"Who lingers on my doorstep?" whispered a voice from inside the cave. The echo made the whispers intolerably loud and the whisperer put emphasis on each word in the sentence. The result was a mysterious whirlwind inside Mr. Irving's ears.

Mr. Irving cleared his throat and replied: "I am an agent of the Bureau of Dungeon Inspection and Enhancement, may I have a kind word with the boss of this establishment?"

The brief silence was disrupted by the sound of hooves stomping closer to the mouth of the cave.

Mr. Irving opened the lid of the stone vase slightly and spoke inside it: "Tox, make yourself scarce. Bug world, that is the play, I think."

"Oh for Pete's and Dormarion's sake. This is how you are treating a god? Summon me in my true form this time, say the words, please Warner, I beg you," a desperate voice said from the vase.

Mr. Irving shook his head: "Demi-god, Tox, don't forget yourself. I can't invoke you every time we go somewhere. We must think economically here. With every invocation, you get a new epithet added to your name that I need to recite next time. It is getting longer and longer already. I cannot spend an hour reciting the invocation when we are in danger, I need you out quick to save me. Can you understand this Tox?"

The vase started to shake violently. The sound of the hooves coming was very close at that moment.

"Tox, calm yourself and remember. With me, you have hope and life. Without me, there is only darkness and oblivion for you. Go, be an ant now," Mr. Irving finished the speech and closed the lid.

Then, Mr. Irving saw her emerge from the shadow. She was quite tall and her body was covered by feathers in all imaginable shades of grey. As Mr. Irving expected, she had hooves instead of human-like feet. But there were things on her beyond Mr. Irving's expectations. One such thing was the bone armor naturally growing from her back and shoulders, or the two tails with arrowheads at the tip whipping wildly behind her, or the gaping hole where her nose should be, the horns on her head, or the piercing yellow eyes.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

She is perfect, Mr. Irving thought as she took a sip of some liquid from a human skull that she carried casually.

"They call me Sotra, the motherless and I am the boss of this domain that you seek," she hissed.

Mr. Irving bowed slightly: "I am Warner Irving, lovely to make your acquaintance." He cleared his throat again and spoke: "This is just a regular inspection of your dungeon based upon the fact that you haven't sent body count reports and taxes for some time to BUDUIEN."

She narrowed her eyes: "Maybe the reason is that instead of scribing on parchment we focus on the actual killing of all the humans wandering into the caves. Why should we owe anything to your little bureau, we are quite capable of glorious slaughter on our own."

Mr. Irving, for the third time, cleared his throat: "Perhaps, lady Sotra, you are forgetting that half of the monsters you employ here were recruited and imported from the BUDUIEN cosmic diversity program, or that we supply your establishment with traps and magic scrolls that are beyond the grasp of this world as well. And finally, you accepted all this in the contract. You do not strike me as an oathbreaker."

Mr. Irving saw his words cut her and he clenched his muscles as it was highly probable she would try to tear him apart.

But instead of killing him, she just smiled horribly and offered him the skull: "Alright Irving, I offer you to drink from this skull as I offer you peace. Follow me."

Mr. Irving took a big sip from the skull, it tasted like a cold ramen soup with a hint of orange and fresh-squeezed liver. Sotra smiled horribly once more and stroke his silvery mustache with one of the tails as she walked forward.

She is perfect indeed, thought Mr. Irving again and winked at a red-eyed ant that hanged from a thistle and was making pleading gestures with many of his limbs.