Chapter 29:

Stryg glanced at the book cover, “The Maid’s Forbidden Tryst with the Mistress?”

The drow squeaked in fear. The book fell to the floor as she scurried away on her knees, leaving her bottom completely exposed.

Stryg casually picked up the book. “What’s it about?”

The girl paused in her hasty retreat. She slowly turned around, fear and shame clearly on her face. “W-what?”

“What is the book about? The books I’ve read so far I’ve found quite interesting and full of information. But I’ve heard many of my classmates say that books can be very boring. Is this one of those books? Was this one so boring that you had to have sex with yourself to pass the time?” Stryg looked at her with genuine curiosity.

“Huh?” The girl said, confused. She looked down at her self and gasped, as if only now recalling what she had been doing. She swiftly pushed her skirt down. Her grey face was flushed blue.

“What are you doing here?” She whispered furiously.

“I was looking for someone,” Stryg said while skimming through the pages of the book.

“So, what, you found me instead?! How did you even get past my illusion?”

Stryg looked around. “Is that why I couldn’t see you at first? That’s a spell right? I remember I read something about that. What color of mana was it? I don’t remember.”

“How did you even find me? How?” The girl asked weakly, tears in her eyes.

Was she going to cry? Why? Because Stryg had seen through her illusion? What sort of weak mage was this? “I heard you. Well, smelled you first actually. I followed the trail and then the air started shaking, it was quite amazing. Then I found you.” Stryg summed up the events.

“How can you smell me? Are you a bloodhound?” The drow asked incredulously.

“I don’t know what that is. The smell of sex is quite pungent,” Stryg said.

Her mouth hung in open horror.

“I’ve already answered your questions. So, answer mine.” He narrowed his eyes.

But the woman wasn’t listening. The lights had gone out of her eyes as she looked up at the ceiling. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she made a weak smile. Was she ignoring him? Someone so feeble as to cry just by looking at his appearance, wanted to ignore him? Stryg had enough of this drow. He walked up to her and kicked her.

“Ow! What was that for?!”

“Name.”

“Huh?”

“What is your name?” Stryg asked.

“Oh, uh…” The woman looked down.

Stryg followed her line of sight to a small metal name on her shirt. “Plumela?”

“People call me Plum,” The girl whispered in resignation.

“Ok. Plum, what is this book about?”

“Its… an erotic novella,” Plum said.

“Erotic? Wait, so you were using the book to have sex with yourself? But there aren’t even any drawings. You find a piece of paper sexy?” Stryg combed through the book one more time to make sure.

“You use your imagination.” Plum glared at him.

“Well, what’s the story about?”

Plum looked away. “Can’t you tell from the cover? It’s about a couple of lesbians.”

“Huh, interesting.” Stryg looked at the book with newfound curiosity.

Plum laughed half-heartedly. “Yeah, right. Because you find two women having sex, interesting. Joke’s over. You can laugh all you want. I’m disgusting, a freak, say whatever you want, I don’t care anymore.”

Stryg tilted his head. “I mean, yes to the sex thing. But why are you a freak?”

Plum sighed in exasperation, “I’m not playing this game with you.”

Stryg crouched down and met her at eye level. “Why are you a freak?”

Plum looked down and bit her lip, “Some people call me that, because I don’t just like boys.”

“Is that it?” Stryg stood up.

“What? What do you mean is that it? How many non-straight people do you know? Probably very few, because the commoners of Hollow Shade hate us. And it's sooo much worse being bi. So, yeah I know how people see and treat me.” Plum gushed.

“My village had lots of people interested in the same sex. It wasn’t strange at all. And here you are calling yourself a freak.” Stryg shook his head.

“You don’t find me weird?” Plum asked, with a bit of fear and hope mixed in her voice. She had just been caught masturbating in the library and told him of her bisexual orientation, how could this guy not find her odd at all?

Stryg looked at her teary face. Crying was looked down upon in his tribe, but it wasn’t weird. “Nope. There are plenty of weak people in the world.”

“Huh?” Plum frowned. “I was just mastur- Nevermind.” She blushed in embarrassment.

“I don’t understand why so many of you are so embarrassed about sex. You don’t even like to be naked while taking a bath. You have to wear towels.” Stryg complained.

“Are you a part of a nudist club or are you some kind of pervert?” Plum asked with a hint of surprise.

“I don’t know what either of those things are. But, I’m not from a club. I was a part of a tribe. The greatest tribe… Now I’m here.”

Everything in the city was strange to Stryg. Ironically, magic was the only thing Stryg felt comfortable with in this place, that and his new bed Loh had bought him. Best. Bed. Ever. He realized he had been rambling with this girl. What was he thinking? He needed to keep his distance from others. None of them mattered. He needed to focus on magic. He had promised himself that. He tossed the book to her and began walking away.

“I have to go find someone,” Stryg said.

“Wait! What’s your name?”

He stopped and looked at her, “Stryg.”

“Stryg,” she nodded to herself and stood up. “Who are you looking for? Maybe I can help?”

“...I’m looking for the librarian or one of her assistants.”

Plum laughed. “I’m one of her assistants. Hence, the name pin, you know.”

Stryg glanced between the pin and her face. Why was she so weak then? “Oh. Good. I was looking for you. I need your help finding some books.”

“I can help with that, but first, why did you kick me?” Plum crossed her arms.

“Because you were crying just because of what I look like,” Stryg said.

“What? No. Why in all the Realms would I cry over your face? You think you're a gift from the gods or something? You're not that handsome. Get over yourself.”

Now Stryg was confused. “You think I’m handsome? But I’m an actual freak,” he pointed to himself. Is that why she needed glasses? Because she was as blind as a bat?

“Why would you be a freak?” Plum asked.

Stryg spread his arms out and pointed at himself as if it was obvious.

