Rupegia - Chapter 102: A Warrior’s Welcome

Chapter 102: A Warrior’s Welcome – Part 2

But Léonne's response is unexpectedly cold, "You know that the heroes who succeed are the only ones whose stories are written in the books, right?" The chill in her tone even makes Alissa's tail stop wagging.

Honestly, we should've expected that from her. Alissa knows that she's a very cunning woman, the kind of realist that can easily see through our bullshit.

"Then we just need to win," Alissa immediately replies, sounding as stubborn as a mule.

Léonne narrows her eyes, her body completely tensed up, suddenly looking like a predator ready to pounce. "You're completely unconcerned about the dangers that lie ahead?"

"We've been through too much to worry about what we don't know," Yunia interjects, her elven pride flaring up in defense against the cold interrogation.

"Even though we don't know our future, we're preparing ourselves as best we can," Alissa piles on, mimicking Yunia's lofty expression.

Léonne gives Jacques a look, signaling for him to back her up, but he just shrugs. "You raised her that way," he dodges responsibility.

"What did you expect after you crammed all those ideas into my head about the honorable duties of a Blood Slave?" Alissa accuses Léonne.

"You are his wife, now!" She exclaims in indignation.

Alissa puffs her chest full of pride. "I was more than just a servant, and now I'm more than just a wife. We're all in this together, until the end."

Jacques laughs, his deep voice reverberating through possibly half the estate.

But Léonne is incredulous. "You're laughing? Our daughter has delusions of grandeur, and you're laughing?"

"Don't be mean, they aren't delusions. The Gods are clearly fond of them all," Jacques tries to calm her down.

The angry old fox shoots a glare towards Alissa. "I want her to take this more seriously instead of skipping along with an 'everything will be fine' attitude just because she believes that she's in a hero's story."

Alissa clenches her fist in annoyance. "I don't believe that 'everything will be fine,' I just know that, no matter what happens, I'll always stay by Wolfy's side without any regrets."

Léonne pauses for a moment. "Even death?" She quietly asks, her anger subdued.

Alissa nods slowly. "Even death."

An awkward silence settles in, but is then broken by Jacques' low chuckles. "You raised her that way," he repeats with a smug smile.

And Léonne becomes silent, staring intensely at Alissa while anxiously tapping her finger against her thigh.

"Arreira prepared us, somewhat," Ciel quietly chimes in. "He pushed us to the limit, and while our failures weren't real, it gave us all a new perspective on the consequences."

Léonne turns to Ciel, and her anger slowly fades away as Ciel's pure smile disarms her until she finally sighs tiredly and lets the tension in her body wash away.

Both mother and daughter are a bit hard-headed, and this time, Alissa's steel forehead won the exchange.

Léonne relents and gives her some honest advice, "I don't think you'll ever be ready for your future, so never stop growing."

Alissa smiles lovingly at having received genuine acceptance from her mother. "Thank you, Mom," she politely replies and bows.

"Be safe, child," Léonne whispers back.

Then the sweets arrive, and Alissa suddenly brightens up when she sees who's bringing them.

"Louise!" She shouts and nearly tackles the small woman, but first, she lets Louise put down the tray, and then they immediately hug each other.

"I couldn't believe my ears when they told us that you were coming back!" Louise shouts back in delight, and Alissa buries her head in the smaller woman's poofy red hair.

"Sometimes I can't believe it myself," she confesses and laughs softly.

"And now you're a Queen!" Louise giggles in delight.

They break the hug and stare at each other, Louise gushing with happiness while Alissa wryly smiles.

"We just inherited the elven royal mandate, we haven't actually been crowned," Alissa embarrassedly explains.

"Yet!" Louise shouts and giggles again.

"Queen Alissa of the Blinding Arrows," Allura teases with a cheeky grin, making Alissa wince, still uncomfortable with her old Title.

"You guys know everything about me, this is so unfair!" Alissa whines since she's unable to return the banter.

"Oh, I'll tell you all about Allura," Ofilia slyly interjects with a subtle grin.

"Ack!" Now it's Allura's turn to wince.

"Have you met the Hunters yet?" Louise eagerly asks.Ne/w novel chapters are published at novelhall.com

Alissa shakes her head in the negative, "No, we just got here and have really just been talking so far."

She grabs Alissa's hands and pulls her out of the room. "Everyone needs to see how much you've grown! The last time some of them saw you, you still had that young kit air about you, but now, they need to see the woman you've become!" And Allura follows them.

Louise's noise level is quite different from all the other werefoxes I've seen so far.

"We'll save you some sweets," I assure Alissa through [Bind].

"Thank yo-..." Her reply is interrupted as her brain goes in overdrive. "Montague!" she shouts and gets a hug from a tall, gray man, who's gray in both hair and skin tone. He's one of the Sworn Hunters, the same as a knight but with a cooler name, and Montague is kind of the brute of the bunch.

"Who is this woman? You remind me of a kit I once knew, but she certainly wasn't as beautiful as you," he teases like a friendly uncle, just slightly triggering my jealousy.

While she exchanges warm greetings with a handful of Sworn Hunters, we gorge on the sweets, and my sweet-tooth comes out in full force. I immediately recognize Apaisant as chamomile, but the flavor of Frele eludes me. It tastes a bit citric and fresh, but it also has a very mild and delicate feel to it. If I had to guess, I'd say that it's like kiwi.

