The inside of the theater is really different than what I thought it would look like.
The outside was really big and colorful, some real eye candy.
And the stage is kinda awe inspiring, the black walls, ceiling and floor, the many red seats, and the stage itself, it feels grand and oppressive, I definitely like it.
But the backstage area… it feels a little uncomfortable?
It’s really barren and unimpressive compared to the rest of the theater, it kinda gives me a feeling I shouldn’t be here.
There’s also way more people inside here than I thought there would be, a few dozen at least, and they’re all practicing, reading certain lines over and over, rehearsing some parts of a song or other music, they’re even making some props.
Thankfully Not important is guiding me through this place, or breaking inside this place would have been really troublesome.
I think there’s about 3 folks with a single pattern, 2 guys and a girl.
I don’t think my chances of breaking in were that bad, if I mastered how to use <Elizabeth’s chaotic puppet dance performance> and the <Dead man’s spider puppet> I could definitely storm into this place.
Wait that’s not what I’m here to do.
I come here for diplomacy, not war!
Focus Octavius!
“We are here.” Not important speaks in a completely different tone, it’s now very carefree and a little foolish.
What the hell.
“Thomas! Who the hell did you bring here?!” A redheaded young lady approaches us.
She’s about the same height as Not important, or Thomas I guess, her skin is a little tanned, and her face is very beautiful.
she’s wearing this big poofy dress, and she has a blade strapped on her hip, I’m sure it’s some sort of prop.
“Ahaha, I found this guy outside, you see, he is…” Not important looks apologetic.
Forget about these clowns, this guy is a real actor.
“I know who HE is! Ugh, just leave.” Valentina dismissively waves him away “And YOU, what the HELL are YOU doing here?! You know what?! Don’t even bother speaking, if you are SHAMELESS enough to come and ask ME what I think you’re going to say, even after YOU REJECTED ME, I’ll KILL YOU! Master is in seclusion, so he can’t STOP ME!”
Her face is red from screaming, several of the people who were practicing are looking this way.
The hell is she talking about? She’s so loud too…
I’m really glad I plugged my ears, I would’ve definitely gone deaf again.
I knew she was ill tempered, but she went from 0 to 100 on the drop of a hat!
I shake my head “I’m… not sure what you’re talking about, but-”
“YOU are not sure what I’M TALKING ABOUT?! YOU DAMNED-!” Her face is completely warped in anger, she grabs her sword and slashes at me!
I quickly activate <Body of steel>, turning my arms and chest hard as steel and try to block it with my ink arm, but I’m not fast enough and she slashes me!
Argh! That’s a real blade!
Thanks to the spell is only a light wound though.
And thankfully the rug isn’t damaged either.
She prepares to slash me again, I manage to block it and I shoot her with a <Steam cannon>!
*BANG! *
Valentina is in front of me, and she can’t dodge, so it hits her right in the stomach!
She falls to her knees in pain, and I think I can see her tearing up.
Heh, take that!
No wait why did I do that.
Someone tackles me, I hit a wall and I end up dropping the rug.
It hurts!
It’s one of the guys with a pattern.
He’s a head shorter than Timotei and has dark skin, he has a strong build too, but I think he’s about my age?
I’m not too sure…
He’s shirtless too.
I stand up, I’m not going to just get beaten up again!
“You sure brought quite a troublesome person, didn’t you Thomas?” Muscle man cracks his knuckles. “Are you ok Val?”
“Guh-! I’m fine-!” Valentina coughs, and the two other people with a pattern are helping her.
“You damn bastard! Look at what you’ve done!”
Leaving me no time to think he charges at me again!
I’m not just going to take it either!
I prepare to slash him with my left hand!
Guh! Muscle man punched me in the stomach, but I clawed his torso.
he didn’t break any of my bones, but I don’t think I could take too many of those punches without taking more serious damage.
On the other hand, I left a rather large wound, though I don’t think it’s very deep, and it’s also covered in ink.
Thanks to the potion my nails are now extremely sharp, like claws, and combine that with the fact that I’m using <body of steel>…
Hehe, this is actually quite a fearsome combination isn’t it?
Wait, forget about that!
This situation is really bad, isn’t it?
I’ll definitely won’t be able to convince Valentina to free everyone anymore…
Somehow, I really fucked up, didn’t I?
I look at Not important, and he just has a shit eating grin plastered on his face.
He definitely knew something like this would happen, didn’t he?
“You-!” Muscle man is grasping at his wound, and tries to attack me again, but the other dude interrupts him.
“Emanoil, wait, you are not in any condition to keep fighting. I’ll take care of this.” He says in a dramatic way.
This guy has about the same height as muscle man, but he’s more slender, he’s also wearing an open shirt, showing off his muscles.
The hell is with people here and not wearing a shirt?
“My name is Nikolai Nikolescu! And I don’t know who you are or why you came here, but I won’t forgive you for harming my friends! Let’s take this outside, you have already disrupted us enough!”
I nod, and we exit the building, making sure to pick up the rug on my way out.
The situation is already beyond salvage, might as well just beat up this guy so I can quickly think of some other way to free everyone.
It’s already the middle of the day? Today has felt very long…
Most of the people in the theater also come out, I think they want to watch the fight.
