Just InCommunityForumMoreSeigyou Tensei - Legitimately Employed Reincarnation by sinereal Anime » Mushoku Tensei/ 無職転生 Rated: M, English, Fantasy & Romance, Words: 326k+, Favs: 1k+, Follows: 2k+, Published: Jun 11, 2022 Updated: Apr 11, 2023308Chapter 34: 34
Seigyou Tensei - Legitimately Employed Reincarnation
34
"Get your filthy hands off my daughter!" Gyes growled as we landed in the village.
I considered it for a moment, but Tona stood on her tiptoes and butted her head against my hand harder. "…Nah."
Gyes came flying at me to throw a punch over his daughter's head.
I bitch slapped him into the ground with magic, pressing him flat with telekinesis.
After a moment of just holding him there, I let go and the man glared at me. He opened his mouth, sucking in a breath. I waved my hand and created a layered bubble of air and vacuum around him. I had seen that trick when Tona sparred against Eris and I wasn't inclined to having my mana scrambled, thanks. Thankfully, it didn't actually directly scramble mana—rather, it messed with a caster's ability to properly shape mana. So persistent magic effects, or things already cast, were unaffected.
Sprite was already looking into a way to counter this ability to disrupt casting, outside of the 'seal them in a bubble' method. My spirit really was the best.
The man roared, silently. When none of us collapsed, he looked confused. "Sprite, keep him in a bubble. Tona, who's the village chief or whoever we need to talk to."
I was all out of fucks to give for niceties when it came to people starting fights with me these days. It probably had something to do with the fact that we were moving and Archer still hadn't responded to my message. I was getting antsy and my sleep had been shit for the past couple of days. I had, admittedly, been taking it out on the prisoners we captured, just a bit.
Last night, I woke up from another nightmare about Zenith and Norn to Eris's hand wrapped around my wrist in a grip like steel… and my fist about two inches from Roxy's face, who had moved in her sleep. I had kissed the sleeping Roxy and Eris both, thanked the redhead, and quietly left. I spent the rest of the night alone on the deck under the stars, until Lilia came up with a blanket and sat with me, pulling me into her lap and resting her chin on top of my head.
I would have to revise Eris's strategy for dealing with my restless sleeping habits, if they were coming back. There was one person on the ship I could fuck to exhaustion and who needed it besides. I'd be dicking down Elinalise last every night for the foreseeable future.
As for the village… It was a beautiful place. All tree house architecture, built high up in the giant trees of the Great Forest. The people were all scantily clad beastkin that had Eris drooling and even Roxy's eyes wandered a bit, only to guiltily come back to Eris or myself… where she found Eris drooling and me giving her a smile.
Tona lead us to the village elder's home, where we met Gustav Dedoldia—Ghislaine's father and Tona's grandfather. The old man took in me petting Tona's ears, the happy look on Tona's blissed out face, and the fact that Gyes was silently screaming at me from over a yard away and every time he tried to get closer he was telekinetically picked up and moved back to that minimum distance. He sighed.
"Thank you for returning my granddaughter to us. Tona, will you be leaving with them?"
"Mm!" she nodded happily, a huge smile on her face. "Rudy and Eris are nice! They know all the best places to scratch my ears. Rudy promised to teach me magic if I come with them. Eris wants to pay me to be her maid, but I think I'd rather do something else."
I sighed, palming my face. "Eris."
"What? I said I'd pay!"
Roxy sent the redhead an amused look before turning back to Gustav. "King-level Water Mage, Roxy Migurdia. My fiancee, Emperor-level Elemental mage, Rudeus Greyrat. And our fiancee…" she turned to Eris. "What are you?"
"Ruijerd says Sword King."
"Saint-level Fire Mage," I added. "Almost King. She could probably do it, we just haven't really taken the time to test."
Roxy nodded and returned her focus to the chief. "Eris Boreas Greyrat. We are here to return the children stolen from you and your sacred beast. Additionally, to offer an opportunity. If any families would like to leave, we're traveling back to the Fittoa region of the central continent. Several other groups are already relocating there with us, including my own tribe."
