With her eyes forced shut, it takes Stripe a moment to realize that she is still alive. She brushes the palm of her free hand against her throat, and opens her eyes to look at the blood.

「…Eh?」

She lets out a surprised utterance when she sees her palm is mostly dry, aside from the sweat. Most of the surprise comes from the fact that her hand is clean, bloodless.

Her confusion only grows when she realizes she's clutching onto her empty fist. Both of her hands are empty. Her heart beats like a horse gallop, and she feels a strange sense of relief mixed with intensifying panic. Her eyes rise to the group that cornered her to try and look for answers. The first thing that she can see is that someone is standing directly in front of her.

「You are sure quick to pick a permanent solution to a temporary problem…」

Straf casually remarks, holding her dagger in his fingertips by its blade, leisurely examining it with his other hand in his pocket.

「What?…」

Utterly confused, terrified, relieved, she stares at her dagger in his hand. Straf turns his bored eyes to hers.

「…You'd only temporarily be in prison. Getting hanged is probably better than cutting your throat, honestly. Getting any of your vital bits slashed kind of sucks.」

He explains, flipping the dagger perfect 180 degrees, catching it on its blunt hilt with his index finger, then the tip of its blade while he looks into her jittery golden eyes.

「So…」

Straf flips the dagger one more time, and grabs its hilt with an exaggerated swing of his hand.

「…I know there's a lot of vampires in the city. At this point, I'm surprised they didn't name a vampire street「The Suck」or something like that…」

He continues, shrugging his shoulders as he grimaces and rolls his eyes while he speaks. Stripe continues staring at him completely frozen, listening, but not quite processing anything.

「…But what's more surprising is how many demons are roaming the city. Did you figure that since vampires are welcome, it's open doors to demons too?」

He asks, spreading his hands with her knife in one of them. She blinks, completely perplexed, gently shaking her head in confusion.

「W- What?…」

She meekly asks in a quiet voice, stammering.

「…You could have at least changed your hat since you ran into Nona. Didn't you think of that? I bet you could hide your horns in a top hat-」

Instead of elaborating, Straf asks another question while he pulls her cloth hat off her head before she can even react.

「Ah.」「Ah…」

They both let a surprised sound. Stripe is surprised her hat is now hanging from Straf's hand in front of her, and he is surprised by her black-yellow striped animal ears, like those of a cat.

They stare at each other in silence, blinking in slack-jawed shock while Greaves and his group cautiously draws near. Straf throws the dagger away into [Portable Storage].

「…Jackpot.」

He grins as he pulls out the slave collar from the purple vortex.

Perhaps it's his mischievous grin, perhaps it's the sight of the iron collar in his hand, or maybe it's just a pure panic reaction, but Stripe lets out a whimper and runs.

「Hey! Get back here, stand still! I don't want to be rough while putting this on!」

With her eyes wide open and teeth clenched in panic, she runs at the group blocking her off to break through. Confused, they stare at her for a few seconds.

Then, they step aside and reluctantly let her through. They turn their eyes to Straf with furrowed brows and concerned faces.

「Why'd you let her pass!? What are you doing!?」

He shouts, running past them after her with his hands spread in outraged disbelief.

「You're just playing with her…」

Will replies and adjusts his glasses. He lets out a sigh, and they follow after the two with in an unrushed step.

After looking over her shoulder at Straf while he's chasing her like a monster in a horror movie, she turns the corner.

Clack.

In a true horror movie monster fashion, he appears in front of her again. She feels cold metal around her neck, and hears a lock latch around it.

「Now… Let's make one thing clear. You ran into it, that means you consented. Basically, you're my slave now-」

Straf explains with his index finger extended while Stripe fidgets with the collar to try and get if off. After a few moments, she abandons the effort and decides to run.

「Hey! I'm not done explaining! Banks aside, do you really want to remain ignorant about your slavery!?」

He throws his arms up, watching her flee in panic. Greaves and his group turns the corner to the short road, only to see a mere glimpse of Straf before he disappears again.

「W- What!?」

Stripe shouts as Straf appears before her once more. Despite the fact this isn't the first time, it is just as surprising as the first one.

「I'm not done explaining. Now stop running and listen to me. If you try to run now, the collar will-」

Before Straf can fully explain, Stripe turns the other way and runs.

