Shaula is walking through one of the city streets of Linis. It is quite a clean and wide street, well lit even. There are a few people walking around her, although she’s been walking to avoid larger crowds.

Shaula is currently wearing her long, red dress, her chestnut hair fluttering in the chilly winds of Linis at night. Even in this temperature, she looks truly lovely and has quite a regal bearing. Shaula has also used a removable piece of her red dress and covered her face with it.

It’s useful not to be identifiable, especially where she’s walking currently.

As she walks down the streets, she sees a number of people ogle her; some of them make unsavoury remarks but she doesn’t care enough to reprimand them. Rather, she is barely listening to these random civilians individually.

She’s listening to the noise of the city. She’s listening to each house she passes to see if she can hear familiar voices. If she can hear a familiar voice, she can cut down her searching time by quite a lot.

Nothing is familiar just yet though.

Shaula is searching from house to house while continuing to track the scent of Plenty Hilltroe. Oitra Ephis, a young girl in her care, truly wishes to be reunited with Plenty and Shaula feels sympathy enough to search for her.

Other than listening for Plenty, Shaula is also listening for the sound of armour scraping and clattering.

She notices someone walking through the street along the path she is heading down; this person is some distance away and the sound of armour accompanies them. Shaula enters a sidestreet to avoid an encounter.

Another guard… shit, this part of the city is like that, huh.

Shaula isn’t surprised by how often she’s noticing Linis city guards patrolling the streets at night along these streets. After all, Shaula has followed Plenty’s scent into the wealthy district at the centre of Linis.

It’s of course possible that Plenty is living on the opposite side of town in the working class or slum districts opposite to where Shaula, Ajax and the girls live. However, Shaula isn’t so negligent as to avoid the wealthy district simply because it is riskier to wander here.

Shaula knows the profession of Plenty: she is a prostitute. Prostitutes can work either on the streets or in brothels and considering the security in this part of Linis, she’s probably working in a brothel.

The wealthy can have their own brothels after all and she might be in one of these buildings within the wealthy district. Conversely, the wealthy also are better protected from harm which would account for the amount of guards patrolling the streets.

Where Shaula was earlier, she had encountered a guard who she had killed. That guard was quite the despicable individual. However, the guards in this wealthy district are not so rude or domineering to the people living here.

As Shaula listened to the ambience of this district to aid her search for Plenty, she heard the interactions between the guards and the people here; they’re quite friendly, calm and reasonable with no sense of superiority. Actually, there was an air of subservience.

Most guards in Linis knew who they were serving after all.

Shaula continues to listen to people talking in each house she passes. Most of the people in the houses she passes are asleep but there are still many who for whatever reason are still awake deep into the night.

What do they stay up to do? Read? Play board games? Talk to each other? No internet, no tv, no video games, so much less entertainment here, shit… ah, I bet a lot of them stay up and drink, smoke, do drugs and fuck, right? If it’s wealthy people in this kind of world, I’m sure all of them have sex slaves or multiple wives or some shit.

Shaula hears a jumble of voices representing those awake at this hour and listens to them in the background. She does hear a lot of sexual activity, indeed. She avoided that guard earlier and now continues to walk down the streets of this area.

...Fuck this, this is just too slow.

Shaula leaps from the ground and jumps onto the rooftops of a building in front of her. She starts leaping from building to building in an attempt to shorten the time of the search. She had just a bit too much fun seeing how rich people live in this world.

But, spending time like that would just get her seen by the guards more easily.

Shaula continues to listen to the voices that she had been listening to, noticing as new voices enter her field of hearing and as each voice disappears into the background noise of the city itself.

Wait! Who… Who was that!?

Shaula hears a voice among this random cacophony. Someone familiar… who is it? It isn’t Plenty, it’s a male voice actually. Shaula pauses atop the three story building she’s on right now to try to find the voice once again.

Where did it come from? Where did it… I can’t hear it anymore… shit! Who the fuck was that? Who…

Shaula had met a number of men in this new world but not truly that many. In fact, all the male voices she could think of didn’t match this familiar voice. It wasn’t Dalm or his men, it wasn’t the leader of the underworld, it wasn’t anyone that Ilna had talked to while she was surveilling him…

It wasn’t the voice of anyone who was supposed to be deceased either like Inalim or Brai or Ilna, or the merchant… or that guard she had just killed, or that beastkin bandit group, or the merchant’s guards.

