"Lone, we're being followed," Sophie suddenly said as she and Lone were approaching the Bengon Forest.

"Oh? By who?" Lone questioned. 'Slavers maybe? Could always be adventurers. Maybe those bigots from before?'

"Children. Two of them. They're cloaked in magic to change their appearance, but we can tell that they are nothing but tykes. They are quite similar to you, actually," Sophie noted impassively.

"How so? Are they devilishly handsome?" Lone asked with a smirk on his face.

Sophie rolled her eyes. "Of course. Yes, they're devilishly handsome, even the girl. No, they have big bushy tails and fox ears on their heads."

"Foxkin? Interesting... Can you tell what colour their fur and hair is?" Lone was quite curious if they were being followed by his own kind or if they were of a different race of foxkin to himself.

The heavily-armoured girl shook her head. "No. We can only tell if an area contains light or if it doesn't. Light possesses magic in it, whereas the absence of light - darkness, is also absent of said magic. The only exception would be colours that have specifically been created with different types of mana in them, like our old home, the dimension we lived in for six centuries."

"Huh. That makes sense I guess. I've never really thought about it," Lone said as he held his chin in his hand. "Anyway, you said that they were disguising themselves with magic? What do they look like right now then?"

Sophie grinned. "Like the fools who we just defeated at the Adventurer's Guild."

"Interesting... I wonder what they want?" Lone muttered to himself.

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"We really shouldn't be doing this... I thought you were just going to tie his shoelaces together or something, not try to do... this," Trella complained as he looked down at his now much taller and lankier figure. "I hate this feeling. It's so icky..."

A big smile was spread across the short man's face who resembled the novice fire mage, Grindol. "Stop worrying so much! It's perfect! Sure, he might hit us with that lightning magic thingy, but I'm very confident that he won't kill us! This'll be great! He'll see that we're family and laugh it off!"

"Tiera, these kinds of schemes is why the next leader of our clan will be me, not you, even though you're older than me by a few minutes," Trella noted as he sighed with Quint's mouth.

"Meh. Who cares about being the smelly Matriarch? Pranks are fun!" Tiera bounced around excitedly as Grindol's ears twitched. "They stopped! Maybe they're taking a potty break? Let's do it now!"

Trella held his face in his hands. "Look, I'm not saying a word. This is all on you, Tiera. If we get hurt or annoy him, I'm telling on you to Grandmother."

"Boo! Just watch! It'll all go smoothly! As smooth as, uh, smooth stuff!" Tiera claimed, which only helped to reinforce Trella's lacking faith in her idea.

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Lone stirred the stew that was sitting over the campfire and savoured its lovely aroma. "Yup, food that I create is stupidly good."

Sophie ignored him as she polished her armour. Since they were having a 'break', she'd chosen to take advantage of this time to increase her skill with maintaining her armour and her swords.

Suddenly, Lone's fox-like ears twitched. "I can hear them. Well, at least they're not trying anything sneaky, I suppose. Kids are real cunts at being sneaky when they really want to be."

Raising his head, Lone saw 'Quint' and 'Grindol' approaching him and Sophie. The former looked nervous and very regretful while the latter had a certain twinkle in 'his' eyes.

"Can I help you two?" Lone asked as he carefully stood up and brushed off his dirty knees. "I'm pretty sure we settled everything back in the guild, didn't we?"

The short 'man', 'Grindol' confidently strode forward before 'he' put 'his' hands on 'his' waist and cackled like a cartoon villain would. "Give us yer money, or we'll steal the girl!"

Lone didn't look impressed. "Try to take her and you both die."

'That should be enough to scare them away, right? Then again, they might actually be super old if they're really foxkin like Sophie said... Hmm.' Lone wasn't particularly worried about any further escalation since they seemed... harmless? He didn't feel threatened by them, at least.

As he was setting up this camp, Sophie had told him that both of the foxkin tailing them could use magic, but they had only slightly more magic inside of them than an average Goblin Mage did. This told Lone that they probably weren't ranked very highly.

Sweat dripped down 'Grindol''s face. "Ahahaha... Um, give us all of your money, or, eh, we'll steal your clothes?"