Hmph, ‘you’ve disrupted us enough!’.
Nikolai takes out a large wooden staff.
How silly, does he really expect to beat me with that?
I don’t grab any of the weapons I have inside my hat, I don’t even know how to use them!
It’s a shame too, this would’ve been a perfect chance to try using the spider puppet, but I’m sure I’ll have more chances in the future.
I will try to experiment with the strings though, I’m sure this is the last push I need to make them completely usable!
Hehe.
We stare each other down.
“You can beat him Nikolai!” “teach him a lesson!”
The crowd of people cheers Nikolai, and he has a smug grin on his face, it kind of reminds of Bianca in a way.
It’s crazy how much more punch-able that kind of face is when you don’t fuck them every other day.
And he’s a dude, so that’s impossible too.
He has a defensive stance, it seems he doesn’t want to make the first move.
I’ll do it myself then!
I shoot a <steam cannon> at him with my left arm.
*BANG! *
The steam is darker than usual, and the spell is much more difficult to boil, I’d say it’s about twice as much mana, but it’s not as if it took a lot of mana in the first place, so I think this is acceptable.
It’s still extremely loud though, I REALLY don’t want to imagine how much it would make my head hurt if I hadn’t plugged my ears.
Nikolai flinched, but he managed to block it with the staff!?
It’s steam! How do you even block that?!
Hehe, how interesting!
“This is the <Sunflower shieldstaff technique>!” He makes his smug grin again. “Attacks of this level won’t touch me!”
“You- you really managed to master it?!” Muscle man seems impressed, and the crowd cheers too.
Even Valentina looks very pleased.
He starts charging towards me and I summon my strings, the strings on my left hand are black, and the ones on my right hand are purple, let’s see the differences between them.
The strings lunge towards him, and he blocks them!
Foolish!
I grab his stick, the black strings are harder to move, but I can use more force with them, while the purple ones are much easier to move, but feel more fragile.
“This won’t stop me! <Sunflower force field>!” A burst of energy comes from him, breaking the purple strings!
Hehe, but the black ones are holding strong!
I shoot him with as many <Steam cannon>s as I can with my right hand!
*BANG! * *BANG! * *BANG! *
Nikolai immediately drops the staff to jump out of the way, but he’s simply too slow, and 2 out of the 3 projectiles I shot hit him!
One in the shoulder and one in the arm.
“AAAAAHH!” Nikolai makes a short scream of pain. It seems I managed to dislocate his arm from his shoulder!
Take that!
I didn’t manage to break his arm though…
I win with this right? Wasn’t that fight a little short?
My guy, being this weak is no good at all, pride is meaningless if you can’t back it up!
I was just starting to have fun too! How frustrating…
Anyway.
The hell do I do with this thing now? I grabbed it since it was his weapon, but I don’t think it would be appropriate to give it back now…
It just seems like a wooden stick to me.
How troublesome…
I’ll just leave it in my hat for now, yeah…
I guess I’ll leave now.
Man, this was a disaster.
“I WON’T FORGET ABOUT THIS!” I can hear Valentina screaming at me.
Let’s walk faster…
* * *
The hell do I do now?
What do I have that I can use to break into a dungeon?
I check all the stuff I have in my hat…
…
I have a few things that I should use more in general, like the <Dead man’s shackles> and the <Dead man’s bracelet>, I kinda forgot about them…
But these are not what I need right now.
I have way more swords than I would ever need, if I had any idea on how to use them I would be very happy, but I don’t…
There’s the spider puppet, I think I’m ready to start using it, but I don’t want to use up the rest of my mana now, there’s important stuff going on…
It seems I also condensed at some point today? I feel I have 10 of those now…
Is that good? I feel it should be a good thing, but ever since I drank that potion a bunch of weird changes have been happening in my body.
I can’t help but feel a little weirded out by it.
But at the same time, I do need to become stronger…
Wait, focus Octavius!
I need to break everyone out from jail!
Let’s keep looking through…
The <Dead man’s shovel> could be actually useful for this…
And…
Oh!
Hehehe…
There’s the sphere the man with a bronze jaw had.
I completely forgot about it, there’s just so much going on.
Anyway, this thing knocked out me, Aurora and Antonia, the whole caravan, and even Timotei who has 3 patterns!
Assuming that’s the upper limit of the thing, all guards with 3 patterns or less would be dealt with.
Of course, I’d also knock myself out, but I think I have an idea.
The sphere works by releasing the sound of this weird song, and it’s that song that knocks out the people who hear it, so what if I couldn’t hear it?
It would’ve been more convenient if I was still deaf, but I’ll think of something.
And if there’s anyone left even after that… Maybe Amalia could take care of them?
Of course, there’s a good chance there will be people even she won’t be able to beat, but I don’t think I have any other option anyway.
It’s not a perfect plan, but it’s certainly the best I can think of.
I won’t worry too much about it, I’m sure that there’s a bunch of things I don’t know that will fuck me over if I plan too much anyway.
I couldn’t have predicted Valentine would just blow up like that, for example.
So if I don’t know what’s going to happen, I’ll just do my best! Ok?!
Yeah!
Zonkermd· Mar 7, 2022