It wasn’t anyone from that hero summoning facility who ran the church or someone random she might have met in passing. It was a voice she felt she had heard multiple times already but not recently.

Shaula can’t place the voice. She tries to search for any sign of it, even the direction that the voice came from. But, it was too much a part of that jumble of nighttime chatter for her to place its general direction now, especially since it’s silent at the moment.

Shaula waits for five minutes continuing to listen for the voice. She listens for each minuscule vocal sound. Every whisper, every shout, every yell, every scream…

...Wait, what’s that? Screaming?

Shaula hears muffled screaming, a lot of it. She can tell the direction of the muffled screaming as well, female voices of sorrow, fear and anger. The screaming is accompanied by mostly silence but also angry and malicious shouts… by male voices.

Shaula keeps a note of the direction of that cacophony of screams while continuing her search for the other familiar voice. But, alas…

Shit… it’s gone. They stopped talking.

Shaula cannot find the familiar voice no matter how hard she tries to pinpoint it. The person of interest has likely stopped speaking, any further focus on it would be pointless now. Especially presently, when Shaula can hear cries for help that haven’t stopped or quieted in the slightest.

Who was that? Who was that? Who was that? Who…

Hearing such a familiar voice sets her danger radar off. It is something that could interfere with her. Something that… something that…

Forget it, let’s at least deal with that screaming now before getting back to looking for Plenty.

Shaula leaps from the roof of the building she had stopped at. Even though her figure might be visible below, she hasn’t been negligent enough to leap over streets where the Linis guards were walking through.

Should she be seen, it would be an unclear image at best and she’s wearing a mask anyways so it should be impossible to identify her. In this world without facial recognition or security cameras, she can afford to be even more lax.

Shaula heads for the sound of suffering. Someone is in trouble and screaming in pain. Not just pain though; also rage.

The screams start to get louder in the direction that she’s heading; Shaula starts to hear more clear screams as well.

It isn’t always happening, rather, it is often interrupted. Yet, when one cry of anger, shout of rage or shriek of pain stops, sooner or later it starts again, or another cry from another person starts in that same direction.

The smell of Plenty also grows stronger. Could she be the one screaming?

Is Plenty one of the women screaming? No, I can’t hear her… or maybe it’s really been so long I’ve forgotten what she sounds like? Or actually, I don’t know what she sounds like really angry or screaming or shouting anyways. Hmm…

Shaula starts to hear the voices of the men accompanying the female cries grow louder as well.

“...slut, arch your…”

“...that face, I really…”

“...is what you get! Maybe you…”

Shaula frowns. The men clearly sound like they’re engaged in some sort of sexual activity. The women screaming seem to be their prostitutes. But, the screaming of the women isn’t them feigning arousal or pleasure. It isn’t orgasmic but it is authentic.

It’s painful. They’re not acting, they’re not actually experiencing pleasure, they’re suffering.

Shaula leaps faster and faster. Her motions become more frantic. She stops paying attention to the streets below her leaps.

Then, Shaula hears another voice among the mix of screaming women. It is the soft voice of a boy crying. He’s talking to someone, someone berating him. This someone seems to be an adult man, based on the deepness and gravelly quality to his voice.

The boy however hasn’t even hit puberty yet, from the sound of his voice.

Shaula reaches a set of large obstructive walls. Shaula, being on the roof of a large house, can see past these walls to the building the walls enclose. This building is the source of all of the noise. Shaula notices that the noise cancelling qualities of the building are quite strong indeed.

Shaula was about a kilometre away from the building and still, she could barely make out the muffled voices, even with her superhuman hearing. But, at this close distance right now, she can hear what’s happening in this building clear as crystal.

Shaula takes a brief moment to examine the surroundings. The walls, made of a light grey material like concrete, enclose a two-story building. There are a number of glass windows but all of them are obstructed by dark curtains preventing anyone from seeing inside.

This is another thing Shaula noticed actually about the wealthy district. Windows weren’t simply made of wood shutters like in the poorer areas of Linis, they were actually made of glass panes.

Nevertheless, Shaula can smell her here. Plenty Hilltroe is within this building. She can also smell other things. Sweat, tears, sex, blood…

Shaula can hear the young boy clearly now and what’s happening to him.

Shaula feels anger. Pure unadulterated rage. At this distance, she can hear exactly what’s going on. She makes a note of the gate to this complex, where a guard is standing. She’ll deal with him later. She’ll kill him too.

