193 Get back on your feet, please! part The group entered the goblin village without their escort, they came all the way only to make sure that they’d reach the village safely, but if goblins saw their leader returning they’d assume he was successful and his quest was far from over yet.
It would have been shameful for him to return like that.
Ryu and his group were led to the house goblins built for him in his absence. It was a lot taller than the wooden box he woke up at when he first arrived at the village, but if bob was there he would have hit his head on the ceiling.
Mia took care of supervising the building and also furnished the house, it was cozy and cute, but most of the decoration was primitive at best. There were a few knitted dolls on the shelf, Mia had tried to reproduce every one of her friends, they looked as if a kid had made them but no one laughed.
She made Bob, Claire, Luke, Sera, Taffy, Veronika and even Hiraku who she only met briefly, all the dolls were smiling and were holding hands right behind Ryu’s doll. The latter was, of course, the biggest and the finest of them all. Mia depicted him with his black hair and his leather attire, including the rucksack. Everything was knitted on wool of course, but she paid special attention to detail.
It looked like a family of dolls.
Although childish, everyone was moved by her silly gesture. Even so, the only one who was able to completely get it was Ryu.
Mia was always a very sociable person, she loved to chat and hang out with people. She owned a potion shop but she lacked the skills to actually craft useful potions. The only ones she made with moderate quality were the healing potions.
She had spent months now far from the city with goblins as her only company. Not only they were just learning how to speak with people, but they also weren’t too good at making conversation. They were much more practical than humans, they spent long hours working and if they didn’t have something useful to say they’d rather be quiet. They didn’t get Mia’s need to talk about her day and whatnot.
.....
After Ryu left to look for his pets she was left alone, in a strange place, surrounded by people from a race she didn’t understand and as if that wasn’t bad enough, she ran out of healing potions to sustain herself.
Goblins walked far and wide trying to look for medicinal herbs, but it was simply too difficult for her to craft healing potions without her craftman station.
In the end she became sad, lonely and her health deteriorated to the point she even considered feeding from a goblin.
Thankfully for her, after kissing Ryu she regained some of her health and her mood improved greatly when she saw him coming back with more humans.
“I’m sorry for the inconvenience but there’s only one room in this place and we will have to sleep together tonight”
Although her words were saying she was troubled by this, she held a huge smile on her face. Mia’s joyful attitude remained oblivious to everyone’s grief. Despite this, no one felt like crushing her mood after seeing her cute little dolls.
Sera was even a little flattered because she made a doll after her and, secretly, she wanted to steal Ryu’s doll to sleep at night.
Everyone was fatigued after their long trip through the forest, they were strong even among adventurers, but they were hurt and they moved too fast resting only the minimum necessary.
Ryu, still worried about Anne’s health, let her take the bed along with Sera, while he slept on the wooden floor with Mia. It didn’t matter how tired they were, they didn’t sleep right away.
Anne was pondering what was Ryu’s situation with mia, Sera was snuggling to the doll she took without permission, and Ryu was awake thinking on his friends.
The next day, someone knocked on their door. Ryu, being the only one with the habit of getting up early, opened the door.
It was no other than Thoba, she was one of the very few goblins who bothered knocking, and this was only thanks to Mia’s nagging.
“Hello, brother of my husband”
“Hi Thoba, it’s been a while”
“Yes”
After her response and awkward silence followed.
“Is there anything I can help you with?”
“Yes”
“How can I help you then?”
“I need you to come take you wife with you”
Ryu, completely confused after her words, decided to play along and followed her.
They climed into one of the many wooden elevators and arrived at a small tree house. Ryu took a second to look around him, although the buildings were on the same place, everything looked to be in better shape than when he first arrived, not just that, there weren’t items lying around in front of the shops and everything seemed to be in order.
Thoba barged into the treehouse, this time without knocking, and pointed at a blond woman in a cute light blue dress.
“Athela?”
“Husband!”
“What are you talking about? I’m not your husband!”
“Shhh”
Athela shushed him before throwing herself on Ryu’s arms. Only when Thoba saw this she left the room.
“What’s the matter? why are you pretending to be my wife?”
“Didn’t Mia tell you?”
Athela explained to Ryu the reason why she called him husband.
Athela wanted to stay in the goblin village until Ryu came back, but goblins didn’t like her at all since she was considered a criminal who slaughtered their young without hesitation. She was considered a bad warrior, and that was even worse than not being a warrior at all like her maid.
In order to have goblins accept her into their village, Mia came up with a plan. Everything made sense to Ryu, especially the part where Mia was involved into convincing goblins that Athela was one of Ryu’s wives.
“Only that airhead succubus could think of something like that”
Ryu complained, but Athela’s eyes widened.
“A succubus!?”