As we start to break off the group hug, the golems hurriedly float backward to avoid getting in our way.

"Let's go back," Alissa tiredly suggests. She's gone through too many different emotions in such a short time, so she's getting emotionally exhausted.

I wish that I could've asked Gurrier about Paradise, but we might have another opportunity one day, so it'll just have to wait until then.

 

Once we reunite with the rest of the group, Alissa gives a hug to her parents and her sister.

"Thank you…" She whispers softly, and Jacques suddenly hugs her from behind, burying her head in his long, red beard.

He mumbles some garbled nonsense, sounding very emotional, then suddenly recomposes himself and goes quiet.

"You're welcome, my daughter," Léonne gently whispers back and pats Jacques' arm, then he releases Alissa.

 

We make our way back, and they tell us their stories about Gurrier, then Jacques reveals something interesting.

"The old fox always asked for a drink whenever I came to tell him the news. It was the only time I ever saw him relax, and we usually ended up talking for a long time since we'd both end up getting drunk," he reminisces fondly.

I share a look with Alissa. It seems that we'll never really know the truth.

 

When we get back to the town, a small group of commoners are excitedly waiting for us just past the gates, and a few of them even begin to kneel and pray as we approach. The werefoxes are very pious, so it isn't too surprising that they've already found out who we are.

Curiously, there's a human commoner couple among them that seems to be very anxious.

Klein and Anton quickly discuss something between themselves, then they organize the Lordsguard to surround us, and Léonne responds by ordering the Sworn Hunters to open the way for us.

Ciel waves and smiles at the commoners, but once her eyes land on the couple, she freezes as memories flood into her mind.

"FLEUR?!" She suddenly shouts.

"CIEL!" The human woman shrieks back.

Ciel rushes over to her, pushing the confused Lordsguard in her way to the side, and tackles the small, ginger woman.

"AAAAH!" The two of them shriek excitedly and hug each other tight, then the Lordsguard quickly follows after her and separates the commoners away from them.

"CALUM!" Ciel shouts and grabs the hand of the human male beside her, ensuring that the Lordsguard lets him stay.

Fleur stops shrieking, but her overflowing excitement bleeds into her voice as she shouts at full speed, "Diamond dragons scales! It's you, you're Queen Ciel! You're the Dark Angel!"

"The WHAT?!" Ciel shrieks back. "Please, don't let that turn into a Title!"

Fleur laughs out loud as she hangs from Ciel's neck. Calum, the blonde-haired man beside them, stiffly stands still, clearly terrified of the stares he's receiving from the dozen-plus high-leveled people currently surrounding him.

Fleur lets Ciel go, who then gives Calum a quick hug.

"What are you two doing here? Didn't you say that you were going to the capital?" Ciel questions them, completely bewildered at their presence here.

Both Fleur and Calum cringe, then look away. "Well, we did find out who my family was…" Calum hesitantly mumbles.

"And they turned out to be scammers who owed money to a rather dangerous sort of people," Fleur continues and nervously kicks a small rock near her feet.

Calum grins unashamedly. "So we ran right back to Mistcross…"

Then Fleur raises her eyes to Ciel, and her tone becomes excited again. "And by coincidence, we found out that my late mother was a werefox, and then my extended family adopted us."

"This is incredible, really. I'm so happy you found your home," Ciel replies with a bright smile and pulls them both into another quick hug.

Fleur nods happily, then she adds, her voice quickly losing its volume with each word, "I'm surprised they actually let us live here since, you know, we're humans…"

Ciel's expression becomes serious. "But are you being treated with respect?"

Calum nods energetically, then quietly answers, "We are, and we're quite happy here, it's just that sometimes, they're a bit 'cold.'"

"Hm… that seems well enough," Ciel comments and gives their shoulders a gentle squeeze.

I approach them and gently ask, "Are these your friends, Ciel?"

The couple turns to me and immediately falls to their knees, but Ciel grabs their shoulders again and pulls them back up. "No need for that here," she affirms, then gives me a bright smile. "They're my friends from the orphanage."

