-=Still Ronnie POV=-
“Are you both ready?” Asks the staff member.
“Yeah.”
*nod*
“Go!”
When the guild staff signalled the start of the examination Burt ran at me while winding up a punch and every person watching broke out into cheer.
‘It’s like they think this is some sort of organized event… ! Those guys are even making bets!’
You’d think a slave wouldn’t be very knowledgeable, but you’d think wrong.
When I was still in the black market I was taught about the laws and etiquette of the country so that I wouldn’t embarrass my future master, and a guild staff member setting up an examination as a betting match definitely broke a lot of guild regulations.
Burt finally got close and threw his punch, however it wasn’t anywhere near what I expected it to be.
It was a normal punch, it had no style, it had no grace, however when I looked at his fist I could see that the air around it was distorting slightly, almost like there was a fire.
If it wasn’t for the martial art my master taught me I wouldn’t even have noticed it, I wouldn’t have had any reason to look at his fists for anything else than dodging them if I didn’t fight this way after all.
To anyone further away it must have looked like it was a completely normal punch, however I saw that he must have used a skill.
I kept dodging his blows over and over, watching and waiting for an opportunity.
Then, when he seemed to have grown impatient and tried using a feint I dodged both the feint and the real punch which came afterwards, and while he was off balance I ripped off a few hairs of my fur and threw it at his fist to find out exactly what he did.
“!”
As the fur hit the distorting film around Burt’s fist they disappeared one by one, I was only barely able to see them get seen flying despite Burt’s fist being stationary.
‘Wind magic? Or maybe it’s a skill?’
I kept on the defensive, evading blows and looking for opportunities to strike back.
*shwish shwish*
‘Bastard is even throwing decent punches now to!’
When Burt got more serious you’d expect me to follow right? Well you’d expect wrong, because to be honest after having been put through master’s training this was kids play!
Sweat covered Burt's face while the only thing that covered mine was the wide smile of a someone who found something to play with and vent their frustrations on.
“Haa, haa…”
Although I felt a bit bad for the now wheezing Burt, I needed to vent one way or another and I wouldn’t get an opportunity like this anytime soon again.
*shwish*
Burt threw another punch, this one slower than the others, and that’s when I finally saw it.’
The weird wavy distortions around his punches were only around his hands, the rest of his arms were only covered by his clothes.
Whether this was how it had always been or whether it became like this only after he tired himself out I didn’t know, what I did know however was that Burt would soon collapse, and if I didn’t take this opportunity now I would miss it entirely.
*shwish*
‘There!’
Burt threw a punch that was even more sluggish than the rest, I could saw that he had already given up himself, however before he could tell the temporary judge he was withdrawing I made my move.
“!”
I grabbed his outstretched arm and used my own exceedingly long arms to create enough momentum to throw Burt tens of meters into the sky.
‘I’m sorry master, as fun as it is to lob everything around there’s nothing that quite beats the satisfaction of a good hit.’
As Burt reached the zenith of his flight I ran to where he would land and lifted one of my legs in preparation.
*CRACK*
“Guho!”
With a kick he flew back into the sky-
*thud*
-bounced once-
*thud*
-bounced twice-
*thud*
-before finally landing and rolling a small distance.
“Phew.”
“...”
“So? How did I do? And who’s next?” I say while putting my hands together.
Is it just my imagination or is the staff member looking a little panicked?
“Excuse me…?”
“Eep!”
Okay, scratch that, very panicked.
“?”
*cough* “Y-you did… All things considered you did adequate… I-”
The staff member who’s name I still don’t know goes quiet for a moment before raising her voice again.
“You’ve already finished this part of the examination, the only part left is for you to complete some beginner quests to prove you can work on the field.”
The staff member now spoke normally however I still saw some sweat on her forehead as her body shook when he walked as though she’d just ran a marathon.
The way she acted now as well as how the spectators had bet on the match made me suspicious of her, however since the battle had ended without any complications I dismissed those thoughts.
