After our two groups went our separate ways, my group set off in the direction of the fishing town of Sonia to investigate whether the knights were still alive or not. If they're alive we'll save them and probably ask them what information they have on the peasant rebellion. If they're not alive we'll retrieve the bodies and find out if they left behind any notes relating to their mission.
With Quincy's party off the ship I thought my sleep situation would have improved significantly, but somehow it hasn't so I've taken the effort of sleeping in the bathroom with the door locked so no one can get in. This is my way of punishing those two since the only other toilets on the ship are on the opposite end. I end up forcing everyone to hold their pee and walk for 3 minutes whenever they want to use the toilet. Morning comes and I hear someone knock on the bathroom door.
"Will come out of the bathroom, we're here," Ryder informs.
"Oh good morning Ryder, is everyone ready to disembark yet?" I ask while rubbing my eyes.
"Nah I woke you up first, but Azura and Lilith are making breakfast. I'm going to head over to the kitchen, but could you wake up Remi for me?" he asks.
"Yea sure," I groggily respond.
I walk over to Remi's room, knock on her door, but there is no response. My next step is to try opening the door, but the moment my hand touches the door knob I feel a spark go off in my head. Quickly I jump back and take a moment to analyze my surroundings. This is bizarre?! Am I being attacked? Why did instinct activate? I don't see anyone, but I'm getting really bad vibes from touching that door knob. Suddenly I see Nazuko come out of a room nearby and greets me.
"Oh good morning master, that wasn't very kind of you to hog the toilet all night," she says all groggily.
"Well it's because you and Lilith won't let me sleep alone, but never mind that. I can't really explain why, but I desperately need you to open this door for me," I command.
"Umm okaaay, suuure I guess," Nazuko says as she opens the door unaware of an incoming threat.
What happened next was quite amusing to see. As Nazuko opens the door I gain a peek of what looks like Remi changing from her underwear to her normal clothes. There's a few brief seconds before Remi notices Nazuko barging in on her and yells,
"AHHHH You pervert, die!" Remi shrieks as she throws a pillow with max force at Nazuko's face.
"Wait what!" Nazuko says in surprise.
Nazuko gets hit by said pillow and gets sent flying into a nearby wall. I'm glad it wasn't me who opened that door. Instinct is such an awesome ability. Although I'm not quite sure as to what counts "as activation under combat" though.
'To best explain it, you could think of it as any situation that is about to cause you physical or mental pain.'
"Ah that's helpful, thanks Mythril," I say to her in my head.
"Nazuko, are you okay?" I ask the girl with a pillow on her head.
"I'll be okay, but please carry me to the kitchen since you just used me as a scapegoat. I think I might have a concussion," Nazuko says as her voice is muffled by the pillow.
Clearly I do not need to wake up Remi anymore so I quickly close the door and carry Nazuko to the kitchen. Azura heals the small bump on Nazuko's head and we all eat breakfast together. After breakfast we all get geared up and ready to explore Sonia. We walk out of the ship to be greeted by a small town consisting of mostly woodshacks.
"Alright Nazuko, if you were a knight posing as a spy for the peasant rebellion what would you do?" I ask.
"Hmm, if I were a spy… I'd probably be wearing peasant clothing, and try to integrate myself into society with specific roles pertaining to information gathering. Like working as a bartender or for the case of this town be a part of the fishing crew," she suggests.
"So look for people wearing peasant clothes that look like they are really interested in what people have to say," I say out loud while scratching my head.
"In that case we should go visit a tavern to go find these spies. If the spies are dead then someone must have heard about them being murdered," Remi suggests.
"Sounds like a good idea. Remi you should be the one to go since you're the one who dresses like a peasant here," Nazuko says all snarkily.
"What was that you little… I'm going to beat your little *ss" Remi threatens.