"Pleasure to meet you," I greet them, and we start our introductions.

They're Fleur and Calum Envye, and they're working for the Envye clan of merchants as assistants.

When Léonne approaches us, they both keep their heads down in respect for her.

"If you're not busy, how about you come to our estate? Any friends of the Ryders are friends of ours too," Léonne offers politely, and Ciel doesn't allow them to say no.

 

As we walk, the three of them catch up, and while they heard rumors about Ciel, the Intervention, and our rise as Crown Lords, they hadn't yet fully connected the Dark Angel of the rumors with the Ciel they knew until they saw her here.

"Out of all the potential nicknames, why did Dark Angel catch on?" Ciel grumbles through [Bind].

"Do you prefer 'Chocolate Angel,' instead?" Roxanne teases back.

"Just 'Angel' would be fine!" Ciel exclaims in frustration.

Fleur is a thin, ginger woman whose late father hailed from Maplethorne, and she kind of fits in among the werefoxes, only lacking in the fox ears and tail department. Calum is a tall, blonde man whose family immigrated from Dyrmorder to Mac Gantus, but then they fractured and fell from grace. He stands out since he's quite tall in comparison to the not particularly tall werefoxes, but, fortunately, nobody has picked on him for it.

As long as they don't make trouble or too much noise, the werefoxes are content to leave foreigners be. The foxes also have a working relationship with merchants and adventurers, so the couple doesn't face any overt prejudice, but they don't have that many friends here.

The two walk hand-in-hand, Fleur leaning over to Calum and touching his chest for just about any little reason she can find. It's like they're glued to one another, and it makes me realize something.

"Are we like that?" I let the question echo in my soul space, and Alissa gives my hand a squeeze.

"With you? Yes. There's always someone touching you," Yunia calmly answers and gives my other hand a squeeze.

"We have to split up our time to be with you; there's no time to spare for you to be alone," Lina asserts.

"It must be pretty awkward to be around us," I think openly in my soul space.

"It was. Especially at night," Ciel chimes in a moment later. During that time when she was in the fellowship but hadn't become my wife yet, she heard the bed creaking quite a lot, even though the girls didn't usually moan that loudly.

When Ciel tells the couple how close we've become to the Gods, their demeanor starts to stiffen, but Ciel is having none of that.

"If our friends start treating us like kings, then we'll have nobody left who we can talk casually with," Ciel worriedly explains.

"Well, you are a Queen, right? That's what all the news is saying," Calum questions.

"We're only Royals, we haven't been crowned, or anything," Ciel tiredly explains.

"And I don't think the Elder Council will let us assume that status," I chime in with a grin.

Calum frowns confusedly and asks, "Royals without a king…?"

"Princess Ciel!" Fleur shouts with a giggle.

That Title provokes a lot of strong feelings within Ciel. What kind of orphan girl has never fantasized about being adopted by a Royal or a Lord?

"I'll accept you calling me that in private," Ciel gently states with a subtle, pompous tone that makes Yunia proud.

 

We return to the Verner's estate, and we see the Elders sitting on cushions on the veranda, enjoying a nice cup of tea while soaking in the sun and watching the foxes play around.

We all decide to split up for a bit. Lina and I seek out the foxes, Alissa goes inside the estate with her mother to meet someone, Ciel sits down near the Elders to talk with Fleur and Calum, Yunia and Roxanne sit by the Elders to talk for a bit while Yunia massages Roxanne's feet, and Hana and human-Aoi showcase [Equipment System] to everyone.

"You're doing well, servant, continue massaging me like this," Roxanne teases with a snobbish tone.

Yunia narrows her eyes dangerously. "Your only positive quality is your beauty," she coldly replies but doesn't stop massaging Roxanne's feet.

"That's… not actually offensive to me," Roxanne admits and shrugs.

The Elders share an amused look, but don't comment on it.

 

The golems stop behind Lina and me, their unmoving eyes staring intensely at us.

