Thunk!

「Eugh!…」

The mage grunts when he's shoved against the idling kubelwagen's side, still clutching at his fingers that are twisted the wrong way.

「Alright… I can guess why you tried to kill me, so I'll spare you that… Did you see a guy with stupid orange hair around here?」

With his fists on his hips, Straf asks the robed man while he's still recoiling in pain.

「…Ungh… Hnnghh… What?…」

The mage asks back, furrowing his brows and shrinking away from Straf and the girls while they surround him in a semicircle around the car.

「You heard me. Did you, or did you not? There should be speccy twerp with him, a plain girl who's not so plain under her robes, and a tall spearwoman with a horrible personality.」

Straf replies with a blunt tone as his face gains a hint of disdain. Stripe perks up and looks at Straf with shocked eyes at the mention of the plain girl.

「Wha…? No, I did not… Agh… I was waiting for you since the early sunrise…」

The mage shakes his head, clenching his teeth and wincing heavily. He looks at his hand then winces again, but from the visual discomfort of his fingers being bent the wrong way this time.

「…Please have mercy, I was ordered to do this.」

The man pleads, sweating profusely despite the cold.

「What is he saying?」

Cycelia asks, leaning aside slightly to get a better look at Straf's lightly frustrated face.

「Can't you hear? Begging for mercy like a sissy…」

Straf replies with a quick glance at her, then returns his gaze to the man while shaking his head in disapproval.

「…Who ordered you to do it? I want names. Addresses if they have 'em.」

He asks with an impatient nod up at the mage.

「Master Willow… Agh… Willow is the one who ordered it…」

The mage replies, pausing to groan in pain and leaning onto the car for support.

「Willow… Is that your boss?」

Straf echoes while briefly rubbing his chin. He then shrugs, and places his hand back on his hip in a fist, narrowing his eye at the mage.

「No- Well… He and Falcon are her Divine Embodiment's closest aides… He's the eldest, and he's a powerful mage, so he has a lot of pull by merit… Unghh…」

The man shakes his head, but quickly changes his mind and corrects himself. As soon as he's done explaining, he groans again and feebly leans onto the car with his elbow.

「What about the Divine Embodiment? Did she order me dead?」

「I don't know…」

Straf asks, and the man quickly returns another shake of his head with a weary face.

「What the fuck do you mean? Aren't you from the palace up there? Don't you all serve all her whims?」

Spreading his arms, Straf raises a brow and glances at the girls at his sides with a confused look on his face.

「We do, but…」

「But?…」

Straf echoes and waves a circle with his hand while the mage fights the pain in his hand while breathing heavily.

「…Look, it's no secret that her Divine Embodiment barely does anything. It's either the palace councilmen ordering things, or Willow. I don't know if it's her order, or Willow's.」

「So why the fuck did you tell me this Willow guy ordered it?」

「Because the guard who relayed the order to me said so! I can't be sure if it was his order, or just relayed to him from her Divine Embodiment! You know how it works!…」

Frustrated by Straf's accusatory tone, the man replies with a shout then returns back to clenching his teeth in pain while leaning against the car's door.

「Tsk… So maybe, maybe not… Guess I'll have to ask them myself… Alright, one last question…」

Fwap.

Straf reaches out and grabs the mage's robes, twisting them in his grip.

「Agh…?」

「…Are there any more assassins waiting for me? I'm getting kind of fucking tired of this shit. Can you guys limit it to once per level? Fuck.」

He asks the wincing man while he's looking at Straf's annoyed grimace with a frightened face.

「How am I supposed to know? You weren't meant to- I don't even know how you've survived this! I'm not even an assassin, I'm just a teleport mage! I send stuff and people here and there!」

The man replies, helplessly shrugging his shoulders with his brows furrowed in worry.

「Figured…」

Crossing her arms with a large sigh, Stripe chimes in with a remark in lowland common.

「Figured what?」

Thunk.

「Augh…」

Straf lets go of the mage, who stumbles back into the kubelwagen's side with another pained grunt.

「They're getting desperate. He's really not someone you'd send as an assassin. Not normally, at least. Have you noticed a pattern about them? And me?」

Stripe replies with a shrug, turning her golden eyes to Straf.

「Uhhhhhhhhh…」

He thinks, glancing back and forth at the mage and her for a few moments each.

「I'll give you a hint… The palace doesn't like messy deaths. A fall from that height would be anything but a clean death.」

She spreads her clawed hands and glances at Cycelia and Nona. Lily simply continues glaring at the robed man with a face of masked frustration and disdain.

「…Nope. I give up.」

Straf replies, shrugging with a bored grimace on his face. Stripe lets out an exasperated sigh.

「All of them are covert. True, there are people like Oleander, who the public pretty much knows that exist, but none can really prove it. She's like a scarecrow for corrupt officials…」

She begins explaining, turning her gaze to the frightened and pained mage who listens to her talk in a foreign language, looking at her with confused eyes.

「…But a random government official turning up dead somewhere isn't exactly interesting enough to make the people blab. Sure, rumors will start, but they'll end as rumors…」

「…And if they're using teleport magic for assassinations, they've decided to forgo subtlety, and are grasping at straws?」

With her head tilted, Lily blinks her scarlet eyes at Stripe. Straf glances at them while the two look at each other.

