Chapter 438: Backyard Of Naked Busts

Mavis’s workshop wasn’t anywhere near the village.

Once, years ago, back when she’d first set up her forge, it had stood right at the edge of the settlement, close enough that you could smell the coal smoke from the main square.

That arrangement had ended the day an ember from her furnace jumped the wall of her fire pit, landed on a dry tree by the road, and set the whole thing alight.

The tree had burned down to a stump. That was all. No houses, no centaurs, no lasting damage.

But it had been enough.

The village had looked at the blackened stump and then at the girl standing next to her roaring forge with soot on her face, and had come to a collective decision:

The blacksmith needed to be somewhere with a bit more...room.

Mavis, for her part, had been delighted. For years she’d been pestered day and night—

—Mavis, when’s my sword ready? Mavis, can you rebalance the hilt? Mavis, I’ve got a dent, it’s urgent, it’s definitely urgent—

—and now she had a workshop all to herself, far enough out that nobody dropped by without intending to.

Luca followed the path out of the village, tracing the course of a narrow stream that wound through the tall grass away from the houses.

It was, he had to admit, a beautiful walk. The wind moved in long waves across the wildflowers; the water chattered over the stones; a pair of birds chased each other from one fence post to the next.

’Peaceful.’ He thought.

And then, because his brain never quite let anything go:

’What exactly is Mavis’s problem with me?’

Yesterday, during the party, he had tried to speak with her. Multiple times, in fact.

But every attempt had been met with the same response: a wary glance, a quick avoidance, and then she was gone,.disappearing into the crowd before he could get a single word out.

It was baffling.

By all logic, they should have been on good terms.

He had supported her during the duel against Sigrid. He had praised her ingenuity, her cleverness, her unconventional tactics. He had even admired her spirit.

But instead of warmth, he had received suspicion.

And then, of course, there was the matter of Nella and her friends—the tiny army that Mavis had apparently sent to "defeat" him.

That had been... confusing. Playful, perhaps. But confusing nonetheless.

’Does she hate me?’ Luca wondered as he walked. ’Does she blame me for what happened with her sister? Either that or she’s got some other reason to keep her distance.’

He hoped very much it wasn’t the first possibility.

The last thing he needed was another stubborn Centaur holding a grudge against him for reasons he couldn’t reconstruct.

Eventually, after following the stream for a good while, he found the workshop.

And he had to admit—it was a rather pretty sight.

The building was similar in style to the other centaur structures, with its wide entrance and sturdy wooden construction.

But this one had a large chimney rising from its roof, billowing thin wisps of smoke into the afternoon sky. The windows were dark, but he could see the faint orange glow of a furnace burning within.

What caught his attention most, however, was the water wheel.

It was positioned in the stream, constantly turning as the flowing water pushed against its paddles. A series of pipes connected the wheel to the building, and Luca could see gears and mechanisms that transferred the rotational energy inside.

He was genuinely shocked!

This was technology. Real, functional technology that used water power to automate some part of the workshop’s operations.

It was primitive compared to what he had seen in his own world, but the principle was essentially an early form of hydroelectric power.

’Did Mavis actually figure out how to generate electricity?’ He wondered, genuinely impressed. ’In a world where the concept doesn’t even exist yet?’

If she had, then Mavis wasn’t just a talented blacksmith.

She was a genius! The kind of mind that could revolutionize an entire civilization if given the chance.

His excitement building, Luca quickened his pace. He opened the small wooden gate and entered the property, making his way toward the front door of the workshop.

He was about to knock when something caught his eye.

A note was attached to the door, written in neat handwriting.

[Go around to the back. The backyard.]

"Hmm?" He looked around, wondering if the note was meant for someone else.

But there was no one else here. And the note was fresh, the ink still slightly damp.

Had Mavis known he was coming?

He scratched his head in confusion but decided to follow the instructions. He made his way around the side of the building, toward the back, where a small fence enclosed a wide open space.

"Mavis?" He called out. "I’m coming in! Don’t be scared—I just want to talk. I’m not here to attack you or anything!"

He half-expected some kind of trap. Given what he knew of Mavis, she wasn’t the type to welcome visitors with open arms. But he pushed open the gate and stepped into the backyard.

And his voice died in his throat.

He blinked once. Twice. He rubbed his eyes with both hands, certain he was hallucinating.

But when he looked again, the sight remained unchanged.

The backyard was filled with statues.

Around a dozen of them, arranged on wooden pedestals like exhibits in an outdoor museum.

They were made of metal—hammered and shaped with incredible skill and each one depicted a bust of a different demi-human woman.

But more then anything, every single one of them was naked from the waist up!

Luca’s jaw dropped.

There were elves, their slender forms rendered in gleaming metal, their breasts perfectly sculpted with attention to every detail.

There were beastkin, their sharp teeth visible even in the metallic medium, their wild beauty captured in the curve of their features.

There were fairies with small wings, dryads with hair like twisted roots, lamias with scales running down their human halves.

And there were more. So many more!

Everywhere he looked, there were breasts. Metal breasts. Round, perky, full, small—every size and shape imaginable, rendered with such precision that it was clear the sculptor had studied their subjects extensively.

Luca felt like he had stumbled into some kind of bizarre art gallery.

’What in the world is going on here?’ He thought, his mind reeling. ’Why would Mavis have something like this in her backyard?’

He came to a stop in front of one bust that looked a little too familiar.