"May we pet the foxes, too?" Ted broaches the topic. It makes me happy that they asked for something on their own initiative.

"Sure, but what made you want to?" I ask back and guide a fox closer to them. The furry little animal doesn't seem to mind, but I think it's because it identified the golems as inanimate objects.

"We may be required to take care of pets," Suzy starts the sequence.

"So we need to learn how to interact with animals," Jarn finishes.

I agree and ponder, "True. I had two dogs before, and though I haven't felt the desire to get any new pets so far, I think it'd be a good idea to get some for our children."

"You already have a few humanoid pets," Lina innocently points out, and I can't really disagree with that.

We smile at each other, then I turn to the golems. "Anyway, do all of you know how to approach animals?"

"Slow movements, no staring, and a gentle touch," Ted starts.

"While paying close attention to their body language," Suzy follows.

"And not following it when it moves away," Jarn finishes.

"Good, good," I approve, nodding sagely. "Come closer, and let it smell you."

Ted and Suzy lower themselves onto the grass, and the little fox immediately scampers away, then stares at them warily.

I don't call the fox back, and instead, I just hand each of the three golems a small piece of dried meat. The smell of food attracts a few other foxes, but they still keep their distance, wary of the golems.

"Come here, little foxy," Ted calls for one of them, her voice in a higher pitch as she tries to sound cutesy.

"Foxy, foxy, foxy!" Suzy shouts, inflecting her voice to make her sound playful.

Jarn kneels and reaches out with her arm. "Come, little one," she soothingly calls, her voice in a much lower pitch, and it raises the hairs on the back of my neck as her "ara ara, onee-san" energy catches me off-guard.

Three courageous little foxes cautiously come forward, then they nibble on the pieces of meat, and their fluffy tails start to wag.

After the meat is gone, they stay and allow the golems to touch them.

Ted and Suzy instantly become popular with the foxes, but Jarn doesn't, and her chosen fox doesn't seem very pleased.

"Your touch is cold, Jarn, warm yourself up," I advise her, and she casts [Manipulate Metal] on herself. The sudden change initially scares the little fox, but it quickly calms down, enjoying the warm touch.

Ted and Suzy sit down on the grass, and two foxes immediately jump onto them, using them as cushions.

The two golems hesitate for a moment as they think, then they push the foxes off of themselves.

"Becoming immobilized by a pet is undesirable," Ted explains to the slightly annoyed fox.

"But we shall provide them comfort, nonetheless," Suzy follows up, and the three golems [Equip] cushions that the foxes immediately fight over playfully. They loudly yip and yap at each other, but their mischievousness makes it all pretty adorable.

"Gih," Gify demands, and the golems obey. They pull out a fourth cushion that Gify claims for herself, and the foxes don't even think about bothering her. Then, she rolls onto her back, exposing her white, feathery belly, and goes to sleep, her limbs all splayed out.

"This spirit looks so cute that I'm a little envious of it," Allura's voice reaches my ears followed by a girlish chuckle.

I turn to see her as she comes over and notice that she has sandals made for her digitigrade feet, and the sandals seem similar to mine.

"You need to introduce me to your shoemaker," I blurt out, and she stops, then looks down at her feet confusedly.

"Oh…!" It dawns on her, and she smiles. "There probably aren't that many people with animal feet in the elven lands, right?"

"Yeah. I have a weredog shoemaker I go to, but I'd like to meet someone more specialized."

She nods gracefully. "I'll ask Mom to give you their name."

I flash her a smile and pull the conversation back from my tangent, "Anyway… I heard that the wereanimals have a lot of respect for nature spirits."

She stops beside me and crouches down, then stares at Gify with fondness in her orange eyes. "They help us to get in touch with our animal side, so beast warriors like me dream about having one follow them, which is also a sign of a good person."

I point to Gify and smirk as I confess, "This one follows me because she said that my life is 'interesting,' so I don't know about that last part."

