by Virlyce
Alora stopped rolling around on the ground, lifting her head to stare at the duo, her cheeks streaked with mud. “Right! Forgetting something like declaring how many rounds there were supposed to be! It’s best two out of three!”
Vur clicked his tongue. “Sore loser.”
“Hah!?” Alora jumped to her feet and glared at Vur. “I’m not a sore loser! You’re a not-forgiving winner!”
Vur shrugged. “If you don’t want to be my lackey, then that’s okay too.” He puffed his chest out. “But I won, and you lost.”
Alora’s eye twitched. “What kind of dragon do you think I am? I’m an honorable dragon, and honorable dragons keep their promises! Even if you don’t want me to, I’m going to stick so close to you and do everything you could possibly want for the next fifty years that you’ll be rendered completely helpless without me by the time I leave. You got a problem with that?”
“Um, I do,” Tafel said, raising a hand.
Alora snorted. “You’re not my boss.” She pointed at Vur. “He is.”
“No, she’s your boss too,” Vur said. “Treat her words like mine.”
Alora’s face spasmed before she closed her eyes and exhaled. “You got it, Boss.”
Tafel whispered to Vur, “Don’t you feel bad for tricking her? Like even a teensy bit?”
“No matter what kind of match we had, I would’ve won anyway,” Vur said, placing his hands on his hips. “And that’s because I’m a dragon. Dragons never lose.”
“…I’m a dragon too,” Alora said.
Vur blinked before turning to Tafel. “Let’s go back to Grandma’s.”
“You’re just going to pretend you didn’t hear me?” Alora asked as she followed after the couple. “Really? Hello? You there? Wow, fine, be that way.”
“Ah!” Tafel stopped midstride. “I remember now! We forgot about Alice and Mr. Skelly.” She bit her lower lip. “But they weren’t waiting outside the cave when we left. And I got distracted by the talk about genies.” She tugged on Vur’s arm. “Do you think they’re mad at us?”
Vur hummed and rubbed his chin. “I’ve never seen Mr. Skelly get mad before,” he said and paused. “But Alice is always mad. That’s why she’s called the berserk librarian, right?”
“Alice would smack you if she heard that.”
“See?” Vur asked. “Always mad.”
“Maybe she’s only mad around you,” Tafel muttered. “There are times when you can be very … frustrating.”
“Huh? Like when?”
“Like now! Don’t ignore me,” Alora said, sticking her head between the two while wrapping her arms around their shoulders.
Tafel flinched at the soft feeling pressing against her back. “Alright,” she said. “The first thing you’re going to have to do if you want to follow us is wear clothes.” She opened up a portal and retrieved the previous robe from before. “Here.”
Alora stared at the fabric in Tafel’s hands. Her nose twitched as she resisted the urge to set it on fire. She sighed as she released Vur and Tafel, grabbing onto the robe. “You shouldn’t humiliate your lackey like this. It’ll reflect poorly on you if you make me wear silly things.”
“It’s not silly,” Tafel said, glaring at Alora. “Right now, you look like a human, and humans wear clothes.”
Alora rolled her eyes as she wrapped the robe around her waist and tied a knot with its sleeves to keep it from falling, turning it into a makeshift skirt. “There. You happy?”
“No! Wear it like a normal person!”
Alora let out low growls as she untied the robe. “You say that, but I’ve never worn human clothing before. What’s the normal way to wear this? Arms probably go in the sleeves, huh? Oh, that makes sense. Euck, clothes suck. It feels like someone’s touching me all over.”
“You’ll get used to it, I’m sure,” Tafel said. She sighed. “I wish Alice were here. I need a slightly normal companion around or else I’ll go insane.”
“It’s not like you’re normal either,” Alora muttered. “I can’t believe she’s brave enough to order around a dragon. I’m going to slip centipedes into her bed while she sleeps.”
***
“In the end, we really spent the night at a stranger’s house,” Alice said with a sigh. She stared out the window, sunlight pouring into her eyes through the gaps between the trees. The skeleton by her side didn’t respond, causing her to frown. She knocked on its skull with her knuckles. “Hey. At least snore when you sleep so I know you’re not dead.”
