Near noon we reached Lardon the largest city in the northern part of human territory, the funnel for dwarven and elven goods into the capital. Being situated in the north, it was also the largest supplier of raw natural resources such as wood, ores and various plants. Naturally as the first princess Gwyn is supposed to go greet Baron Burbus Von Helvick even if they did not plan to stay the day here. "Why do I have to go visit that old man, let's just drop off the criminals and go."
"You can't do that Princess, there are formalities you have to follow."
"Then you take care of it Tarbalt, I'll be at adventurers guild training grounds." Saying thus Gwyn started walking away from the mansion in the center of the city, with the rest of the men laughing lightly at Tarbalt's predicament.
"Shin, please say something." Turning towards me he had a begging look on his face.
"Hey hey Shin what's that over there?" Lily was fluttering about an accessories cart while drawing lots of attention.
"Pri- Gwyn, I'll train with you later today so go talk to the Baron, faster we get it done the faster we can leave." In addition to the looks redirected from Lily to me there were also various glares and gazes of amazement when I called Gwyn so casually.
"Alright, let's go Tarbalt!" Switching directions Gwyn started dragging Tarbalt at a fast pace towards the mansion, well I call it training but I have no clue how to teach people.
Ignoring the looks I faced the stall and saw the piece of accessory Lily was pointing at, it was a simple silver hair clip with a blue butterfly made from a crystal like material. "That's for holding your hair in place."
"Hmm... Shin make one for me!" The old man that was running the stall smiled warmly at us as Lily said that with her eyes sparkling.
"Maybe later, how much will that hair clip be?"
"That'll be five silver coins," Despite his warm and homely look it would seem that he was trying to bump up the price. With the ornament certainly looks pretty and expensive it was made from a simple blue crystal that wasn't worth much at all, in fact I have a ridiculous amount of it in my inventory from when we were hollowing out the mountains.
"Here you go," Reaching into my pockets I brought out five silver coins, it's not that big of a difference that I need to make a fuss about it plus Lily seems to really like it.
"Thank you for your purchase," After counting the coins the old man reached underneath the stall likely into a compartment and brought out an identical piece. Is it just me or was the crystal glowing...
"Wait Lil-" As soon as Lily touched the hair pin, she along with the stall and merchant disappeared. Sighing I released the restrain on Sense Presence and searched for Lily. It seems like she was teleported to the far side of the city, I tapped Fergul's shoulder as he was issuing orders to the men. "It's fine, I'll go by myself. Just take care of the thugs and I'll be back before Gwyn's done with her greetings."
"Eh, you know where she is? No, either way you should take some men with you. I know you're strong but one shouldn't be careless."
I activated Killing Intent (Restraint 99%), "It's fine, Lily could escape by herself but... well knowing her she'll wait for me. Plus I don't want to accidentally hurt one of you guys."
"Er-uh, okay... be careful though alright?" I hate high level skill sometimes, despite being at the lowest possible setting Fergul was still shivering a bit.
"Yeah, I will."
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"Where's Dooza right now?" The old man was busy making preparations to leave, on a crate nearby Lily was sitting in one of the cages with a collar on her.
"Wasn't he going to Ortelle because of the situation there? Think he was going to make some trades with Lord Houd." A middle aged man with a muscular build and short cut hair replied to him.
"You sure about trusting him with a fairy?" A young man, not much more than a boy was standing next to Lily's cage and poking at the bars with a dagger. "Didn't he already get caught by the Princess before? And this time you kidnapped the fairy from the First Princess's men didn't you?"
"Leave the fairy alone she's precious merchandise and Dooza's good at what he does. He's a crafty sly merchant but honest, he has an image to uphold after all." Grabbing several accessories as well as a sword and a blanket he walked towards Lily, kicking several small scrap papers on the ground in the process. "Don't know why you can't be marked as a slave but be quiet otherwise we'll have to get a little rough with you."
"Shin's coming to rescue me you know, " In her hand she still held the accessory from before although the crystal was cracked, "You should run if you don't want to be hurt."
"We're across the city from where we were, there's no way he would be able to find us." Putting on several of the bracelets on his hand the man covered Lily's cage with the blanket then picked her up. "Let's go, Bob should have the wagon ready by now."
Creaking the door to the warehouse slowly opened revealing the silhouette of a big bald man. "Right on time, let's move before the guards start searching."
"Tch, boring." As the three men start to move Bob remained unresponsive.
"Hey Shin!" The cage that contained Lily burst apart, the collar that had been on her neck was nowhere to be seen as she flew up with ample amounts of sparkles.
"Wha- how'd you get out?!?!"
"Oi, old man you didn't put the wrong collar on her did you?" The collar was specifically made to prevent the casting of magic.
"Of course not, I'm not that senile yet, just catch her quickly." As the two older men fused over Lily the younger one was looking at the doorway where a tiny amount of killing intent leaked out with a grin on his face.
"I don't know how you got here so fast but entertain me a bit will you?" Reaching into his pockets the boy threw a glass ball at the doorway. On impact the glass shattered releasing a fiery explosion causing the other two men to cover their heads in panic.