She chuckles softly and covers her mouth with her hand in a cute way. "I guess that's true. They are known to be whimsical."

"Gih…" Gify chirps softly, half-asleep, and we watch her fluffy chest moving up and down, entranced by her cuteness.

Jarn puts a cushion on her lap and warms up her body, quickly becoming popular with the foxes, so I talk to one of them and guide it to sit on Lina's lap so that she doesn't feel ignored.

"I wasn't…" She complains in my soul space and pouts.

"Can I ask you something, Wolf?" Allura suddenly asks.

"Sure," I casually reply.

She grins like a child who had just been given some chocolate. "Can I see your dragon form again?"

I push the fox near me away and shift. The skittish foxes squint at the light, but they don't actually run away from me since my [Animal Tongue] soothes them quite a lot.

"Ooh… can I pat you?" Allura pleads excitedly.

"You may pat the dragon," I reply in a lofty tone.

She pats my head, but the horns and spikes make it a bit awkward for her, and the scales get in the way, so I barely feel anything.

"Well… this isn't what I expected," she admits with a chuckle.

I use [Soul Manipulation] to grow some fur over my scales, turning me into a weird, fluffy monster.

"Better?" I casually ask.

"What in the Gods'…" She mumbles, caught off-guard, but continues patting me.

I grow a few tentacles and display them to her as un-lewdly as possible, then I extend one and grow it into a black hand that I use to pat her head in return.

"This is a skill I created, it's called [Soul Manipulation]," I proudly explain.

"So, you're touching me with your 'soul'…?" She hesitantly asks.

"Yes."

"Isn't that like a dryad marriage…?"

I quickly pull back the hand and feel my cheeks heat up. "No…? Kind of…? Maybe…?"

She starts laughing so hard that she wheezes, but she quickly controls herself when she notices my visible discomfort. "I'm sorry, I'm joking. A dryad marriage needs a lot of blood to be spilled."

"Oh…" That calms me down a bit, but then I realize something. "How do you know that…?"

Now she becomes a bit awkward and looks away. "T-there's a story I read that explains it."

"Definitely not Nocturna's," Alissa chimes in through [Bind].

"Definitely not Nocturna's," I repeat with a teasing tone.

Her pale cheeks redden, and she holds back some embarrassed laughs. "Hom's biography talks about it. We don't know if it's true, but…" She shyly mumbles and awkwardly adjusts her short hair.

Something about her demeanor tells me that this "Hom's" story isn't intended for children…

"Well, I kind of have an idea about why dryads would use touching spirits as part of a marriage ceremony," I casually comment with a sly smirk, one of the few emotions that I can properly convey in my dragon form.

"Hm…?" She tilts her head in confusion.

I extend my soul and touch it to the back of Lina's neck, making her moan out loud in surprise. She immediately jerks her head towards me with an angry pout, and her face becomes scarlet red.

I chuckle evilly, then I grab her head and give her forehead a lick. "I'm sorry, but I just couldn't resist."

She grumbles and moves away from me, the only effective way to truly wound my heart.

"Noo~… I'm sorry~…" I earnestly apologize, and she stares at me, measuring my honesty.

She eventually finds it good enough and returns to my side, calming my lonely heart.

"Hm… what was that…?" Allura hesitantly asks, blinking blankly in confusion.

"I touched her neck with my spirit, which causes a jolt of pleasure for the person being touched," I explain and show her my sly smirk again.

"Can you… can you touch me, too?" She anxiously asks, and I grin like a devil.

 

Alissa encounters a very old werefox man who is weakly walking forward while leaning on a cane, and she immediately recognizes him.

"Homvieun!" Alissa happily exclaims and spreads her arms wide.

"Alissa!" He returns the greeting and smiles like a good old grandpa. They hug, and he compliments her with a gentle laugh, "You've become such a wonderful woman! From a slave to a Royal! Hahahah, your story is unbelievable!"

She releases him and kindly holds his shoulders. "And who's the one who taught me everything I know?"

