“It’s about Aiz and the others…No. It’s about Bete, to be specific.”
At the mention of the werewolf’s name, identical knowing looks crossed Finn’s and Gareth’s faces.
“Right now, among members of the familia, there’s—”
At that very moment, the raucous sounds of a fight reached the office.
It was coming from another of the mansion’s towers.
“…Seems we mighta been a bit too late on this one,” Gareth murmured before heading toward the door.
“Really, what a handful…” Finn sighed with a pained smile of his own as he followed the dwarf out.
The last one to leave, Riveria brought a hand back to her forehead. Apparently, the headache from before was flaring up again as she quickly headed toward the hallway.
“Mister Bete is unbelievable!” Raul’s shout echoed off the rafters of the large dining hall. It was breakfast time in Loki Familia’s home, Twilight Manor. But rather than eating, the members of the familia who were currently gathered were in the midst of an uproar.
Their anger with a certain member of the familia had finally peaked.
“How could he say something like that? That…that Leene’s and the others’ deaths were pointless?! To even think of saying something like that about your own companions…What makes him think he has the right?!” Raul sputtered. The normally indecisive, confrontation-hating peacemaker of the group was unable to hold in his rage any longer.
“Yeah, it’s not like he’s ever been the most approachable of guys, but…this is just too much,” Anakity, herself a candidate for the familia’s upper echelons, weighed in from beside Raul. Her own anger was evident on her face. Leene had been a close friend. Anakity was attempting to keep her emotions in check, digging her nails into her arms.
The event currently on everyone’s minds was, of course, what had transpired in Knossos. The source of their outrage was a certain werewolf who’d laughed at their companions’ deaths.
Bete might have been a well-known powerhouse in Loki Familia, but that didn’t stop his fellow familia members from fearing and reviling the way he constantly looked down on and abused those in the lower ranks. Now that he’d even gone so far as to mock their companions’ deaths, their enmity toward the young wolf had reached a breaking point.
Watching the tumultuous storm of condemnation swirling about the dining hall now, Lefiya stood stock-still near the door.
“What’s wrong?” The voice belonged to Aiz, who had come running to investigate the commotion.
“Hmm? Oh, Miss Aiz! It’s…Well…” Lefiya started, hurriedly attempting to explain the situation, but all it took was a few words for Aiz to understand what was going on. The swordswoman’s eyes quickly scanned the room.
The red-faced, teary-eyed Raul wasn’t the only one condemning Bete. Every one of the adventurers who’d been there in that stone room shared resentment for the werewolf. The elf Alicia, the chienthrope Cruz, the human Narfi—all of them second-tier familia members just like Raul. They were not at the point of joining in openly lambasting Bete, but their mouths were certainly tense. Even Tiona and Tione were acting particularly chilly at their spot by the wall. Neither of them had been at the scene of the crime themselves, but they had obviously caught wind of what had happened.
Aiz had never seen her fellow familia members like this before, and for a moment it left her dazed, unsure what to do.
Not a single person present was standing up for Bete.
Not that they would be, considering what he’d done.
He’d simply gone too far this time.
“…What do you think…Lefiya?”
“M-me? I, uh, well…Of course I’m mad at Mister Bete, but, I mean…I can’t be too mad…After all, he did save you and the others…”
She was referring to what had happened in the pantry on the twenty-fourth floor when she, Filvis, and Bete had formed a three-man party to rescue Aiz and the others.
“After what happened down there, I always just kinda thought Mister Bete was scared, but…but after hearing what Mister Raul and the others are saying, I…I guess I don’t really know what to think…” Her directionless response quickly fizzled out.
Aiz could empathize with her indecisiveness. It was understandable why she was leaning toward Tiona and Tione’s view.
Lefiya’s voice was unmistakably discouraged, and she even seemed to be losing hope entirely. “…What about you, Miss Aiz?” she posed, her eyes still trained toward the ground.
“Me? I…”
She didn’t have an answer.
