Half an hour ago, outside of Cycelia's inn room…

Cycelia exits her room and locks the door with her key. She puts it back in her coat pocket, and heads down the stairs.

「Excuse me… Do you have baths? I can't sleep, so I thought about taking a bath…」

She asks the bulky man at the counter. He raises his brows, then nods.

「Hm? Yeah. We keep buckets of water warm here by the hearth, take two if you want to take a bath, but bring them back when you're done.」

With his bulky arms crossed, the innkeeper nods up at the wooden buckets by the crackling flame. The cast iron pot full of stew bubbles quietly while hanging over the hearth behind him.

「Hnnn… Hup!…」

Cycelia walks behind the counter and takes the handles of two water-filled buckets into her hands. She straightens out, grunting and straining heavily.

「Thank you… I'll bring… Them back… Soon. Hnnfff.」

Splosh. Splosh. Splash…

With small and heavy steps, she walks with the buckets towards a hallway beside the stairs. The innkeeper furrows his brows.

「Eh? They're not that heavy… Do you need help, lady?」

He asks, but Cycelia shakes her chestnut head as she walks off and disappears behind the corner. He shrugs, then continues watching the patrons…

…

Less than an hour later, in the inn's bathroom…

Splash!…

「Ahhhhh… There's no way I won't fall asleep now… I'm already feeling a little drowsy…」

Cycelia lets out a large, contented sigh. With her chestnut hair damp, she leans onto the wooden bathtub's edge with her arms, and looks at the door through the thick steam.

「…I wonder if Straf is sleeping already… Would he even sleep here? He never sleeps on the road…」

With a little pout on her wet face, she continues looking at the door with a pensive gaze.

Splash!…

Cycelia stands up and climbs out of the bathtub. Water drips off her curves hidden in the steam onto the floor. With another contented sigh, she takes a towel off a nearby rack.

「…Warm baths are the best, after all.」

She idly remarks while patting away water from her steam-shrouded chest.

Cycelia takes the towel lower, rubbing the water away from her soft stomach. Neither fat nor toned, it perfectly treads the fine line between healthy, and sedentary. She goes lower, quickly wiping her hips before moving onto her thighs, also large and not very defined, but not quite thick enough to be excessive. She then quickly wipes away her feet, folds the towel back up, then sets it down beside the rack.

Five minutes later, after re-dressing and slipping her coat back on, she exits the bathroom with the buckets.

「Thank you. I left the used towel folded.」

Cycelia nods with a smile at the innkeeper as she returns the empty buckets behind the counter. He replies with an acknowledging nod, and she climbs back up the stairs.

Just before pulling the key to her room out of her coat's pocket, she looks over at Straf's door, and pauses.

「Nnnhhhhh…」

With a troubled grimace on her face, she winds a chestnut lock of her damp hair around her finger again. She tilts her head left and right with her eyes closed in deep thought.

《…It wouldn't hurt to ask again.》

Cycelia shrugs, and walks up to Straf's door instead.

Knock knock knock…

「Straf? Are you asleep?…」

She asks softly after quietly knocking on the door with two of her dainty fingers. There is no response.

Knock knock knock knock…

「…Straf?」

Cycelia knocks again, a little more decisively this time. She turns her ear to the door, and hears absolutely nothing beyond it.

「Straf… I'm going to come in, okay? If you don't want me to, let me know!…」

She calls out towards the door, and places tentatively places her hand on the door handle.

「…Okay! I'm coming in!」

Cycelia announces, after a brief pause, and opens the door to Straf's room. The first thing she does is peek her face in.

「Eh?…」

She lets out a surprised utterance, when she realizes that Straf's bed is empty. She opens the door further and takes a look around his room.

「…Where did he go? He definitely lied down on the bed at least.」

Cycelia notes the indent in the bed's cover, which could only be caused by something of a man-sized weight disturbing it after being made.

「…Could it be that he left without me?」

Mildly concerned, Cycelia rushes up to the moonlight pouring onto the floor through the window's glass. She opens it, and leans outside.

「Whew… The horse is still there.」

With a very cold breeze of air washing over her, she pushes herself back inside after seeing the familiar horse in the inn's small stable. She closes the window, then thumbs at her lips.

「…But if he didn't leave, then where could he be?…」

With her fist on her coat's hip, and her other hand thumbing her lips in deep thought.

