The Real Monster 35 Being Bothered By Small Fries I

So I went on my way home and took the same route I did from Agamemkeru's nest to the city of Atbangkeru where I left the mother-daughter pair in an Inn.

Arriving at the Inn and meeting them will only take 5 to 10 minutes of my time so I let them rest a bit more after checking on them. They were both doing a bit better and their complexions were even rosier than last time I saw them. Plus, Asha's being s.e.xy as always so I couldn't help check her out. I'm sure Meridith will also turn out that way when she grows a bit more.

What I did after checking on them, no, not checking them out, checking on them – it's important so I have to repeat that – was to take a stroll on the city with the list that the boss man gave to me. I started hunting those people in the list and gave them stern warning against doing that against their own fellow demons and maybe even other races.

My kind of warning is not something just anyone would want to ignore. Plus, I gave the list to Kangkuro for them to check on those in the list.

One must think that by me saying "warn" to be just a warning of some sorts? No, no.

My kind of warning was to totally clean them up by killing them and those that are related to them. Why, because it's a hero's blunder to let those evil c.o.c.k-suckers to live even though they've done evil things for whatever reasons. It's n.o.ble and all to do that, but truthfully I find it unfair and stupid for heroes to swear not to kill evil doers. I repeat it is plain stupid; it is stupid I say.

Notice the redundancy and reiteration. It's super important. That's why I'm all for Deadpool's Antihero means. I mean, it was the sages who said "fight fire with fire" right? Who are we to question the sages?

Not that I don't question the sages, but you know what I mean.

I gave the list to Kangkuro only so he could monitor any other a.s.sociates that those men in the list might have and give me another list to eliminate. That way I can trace the syndicates and give them a rude awakening. I'm that kind of person.

When I set out to do something I have to do it thoroughly for it to totally be safe. You know what they say, "safety first" when having intercourse, or am I using that wrongly?

I had to visit different parts of the city to clean up which took me another night and after that, I had Kangkuro and Graccus to clean up further. With their help, this city should at least gain a bit more hold on security. I know it's just a temporary patch to the problem, but the problem is crime, and I alone cannot prevent crimes from happening, unless I wipe out each and every citizen in this world just to prevent crimes from happening ever again. If I had enough power for that I would actually do it, but the a.n.a.lysis in my head that comes with every thought tells me that I need to at least get my stats to deity-level for that to happen.

A simple a.n.a.lysis of my abilities and strength tells me that I can now command magic with but a thought and the only limiting factor for any magic that I want to perform is the amount of mana I need to make it possible. For example, I can now snap my fingers with the image of having a lake created anywhere I want it to be and it will be. Just like how I can make a volcano out of the ground just by flicking my index finger towards the sky with that image in mind. Magic is that awesome, I just don't think the people of this world have reached this level of enlightenment or maybe just the INT stat alone unlocked that possibility for me. Either way, I can recreate things that have already existed in this world or even my previous world with just a thought.

Finishing up on the clean-up, I told Kangkuro to stay alert and they would have this city become prosperous enough in time. I then came to the Inn and told the mother-daughter pair to come with me to my territory to live there. I told them they can refuse to come with me, but obviously, they'd want to take advantage of the opportunity I've given them – any sane person would take it – and agreed to travel with me.

Preparations for travel have already been taken care of by me before coming to them so there's nothing that's stopping us from getting on our way. Kangkuro and Graccus actually personally bid us farewell at the gate and we started our journey home after that.

***

-THIRD-PERSON-

Meanwhile on Village, the city that Clay had established, 2 years had already pa.s.sed by and Clay was still not back and news of an invasion have already spread on the city from the supporters of the city itself. Merchants, adventurers and even mercenaries took to arms and made arrangements to counter the invasion of a very large army that determined that Clay was the Lord of this city from the word of mouth of people from the city itself. It seems his legend being pa.s.sed on openly also led to their enemies learning of Clay's involvement to the city itself. Village was a peaceful city that gained its current prosperity by pure honest dealings with merchants and other connections made by Isaac.

At the peak of Moribor.

Isaac, Caltec, Jon and Mor with Lucretia among them were huddling in the living room of Clay's abode. The place was peaceful and there were no furniture that was moved even after Clay's journey begun. It was regularly cleaned of course, to maintain the cleanliness.

[Sire is still not around and the Empire's army is already at our doorsteps. They're sieging us and are taking their leisure to wait for us to surrender. The merchants that bring us grain have been blocked forcefully by the army and those that refused to listen were killed by the army. It's chaos out there. We need to move or the people under our protection will begin to doubt our ability to protect them, doubt the ability of our sovereign to protect them, which in itself an insult to Sire. We need to move!] Mor pa.s.sionately suggested to the people with him.

[Lucretia, why don't you attend to your son for now and we'll call on you when we need you?] Isaac, with the tone of commanding Lurcretia to go and give them time to speak amongst themselves said.