A female elf with long hair down past the shoulders and a pair of breasts rendered with an accuracy that suggested the sculptor had worked from very careful notes.

Luca leaned closer.

’...Is that Leona?’

It really was! The face, the jawline, the shape of the eyes, the way the hair was parted—it was unmistakably his wife!

And the chest? The chest was Leona’s exactly.

He could feel himself going slightly red. He had, after all, spent a great deal of time with that particular set of facts, and he was intimately qualified to verify the likeness.

’How did she even do this?’ He thought. ’In metal?’

He circled the bust slowly, examining it from every angle—the careful burnishing along the collarbone, the faint lines suggesting skin folds, the way the nipples had been rendered with two tiny discs of darkened metal.

Whoever had made this had not been guessing. Whoever had made this had studied, and practiced, and cared deeply about getting it right.

He moved on to the next bust.

This one depicted a vampire woman, similar in build to the elf but with sharp fangs visible in her open mouth.

The metal captured the coldness of her expression, the predatory grace of her features. And once again, the breasts were rendered with loving attention.

Then a dragon-kin, her tail curling behind her, her small wings spread wide.

Then a dryad, leaves covering her breasts in a playful nod to modesty.

Then a lamia, the transition from human torso to serpentine lower body captured in intricate detail, scales running up her stomach and around her breasts.

Luca moved from statue to statue, his earlier confusion giving way to genuine appreciation.

Whoever had made these and he was increasingly certain it was Mavis herself was incredibly talented. The anatomical accuracy, the artistic vision, the sheer craftsmanship involved...

This wasn’t just perverted. This was art!

Finally, he reached the last bust in the collection.

It was a slime girl—her body rendered in metal but somehow still conveying the gelatinous, plump quality of her race. Her breasts were particularly impressive, shaped to suggest softness and bounce even in their rigid medium.

Luca stood in front of it for a long moment, staring, completely absorbed.

’This is incredible.’ He thought, honest wonder rising in his chest. ’The bounce. She captured the bounce in metal. How do you capture bounce in metal?!’

His hand reached out, almost of its own accord, his fingers stretching toward the nipple.

He was about to make contact when—

"GOTCHA!"

A voice rang out, triumphant and gleeful.

Before Luca could react, the ground beneath his feet gave way with a thunderous crack.

Boom!

Earth and dust flew everywhere as he plummeted downward, and something thick and heavy wrapped around him from all sides.

When the dust settled, he found himself completely entangled in a net. A thick net made of woven vines, wrapped around him from every direction, pinning his arms to his sides and leaving him completely immobilized.

He was trapped.

Luca wiped his face, processing what had just happened. He had been so completely absorbed by the slime girl bust, that he had walked right into a trap.

And then he heard it.

"I did it! I did it! I actually captured the Hero!"

The voice was high-pitched, arrogant, and utterly delighted with itself. Luca recognized it immediately.

"I mean, should I really be surprised?" She continued, her tone dripping with self-satisfaction. "Even the great Hero is nothing in the face of my brilliancen! Whether it’s a hero or a demon king, they’re all the same when it comes to the great blacksmith, Mavis!"

Luca turned his head inside the net.

A figure came trotting around one of the pedestals, chest pushed out, blue eyes gleaming, short silver-white hair ruffling in the wind, tail swishing with magnificent self-importance.

It was Mavis wearing her brown blacksmith apron!

Luca watched her approach, noting just how tiny she was compared to other centaurs. She barely reached his height, her pony-like lower half making her look almost like a child playing at being a warrior.

But her attitude more than made up for her size.

"How does it feel, Hero?" She asked, leaning down to look at him with gleaming eyes. "How does it feel to be trapped like some kind of prey?"

Before Luca could respond she let out a mocking laugh.

"I can’t believe you actually fell for such an obvious trap! Honestly, I thought it wouldn’t work at all. I thought I was stupid for even making it."

She held up her hands, showing him the small bruises and bandages wrapped around her fingers.

"Look at what I did to myself! I worked like a beast for the past two days, making all these statues! Every single one! And I thought it would all be for nothing..."

She glanced at the statues with undisguised pride, then looked back at him with a smirk.

"But who would have thought? You actually fell for it! The great Hero, caught like a common animal!"

She pointed at him and laughed, the sound echoing across the yard.

Luca, still processing what had just happened, finally found his voice.

"So...all of this? The statues, the setup, the trap? It was all for me?"

"Of course, Dummy Hero!" Mavis said, as though it were the most obvious thing in the world.

"Dummy Hero?"

"Yes, you’re a Dummy Hero!" She crouched down, bringing her face close to his, and poked his nose. "You actually fell for something as simple as this! You’re definitely a Dummy Hero!"

She straightened up, clearly enjoying herself immensely.

"Do you want to know how I came up with this brilliant plan? I was thinking—how can I defeat the Hero? What weakness does he have?"

She scowled, remembering the frustration. "But no matter how much I thought about it, I couldn’t find an answer. You’re stronger than me. Faster than me. Smarter than me—"

She paused, then reluctantly added: "Well, maybe on the same level. I’ll give you that much."

Luca raised an eyebrow at this unexpected concession.

"But no matter what angle I looked at it from, I couldn’t find a single weakness! You’re just...perfect."

She said the word like it was an insult. "And then, when I was changing my clothes one day, I looked down at myself and—"

She gestured at her own chest where her cleavage spilled out from beneath the black leather apron she wore.

"—I had a realization. Your weakness...is women!"