"I'll have to speak to the others. There may be some who wish to leave, given the yearly raids by slavers—"
"Those won't be a problem any more." When the man looked to me, incredulous, I shrugged. "We're killing every slaver we come across and leaving the bodies out as a message to others. Slaving is done as a profession and slavers will be killed on sight."
"That's all well and good, until you leave."
"Sprite. Local monster count?"
My summoned spirit materialized beside me (thankfully clothed). "Fifteen giant arachnids—water spiders. All on the ground, hiding in the under brush. Nothing else within a mile."
"Show us." A hologram appeared floating between us and Gustav. "Now, put pretty little holes in all their heads."
"Yes, master." A single bright white light streaked between the spiders—bending in midair as it punched through one, bent, and hit another, and another, until there were no more spiders living. "Targets eliminated."
"Thank you, sweetie." I looked at Gustav. Off to the side, Gyes had stopped trying to shout and get out of his bubble. Pointing to the dead spiders, I said, "Now imagine that's slavers."
Roxy smiled, reaching out and laying a hand on my thigh. "Now, there is some other business we would like to talk about while we're here. What sort of fruits and vegetables grow locally? What about wild game? Local delicacies and the like. We would like to try a few things, purchase some, and perhaps establish some sort of agreement for future trade…"
After that, I sat back and let Roxy do the talking, while Tona wore a strangely smug little grin on her face and kept staring her father down. That was probably my fault.
Not even twelve hours later, I was being woken up in the middle of the night by Sprite.
"Master, there's a problem."
I sat up in bed, easing Kishirika off of me and onto Eris while, at the foot of the bed, Elinalise slept on soundly. Eris's quiet snoring abated and her red eyes cracked open as she eyed us. On my other side, Roxy continued sleeping peacefully.
"What is it, Sprite?" Eris asked sleepily, curling into my side and laying a kiss on my bare flesh after pushing Kishirika off of her.
"Sauros is in trouble," Sprite answered, and produced a hologram. That had Eris sitting up beside me, suddenly much more alert. We were treated to the view of the inside of a castle. A bit of magic on Sprite's part got us audio, but kept us separated from the others so they wouldn't hear and be disturbed.
"And so, it is my judgment that Sauros Boreas Greyrat grossly mishandled the events leading up to the Fittoa Calamity, causing the destruction of the Fittoa region and irreparable harm to Asura as a whole. It is my judgment that he be stripped of his titles and any remaining wealth and assets seized. He will be executed tomorrow, at dawn…"
"Yeah. No. Sprite, gimme a hologram. Make sure I'm clothed, please. And get me Ariel. Get ready to make a hologram for her, too."
A hologram appeared in our bedroom of myself, in my usual mage attire and I frowned. I was starting to outgrow it and needed to trade some pieces out. But it would do for now. "That's good. Send it."
"Broadcasting." My hologram appeared beside Sauros. "You're live."
"How are you doing, old man?" I asked, to cries of surprise from the gathered nobles. I gestured, projecting my magic through the hologram, and everyone in the room was abruptly silenced. Dead silence, save for what Sauros and I were saying.
"Rudy my boy! It's good to see you, lad. But it must be the middle of the night over there."
"Yeah," I confirmed. "But when Sprite tells me that someone has decided to have you fall on your sword for a problem you weren't responsible for, that's something I have to roll out of bed for."
Reaching into the magic before me, I puppeted my hologram, making it sweep the room with his eyes, before locking onto the king and prime minister. Another gesture and the king, and him alone, was taken off of mute—the sound inversion spell keeping him quiet canceled. I sent my hologram stepping forward, bringing Sauros with me as the chains holding his arms and legs turned to dust and fell to the ground with a flex of mana.
The guards leapt to action, only to be slapped away, dragged to the walls where they were pressed firmly in place—unharmed, but not going anywhere.
