Chapter 96
Gren put his hands up to show that he was not threatening but they didn't put their spears down. "Sorry, but I have business with the little... young woman in the carriage. Can you let me through?" They didn't budge and instead took a step towards him. "I'm just trying to help."
"Their orders are to protect the carriage. The lady does not wish to be disturbed." The guards remained silent; it was the female knight that spoke up. She was wearing black armor similar to Raymond's but it was lacking the silver crest and she didn't have a helmet on. Her reddish-brown hair was in a curly side bun on one side and she had a braid running along her bangs towards the other side. It was a hairstyle that he had never seen before. "I would return to your home if I were you. These are some of the Duke's best soldiers."
Was that a challenge? It had been a while since Gren had challenged himself against other humans. Gren backed off and hopped into the air with his arms and legs spread apart. It looked weird but it allowed the system to equip his armor on him. Using the golden weapons would be cheating but golden armor would still be fine, right? Gren brought out one of the dull iron swords and wielded it with two hands at an angle to help deflect the soldier's spears. Three of the soldiers sent their short spears forward with a thrust. Gren managed to collide with one of them in midair but the soldier's spear knocked his sword out of the way and all three hit him dead on the chest.
Gren was starting to think that he might not be able to defeat even one of them when the two with longer spears launched an attack against him and each hit one of his shoulders. He didn't feel the impact from their attacks but he was still sent back. "Mind going one on one? It's not really sparring if you all gang up on me at the same time." The soldiers retreated and took the same position as they did before they had attacked. "I guess there's no plan on having a fair fight."
Gren put the sword away and walked towards them. This time when they charged forward with their weapons he stored them away and used the dirt to create a bridge above their heads to get on top of the stage coach. He didn't need the weapons and didn't want to steal from the Duke's army so he tossed them out towards the guild's courtyard. "Are you done playing around?" The female knight had her hand on her sword and looked like she was ready to pull it out.
Gren had no plans on starting a fight with her. The fact that she didn't draw her sword yet meant that she was probably confident in her speed. Georgia held her hand on the pommel of her sword the same way and if he ever faced Georgia then he was sure that he'd die in an instant. "Hey, they started it. I just want to help your lady with her health problems." Gren thought about hopping down but didn't want to set her off. "Is it okay if I go down now?"
"Just stay within my sight." Gren hopped back down and looked up just in time to see a man in black armor swinging a sword at him. The female knight used her sword's pommel to knock the blade to the side so it just missed Gren. "He's not an enemy." Twisting her sword so that it was properly seated in her hand, she used the tip of the blade to knock off Gren's helmet. "So, kid, where did you get that armor?"
Kid? He at least looked like a young man now. "I found it." The knight put away her sword and grabbed Gren by the neck, pinning him against the carriage.
"I asked you where you got that armor." Did this just become a serious incident? She didn't seem to be joking around.
"I told you, I found it." Gren didn't know what else to say, he was telling the truth. It was one of the suits of armor that he found underneath Newton. "It was with a bunch of other treasure that I found."
She released Gren and used her sword to draw a large sword with an insignia on it in the dirt. The insignia looked like a dragon with two heads. "Did you see this?" Gren wasn't sure so he asked the system.
{Do I have a weapon that looks like that in my pocket dimension?}
Gren held out his hand and the sword appeared. It was heavy so he needed to use his second hand to hold it. Even with that, the sword was still too heavy until a third hand helped him hold it up... that wasn't his hand. "Is this the real Dragonsplitter? It looks just like the painting." The female knight pulled the sword from his hand and lifted it into the air with both arms. Her eyes seemed to be sparkling as she looked at it. "Hey, you wanted to talk to the young lady, right? If you give me this sword then I'll pull her out of the carriage for you."
Why would he pay to help someone? It didn't make any sense! Gren stored the sword and armor away. "It's not for sale." She seemed a bit upset that the object of her wors.h.i.+p disappeared. "I wanted to see your young lady to help heal her. She doesn't want to be bothered so we can do this a different day." Gren planned on heading back
Henrietta had one of the lenses that were attached to her helmet in front of her eye. "Green!" Gren thought that she got his name wrong until she continued shouting. "There's so much green around you! You really do know healing magic!"