「…Yeah. And I'm fairly sure their desperation has to do with how close to the palace we are. If they let someone marked for death in, they'd have to kill themselves from shame.」

Stripe nods, then shrugs and turns her eyes up at the cloud-shrouded palace atop the nearby mountain.

「Hmpf. Pathetic. Can you believe it Straf? It's their most desperate attempt at your life yet, and you've practically laughed it off. This pathetic land has no right of existence…」

Lily scoffs and looks up at Straf's bored, nonchalant grimace.

「Hey, don't be like that!… It's plagued, okay? They have a lot of problems, but they're doing their best!」

Furrowing her brows, Stripe protests at Lily's comment. Lily returns her scarlet eyes back to her golden ones.

「Plagued by humans, I'm sure.」

Lily casually replies with a completely ordinary if a little disdainful tone, then loses interest in the conversation and turns away.

「Alright… Everyone, get back in. Guess we'll have to look for them in town by ourselves…」

Fwapf!

Straf declares, grabbing the mage and shoving him aside off the road. He stumbles a few steps more, visibly relieved as Straf and the rest get back into the kubelwagen.

「…You're lucky Lia's with me, dipshit, and Nona is here to even things out…」

Straf says while pointing his finger at Cycelia. A little confused while settling into her seat, she perks up. Straf then points his finger at Nona, who smiles at the mage.

The man shrinks with a frightened grimace on his face, gulping nervously.

「…Remember this! I could have let Lily punch you a few times, or worse, I could have done it myself!…」

Pointing at Lily, Straf shouts at the mage, then presses his foot down on the formerly gas pedal.

Vrrrrrrrrrooooooommmmmmmmm!…

「…Go play dice! It's your lucky day, fucker!」

He adds while peering out of the car's side while he speeds off towards the mountain's foot, leaving the man with twisted fingers behind…

Stolen story; please report.

…

Half an hour later, outside a city gate, at a mountain's foot…

Vrrrrroooooooommmmm…

Straf lifts his boot off the pedal and slows down to talk to the two very confused armored men standing guard at the gate. The two exchange baffled glances as Straf rolls up.

「Hey! Did you see a tiny guy with massive orange hair around here?」

Leaning outside the kubelwagen's side, he calls out to one of the guards.

「Wha…? Orange-? Yeah, we did!…」

Though briefly confused, the guard nods his lobster-tailed helmet as he approaches the driver's side.

「…His party came very early in the morning. They were pretty badly roughed up. Are they your friends?」

The guard adds, leaning in a little and hanging his weight on his spear as he looks at Stripe and the rest in the car.

「Roughed up? What the fuck happened?」

Straf tilts his head in confusion, narrowing his eye at him. Straf glances aside at Stripe, who is equally confused.

「They ran into demons. It looked like the women were mostly fine, the one with the spear had a few scratches, but the men were in a bad shape.」

The guard explains with a shrug of his armored shoulders. Stripe gains a nervous and concerned grimace on her face.

「I thought the demons were up north?」

Straf remarks with a confused shrug of his hand.

「…Yeah. We thought so too.」

The guard nods after an awkward pause and a face matching Stripe's, exchanging a worried, knowing look with her.

「…So, where are they now? They went into the city, right? 」

「Yeah, they did… They're probably still at the clinic. Like I said, those two looked like they were in a pretty bad shape.」

Straf asks, and the guard straightens out as he nods, turning his gaze towards the city's gate and the other guard still standing beside it.

「Where is it?」

「Ask around. It's hard to miss.」

The guard replies as he walks off to return to his spot with a shrug.

「I think I might know. I'm not certain, but I think I know where it is.」

Stripe says to Straf as he fiddles with the gear stick.

「Where is what?」

Cycelia asks, blinking her emerald eyes at Stripe.

Vrrrrrroooooooommmmmm!…

「…The clinic. He said Greaves and his party ran into demons.」

Stripe replies with a concerned look on her face as Straf rolls into the busy city streets. The people inside the city jump out of the way of the car as it rolls towards them.

「What!?…」

Cycelia's eyes widen in shock as her brows furrow. Stripe points her finger for Straf to take a turn, and he begins spinning the steering wheel…

…

Less than fifteen minutes later, in the center of the Palace Town, in a clinic…

Shirtless and covered in bloodied bandages from his waist up, Will is lying on a bed behind a cloth curtain. He opens his weary eyes, rubs his face with his hand, then lifts his arm up to look at his bandaged forearm. He looks aside, but can only see another curtain. Someone violently coughs at least a few beds away, and an intensely irritating, sharp smell of burning bark fills the room. A door slides open with a gust of cold wind and a rustle of curtains.

Will closes his eyes in an attempt to get some more sleep, but opens them a difficult to determine moment later, when he's almost certain that he has just heard a frustratingly familiar voice.

Someone approaches his bed while a woman shouts something in a foreign language.

Fwappff!

The curtains fly aside, revealing Straf's smirking face.

「Oh no…」

Will turns his gaze away with a groan.

