"Is this really necessary?" I couldn't help but ask as Mia and I watched the cruel spectacle unfold amidst the snow.
"Yes," Mia said calmly. "They need to fight actual threats."
Ian was desperately parrying strike after strike. His efforts bought Revilla the time she needed to unleash yet another spell against the shield of an extremely ragged-looking demon. The shield flickered and almost went out, making the demon growl in frustration and pain.
As tough of a front as this demon was trying to present, our apprentices were grinding him down. I could see that much from the wildly thrashing Emotions he exuded.
He was terrified. He was desperate. And his only viable way out was through the elf and the shifter standing in front of him.
The demon gritted his teeth and blurred forward. His sword roughly pushed Ian's blade aside before he planted a kick right in the middle of my apprentice's chest.
Ian's mage shield shattered. The exhale of a mana construct coming undone was accompanied by a loud snap of ribs fracturing, if not breaking outright. Mana visibly sputtered out of the open wounds littering my apprentice's forearms and chest. Yet despite all of that, Ian managed to stagger back and stay on his feet.
He was still getting chewed out later. That wasn't even the first time his shield had gone down during the battle.
What saved his life was the sudden flaring of green flames in the demon's own injuries, especially those in his chest, side, and the stump of his left arm. Pure torment was visible on his face, and he bellowed like a man on death's door.
Probably because he was.
Mia smiled contentedly. "We can't coddle them forever."
"I know," I replied. "But to throw them up against a greater demon?"
"A greater demon you maimed first."
"Touché."
Revilla screamed out a spell, pairing one of her favorite incantations with the style of casting we'd taught her. A bolt of lightning shot out of her hands into the demon's shield.
Ordinarily, the greater demon could have tanked something like that easily. But with his concentration and mana flow both shot by his injuries, his shield glitched like a badly damaged TV screen and winked out.
He howled in agony. The flames he had been struggling to repress exploded out of his control, threatening to consume him wholly. Before they could finish the job, though, Ian was there. My apprentice's sword cut through the air with a whine and parted the demon's head from his shoulders.
The demon fell back, but a few stray branches of electricity reached out to Ian through his very big metal sword. The doggo locked up and start quivering as the spell did its work on him. He wasn't a demon, after all. Not yet. His body was still mostly mortal, and with his poor spellcasting prowess, he couldn't do much to defend himself.
Of course, Revilla shouted some dramatic nonsense and cut off her spell off quickly. Then she rushed to check on him as he bonelessly collapsed.
"That idiot," I sighed, feeling more tired than I had any right to be. "Welp. At least maybe now she'll learn not to chuck highly destructive spells in the vicinity of her allies?"
Mia just scoffed, and I sighed again. I wasn't holding out much hope that Revilla would learn any such thing. To my growing horror, Mia's apprentice had turned out to be the kind of ally who yells, 'I don't care how many people are in there or how big the room is. I said, I cast Fireball!'
I was never teaching her that spell.
"They did well," Mia purred. Pride shone in her eyes as she gazed at the pair.
The elf was cradling the shifter to her chest and trying to cast the few healing spells she had only just started learning. It wasn't going well. Healing spells are notoriously tricky, after all. She was also distracted by trying to force a healing potion down the doggo's throat. That was going even worse, since his jaw was still clenched shut.
Maybe I should have worried more about teaching her those lightning spells, rather than the potential of her discovering Fireball. This was real life, after all. Fireball was hardly the most destructive spell out there.
"I really need to get Ian better armor," I mused. "Before they get to any more of the really destructive spells. Maybe something like Lagyel sand, if I can swing it? That way, at least his own girlfriend won't be at risk of killing him all the time."
"Ooooh, they're official then?"
"Nah. I don't think either of them is brave enough to make the first move. Just lots of cuddling."
This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.
Mia looked genuinely sad to hear that for a moment. Then she perked up and gave me a meaningful smile. "Well, that's how it starts, right?"
I couldn't help it. I laughed. "Yes, that's true. Any day now, they'll move on to the lewdest of activities." I brushed my hand down her arm and gently entwined my fingers with hers. "Holding hands."
She flushed, shooting me a confused look. "What? How is that…? Ohhhhh, I see." Her ears twitched mischievously. "That was… what's that word? From those memories of yours? Right, I remember. That was 'lame.'"
I coughed and looked away. My own face flushed a little at the reminder that Mia had seen every last bit of me, and still chose to stay by my side.
"Yes, well… We need to practice a bit more. You know what."
"Smooth topic shift," she purred, her lips quivering.
"It doesn't change the fact that I'm right!"
"I know. We've just been busy."
She didn't need to clarify. We really were.
We had been on Breskwor for nearly a week already, and we were both getting frustrated with how little we were accomplishing.
Oh, we were doing just fine on the 'catch and kill' infiltrators front. Too fine, in fact. They seemed to be multiplying. We had already caught fifteen different idiots, some moving alone and some in groups.
The real problem was how little we had managed to extract from them.
