Prytaneum
Interlude
The Flame
Part 1
"We should probably leave," He said. "It's probably not a good idea to just stand here waiting. You know, considering we just maimed the head of a Familia and all."
Percy looked at him over his shoulder, cracked his neck absently, and nodded.
"We'll go to my place," Percy said. He glanced around once before bringing his fingers up to his lips and releasing a whistle that might have been able to break glass. Almost immediately, the long shadows that covered the twelfth floor seemed to ripple, like water might if something were struggling beneath the surface. He'd seen it happen several times now and it was still hard to describe what happened next. The shadows didn't quite gather, didn't quite tear, and didn't quite open, but what did happen held elements of all those things—and then the largest dog he'd ever seen was suddenly in their midst. In fact, she might have been the biggest monster he'd ever seen, though that didn't necessarily mean much given his limited experience. Still, she easily dwarfed even Large-Category monsters, standing perhaps twelve or thirteen feet tall, making her large enough to have trouble standing up on the upper floors, and over twice that in length.
Even by those standards, she was big. He wasn't sure if she resembled any normal breed of dog, but her shoulders were wide and her body was heavy with muscle. Her entire body was pitch black, but for her literally glowing red eyes, and while she didn't necessarily look scary—at least, when she wasn't trying to be, at which point she was more than a little terrifying—there was no way around the fact that she was a lot of dog. If she suddenly decided to roll over and he was caught underneath, he wasn't sure he'd survive.
But at the same time, she was their ally—their friend, or at least Percy's. He trusted her because of that and because she'd proven that she was reliable. Besides, of the four of them, she was definitely the first or second strongest and most useful, whereas it was still up for debate whether or not he was third or fourth.
Lili inched back slightly as Mrs. O'Leary appeared and proved good on her name, staring at them both for a moment, not that he could really blame her. He knew Mrs. O'Leary probably wasn't trying to breath down their necks, but each of her lungs was probably larger then he was and every breath she took was like a small gust of wind that smelled of blood and meat. The only thing he'd ever seen her eat was other monsters, but which monsters she preferred when she wasn't wasting her time looking after them, he had no idea. For all he knew, she ate dragons for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
"Hey, girl," Percy said, seeming either immune or oblivious to any of that. "Can you give us a ride back home? Something came up."
Mrs. O'Leary huffed and…well, leered. Though that might have just been the glowing red eyes again.
"Come on," Percy said to them, putting one hand on her side and easily vaulting up onto her shoulders. After taking a moment to seat himself, he leaned over to reach down at them, lending a hand. Given Mrs. O'Leary's height, that still meant they'd need to jump to reach him, but it was the thought that counts.
"Here, Lili," He said, leaning down to scope her up and toss her up into Percy's arms. Percy caught her easily and settled her in front before reaching out again to catch his hand as he took several steps and leapt up onto Mrs. O'Leary's back. Percy gave him a moment to seat himself as well and experience was enough to make him and Lili hold onto Percy tightly.
A moment later, the world fell away. An semblance of light vanished as they plunged into a world of shadow, where darkness was so pure he literally couldn't see Percy in front of his own face—but he could feel Mrs. O'Leary run, feel a cold, cold wind blowing by so fast that it seemed to cut, and he felt like something else was there with them in the darkness. Percy called it shadow travel and hadn't explained anything beyond that, but wherever they went for it, it was a damn creepy place.
Shadow travel itself, however, was damn handy, and in what seemed like only a couple of moments, they emerged into the light of the church Percy and his goddess lived beneath. The place was rundown to the extreme, enough so that he couldn't tell what it had been a church too, but it was spacious in an 'exposed to the elements' sort of way. It was big enough for Mrs. O'Leary to fit in and that's what matters.
"Thanks, girl," Percy said, rising and picking the two of them up in the process, absently carrying them like they were children. He hopped down from her back, landing with a slight creek on the floor, and set them down easily. "Sorry to bother you. Get some rest, okay?"
Mrs. O'Leary snorted and then seemed to dig at the floor, burrowing her way back into the shadows in search of her next meal as Percy waved goodbye. It was probably for the best given the utter commotion it would cause if anyone learned that a monster—much less one like her—was loose in the city, but he couldn't help but wonder what might happen if someone walked in and saw her waiting in the church.
"You can stay with me, Lili," Percy said after she was gone, turning and leading them towards the stairs. "It's not much, but it should be enough until we sort all of this out."
He and Lili followed, walking down into the fairly cramped confines of the Hestia Familia home and quickly finding themselves seats on the couch.
"Where's Lady Hestia?" He asked, looking around. Come to think of it, he'd never actually seen the goddess formally.
"Out," Percy said with a shrug. "She had something to do, she said; it's been a few days now, though. I think it might have had something to do with Hephaestus."
"Come to think of it, I haven't seen her in a few days, either…" He mused. "We've been busy, though."
"Might need to change that, soon," Percy said, rolling his shoulders before sighing. He walked over to a box by the side of the room and removed several vials before coming back over. "Lili, your wrist must hurt, right? Take these. I have a friend who's…sort of a doctor, I guess? I'll run out an ask him to stop by when I go back out."
