"Heavy..." Lone grumbled as he opened his eyes.

He looked down and saw Soph sprawled out on top of his chest. He smiled warmly and slowly sat up. The girl yawned and blinked a few times in confusion. Once she recognised that she was on Lone, she blushed lightly and wore a shy smile.

She raised her head and kissed him softly. "Morning."

Lone grinned. 'Why are you so adorable?' he thought before he returned her affection with his own. Planting his lips on hers, he replied, "Yeah, morning."

The two got dressed and had breakfast in their room. Lone had seen the quality of food this inn offered when they came here last night, and he, Soph, and Sophie, were all in agreeance that it would be wise to let Lone simply create all of their food from now on. They could explore the local culinary skills another time. Perhaps when the food was actually appealing.

Sophie took control of Soph's body, and then she and Lone left the building. Their goal today was to find a library.

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Three hours meandered on by as the morning slowly rolled into the afternoon.

"No library, huh?" Lone mumbled as he looked at the small miscellaneous store that sold a variety of things which was in front of him and Sophie.

One of the things it sold was books, or so the sign out front said. "Here's hoping it has books on common knowledge and not some obscure shit..."

Sophie, who was holding his hand, shrugged and whispered, "We can only hope. By the way, someone has been following us for the past ten minutes."

Lone's eyes sharpened. "Are you sure?"

Sophie nodded. "There's three of them. One has a lot of mana, but the other two seem fairly ordinary. It was hard to tell at first, but they've consciously been maintaining a distance of one-hundred meters from us since they entered our Mana Sensing's range."

Lone frowned. "Hopefully they're just curious about me because of my rare heritage."

Sophie shrugged once again. "They have no extremely strong emotions. Or at least, none that we can feel like with Soph and the elven women."

"That's good, I suppose. Well, for now, let's buy some books. Information is key if we want to get anywhere fast here," Lone said and then lightly pulled his 'master' into the store.

A small bell rang as the two entered the shop. The somewhat bored-looking old man behind the counter gave them a cursory glance and whistled.

"It's rare that such a good lookin' demi is wanderin' 'round these here parts. Whatcha lookin' for, young man, or are ye actually a few hundred or thousand years old? It's always hard ta tell with you demis," the wrinkled man asked with a toothy grin.

'What? So demis are long-lived? Or maybe free from the risk of ageing entirely? Interesting. He also doesn't seem racist... I think. That's a great start,' Lone thought privately.

He cleared his throat and returned the old man's smile with his own. "I'm twenty-four. My master loves books, well, she loves it when I read them to her. Would it be possible to buy all of your books? The topic doesn't matter."

The old man raised an eyebrow. "Smart. Actin' like a slave. It'll keep some folk away. Can't fool me though. Ye might wanna brush up on those there actin' skills of yers, Son. I hope yer strong enough to defend yerselves. 'Cause if ye don't go lookin' fer trouble, ye can bet yer sweet asses it'll come lookin' for you. S'not every day a Golden Foxkin appears."

He cracked his back and began walking around the room collecting books as he hummed a little song that Lone didn't recognise.

"Um..." Lone was a bit lost for words. "How'd you know, Sir?"

The shopkeeper laughed. "'Sir'. That's a good'un." He turned to look at Sophie and smirked. "The girl. She's pretty smitten with ye. I can smell 'er feelin's from a mile away. Looks like ye return 'em too. I ain't ever 'eard of a slave in love with their master. Sure, it 'appens, but a slave like you? Not a chance. I ain't no powerful sage or nutin', but I can tell ye right now, a guy like you, being enslaved to a girl like her? Not a chance in 'ell. I could be wrong, but I'm willin' to bet that I'm not."

Lone's eyes widened for a moment before he smiled in defeat. "You're a smart man. How much do you want to keep this between us? I'm aware people will come looking for us regardless because of me, but I'd rather they didn't know I was free for now."

"Clever. Unlike old me. I ain't no genius, Son. I've just lived long enough to get wise. Milindo's a harsh place to live for you types. Demis. Only place that's even remotely safe in this here country is the capital up north, Ranton. It's protected by the Church of The Primals, so demis aren't hunted as actively there." He wandered back to his counter and placed seven books on it.

He sat back down on his stool and smiled again. "These'll be two silvers. Don't worry about you two not bein' master an' slave. I've nutin' to gain from ratting ye's out. Nutin' that I'd want, anyhoo."

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Lone reached into his pocket and pulled out a gold coin. He had plenty of gold thanks to the Goblin King's throne room, so he wanted to give this nice old man a generous tip for being so informative. "Thanks. I really appreciate it."

After Lone had picked up the books and was walking out of the store with Sophie, the shopkeeper said, "Good luck out there, Son."

Lone nodded in response. As soon as he and Sophie were back on the cobbled street, he grinned from ear to ear and looked at the girl. "So you're 'smitten' with me, huh?"

Sophie scowled. Her cheeks were red as she glared at Lone with her lifeless eyes. "That senile old man was clearly blinder than we are. Of course we have no feelings for you."

Lone chuckled. "You're just as cute as Soph is, but only when you're flustered. How weird."

Sophie just pouted as she held his hand. She didn't want to embarrass herself any further. "The three people from earlier are watching us. We're hiding our mouth from them since we are supposed to be mute, but what shall we do?"

Lone wore a serious expression. "I guess we find a deserted alley and confront them. Either that or we act like we haven't discovered them. What do you want to do?"