‘Maybe she just has a cold or something? … For someone who isn’t a slave to work while sick, she must be a good person… Kinda feel bad for lashing out at her earlier…’
The entire crowd disperses while they hand each other their winnings.
‘I should probably try to find Plush’s familiar, I doubt they would think that I’m the one who left her behind but I’ve heard much weirder stories.’
I walk over to behind the fence I’d seen the familiar fly over to before and hoped she hadn’t already left.
“Hey, rabbit.”
However instead the familiar called out to me from behind.
I turn around without my surprise show on my face.
“What?”
“Listen, I have stuff I need to do in this town, stuff that Plush and Shiona shouldn’t know about, so let’s just pretend I flew away while you weren’t looking and you weren’t able to find me alright?”
“...And what if I told them you were doing stuff behind their backs?”
“Ha! I’ve been with them longer than you have, and I’ve helped them both a bunch as well, you on the other hand, you were bought as a slave, and most people who are slaves are so for a reason, like they’d have any reason to believe that the gluttonous mayfly Lizz could hide anything from them a slave told them.”
“Alright.”
“Good, then I’ll see yo-”
“I still refuse.”
“Wha-”
“You said that this was something that Master and Plush shouldn’t know about right?”
I smirk at the familiar who I’ve now gotten a bit more respect for.
“That means something illegal yeah? You’re right, slaves are slaves for a reason, so count me in whether you want me to or not.”
The familiar stares at me dumbfoundedly before smirking back much the same way.
“You’re real cheeky for a rabbit you know?”
“And you for a dragonfly.”
Despite my prodding at her being so alike a half-dragonfly she didn’t flinch at all, proving that she really had just been playing it up all this time.
“Ha!”
She scoffs before black fog seeps out of the ground and covers her, then after expanding the fog dissipates, showing that the mutated human dragonfly thing (never really did understand what she was when Plush explained it) was nowhere to be seen, instead in her spot there stood a black haired woman. She had long pitch black hair with matching robes and a pointy hat.
She also held in her arms a very long staff, it was as long as she was tall.
Speaking of her height, she was the height of an average human, so a fair bit shorter than me.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
I’d hate to admit it, but she actually looked pretty cool.
“Follow me.” She says and turns around causing her robes to flutter in a wind that doesn’t exist.
And then she freezes up and stops.
“...”
“Hey, what happened?” I ask.
“... Suu...”
The she started making sleeping sounds.
“Oi oi, don’t tell me you really fell asleep after all that bravado?”
Without responding to me she resumes walking, always keeping ahead of me and not letting me see her face.
As we approach the main road I start picking up various pieces of cloth from the ground and draped them around my body, and although it felt very uncomfortable I also folded down my ears along my head before covering my face in rags.
“Whoever sees me will still see that I’m freakishly tall, but they won’t see that I’m a hare-kin’
An all black witch and a homeless looking person walk onto a road ready to do something illegal.
It sounds like the start of a joke but it probably wouldn’t end in laughter.
-=Plush POV=-
“So your slave is a rabbit?”
“A hare-kin.”
“Rabbit, hare, same thing. But since don’t have a thing that means it’s hers right?”
“Yes but not for that reason.”
“Says the jealous husband. Besides, what other reason could anyone having for owning a rabbit slave?”
“For the love of god please just stop.”
‘Fuck I hate this guy.’
The guard grins at me like he just won an argument, normally I wouldn’t care about it but the way he looked so smug and sure of himself really just pissed me off to no ends.
We followed the guard a couple of blocks further before he turned and entered the door to a large building made of stone bricks and wooden logs.
He didn’t even bother holding the door open for us, in fact he even closed it after he entered.
“You’re here, this way.” Says the guard who we met back at the merchant’s stall.
* * * *
Half an hour later we walk back out with a small bag of various magic crystals from the merchant as an apology.
He was still sent to jail though, but his sentence was reduced.
We walked back to the guild to check up on Ronnie but she still wasn’t there, and when we asked the guild staff they hadn’t seen her.
I tried to contact Lizz again, however this time she didn’t respond at all.