「For fuck's sake…」

He sighs out, heavily scrunching his mouth while his frustrated eyes glance sideways.

Crackle…

「Agh…」

A tingly, painful, sharp stabbing sensation suddenly begins hurting Stripe's neck. While at first it's enough to make her wince and clench her teeth from the pain, after a few more steps, the odd crackling noise from the collar grows louder, and the feeling quickly turns unbearable. Distracted by the pain, she stumbles.

Crack-crackle! Zap!

「Agh! Ghrghhh!…」

She lets out a pained groan and falls to her knees, tugging at her collar to make it stop, or at least make it better. Suddenly, the crackling goes silent, and the pain disappears.

「Haaaah…. Haaaah…」

Stripe breathes heavily while she's recovering from the faint remnants of the pain still lingering.

「…I was trying to tell you… If you run, you'll get zapped, so don't try to run or the collar will hurt you-」

Straf explains, still holding her cloth hat in one hand. She quickly shoots back up to her feet.

Zzzap! Zap-zap!

「Gahh! Grrrgggghhhh!…」

Before she can take more than a single step, the collar applies more painful shocks to her neck. She crumbles back down.

「…What did I tell you? Stop running if you don't want to get hurt.」

He sighs and asks, walking up with one hand in his pocket, and one holding a hat.

「…What did you do to me!?…」

She asks with her voice raised, glaring at Straf with hatred plainly visible in her slit pupils, but also obvious fear in her golden eyes and voice.

「It should be pretty obvious. I enslaved you with a magic collar.」

He nonchalantly shrugs as he replies. Greaves, Will, Lian, and Alicia finally catch up, slowly approaching them.

Stolen story; please report.

「You- W- W-… What!?」

Stripe exclaims with her brows raised in disbelief, clutching onto the slave collar with her clawed fingertips. Her eyes quickly jump to the adventurer party, then to Straf.

「By the way, the collar will punish you if you don't do what I say. So you better do everything-」

While Straf is explaining, she lifts her pant leg a little. Stripe quickly draws a small knife sheathed above her ankle and shoots up to her feet.

Zzap! Zap! Zap! Zap!… Clank-clank…

The knife bounces off the cobblestones as it slips from her clawed hand.

「Gyyyyagggghhhh! Nrrgrggghhh!… Gnnnhhhhgh!…」

Straf's brows rise, and she drops back down to the ground, groaning and moaning in agony while writhing and flopping around like a fish out of water.

Zap! Zap! Zap!…

「You fffucker!… Grrrhngh!… I'm going to kill you!…」

Stripe exclaims, glaring at Straf with an expression of pure hatred while the collar continues to punish her.

「…By the way, it's going to punish you if you think about killing me, too, so better cut that out or you'll get hurt.」

Zap zap zap…

「Gnnnnnnrrrrrggh!… Hnnnnrrrgggghhhhh!… Aaaaaaaagh!…」

The golden-eyed woman tries to hold the pain in and reach for the knife, but it quickly becomes too much to bear and she starts screaming in pain. Her voice echoes through the empty streets of the warehouse district. Greaves and Will glance at each other with very similar expressions to each other, then turn their eyes back to Straf.

Zzzap. Zzzap…

「Hyaaaaaaaggghhhhh!… Gyyyaaaaaaaahh!… Aaaaaaaa!…」

「Straf, isn't that enough? Stop it already.」

Will says with a troubled grimace on his face, pointing his hand at the woman rolling around and screaming on the ground.

Zap…

「Nngggggggghghhhhh… Mgggggghhhhhhhhhh… Gruhhhhghhhhhh…」

「Hey, she can stop it herself. She's getting zapped because she's actively thinking about killing me. All she has to do for it to stop is to, well, stop.」

Straf calmly explains with his hands spread while her screams turn into high-pitched, agonized moans that seemingly grow weaker and weaker with each one.

Zzzap… Zzzap…

「…Mmmmhhhhhmmmmmm… Nnnnnnnnhhhhh… Hnnnnnhhhhhh…」

「…Hey, I'm fairly sure it can't shock you to death, but… Are you sure you want to test that out?」

With his fists on his hips, he leans forward, looking down at the woman. Her pained moans are now just strained exhales, and she appears to be too weak to even roll around anymore.

Suddenly, the collar goes completely quiet. Greaves and Will look at each other with concerned faces.

