Chapter 16: Lupy Vs DM?
“Huh?” Lupy struggled against the tentacle a couple of times. “Let go!” She lowered her hips and attempted to overpower it.
A second tentacle spawned behind Lupy, hooked around her waist, and pulled her back just as the first tentacle released her arm. She flew parallel to the ground for a moment before a new tentacle reached up and grabbed her, picking her out of the air and pinning her to the ground while wrapping up her arms and upper body.
“Boss!” the two flunkies yelled in unison, rushing to her side.
Lupy was too busy having the wind knocked out of her to respond.
“What the—“ The man Lupy was questioning had been rescued, but before he could utter more than two words, a new tentacle spawned and wrapped around his neck, lifting him up into the air while applying sleep touch. A moment later, it placed his sleeping body on the ground.
The tentacle de-spawned, reappearing next to Lupy. It reached out and grabbed one of her followers’ ankles, this time using charm touch. Just as it succeeded, the tentacle unhooked the guy’s ankle and snapped over to the final witness, grabbing his ankle before he could react. Unlike the first of Lupy’s allies, this guy was just put to sleep.
One by one, the tentacle spawned next to each defeated hoodlum, healed as necessary, and applied sleep touch to assure they were down for the count.
Lupy started struggling again, so the second tentacle spawned next to Lupy and grabbed her legs, further holding her in place.
“…I’m not a believer in violent parenting, but desperate times call for desperate measures.”
Lupy thrashed even more violently, then ceased squirming all at once. She groaned and then took a deep breath. “DM…”
“…Let’s talk.”
She twisted her neck as much as she could to look in the direction of her charmed comrade. “Okay…”
Both tentacles disappeared simultaneously, releasing Lupy. Not being injured, she sat up and fully faced the young man who was speaking DM’s words.
“…This is my fault.”
“What?”
“…I’ve been putting so much responsibility on you, and it’s probably not fair. You’ve been forced into such unreasonable situations, and until now, you’ve done a great job using the right amount of force to deal with the problem, whatever it was. …I realize this world can be quite unreasonable, but being forced to fight, often to the death, isn’t right for someone your age.”
Lupy glanced at her ax, which was laying on the ground near her defeated rival. “But I like fighting.”
“…Just now, it looked like you really were about to execute that guy. Why?”
“I don’t know. I was…” Lupy was at a rare loss for words.
“…It seemed to me like you were on a high from the battle and were doing your decision-making with all the blood rushing to your head.”
She held a hand to her head. “Maybe now it seems more like that…”
“…If you’re going to fight, even if it’s only in defense of the innocent, you’re going to encounter situations where you need to calm down and judge the situation rationally. You’re incredibly talented at thinking on your feet during battle, but you shouldn’t lose sight of when you’re using excess force.”
“Excess force?”
“…Some of these guys got injured during your fight, but I think that was okay given the circumstances. Once their leader was incapacitated, you tried to question him and learn what hostile business they were up to, right?”
“Yeah.”
“…When that stubborn guy refused to talk, the right answer wasn’t to kill him. In fact, I don’t even want you harming him just to try to get him to talk. …If a little intimidation doesn’t work, and you can’t just let him go, then escort him back to home base and let the others deal with it.”
“I guess…”
“…I won’t even say you should never kill an enemy who is momentarily unable to resist. That can easily come back to bite you. …But, when you really do have control of the situation, don’t kill anyone. You may like fighting, but I don’t want you to like killing.”
“Okay…”
“…Even this mission you blundered into of working in the criminal underworld is unreasonable. If you don’t want to do it, you can stop right now. …I’ll do whatever is necessary.”
“No, I like it.”
“…In that case, it looks like they’re not assigning you work that would have you up to no good, but that will probably change eventually. When they put you in a difficult spot, discuss it secretly with the other girls or with me. …I don’t want you to feel like you’re alone or abandoned on this mission. I can’t watch you every moment, but I’ll do everything I can to keep you safe.”