Walking right up to the king, I sent the man a grin. "Good…" I checked the time, "morning. My name is Rudeus Greyrat, and I believe there's been some sort of mistake. Now, I'm guessing this is about the teleport event. Please, allow me to explain what happened, from a mage's perspective. You'll see that Sauros, Phillip, myself, and everyone involved did everything we could—"
"You waltz into my audience chamber, free my prisoner, assault my guards, and expect me to listen to anything you have to say?!" the man rose from his seat, his speech quickly rising to a roar.
"Actually, yeah," I nodded. "Now, sit down and shut the fuck up before I shut you up."
The man took on a poleaxed look for a moment.
"Master, Ariel is ready."
"Send her."
A hologram of Ariel joined me and I sent the beautiful blonde a smile. "Rudeus!" she beamed at me, her hologram reaching out and pulling mine into a hug—the entire sequence animated by Sprite.
"Hello, wife."
"Not yet. But soon~," Ariel giggled. She turned and visibly took in the whole situation, before turning to her father. "Hello, father."
"Ariel? I thought you died—"
The girl shook her head. "No. Just in hiding. Despite the Prime Minister's and my brother's best efforts to find me and have me assassinated."
I gestured towards where Darius Ganius had stood up and looked to be visibly shouting, and growing redder by the moment. "Looks like he wants to say something. Probably deny it or claim you have no evidence."
"I have all the evidence in the world," Ariel smiled. "But first, before we begin the Prime Minister's very incredibly short trial," the man turned and began running for the exit. "Sprite, make sure he doesn't leave, please and thank you." The man lifted into the air, still running, before he started flailing as he was lifted back to his seat and forced back down. The king was suddenly looking very nervous. The crowd, however… they were on the edge of their seats as they watched and listened—this was probably the most exciting thing they had seen all year.
Even if some of them looked particularly wary, especially at the way the Prime Minister had been handled. Take, for instance, the man who looked suspiciously like Paul and who wore the Notos Greyrat coat of arms…
"I think official introductions are in order, father. Rudy doesn't like to go throwing his weight around with his titles and such—he says he doesn't feel the need to engage in the sort of dick waving that insecure and weak people are prone to."
"I mean… yeah?" I shrugged. "It's posturing. I'm not going to bother with it when I can just actually do something instead."
"American diplomacy again," Ariel sighed, sending my hologram a fond, if exasperated look. She turned back to her father. "Father, allow me to introduce my fiance." The man turned a sharp look on 'me' at that—apparently, he had dismissed our little play before with me calling her my wife. Now that she was making it official he couldn't just do that. "Rudeus Greyrat. Emperor-level Elemental Mage."
The king froze. "That's impossible."
Ariel nodded. "I don't know if you're aware, but the stones marking the Seven Great Powers have been updated. Did you see the one with the little rat on it?" The blonde pointed at me.
"I hate that system. Just because I killed Badigadi doesn't mean—"
"You killed the Fighting God, so of course you should go on the list," Ariel interrupted. It was a complaint I had voiced a few times recently when she brought it up. She thought it was great, because it was basically verifiable proof that I was a certified badass—and that kind of thing equated to political power in this world where might made right ninety percent of the time.
"He killed—no, that's. No. There are no mages that powerful, outside of Perugius."
"There is now~," Ariel leered. "Furthermore, why don't we bring in Eris?"
I shrugged. "Sure." Turning to Eris, the girl I'd pulled my arms around nodded and, a moment later, her hologram joined ours.
"Eris!"
"Grandfather!" Eris grinned at Sauros before putting herself on my left, opposite Ariel.
"Eris Boreas Greyrat. Also Rudeus's fiancee. Which makes her mine by extension. And dear Sauros is her grandfather. You know what this means, don't you?"
The king shifted in his seat, before turning and looking towards the crowd. Towards his son, the first prince—Grabell Zafin Asura. Towards Darius Ganius and who Sprite told me, on our side of the hologram, was Pilemon Notos Greyrat—and he was indeed Paul's brother. My uncle.
