Chapter 221 – When Quest Givers Won’t Leave You Alone

Lilyth - Days 4 to 10 - 111 Days Remain

There was something off about Rohel’s… smell? Aura? I didn't have the right word for it. Something… terrifying.

‘He reeks of the harvester plant,’ Phosi rasped, naming the weird feeling and thus causing me and Savri to pull our guns out and point them at the man’s face.

‘Phosi, could you please check if he was infested?’ I asked.

‘Gladly, morsel,’ the Sconryoll gave us one of her terrifying smiles, but before she could do anything, the man began convulsing and fell to the ground, shrieking.

Before we could stop her, Mahdar rushed to help her brother, so I did something I wasn't particularly proud of and pushed her back with a [Gust of Wind].

Seeing what I was doing, Caei immediately leapt over to her to restrain the woman and heal the damage I had done to her.

The rest of us looked at Rohen, his body beginning to shrivel as if something was consuming it from the inside, and waited for what would happen. Soon, his shrieks of pain reached a crescendo and then, with a wet squelch, vines burst out of his stomach and all orifices.

Once again, watching hentai has failed to prepare me for this.

Persephone snapped her fingers, and a pillar of flames erupted from beneath the man, incinerating him and burning a hole through the ceiling.

‘You set the house on fire,’ I remarked dryly.

‘Ooops,’ the sorceress muttered with a sheepish expression and with a flick of her wrist extinguished the blaze, reabsorbing it as mana.

Mahdar, whom we no longer felt a need to keep away, got to the spot where her brother had just died and began to wail, seeing his charred bones.

Now, how do you console someone whose brother’s body you just incinerated after they suffered a horrible and painful death?

We spent a few more days in Pik-Cas. Mostly to observe whether more locals didn't decide to evolve into vine monsters. Savri cast [Scan Body] on some volunteers, but after finding nothing and with no reference as to what to look for to begin with, we didn't do a large scanning campaign. Our welcome was wearing thin as it was.

I was worried I would be expected to officiate the funeral, but since the bereaved Mahdar wanted nothing to do with us, I got away lightly and without having to put on my nonexistent acting skills on display.

Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to say the final goodbye to Rohel of Julbar. He died screaming after a series of bad decisions that involved delving into an ancient tomb and eating seeds from a plant surrounded by a mountain of human bones. He is survived only by his sister, who thinks that somehow Palpa-... this is our fault. Luckily, he didn't have any children, so he didn't pollute the gene pool with his Darwin Award-winning intellect.

Yeah. I would definitely bring dignity and solemnity to the event.

Note to self: Find a Master of Ceremonies.

I did confirm with Ere that my job as the Marquess of Hell would involve none of that nonsense and would only require me to maintain a semblance of order there by rooting out bad actors. Something akin to me being a Legally-Distinct Flying-Rodent-Themed Vigilante, except I would be sending too naughty denizens to hell straight to Super Hell (™). They would also have no hope of leaving, making me superior to that particular comic book character. I mean, he, at some point, became accessory to genocide, because after the third escape of one of his villains, an event that tends to involve dozens if not hundreds of casualties, you would have figured that the best solutions to the clown or the croc person crime sprees would be for them to have an accident.

Not the sexy plant lady, though. I can fix her.

Anyway, after three days of sitting on our asses mostly doing fuckall, Persephone did start teaching me how to fly, so that was a nice thing, we returned to Ror-Bhyk, though we first stopped in Mer-Cas to grab Anika. We needed numbers, pure and simple.

The ghûl was both happy to be finally included in our group and pissed that it took us so long.

‘We were waiting for the right moment, Ani,’ Sav tried to placate her, and when that didn't work, my threat to turn the trip around and leave her back at Mer-Cas did.

We briefly pondered recruiting Laachersain and his two friends: Weetabix and Umaheet. The three of them did a stellar job in the Tyr-Mel town guard, from what I’ve heard, but decided against it. It wasn't like I didn't trust them, but I didn't TRUST them, if you know what I mean.

To be fair, Anika was in that category too, but at least Sav vouched for her, so that was something. Plus, I’ve figured that it would be prudent to keep her and the three Sanguine apart. Her discovering Caei’s brother was an associate of a certain Nazi Fuck could turn ugly.

Back in Ror-Bhyk, Kart informed me that while we were on Julbar, an old man and a Krimnid girl came to the city seeking assistance. Kart's explanation as to what those "Krimnids" were made me think a bus filled with women reading those terrible monsterfucker romance novels must have ended up on Dwynveia at some point. Then again, given how enormous Dragon schlongs must be, it could have been a group of men instead. Like… I can’t imagine being on the receiving end of that being fun for any woman involved.

At any rate, Kart turned them away per my standing instructions to send any quest-givers packing. She did admit she would have done it in this case regardless of my instructions, because she doubted I would have any interest in getting involved in that kind of shitshow, no matter the circumstances, something I readily agreed with. The last time I had been resulted in an interdimensional invasion and me actually becoming a ruler, so I had no interest in repeating that particular chain of events.