“...Because you’re a hybrid? That’s not weird at all. Well, my mom thinks it's weird, but my mom has a lot of messed up beliefs.”

“You think what I look like is normal? No one looks like me.” Stryg grit his teeth.

Plum took out a handkerchief and a small bottle she used to wipe her hands clean, “When I was a kid my dad taught me how people love all sorts of different people, it didn’t matter who or what they were. Love didn’t care, it just existed, without limits. He told me hybrids are the living result of love unbound, I honestly thought it was pretty cool, if a bit cheesy.” Plum sighed, “My dad was one of the few people who could see things for what they were.”

“Uh-huh.” Stryg frowned.

This girl was crazy. Stryg highly doubted there was any love between his own parents. Goblins weren’t very prone to love. But for some reason this girl thought his odd existence was somehow cool? Yep, definitely crazy.

“Hey, before I go help you look for the books, can I ask you a favor? Can you not tell anyone about how you found me or what I was doing?” Plum shuffled her feet.

“Why would I do that?”

“Because I’m going to help you find your books. That’s how it works, give and take. Besides, you kicked me for no good reason. You owe me.” Plum stood her ground.

“...Fine.” Stryg didn’t think he owed her, but her help didn’t cost him practically anything. Who would he tell anyway?

“You have to promise me,” Plum said sternly.

“Okay.” Stryg raised his hand. “As Lunae, the mother moon, as my witness, I promise I won’t tell anyone that I saw you reading a book and fucking yourself.”

Plum covered her face in shame, “...It’ll do.” She took a deep breath, “Well, now that we’re friends I’ll help you find those books.”

Stryg scowled, “We’re not friends.”

Plum looked at him strangely and giggled. “You’re pretty weird. You just made a promise to me. That’s like step 3 of friendship.”

“I didn’t say anything about being your friend,” Stryg retorted. He didn’t want to be friends with a crazy girl who cried at... actually, why was she crying then? He definitely didn’t want to be her friend. He was afraid her craziness was contagious.

“It’s part of the deal when you make a promise. Plus you saw me naked. There’s no going back now. Lunae as your witness, remember? Now come on, let’s go find your precious books.” Plum grabbed his hand.

“Let go of me,” Stryg ripped his hand away and hissed at her.

Plum’s eyes widened, “Woah, your eyes are awesome. I like the hiss, very savage like.”

Stryg frowned.

“Now what kind of books were you looking for again?” Plum asked.

“Uh.” What was wrong with this girl? “Information about dragons.”

“Dragons? Damn, that’s a tough one. Alright, then. Challenge accepted. Let’s go,” Plum grabbed his hand again and dragged him along.

“Hey, I said let go of me!”

---

Plum led Stryg through the maze of books that was the library. She scoured through different sections trying to find even a single book that mentioned dragons. After a few hours they had managed to find only four books. They were all fairytales that mentioned dragons in the most egregious manner. The dragons were all dumb and monsters that captured princesses. Stryg didn’t need Plum to tell him how useless the books were. Kithina and Callum had no better luck. The entire trip to the library had been a waste. Plum assured them that’d she keep an eye out for any books on the topic, so long as he kept his promise. Stryg was fine with that, so long as she kept her hands off his.

The next few weeks passed by in routine fashion. Stryg would wake up early in the morning, leave his apartment and head over to the academy’s track for his morning run with the begrudgingly beautiful orc professor Tauri. Stryg wasn’t a fan of orcs in general, Tauri was no exception. But, he had to admit, staring at her curvaceous ass while she ran in front of the class was quite nice.

Rime’s Magic Fundamentals class was as informative as ever. Stryg would have said it was his favorite class, if it wasn’t for the fact that the drow had it out for his project group ever since Stryg had mentioned the gods. Stryg learned to keep his head down and stay quiet while in Rime’s class. It wasn’t much different to how he had behaved back in the Blood Fang tribe. Callum, Kithina, and Stryg spent a lot of time in the library trying to research dragons. Plum had even joined them sometimes. But they still hadn’t made much ground on the rare topic. Stryg was frustrated with the whole thing, especially with Plum who had insisted on being the pseudo 4th member of the group. Stryg didn’t want to be a part of this group at all if he could help it.

Ismene’s class was the most frustrating of all. The old lady continued to encourage the class to meditate within the dark dome. Stryg had continued to fail in the practice. His mind would always wander off when he closed his eyes. When they were open he’d normally stare at an unaware Kithina. He hadn’t made much progress in class.

“Intro to Black Magic” with professor Gete had been going well to a degree. Stryg studied the anatomy books Gete had assigned. Stryg had even written notes down in class, dissected corpses, and more. But, for all his work he could barely move a fresh corpse’s hand. Shadow spells came much easier to Stryg. It was the one place where he felt like he was making progress. Gete told him he was the best shadow spell caster among the first-years. It gave Stryg confidence that he was doing well, that was until he met with his master Loh.

Loh’s dueling class was brutal for all of her students. When she wasn’t making them fight each other, she was making them run through dangerous obstacle courses while slinging spells at them. Not a single student left unscathed. Loh berated her students for failing to live up to her expectations, especially Stryg. His classmates thought it was because Loh didn’t like goblins, but, in private Loh told him it was because he was her apprentice and she expected more from him than anyone. Which simply translated into harsher one-on-one lessons. If that wasn’t bad enough Loh sent him on random errands all the time. Sometimes for a rare flower in the trade district, other times for a sweetroll in the dining hall. Her demands were nearly endless. Stryg hated her. He would have given up already, but strangely enough despite all the bruises and midnight errands, he was actually learning a thing or two from the damn drow. Stryg licked his wounds and kept training and studying, with a small modicum of success. The days began blending together and before he knew it the autumn leaves had all fallen and winter had arrived.