"Whoa, whoa, Remi you don't look like a peasant, but Nazuko's right. You're the one least likely to draw attention to themselves. I look evil, Nazuko looks like a ninja, Ryder is Ryder, Azura looks like an imperial wizard and Lilith looks like a knight. We'll just wait outside and back you up if anything bad happens," I tell her.
"Alright fine, I'll do it, but don't blame me if everyone in the room tries to attack me," Remi warns.
Remi walks into a nearby tavern and the rest of us head to a window to try and eavesdrop on her conversation. I can sort of peek through the window to see Remi walk up to the bar and order a drink. I jam my dagger into the window sill to open it from the outside and now I listen in on her conversation with the bartender. I take a look around the bar and it seems pretty normal to me. People are just eating and drinking like you typically would in these types of establishments. No one looks out of place to me so if there is a knight here then they're doing their job as a spy correctly.
"Hello sir, I've got valuable information from the south and I was wondering if there has been any reports of suspicious people from the North in town," I hear Remi ask the bartender.
So this is Remi's way of getting information. She's posing as a rebel informant from the south to gain his trust. This is giving me flashbacks to that time I impersonated her to get out of paying for Quincy's drink. I'm glad he ended up paying for that in ways not related to money.
"No missy, there haven't been any recent reports of people from the North. You'll have to go deliver your report to the people in the town hall. We have had our fair share of spies in the past, but so far we managed to eradicate pretty much every one of them," the bartender says.
Eradicate every one of them?! That's not good. At least it seems like this group of spies haven't been caught yet, but I wonder why they haven't tried to make a report yet.
While these two are talking I notice a person wearing a hood start to inch close to the bar as if to eavesdrop on their conversation.
"Nazuko, do you think that person might be a spy?" I ask her, but she isn't tall enough to see through the window.
"I can't see, lift me up," she says.
I proceed to lift Nazuko up and have her sit on my shoulders to see.
"Yeah, yeah I think there's a possibility; but that person is way too obvious of a spy if that were the case. If all the previous spies were like this then, I can understand how they were all eradicated," Nazuko notes.
Remi seems to notice this person inching their way towards her as well.
"Ok I'll go make my report to the city hall then. It would be such a shame if the information I'm about to deliver gets heard from the people in the North. We'd be at such a disadvantage," Remi says, clearly acting to get this person's attention.
Remi pays for her drink and makes her way out of the tavern to meet us. I can see the cloaked figure start to follow Remi out of the tavern as well.
"Whatever you do, don't look backwards. We don't want that person to know we are onto them," Remi whispers to me as we walk towards city hall. We walk for a bit in the direction of city hall, and then Remi announces
"Ok, guys! Let's take a shortcut to the city hall building,"
We take a turn into a nearby alley and start to walk for a bit. As soon as we approach the middle of the alley Remi turns around to face the figure and gives the signal to cut off their escape.
"Now!" Remi yells.
Nazuko proceeds to jump off a building and land on top of the cloaked figure. The hood comes off and I can see it's a beautiful girl that seems to be a little bit older than how Lilith looks. She has long black hair and purple eyes that seem to draw you in. It's like staring into a portal.
"We've got you surrounded so don't try anything. First question: are you a spy from the capital?" Nazuko asks, sitting on top of the person.
"And why would I answer that? Even if I am a spy I would never tell you anything," the girl says.
"You are the worst spy in existence. You basically admitted to being a spy just now," Nazuko says bluntly.
"Eh!? No fair! You just tricked me into admitting I was a spy," the person says.
Nazuko facepalms at how dumb this person is right now. I think everyone else in our party is starting to feel the same way.
"You better be glad that we are back-up from Lieutenant General Hume and not actually people who would kill you for being a spy," I sigh.
"Really? That's great! Then you guys can help me and the rest of the spies escape. My name is Scylla, I'm an imperial knight assigned to assist the eastern front. We'll share our information as soon as we are all reunited," she says while she gets up effortlessly because Nazuko doesn't weigh much at all.
"Why do you guys need help escaping? What's the problem?" I ask.