All Aiz could think about was the look on Bete’s face. The way he’d been unable to put into words the feelings building inside him that led to irritation, then anger, before he’d finally snapped.
“We can never repay them for what they’ve done!!”
As Aiz was still trying to find her words, Raul’s voice cut through the food hall.
And it was at just that moment that a certain gray-furred wolf decided to make his entrance.
“Pretty early for y’all to be so goddamn annoying, don’t you think?”
It was Bete.
A sudden hush settled over the dining hall, all eyes on him.
“M-Mister Bete…”
He walked straight past Aiz and Lefiya, both still standing by the door in stunned silence, and into the center of the hall. His usual aura of antipathy was plain on his face, and one of his lupine ears lay flat in indignation.
His appearance, however, solicited a variety of responses from the crowd of adventurers. Some cowered in fear, others furrowed their brows in anger, while still others couldn’t hide the animosity building up inside them. But one thing they all had in common—their castigation of Bete.
Bete, however, was the same as always despite having opponents on every side.
“Moan, moan, whine, whine. If you’ve got somethin’ to say, say it to my face! You little shits can’t do anything on your own!”
Every brow in the room rose. Raul even seemed ready to lunge forward. But Bete paid their reactions no mind and simply made his way lazily toward a nearby chair.
Or he would have if a certain copper-colored leg hadn’t blocked his path.
“M-Misses Tiona and Tione…” Lefiya whispered, her eyes trembling as she watched the twin Amazonian sisters step in front of Bete.
Tione’s eyes were narrowed in icy wrath, and even Tiona’s smile had disappeared as she glared at the werewolf.
“You got a beef with me, Amazons?”
“…”
Tione didn’t respond. Her sister, however, did.
“Don’t you feel anything, Bete?”
“…”
“Leene and the others—they’re dead. Don’t you understand that? You’ll never be able to see them again!” Tiona’s voice was quiet amid the protective gazes of her peers.
She continued:
“Leene liked you, you know?…You really don’t feel anything?”
The question, coupled with Tione’s silent glower, was the last straw.
The room fell utterly still.
Bete said nothing for a moment. Then—he laughed.
“Sorry to burst her bubble, but I hate weak girls most of all.”
His words were the trigger.
All of a sudden, the bodies of the two sisters became a blur.
Their faces blank, they came at the wolf and his unchanging, characteristic derisive smile.
From the left came a punch and, from the right, a front kick aimed at his head.
Some of the women in the room yelped. But before the two iron hammers could fall—they were stopped by a massive fist and a long spear, respectively.
“That’ll do, you two.”
“Gareth…!”
“Any further and this will have gotten entirely out of hand.”
“Captain…!”
Gareth’s fist had grabbed Tiona’s wrist, and the handle of Finn’s spear had blocked Tione’s kick. The t
wo of them had raced into the dining hall just in time.
Joining them was Aiz, standing firmly in front of Bete. Despite being empty-handed, she’d reached out to restrain the werewolf’s arm, already extended in the process of delivering a counterstrike.
Lefiya and the others had barely been able to respond, all of them frozen where they stood. They gulped at what had just transpired in front of them.
“Outta my way, Captain! This piece of shit thinks—!”
“As a high-level member of this familia, you have a standard to uphold, Tione. Or is that not what I’ve always told you?”
Tione bit down on her lip, Finn’s unwavering gaze cooling the fire that had been about ready to rage out of control inside her. She scowled at Bete.
Bete also stood down, cursing beneath his breath.
“Ain’t it a little early to be gettin’ all riled up, guys? You’re a real hot-blooded bunch, you know that?”
“L-Loki…”
The familia’s patron goddess herself strolled into the dining hall past Lefiya at the door. Her vermilion eyes took in the explosive situation currently gripping the hall before widening ever so slightly.
“That’s enough, Bete. Get outta here and go cool off.”
