On the way back to Kyushu, I glanced at the book I stole—borrowed—from Victor before handing it off to Milia, figuring she’d be able to make more use of it than I could. The dryad wasted no time binding it, though she couldn’t help but be stunned that something like this was possible. I didn’t see a problem. Force mana through the connection between the book and magician until overloading it, rip the book or its spirit away, toss it into a storage ring.
But hey, with a significantly stronger Milia, I felt even more confident on eventually conquering that S-ranked dungeon.
“If you come across any more D-ranked spell books, do sell one to me,” Chenzu said. “Assuming we are fortunate enough to somehow come across another one and also not be the targets for once.”
“I doubt that,” Harmony said.
I glanced at Alexander. “Is everything good with Ripley?”
“Aye,” Alexander replied. “He…”
“Seems to have fallen for Anzu,” Milia finished. “She’s not really giving him the time of the day, but Ripley appears to be loving the chase, even if it leads to a dead end.”
“Did she express any interest in the dungeon?” Mandi asked.
Milia nodded. “She wants time to think about it. I hadn’t told her about the dungeon’s rank, just that it’s immensely powerful. There was a light in her eyes that showed promise.”
Since we arrived late, we dropped everyone off in town, rather than making them walk the ten minutes in the dark. Sure, they could kick the crap out of anything that got in their way, but the walking still sucked after a busy day.
I briefly considered going to war with Milia for the first rights of the shower but ended up letting her have it. Cheetara meowed at me until she finally got my attention. I followed the kitten outside and all the way to the elicrone house. There awaited two oval-shaped objects that looked as if they were made of glowing marble.
“They actually laid some eggs,” I said. “Nice.”
I gestured for the elicrones to come over, mostly as a test, but they eagerly hopped in my lap, rubbing against me like cats. I guess they appreciated being included in family time a lot more than I assumed. “Congratulations!”
Both let out excited yips. It annoyed me that the system translated my words to them but didn’t translate whatever they were saying to my ears. Wolverine burst from the house to dive into me, gaining his share of pets and scratches.
“Come on, let’s say goodnight to Beakwing,” I said, leading the spirit beasts to the griffin’s large barn. Though one could call it a giant bird house that had no scent whatsoever.
Beakwing slept in it and also stayed inside during rainy days, choosing to accept all of his meals from us instead. He was currently laying down, but quite excited to see us.
After the bath and dinner with Milia, we started off meditating before somehow that turned into chatting and kissing. Despite messing around, we both still made some gains. I felt our power increase simultaneously. Not that I cared about that, let’s be honest. People that only lived for power or even to procreate for the purpose of making some ultimate superfamily threw away everything life had to offer. It didn’t have to be all shit, gloom, and pill-eating.
So I spent a good bit of the night in conversation with Milia, even telling her what humans on Earth did for fun, leaving out the technology bits. I also told her about a few pies that she’d love and that I was actually able to make, mostly thanks to family, especially Grandma. I was a decent cook, but far from a professional chef, which was why I cooked somewhat easy meals, those that could actually be made from scratch. On the other hand, Milia prepared meals with a skilled hand, once again making me wonder about her hometown or kingdom. Her nice clothing clearly indicated dryads lived in civilizations similar to humans, with their own nobles or potentially the divine themselves as rulers.
As I drifted off to sleep that night, I couldn’t help but entertain the idea of Milia and I kicking asses with our spell books like some kind of power couple. We’d have to get Lucas his own F-ranked spell book to push his magic to a new level with whatever greater spell it granted.
My thoughts naturally brought up the events from earlier that day, the feelings of hopelessness from Gwendolyn and fear upon finding out Princess Ling was behind the murder the entire time. The Red Star ended up sending their most expensive emergency spirit messenger bird to reveal everything to the Lord Ruler, having no choice. Hopefully he wasn’t an asshole and would resolve the issue like a proper leader in charge. I hated myself for the bad feeling I got just thinking about the situation.
We were talking about his daughter, after all. What if he covered up the situation, pinned the blame on Gwendolyn? I couldn’t put this kind of fuckery past any noble of that caliber. But if I could guess this, then the Red Star likely knew too. Her best bet would be to gather her family and get the hell out of Dodge before the Lord Ruler showed up to kill her.
Hopefully that was a guess. Our trip to the big city would be the final stop to rank Kyushu to E, which would unlock more things for my D-ranked Shop.
Not being an E-ranked loser made me smile at the hard work put in to get this far.