'Dropped the accent already? Hmm... Well, since things aren't getting violent, can I assume that they come in peace? Let's tease them a bit to test the waters,' Lone decided.

He wore a disgusted look on his face as he glanced back and forth between the two 'men'. "She's just a kid. Not only are you an ageist and you a racist, but you're both pedos too? I feel like vomiting."

"Uh..." 'Grindol''s face was slowly becoming more sweat than skin. "N-Not your clothes then?"

Lone shook his head. "If anything, you two should be giving us your clothes."

"Wha?!" 'Grindol''s face had turned beet red while 'Quint''s face was being firmly held between his hands.

Lone tutted his tongue and went back to stirring the stew. "Don't you know that it's common amongst human bandits to leave a piece of their clothing with their victims? It's like a calling card. Most usually just leave a scrap of cloth. Considering your reaction, are you two really humans?"

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"Uh, o-of course we are!" In a mad attempt to prove 'himself', 'Grindol' took off 'his' belt and threw it to Lone.

As soon as it touched Lone's hand, the belt turned into a few motes of light and then reappeared around 'Grindol''s waist.

"Okay, that's enough playing around," Lone said, having decided that the two kids were, in fact, harmless. "Dispell the illusion and join us for some grub?"

"Eh?" 'Grindol''s body morphed into that of a small Foxkin girl with red hair and a single bushy tail while 'Quint' became a handsome young lad with three tails.

"I told you he wasn't stupid. He's a Golden Foxkin." Trella stepped forwards and bowed deeply. "I'm sorry for my sister's stupid actions. I couldn't convince her to act otherwise. She's the type to be even stupider if I try to get her to stop, so it's best if I play along and try to make sure nothing goes horribly wrong... I hope you can understand and forgive us."

Tears started bubbling out of Tiera's eyes. She ran up to Lone and stared up at his face accusingly. "How'd you see through my illusions?! I was really worried for a bit there, but if you knew all along, why didn't you play along?!"

Lone just laughed as he served the two children a bowl of his stew.

Sophie, however, had a fed-up look on her face. 'Fine, but once they're done, return control to us, okay? Yup! I promise.'

Her icy demeanour dissolved and was replaced by a brightly smiling face. "So fluffy..."

Soph ambushing the frantically swinging tail that was attached to Tiera's hips so quickly that her body hadn't ever shifted back to its ten-year-old version yet.

"Hya!" Tiera yelped in surprise as her back straightened up like a bow. She turned her head around as quickly as was physically possible before she asked, "Wha-wha-what are you doing?!"

"Savouring your floof," was the only reply that she was ever going to get.

Trella looked over at his twin anxiously. "Um, the human won't hurt Tiera, will she?"

Lone shrugged. "I doubt it. She loves fluffy things. It's been a while since she's done that to my tails. I wonder why she didn't go for you? You've got two more than your sister does."

Trella shuddered at the mere thought of being assaulted like that.

Lone smirked once he saw the fear-stricken look on the boy's face. "Anyway, mind telling me who you two are and why you were following us?"

"Uh, em, sure," Trella answered hesitantly as he kept his eyes off his sister who appeared to be struggling for dear life.

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"A baby Golden Foxkin, huh?" Lone asked rhetorically as he had finished listening to Trella's explanation for why he and his sister were in a fairly discriminatory human country.

Not realising that his question wasn't actually meant to be answered, Tiera nodded her head as she sucked down her third bowl of stew. "Yup! Grandma wanted us to find them, but even after spending two months here, all we could find out was that the baby was in Ranton somewhere."

'Well, you're only kids. You don't exactly strike me as master information gatherers. This 'Crimson Foxkin Clan Matriarch' must've been pretty fuckin' desperate to send kids over here,' Lone thought.

He stroked Soph's hair softly, making the girl who was resting on his lap smile in her sleep. "Well, I think it'd be better if you two went back to your clan. I'm not sure how common your illusion magic is, but I'm pretty certain you'll get found out eventually if you're not careful. From what I've heard, two cute kids like you would be enslaved pretty damned quickly."

Trella nodded sadly. "You're right. We were actually going to leave until Tiera found you. I guess we can go back though now that we've met."