「What the fuck do you mean, oh no? Oh no was my initial reaction, but then I learned it was just you two who got your shit kicked in, so then I was like heh.」

Straf asks, throwing his hands up before placing his fists on his hips.

「…Please just leave me alone… If I have to spend mental energy on you, I might actually die.」

Will sighs out with a fatigued and dismayed expression on his face while staring at the ceiling with weary eyes.

「Woooow. I came to visit you pricks and this is the kind of thanks I get? For shame…」

Straf replies, spreading his arms. He turns around and walks away from Will's bed, shaking his head.

「Are you done bothering my patients?」

A serious-faced woman in her 30s with a long, thin smoking pipe in her hand asks Straf as he returns to her desk at a wall while she's sitting on a simple stool.

「I only wanted to bother two of 'em. So, how are they?…」

Straf asks while the woman places the pipe between her lips and draws from it. She exhales a puff of smoke, intensifying the sharp smell of burning bark.

「…And do you really have to smoke that shit? Fuckin' smells terrible.」

He adds, waving some of the smoke away from his face with an annoyed grimace. The woman leans back with her elbow on her desk.

「It's an acquired taste. And beats catching whatever the desperate cherry blossoms drag in here with them…」

The woman replies and takes another draw of her pipe. With the smoke still in her mouth, she stubs the rest of the contents onto a small ash-filled tray on her desk.

「Cherry blossoms? You mean like on a tree?…」

Straf narrows a confused eye at her.

「…Pffooo… If you don't know, then you don't know…」

She casually says while spewing out smoke from her mouth.

In the background, though she's rather displeased with the interaction, Stripe is discussing something with Oleander. Cycelia and Nona are talking to the weary, albeit smiling Alicia on her bed.

「…The short boy was wounded the worst. I took care of him first. Rather than having one grievous wound, he had many, many serious ones instead…」

The woman in plain kimono begins explaining, turning her eyes towards Greaves, who is turned away from the commotion in the clinic and desperately trying to sleep.

「…Then the glasses. He wasn't in any better shape, but he wasn't as injured. Rather than injuries themselves, the issue was how long they were left untended…」

She turns her gaze to Will, who is covering his eyes with his bandaged arm.

「…The spearwoman. Funny story. She had minor scratches here and there, as well as her face. I thought she could wait… Then when I took a look at her, she no longer needed help. Strange…」

The woman looks at the only bed still covered by the curtains, then lets out an amused huff with a shrug of her shoulders.

「…And that girl… Well, she was just exhausted and cold. She'll get better if she's just allowed to rest a little. The short one might take a while, but I think they'll be fine.」

She then turns her eyes to Alicia, and shrugs as she looks back at Straf's bored face. Their eyes meet.

「And they already paid?」

Straf asks with a glance over his shoulder at the beds.

「They did… But don't get me wrong, I don't ask dying people if they have money. I treat them first, then ask for compensation. Even if wouldn't pay, I'd still treat them…」

The woman nods, then adds a shrug of her hands with a light smirk on her face.

「Mighty kind-hearted of you…」

He remarks with a brow raised and his eye warily narrowed.

「Hmpf. You think?… Then you misunderstand. I'd treat them because corpses don't pay. If my clinic's full, well…」

She lets out an amused huff, briefly lowering her head before returning her amused face up to Straf.

「…I'll prioritize my well-paying customers, so to say. It's a business I do for a living. I've seen a lot of those kind-hearted clinics go out of business like that, treating those who can't pay.」

The doctor woman adds with a nonchalant shrug of her hands.

「You mean someone has to pay for free healthcare? Who would have thought.」

Straf scoffs, rolling his eyes.

「You laugh, but I frequently get accused of being greedy and stone-hearted. I don't want to end up like those kind-hearted clinics' doctors… Working in a pleasure house. Unbelievable.」

The woman replies with a serious face as her amused smirk fades. She shakes her head, turning her frustrated gaze aside.

「Working as a doctor, right?」

Straf asks with a raised brow. The woman returns her eyes back to his.

「I'll let you figure that out. Is that all?」

She asks with a nod up at Straf, then tilts her head.

「I guess.」

He shrugs in response and places his hands back in his pockets as he walks up to Stripe and Oleander.

「Straf…」

Stripe looks at Straf's bored grimace with a serious, concerned face.

「Sooo… Guess our vacation is getting more and more fucked, huh?」

Straf says to both of them with his mouth scrunched to the side.

「I have no idea why would the demons wander this far south… Unless…」

Stripe says, lowering her chin into her thumb and finger with her brows pensively furrowed.

「Unless?…」「…Unless?」

Straf and Oleander echo back.

「…Unless the demon lord is planning an attack nearby. It may even have been the very shrine we were staying over at. Greaves and his party might have saved the shrine maiden, but…」

Stripe replies with concern in her golden eyes.

「But?」

Straf nods while waiting for more, leaning in with his brows raised.

「…I don't know. Something is off about this. The demons eventually backed off… That's not what they usually do. Why were they there?」

Stripe replies with a helpless shrug and lowers her head again, grimacing heavily in deep thought while mumbling to herself…