「…Haah… Haaah….」

「…Aaand there, she stopped.」

The woman is now back to breathing heavily, as if she just returned from an exhausting run. She rolls onto her back and stares blankly at the evening sky with her brows furrowed.

「…Haaah…. Haaah… Haaah…」

Her face is covered in sweat and twisted into an extremely fatigued grimace. She looks like she could fall asleep in the next minute if left unattended.

Still panting, she covers her golden eyes with her forearm.

「…What did you do to her?」

Will asks, and adjusts his glasses.

「Magical slavery.」

Straf nonchalantly declares.

「Straf!… That's illegal!」

Will's head perks up in surprise, and he replies with his voice raised.

「Mmmmmmhh… Actually, she gave me her consent, so it's more like a fetish rather than the type of slavery where you get sent to a coal mine.」

Straf briefly glances up and aside, thinking before he shrugs his shoulders.

「She… What? When did that happen?」

「When she put her neck into the collar, obviously.」

Will asks, and Straf replies as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, pointing his hand at Stripe on the ground.

She sits up, elbows resting on her knees, and her hands hanging limp off of them. Her face bears an unmistakable expression of exhaustion, resignation, and defeat.

「…She's not hurt, is she?」

Will adjusts his glasses while looking at the woman sitting on the ground. She stares blankly at her feet.

「Oh, she is, it's just it's not the kind of hurt that heals. Watch…」

Straf replies, and scoops her knife off the ground. He flips it in his hand, and holds the handle out for her.

「…Put this away where it was.」

He nonchalantly says while looking into her golden, half-open eyes.

「Wh-? Straf, I don't think it's a good idea-」

Will chimes in, and goes silent when the woman takes the knife after briefly looking at it, then Straf's face.

Albeit reluctant at first, she obediently lifts her pant leg and places it back in its sheath at her ankle, then secures it. She avoids eye contact with Straf the entire time.

「See? No pain. Now get up.」

He briefly spreads his hands, then gestures her up with a wave. She stands up and wobbles a little on her feet. Her tired eyes look at Straf, possibly in search for some mercy.

「…So she can't hurt you or run from you if you order her not to?」

Will walks up, adjusting his glasses.

「Yup.」

Straf replies with a proud nod of his head.

「…That's a pretty useful tool for arrests.」

Will nods, and adjusts his glasses again.

「Interrogations too, probably. You can just order them to tell you stuff.」

Straf's face gains a grin, and he holds the hat out for the woman.

「N- No, that's… That'd be a pretty foul way to go about things.」

Will stammers, shaking his head with his brows furrowed.

「Here. I thought you were hiding horns or something.」

Straf says, then shrugs. Her eyes briefly glance at the hat, then drift away.

「…I don't want it…」

She looks aside as she says in a completely dejected, crestfallen tone with absolutely no energy in her voice.

「…Right. I'll just put it away for later. I'm going to take her to the palace and explain what happened to Lia. What are you going to do?」

He returns Stripe a little nod of his head, grimacing slightly, then throws her hat into [Portable Storage]. He then turns his eyes to Will and Greaves.

「Well, since the intruder is caught… I suppose we'll head back and report too.」

Will briefly look at Lian, Greaves, and Alicia, before shrugging and adjusting his glasses.

「Okay. Let's go, then.」

Straf nonchalantly walks off towards the palace with his hands in his pockets. Stripe obediently follows as if she was a pet on a short, invisible leash.

Will and the rest glance at each other one last time with light disbelief in their eyes, before joining him on his way back.

The group remains awkwardly silent for a few moments. Will then finally decides to speak.

「That magic of yours, the one that lets you disappear and appear in another place… What is it, really? Teleportation?」

Will asks, looking at Straf's profile from behind him. He peeks at him over his shoulder.

「None of your business.」

Straf nonchalantly replies, and turns his head forward. Straf's new slave ignores the conversation, walking with her head lowered, and her golden eyes on her feet..

「Time magic? It doesn't seem like teleportation. You always react to everything before anyone else can-」

「None of your business.」

Walking with his hands in his pockets, he repeats in a more insistent tone, without turning his head towards him this time.

「…Fine. I won't pry. Keep your secrets.」

A little frustrated and disappointed, Will shrugs and turns his bespectacled gaze aside, adjusting his glasses. They return back to the palace in a painfully awkward silence…