「…Ah! The innkeeper should know! You have to pass by him to leave!」

Cycelia rushes out of the room at a pace just above walking, shutting the door behind herself. She hurries to the stairs, outright jogging to them.

ThudthudthudTHUD!

Heavily stomping down on the steps, Cycelia practically runs down the stairs, then nearly throws herself onto the counter.

「Um, excuse me!… Did you see the man I arrived with leave?」

Cycelia asks with her lips lightly pursed, blinking her emerald eyes at Myria's father.

「Yeeeah… He left some time ago. Was he not supposed to?」

The innkeeper nods, and shrugs his wide shoulders.

「No, but… But he didn't really have a reason to leave. Did he say where to?」

Cycelia shakes her head and furrows her brows as she leans further onto the counter.

「Yeah, he said he's going for a walk. But…」

「But?」

The innkeeper turns his eyes to the door, grimacing slightly. Cycelia leans in some more.

「…It's an awful long walk he's having. I thought he'd be back in five, ten, fifteen minutes at most. Now, I don't want to worry you, lady, but we've had some disappearances.」

He adds, then turns his gaze to Cycelia.

「Disappearances?…」

Her head perks up, and she gains a tight-lipped grimace on her face.

「Yeeeah… Like I said, I don't want to worry you, but I'm starting to get a little concerned myself. It's probably nothing, but…」

Myria's father nods, and a tight-lipped grimace appears on his face as well.

「…We had a guy disappear some time ago. He supposedly had a large debt in Draconis, so he moved here in an effort to hide from any goons that might be coming after him.」

With a hushed tone, he tells the story of a debtor to Cycelia.

「And he disappeared?」

She asks, anxiously fidgeting with her coat's button.

「That's right. He apparently managed to get himself into debt here, too. He wasn't a bad guy by any means… He was polite, helpful, nice to people…」

The innkeeper nods, and leans onto his counter, speaking in a quiet voice while warily watching the patrons.

「…But if you lent him some money, you weren't going to see it back. He apparently left his home overnight in such a hurry, that there was burnt food in his cookpot at his home.」

「He just left and never came back?」

Cycelia asks, furrowing her brows. A vague sense of unease fills her.

「Yeah. Either that, or the said goons found him, and snatched him without anyone in the village knowing. There was another…」

The bulky man nods, then raises his index finger, glancing aside to see if any of the patrons are watching them. None are, and the inn is slowly emptying.

「…He was a boozer. Similar situation, but a little different. This is a little more personal of a story. He had a problem with his drinks. Namely, he tended to finish them too fast…」

The innkeeper says, then straightens out a little.

「…He built up such a massive tab, that I just had to shrug and admit that I'm never gonna see that money. Lesson learned…」

With his mouth scrunched to the side, he throws his arms up in a shrug, then leans back onto the counter. Cycelia nods along, listening quietly with a mildly unnerved expression.

「…Anyway, he kept pestering the patrons, until one of them, 'scuse my language, bought him one just so he'd fuck off. I had enough, and threw him out until he pays his tab.」

「…And?」

Cycelia asks with a quizzical look in her eyes while weakly nodding her head, almost suggesting that she already knows the rest of the story.

「Yeah, never seen 'im again after that. We all figured he just left for greener pastures, but… Anyway, this one is where it really gets weird. Listen here…」

Myria's father shrugs his shoulder, then leans in and wags his finger, all while watching the few patrons remaining.

「…There was this married couple. Perfect, happy marriage. The mere sight of them pissed off the men with bitchy wives to no end. Always holding hands to the market, so on…」

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He continues wagging his tongue as he explains, briefly glancing at Cycelia every now and then. She returns an acknowledging nods of her head, listening quietly.

「…Then one day, poof. He's just gone. Completely disappeared. Left everything behind, even the money. And the strange thing is, his wife said he told her that he was going for a walk, too.」

「H- He went for a walk?…」

Cycelia's head perks up, and she blinks her emerald eyes at the innkeeper. The sense of unease magnifies greatly.

「Yeah. We were all completely boggled. Why would he leave? He built his home with his own hands, brought himself a wife… Then just up and leave?… It makes no sense…」

The bulky man nods his shaved head, furrowing his brows at the inn door while one of the last remaining patrons raise their hands to bid him farewell. He returns the gesture.