“What are you talking about?” a voice asked from the doorway leading into the room.
Alice raised her head. A skeleton was holding a book and leaning against a doorframe. Alice’s eyes widened before she let out an ear-piercing scream. “What the hell!?” She kicked the skeleton lying beside her, launching it into the wall and causing it to shatter on impact. “Nate! You! What—, gah! Was that a real skeleton!?”
“Uh, no,” Mr. Skelly said as he placed the book onto a nearby table. He used his feet to sweep the broken bones into a neat pile that he shoved into a corner of the room. “Of course not. You must’ve been imagining things.”
Alice’s eyes flashed with a yellow light as the rune on her forehead lit up. Translucent golden fangs sprouted from her mouth as she leapt out of bed, landing on all fours. With a roar, she pounced forward, knocking Mr. Skelly to the ground. A few bone-breaking moments later, Alice’s rune disappeared as she stomped out of the room, leaving behind a disassembled, shattered skeleton.
In the bathroom, which surprisingly had running water, Alice rinsed off her face and dried it with a cloth towel. She stared into the mirror above the sink and sighed. “Am I too harsh on him?” she muttered to her reflection. “He did say fooling people was one of the greatest joys in life for him after becoming an undead…. Ugh. But if he wants to prank someone, why does it have to be me?” She shook her head before taking in a deep breath. “Maybe I should help him start that war he was going on about. But wouldn’t it be wrong to start a war just to please him? Yes, it would. And that’s why you”—she pointed at herself in the mirror—“need to gather evidence of the king’s wrongdoings.”
“Ms. Alice? Who are you talking to?”
Alice flinched as her face flushed red. She scratched her neck as she opened the door to the bathroom. “I was just clearing my throat,” she said to the woman standing outside. By the woman’s side, there was a little girl that had the same face as the little meatball. Alice ruffled the little girl’s hair. “How are you doing? Feeling better?”
The girl shook her head back and forth, her short hair whipping against her cheeks. “The skeleton is scary.”
Alice’s face darkened. “Right? He might look really scary, but he’s actually even scarier once you get to know him as a person. For your own good, you should stay away from him.”
“What? How rude; I’m the definition of a gentleman,” Mr. Skelly said, popping his skull into the hallway from the bedroom doorframe.
The little girl trembled and opened her mouth, bawling out loud as tears fell from the corners of her eyes. She ran into the bathroom and slammed the door shut with a bang. The woman glared at Mr. Skelly before sighing at Alice. “Why don’t you take your companion and go outside for a bit?”
“I’ll do that,” Alice said, speaking towards her feet. She raised her head and narrowed her eyes at Mr. Skelly, drawing a line across her neck with her thumb. “Stop terrifying children, alright?”
“Then it’s okay to terrify adults?” Mr. Skelly asked as Alice pulled him along, dragging him out of the house. “You should be more open-minded. Children should receive the same treatment as adults. They have every right to be terrified by skeletons too.”
“Children don’t want to be terrified!” Alice frowned at Mr. Skelly. “I’m going to buy a suit of armor for you. It’ll come with a helmet that covers your face too.”
“You … don’t like looking at my face?” Mr. Skelly asked, clutching his chest as he be
nt over. Fat tears leaked out of his eye sockets, plopping onto the ground.
Alice smacked the back of his head. “Stop it. You’re making a scene.”
Dozens of villagers—all of them women—were standing around, whispering while pointing at the couple. Mr. Skelly sighed, causing some of the women to gasp and take steps back. “Alright,” he said, his tears vanishing. “For your sake, I’ll wear a suit of armor. I understand you become jealous very easily, so I’ll hide my face to prevent women from falling in love with me at first sight. And a suit of armor will provide many opportunities for me to approach people without causing alarm before I scare them.”
“You really like scaring people, huh?”
Mr. Skelly nodded. “It’s my only form of release.”
Alice bit her lower lip. “Is it tough? I mean, you know, being dead and all. Is living life as a skeleton difficult? That’s what I meant.”