The old fox smiles smugly and dramatically asks, "Yes, yes, who's the blessed soul that made you into a Queen, huh? Who's the 'Queenmaker'?"

"Definitely not you," she flatly responds.

He frowns exaggeratedly, and his gentle voice sounds pained as he exclaims, "You're still a brat at heart!"

"Always!" She happily agrees.

Then they continue talking while slowly making their way back to us.

 

"This [Equipment System] is a powerful skill. Are you willing to trade it with us?" Jacques diplomatically asks Yunia.

"This skill isn't ours to trade, so we're just going to give it to whoever asks us for it," she casually replies.

He nods respectfully. "Thank you, this is a wonderful gift."

Yunia turns to him, her striking, blue eyes becoming sharp as she enters Business Mode. "There is something else we could trade, though."

"What would that be?" He stoically asks, possibly using [Acting] since he also enters Business Mode.

"Eia, our secret pill. Your mounted warriors could benefit greatly from it."

"Is there something that you desire in return?" He immediately continues without even showing the slightest reaction.

Yunia just calmly reveals her intentions, not seeing a benefit in concealing them, "Some of your hunters, but only temporarily. We need more help with containing the dungeons since our knights are becoming fatigued, and werefox monster hunters are known to be the best. If there are any among them who want to settle in the High Forest, though, they should know that we'll be loosening the Right of Inheritance soon to accommodate the spirit Chimeras we've recently welcomed."

The door next to them slides open, and Léonne replies, "That could be arranged."

With that, they begin the casual negotiations.

"Ask for an unmarried woman, but not for marriage, though," Alissa suggests through [Bind].

Yunia hesitates, but she eventually includes the request.

Léonne also hesitates to respond, and Jacques seems to turn into a statue due to how unmoving he becomes. "We heard about… Wolf's 'appetite.' Is this for him?" She hesitantly asks.

"Yes," Yunia lies.

My reputation…

"It's for a good cause," Alissa comforts me through [Bind].

"Unless you're asking for a sex slave, we might not be able to fulfill that condition," Léonne explains.

"It's good enough to try," Yunia assures her.

"Very well."

 

"So, where are you living?" Ciel asks the couple, then takes a sip of her tea.

Fleur feeds Calum a bite of her cookie as she answers, "We're staying here in town at the clan's housing complex, but we were thinking about moving to Mistcross since it might be more 'agreeable' for us." Then she takes the other bite for herself.

Ooh, I want you girls to feed me like that again.

"Always," Alissa quickly replies through [Bind], then returns to her conversation, and I feel Lina nod internally.

"The road to Escanso should be pretty safe by now, and you're always welcome to come visit us," Ciel offers.

Fleur and Calum look at each other excitedly. "Oh, we definitely will," he happily replies, but Fleur narrows her eyes at him.

"We're not going there just for you to ogle at the elves," she warns him.

"Of course," he immediately replies a bit stiffly, then he runs his hand through her puffy, orange hair to appease her. "I just hear a lot about the beauty of that town and its food, you know?"

"Right…" Fleur mumbles.

"Be careful with the elves, they like to hide the boys among the girls, and vice-versa," Ciel cautions them with a cheeky grin, and they both share a worried look.

 

"Where's Nen?" Alissa suddenly asks her father, and Ofilia turns to give her a curious look.

"North, in the White Stalkers' territory, currently investigating some suspicious bandit attacks," he answers impassively.

Alissa frowns and looks down at her empty ceramic cup. "They're still causing problems?"

Jacques nods and grimly replies, "They are, and it's becoming truly bothersome."

Ofilia looks away, a little saddened at the mention. She was originally from that clan.

"Can we meet with Nen? Maybe we could help them," Alissa appeals to Yunia and Léonne, and they stop their negotiation for a moment to consider it.

"It'd be an opportunity to see the Ryders fight," Jacques points out, which convinces Léonne to agree.

"I'll send a message to Darcy and see if he's willing to take them," she replies, and Alissa's tail wags lazily in happiness.