Testing My Luck in the New World

“What do you think?”

“Huh? What?”

“The drink, silly,” she said, playing the part of the oblivious woman perfectly. She took a sip from her own glass. “How is it?”

Quickly, I scanned my drink’s info box, doubled up with Appraisal, found no faults in any of it, and brought it to my lips. I took care to match her nonchalant sip and pretended that I knew a thing or two when I forced it down.

“It’s good. But is drinking this early in the morning normal around here?”

“More or less. Many have difficult jobs and just as many want to start their days feeling strong enough to tackle them.”

“But wouldn’t the booze just trick them into feeling that way?”

“Of course. They know, and that’s all they want.”

“Fair enough, I guess. I suppose the real question should be, what do you want?”

Now, let it be known that I, Alex, am by no means an idiot. At least, not as much of one as certain people in my life would have you assume. I was not oblivious to the numerous possible reasons as to why she suddenly wanted to drag me upstairs to show off the goods where my wives couldn’t see us.

I remembered Fitz’s words and kept on guard against her womanly temptations. Not that I really needed to, mind you.

My first wife actively enjoys playing the Naked Apron Game with me while she cooks. Another tends to walk around with nothing but a bra covering her chest, while another spends half her days completely nude – I could not be tempted by a mere peek.

“Alright,” she said and set her glass down. “Straight to the point then. I like that.”

“Go on.”

“Okay. Mmn. Let’s see, how should I ask?”

Humming to herself, Elara stretched her arms high up over her head and the softer, more malleable parts of her body reacted accordingly – intentionally. Her shoulders rose and her breasts lifted themselves up out of their cups to follow suit. The voyeuristic peek had suddenly become a peepshow.

Truly clever. A lesser man might have folded already – as many likely already had. I guess subtlety isn’t on the menu in the Last Drop.

Her arms fell down again and the peepshow ended when she put a hand on my thigh. I prepared myself. Her attempts to butter me up had been unleashed, so now the real conversation can begin. Whatever that may be.

Did she find out why we’re really here? Was she going to offer a one-time free pass to leave this place unharmed? Was she going to betray her buddies and offer their heads so she could keep her own? Did Willomina betray us by telling her we spoke?

I awaited the answer that came from her softly-smiling lips.

“Would you consider moving your family to Villeverdure?”

“… Do what now?”

“I’d really like it if you’d move here,” she said again, slowly rubbing my thigh. “I’m sure life in a big city like Amoranth must be fun, but it can be pretty lively here, too. And I’m sure my Gino would just love it if his new friend stayed.”

“…”

I had to put my glass down. I couldn’t bring it to my lips again because the sneer I was fighting wouldn’t let me open my mouth. And I didn’t want to shatter it in my hand.

This temptress. This evil bitch!

It’s one thing to use her looks as a form of advertising, it’d be another if she were a cat-kin that just didn’t mind enough to cover up, but to purposefully flaunt her tits just for that?! To use her own body to ask a favor of someone, someone her lover viewed as a friend? A friend?!

I had to admit again, and I do hate to admit it because she doesn’t deserve it, but she is beautiful in a bewitching sort of way. But the image of Giulio and him unknowingly showing off his big, bright, dorky smile whenever he so much as thought of her forced me to swallow my disgust.

“Gino’s taken quite the liking to you, you know?” she continued when I didn’t respond. “I’ve never seen him so interested in hanging around other men before, not even the other guards can manage to keep him rooted long enough for a second drink.”

She touched a finger to her lip and mused aloud.

“You’re different, for some reason. He takes his time to go on walks with you in the forest, to train you and all that. Usually, he’s all work, work, work. And when he talks about you, he looks like he’s talking about an old friend he’s known all his life, not someone he just met a few days ago. I wonder, maybe it’s because you’re both swordsmen with impeccable taste in women?”

As she went on pretending to belittle herself for speaking the obvious, I cast Thought Steal on her.

This boy’s going to leave eventually and when he does, Giulio might even want to leave with him. There’s something about this kid that he’s fascinated with. We can’t have that. He’s been too good to me… But if they both stay… Well, this boy can’t keep his eyes off my boobs for more than a second. This should be easy.

I closed my eyes and picked up my glass for a drink. Apparently, my inability to control my eyes has led her to think she was passing every persuasion check that popped up.

“I wonder what it is about you,” she concluded with another sip of her drink. “I don’t know what’s going on inside that man’s head, but you seem to be in it quite alot.”

“Well, maybe he’s secretly into men,” I joked. “If we’re both bragging here, my wives say I’m pretty handsome myself. And they don’t just say that when they’re asking for something.”