"It seems that she was very loved," Ciel comments with a small smile as she looks towards the other room.

Four pointy fox ears point straight up, and both Léonne and Jacques turn to her.

"Of course she was," Jacques states matter-of-factly and continues eating his dessert.

"The Sworn Hunters are almost like an extended family," Léonne explains.

"Our knights aren't that close with us..." Yunia remarks, sounding a little conflicted.

Léonne turns pensive eyes towards her. "I assume that you have a lot more than we do."

"Not currently, but we have the capability to support many more."

"The bonds weaken the more people there are," Jacques sagely points out and takes a sip of his tea, the small teacup looking comically small near his large red beard.

"Hm..." Yunia hums in thought as she swirls the tea in her porcelain cup.

With the conversation slowing down again, I ask a question that has been growing within my mind, "Léonne, the werefoxes seem to be quite isolationist, so I didn't expect you to know so much about world history."

Her ears and tail point up in surprise, which is pretty fucking cute, and then her expression turns sly. "I studied history to learn how my ancestors kept the Misty Low Forest under their control. Learning about world history was just bonus material to prepare me for unforeseen events."

Learning history so that she could repeat it.

Lina and Yunia look up attentively, their curiosity piqued, and now that I've given them a good conversation starter, I just sit back and watch them talk, feeling quite proud of my little maneuver.

After a few minutes, the loud chatter in the other room starts to die down, and Léonne rings the bell again.

"Prepare the twenty-fifth," she cryptically orders, and the servant quickly leaves.

Once the excitement dies down, the Sworn Hunters continue sharing their stories with the Lordsguard. Klein and Anton have quite a lot in common with the Hunters, so they easily get along. Warriors and hunters are the same no matter where you are, so they easily bond thanks to their kindred search for glory or a good fight.

Then a group of old, but dignified werefoxes arrives at our room, and Léonne introduces them to us. They're the Elders, a group of old rulers that safeguards and organizes the succession of power in the Misty Forest. They don't have the same degree of absolute power as the elven Elder Council does, but they could easily enforce the rules by working with the temple and riling up the commoners to rebel.

Alissa comes back to greet them, and the stern-looking Elders become kind old grandparents in front of her.

"Where's Gurrier?" Alissa innocently asks, and they all go silent, giving her sad smiles.

"He passed away in his sleep a few months ago," Léonne announces.

We leave the Elders behind and descend through the long, grass garden along a sloped cement path. It seems that it gets cleaned pretty regularly since the dampness of the air here should encourage the growth of moss, and that would normally make the steps pretty slippery.

Along the way, a group of foxes comes to greet us, loudly yipping and wagging their tails like excited dogs until the Sworn Hunters give them little tidbits of food.

Alissa stops to pat some of them, and a few of the older ones seem to recognize her. Then we use [Animal Tongue] to get permission from the foxes to pet them, though Aoi needs to change into her humanoid form before she can even get close.

As wereanimals, Klein and Anton also manage to get close enough to pet the foxes, but the rest of the Lordsguard remains on guard, though the Chimeras seem very envious of us.

Hukarere suddenly approaches us and asks in Reo, "[So, uhm... I have a question]."

I move some points around to understand her better and gently reply, "[Yes]?"

"[Do werefoxes fuck animal foxes]?" She bluntly asks in a way that only a Chimera could.

"[Do weredragons fuck dragons]?" Hana immediately shoots back.

"[Lord Aoi is intelligent, though]," she retorts.

"[Fair point]," I admit.

Alissa tries her best to sound scholarly as she explains, "[Foxes only enter heat during specific seasons, and they search for a mate, not just some fun, so it's incredibly disrespectful to mate with a fox and then abandon it]."

The truth is, getting fucked by a fox is one of her fantasies, so she had clearly thought it through very thoroughly long before she met me.

"Every werefox is taught about these things!" She quickly defends herself in my soul space, but we all know how much of a depraved slut she truly is.

"[What if you don't abandon it]?" Hukarere continues, sounding rather fascinated.

"[Then you'd better get ready to become the parent of a fox]," Alissa amusedly answers.

Hukarere's tone starts to remind me of a child's since it's so full of wonder. "[Can a male werefox impregnate a female fox? What about the opposite?]"

"[Both are possible. Also, a werefox woman can be impregnated by an animal fox in both of her forms]," Alissa awkwardly replies.

"[Divines, step on me]," Hukarere mumbles in awe.

A fox shows me their belly and giggles loudly as I scratch it, then my hand brushes against something familiar, and I realize that it's a female.

"Mating season starts soon," Alissa whispers to me and bumps my shoulder with a smirk.

"Oh, Gods..." Anton mumbles as he immediately realizes what we've been talking about, and then Klein blushes just a second after him. Sex in their animal forms is just about the most intimate act possible for a wereanimal.

Alissa notices Allura's intense, surprised stare, and Alissa holds a hand over her mouth as she had completely forgotten how sensitive werefox hearing really is. Thankfully, their parents weren't paying attention.

"Mo~m!" Allura suddenly shouts, and Alissa darts towards Allura to gag her.

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