"You're leaving?" Lili asked, sounding surprised. She looked at the potions held out to her for a long moment before grudgingly accepting one; he'd forgotten because she was so quiet, but she'd gotten something broken, hadn't she?
"I have to check some stuff," He said. "I'll head over to the Guild and ask my advisor about all of this. What those guys were doing couldn't be legal, right?"
He got the feeling that last question was directed at him and shook his head before making a face and waggling a hand.
"Could you be more specific, Welf?" Percy asked, furrowing his eyebrows.
"It's not legal," He said. "At least, it's probably not legal; the law in Orario is kind of a funny thing. Basically, the Guild is the law and it controls everything, but…"
He trailed off, looking for the right words, at which point Lili took over.
"The Guild is powerful because it's a neutral party," She said. "On its own, the Guild is no match for any Familia, but it remains in power because of ties it holds and the services it provides. But at the same time, the Guild restricts itself in a lot of ways, because it's only as strong as it's allowed to be. Part of that is remaining impartial, refusing to take sides, and not revealing any personal information…and part of it concerns how it governs adventurers. While things that happen within the city itself are closely monitored so as to not cause too much trouble, what happens in the Dungeon is something else. It's not uncommon for adventurers to attack one another there."
"I…see," Percy said, frowning. He looked down for a moment before lifting his eyes again. "Sorry, Lili, but could you tell me a little more about that guy I fought before? I don't want to pry, but…the truth is, I wasn't sure who he was."
She nodded quietly.
"That was Zanis Lustra," She said. "He's the head of the Soma Familia."
"Yeah," Percy said, sighing again. "Somehow, I thought as much."
"He became the head of the Familia about nine years ago," She continued. "Since then, he's ruled it completely."
"Somehow, I'm guessing there's more than just charisma involved," Percy said. "I've thought so for a while now, but…there's something wrong with the Soma Familia, isn't there?"
"What type of god is Soma, anyway?" He added, tilting his head at Lili. "Now that I think about it, I've never heard about him. All I really know about your Familia is that you sell really expensive wine."
Lili closed her eyes for a moment and smiled sadly.
"Ah, that stuff…those are the failures," She said.
"Huh?" He asked, blinking at her in surprise.
"Sometimes mistakes are made," She said. "That's true for Blacksmiths too, right? Something will break or something will spill and the whole thing will be ruined. But it would be a waste to just throw it away, right? So it's sold in stores instead."
That…made a certain amount of sense, he supposed, though he had to twist his head around it. It was true that for various reasons—a lack of quality in materials, mistakes made in the forging process, unforeseen errors—even a high-ranking smiths work would considered subpar. The Hephaestus Familia had struck standards on what was allowed to be sold in their stores and especially on what was allowed to bear their brand, but it wasn't unheard of for a smiths work to be placed on a different floor then was normal. There have been times when a Level 4s work was placed alongside the Level 3s and even a fiasco where a Level 4s handcrafted armor was placed among the Level 2s and the smith got yelled at by Hephaestus. Being subpar didn't necessarily mean worthless.
But for ruined wine? No, a better question—
"Hold on, Lili," He said. "I've seen Soma's wine before, I think. At the time, it was priced something like sixty thousand valis. That's a failure!?"
If it was a Blacksmith's work, like a sword made for adventurers by someone with a Developmental Ability, it might make sense—but wine.
"It's because the wine is so good that even a failure is like that," She said, still smiling. By now, he knew for a fact that that was something she did just to hide her emotions. "Lord Soma isn't interested in gods or humans or anything else except one thing—making wine. It wouldn't be a lie to say that the entire reason Lili's Familia exists is to assist him in that."
"I think I get it," Percy said, frowning. "That's the god's hobby, but there's the Familia to consider too, right? Even if Soma only cares about making wine, if his Familia doesn't bring in enough money or doesn't care…?"
"It's like Mr. Percy thinks," She said, smile refusing to falter. "That's the reward for those who earn enough for the Familia—Lord Zanis gives them a taste of Lord Soma's wine. Or perhaps I should put it a different way; the Soma Familia doesn't exist because of Lord Soma at all, but rather for the sake of the wine, 'Soma.'"
Percy closed his eyes for a long moment, exhaling through his nose before nodding.
"Welf, do you mind sticking around to watch over Lili for a bit?" He asked, opening his eyes again. "Just in case? I'll head out and ask Miach to drop by the house and then go speak to my advisor. I'll see if the Guild can do anything but, failing that, Eina will probably know what to do. If that doesn't work, we might have to ask Hestia and Hephaestus, but let's just try to lay low for now, okay?"
"Sure," He replied. "I don't have anything I need to do—I'll stand guard until you come back."
"Thanks," Percy replied with a smile. "They shouldn't have seen us come back so they shouldn't know we're here, but…better safe than sorry, right? I'll be back as soon as I can and Miach should stop by before I get back. I'm sorry, but can you hold on until then, Lili?"
"Yes," Lili said and, to her credit, he couldn't hear so much as a hint of pain in her voice. "Lili will be fine, Mr. Percy."
He nodded slowly, looking at her for a moment.
"Lili, we'll figure something out," Percy told her. "I promise."
"…Yes."