Sophie shrugged. "We are confident that we can handle them. Teleportation should be enough to cripple them."

"Morbid," Lone replied. "Fine. Let's find out what their goal is then."

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Five minutes later, Lone and Sophie were now in a fairly isolated road between two buildings. Hardly wide enough to be called a street, but not narrow enough to justify being an alleyway.

Books still held in his hand since he didn't want to expose his Dimensional Storage ability, Lone said aloud, "We know you're there. Come out now and explain why you're following us."

Sophie's face turned sour. "Lone, they left. As soon as you spoke, all three of them ran away."

Lone looked a bit surprised. He stored the books since no one was nearby anymore. He held his chin in one hand and his elbow in the other as he paced back and forth.

'Why did they run? Were they scared of us? No. I doubt that. I don't know if it's possible to detect strength at a higher rank, but I certainly can't at my current rank. If they could, then they'd know how weak we appear. Are they being cautious? Were they just curious about the new 'Golden Foxkin'? Were they scoping us out? I feel like it's the last one...' He continued like this for a few more minutes.

Finally finished with his train of thoughts, Lone turned to Sophie. "I've decided."

"Hmm?" Sophie raised an interested eyebrow.

"We're leaving this place. That shopkeeper said that Ranton was safer for demis. We'll go there for now. Do you mind teleporting us north as far as your mana will allow us?" he asked her seriously.

"What of the ship?" she replied with her own question.

Lone shrugged. "Who gives a fuck? I can create a new one at any time. We need to get out of Ros as fast as possible. Those people might not have had bad intentions, but we can't risk it."

Sophie nodded. "We can agree with that," she said before grabbing his arm and activating her unique skill. The two vanished instantly.

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Ten minutes later, in the city lord's keep, three men stood before the lord.

His flabby face wore a frown at these men not bowing or kneeling before him, but they were all B-rankers, so he couldn't risk offending them right now. "Well? I trust that you have good news?"

The middle man of the three, a tall fellow with a longsword strapped to his waist and a kite shield fixed to his back replied, "Yup. They're both H-rankers."

"Are you certain?" the lord questioned with his anxiety clearly on display.

The adventurer clicked his tongue and picked at his ear with his pinky. "Look, we did the job. Pay us. They're both H-rankers, okay?"

"Of course, of course. You," he said as he pointed at a servant, "go fetch me three white-gold coins."

A second adventurer, a short man with knives covering every inch of his leather-covered body asked, "What, ye don't 'ave the coins on 'and?"

The city lord wore an apologetic face. "No. I didn't expect you to accept the commission so fast, nor did I expect you to complete it so soon."

The last of the men, an intelligent-looking sort with rectangular glasses and a long robe on, stroked his beard and hummed lightly. "Understandable. We were rather fast." He readjusted his grip on his magic cane and smiled. 'Although, we only came to hand it in so soon since we were somehow detected. Thankfully, the commission was wholly for the information on their ranks. Such an easy job for so much money. Foolish noble. I wonder when he'll find out that his precious fox isn't even in Ros anymore?'

A few minutes later, the servant returned, and the men were paid. One white-gold coin was worth one-hundred gold coins, so they had made off quite handsomely.

The second they left the audience room, the city lord's face morphed into one of rage. "Impudent adventurers! Not showing me even a modicum of respect! If they weren't protected by the Grand Guildmaster, I'd have their blasted heads!"

A mere second later, the doors to the room swung open once more. Gazing at his new intruder, the city lord's face regained some composure. It was the blonde-haired rogue who was employed by him.

"Well? What have you come here for, Ceela?" He was certain that he had ordered her to watch the foxkin and the foreign noble until she was given further instructions.

"L-Lord Griffset... T-They disappeared... T-The two of them are no longer in Ros..." Her face was pale and her eyes were plastered to the floor as if she had been charmed by the velvet carpet.

"They... what?" The city lord was hoping that she was mistaken. "You were a fool to return if what you say is true. You know what becomes of those I deem incompetent, yes? Your life in Milindo will be over."

"Y-Yes, Lord Griffset. Please... command me to hunt them down. I will not fail you again. They simply used a trick on me. I won't be fooled twice," Ceela begged. What was waiting for her was a life worse than death should she not be given another chance.

Had she chosen to run, her family would be sold into slavery and she would have eventually been caught to join them in such a sorry existence. She couldn't allow that. She needed a second opportunity to prove her worth.

"Hmm... You are on thin ice after failing to secure the baby... Very well. They are only H-rankers, from what the adventurers claimed. I truly wish that I could punish them for keeping this from me. I'm sure they were aware. Every second wasted is another step taken by them away from Ros. Go. Find them. There will be no more chances." His eyes were cold, and despite his rotund figure and lacking strength, he was putting vast amounts of pressure on the C-ranked girl.

"Y-Yes! I won't fail you again, Lord Griffset!" She practically slammed her head onto the floor as a show of loyalty.

"Good. Should you find out that they have a set destination, return and bring Bastion with you. He needs the experience. Otherwise, offer to buy the fox from the noble girl. Should she decline an offer of ten ruby-gold coins, kill her. I'd rather acquire the fox legally to avoid any trouble, but the risk of killing her is worth it should she refuse the money." After saying that, the city lord didn't wait for a reply and left the hall.

He was hungry, so it was time for lunch. No matter the events of today, he still had to eat to maintain his overflowing 'health'.