“Hahahaha! Oh please. Surely you jest! Trust me, he’s not like that. At all! I could tell you stories about what he's like when we’re alone that would make men with three, no, four wives blush.”

And yet your tit’s still out…

“So how about it?” she asked. “I have friends in high places, you know? I’m sure I can get you a cheap house – or maybe even a free one.”

Yea, a house built by the corpses of the people you’ve had killed…

“A house big enough to fit all four of you. And the taxes here are very manageable, surely better than in Amoranth. And you can train with Gino whenever you want.”

“That’s a kind offer, but it’s also not something I can decide by myself.”

“Come now. You can drag your women all the way across the country just to pick some flowers, but you have to leave the decision on where to live to them?”

“It’s not that simple. We literally built our house ourselves. I can’t just up and move without discussing it with them first.”

And frankly, I don’t want to. Sure, it started off as a small cabin Yua and I began our relationship in, but then it blossomed into something great when Elane inspired me to make it better.

The big kitchen and even bigger training grounds for Yua. The study where Elane can work on her maps in peace. Even the giant bath Mana swims around in whenever she’s done playing in the forest. All of it was home to them now.

Their feelings are attached to that place just as much as my own. Even if she doesn’t know the details, how does she not see that?

I guess the severity of her request is why she decided to preempt it with a nip-slip. But still, what was she expecting past that? Her mind didn’t say.

If I played along with her little scenario of ignoring all their crimes and actually befriending Giulio, all it’d get me is being occasionally blue-balled by her. I mean, who in their right mind would try and actually make a move on the the woman claimed by the city’s best swordsman?

“That can’t be it, right?”

There has to be more. She must want us to stay for another reason. Maybe she found out what we know somehow and wants us to stay so we can’t ask the guild for reinforcements.

“Haha, well,” she laughed coquettishly. “I suppose I am a little worried about him. It’s not just the other guards. He keeps the other women here at arm’s length too, but it’s clear they fawn all over him. I guess I’m just worried that, one day, he might give in to their temptations.”

“And you think I’d be enough of a distraction to keep him away from them?”

“I hope so. He needs a guy friend to screw around and do dumb things with.”

It feels like my grip on him has been slipping ever since you showed up. But all it’d take is one trip to that little vampire and this boy’d be brainwashed into hating my poor idiot.

Goddess, this fucking bitch… What does Giulio see in her?

At least I have my proof she’s in charge of this nonsense. Rest assured, Mina, you’ve been proven true and are vindicated. I hid my oh-so-overwhelming respect for this bartender cosplaying as a real-estate agent behind another sip of my wine.

“Haha… Can I take it by that nasty look on your face that you don’t like this city enough to live here?”

“It’s alright, sorry. Like I said, it’s not that simple of a request. But if that’s all you wanted, maybe I should go discuss this with my wives and…”

“Wait, wait,” she cried, moving her hand off my thigh to grab my arm when I tried to stand. “Please, wait. There is another matter I’d like to discuss.”

“And what’s that?”

“J-Just hold on a second.”

She reached behind her back, first like she was trying to scratch an itch, but then the movements of her hands started to look more deliberate.

This one’s a tougher nut to crack than the rest were. Suppose I should have expected as much, since he has those three fawning all over him. Uggh. Maybe I should have led with this.

“It’s starting to feel a little stuffy in here, isn’t it?” she said, fanning herself. “I hope you don’t mind if we finish the conversation like this.”

“What do you…?”

“Phew, there we go.”

Without missing a beat, Elara’s left hand reappeared from behind her back, a string fixed between her fingertips. She gave it a tug, and the knots holding her corset together loosened. It gaped open, finally allowing her bosom to fall naturally into place. She nearly tore it off entirely before gripping the cups of her dress in hand and pulling them down sharply, exposing in full the shapely mounds of her breasts.

No longer could she claim it was an accidental peek, or a purposely seductive peep. She even pulled her arms out of her sleeves, leaving her dress to fold around her waist like the overgrown sash of a failed beauty queen.

“What are you…?”

“You can look all you want,” she said with an unbearably seductive smile painted on her lips. “But touching will cost you your life.”

“So we’re just giving up pretending all this was an accident?”

“I’d rather focus on the other reason why I brought you here. The more important reason.”

“And that is?”

“I want you to help set up new trade between Villeverdure and Amoranth. We had something nice going in the past, but for some reason, we were largely cut off from the great city a few months ago.”

“Trade…? That’s it? Really?”

“Um, yes?”

“Really?”

“We really need the supplies to sustain this place.”

“Wait, wait. You’d be directly benefitting from more open trade somehow, right? Not this city, just you.”

