Chapter 73

Chapter 73<~> Chapter 73

After quickly cancelling our future reservations at the inn we headed back towards the adventurer's guild. Torien hung behind a little, waiting for me to fill her in on what was happening. I felt like everyone would be better off if I brought them into the loop so I let Bella and Morrigan walk ahead a bit so I could fill Torien in first.

"I don't know the full story but Bella was tricked into selling herself into slavery by her abusive father and... a slaver. At least a few years before that, her mother was beaten pretty severely and ran away with Bella's aunt. Bella told me her mother abandoned her. At the time I assumed she just meant she left without taking Bella with her but I think there's more to it than that now. Bella has always been pretty hostile towards the Tamin church and recently even had an outburst that seemed pretty out of character for her at the time. I didn't really know what to think about it when it happened but this puts it all in a little bit more context. Do you have any idea what might have happened?"

Torien nods solemnly. "The Tamin church is known for aggressively recruiting anyone they can. One of their prime targets are people who run away from family because they're so vulnerable. They take in broken down people and turn them into fanatical zealots. In cases like this they make people give up all former attachments, property, family, even pets."

"And no one thinks that's fucked up?" I reply sharply.

Torien sighs. "It's not universally seen that way. That's my perspective as a beastkin, I'd be the first to admit I see everything the church does in a negative light. A lot of humans see it as a benevolent church saving people at their lowest and giving them a place to start over and rebuild their lives. The whole brainwashing aspect is just seen as the people being grateful for the 'good deeds' of the church that 'saved' them."

"Sounds like a freaky cult more than anything to me."

"You're not wrong, best not to let people hear you say that though. Their zealots are everywhere and we know for sure they're in town. If you go around calling them a violent cult they'll do everything they can to prove you right."

The two of us caught back up with Bella and Morrigan again. I gently placed a hand on Bella's shoulder. She leaned her head against my hand and took a few steadying breaths. Morrigan took this as a que to hang back and get filled in by her sister.Nnêw n0vel chapters are published at novelhall.com

"Are you going to be okay Bella? I might be able to talk to the guild master if you need to sit this mission out."

Bella went quiet for a moment, lost in thought, but eventually shook her head. "No. That... woman already cut all ties with me and Bruno is gone now too. I am no longer that woman's son. This is something I need to face, even if it's... hard."

I squeezed Bella's shoulder reassuringly. "I'll always be here for you."

A genuine smile broke through Bella's dour mood for a moment and she kissed my hand. "Thank you Lilith. I'll... tell you more about what happened later. We're almost there."

As we approached the adventurer's guild we could see the grumpy looking Tigerkin guildmaster waiting outside with six Tamin church adherents and two adventurers I hadn't seen around before. One was a enthusiastic looking male elf with a long ornate halberd resting against his shoulder the other was a incredibly muscular human woman with a pair of crossed swords on her back and sheathed knives adorning most of the rest of her body. It was almost humorous how opposite they were from typical fantasy hero characters.

Perhaps I'm underestimating a personal request from the guild master herself though. It felt reassuring the guild master was willing to assign good adventurer's to protect us. And everyone in our group could clearly tell who they were actually protecting us from. If the church decided to attack us then it would probably devolve in an outright brawl. I was curious what levels they were but knew better than to ask by now. Though actually, I wonder if Mimi could tell.

-- "Hey Mimi, can you tell me the levels of the two adventurers that are escorting us?" --

-- "Sure, no problem!... The Elven man is 42 and the scary woman is 56." --

I nearly choked. Both were so far above us, the woman was more than 20 levels higher than I was.

-- "56? What level are the priests and Paladins?" -- I asked.

-- "Hmm... The lowest is 15, most of them are around level 28. That one over there is level 40." --

Mimi pointed out one of the paladins that was talking with Bella's mother. It seemed like he was the leader of the group. Some of the priests were looking over at us now, looking somewhat confused.

-- "Mimi, thanks a ton but I think they might be able to detect you identifying them. That's it for now, good job." --

-- "Sure thing! Tell me if you need anything else!" --

I felt a gentle wave of emotions through the link, she was happy to be useful and liked receiving praise. I smiled to myself. She was cute, she was still trying to figure out how to interact with everyone but it was easy for me to tell that she had a good heart. Somewhat amusing for someone who had once technically been a demon.

I looked over the priests again. The looks of confusion had passed and Tarklin had most of their full attention again. The exception was actually Bella's mother. She was watching the four of us like a hawk now. Her expression made me think she didn't trust us almost as much as we didn't trust her. This whole thing is really unfortunate. I don't really know the full situation with Bella and her mother and hell, I can't even remember my own relationship with my parents but this situation was insanely awkward.

I tightened the straps of my bag and kept walking. It would be a few more hours before we got there and it was clear my friends weren't as interested in talking as they were on the way back to town a few days ago. So instead all of us just kept walking in silence, only on guard enough to be alert when monsters jumped out before being cut down by the Tamin church adherents.

The walk continued like this as the late afternoon sun set on our journey.