Ellie sidestepped the skeleton's lunge, longsword in hand, then with a casual stroke cut it in two at the waist.
She stomped the skeleton's skull to pieces and turned to walk back to Ryan. "That should be the last skeleton in the area."
Ryan took the longsword she handed back and, looking at the bones littering the ground, couldn't keep the corners of his mouth from rising.
Impeccable. Truly impeccable.
On a sudden whim, Ryan had wanted to see how her swordsmanship was, so he'd handed her a blade and let her wipe out the skeletons — and the result far exceeded his expectations.
Her strokes were precise and sharp, the force and speed pitched exactly right — a hair more would be too much, a hair less not enough — and she never swung twice at the same target.
Ryan would bet that not one of those mercenaries at the tavern could match Ellie's skill with a blade.
Tonight he'd have to feed her a little extra and bump up her Loyalty.
"Let's grab what we need and head back." Ryan slowly crouched and rummaged through the bones.
Evelyn had said that inside a skeleton's chest there was often a thumb-sized black mana crystal, and he needed to pry the things out to exchange for his pay.
Ryan turned over a set of bones and, sure enough, found one among them.
Steeling himself, he pried at it with a dagger. The instant the mana crystal came loose, Ryan heard an eerie groan, and then the bones crumbled to powder in a heap.
Ellie was faster — in the blink of an eye she'd stuffed seven or eight mana crystals into the sack.
With the spoils gathered, Ryan looked up at the sun hanging overhead, wiped his sweat, and decisively headed back to the city with Ellie, digging up the gear they'd buried that morning along the way to go sell it.
The two light crossbows plus the assorted weapons sold for fifteen silver in total — nothing like what Ryan had expected; he was haggled down brutally hard.
The tailor wasn't especially keen to take the bloodstained clothes either, and only after much back-and-forth did they sell for eight silver.
Adding in Evelyn's bounty, he earned twenty-five silver today, for a total of thirty-seven silver on hand.
He could buy Ellie an outfit first and put the shoes off for later; he wanted to bring home another slave.
After a moment's thought, Ryan took Ellie to the market and let her pick out a dress she liked herself.
Ellie turned to glance at Ryan, then stood before the stall and began picking through the wares.
But this catgirl seemed to have a chronic case of indecision; Ryan waited until his legs went numb.
Evelyn had been exactly right: Ellie had been stripped of the right to choose since childhood and wasn't good at making decisions.
The tailor stood by the stall, arms folded, a trace of disdain in the look he gave her. "Is your slave done picking? Don't go dirtying up my stall — other people still want to buy."
Ellie didn't make a sound, nor did she put the clothes down, still carefully sorting through them.
Ryan shot the tailor a glance — his neck was grimy black and he reeked.
In the dead of summer, you could tell just from the smell that he hadn't bathed in at least half a month — and he had the nerve to call someone else dirty.
"Ellie, want me to help you choose?"
Seeing her nod, Ryan stepped up, holding dresses against her one by one to compare, and finally settled on a pale-blue, waist-cinched long dress.
Honestly, by Ryan's standards all these dresses were hopelessly tacky; only this one was a touch better.
But Ellie had a supermodel's figure and could pull off anything; she'd look good in it for sure.
"Do you like this one?" Ryan turned the dress around to show her.
Ellie gave it a very earnest look, then nodded slightly. "I like it."
"Good, then this is the one."
Ryan paid seven silver and turned to leave with Ellie.
He meant to stroll through the slave market and pick out a slave to serve as backup.
Ellie followed behind Ryan, and as they walked they arrived at the entrance of the slave market.
Gazing at the two rows of demi-humans caged in iron along the street, Ryan was about to step inside when Ellie reached out and grabbed his clothes.
She stared at Ryan and said nothing at all.
"What's wrong?"
Ellie clutched the dress tightly to her chest, silent for a while, then finally spoke. She pleaded, "Don't send me back."
"What? Who said anything about sending you back?" The slaver had said Ellie could be returned if she misbehaved — maybe that was what worried her — so Ryan added, "I just want to buy one more to bring home."
Ellie said nothing, and the hand gripping his clothes didn't let go.
The two of them stood deadlocked in the street for a dozen-odd seconds, until a man's voice came from behind them. "It's you?"
Ryan turned to look and found it was the slaver from the day before, in his brown robe, face drenched in sweat, with two demi-human slaves — a man and a woman — trailing beside him.
Seeing Ellie clinging to him, the slaver asked, "What brings you back? The beast won't behave?"
Ellie's face was blank, but those fuzzy ears of hers had long since flattened sideways.
"I'm here to buy a slave." Ryan patted Ellie's hand, and she finally let go.
"The next batch of White Mist Island beasts hasn't arrived yet." The slaver pointed his whip at the slaves in the cages and went on, "Care to come in and look at the other beasts?"
Ryan nodded and walked into the market, beginning to pick and choose with care.
Ellie followed at a distance, hugging the dress, watching for a good while before sidling back up to him.
She gazed at her own kind in the cages, not a ripple in her eyes; what she was thinking, there was no telling.
Finding it too tiring to appraise the slaves one by one, Ryan asked the slaver, "I need a Dog-Kin slave with a keen nose — ideally one that can fight."
The slaver narrowed his eyes, thought back briefly, then said, "And a big-chested woman?"
"Exactly. The bigger the better. The extra padding offers a degree of protection for the vital organs beneath, and to some extent it helps balance the weight of the upper body, so a person can control their balance better..."
Ryan rattled off a whole spiel, but the slaver just waved a hand, wearing the expression of a man who'd seen it all. "I get it, I get it. I'll go have a look and see if there's a suitable one."
Once the slaver had gone, Ryan looked over at Ellie beside him.
She was looking down, studying the swells of her own rabbits, seemingly lost in thought for some time now.
Ryan couldn't help saying, "What are you looking at?"
Truth be told, hers really were big.
Ryan had only ever seen that size in manga.
If she ever had a child, she could absolutely feed it up into a fine, plump thing.
Ellie shook her head and mumbled, "It's nothing."
The two of them waited by the street a while, and the slaver finally emerged from that dilapidated building.
Leafing through the reddish-brown sheepskin book in his hands, he said to Ryan, "No suitable Dog-Kin beast, but there's a Wolf-Kin beast that fits the bill. Do you want her?"
Ryan thought it over — dogs and wolves shouldn't differ much when it came to sense of smell.
Some specially bred working dogs could outdo wolves at scent, but overall wolves had the edge.
"Sure. Take me to see her."