I even asked the book if it would be able to find her, however it just shook in a very dejected manner.
“Well, it’s Lizz we’re talking about, she should be able to find us if something happens.”
“Yeah, I’m still a bit worried though.”
Getting an idea I take out the magic formation book again and look through it before finding what I wanted.
After we get back to the inn and close the door I create a two circle magic formation above my hand and make it come into contact with Shiona, the magic formation the draws out the slave contract again.
“The contract is the physical embodiment of the slave magic, so if one you dies and the magic disappears then so does the contract, so as long as this is here she’s fine. If they’re not back by tomorrow we’ll start searching alright?”
We then eat some dinner before doing magic practice and going to bed.
Turns out Shiona wasn’t very good at normal magic.
-=Elizabeth POV=-
I cast a guidance spell to help us find our target, and above my hand appears a purple foggy arrow that points in the direction of my desires.
We follow the construct’s directions in silence and make our way through many alleyways before arriving in a dead end.
“Guess magic can only do so much.” Says Ronnie in an altered voice, I had cast magic on her to change her voice so we could talk without people being able to recognise it.
I walk up to the wall and touch it with the leather armlet that the book made, and with some rumbling the wall then gets covered by blue markings, symbols and patterns.
After having thanked the heavens that the magic was still worked after so many years called out to Ronnie who had jumped onto the roofs to see if there was anything else on the other side of the wall.
With a *thud* she lands back on the ground.
“So… What’s that? Someone give a kid blue crayons?”
Disregarding her comment I took out an artefact from my robes and started adding more symbols to the wall.
“You’re kidding, it really was a blue crayon?”
After deeming it finished I gave Ronnie the artefact and told her to stand at the center of the wall.
“What now?” She asks.
“Tighten your fist around the artefact-”
“Crayon.”
“-Artefact-”
“Crayon.”
“...”
*sigh*
“Just hold it and punch the wall okay?”
“...What?”
“...”
“... Is it because of what I said about magic before?”
“Just do it.”
Ronnie resigns herself to her fate with a sigh, takes off some of the rags covering her and wrap them tightly around the hand she’s holding the cra- artifact in.
And then she punches the wall.
*CRASH*
-=Ronnie POV=-
‘What the fuck!’
When I punched the wall with the crayon in my hand it shattered like someone had just thrown a large rock into a glass window!
Pieces flew everywhere, they ranged from the size of sand to the size of wagon wheels.
I sheepishly turned around to see the huge mess that must’ve been made by all those stone shards-
“!”
-only to see them all suspended in mid-air.
“Well? Are you coming or not?”
I turned around and saw Lizz stand next to the opening i the wall.
Where the wall had been there was now the entrance to a tunnel.
Some pieces of the wall were still there, it looked like someone had built the wall specifically to cover this tunnel.
But here’s the thing-
“How…”
-there shouldn’t be a tunnel here.
I had seen what was on the other side of this wall from above, it just went into another street and the wall was only half a meter thick, it shouldn’t be possible for a tunnel to be here.
*sigh* “I thought you said you were going to be coming along Ronnie.”
“Well sorry for being surprised by magic I’ve never seen before!”
Taking the cloth off of my fist and putting it back where I’d taken it off of before following her.
Lizz then walked calmly through the tunnel and, seeing her example, I followed her.
“Are we going to be doing anything other than walking?”
“We will, as soon as we get through this tunnel.”
“And how lo-”
Just as I’m about to ask how long it will take us to walk through the tunnel I’m bathed in a bright light, and when I’m finally able to see again we’re inside a dark cavern.
“This is…?”
“Deep underground.”
Looking around we could both see that the walls were covered in large writing and images which depicted underground cities and the people within them.
“Long ago people lived down here. Entire civilizations, each with their own distinct cultures and ways of living.”
“... You mean the pickits?”
Plush had told me about their encounters with the pickits and how they’d helped them out.
“No, longer ago than that, and much deeper underground as well.”