Lone shook Soph awake and then stood up to stretch his back. "Sounds good. Tell your matriarch that I'm more than happy enough to talk to her if she comes to visit me in person. It's a shame you can't use that 'communication orb' of yours whenever you want, huh?"

"Yeah! It sucks! I wanna talk to Mum and Dad more often!" Tiera said loudly before she muttered, "It sucks that they're so sick..."

"Quest?" Soph asked in a dreamy voice as she rubbed her eyes.

As much as Soph wanted to avoid taking naps in the middle of the day, playing with Tiera's tail had really tuckered her out, so she'd slept a bit to make it easier on Sophie when she and Lone went hunting orcs. Yup. She definitely didn't just find Lone's lap and tails to be enticingly comfortable. Definitely.

"Yeah," Lone replied calmly. "The day isn't getting any younger, and I really would like to fight at least one or two orcs before the sun starts to set and we have to go back."

"Um, it was the Amberbark Inn you two were staying at, right?" Trella asked to double-check his info.

Lone smiled faintly. "Yes, the one run by the Lesher."

"I'll make sure to tell Gran-, em, the matriarch that that's where you're staying so she can visit you," Trella said as maturely as he possibly could.

Lone casually rubbed the boy's head. "Sounds good. Tell her I look forward to meeting her."

"We will!" Tiera answered in her brother's place. "Seeya later, Mister Lone! Soph!"

"Yeah, um, bye," Trella added a bit bashfully. He wasn't used to having his head rubbed like that, so he was a little bit flustered.

"Stay safe," Lone replied while Soph just waved slowly as the kids wandered away.

Soph returned control to Sophie who immediately demanded Lone to help her into her armour.

As Lone was finishing strapping her into her steel-reinforced platemail, Sophie asked him a question. "Why did you lie?"

"About?" Lone responded immediately.

"About looking forward to meeting their leader," Sophie elaborated.

Lone got up and, after finishing with her armour, shrugged. "I didn't have much choice. It's not like I could have just told them to go back in time and not tell their matriarch about me ever existing, now could I?"

Sophie raised an eyebrow at that.

Lone sighed. "You were awake in here, weren't you?" Lone asked as he lightly tapped the girl's exposed forehead with his index finger. "You heard him say that he was the next patriarch of their clan, right?"

"Yes... And do not touch our forehead without our permission," Sophie replied with a sulk as she put her helmet on.

Lone grinned at her timidity. "Well, why the fuck would the future leader of a clan of foxkin - which I'm assuming are powerful, be sent to a small human country that is widely known to enslave demis when it has the chance? Just to follow a lead on a Golden Foxkin baby? There's more to it than that, I suspect."

"Your meaning?" Sophie didn't quite follow.

"Well, there's all of these supposed legends about Golden Foxkin, right?" Lone said as he started walking towards the forest.

"Indeed. We've yet to hear a single one, but there certainly are legends, it would seem," Sophie answered.

"Right. Well, my current running theory is that the Crimson Foxkin Clan is in a war or something, so the matriarch is looking for a powerful ally to turn the tides. She sent the next leader away to avoid the flames of this war of theirs from reaching him since he's too young, or maybe to use his good-nature to win over a powerful expert to help back at the clan's base as they searched for the rumoured baby. Maybe only one of those, maybe all of them, maybe none. I'm just making assumptions here," Lone explained.

"And you didn't want to refuse or act rudely because you were afraid?" Sophie concluded.

Lone nodded. "Spot on. If this matriarch is coming to see me regardless due to my heritage, I see no reason in making her mad. Hell, it could even be a good opportunity to learn about my race, but I don't like it."

"Because you're a coward?" Sophie teased.

Lone scoffed. "No, because I'm a control freak, but right now, I'm far too weak to control anything, so I've gotta suck it up and try to make the flow that's pushing me, bend to my will at least a little bit."

"How childish," Sophie mocked.

Again, Lone shrugged. "Call me what you want. I dealt with enough of my life not being decided by me back on Earth, I won't let the same thing happen here. And so, let's go kill some Blue Orcs and rank up, shall we?" he asked with a smirk strewn across his lips.

Sophie smiled coyly beneath her helmet. "Yes, we shall." Her blood was pumping and she was more than ready to cut some lives short today.