They were all, in simple terms, hirelings: desperate demons with a relatively decent skill and power level who had been sent to infiltrate Breskwor and snoop around. But since they had been hired through proxies and given very general orders, none of them knew anything useful.
We were absolutely certain of that. Between us, Mia and I had a ton of different ways to get them to, ahhh, 'open up.' Abyssal flames, crystal mana, dream mana, and a soul blade can do a lot when combined.
We still had one guy on display inside the interrogation room. Crystalline vines had grown throughout his body and kept him lifted off the floor, flames occasionally wisping from them. He made a lot of noise as his mind drifted through ever more terrifying and painful nightmares. It made for a hell of a show, and guaranteed that anyone new we brought in was a hell of a lot more motivated to talk.
Didn't help when those new people had nothing to say, though.
"This isn't sustainable," I said flatly, meaning every word. "If we leave, those goons will just whittle away at the defenders here. But how long can we stay? Another week? A month? A year? It's not like Glaustro can afford to lose two Barons indefinitely. Not when we consistently have nothing to show for our 'successful' infiltrator catches."
Mia gave her own weary sigh as Revilla finally managed to loosen Ian's jaw enough to trickle potion down his throat. "I know, but… what can we do?"
"I've had a few ideas, but none of them are really possible to implement. I mean, the real trick would be placing a solution in the hands of the local garrison. If Breskwor can defend itself, then we can leave this mess behind us for now and focus on the invasion we're supposed to be assisting."
"If we could just force them all into a contract or an oath or something…" Mia grumbled.
I froze, looking at her with wide eyes.
"What?" she asked defensively, then repeated the question when I just grinned at her.
"You are brilliant, you know? Could you hold down the fort here for a bit? I need to talk to Yules and Tibath. Oh! I can take our two idiots with me to meet them, too."
"Of course, but…" She narrowed her eyes. "What did you come up with?"
I grinned wider. "Oh, you'll see."
"So, these two are your apprentices?" Tibath asked skeptically, staring hard at Ian and Revilla.
Couldn't blame her much. When we realized we were hitting a dead end with our interrogation, we had decided to put the infiltrators to good use. And by that, I meant maiming them badly enough so our apprentices would have a chance, and forcing them to fight.
Ergo, Ian and Revilla looked exactly like a pair of mortals who had spent the last two days fighting demons in the middle of an icy wilderness: utterly exhausted, moderately frostbitten, and dressed worse than street urchins. They were dressed warmly, but that was the most charitable attribute I could assign to their clothes.
There was a reason tribal fur fashion wasn't in style anymore.
"Well, not both of them. The elf belongs to Mia. The mutt's mine. They're more impressive than they look, though. They've killed five demons so far!"
"Really, now?" Tibath demanded, eyeing them a second time.
Meanwhile, Yules was practically vibrating with excitement. "Ohhhh, did you bring them here for armor? Did you? Did you?! Cause I've gotten a lot better at making budget armor for mortal-level legion members."
"Really? Why ever would you focus on that?" I smiled. "Also, yes, I do need some armor for them. And yes, they've killed five demons. Heavily damaged and kind of crippled demons, but still."
"Hrm, that's believable enough," Tibath chimed in before Yules could reply, earning a scowl from the young demoness. "And yes, my daughter really wanted to expand our list of offerings. It works, since we can now advertise our shop as having armor of every level of quality you could ever need. We have a truly stunning price range, too."
"Yes, the costs for some of your pieces can definitely be described as 'stunning'," I dryly noted, not that I didn't think they were right to charge such prices. "Yes, Yules, you can have the duo. Be… actually, I don't mind if you're not gentle with them. Enjoy yourself."
Yules squealed and laid her hands on the shoulders of the apprentices, who suddenly looked a lot more alarmed. I just smirked, ignoring their pleading looks as she dragged them off into the back of the shop.
Once they were gone, I focused on Tibath again.
"Hmmm, so you're here for me, and not my daughter. Should she feel jealous of you deciding to commission armor from me?" the demoness teased, but I laughed and waved her off.
"No, no. I actually need your expertise. Breskwor's been growing a bit more… unstable, recently. We're dealing with infiltrators, left, right, and center."
Tibath's face tightened as her voice's warmth faded a little. "I hope you are not asking me to help with that?"
"No! I promise that's not it," I assured her. "Mia said something, and it got me thinking. Is it possible to slip a contract into an item, such that the mere act of accepting the item would bind you to the contract? Would such an enchantment even be possible?"
Her eyes sharpened, but the amusement in her voice came back twice as strong. "Oho, now that's an interesting question, indeed. What kind of item? And, more importantly, what kind of contract?"
"Well… I was thinking bracelets, maybe? A simple design I could mass produce using my crystals? As for the contract…"
I did my best to explain my idea in detail, growing ever more hopeful as the smile on Tibath's face widened.
Maybe I should have been a little alarmed at how malicious that smile was, but we were demons, after all. I was more than happy to match her energy. In fact, I'm not even sure exactly when an equally devious grin slipped onto my own features.