“…Hmph.” The wolf cursed beneath his breath but did as he was told. Turning his back on Aiz, he made his way out the door.
Riveria took the opportunity to approach him, moving from where she’d been watching over the proceedings to stand in front of Bete.
“Whaddaya want, ya old hag? You wanna have a go, too—?”
“I’d choose my words more carefully if I were you, Bete,” the high elf queen warned, half interrupting the wolf’s tirade. “I don’t care how you choose to feel, but that’s no reason not to mourn the loss of your companions.”
Bete snorted. “Oh yeah? And what’s mourning gonna do for ’em? I’d cry myself to sleep every night if it’d do a damn thing. But it won’t, will it?”
“…”
“They died ’cause they’re weak. Or am I wrong? Tell me I’m wrong, huh? I’m not gonna deny what’s true.” He looked back over at the group behind him. “You bastards, too. You slow us down and that’s what happens!” he spat before pushing past Riveria and leaving through the door.
Tiona clenched her fists as Tione kicked over a nearby chair with an enraged yell. “Piece of shit!” This earned her a swift smack on the back of her head from Finn’s spear before Loki, Finn, Gareth, and Riveria all heaved a simultaneous sigh.
“This has really gotten out of hand. At this rate, it may end up forming a rift in the familia,” Finn lamented, turning away from Tione, who was squatting on the ground with her hands to the back of her head.
“Maybe a bit late in sayin’ this, but…that boy may have been more trouble than he’s worth,” Gareth mused.
“We knew this would happen…sooner or later…” Riveria agreed as she made her way over to rejoin the two. One eye closed, she scanned the dining hall while the lower-level familia members around her trembled in fear. Raul and some others continued to stare daggers at the door Bete had gone through.
“C’mon, people! Enough of this, yeah? I’m starvin’! Fix me up a heapin’ big plate of the good stuff, won’t ya, Lefiya?” The sound of Loki’s relaxed voice sliced through the tension. “Food, food, I need food!”
“Huh? I, erm, o-okay…” Lefiya sputtered at the goddess’s carefree request before she and the others quickly moved to obey.
“…”
Only Aiz stood alone, the clatter of plates on the table ringing in her ears as she gazed toward the corridor where she had last seen the young werewolf.
There was still much information to be gathered—not only to further their knowledge of the events in Knossos but also to investigate Freya Familia’s attack on Ishtar Familia. That night, the members of Loki Familia were issued their respective orders.
It was around that time that Bete was making his way down the hall, one eye on the sun setting over the city through the nearby window.
“…Hmph.”
Everywhere he went, his fellow familia members fled. They didn’t even look him in the eye, never mind utter a greeting. In the hallway, in the parlor room, everyone he passed kept that same silent distance. Not even Raul or Cruz, the two he’d spent the most time with, acknowledged his existence. The second they noticed him coming down the hall, the emotion left their faces as they passed by in silence.
“Ah…M-Mister Bete.”
Then there was Lefiya.
The young elf glanced up at him when they unexpectedly encountered each other, looking as though she was about to say something—
“This way, Lefiya!”
“M-Miss Tiona! Miss Tione…”
But before she could finish, Tiona and Tione arrived to grab her arm, pulling her away from the werewolf. Normally, the Amazons would start fighting with him the moment they made eye contact, but this time, they didn’t so much as glance at him.
People had a tendency to change gears once their anger had risen too much. They began to ignore the source of their anger, behaving as though it didn’t even exist.
That was exactly what was happening to Bete.
It made him feel like he was walking on a bed of nails. While he wasn’t so emotionally delicate that their treatment bothered him, he also wasn’t so uncaring as to simply do nothing and take it.
Bete was well aware that his refusal to behave any differently from normal painted him as the ultimate evil to the rest of his familia.
“—Bete. I don’t know how much we can do for you.”
An hour earlier, he had been summoned by Finn after his duties for the day had come to an end.