「…We were joking with the guys how maybe he had a bitchy wife all along, too… But jokes aside, it didn't seem that way. She was crying for months.」

The innkeeper smirks slightly, but his eyes remain nervous, and the smirk soon dissipates into a tight-lipped grimace as he turns his eyes back to Cycelia.

「…Ah, sorry. I didn't mean to scare you or anything, lady… He'll probably be back… I think…」

Seeing that Cycelia now appears to be petrified, staring at him with wide-open emerald eyes, he apologetically raises his palms and shrinks himself, grinning awkwardly to calm her.

「…Maybe he's having a look around the village? Why not go find him? Give me a moment…」

He points his hands at the door, then turns his eyes to his daughter sitting at one of the tables with a shriveled, smiling old man and his tankard, talking with her about something.

「…Myria! C'mere for a second, you little goblin!」

The innkeeper calls out to the young girl, wiggling his fingers at her for her to come.

Her face snaps in his direction, thick eyebrows raised, then quickly stands up and with a little apologetic bow, she leaves the old man to his tankard.

「What's up, dad?」

She hops up to the counter with a smile on her face.

Pat.

「You are going to help the lady over here find someone. He ought to be somewhere around the village.」

Myria's father explains, placing his bear-like hand on top of her head and ruffling her hair as he does so.

「Okay! Is it that Straf guy?」

She nods, then turns her smiling face to Cycelia.

「Y- Yes. Yes it is…」

Trying to force a smile back on her face, Cycelia nods.

「…And no going outside the village! If I see you walk past the houses on the edge of the village, my belt will come off and I'll whip your ass until you can't sit for weeks!」

The innkeeper chimes back in, pointing his finger at Myria with a stern glare.

「Yikes… Okay, let's go. It should be easy if we just look between the homes.」

Myria winces at the idea, then peels away from her father's hand. She nods her head towards the door, then leaves with Cycelia. With his brows furrowed, the innkeeper lets out a sigh…

…

Five minutes later, in the dimly village…

「Straaf! Straf, where are youuu!?」

「Mr. Straaaaf! The pretty lady is looking for youuu!」

Cycelia and Myria aimlessly wander the dark dirt road between the buildings. Having looked through the market, the stable, and the abandoned buildings, Straf is nowhere to be found.

With their hands by their mouths, they continue calling out into the dark for Straf. The sense of unease intensifies the longer that Cycelia can't find him. One of the doors opens.

「Oh my… Another one disappeared?…」

The old woman standing in the doorway asks, speaking with concerned, hushed tone. Warm light floods out of her home out onto the dirt road.

「No, no, no… He's just wandering somewhere around here!…」

Smiling, Myria shakes her head and waves her hands in front of herself. The woman turns her tired eyes beneath her furrowed brows to Cycelia, and looks at her with great pity in them.

Without another word, she returns to her home and closes the door. Biting her lower lip, Cycelia is clutching onto her coat's button.

「…What if something happened to Straf too?」

Cycelia utters out, staring at the dark ground with a deeply concerned face.

「Iiiiit's too early to say! Don't let my dad spook you, miss! He's been gone for what, less than an hour? We'll find him!」

Rubbing the back of her neck with her hand, Myria shrugs her shoulders, grinning awkwardly at Cycelia. A very short-lived flash of blue light from outside the village illuminates the sky.

「Eh?」「Huh? What was that? Did you see that, miss?」

Cycelia and Myria look in the general direction of where the light appeared. The young girl points her finger there, and turns her confused eyes up to Cycelia.

「Ah! There it is again!…」

Cycelia remarks as the sky turns bright cyan-blue from the light's glow again. Myria turns her head to look, but she's already late, and sees nothing.

「Eh? Really?… I missed it-」

She remarks, and Cycelia runs off, heading for the source way beyond the village.

「Ah! Wait, miss! Dad said I can't!… Ah, well… It should be fine…」

Panicked, Myria waves her hand towards Cycelia, but with her back turned towards her, she doesn't notice. Myria glances over her shoulder at the inn, then shrugs and rushes to catch up.

《A bright light like that!… It has to be Straf!…》

Cycelia thinks, panting heavily as she heads towards it. The light appears again, much closer to the village this time, nearly inside of it.

「Eh? But wasn't it?…」

She slides to a stop, furrowing her brows in confusion, puzzled by the change in the distance.