I snapped my fingers, using wind magic to make the sound come out more like a cannon blast. The man flinched, jerking his gaze back to me. "Don't look at them. Look at me. Now. I was the mage on site at the time. I had the most time to study the anomaly. I was a King-level mage at the time of the incident." That I was capable of silent casting went unsaid, given that I had been doing it the entire time. "When I first became aware of it, I brought up the possibility of something happening. Sauros and Phillip both had already had people investigate it, people dispatched from the capital, meaning they were directly in your employ. If they failed to find a solution, how can you expect a couple of men with no magical education or ability do it? As far as they are concerned, they did everything within their power to prevent it short of evacuating the city of Roa—which, as we've seen, would have been pointless. Sprite, aerial view, Fittoa region."
A moment later, a hologram pulled from our reconnaissance photos sprang up above us, filling the air for everyone to see clearly. A series of photos and videos taken at various altitudes and angles, to showcase the entire region, gathered over the time we had been gone. It showed Fittoa from right after the disaster, when it was a bare circle of land stripped of everything, through grass growing over it in the intervening years, to now when it had become known as the Grass Sea of Fittoa. Miles and miles of nothing but grass, with a small settlement near the center now where refugees had begun to rebuild. "As you can see, everything within a hundred mile radius was teleported away. Ten thousand square miles, knocked flat in an instant. I was there," I squeezed Eris against me and our holograms mirrored the action, "We both were. There was nothing that could be done. Believe me, I investigated it myself. The anomaly ate magic. It couldn't be moved. Couldn't be touched. And even if we had evacuated, we'd have had to abandon the entire region to avoid the blast—which you wouldn't have allowed, Fittoa being where Bardius plants were harvested. So in a way… the responsibility for this travesty falls to you. Your government, your nobles, your policies, your decisions. If anyone is going to be stripped of titles and wealth and executed for this mistake, it's going to be you. I'll make sure of it, personally."
I let that one hang for just a moment. The king's face reddened, before he paled as he realized that I was fully capable of carrying out the promise. "…I believe you may be correct… Rudeus," he tried, guessing at the fact that I didn't need the verbal ego stroking that titles represented given the way Ariel and I interacted, and I nodded. "The Fittoa Calamity was a terrible, unavoidable event that can be likened to a wildfire, tornado, flood, or earthquake. A natural disaster that couldn't have been prevented. I… was mistaken. For that, I," he gritted out the word, and apparently it tasted like shit in his mouth, but he spat it out anyway, "apologize, Sauros. No man should bear the blame for something mages couldn't foresee or prevent."
"Of course, your majesty. Your wisdom and magnanimity are truly… remarkable," Sauros sassed. "Without compare. Why, I'm sure that even if young Rudeus hadn't come along, you would surely have discerned the truth of the matter."
"Yes. I think that's quite enough praise, Lord Greyrat," the beleaguered man grumbled. I couldn't say I blamed him. It wasn't every day that someone who should ostensibly be one of your subjects came in, casually mentioned that he was essentially a nuclear armed power all to himself, and politely informed you how you were going to conduct business in your own country… and all you could do was grin and bear it.
"Alrighty then. Now that that's settled," I began, flicking my hand at the hologram above us. Sprite took the cue and dismissed it. "I'm thinking, while I've got you all here, a captive audience… so to speak." I let that one breathe long enough for them to realize that yes, they really weren't going anywhere I didn't want them to, given what happened with Darius when he tried to flee. "We might as well just go right on ahead and take care of this business now, instead of letting it go until I get back. No point in letting the rot continue to fester."
I moved back a bit, towards the center of the room. My hologram gestured while I cast through it, creating a series of steps leading up to a set of three stone thrones, all of equal height and noticeably much taller than that of the king. My hologram took Ariel's and Eris's by the hands and led them up, seating them on the thrones before plopping down in the middle one and adopting a lazy, carefree pose. "Ariel, please begin your presentation."
The king at least had the balls to stand up and begin to protest. "You can't just—"
I snapped my fingers, setting off another cannon blast of sound. "Ah, you're right. How silly of me to forget. You were going to go ahead and retire. Step down from the throne and pass the crown on to the most qualified heir." I reached out and laid a hand on Ariel's shoulder, making it plainly clear who that was. "Let's get that taken care of now, father," I emphasized our soon-to-be relation.
