Leena bit her lip and looked at Yue, who seemed dead set on helping the orcs, and let out a sigh. "Fine... But you have to protect me."
Yue smiled and nodded her head. She was happy that Leena was willing to trust her even though they had just met. "Don't worry. I always keep my word. If something happens to you, then it means I am already dead."
This was just who Yue was. She would keep her promises no matter what. It did not matter if it was dangerous or not. She would always uphold her promise.
Leena looked at Yue and forced a smile. She was not happy about the situation, but she also felt things were not quite right either. And if they were going to get to the bottom of it all, Yue's power may just be needed. But what was strange was that Leena felt that she could trust Yue. It was as if her words held a strong power within them.
The group set off towards the monster domain. It was an unusual group, to say the least. To see a dwarf, elf, and a wolfkin mixed into the group of orcs talking and laughing away as they traveled was very strange. One thing that Yue found was that she could actually understand orcish. Those who did not understand it would call it a crude language, but it was in no way different than the common tongue.
While she could understand it, speaking it was a bit difficult and took her almost a week to be able to speak conversational orcish. But it was worth it as she found out the reason why the orcs liked elves so much. It had something to do with a low population of female orcs in ancient times and since both elves and orcs lived in the forest, elves became the main targets for breeding partners. But as time went on, it became more of just a sick sexual desire to have elves as mates, whether they were male or female. In truth, it could have been any race at the time that could have set this strange desire off.
When Leena heard this, she went off into a rage about how her people had suffered under the hands of orcs for so long. All the while making Yue translate everything she had to say. In the end during the trip, instead of Leena needing to be worried about being forced into things, she was proposed to multiple times by the single orc males and was treated like a princess in the tribe. For some reason, Leena was not against being treated so well. She even seemed to be rather enjoying the attention.
"Slutty elf..." Yustel, who looked over at Leena happily accepting a gift from a male orc, shook his head in disdain.
"Don't be like that. They are just trying to woo her. Plus, if she doesn't accept, there will be another incident like before." Yue said while patting Yustel on the shoulder.
When they first started trying to give Leena gifts, she kept trying to refuse them, but this caused a big stir, and fights broke out within the orc tribe. Something along the lines of someone had made Leena unhappy, and everyone was blaming the other. It turned into a huge mess. To rectify it, Leena caved and started accepting the gifts. In the end, she began to like the attention, and now she was happily chatting away with the orcs. With what little she had learned of their language.
"I am just saying it has become second nature for elves to warm up to orcs. No pride at all!" Yustel took a big swig of his wine and stared daggers into Leena's back.
Yue giggled as a thought came to mind. "Yustel, is this jealousy I hear? I mean, Leena is cute and available. You two have been traveling a while together, so there is nothing stopping some feelings from blooming."
"Lass! You pick on this old dwarf!?" Yustel's cheeks were bright red. But he still didn't deny what Yue had said.
"Haha! I am just saying if you want to keep Leena to yourself, then you should go speak to her. Do not think that I have not seen you staring at her this entire time. And Leena doesn't seem to be dumb either and is very friendly with you. So you may have a chance." Yue had no idea about relationships, but she felt if you liked someone, just go up and tell them!
"Humph! You have no idea… I will show you how we dwarfs do it." Yustel put his wine down and stood up. He then made his way over to Leena, scaring away the orcs and pulled her away.
Five minutes later, He came back with a red mark on his face. Yue couldn't help but laugh. "What did you do to get slapped?"
"She told me not to lay my dirty dwarf lips on her ever again," Yustel replied with a big grin.
Yue held her head. She wondered what went through Yustel's mind when he did what he did. "Well, I will say this, if you ever try to kiss me, I will make you sit for all eternity."
"Humph! I am not so stupid to mess with someone who can use ancient magic. I would be digging my own grave. And who said things were bad! She kissed me back, you know!" Yustel huffed.
"I see... Well, good luck!" Yue wanted no part in what was going on between the elf and dwarf. They had a strange relationship as it was.
After months of travel Yue and the rest finally arrived near the monster domain. It was just that things seemed much worse than they had feared. The whole plains leading to the monster domain was filled with monsters of all kinds.
Lying on a high hill looking out over the plains Leena and Yue stared at the herds of monsters with grim expressions. "What do you think Yue? Things are pretty bad."
"Were these plains like this before?" Yue asked.
"No, they were always clear. The monsters never passed the tree line. But now… It's like a sea of monsters out there."