“But you stood up for me, Liz. I’m forever grateful for that.”
“Come to think of it, yes. Back then, I was still...” Liz’s words trailed off, drowned out by the sounds of the intensifying rain as raindrops began to bounce vigorously off the unkempt weeds. Liz took a deep breath, and suddenly reached out, looping her arm around Zenos’s.
“What’s wrong, Liz?” he asked, turning to face her.
She looked at him feverishly. “Hey, Zenos? Can we go to our secret base?”
***
Pelted by the oblique raindrops, three demi-humans and an elf were sprinting through the streets, splashing through puddles as they raced to stop Liz’s scheme.
“Come on!” Zophia said. “Hurry up!”
“I’m already hurrying!” Lynga protested.
“But Lily’s falling behind,” Loewe pointed out.
Zophia looked over her shoulder to see Lily’s form had already shrunk significantly in the distance. The girl was running as best as she could, but seemed out of breath, and kept losing ground.
“I don’t think she can keep up,” Zophia remarked. “What do we do?”
“There’s only one thing we can do,” Lynga said.
“Agreed,” Loewe added. The three exchanged glances and stopped, then ran back to Lily. Loewe lifted the elf onto her shoulders. “I’ll carry you.”
“Huh? Oh, I’m sorry for the trouble, Loewe,” Lily said.
“I don’t mind. It’s a perfect opportunity to regain the muscle I lost from dieting.”
Lynga spoke up as she ran alongside the orc. “No one gets to bewitch Zenos and take over our slums!”
Zophia nodded, her gaze focusing on the mountains ahead, misted over from the rain. “I feel the same way. But remember, she’s with the Black Guild. Don’t let your guard down.”
The rain grew more intense, and thunder roared behind the dark clouds, harkening the climax of the women’s war.
“Is this the mountain, Lily?” Zophia asked.
“Yes, I’m pretty sure this is the one,” the elf confirmed as she and the demi-humans finally stepped onto the mountain on the outskirts of the slums.
“This place...” Lynga mused. “Was Sir Zenos in the Dalitz Institute?”
“You know about it, Lynga?” Loewe asked.
“The place had a bad reputation. I mean, not that there are any well-regarded orphanages in the slums, but...”
Moving like the wind, the group rushed up the moss-covered stone stairs as the increasingly fierce rain drenched the mountainside.
“I wonder if the doc’s okay,” Zophia said.
“I want to say he is, but I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” Lynga chimed in.
“Supposedly, that woman has some sort of strange power to bewitch men,” Loewe pointed out.
“A strange power?” Lily echoed anxiously.
Zophia glanced up at the elf and said, “Maybe she’s a mutant.”
“A mutant?”
“I forget what the proper word for it is, but that’s what we call them. Very rarely, some people suddenly manifest the ability to use part of a monster’s power. Supposedly it’s caused by a bunch of factors, like predisposition, exposure to large amounts of mana, and other stuff.”
It was said that the demon lord’s army had been destroyed in the Great Human-Demon War three hundred years ago. However, remnants of the demon lord’s mana still drifted across the land, giving birth to demons and magical beasts.
“I had no idea,” Lily murmured.
“Mutants are rare and subject to persecution usually, so many hide their condition,” Lynga added. “Some may not even realize immediately that they’ve become one.”
“I hear there are more than a few of them in the Black Guild, though,” Loewe said.
“If she’s bewitching men,” Zophia mused, “maybe she’s using a succubus’s power.”
“What’s that?” Lily asked.
“A monster that appears in men’s dreams to seduce them. Depending on the type of mutant, the power and the way they wield it can vary, but...” Zophia paused, thinking for a moment, then continued, “What can be said for certain is that a man whose chastity is taken by one becomes their puppet.”
“What?!”
“Unacceptable,” Lynga said. “Sir Zenos’s chastity is mine for the taking.”