"Well there is this really powerful group of individuals that rule over this town. No one enters or exits this town without them knowing. In fact they probably already know about your presence," Scylla says.
"Yes and we have caught onto you evildoers!" someone shouts from atop a nearby rooftop.
It seems there are 5 people all wearing very flamboyant outfits, each with different colors. They each have a visor with a certain color and they look really shiny.
"It's time we dealt with the latest batch of spies. Hear my title evildoers and let the fear traverse throughout your body; for I am Sonia Red, the destroyer of all evildoers," one guy says as he does this really strange pose where he turns around and dabs.
"And I am Sonia Blue, beautiful ally to the rightful peasants," one girl announces while posing as well.
Her arms are crossed in an x formation while she closes her eyes.
"Third, but equally important Sonia Yellow. The dependable spellcaster who drives away all mischief and pain," the third guy yells as he proceeds to do a handstand and has this stupid grin on his face.
Deciding I've had enough of this, I lift up my left hand and shoot a wind bullet at the fourth green guy who is about to make his introduction. He ends up dodging it, but almost falls off the rooftop so he's hanging there on the ledge. None of his other teammates want to stop posing to help him so all of us awkwardly stare at the green guy scrambling to get back on the rooftop. He succeeds and starts to pose while introducing himself again. While he's doing this I take the time to open up a portal just around the corner so once these guys are done with their little schick we can leave without fighting them.
"You rude fiend, daring to interrupt our magnanimous introductions! Let's continue, Ahem for I am Sonia Green, ally of the earth and all its creatures. I will destroy all oppressors," the green guy says as he throws both arms in the sky as if he's praising the sun.
"And who are you supposed to be? Sonia Black?" I say looking at the last black clothed figure.
"No for I am Sonia Negro, anyone who would call themselves black is stupid," the person says.
"That's literally another word for… You know what, nevermind I don't care. C'mon guys let's leave, there's a portal around the corner to our ship," I tell the rest of my party and the spy.
"Wait, wait evildoers, you can't just leave, we have to fight and defeat you guys. Plus we are not even done introducing ourselves yet. Poor Sonia Negro over there hasn't even said her line yet," the red guy says.
"Bye, bye Sonia Idiots," Nazuko taunts as all of us disappear through a portal.
"If you tell me that those fools are the people preventing you from leaving I am going to be extremely disappointed," I tell Scylla.
"No, the Sonia Rangers aren't the threat, it's more of the fact that each one of them has a dungeon boss level monster backing them up," Scylla replies.
"That explains it. There's no way that those idiots could be that strong," Azura remarks.
"Still dungeon boss level monsters, there has to be some kind of way they're controlling them," Remi notes.
"Yes, my team and I have concluded there are a series of totems located in the town hall that allow them to influence the demons," Scylla informs us.
"So we just have to nuke the town hall and those demons will go haywire," Ryder says, getting all pumped.
"Wait if you do that then all those monsters will get unleashed on the people of the fishing village. There's no way they can all be defeated by peasants with no combat training," Lilith argues.
"Hmm, I'd like for this mission to not turn into a massacre, so the complete demolition of the town hall is off limits," I announce.
"Aww man, it's so much easier to blow everything up," Ryder sighs.
"Okay fine, maybe just a few explosions then," I relent.
"Yay!" Ryder cheers.
"For now I think we should try to find the other spies before we launch our attack on the city hall," I decide.
"Okay, but I think only you should come with me. It'll be hard for all of us to move as a group. Especially when people know our faces now. We can find the rest of my allies and we will help you fight," Scylla says as she points at me.
"Fine, but if you do anything perverted with Will while you're gone I'm going to stab you right between your nice boobs," Nazuko tells her.
"What?!" she says in surprise.
"Ignore the flat girl! Let's go," I say as the two of us head into town.
I think I've met the stupidest group of people in this world. Even my group looked more awesome than those guys when we posed. I hope this next stealth segment of my mission will go off without a hitch.