"I don't believe that will be necessary," he tried. "Please. Continue."
"You made it necessary when you allowed your house to fall into petty infighting, backstabbing, and allowed that piece of shit," I pointed at the soon-to-be former Prime Minister, "the power to just do whatever he wants. So. We're having a house cleaning. Starting from the top and working our way down, using the evidence we've gathered over the last years, spoken from your own lips and recorded for all to hear. Don't think of this as a coup, think of it as your retirement and your daughter's ascension to the throne, as the most viable heir. And then, when this is all said and done and you and this country are enjoying the benefits of this political marriage between your second princess and an Emperor-level mage, you'll see that it really was the best choice you could have made."
"Not much of a choice."
I shrugged. "It's better than the 'choice' your Prime Minister would have given my fiancee." I turned and fixed the fat bastard with a glare—one that was easily outstripped by Eris beside me. "Don't think we don't know it was you who ordered Eris kidnapped."
"Rudeus. I'm going to give him to Tristina." Darius began shaking his head, his lips flapping silently as he rapidly paled.
"No. I think that'd only hurt her. Why don't you handle it?"
Eris nodded. "'Kay. I'll kill him later."
I turned back to the king. "So. Go ahead and pass that crown on up here and let's get this shit show started."
The following weeks passed quickly. I handed off all the stuff in Ars to Ariel and Sprite. The Japanese reincarnation was enjoying actually having the power to start clearing out the mess she had seen and been forced to live through during her childhood. She said it was cathartic. Sylphie said she had never seen Ariel so happy. Or handsy in bed.
What's that you say? I conquered the largest nation on the Central continent, declared myself the ruler by virtue of the fact that they only continued to exist because I hadn't erased them from the face of the world, then handed off the actual work of cleaning up the mess to my fiancee and summoned spirit?
I mean… yeah? I hadn't really intended for it to happen, but what little patience I had had kind of… snapped, exploded, and burned down to ash when they decided to kill my second wife's grandfather as a fucking scapegoat. I knew, realistically, I could and should have taken a softer approach… but I was so fucking done with stupidity and things, or people, causing problems for me and mine.
And really, well, it was always going to happen eventually. We always intended for me to come back with a fleet of airships once I was done dropping off refugees, park them over the capital, and walk Ariel straight into the palace to accuse her brother and the Prime Minister and have them ousted, and from there politely ask her father to go ahead and hand over the throne to her. This just sped things up a bit.
Good news though! There weren't going to be any political roadblocks to rebuilding Fittoa and Roa. So I could put that one to bed and let Sprite handle it for now.
As for the continuing hunt for Fittoa survivors, that continued much the same as it had. Scour the surrounding area for slavers and their hideouts. Gather information. Strike. Collect slaves. Release a surviving slaver to run home to his buddies… and lead us straight to them. Repeat. Then fly them back home to their villages. All told, we collected some three hundred and change in former beastkin slaves and people looking for a change who wanted to relocate to Fittoa.
Unfortunately, it wasn't just beastkin taken by the slave rings. The Great Forest was home to beastkin, elves, and dwarves all along the east cost and halflings/hobbits on the west coast, butted up against the Blue Dragon Mountain Range separating the Great Forest from Milis. We started seeing more and more of other races, even humans.
Additionally, we actually found several Fittoa survivors who had spent the past few years living amongst the races of the Great Forest. They were, for the most part, eager to go home—with only a few actually wanting to stay, having embraced their new lives, found some niche to fit in, or a new craft or trade.
So, between Fittoa survivors and former slaves or people who wanted to leave for greener pastures so to speak, we collected over twelve hundred additional passengers. Which meant Sprite had to spend some effort collecting fruit and vegetables from the Forest, in addition to fish from the sea. Not that she minded, because she was excited for us to try new foods.
All of those extra passengers, Sprite, Roxy, and I sat down and spoke with. Well, more like we had each group who would be forming villages together elect their own leaders and we sat down with those and Rokkus. Then, we went through what would be available when they got to Fittoa. The general areas where they would or could be settled. What each village specialized in previously, if anything—and if not, if they were willing to take on a new trade, which they were.
