Chapter 128 Kiruya

In the middle of nowhere, High on their mounts and surrounded by trees, the group continued on the gravel path towards the fox realm.

Shaman was currently glaring at Elysia, the same person who thought it was a better idea to get cooking books rather than the food to cook the recipes.

"Uhhh… I'm sorry." Elysia was unsure what Shaman was going to do but knew it was not going to be anything good.

Shaman slowly closed the gap between her and Elysia while encasing her hand in ice, forming it into an icy club.

Elysia's eyes widened as now she knew exactly what was going to happen and had no way to escape unless she wanted to be left behind.

'Damnit, why did we have to be on a mount...' Elysia could not move any further down the mount's back without risking falling off.

Shaman was now in range, and she slowly lifted her arm into the air, ready to strike Elysia.

"I love you." Elysia tried one last thing before Shaman bestowed judgment on her. Unfortunately for Elysia, it was not enough to shake Shaman and she finally swung down bonking Elysia on the head.

The ice bat upon impact had shattered, but nonetheless still hurt like hell for Elysia. Shaman had also accidentally knocked out Elysia causing her to almost fall off the mount. Shaman caught Elysia just in time and pulled her in close, then laid her out in the middle of the mount so she would not fall off.

"Oops, I may have a little bit too much strength." Shaman's pent-up stress and frustration caused her to have no restraint, making Elysia take the brunt of it. Even if it was overkill, Shaman needed some relief and Elysia was the unfortunate victim.

Elysia could have used her flames but found it futile to even fight back against Shaman as she would have won anyway.

Clara and Wolfy, who were watching from the other mount, could not help but chuckle to themselves quietly.

Shaman let out a sigh, quickly checking Elysia's health just to make sure she didn't almost kill her and thankfully she still had most of her HP.

Shaman climbed back to the front of the mount. She noticed that by now they were no longer surrounded by so many trees and was able to see a town ahead of them.

'Oh? This place seems sketchy but seeing as we don't have much proper food left it might be worth stopping for a quick look.' Shaman was also unsure if her map even had every location marked so a small town not being on it seemed plausible. Shaman has started getting more confident in her strength, believing she could handle most people as long as it's not the man from before.

"Hey Clara, should we stop by this town to stock up?" Shaman looked over to Clara wanting to hear her opinion.

"I don't see why not, it's not like we are fugitives although it feels like it." After running away from Ebonscale they had this feeling of being wanted, although that wasn't the case at all excluding the cult and potentially Elysia's family.

"Let's hope there aren't any knights that want to kidnap us for their secret underground rituals." Shaman quickly muttered out a few words which caught the attention of Clara.

"Huh? Rituals?" Clara had yet to be briefed about the whole cult situation and was rather confused.

"Oh, I haven't really told you about our situation have I." Shaman realised this and began to explain it to her while they approached the small town.

*

"What the hell? So you're saying that guy from before is most likely the leader of this whole thing and wants fox girls to perform a ritual?" Clara was a little shocked at how big of an operation was going on just underneath their nose.

"Again it's just a theory that he is the leader. Honestly, I'm surprised Himeko hasn't filled you in on our situation." Shaman thought she remembered Clara being informed but wasn't quite sure.

"Aha she might have, but honestly small memories like that, I have probably forgotten. I was under such heavy influence by the cursed object that only bigger events like meeting you stuck." Clara felt there was a gap in her memories as she found it hard to recall anything that wasn't important to her at the time.

"That makes sense seeing as it was basically controlling you and we didn't really know you when we told Himeko, so it was expected you wouldn't care." Shaman found it reasonable and did not question it.

"Indeed! Also, it looks like we have arrived." Clara gestured to look and as Shaman hoped for, it looked like a rather normal town.

"Seems like they have no mount barn and we just have to leave our mounts in a safe spot." The town did not have any massive buildings and looked like a normal suburban town.

Shaman looked over to Elysia and could tell she was just sleeping so she lightly punched her in the stomach causing her to shoot up awake.

"AHHHH!" Elysia looked around frantically trying to get her bearings.

"We are arriving in town so stop screaming otherwise people will get the wrong idea." Shaman could already tell problems were going to occur.

"Huh? We are here?" Elysia looked over and could see the town right in front of them finally putting the pieces together. Shaman let out a sigh as the urge to use another ice bat was growing.

"Oh sweet, let's hope I'm not kidnapped again." Elysia making a similar comment caused Shaman and Clara to chuckle a little as they had conveniently just talked about their situation.

'I shouldn't be laughing but that was too well-timed and too casual to be taken seriously.' Shaman wasn't sure if her friends would take it in good humour, so she avoided making any dark jokes.

The group then slowly entered the town.

*

The small town's architecture resembled that of Britain in the 1900s, with many houses lining the sides of the roads. The roads were big enough for both decently large mounts and people to walk side by side without any issues.

Unlike a city, one could enter the town without going through any guards. No wall surrounded the town, which allowed for easy expansion and unlike a city, there was no central building that clearly belonged to the mayor or city lords.

'Seeing as there are always wild monsters out and about, I'm surprised they don't have any walls. I guess with the rise of magic circles, the concept of walls must be for the older cities that have been around much longer.' Shaman assumed that the town was surrounded by defensive magic circles so if any monsters approached they would be killed, or if not, at least alert the right people to take care of it.

The group continued through the town on their mounts without any issue, but they still got the occasional stares as it wasn't every day the locals saw new people entering the town.

"Well, at least the looks are not hostile and just curious eyes." Elysia felt a little weirded out by all the stares and wanted to shoot their eyes out for looking.

"Don't worry about it, Elysia, it looks like we can secure our mounts in this open space." Shaman could see the look on Elysia's face and could tell she was planning something irrational. Shaman also pointed to a gap in the buildings which looked like it was meant for mounts to go in.

"Let's head over and see then." Clara was itching to stretch her legs as sitting on a mount all day was getting stifling.

They headed over to the open space which had shelters meant for mounts as a sign at the front told them everything.

*Mount drop off and Pick up.*

"Well, this is definitely the place." Shaman and Clara entered the drop-off and parked their mounts in the designated spot.

They were attended to by a man and were told they can come back to get their mounts but if they did not return in the next week the town would be allowed to assign the mounts to new clients.

Shaman found it fair as they only planned to stay for a day so there were no issues.

Once they settled their mounts they walked back to the main street till suddenly Shaman crashed into somebody.

A dark brown furred cheetah girl had accidentally walked right into Shaman causing them both to fall to the ground.

Shaman was a little shocked by the sudden crash but was able to quickly grab a hold of the Cheetah girl and brace her fall.

They landed on the ground with Shaman holding the cheetah making sure she did not get hurt.

The Cheetah girl with great speed quickly got off of Shaman who had braced her fall, her face completely red from the embarrassment of what just happened.

Shaman got up from the ground and was able to finally get a better look at the girl in front of her.

She had brown skin as well as beautiful mid-length dark brown hair, her tail and ears were the giveaways that she was a cheetah as they had the same black dots all over them. Her eyes were a coffee brown and filled with hesitation, revealing her to be a rather shy person. She wore a normal white shirt with thin black stripes and black jeans.

The Cheetah and Shaman both were the same height making Shaman instantly connect with the cheetah on a personal level as she had found someone who shared her suffering.

"I- uhhh… I'm sorry." The cheetah girl lowered her head expecting someone to yell at her.

"Oh, it's okay, are you hurt anywhere?" Shaman quickly opened up the girl's status, but to her surprise, it was anything but normal.

[Kiruya]

[Unable to inspect, please level up to see her stats]