The only green around Gren was the gra.s.s so that little lens must be showing her something that he couldn't see. "If you want to be healed then I'll need permission to examine your body." Gren didn't want any misunderstandings. "You don't need to take off your clothes."
Henrietta nodded her head which allowed the system to scan her body. There were some scars on her heart that were a sign of her using potions to heal internal injuries. Without the potions she would definitely be dead by now but they wouldn't keep working long term. The eyes didn't seem like they'd pose any problem and could be healed. Examining the rest of her body revealed other injuries; part of her body were scarred with burns and her shoulder was broken in the past but didn't heal properly.
That wasn't the end of the surprises. The system's scan allowed for Gren to see a complete image of the target, in and out. Her height might be too short at around five feet tall but she had bushy blonde p.u.b.es. It would be impossible for Gren to think that she was a child with that image in his mind.
Gren had finished scanning her model for injuries in the system and gave her the verdict, "I'll have to heal the scars on your heart before they get any worse. While I'm at it, I'll heal the burns on your side and fix your eyes and shoulder." Gren wasn't sure if he could fully heal her heart but she could just stop by once a year for him to heal her and she'd probably live a mostly normal life. "If you're ready for me to start then let me know."
Henrietta placed her hands over her heart and nodded before holding on to the sides of her robe. "Do it." Gren started circulating the magic and sent it towards Henrietta's chest but it dissipated before it reached her skin. That shouldn't have happened. No matter how close Gren got, he lost control of his magic; even direct contact over the clothes didn't work. Was it the clothes?
"Hey." As Gren was trying to figure out what was wrong, Raymond grabbed his shoulder. Why was he glaring? "What do you think you're doing?" He already said that he'd be trying to heal her. Why did he need to ask? Gren looked back towards Henrietta and saw that she was also glaring at him. Even the guards that were away from him ended up getting closer with their spears pointed at him.
"Ah." Gren figured out the problem. "The magic wouldn't go through. I wasn't trying to do anything bad." He really wasn't trying to grope her. He had wives with nicer b.r.e.a.s.t.s so why would he want to touch hers? Gren felt a heavy hit on his head before he lost consciousness.
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{What? Is this a dream?}
Right, he could talk to the system when he was asleep. He turned off the nightly reports long ago and had forgotten about it.
{Am I going to be okay?}
That was unsettling.
Gren was alone with his thoughts while unconscious. The more he thought about, the worse it seemed. He was just trying to help. If they killed him over this then he'd come back to haunt them. If he survived then there was no way that he'd try to help an Adier ever again.
Gren started wondering about the supposed young lady. He didn't even know if that was the real daughter of the Duke or if Henrietta was really her name. Was this just a trap set for him? It was a possibility. They might have known that he was a healer and used that against him. Gren would need to escape from them somehow.
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When Gren opened his eyes, he was in a small cell with chains attached to his arms and legs. Trying to light a small fire caused it to fizzle out as soon as it was released from his hand. Whatever they were using to interfere with magic was better than the one used by the Viper Guild. The back of his head hurt but he couldn't even heal it to relieve the pain. Rubbing it didn't make it feel any better either.
The sound of his chains moving must have alerted the guard. "You're awake, huh? It's not every day that we get a fresh face down here." Gren saw a soldier sitting at a table outside of his cell, eating something. "Good timing. The others are too weak to talk to me anymore. Looks like the two of us are going to become good friends."
"Why do you say that we're going to be friends?" The system's scan showed a simple lock on his shackles and the system designed a key that would fit it. Gren would need to be alone before he could have the system build it.
"You've got n.o.body else to talk to and the people down here don't go free. The only way you get out is if they think a monster might enjoy the taste of you." The soldier slurped down the rest of the food before tossing the empty bowl in front of Gren's cell. "Thanks for the meal." He had a grin on his face like he just did something clever but Gren had lots of food in his pocket dimension and he wasn't even hungry right now.