We worked out where everyone would be resettled and who they would or could be settled beside (elves preferred not to be settled next to demons but didn't mind humans and hobbits, dwarves preferred not to be settled next to elves but had no problems with anyone else, the Migurd (in fact, most of those from the Demon Continent) didn't care who they were settled near as long as the area was nicer than what they had), the roads between villages, and so on. Then we got down into the nitty-gritty details of housing, structures, and other requirements and what we could/would be providing. For instance, nearly everyone of every race wanted larger homes and a few more empty homes because they planned to start making larger families soon.
Then, I brought in Lilia, Aisha, and Eris and got them, Sylphie, Roxy, Sauros, and Ariel together with the village leaders to discuss matters of schooling for children, and starting their children on learning magic at the earliest age possible—using my direct students as examples. Aisha, however, was the clincher there. She wasn't a direct student of mine, but a student of my student, who had learned a lot of what she knew from the books I had given her.
An idea was proposed for a large school—similar to the Ranoa Academy of Magic, but for children to learn at a lower grade level. We would have to work out transportation back and forth every day, but that wasn't really a problem given what I could build. We would make early education mandatory for everyone, commoner and noble alike, across the nation of Asura soon but Fittoa would be our test for not just a standardized education, but including magic in that education. As the lord of Fittoa, Sauros would be passing down the order officially to have the human children sent to school, with the backing of the new queen—whereas the non-human refugees looked at it as a matter of practicality. An Emperor-level mage who could cast silently was offering to teach their children magic.
They wouldn't say no, even if it meant the temporary loss of workforce in the short term… because as Aisha happily demonstrated, in the long term, having people who could run around casting magic for everyday use would improve things overall. They were especially impressed when we went down to the ground and Aisha demonstrated the process I had noted down for readying fields with Earth magic, watering them with Water magic, planting seeds with telekinesis, and then speed-growing them with Healing magic. Though, to be fair, that last one I demonstrated myself since I hadn't had time to teach Aisha how to do it yet.
Needless to say, they were very interested in their own children being able to do that in the future. Their children, their children's children, and so on.
Finally tough, we finished scouring the Great Forest and crossed over the Blue Dragon Mountain Range (taking the time to kill and store a few blue dragons for processing, to see what we could make from them) and into Milis, where more drones spread out and began scouting.
"So, that's Milishion," I muttered, looking at the city displayed in a hologram as we sat around our communal lounge area. The city was beautiful, lit up as it was in the dark, visible from miles around. I imagined it would be even more stunning in the daytime.
"It's pretty!" Aisha beamed from my lap.
"Mm!" Eris nodded, petting Tona in her own lap. "Rudeus!"
"Yeah Eris?" I asked, looking over.
The redhead took on a sudden serious look. "I want to go kill goblins."
I blinked. "Huh? Goblins?"
"Mm!"
"Why?"
"Because it's one of the first things real adventurers do!"
I considered her for a moment, before turning to Roxy. My blue-haired future wife smiled and nodded. "I don't mind. It'll be fun."
"Alright. I guess we're going to be killing some goblins."
"Yes!"
"After," I interrupted, causing Eris to pause, "we scan the city for Fittoa survivors and slaves, gather those up, resupply, and get Tona and Aisha their Adventurer cards. Then we can all go out together and do it. Sound good?"
"Sure!"
"Oi. As long as we stop to have a proper drink. Cannae believe ya would'na let me drink with my own kin—"
"Your kin who ran you out for being a homosexual deviant," Elinalise sniped.
"Says the woman who had to pay men to sleep with her," Tallhand returned fire.
Yeah, that was the kind of casual banter and shit talk that happened any time those two were in a room together. You could tell they were basically family with the way they constantly picked at each other. It was one of those love/hate relationships.
"Look," I cut in before they started going at it. "We didn't have a month for you to just sit around drinking."
"Ye coulda joined us."
"Dwarven drinking holidays are how alcoholics are made," Roxy countered.