「Miss! Haah… I'm glad you stopped! Dad really might get the belt out!…」

Myria finally catches up while Cycelia watches the sky for any more signs of the light.

「…I love my dad, but he can get really furious sometimes! You know, one time a traveler touched my… Well, doesn't matter! Dad got so mad, he pulled an axe from under the counter, and-!」

「Fucking die already, you oversized mutt!」

With her hands on her knees, Myria tries to tell a story while catching her breath. A man's shout cuts in.

「Eh?…」「…Eh?」

Straf and Cycelia both utter out at the same time as he leaps backwards into the village. Though lasting only a fraction of a second, they manage to catch a glimpse of each other's confused eyes.

The blue orb following Straf shoots out a wide blue beam directed outside off the village, while he, himself, flies right past Myria and Cycelia.

「So that was the light!… See, I told you-!」

With her hands proudly on her hips, Myria gains a large smile on her face and glances up at Cycelia.

Thud-thud-thudTHUDthud-thud-thud!…

「Wah!」「What was that!?」

Both Cycelia and Myria jump up, startled by the sight of a hulking bipedal wolf speeding after Straf in hot pursuit.

「…Oh no!」

Cycelia exclaims, then runs after the wolf in Straf's general direction. Myria's eyes widen in shock at the fact, but she joins her after a moment of hesitation.

「Straf! Are you okay!?」

Cycelia shouts at Straf, who is facing down with a charging furry beast. Now that she can properly see it, it definitely has a faint blue aura to its fur.

「I'm a little occupied!… And having technical difficulties!…」

Straf shouts back after leaping aside out of the wolfman's vicious claw swipe. They rip through the dirt where Straf was standing, leaving massive gashes.

「…I've been hitting and hitting this asshole with deathlasers, but he just keeps fucking coming! I think I have a solution, though!」

He adds, sprinting past the building towards the exterior of the village again in a large loop around. The hulking beast quickly recovers and gives chase on all fours like a regular wolf.

Cycelia runs back, heading to the edge of the village from the other, safer side. With her brows heavily furrowed in concern, she waits for the two to emerge from beyond the buildings.

ThudthudTHUDTHUD!…

「Straf! That's a werewolf!」

She shouts as Straf and the werewolf emerge out into the open.

「Thank you Lia, I noticed!…」

Rather unimpressed and with a lightly sarcastic tone, Straf rolls his eyes and looks at her with a patronizing gaze, smirking slightly.

「No, Straf! You don't understand! You didn't attend the lecture with me!…」

Desperate, Cycelia shakes her head, staring at the two with a tight-lipped grimace while Straf leads the beast so that its back faces the hill.

「You're one sick puppy, and I just gotta put you down!…」

Straf shouts at the werewolf while it's gaining on him, glowing slightly. He leaps forward, turning to face it.

「…Let's see how you handle a smaller mountain-melter, you little shit!」

He adds, smirking at the charging werewolf. A bright blue orb appears in front of Straf again. Cycelia's emerald eyes widen.

「Straf, no! Wait! Don't!」

「Eh?…」

She shouts desperately, outstretching her hand towards him, but a spell cannot be so easily stopped. He glances over his shoulder, confused. Though Straf cuts the flow of mana early, the spell still has more than enough to activate. A massive beam spanning at least one and a half men in its diameter shoots across the empty field and impacts against the werewolf. Its charge is stopped, and the beast stumbles backwards, covering its body with its fuzzy, shaggy arms. The blue glow around it intensifies, causing the werewolf to shine like a lightbulb in the night.

「…Werewolves absorb mana, Straf! They grow stronger the more they're hit with spells!」

Cycelia winces when she sees the spell activate, and explains.

Straf's jaw drops as the beam dissipates into nothing, leaving only a glowing beast standing tall, and leaking drool from its sharp teeth.

「Lia, that's kind of important!… Couldn't you have said that a little earlier!?」

He asks, pointing his hand at the werewolf.

「I tried to, but!… You were too fast!…」

Cycelia throws her hands up, grimacing heavily as she helplessly shrugs her shoulders.

「That explains why this asshole ate a few of these like it's nothing. Tsk…」

Staring down at the werewolf, and it staring back at him, the two glare at each other while Straf leisurely returns his hands to his pockets…