“Of course. The other merchants in the city and I got together and created this.” She reached into her dress pocket and produced a small piece of parchment. “This is a list of supplies we’ll need, and any rarer alcohols imported to Amoranth through Guerraway are most certainly on the list. And, aside from what I’d earn from this,” she shrugged. “I suppose any traders passing through will likely want to stop by for a drink or two before they move on, right?”

With a smile on her lips and a tempting wobble on her chest, she handed me the slip of paper. I gave it a quick glance and found that it really was essentially just a shopping list. I wasn’t the least bit surprised to see that most of it were requests to have someone collect various harder-to-acquire building supplies that might not be found in more conventional places. It even had offers for what they’d be willing to pay for each item.

“Are you expecting me to negotiate on your behalf?”

“Not at all. One of the other merchants will be going with you. Naturally, you’ll be paid extra to keep them safe.”

“Okay, but why ask me to handle this? I get your envoy will need protection, but why should I be involved past that? Can’t you just send a letter with him or something?”

“Because I’d like for you to go to your guild and arrange for you to be the one to guard any trade caravans heading our way in the future.”

If he becomes the exclusive guard for the caravans, then he’ll come back every once in a while. If he stays, Giulio stays happy. If he leaves, and if Giulio knows he’ll be back, then maybe he won’t want to leave with him. It’s a win-win for me. And if I’m lucky, the caravan will be raided and he’ll catch a stray arrow with his chest during the trip.

And there it is.

“Alright, we’re done here. Thanks for the drink.”

“Wait, we haven’t discussed terms yet! We’re willing to offer your party 40 silvers just to bring our man to Amoranth and back. Then any further caravan guarding you do for us will get you an additional 150 per round trip, including possible bonuses if you do your job well. Regardless, I may let you have a squeeze or two of these after each round trip.”

To punctuate her offer, Elara cupped her breasts and hoisted them up. As she slowly squeezed and massaged her mounds, her nipples continued to stare straight at me, waiting patiently for an answer.

“What do you say? Sound like a fair deal?”

I sighed.

Even setting aside the fact I’d be working for the bandits, that’s only around 37 silvers for each of us per week of travel, not including guild fees. And that’s traveling by horse, too, while protecting an unknown number of traders with just four people.

Obviously, I could just ask for more and teleport them all between the cities, but then I’d be outing my ability to use that spell to the bandits – and all the traders of both Villeverdure and Amoranth.

That being said, it did sound like a fair price and it would likely keep our quest quota for the guild neatly squared away. It’s just a shame that their ability to offer so much coin comes from their undead slave labor freeing up costs.

More out of retaining a visage of respect, I downed the rest of my drink and stood.

“I’ll have to discuss it with the others first.”

“Them again? I asked you up here because I thought you were in charge of your party.”

“We decide on quests as a group. That’s how teams work. You can put your tits away now, by the way.”

“Oh my,” she laughed, but slowly started to pull her dress back on all the same. “I must say, I’m feeling a little insulted that you weren’t even a little interested.”

Yea, no. Friggin bandit queen or not, what kind of man gets all hot and bothered when another man’s woman acts like this? Especially when I was supposed to be said man’s friend.

Between letting her customers cop a feel with nothing more than a wag of her fingers as reprimanding, and her flashing me, I’m seriously starting to feel bad for Giulio.

“Especially when you were staring so adamantly just a few minutes ago,” she continued, then added, “That disgusted look isn’t appreciated, by the way. You’re going to make my womanly pride cry.”

Does this little shit have any idea how many trade deals suddenly swung in my favor once I whipped these out? He could have at least gotten a little hard!

Though she pretended to be upset in person, and was pissed off in her head, Elara’s expression remained mostly placid, just with a wry smile tacked onto her lips.

I cut my Thought Steal spell, lest I learn more about this bitch, and put on the straightest face I could muster.

“I know I may not look it, but I am faithful to my women and my women alone.”

Ahem… At least my heart and brain are. My eyes have a mind of their own, apparently. Somehow. If a visit to Yua’s village couldn’t harden me, this bitch didn’t stand a chance.

Elara smiled wryly at this and stood, still stuffing herself back into her dress with all the nonchalance Yua might show in front of me when doing the same.

“Hmm. Well, good for them, I suppose,” she said, tying off her corset. “But my offer is serious. Come see me before you leave Villeverdure. Accept and you’ll have half the offered silver now and the rest when you bring our man back.”

“We’ll think about it.”

“Good. Thank you. For now, I’ll show you back downstairs.”

She started back towards the door, but then stopped and turned back to me.