"So that's how new dwarves are born," Elinalise nodded along.
Quietly, Ruijerd muttered, "I always suspected as much."
Look at him go, folks! Ruijerd actually has a great sense of humor, it's just convincing him to open up and get comfortable enough to display it that's the problem.
"Yeah, no thanks," Eris shook her head. "I like a pint every now and then, or a nice bottle of wine, but there's such a thing as too much."
"Blasphemy, lass! You take that back!"
"I won't! Learn some moderation!"
"I moderate it as it goes in!"
The elf rolled her eyes. "By the barrel."
"Aye," the dwarf confirmed.
"I've finished scanning the city, master," Sprite reported. "I've found several slaves being held captive. Because the normal population is almost entirely human in Milis, I'm unsure of how many of those are Fittoa survivors. Though, there are a large number of non-human slaves."
That made sense. Milis was notoriously anti-everything but human. Of course there wouldn't be much in the way of non-human population, aside from their slaves.
I couldn't say I disagreed, at least not entirely. Every other race had their own nations, there was no reason why humans shouldn't have their own as well. Even banning non-humans from their country would have been fine, normally. As long as they didn't go out and actively hunt and kill, or enslave, peaceful non-humans I wouldn't have a problem with them. They could do their thing, everyone else could do their own thing, everyone gets along.
The problem was that the Holy Kingdom of Milis was fucking huge, taking up the entire south western half of the Milis Continent, on this side of the Blue Dragon Mountains. Also, the overland route between the Demon Continent and the rest of the world cut straight through their territory. They didn't ban travel from all non-humans, thankfully, just demons specifically—those that looked grossly non-human, anyway. Races like Migurd were allowed to pass, because they typically claimed to be elves or hobbits. They just got charged more in fees and hassled more at the ports.
"Save them all. Take any slavers prisoner and bring them up as well, so we can question them about any survivors they might have taken and sold off. Keep records on who was rescued from where. If there are any nobles or royalty involved, put that in a separate file."
"Yes, master," Sprite nodded, already getting to work. Thankfully, it was already dark, so we could go ahead and begin operations on that front. It was much easier to rescue people when strangers on the street didn't see them flying through the air towards our ships.
"There is something else…"
I sent my summoned companion a curious look. "What's up?"
"I found your father."
Sprite produced a hologram, clearly of the inside of a bar. Sitting at a table with a younger woman at his side and several others gathered around, he was drinking from a tankard of beer.
Honestly, he looked like shit. Haggard. Thinner than I had last seen him. Bags under his eyes. His hair was starting to show a few strands of gray. He was unshaved and his clothes looked unwashed.
Lilia sighed. "He hasn't been taking care of himself."
I considered her for a moment as Aisha squirmed in my lap. "Can we go see papa?"
Squeezing Aisha tightly, I nodded. "Sure. Just not right now."
Aisha nodded. "Mm. I don't want to deal with him when he's drunk like this. Wait until he sobers up."
Lilia hesitantly nodded. "Tomorrow, then."
Well, this is going to be… fun.
« First « Prev Ch 34 of 48 Next »
ReviewJump:Chapter 1Chapter 2Chapter 3Chapter 4Chapter 5Chapter 6Chapter 7Chapter 8Chapter 9Chapter 10Chapter 11Chapter 12Chapter 13Chapter 14Chapter 15Chapter 16Chapter 17Chapter 18Chapter 19Chapter 20Chapter 21Chapter 22Chapter 23Chapter 24Chapter 25Chapter 26Chapter 27Chapter 28Chapter 29Chapter 30Chapter 31Chapter 32Chapter 33Chapter 34Chapter 35Chapter 36Chapter 37Chapter 38Chapter 39Chapter 40Chapter 41Chapter 42Chapter 43Chapter 44Chapter 45Chapter 46Chapter 47Chapter 48Share: Email . Facebook . TwitterStory: Follow FavoriteAuthor: Follow FavoriteContrast: Dark . Light
Font: Small . Medium . Large . XLTwitter . Help . Sign Up . Cookies . Privacy . Terms of Service