Before she even knew it, Milia found herself in an open area enclosed by high walls. It was a stadium, a colosseum. The rest of the paused monsters somehow fit into the open space with a bit more room to spare. Milia chuckled at the bewildered monsters that unfortunately remained conscious. All of them were supposed to be knocked out and currently dreaming away like the young man beside her, but it seemed Valentine felt like they had waited long enough.
"They're always picky like that...huh? Do I have something on my face, Houren?" Although her face was covered in soot, her brilliant smile was observed rather easily by the mousy tactician in question. His eyes twitched a bit as he opined his concerns, as Milia's scorched face was a bit too conspicuous.
"How. Are. You. Talking. No wait, how are you even this damaged? All of these monsters are small fry compared to you!" His tone started off low and inquisitive before devolving into full blown panic and confusion. It was a little like the mouselike monster's personality, the diminutive boy often overthought every single query that would enter his mind.
It was a bit sad, honestly, but that was how he got the role of tactician. It was a true shame that the commander he was assigned to was a woman who thought maybe once or twice before giving up and resorting to her impulses. To say he was constantly stressed would be no exaggeration, to say the least.
"All of these monsters were supposed to be small fry to our whole entire army. Yet we lost more than half of our monsters today, half of which are now permanently dead. Go ahead, be shocked about that too~" The pointed sneer blasted its way into Houren's ears, agitating him even further. The part that discomposed him the most was that Milia wasn't even wrong. If he knew that fighting against those country hicks from another region would be so egregious, he would've brought much more troops! How did it take them a whole forty percent of their infantry before they got their shit together??
Houren let out a sigh that dragged along his lungs, expelling all the air trapped in his body. He looked absolutely deflated as the slight wind pushed him up into the air, caught up in the despair that suddenly beset him. Milia's slight chuckle changed into a full blown chortle as moos filled the atmosphere.
The mooing laughter was interrupted by loud footsteps that struck crisply against the stony ground. The gaggle of footfalls closed in on Milia's position, walking down a long set of stairs at a steady pace. As the distinct steps grew louder to all of the cognizant monsters, a certain gheckla sibling duo hesitated to approach Alban. The burnt minotauress looked pretty scary, after all. She looked really frustrated.
"Commander Milia Hatle. You were instructed to give our new additions a good working over. Why do I see some of them unharmed and ALSO awake?" An irked voice announced their presence to the world, clearly uninterested in the fact that they were disclosing sensitive information. The monster that produced the voice was followed by two well dressed monsters, one resembling a lamia and the other humanoid looking fowl that resembled a duck. Before the strident and unpleasant voice could make itself known again, Milia interjected.
"I'm sorry, Gethu, but were you the one who had to fight against them? I'm sure they'd kick your candy ass faster than you could complain about it." Gethu, the man in the center who had a beak and four tentacle-like arms gawped in umbrage at Milia's outright discourtesy. To add onto that, an impish voice that was silvery yet mild joined in on the insults, piling on top of Gethu's already quaking shoulders.
"Hah...what a shithead." The snickering tone carried palpable disdain that tinted the air red, as Teta lazily flew prone as a red gaseous haze that teemed with black blotches swirled around his fingers. Clicking his tongue, Teta took aim and fired at Gethu, shouting "Bang!"
Gethu didn't even bother to defend, expecting that the potshot wouldn't even harm him. To his surprise, he was very wrong. The power that assaulted his left arm was entirely disproportionate to the strength the crimson and black bullet should have held. It was only explicable by one word...
"You. Imp. Are you a borrower?" Although the beak made it hard to tell, Gethu's face was currently scowling. He hadn't been this embarrassed since...this morning! He had a long streak going today, and the fact that it had been broken while doing his job as proprietor of the Blood Band Arena seriously ticked him off.
"I don't see why I have to answer an ugly shitty prick like you. Why are those fine looking ladies even at your side, ain't they outta your league old man?" If Gethu's face could get any uglier, it certainly would have at that point. His very flesh was broiling as he felt a faint radiation from his second left arm, the topmost one to be precise. Suppressing the slight pain and discomfort that caused him to sweat a little, the lamia spoke up for the first time.
"Ssss. I likesss thisss one. And the blondie too. The ssssleeping beauty over there hassss got to be the mossst gratifying to look at, though." The lamia cooed as her forked tongue licked her plump lips. The stunning serpentine woman gazed intently at Alban after letting her gaze drift over Lat and Teta.
"Ho, you're right! That young man is clearly the best looking one, don't you think so too Gethu?" The woman with a billed cap agreed, her looks equally striking. The two were femme fatales in their own right as they scanned the crowd for the prettiest men, noting down their favorites.
"That ISN'T the point. Are you just going to let that imp disrespect me like that??"
"I don't ssseee the problem...whatever will happen will happen in the arena. If you don't like him so much, fix the matchesss."
"Why do I even pay you two." The veins on Gethu's head were protruding so far you could see the blood running through them. The man's pink face and grey hair were shaking wildly in his anger.
"Ho, methinks it's because you cannot get a woman to even want to enter the same room as you? We're great company in that regard, no?" The haughty avian woman echoed the same sentiment Teta was mulling over. Snapping his clawed fingers together, the imp looked like he had an epiphany at that moment.
"Hah, I knew it. Of course a shit eating crap slinging shitshow like you has to pay. It REALLY only makes sense." Teta's scornful remarks were accompanied by booming laughter of all of the women present, the noise loud enough to cause Alban to stir in his sleep.
"Hey, you should hurry up and bring the captured monsters to their cells. If the slumbering boy beside me wakes up we're all going to experience a new fresh hell." Milia's expression was a smile, though her eyes seemed to be completely serious in their warning. The two women took her rather seriously, as they knew Milia never lied.
"Issss he the one that ssscorched your face? How fierce...might I sssuggest that we put all the pretty boysss in a cell together?"
"Ugh. Sure, if it'll make you all shut up. Yamel, do your work." Gethu gave up on being respected for the day, scurrying back up the steps in an attempt to quickly leave the sphere of contention.
The woman with wings akin to a duck then glowed with an orange light, the rays oscillating from her form. As the rays touched the monsters that were successfully procured, their forms disappeared entirely.
"Methinks you shall all have fun in Mrathos. There's a lot more to do than wherever you came from, hoo~"