“And please don’t tell Gino about this. His brain is all filled with nothing but swords and sex. He doesn’t have the mind for business talk like this. He wouldn’t understand.”

“Business talk, right. Don’t worry, I won’t say anything.”

Giulio looked a little murderous just at the thought of me flirting with her. I wasn’t about to spill the beans, either.

“Much obliged. This way, please.”

She turned the door knob and waited. I took a step, then another, then stopped in my tracks when a thought occurred that I dared not ignore.

“Something wrong?” she asked. “If you want another drink, or another peek, you’ll have to pay for it.”

“No, it’s just… I’ll leave this way.”

I threw a thumb over my shoulder towards the balcony.

I’ve seen how these sorts of scenes end countless times in fiction. Elara and I are going to head downstairs and right at the moment we set foot on the first floor, Giulio is going to open the tavern door. He’s going to see that her dress is disheveled and out of place after she disrobed the way she did. He knows me to cause quite the ruckus in bed and we both have alcohol on our breath – there was only one conclusion he’d come to after seeing us walking down from her apartment together.

Obviously, I had no proof Giulio was going to appear, but I had an itching feeling he might show up just in time to misunderstand. We were supposed to meet around this time for the day’s training session. He’ll probably be looking to get started soon, so let’s just skip the needless misunderstanding scene.

“You want to climb down from the second floor?” she asked, brow raised.

“Yea. Gino and I will be training here in a minute, so it’ll be a good warm up. And don’t worry about my girls, I’ll discuss your offer with them later tonight.”

“If you say so, but don’t come asking for money if you break your ankles.”

With a flippant wave, Elara headed back into the hall by herself and I moved to the balcony to begin my escape.

Before I did anything, I poked my head through a half-drawn curtain and checked the streets surrounding the building. Giulio aside, we can’t have anyone else seeing me retreating from the bedroom of a would-be maiden, only to assume we did something disreputable, now can we?

On the railing were two hand-sized spots about shoulder-width apart where the paint was more faded than the rest. Likely the result of a certain bandit sneaking into this room in the dead of night when the main doors were locked and closed. Poor bastard.

Once I was sure nobody was looking, I poked myself out further and checked the courtyard behind the Last Drop and, sure nobody was there either, I teleported straight down to where we trained yesterday.

I slipped through the gate and hurried around the building, only to find Giulio walking up the steps to the tavern, just like I’d guessed.

Mentally patting myself on the back, and after filing this moment away as proof for the next time Yua tells me to stop thinking the world works like it does in games, I used my item box to ditch my dagger and swap out my real sword for my training sword and ran over to him.

“Gino, there you are!”

His hand already less than an inch away from the tavern’s door, he spun on his heel and my feet slowed to stop well before the entrance. He greeted me with a smile so bright, I nearly felt sick to my stomach just for having that talk with Elara.

“Mio amico, there you are! We were supposed to meet behind the tavern, but you weren’t there.”

“I was there a moment ago. We must have just missed each other.”

“That’s fine. That’s fine. I see you’re ready to begin, so no worries. Let’s get to it!”

He abandoned the door and descended, or rather maybe it’s better to say he practically skipped down the stairs to join up beside me.

“Oh, wait,” he said. “What about your wives? Won’t they worry? After all, they just couldn’t bear to leave you alone with me for even a second yesterday, right?”

He playfully elbowed my arm and laughed.

“Maybe you’re right. One sec.”

I stepped back up the steps and stopped at the door before cupping my hand beside my mouth.

“Hey, Yua!”

I called and the ears of her outline perked up through the door. Apparently, she’d shifted to sitting at the bar to hear us better, but now she tilted her head confusedly. Must have missed me teleporting away, but she was listening.

“Gino and I are going to train. You three can head back to the room when you’re done!”

Giulio tapped his wooden sword on his shoulder, brow raised in confusion.

“Say, why weren’t you in there with them?”

“Oh, I sent them to the tavern ahead of me since I needed to renegotiate the price of our room for the next few days.”

“I see, but are you sure she heard that? You weren’t very loud.”

“Trust me, she heard everything.”

There was no need to make sure she heard me, or to reaffirm that I, her husband, did nothing wrong when I was upstairs. If anything, I was going to wind up playing the victim, since Elane no doubt was going to rib me over it. Meanwhile, the worst Yua might do is complain that I didn’t let her join in the training.

Until then, Yua can take care of relaying what happened to the others. I’ll fill in any blanks later.

“Let’s get started,” I said, walking ahead of him. I wanted to draw him away from that place as fast as possible and he happily took the bait and jogged after me.

“Hahaha! Someone sure is eager today!”