at the clergyman’s request on Rina too, except Rina told them her name was Asakura which is kind of funny. Luckily Gyle didn’t get it. He’s never met Asakura so he might think that one of the name’s is a nick or a family name, and dwarves do that often. Both of them looking the same might actually be useful for people suspecting us of having demon blood. Unexpectedly Rina’s ruse of using the gene changer to look like Asakura has paid off big time. If they had used the detect demon spell on Asakura it would have done something I think because of the ghoul race. And also if Rina still looked very young then they might have tested me right after Sunghee instead of Rina.

Then ‘Asakura’s demon detection test comes back negative, though it’s really Rina.

But that just made everyone even madder.

Fuck….that means they test me next huh?

I can see them walking towards me looking very determined.

And there are too many people around here to run because everyone is packed in here so closely.

!

Then suddenly the mob just lost it.

They just want blood and had caught the guy running a scam. And dwarves live by this honor of if it’s evil, it means you kill it before it can breed code of ethics.

All hell broke loose.

Street stands, groceries, baskets, tables, and pretty much you name it suddenly are being tossed and destroyed while people are grabbing any kind of weapon available. Some of those table legs are now clubs in the hands of the mob.

But with others, people spilled their groceries trying to get away while trying to save themselves and their kids. The civilian dwarves are now mobbing the Church of Gaia people.

While we try to swim against the crowd…which is in a full scale riot.

Rina and Sunghee both cry out to try to stay close to me but they are fighting like crazy to get through people to even stay within a few feet of me.

“Corrupt! Corrupt fucker! Burn him!” the mob is going mad like crazy now. A sea of angry little dwarves is charging the Church of Gaia people while we try to get the hell out of the way. If we fall or lose balance even for a bit, we will surely be trampled to death by several hundred angry dwarves.

“Get your women and get out of here fast!” the city guard leader said to me with a terrified expression before trying to push back the mob of dwarves. The mob was so bad I could barely hear him as we struggled to get away with a dazed look. And the mob is so worked up that the dwarven city guards can’t stop it either.

The city guard is now caught between a riot and total unrest out of control as the rioters are trying to go after the Church of Gaia people.

I was saved by a hateful mob? I can’t believe it.

“Holy shit!” Sunghee said as we’re ducking down an alley.

Sunghee and I somehow managed to get hold of and grabbed Rina, while Gyle is following us. The two mage volunteers try to follow too but are getting swept through the crowd. I lost sight of them and that other mage girl.

Who was she?

At some point we find ourselves several blocks away, alive, but all scratched up from nearly drowning in a mob.

“Holy fuck that was scary!” Gyle exclaimed.

“I know right! I’m never going to do that again! Mobs are scary!” the red robed mage girl said.

Eh?

She’s with us still. When did she catch up? I hadn’t seen her this whole time. She seems mysterious somehow.

“So that guy was just going to kidnap us?” Rina asked again trying to piece it together.

“He’s done it many times. The dwarves knew something is off about him for some time and a lot of pretty girls have turned up missing after being arrested for being demons, but no one has caught him yet. He was going to take both of you and with those other twenty idiots have a rape party in the church basement. And just so you know, he has a high arrest rate for demons but the funny part is that he only arrests pretty young women,” the red robed girl said.

“But if they’ll mob him so easily and he’s human, then we better be careful here too. We’re also a minority,” Sunghee said.

“Eh?!” both Rina and I exclaimed.

Sunghee gives me a pitiful look.

“That’s awful!” Gyle said.

“Are you sure all of the lackeys were in on it too?” I asked.

The mage girl nodded, “right. Did you notice how none of them were female? Isn’t that weird by itself? I mean the dwarven city guard and in the human kingdoms they have plenty of female guards and female clergy even in some places and some religious orders. And all of them except the main mage guy had white bandannas over their mouths and noses? It’s totally suspicious right? People didn’t see that just because all of them were in white robes with those funny pointed hats.”

…

White robes with pointed hats? Huh?

“Why did you save us?” I wondered at the girl after we finally caught our breath back from running hard to get away.

“Because that guy took my sister last year; I’ve been trying to get him caught every since then and track her down to find a location for her. I’ve even checked the church basement but the problem is she’s not there anymore. I’ve found out that they sell the women they take as slaves on the mage net,” she said.

Wow, she knows about that secret mage net thing?

“But why did the crowd get all riled up too?” I asked in follow up.

“That’s guys done that to over forty dwarven girls. There’s ironically a big market for cute little dwarven girls somehow through the underground. This fortress isn’t so big that people don’t notice that sort of thing,” she said with cold looking eyes.

Holy shit…that’s probably the same mage net that Cid had given me access too…things are starting to fit. Why there were more girl slaves on the mage net than male slaves by far. Through various means people were hunting people using different schemes.

But I hadn’t expected the Church of Gaia to be at the heart of it.

And that guy had gotten too bold.

But we had come that close to being roped into a mass kidnapping scam. And it was really, really good since they were posing as real authority figures.

ed to, so it sounds like jibberish to me.

rd. hat the clergyman has indeed written the sequence for the demon detection

...

Note to readers; please don’t think churches are bad. Church is good.

Its just a story.