“Is being a skeleton difficult…,” Mr. Skelly said and rubbed his lower jaw. “It’s actually really convenient. You don’t have to eat. You don’t have to poop. You don’t have to breathe. You don’t have to worry about dying. You can’t even feel pain. If you’re tired, you can hibernate to preserve mana. When it’s cold out, you don’t need to wear a jacket. When it’s hot out, you don’t even sweat. Mosquitoes don’t bite you. Dogs will flock to you. And you don’t even have to worry about getting fat.” He nodded and grinned at Alice.
“So … if you could come back to life, would you?”
“Without a doubt,” Mr. Skelly said. “If I missed being dead after coming back to life, it wouldn’t be too hard to change that again with the help of my trusty ol’ sword.”
Alice punched Mr. Skelly’s sternum. “Don’t say things like that.”
“But you asked?”
Alice snorted. “Forget it. Let’s go explore this village and find a reason to start a war.”
***
“What? The price rose again?”
Alice and Mr. Skelly turned their heads. A woman was standing in front of a cart of fruit and other miscellaneous food goods. Across from her, there was a fat, bald man with a jet-black goatee and nearly closed eyes that looked like mini crescents. Behind him, there was a convoy of wagons with two horses per wagon. Alice wrinkled her nose at the smell of horse manure lingering in the air.
The merchant smiled at the woman and rubbed his hands together. “Yes, I do apologize. The empress has raised our taxes, taking nearly half of our earnings. The other half is spent on hiring an armed escort to traverse these lands. With the rising taxes, bandits are more abundant, and it really is quite dangerous to make a trip this deep into the wilderness. If we’re not careful, we can even be assaulted by dragons. I hope you understand our plight; we really can’t afford to sell these for any less. Truly, our empress is a demon lord.”
Alice’s head snapped towards the merchant. “Did he just say demon lord?” she whispered to Mr. Skelly.
“I’m pretty sure he did,” Mr. Skelly said and nodded. He nodded again, slowly this time. “Yes, he did. That’s the kind of lead we need.” He grabbed Alice’s wrist and pulled her along, marching towards the merchant with his chest puffed out.
The merchant’s eyes widened at the sight, and he took several steps backwards, stumbling and hitting the wagon behind him with his back as he fell over. He pointed at Mr. Skelly with a trembling hand. “S-skeleton! G-guards!”
Mr. Skelly grinned and waved at the man as armored men poured out of the wagon. “Hi.”
“This is a guest,” the woman, who was speaking with the merchant, said as she held out her arms, stopping the guards in their tracks. “He won’t hurt you.” She paused and added in a mutter, “I think.”
Alice pointed at the armor that one of the guards was wearing. “Can I purchase a suit of armor like that?” she asked, glancing at Mr. Skelly. It was a perfect fit for his frame, well, as perfect as a suit of armor meant for a fleshy human could fit on a skeleton.
The merchant wiped away a bead of sweat from his brow with a handkerchief he pulled out of his front pocket. He dabbed at his pale cheeks before taking in a deep breath, his upper body shying away from Mr. Skelly as he stood up. “Armor, yes, armor can be sold,” he said as he folded his damp handkerchief and stuffed it away. “One set for seventy shillings.”
“A what?” Alice asked. She reached into the pouch by her waist and pulled out a gold coin. “How about this?”
The merchant’s crescent eyes lit up, but before he could take the coin away, the fruit-buying woman stopped him. “Can I see that?” the woman asked Alice. She received the coin in her palm and grasped it while closing her eyes. A moment passed as she moved her arm up and down. “It’s worth about a hundred shillings,” she said, opening her eyes and handing the coin back to Alice.
“Oh,” Alice said, nodding at the lady. “Thanks.” She held the coin out to the merchant. “I’d like to buy a full set of armor; you can keep the change as long as you answer some of my questions.”
The gold coin disappeared as the merchant’s hand flashed. He beamed at Alice and Mr. Skelly. “I’ll answer any question to the best of my ability.” He pointed at the guard standing next to him. “You, strip and hand over your armor to her.”
“B-but, sir, I—”
“Nonsense! Are you disobeying your employer?”
The guard’s hands trembled for a moment before he lowered them, sighing as he used his eyes to ask the other guard for help. While they worked on freeing him from his gear, Alice crossed her arms and tapped her elbow as her forehead scrunched up. “Hmm, what should I ask first? I’ve been hearing a lot about the rising taxes; what’s that about?”