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Bandit entered the Guild, pretending to inspect the postings of any available quests. Before long, she felt a tap on her shoulder. Looking, Thaw was already walking away. Keeping things natural, she exited the Guild at her own pace and shadowed Thaw back to their usual meeting spot in the basement of a certain nondescript building.
“Have a seat.” Thaw settled down opposite Bandit. “Welcome back, Nina.”
“Thaw, are you all right after…”
“Hm. That? It will take more than some harsh words from a lizard to keep me down. What happened after I left?” The false bravado was apparent, but Bandit didn’t say anything.
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Instead, Bandit explained that the female dragon instructed the male dragon to leave Daphne alone and then they both departed. She left out the part about how Shiba repurposed the dragon’s skeleton to be her undead minion. She wasn’t sure if Thaw had witnessed it or not, but she decided not to risk revealing the weirdness herself.
“That elf is lucky is all I can say. Were you girls just there by chance?”
“No, after we finished our mission in the Empire, we went back to the Upper Gordu Dungeon for our reward. The dragon there just told us to go meet Daphne—that elf. He didn’t even give us any reward…”
“Meet Daphne and do what?”
Once again, Bandit wasn’t sure how much to reveal. She decided to stick to the truth and just feign a bit of ignorance. Any more than that and Thaw could probably catch on. “Meet her and tell her not to summon dragons.”
“I wouldn’t have believed it if I didn’t see it for myself…”
“So you don’t know why she can do that either?” asked Bandit, using offense as her best defense.
“When I return to the capital, I’ll ask around, but no, this is news to me. Oh.”
Bandit raised a brow, waiting for Thaw to change the topic.
“I recently heard a rumor about something that happened in the Empire. Are you familiar with Zaranar? The port, specifically.”
Bandit’s heartbeat quickened. While she didn’t really need to feel guilty about completing the mission assigned by the dragon, or about causing some clandestine sabotage which ultimately ended a war before it began, her actions in total were beyond her supposed capabilities.
“I can see it on your face that you are. Nina, I heard a single girl of around your age was quite busy over there near the end of the conflict, and she employed some very interesting methods. There aren’t many people who could meet that description and do such a good job of letting loose over there. Care to share?”
Was this the moment when Thaw was going to piece together Bandit’s connection to DM? Perhaps Thaw wouldn’t react too violently since both of them were on decent terms for the time being, but any betrayal of such a dangerous dwarf was exceedingly risky. Bandit suddenly decided she had the most unreasonable secret mission from among her friends, regardless of the fact that she had merely blundered into this Guild Agent business. Trying to deceive Thaw was a fool’s errand.
In contrast, Shiba could probably tell Harold everything and he wouldn’t care or do anything about it. Vulp’s reputation was spiraling out of control entirely; she was nearing the point where she could fess up and people would side with her over the city anyway. Kat’s mark, the church, was too busy trying to keep on DM’s good side to notice anything strange from her.
Well, Lupy’s new bosses were dangerous. The girl wasn’t well‑suited for keeping secrets, and that Anne woman clearly didn’t operate within the law. One wrong move and Lupy could end up in a ditch somewhere. Bandit had to recognize that Lupy’s situation was equally precarious. Still, Bandit was far more afraid of Thaw’s abilities than those gangsters. Lupy would probably be fine so long as she wasn’t perceived as a threat to the business and continued to provide a useful service.
“What are you thinking about, Nina?”
“Th–The dragon, he…”
Thaw tilted her head, waiting patiently for Bandit to elaborate.
“He helped me a bit. I couldn’t have completed that sabotage mission at Zaranar Harbor entirely by myself.” Both sentences were true, although their implied connection wasn’t honest.
“Oh? Are you at liberty to say how exactly the dragon helped you?”
Bandit shook her head. “Only because it’s a dragon…”
“Yes… After my recent experience with that ice dragon of the north, I won’t blame you if you don’t want to tempt fate.”
“I…I almost didn’t make it out of there. Someone I didn’t sense in time struck me with their crossbow. If it had struck me in a more critical place…”
“Nina, stop. Don’t think about it that way. Tell me, when did this happen?”
“Right near the end…”
“How did you escape? Can you discuss that?”