To which she answered, [Sir Isaac, it is true that you are the Mayor of the city and that you are the one who a.s.signed me to be Sire's personal servant and I thank you for the opportunity that you have opened for me, but currently, I am not your servant nor am I equal of status to you, I do not need you to tell me to go. I already have my own servant to tend to the child at the moment. I have to hear what you have to say to represent Sire in this situation. Although I will not speak for him, I can listen to what you have to say and convey it to him later. So please, proceed without minding me], which made the three feel uncomfortable because nine months after Clay's journey to train himself, Lucretia gave birth to a son, an ordinary human son, which to all of them became the very token to Lucretia's rise in authority and influence among Clay's retainers. The child is still unnamed even now that it was already 2 years old. They did not hold birthdays or whatever for it since the matter had to be kept secret to the world.

[Fine.] Isaac consented and proceeded to the main topic without tarrying any longer. Although his mood was not so good because of Lucretia's apparent change in att.i.tude as if she already owned the whole place, Isaac could not do anything at the moment because even Clay did not know about the child and Lucretia's circ.u.mstance. Deciding something for that would be overstepping his boundaries, which could be pinned on him as a betrayal of some sort to Clay which all of them did not want to do.

[Our current concern is the Imperial Army's siege against the city, Village. If this goes on, Mor is right that the people would lose confidence in us and grow to distrust us which is not all that problematic, but with that single decline in trust, our dealings with other affected parties would become harder from that moment on.

[So I propose that I as Acting Mayor and you three, Trinity, would sortie and give the invaders a piece of our minds. If we kill a few commanders on their sides in an open way, then maybe we can tell those that are left to retreat to the empire or suffer the consequence of gaining the ire of Sire.

[If they still don't listen to us after that, then we can only proceed to carry out a slaughter in place of Sire. Remember what Sire said before he left?] Isaac paused there and looked at the people present one by one to confirm if they remember what Clay said before disappearing on his journey.

[If I remember correctly,] Caltec said to answer and then continued, [he said: "Two years of training intensely would probably get you on par with Legends and the empire would have to send their very best troops just to stop one of you from advancing further. If you feel that that isn't enough then train even more intensely." Which means that this army that's loitering on our lawn, is but a coalition of different kingdom's armies which cannot be called the Empire's best, which further means that they are easily dealt with by just causing strife among them. Is that what you want to get to, Isaac?] He finished with a question back to the brains of this group.

[You got part of it right, but what we need to do is not to cause strife among them but to cause despair instead. They came here with high morale believing that their army can scare everyone into submission, but what we'll give them is death for the lives that they took. It's only right and I'm sure they are prepared to get killed when they attacked those that supported us.

[With that said, I plan on secretly informing each mercenary company, adventurer party and merchant company to not go out of the city or even try to fight the empire's army and just quietly hole ourselves here for the time being. Some will disagree but I will persuade them successfully for sure, so while I do that, you will be attacking the army in three different directions. Caltec will attack the west, Jon the East and Mor the south from the outside. Meaning, we will have them surrounded with the city as their only choice to run to. By then, I will have the men who supports us do their worse and slaughter for us the empire's army. That way, we will cause not just the trust of the population on our city to soar but we will also sternly warn those that want to attack our city. Of course, we can also use this as a declaration of war from the empire and we will be able to gather men to become our army easier that way.

[This plan has a lot of things that will benefit us greatly if done right. So I need everyone to do this without fail. Lucretia will stay here of course, to wait upon Sire and take care of his son. We won't be able to redeem our lives if you or your son happens to get hurt because of this campaign.] Isaac concluded his plans with that.

The rest of them had their mouths open while listening to Isaac's plan of action. It was genius to them. It was something that can be only thought of by people who are like Isaac, a genius in management. What are strategies but managing resources and setting up plans of actions that could benefit their side? That's what Isaac is always thinking of and is going to continue to do for Clay and those he swore to protect. As loyal retainers to Clay, they have already developed a mind-set of having Clay's interests their first priority instead of other things, without losing their own autonomy.

With that, said, Lucretia fully did what she promised and stayed silent and only nodded to Isaac's suggestion. She knew full well that she has no place in putting her hands on the government of Clay's domain, what she needed to do was to serve Clay and wait on him, even if her head bloated up a lot since birthing to a son. In this world, kings only valued women who bore them sons, not daughters, so surely as a former n.o.ble, she banks on her son to be her ticket to becoming not a servant but a wife or even if just a mistress, she doesn't care. As long as her standing and influence increase more than those direct retainers had.

***

At the same time that the people directly involved with Clay were plotting their counter-offensive, in a certain office inside Village where the sign that says 'Company Head' was engraved on the door, a certain woman was having a meeting with an ordinary looking man.

[Company Head Elle, if we don't do anything about this invasion, our own supply to the army we are currently raising up will not be able to go through and that will affect your plans in the future. I ask you, to order me to go and negotiate with the commander of this army to grant us access.] The retainer asked in suggestion to the Company Head he called Elle.

[You were once a soldier yourself but I like the way you are thinking as a merchant now compared to a few years back, Mik. And I already said did I not, we will do no such thing. We'll wait for the sovereign of this place to make their move. Trust me, that 'man' will not allow something like this to disturb him. His mind works like that of a cunning fox's after all. Fufu] The woman called Elle said and gave a light chuckle.

If one were to look at her then surely they would say that she was a very beautiful woman in the prime of her youth, having features even more alluring that that of Lucretia's and face even prettier than any other ordinary woman. If Clay were to see this woman, he would have recognized her immediately, which was how familiar this woman to Clay was.