The merchant sighed. “Judging from the markings on this coin, you’re not from around these parts,” he said. “The empress is the ruler of the lands. With a single stroke of her brush, she can sentence thousands of people to death. With a simple glance from her eyes, a guard will come forth to execute a man. She’s a demon who cares not for her people, treating them as disposable resources to be exploited. Her financial advisors are beheaded when they disagree with her ideals, and she knows nothing about running an economy. Taxes, taxes, more taxes. She’s trying to amass all the wealth in the land at the cost of her people’s lives. It’s terrible. At this rate, the dukes will rebel and a civil war will break out.”
Mr. Skelly nudged Alice’s side with his elbow. “Did you hear that? There’s going to be a war starting soon.” He smiled at the merchant. “Are any of the forces recruiting mercenaries?”
“That’s … hard to say,” the merchant said, a sheen of sweat appearing on his forehead. “Mercenaries will certainly be executed if they’re hired by dukes to rebel against the empress. But there’s no doubt they’ll be drafted by the empress to fight against the dukes. It’s a matter of picking a side that you think is going to win. I imagine many mercenaries would stay out of a rebellion until the winner becomes clear.”
“I think it’s clear what we have to do,” Mr. Skelly said, wrapping his arm around Alice’s shoulder. “The empress is evil. She’s nicknamed the demon lord. We have to stand on the righteous side and help overthrow her.”
“Do you think we can do it with just the two of us?” Alice asked. “I mean, without Vur and Tafel. I feel like it’d be cheating if we asked for their help.”
“Cheating?” a clear voice asked from behind Alice and Mr. Skelly. Tafel placed her hand on Alice’s shoulder, causing her to turn around. “We finally found you two. Sorry about the delay. We, err, got a little sidetracked.”
“You forgot about us, didn’t you?” Alice asked. Tafel bit her lower lip while Vur looked to the side. Alora was standing behind Vur with her eyes closed, her head drooping to one side as a line of drool ran down from the corner of her mouth to her chin. Apparently, she had inherited her father’s ability to sleep in any position. Alice rolled her eyes. “It’s whatever. Who’s the lady with blue hair?”
“That’s Vur’s cousin, Alora,” Tafel
said. “For reasons, she’ll be accompanying us as a party member”—Tafel’s voice lowered to a whisper—“for the next fifty years.” She cleared her throat as her eyes glistened. “Anyway, I couldn’t help but overhear something about a demon lord?”
After a bit of elaboration on the merchant’s part, Tafel narrowed her eyes at him. “So, you’re telling me that the empress isn’t actually a demon.”
The bald man wiped the sweat off his brow with his handkerchief before nodding. “There’s no doubt about her being a human.” He wet his lips with his tongue before sending a glance towards his guards. They were as uneasy as he was. Just where did all these weirdos pop out of? First there was the girl with the talking skeleton, and then there was the girl with horns and purple eyes who called herself a demon.
“And the empress is called demon lord because people think she’s evil, not because her class is demon lord,” Tafel said, the hope in her eyes dimming.
“That’s right,” the merchant said. He leaned forward and whispered, “The empress is actually a dark knight. Her strength is powered by blood and souls. The previous emperor had seventeen children, all of them competing for the throne. Once the emperor died, it took the demon lord less than half a year to ascend to the throne. The palace tells us all the other heirs suffered from unfortunate accidents and passed away, but everyone knows the demon lord killed them.”
Tafel heaved a sigh, her eyes completely dull. “Here I was, thinking I found a lead,” she said and clicked her tongue. She turned towards Vur, who was eating food out of the merchant’s cart, and bit her lower lip. “One day….”
Alice tugged on Tafel’s sleeve. “After hearing about this empress’ crimes, what do you think?”
Tafel tilted her head. “What do you mean? What crimes?”
Alice’s brow furrowed. “You know, raising taxes so much that the citizens are dying of starvation, killing her brothers and sisters to take the throne, forcefully seizing property of citizens in the name of helping the empire.” Alice nodded. “Doesn’t that make your blood boil? Don’t you want to beat her down for being such a tyrant? You want to, right? Let’s start a war.”