“It doesn’t matter what Riveria, Gareth, or I say—none of it’s likely to get through to Raul and the others. While I’ve no wish for dissension in this familia, I’m also aware that no amount of persuasion is going to help. Quite the opposite, really.”
The two of them had been in Finn’s office, the prum sitting at his desk with shoulders sagging.
“If we covered for you, we’d simply bring the hostility of the familia onto ourselves. And, unfortunately, I’m not really in a position to let myself become a target at the moment.”
They didn’t want any outrage directed at them. It was such a refreshingly honest answer, Bete couldn’t even be mad. It wasn’t an issue of Finn’s personal preference, either, only an objective decision. After all, the familia’s morale would take a big hit if its members disagreed with their leaders. And with the underground organization of creatures and the Evils’ Remnants practically at their doorstep, they had to be at the top of their game. This wasn’t the time for discord among their ranks.
Bete knew this, which was why he hadn’t interrupted Finn’s speech.
“Thus, I’m placing you on leave. Once all this dies down, you can return to the manor. Until then, I ask that you stay at an inn. I’ll provide you with the funds—though I doubt you’ll accept them,” Finn finished, placing a bag of coins atop the desk separating them.
Unsurprisingly, Bete pushed it back with an “I don’t need this shit.”
Bete didn’t care about money. All he cared about was the Dungeon. And he wasn’t about to let someone else become involved with his personal problems—which was exactly what Finn had been afraid of. Bete couldn’t shake the look of sympathy Finn had directed toward him as he’d left the room.
There was no place for him right now in Twilight Manor.
“…Hmph.”
Grumbling beneath his breath, he made his way toward the main entrance. There was no one there to see him off. The only witness to his exit was the scarlet sky smoldering overhead.
His destination was the Flaming Wasp, a pub in Orario’s fifth ward.
It was just one of many pubs in the sprawling Shopping District located at the city’s southern quarter. Nestled into one of the many alleyways some distance from the main road, the pub was distinguishable from the surr
ounding buildings by the bright-red wasp signpost hanging from its wall.
This establishment was well-known for its wasp liquor—colored a red so deep, it might as well have been liquefied ruby, and boasting a fiery heat that burned the throats and stomachs of its patrons. The combination of its unique flavor and the pain drew regulars back time and time again. That night, as the sun neared the horizon, the Flaming Wasp was indeed a hive of activity as per usual.
Normally, Bete would be here with Raul and the others. This time, however, he had no company for obvious reasons. Nevertheless, he was fully prepared to drink in solitude…or at least, he had been.
“…What the hell you doin’ here, Aiz?”
“…Because I felt like it?”
Bete’s lips curled into a scowl at the golden-haired, golden-eyed swordswoman cocking her head from the other side of the table for two.
Had she followed him from the manor? Either way, she was sitting across from him. Even among the raucous cacophony of drunken patrons surrounding them at their center table, a strange aura seemed to settle over the two of them.
“You follow me?”
“…I did.”
“And why the hell would you do somethin’ like that?”
“You looked…lonely?”
“Like hell I did!”
Bete brought his mug down hard on the table, interrupting the halting conversation he was having with the girl of few words. Aiz, however, just tilted her head curiously.
Around them, the carefree jubilance of the other patrons continued, oblivious to Bete’s inner turmoil. There was a whole host of customers today, everything from dwarven adventurers to humans, animal people, and even a few Amazons. The prum girl tending to them was in constant motion bringing out orders of liquor and food.
But some of them also seemed to be foregoing drink, and some were throwing glances at Bete and Aiz. More than a few, in fact. They were Loki Familia’s Vanargand and Sword Princess, after all. No matter where they went in the city, they were likely to draw attention—that was simply what it meant to be a first-tier adventurer. Aiz’s looks, in particular, drew more than a few lewd gazes. Bete was quick to glower back at the demi-human culprits, who responded by keeping their eyes well enough to themselves afterward.
Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? On the Side: Sword Oratoria, Vol. 8 Page 2