"How's everything going?" Sabelle asks, as she heads over.
Nicholas turns to face her. "Oh, hey..."
"Did something happen?" Sabelle inquires of Nicholas.
"What about the battle?" Nicholas asks her.
"It's mostly over, now. The other paladins are going after the stragglers, so I had decided that I'd come to check on you. Now, what's happened?" She asks him again, though a bit more seriously, now.
"Well... He kind of... Killed himself..."
"What? How?"
"He refused to talk, so I then decided to put one of those collars on him, but he still refused, so I gave him an order not to do anything, and went to unlock the cages while I waited for you, figuring that you'd be able to interrogate him better, but the next thing I know, he's dead. He appears to have poisoned himself. But I have no idea where he even got it, to begin with." Nicholas explains.
"What? B*stards like this always carry some form of poison on them." She remarks.
"Well I know that now, I'm only f*cking eleven, after all. I've not had to leave the city very often, before. And you're the one who put me on this. If you wanted someone better, you should've swapped mine and my mom's jobs."
"Yes, I'm sorry. It was an insensitive comment. I've never exactly been very good with children, before, even when I was a child, myself, honestly." Sabelle apologizes. "Anyways, you have no ideas? He said nothing?"
"Well, he did mention something about needing an understanding of darkness in order to use the collars." He mentions.
"But you have light magic, don't you?" Sabelle asks Nicholas, a bit puzzled.
"I do." He then creates a tiny orb of light in his hands. "I'm not very good with it, though..."
"Hm... Maybe... Is it at all possible that you have both light and dark magics?"
"I... don't know... I don't even know who my father is. I honestly only just barely even met my mother. I was living on the streets on my own, previously. You'd have to ask her." Nicholas admits.
"I see... Alright."
-------
Back during the main fighting, Caleldes soon finds herself in the tent of the leader of this particular band of slavers, along with a couple of his guards. This tent seeming to be only the next biggest tent, aside from the slavers main containment tent.
Caleldes wields her twin light energy swords, easily fending off each of them. "You're supposed to be the leader here? They must hot have very big expectations, then." She just mocks them.
This does get him angry, which does start to make his fighting a bit sloppier. "Shut up, you d*mn b*tch! When I defeat you, you'll fetch me a nice price! Elves are always in high demand, especially now, after what those brutish Orcs did."
"Not if you keep fighting like this." As the two guards get nearer to her, she sidesteps their attacks, then pushes one of them into the other as they try to attack again, the one that she pushed being stabbed through by their friend. She then blocks an attack from the leader, kicking him away, then heads for the other guard as he tries to pry his now dead friend off of his sword. He just barely manages to lift the body up to block her attack, the body now falling off, though.
Caleldes dodges the leader's lunging attack, again, then knocks him down, then stabs the other guard through the chest. As he falls and the leader gets back up, she puts her sword up to the lender's neck. "Now, where is your little business book?"
"Like I'd tell you. You'd kill me, either way. So go ahead. Kill me, b*tch!"
"Fine. I'll just find it myself, then." Caleldes then decapitates the slaver leader.
After she lets her light energy swords dissipate, she then starts to search the area.
-------
Shortly after Caleldes finds the large book, she goes back out to see if any of the others need any help.
"Were all good out here, miss. Not many left. You should go find your kid. I think Sabelle already went to go assist him." One of the other paladins informs her.
"Thanks." She then heads off again.
She soon finds them within the largest tent, towards the back, going over to them.
Nicholas quickly notices her as she heads over towards them. "Hey, quick question; would it be at all possible for me to be able to have dark magic, as well as my light magic?"
"Well... It'd be extremely rare, and highly unlikely, but... I suppose that it's not entirely impossible. Your father does have dark magic, after all."
"...Would that be why I'm not very good with my light magic, then?"
"Most likely. Since they're opposing elements, they're both probably fighting for dominance within yourself. If you want to be able to master one of them, then you'd have to help one of the two elements to eliminate the other, within yourself." Caleldes explains.
"I'll... think about it... Anyways, that means that I should be able to get these collars off of these slaves, myself, right?"
"It's possible. But these sorts of things re very sensitive. One wrong move, and the collars could kill them fairly easily."
"D*mn..." Nicholas thinks for a moment. "Actually... Are there any of these slavers left alive? I'll be heeding them. But the slaves should probably leave the tent, for these experiments."
"Right. I'll take care of all that, then." Sabelle then heads off, ushering all the slaves out of the tent.
Sabelle then eventually returns with a small group of slavers and their guards.
"I guess that they'll have to do."
-------
After probably a few hours, there are multiple bodies of the former slavers laying on the ground, their heads seeming to hare been exploded right from on top of their bodies.
Soon enough, though, Nicholas then finally manages to get a collar off from the slaver, with the frightened slaver still alive. "Hey, I actually managed to get it off, now, without killing anyone." He then tries it again a few more times, on the same fellow, to practice it some more.
After practicing it for a while longer, Nicholas is finally confident enough to try it on the actual slaves now.
As he exits, the rest of the slavers are then killed, and Sabelle and CaIeldes then follow after him.
After a few hours of just straight working, Nicholas finally gets to the last few former slaves. The next one that he gets to is actually a girl, who is possibly about his age, and is actually a cat beastkin. She has shoulder length black hair, and black cat ears and tail, with natural light pink streaks in her hair and fur, dark pink eyes, and small cat like fangs.
When Nicholas manages to get her collar off, he then goes for the others still with collars on.
After he's seemingly completely finished, the cat girl heads over to him again. "...Excuse me..." She seems to be holding something a bit closely.
"Yes?" Nicholas turns to her.
"...There's actually one more..." She then shows him what she's been holding. It's a tiny cage, barely seeming big enough to fit a small bird in, and it has a similar look to the collars, dark metal with purplish runes carved onto the top. Though this tiny cage actually contains a small fairy.
"Is that...?"
She just nods.
"Why would they have someone like that? It's not like they actually do any work?"
"Because of the dust that they produce from their wings. Some men would pay enormous amounts of gold just to get some of that dust, nevermind an actual fairy." The cat girl explains to Nicholas.
"Wow. Anyways, let me see her, then." He carefully takes the tiny cage, concentrating carefully, and the door to the cage soon swings open. "Can you fly?" Though the fairy just sadly shakes her head a bit. "Been stuck in there for too long?" The fairy then just nods.
"...I can help her." The cat girl then carefully takes the fairy out of the cage, just letting her sit on her hands. "We've been friends since we've found ourselves here, together."
"Alright. Oh, I'm Nicholas, by the way. Glad that I've been able to help everybody, here."
"...I'm Annabelle. And the fairy is Melody." Upon closer inspection of Melody, the fairy, her brilliantly golden monarch butterfly style wings are what stand out the most, they even shimmer in the sun.
"Alright, men! Were heading out! And I want these citizens meticulously protected, on our way back to the capital. If even one of them goes missing, or gets mistreated in any way, it will be all of your *sses on the line! Got it?" Sabelle calls out.
"Yes, ma'am!" The paladins all answer back, and everyone soon starts to march on out of the now devastated former slavers camp.
As they all head out, Annabelle, who is still holding Melody, goes over to Nicholas, who is walking beside Caleldes. "...We were talking with each other, and... is it alright if we... travel beside you...?" Annabelle nervously asks Nicholas.
"Oh, sure. I don't mind." Trying to help her calm down a bit, he then gives her a small smile.
Though this just makes her even more nervous, but in a good way, as she starts to blush slightly.
Nicholas doesn't even seem to notice this, but Caleldes certainly does, and she just smiles to herself, a bit.