CH.337 Unika’s family

CH.337 Unika’s family

It had been three days since we got back from the Green dungeon when we finally got a call from Unika. We hadn’t spotted Nel again, by the way, so we still have no clue where she is hiding, and I actually almost sent one of my monsters to check out the house she entered, but I can wait a bit more.

But back to Unika. Since she called for us, I’ll go meet up with her.

With the emergency device (not finished) that I gave her, I located Unika in the city and beamed down very close to her. Not right next to her, but pretty close. I also brought Ria with me, just in case.

“Unika. I’m here.” I called out to the purple tailed fox-girl.

She was standing in an almost empty alley with a young boy, probably 10 or so years old. The boy didn’t have a tail, but he does seem to have some sort of ears on the top of his head. Though unlike with Unika, where her ears are standing up straight, the boy’s ears are flat against his head. Oh, and his hair was cut quite short and was a blue-ish color. Quite a light blue at that. It is an interesting contrast compared to Unika, as she is a very dark blue. Well, purple, but purple is a mix of blue and red, while this boy is a very light blue.

“Ah? Lord Brian? You really came?” Unika seemed genuinely surprised that I had come to meet her. Did she not trust me?

“Of course. I promised as much.” I reassured her. “Is this your younger brother? It is a pleasure to meet you. My name is Brian.”Cheêck out latest novels at novelhall.com... I’m Valoa.” The boy introduced himself.

“I apologize that our mother couldn’t be here. She wasn’t able to take a day off.” Unika told me.

“Don’t worry. That is no issue. Let’s head to a local tea-shop or something, where we can talk in peace.” I told the two, and as I saw their faces change, I quickly added. “Don’t worry. I’m paying.”

“Then... then we can go to the place mama works at.” Valoa said. “... maybe she can take a break.”

“I’m not so...” Unika tried to say no in a gentle way, but actually, Valoa’s idea sounds just fine.

“I think that is a great idea. Can you show me the way?” I asked.

After just a short walk, we stopped in front of a small diner. It looked ... fine, but it looked a bit run down, so maybe it lacked customers. Or maybe the owner was just a cheapskate.

Following Valoa and Unika, we entered the building. I quickly noticed that there was a considerable number of customers inside, despite the somewhat early hour and the state of the building. If I owned this place, and I had this many customers every day, I would fix this place.

We were quickly spotted by a server, and she rushed somewhere to probably get someone. And very soon, a fox-folk lady with dark blue hair, ears and tail came to us. Her work uniform... well, I can definitely see what kind of ‘diner’ this is. She was dressed in a skimpy uniform that covered just a bit more than the minimum. If I didn’t know any better, actually I don’t know any better, so maybe this place is actually ... that kind of place. Hopefully not.

“... what are you doing here?” She didn’t yell, speaking quietly but assertively. “I told you not to visit me while I work.”

“But mom...”

“No. Leave.” She said, still in that hushed tone.

“We came to eat. Would that be possible?” I asked.

The fox-lady then turned to look at me, as if this was the first time she noticed me.

“... Sir? I’m not sure you would enjoy any food in this place. Are you sure you don’t want a recommendation for a better restaurant?” She asked.

“... is that really how you treat your customers? No wonder the owner doesn’t fix this place.” I said, before I told her. “But yes. I would like to eat here. And I would like you to join us.”

“I... I’m not sure that is possible.”

“It isn’t if it is possible, but how much it costs. So how much for you to dine with us?” I asked, as I got a gold coin out of Storage and handed it to her.

“I... I’ll go ask.” The fox-woman agreed to my suggestion. She guided us to an empty table that would fit all four of us, before entering some back area, possibly the kitchen.

“The manager allowed me to eat with you for the cost you already paid.” The fox-lady came back and told me. She then sat down at the table with us.

“That’s good.” I was honestly expecting him to ask for even more money for this, but just one gold is very little. “Can you recommend some good foods?”

“Good.”

“You are not someone that can be understood by someone like me.” Olia said.

“... well, I suppose that might be the case.”

“Thank you. For this. It will take me a bit of time to sort out everything, but once we do, we shall make the move.” Olia said, as we went our separate ways.

“Of course. Unika has a way to contact me, so when you are ready, just use it.”

For now, I couldn’t bring the group straight to HomeBase, even if I wanted to. They wanted a few days to deal with things like debt, their home, the school Valoa goes to and so on. And I was more than happy to wait a bit longer.

I had given the group a total of five gold coins, as prepayment. They could use that to clear away any debt they have, and hopefully they could do what they want with their house. I did tell them that I’d expect them to live on HomeBase, so keeping a house on the surface might be useless to them. Sure they can, but it is just going to be another money sink.

After saying see you later to the family, I located a nice quiet spot and beamed myself up to HomeBase.

“Master. Endemion requests your presence.” Water Magician informed me when I arrived at HomeBase.

Spoiler

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I don’t actually have Aqua-type monster dedicated avatar dolls yet, but luckily Water Magician can use the general gen 1 avatar dolls. But unlike her, a lot of Aqua-type monsters can’t use them, as ... well, their bodies are kind of made of water. Or slime. Or something similar. Just not a good day.

But that is neither here nor there. Endy needs me, so let’s see what he wants.

“Someone attempted to use a visual spell on HomeBase, likely appraisal or something similar.” Endy told me when I got to my office, aka. the Citadel Core room.

“... does that mean... that someone was able to see HomeBase?” I asked. “I mean, visual magic would mean...”

“Yes. I believe that to be the case.” Endy answered.

“... I assumed it was impossible. I mean, you’d need a unique skill for that, right?”

“That was our theory, but perhaps a right combination of skills can do it. Especially if they had a tool to enhance sight.”

“... yeah. Maybe I underestimated the capital. Treasure items should be more common here, so maybe if someone noticed anything, and they have access to said items, they might go ahead and use one.” I theorized. “... Do we know who did it? Or where it came from? And did they succeed?”

“They must have seen HomeBase, but the magic was blocked by our barrier. And we have a general idea on where the spell came from, but we do not have the exact point.”

“Show me.”

Endy used the Citadel Core to display a map of the capital and on it, a large circle was drawn. It was all situated over the noble’s district, with just a bit of it even entering the castle.

“So a noble. Should have assumed as much. Is the center of the circle the most likely spot?”

“No. We had to estimate the area based on the spot of the barrier where that spell was stopped. From that, we estimated this area.” Endy answered. “It may have even been from outside of this, but this is the most likely area. We are currently keeping a close eye on it, and if we catch anyone watching at the sky for too long, we will make a note of them.”

“... great work. Make sure to keep me informed.”

So someone has seen HomeBase from the ground. What kind of person could do that? And what will they try to do next? What can they do?

Will they spread the news that an island is levitating above the capital? An invisible island at that? Would anyone believe them? Probably not.

Try to attack HomeBase? First, why would they do that? Second, that is nearly impossible. Even Agunan can’t get past the defensive barrier around HomeBase. I suppose Lady Janina could, but I don’t think there is a human as powerful as she is.

The one thing I could see happening is them trying to infiltrate HomeBase. And the way they could do that is to kidnap someone that has access. I’m not really worried about myself, Alice, Lua, Ria or Agunan. Anyone of us should be able to defend ourselves. But some of my workers... They are a different thing. I really need to finish the emergency device and give them out to everyone. Add a feature where it will block their access device after activating, so that the access device cannot be stolen.

Yeah. I’ll get to work on that.