‘They are still in the city, from what my agents told me,’ Kart finished. ‘Probably hoping you would return soon.’

We didn't enter the city with any pomp, but I had no doubt our arrival was noticed.

‘I am about to head back to the realm of Air to spend some time with my daughter, and we will be off tomorrow,’ I told her. ‘So… I am not accepting any visitors.’

‘Understood,’ Kart nodded. ‘Also, your Majesty, I have been wondering, since you will be going after the Red Masks, may I tag along? Finding them will require a fair bit of detective work, and I do have the prerequisite skillset. Been a while since I have been in the field, and I do have an axe to grind with them, as many people in the city do.’

I mulled it over.

‘Welcome aboard. We leave… I don't know… probably not before noon tomorrow, knowing my tendency to sleep in and enjoy a lazy morning whenever I can get those.’

‘I’ll be ready,’ the majordomo smiled.

Zaevi - Day 11 - 110 Days Remain

It was getting dark, so she hoped the Queen's party would be stopping for the night soon. This was Zaevi's last desperate attempt to get an audience with her. Being turned away by her nasty majordomo was a grievous blow to her, and seeing the party depart the city a few hours before… she needed to act. The future of her Kingdom depended on that.

Why didn't the Witch Queen even want to listen? You would think she would at least grant Zaevi an audience and not well… do that.

‘Keep your chin up, Zaevi,’ Nevahl tried to reassure her. ‘If we can't convince Queen Lilyth to help, you still have me, and I do have a few tricks up my sleeve.’

‘I don't think the two of us will be quite enough to save Mavigan.’

‘Where there is a will, there is a way.’

‘Good luck trying to convince our nobles to let a woman take the throne.’

‘There may be a solution to that issue, too. And it is not like the Witch Queen could resolve that problem either.’

The only solution to that issue was finding her brother. If that proved impossible, Fenya would likely have to marry one of their cousins to keep the throne within the family. The only alternative was holding a tournament to find a suitable new King.

The Queen’s party made a sudden turn off the road and towards the river.

What?

‘I wouldn't try to follow them,’ Nevahl said. ‘Right now, we are just another pair of travellers. Our leaving the road too soon would be too conspicuous. Let's wait a bit.’

‘What if we lose the trail?’

‘There are ten of them. It would be hard not to find their tracks.’

There was wisdom in the man's words, and when they resumed tailing the adventurers ten interminable minutes later, there indeed was a clear trail for them to follow.

After a few minutes, she realised that there must have been more to the group's detour. She was about to ask Nevahl about it when she heard a branch loudly snap behind them. She turned around and saw that she was staring into the barrels of several guns.

‘H-hi,’ she muttered.

‘Hello there,’ a Kitsune Zaevi realised must have been the Witch Queen said with a faux-pleasant smile. ‘Who might you be?’

Lilyth - Day 11 - 110 Days Remain

‘P-princess Zaevi of M-Mavigan,’ the red-skinned descendant of dragonfuckers replied.

‘Nevahl, a wandering scholar,’ the suit-wearing old man replied.

Something inside of me screamed about that answer, but I couldn't quite place it. He was definitely too neatly dressed - a suit and a woollen greatcoat seemed like an odd garb for someone of his profession, and he seemed too old to be a travelling anything, and his cane didn't help the impression.

The problem was I couldn't call him out on any of that without seeming like a massive hypocrite. After all, I also wore a suit, mine was white to boot, I knew several well-travelled old people, and the man was probably in better shape than I could ever be again, courtesy of what the Blood did to me.

Stupid intellectual honesty.

When we noticed the pair following us, Kart confirmed that those were the people who wanted to meet up with me earlier. They were persistent buggers, I had to give them that, which made me wonder what exactly they were selling and what kind of an absolute disaster would develop from me coming anywhere near that “quest”. But first things first.

‘Sav, could you please take Master Nevahl's staff from him?’ I asked the medic.

‘You would deprive someone of his walking aid?’ he asked in indignation that I couldn't decide whether it was real or not.

‘Given the circumstances and the fact I have killed someone with one of these before, I am going to say: Yes. Yes, I fucking would.’

He placed the thick staff in Sav’s extended hand without another word of protest.

She began to examine it and quickly discovered it was a swordcane.

‘Can’t blame me for trying,’ he said with a shrug and then knelt and slightly rolled up the right leg of his suit pants, revealing that there was metal rather than flesh underneath it. ‘I will need some assistance walking without it, though.’

Huh. Now I feel like an asshole.

‘One of us can conjure up a [Floating Disk] for you,’ I said apologetically. ‘Hopefully, we will clear up the situation soon, and we can return your cane to you.’

‘I understand,’ the scholar nodded. ‘I appreciate the gesture.’

‘Hey, we are just cautious, not monsters. Anyway, shall we get this show on the road?’