“Okay, so they were here before, but then why aren’t they here now? And could you make some magic light or something? It’s impossible to see anything with only this glowing crayon.”
Lizz waved her giant staff around and conjured a white glowing orb which rose into the air and illuminated the entire cavern, revealing how huge it really was.
The cavern we were in looked like the inside of a giant tawny egg with four openings on opposing sides.
“You asked why they left? That’s why.”
Almost all the space in the entire room was taken up by what was inside.
Wrapped up in chain, covered in magical charms and half submerged in the ground there was a creature.
It was hard to see what it was, but from within the mesh of chains and charms two yellow eyes glared at us.
“These ancient cities had perfected the art of summoning demons and having them work for you-”
“It doesn’t look very perfected, what with this thing probably being the reason the city’s abandoned.”
*glare*
“... Sorry.”
*sigh* “They had perfected the art of demon summoning, they knew everything they would need to have and do in order to get the demon that they wanted, however one person thought that it wasn’t enough. They sought to improve what had been thought to already be perfect, and in order to do that they created a magical artefact to help in the rituals.”
We walked closer to the demon.
“The artefact could store the object needed for the rituals, any animals needed as sacrifices, it was able to create an entire self sustained ecosystem to grow more offerings and breed more sacrifices, it could even speed up the time within the ecosystem to instantly restock whatever gets used, it made demon summonings practically free.”
She lifted her wand.
“This made the person who had the artefact able to summon any demon at any time, including ones that no one had been able to summon before without the artefact.”
She gathered energy into the staff causing it to glow bright red.
“But, the man that made the artefact grew greedy.”
Above the staff a single red circle formed, and from that circle blue flames erupted onto the giant demon.
“He knew that the artefact he had created was going to be the most potent offering in a summoning ritual, and then he did exactly that.”
The flames spread across the demon as it started to roar in pain.
“He used the artefact as an offering, however it was too much. No one demon was enough to become an equivalent exchange for the huge amounts of energy that the artefact had, instead a gate was opened, through that gate came a huge number of these demons”
The demon in front of us had become a raging inferno and started to grow smaller and smaller.
“The artefact broke and each of the demons grabbed a piece and ran off to do their own thing since the summoning had ended before the man could strike a deal with them.”
The blue fire which used to be a demon kept growing smaller.
“The demons spread from city to city, killing everyone they could find, and with the power of the fractured artefact they were nigh unstoppable, but then a hero appeared.”
The demon gave out a final roar of pain, yet even after the demon appeared to have died the fire kept raging.
“The hero grabbed the broken husk of an artefact which had been hidden away by its creator, the hero then proceeded to hunt down the demons and reclaim the pieces of the artefact from them, and as the news spread among the cities the inhabitants started to train themselves and fight back against the demons, they captured them and awaited the hero.”
The fire had now shrunk to the size of a small house.
“But as the news spread to the people it also spread to the demons, some demons confronted the hero head on to try and kill them, but the majority put all their efforts into running away, because of that it became harder for the hero to repair the artefact and save the people, eventually the hero died of old age without completing the artefact.”
The size of a wagon.
“The hero went down in legends to the people who survived, they all longed to take up the hero’s mantle and complete the artefact once and for all.”
The size of a shed.
“Many followed the hero’s footsteps, many of them succeeded in killing a demon before their lives ended, however only a fraction of them knew of the true hero and did it for the sake of completing the artefact, the rest sought to use the powers of the fractured pieces for themselves, causing the pieces to scatter throughout the world and fall into the hands of not just the demons but also the people.”
The size of a horse.
“Yet to this day there are still some people who attempt to kill the demons and reclaim the pieces of the artefact. Some do it for the sake of going down in history as heroes who saved the land, others though…”
Lizz reached out her hand and grabbed the fire.
“They do it to honour family.”
The fire took the shape of a glowing blue piece of paper.
“Well that’s cool and all, but I thought we were going to be beating up some people...I was really looking forwards to it…”
“Fufufu… You already have a disguise so if you like we could look for some criminals before we find Plush and Shiona.”
“Deal!”