"What are you doing? Are you trying to get us caught?" As the old man was lecturing the boy the other man finally noticed the presence at the door.
Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
"That was quite heartless, wasn't he your friend?" Standing there admist the burning edges of the building calmly and untouched was a man in black clothing, Bob was collapsed in a pile right outside behind him. "Well I highly doubt you will but if you surrender I promise not to hurt you... much."
"You two get him while I catch the fairy," Saying so the old man pointed one of his rings towards Lily, glowing the ring created a downward draft of air pulling Lily slowly towards the ground.
"That tickles Shin," Giggling Lily rolled around a couple times in mid air as the magic from his ring was canceled.
"Wha-" Confusion was painted on the old man's face as the body of his guard slammed through several crates, one arm bent badly with bone protruding from his flesh. Turning around the man saw Shin standing beside the boy and without any visible emotion Shin started casually walking towards him.
Mumbling a continuous string of gibberish the boy was curled up into a ball, his arrogant attitude and daggers no where to be found. What had happened in this short period of time, there wasn't even a sound between him giving his orders and the man crashing into the boxes from behind him at all.
"So, will you surrender or am I going to have to... immobilize you." Who was he? Searching in his memories for any mention of a person like Shin the old man came up with nothing. It definitely wasn't that his information wasn't extensive enough, for someone like him that dabbled in the dark side of society he made sure to make note of people he should be wary of. "I'll take that as a no."
"Damn it!" The old man thrust his hand out towards Shin but nothing happened. "What did you do!??!" As he shouted at Shin he was looking down at the bracelets and rings that he had on, none of them were responding.
"Simply an Anti-Magic Barrier, I figured you would have a means of escape for emergencies." Shin shrugged, "It's a must for evil doers is it not?" Stating so in an indifferent tone Shin walked up to the man with a fist raised.
"Wait! I surrender, please don't hurt me." Dropping to his knees the old man bowed his head, he would have a chance to escape if the anti-magic barrier goes down, but someone who could use an anti-magic barrier. Just who was this Shin person.
"Shin I want some candy," Lily floated down and onto Shin's shoulder, "The blue one that fizzes up." Shin looked at Lily a bit and blinked.
"Okay, let me just make sure he doesn't get away first."
"Oh and I don't want this anymore," Lily dropped the broken hair clip into the old man's hands, "I want one made by Shin." Shin looked down at the man for a second then back to Lily, scratching his head he started leaving.
"Alright, I make you one when I fix Gwyn's sword okay?" Pulling out a miniature blue candy he put it into Lily's open mouth before patting her head a bit, "Sorry I didn't stop you, although you should stop getting caught on purpose."
"Eh... but I want you to rescue me," Lily leaned over and kissed Shin on the cheek, "You're my knight after all."
As the noise of the two faded and the sound of guards rushing to the scene was being heard the old man just sat there looking down at the hair clip. His body was lax and drool was leaking out of his mouth and strange baby like sounds were coming from his mouth, almost as if his mind had regressed back to that of a newborn's. This would later go down in history as the second most disturbing arrest the guards had ever made in the city.
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"Are you two alright? No injuries or anything?" Tarbalt was fussing over us when we got back to the group, in fact there was a good amount of the cities guards gathered seemingly ready to start a search.
"Shin rescued me!" Lily exclaimed loudly raising a fist into the air.
"Yeah we're fine."
"Ar-are you sure? Lily's mouth looks a little blue." The two men in the group who knew healing spells was walking towards us.
"Perfectly fine, Lily's mouth is blue because of the candy so nothing big." A little too much candy, I need to make sure Lily properly brushes her teeth tonight.
"Okay all solved, let's go!" Gwyn clapped her hands then waved for the guards to leave, "I'm looking forward to tonight Shin." Tarbalt looked at us in concern one last time before turning towards what I think is the captain of the guards and bowed his head with an apology about the commotion.
"Shin I want another candy." Lily opened her mouth and closed her eyes, "Ahhhhhh."
"No more, you already had three." Looking at her pouting face I pulled out a small glass of apple juice, "Fine drink this but no more until dinner."
"Yay!" Grabbing the cup eagerly Lily started drinking the sweet juice.
You really are acting a lot like an over doting and over protective parent right now.
Due to your actions you have gained new titles:
Doting Father - You gain + or - 1000 Reputation with kids and mothers .
Over Protective Father - You gain + or - 1000 Reputation with kids and mothers.
Internally sighing I ignore Karen and the title to the best of my ability, the amount of useless stuff I've got in the list of titles and achievements over the past two years vastly out number the amount of actually useful stuff.
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*Note - Clarification of what happened to the young man: Intimidation (No Restraint) + Killing Intent (No Restraint) is quite traumatizing. X.X going to bed, cut a bit into my sleep time to finish this (although I slept directly after work which led to this situation)
Edit: Don't think anyone saw it but wrong title >.< ("Capital" will be the next chapter and be out during the weekend sometimes, it will be a longer chapter)