This time, Bandit nodded. She could answer the question while leaving out the sensitive parts. “From the rooftops. I worked my way north and escaped over the wall and past the border into the Union.”
“How did you manage from there with that injury?”
“I quickly met up with my friends who were doing work in the Union. They helped me out.”
“Ah, yes.” Thaw held up one hand and extended fingers, one at a time, as if she was counting Bandit’s party members. “Do they realize the feat you accomplished in Zaranar?”
“Kinda?”
Thaw exhaled loudly. “Keep the details you share with them to a minimum.” She stood. “Thanks to some unfortunate events… I’m delayed in returning west. I need to go. It sounds like the dungeon master of the Lower Gordu is causing quite a stir, but I won’t know the details until I get back. Continue your mission and wait for any messages from me.”
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Shiba wanted to practice her necromancy, but she was getting tired of Harold’s methods, such as hunting for rats in the city. She decided to exit the city by herself and look for monsters or animals to prey on. Normally, a young black mage journeying by herself, especially off the roads, was a bit frowned upon. Now that Shiba had the ability to summon a powerful minion, she felt comfortable journeying solo while the other girls were busy elsewhere.
Due to her reputation of being in a strong up-and-coming party including notorious members like Vulp, the guards at the gate didn’t give her any trouble. Shortly after leaving the city, she sensed people following her. Shiba must have seemed like a prime target, but she actually wanted to get further away from the city before any conflict happened. If she was too close, witnesses would likely see how she dealt with any attackers.
Quickening her pace, she entered the Lower Gordu Forest. After a few minutes, she sat down on a rock. Why allow yourself to be pursued indefinitely when you can just deal with it now?
“Twas pretty foolish of you to come all the way out here by yerself.” Several men approached, each keeping their hoods drawn over their heads. “Honestly, if there were even two or three of ya we’d have let you go. Would be too risky.”
Shiba didn’t dignify the man’s unsolicited advice with a response.
“Yer coming with us.”
“Where are we going?” she asked innocently.
“Oh, you needn’t worry yourself about that. We’ll take care of that.” He gestured with his chin, and his friends fanned out to cut off her escape.
“If you all live, then I’ll just get a monster or an animal.”
“What?” The leader held a hand to his ear, encouraging Shiba to speak up.
“If one of you dies, then I’ll try using your body. I’m not afraid of that like Harold is.”
“Girl, just what are you talking about?”
“Don’t worry,” Shiba began to reassure him. She placed a hand on her knee and gripped her staff in the other hand while standing. “If you get your blood on me, I have a new way of getting it off.”
“Bitch, are you all right in the head?”
“I really don’t like that word, you know.”
“What, bitch? Cause yer a dog? Hah. I’ll call you it all I want, bitch.” He addressed his friends. “Get her.”
Shiba extended her staff and her free hand forward. “If this doesn’t work I’m going to be pretty mad…” Fortunately, a moment later, the dragon skeleton appeared right in front of her. “Get ‘em!”
Her summon lunged forward, swiping at the leader with bony claws before he could even react, sending him flying with a thin trail of blood forming an arc behind him.
At the same time, Shiba spun around and raised her staff, pointing it at one of the stunned pursuers. “Lightning Bolt.” Charge arced from her staff to the target, causing his body to convulse—the consequences of taking the T2 version of the spell. He tipped over sideways, muscles now locked in place.
Turning her head to the right, she saw a man running away while screaming obscenities. Following him closely was a charging dragon skeleton. Looking left, she saw the final opponent frozen in fear.
“I’ve been meaning to experiment with my new abilities a bit…” She pointed her staff at the ground directly behind the guy. “Spawn tentacle. Tentacle slap.” As planned, a tentacle spawned behind him and then smacked him from behind, sending him flying toward Shiba. “Spawn tentacle. Sleep touch.” The tentacle reappeared next to the man as he lay on the ground, pressing up against him and then applying the sleep status effect after a couple of seconds.
“GAH!”
Shiba turned and saw the last guy sailing through the air. Apparently her dragon skeleton had caught up.