The soldier eventually got up and walked off so Gren took the opportunity to create the key. He had seen the armor that the Duke's soldiers wore so the system was able to create a suit for him but he couldn't put it on yet until he knew that he was clear. The lock to the cell was the same kind that was used for the shackles but Gren couldn't reach it. There was the sound of boots headed his way so Gren quickly put the shackles back on.
The pace of the footsteps slowed down before coming to a stop in front of Gren's cell. "You really do look a bit like her." The man with a weak chin looked in to Gren's cell. It would be easy to mistake him for Raymond but his face was thinner and he was wearing fancy clothes instead of armor. Behind this guy were four knights in nice armor but Gren didn't hear them coming at all. "I wish that I could give you better accommodations but I'm afraid that your mother's followers destroyed my grandfather's anti-magic device. This is the only place left under my control that can hold a magician like you."
If this wasn't Raymond then it had to be his brother, Robert. "So, you and your brother decided to walk in your grandfather's footprints? It seems pretty pointless to go through all of this trouble for one person. There's nothing that I can offer you that you don't already have." The only exception might be Gren's weapons but he didn't want to bring those up.
Robert seemed amused by Gren's comment. "Either you're being intentionally oblivious or I've overestimated your intelligence. I suppose it's more likely to be the latter considering how I got my hands on you." Robert shook his head and stopped smirking. "Trust me, you're worth more than you give yourself credit for. If you were born a woman then you really would have little use for me and I could leave you be."
"My grandfather thought of both outcomes; one where the G.o.ddess gave birth to a girl and one where she gave birth to you, a boy. Whether you were born a girl or a boy, his plan was to raise you and train you to be our family's guardian." Gren was likely going to live for thousands of years and had a large amount of magic energy so that plan made sense. "Unfortunately, you were born outside of our control. At best you could be used to power magical devices now if you were born a girl."
Robert grabbed the bars to Gren's cell, his face twisting into a grin. "But you weren't. With your bloodline, we could have an army of powerful magicians in just fifteen years." The old Duke must have been overly-ambitious to think of this plan. "When I heard that your children were born, I was happy. My grandfather's vision wouldn't have been able to be fulfilled if each of your children took hundreds of years to be born."
Gren wasn't sure if Robert's monologue was finished but he needed to interrupt him. "If you touch my family then I will tear you apart limb by limb." He could even reattach the limbs just to keep doing it over and over again every day until Robert went insane.
"They serve no purpose for me. Your only son is a demihuman. A goblin, no less." It seemed that Robert was part of the group that disliked demihumans. "Goblins make terrible soldiers; no discipline or coordination at all." Robert's bangs got in front of his eyes so he swooped them back with his hand. "Don't worry. I can imagine that I'm a terrible person from your perspective but I won't touch your family. I don't plan on treating you poorly while you're here and I'll even let your family visit as long as you cooperate."
"So what you're saying is that I just need to impregnate a bunch of women for you?" Gren wanted Robert to think that he was going to cooperate. "There's no way that I can get in the mood in a place like this. I'm not a fan of being tied up when I do it and I'd like to have a bed."
"Any other requests?" Robert was perfectly happy with fulfilling Gren's requests as long as it led to his cooperation.
"Try to make the women attractive. They don't need to be as beautiful as my wives but they need to look nice." Gren thought about other requirements that he had for his women. "I like it when a woman has a big b.u.t.t and thin waist. Big b.r.e.a.s.t.s are optional but preferred."
Robert seemed to be thinking. Gren could hear that he was saying something under his breath but he wasn't loud enough to be understood. "Why not?" Robert had come up with the answer that he was looking for. "There's a guard room that's still within the field. I just need to have some people add a larger bed and put in a more secure door. As for your women; I don't know if I'll be a good judge for their looks so I'll just bring a group of them around tomorrow. You can just pick and choose who to breed with." After saying his part, Robert left, leaving half of his knights to watch Gren.
It was unknown if Robert believed him or not but it didn't really matter either way. With those knights watching over him, Gren wouldn't be able to make his escape.