Chapter 146

146 Dress properly, please!

Mia didn’t want to abuse the goblin’s generosity and she attempted to pay him with a bone taken from the megalania. It was the closest thing to money she had since goblins went crazy for beast parts. But the goblin shook his head and wouldn’t receive anything from her.

He was one of the many goblins that almost perished fighting the huge lizard and, even if he couldn’t communicate it with words, he wanted to thank the person who saved him. If he knew Mia actually wanted the fabric to make a dress for Athela, the bad warrior who killed younglings without hesitation, he would have asked for proper compensation. In fact, he would have overcharged her.

By the time Mia went back to Ryu’s house there was yet another pile of gifts waiting outside, goblins were truly grateful towards Ryu. She took the gifts inside and rummaged into them to find something that could be helpful.

She had the fabric and some thread, but there was something she didn’t have and she didn’t realize it until she was already back at Ryu’s house.

“What’s the matter Mia? you look confused”

“Master, I don’t have a needle to sew the dress”

She said with teary eyes

“How did you make yours then?”

“I just covered myself with a piece of cloth and tied it by the waist with a rope”

.....

While her dress was nothing to be proud of, she actually looked really nice. No one would have guessed that she wasn’t wearing an actual dress.

“Then you need to make a proper dress for you too Mia, I have the sewing and tailoring skills but I think it would be better for you to learn new skills”

“Is it really ok? I might end up wasting lots of materials”

She said somewhat troubled.

“As soon as the leather is ready I intend to craft some armor for them so you don’t need to feel bad about wasting some resources”

While Mia nodded in all seriousness, Athela lost her cool when she heard about Ryu’s intentions to craft gear for those ‘beasts’.

“How come you refuse to help me, but then you go out of your way to craft armor for them? since when are you sided up with those beasts? You are treading into a dangerous path, turning your back on humanity like it’s nothing”

“Uh? do you seriously expect me to answer? tell me, what have you done for me other than bringing me trouble? what did the other adventurers do for me? even Lorenzo refused to help me when I was desperate, not only that, he ran the rumour that I lost against a goblin just to make fun of me. The other rookies betrayed us, heck, even Shortie the guy I helped the most stabbed me in the back, quite literally by the way...”

Ryu was starting to lose his temper after hearing his own words so he took a few seconds to regain his composure.

“And then the goblins, which I had faced as enemies before, not only saved me from certain death, they also gave me food and shelter for free. I’m not saying I’m on anyone’s side, Human or beast I don’t care, I’ll always repay kindness with kindness and pain with pain.”

Athela’s face grew paler and seemed quite overwhelmed by Ryu’s attitude, he had always been mild mannered and respectful in front of her. But she didn’t dislike his new behavior, in fact, she thought it was manly.

“I can respect that actually, now I really wish I didn’t try to escape so many times. To be fair, they only hurt us when we attempted to run away...”

After reaching some sort of understanding, Ryu turned his back on Athela and picked a stone from the pile of gifts he received. Goblins had a knack for trading because they didn’t have any sort of currency, and that meant every single one of them hoarded everything they could get their hands on.

A simple stone that might have little to no value for a person, could be considered a treasure for a goblin. That made the fact that they willingly showered Ryu with gifts even more impressing.

It took a single point of mana for Ryu to turn the useless stone into several needles sturdy enough to be useful, at least with clothes.There was no chance for a needle like that to be able to pierce leather made from the megalania. But that was a problem for the future, and he needed to solve the girl’s dressing problem as soon as possible.

It didn’t matter how much he still loved Rina, he feared he would fall into Mia’s mind games or Athela’s straightforward attitude, he wasn’t made of steel after all. Of course clothes had little to do with that, but at least seeing them dressed instead of naked would give him some peace of mind.

Unbeknowsnt to Ryu, they were on a pretty similar situation. When the goblins rescued Ryu his shirt was already tattered and when the goblin doctor removed it for treating his wound it became nothing but shredded fabric.

He had been walking around all day dressed with his boots and pants, revealing his new constitution. His abdominals were so chiseled Mia often sighed thinking she could even use his belly to wash clothes without issues. Not only that, but now even his chest was that of a proud warrior instead of his past rather skinny self.

Of course he was completely oblivious to the changes his body had gone through, it happened while he was unconscious and there was no way he could have noticed without a mirror.

after threading the needle mia wanted to start sewing right away, but she was so distracted by Ryu’s presence she forgot to tie the thread and it passed right through the fabric, she also pricked her fingers almost after every stitch.

Being a succubus, one of her most notorious traits was she was able to taste people energies. Every person had a distinctive flavor and every emotion complimented it.

She hadn’t been able to feed properly for days, since everytime she tried to make a move on Ryu, he would turn her down. Being close to him provided her the bare minimum of energy she needed to survive, but it was the same as a hungry person standing in front of an all you can eat buffet with their favourite dishes.

To make matters even worse, her body reacted to hunger in a different manner than humans. The more hungry she was, the more devious her behavior became. She would also experience a state of constant arousal that couldn’t be put down by herself even if she wanted to. In short, she was desperate for Ryu’s fluids but he wasn’t budging.

“Uhm, master”

“Yes?”

“Could you please...”

“No”

“But you didn’t even let me finish!”

Mia pouted as if she had been unfairly treated.

“Ok, finish what you were saying”

“Could you please feed me?”

“No”

“Why!?”

She puckered her lips in frustration.

“Isn’t it obvious? I don’t want to do that sort of things with you”

“Am i not attractive?”

“That’s not it, but our relationship will change completely if we cross the line and I don’t want that to happen to us”

Ryu was being completely honest with her and she completely understood where he came from. Her personality differed from her race so much that she was able to endure starvation so far, but that didn’t make it any easier on her.

“If only you had some potions, no, just one would keep me going for a couple days”

“It’s just not possible, your craftman station is back at Celarent along with my equipment. Even if I asked the goblins to make the equipment for me, it would take them weeks, and that is if they’re even able to do so. Distillers are really complicated, I’m not confident I could craft one”

Ryu looked nostalgic for a second.

“What!? I thought you made your own equipment”

“Didn’t Luke tell you about Ayumi?”

“Yes! he told me about a granny that always nagged at him. He said she was quite the hipocrite and he was glad to be free from her”

“He said that?”

Ryu was shocked by Mia’s words. Both Ayumi and Hiraku always treated Luke as their own son, they always fought and argued, but whenever Luke complained Hiraku would tell him ‘that’s what families are for’ and laugh it off.

“He did, but he looked sad everytime he talked about her”

She said shaking her head from side to side. Albeit briefly, Mia met Hiraku and she had an idea of the kind of person he was, but after hearing Luke’s blabberings about his wife she made a completely wrong idea about her. She pictured Ayumi like an old wrinkled witch with a pointy hat and a wart on her nose.

By the end of the day Mia finished two decent dresses, one for Athella and one for herself, while she talked with Ryu about his past with the group of heroes. Some of the stories she heard, like the time Ayumi had an allergic reaction to a plant when trying to make beauty products, had a complete different meaning in her head. She could already see her in front of a cauldron swirling an iron ladle with an evil grin and, because Ryu was too busy feeling nostalgic, he didn’t even notice the mixup and kept on telling stories.

It felt good for him to be able to share memories, since he had none from before that time. It was a new feeling he couldn’t even begin to describe.