For now, she has other things to deal with.

~

“I hate you. I hate you. I hate you. I want to kill you, you fucking… fuck, I hate you so much, I just… I hate you so much... I hate you… I fucking hate you, I want to kill you, I want to… You, your bloodline, I want to wipe you from the face of the earth, I… I hate you! I hate you!!”

Plenty Hilltroe. She is currently lying on her bed in this room. She had just been defiled by a man who she didn’t invite into her bed. She wishes she could kill him, that she could finish his entire line but… she’s not strong enough.

This man, this human, is powerful.

His body is scarred from battle, a soldier from the looks of it. She couldn’t push him off, she couldn't do anything to stop his advances.

Currently, he is sitting in a chair at the edge of her bed, completely naked. He is smoking something, a white crystal substance; it is a drug that she had never seen before in a glass pipe that he lights with a luxurious looking lighter.

She’s not looking at him, however, she’s muttering to herself about what she wants to do to this man who just harmed her.

He was violating and humiliating her just a few minutes earlier and he was laughing in vulgar, malicious pleasure while he was doing all this. He hears her desperate words of hatred and rage towards him for what he’s just done.

He’s only been laughing even while hearing the hateful words of Plenty who just pledged to destroy his whole bloodline. He knows that she cannot do anything to him. She cannot hurt him. She cannot harm him in any way, whatsoever.

But, Plenty isn’t weeping, she’s not going to give him the satisfaction of seeing her in despair and agony. Only anger is what she will show him. She cannot show sorrow.

She can’t… she can’t… not after what she’s been through.

After Inalim was killed, Plenty ran from his killers. She ran as fast as she could without looking back. She was only thinking of survival. She makes a decision, a decision she continues to regret to this moment right now. The decision to go to Brai.

Plenty still owed Inalim a long term debt that she was in the process of repaying by working for him. She decided to return to Brai so that he could protect her from the two who had killed Inalim.

Those monsters… especially the woman, an unthinkable evil being. She had so easily killed the man named Inalim Drumyl, as if his life for all this time was nothing more than a puff of air.

Plenty went to Brai Drumyl, Inalim’s uncle and benefactor. She told Brai all she could about the ones who had killed his nephew. She explained about their physical strength, their healing abilities, their power, their unsurpassable power.

She wanted to be protected from them, the two of them.

She wanted, at the very least, to be able to continue working for Brai rather than becoming a streetwalker without any protection whatsoever. A life like that would end up with her seeing the inside of a prison cell quite soon.

But, Brai refused her.

“Dalm, send Plenty over there, will you? To Kono’s brothel.”

“...What? To… To Kono’s… w-wait, Master Brai, what are you--”

Brai raises his hand and strikes Plenty across her face. She had been sitting in a wooden chair in Brai’s office and she fell off of it. She clutches her face in agony. He struck her with the back of his right hand and he had two heavy rings on that hand.

Plenty looks at him dumbfounded as blood flows from a busted lip. Dalm didn’t move from his position in the corner of the room. He appears to be waiting for Brai to finish his business with Plenty completely.

“...Why? Why are you…”

“Plenty… you let my nephew die. You ran from the people who killed him. You’re not even injured! You still have all of your limbs, your eyes. I don’t even see a single broken bone or cut.”

“B-But, they completely overpowered Inalim even after Inalim hit them with his magic, I-I couldn’t do anything to stop them!”

“You could have bought him time, you could have laid down your life so he could escape. You could have shielded him with your body. Look at all he did for you, too. You were his most trusted girl, he talked about you highly.”

“N-No, wait, I-I wanted to help but… but I… I…”

Plenty looks into Brai Drumyl’s eyes. There is no mercy in them.

“What more was I expecting from a beastkin like you…”

Plenty feels shock and agitation. Brai truly expected her to lay down her life to protect Inalim. Plenty wouldn’t be capable of doing that, she just… she simply didn’t believe in Inalim to that degree. But, of course, she couldn’t tell something like that to Brai.

She thought about it. She thought about the options she had to save Inalim… because… she knew there were none.

No. She truly thought that there was nothing she could do to save him at that point, at the point where the two of them decided to kill him. There were two of them. They were far too powerful. Plenty wouldn’t have been able to do anything.

She can say this as her excuse; she can use the facts, the clear facts of this impossible situation to save herself.

“Master Brai, please. There was nothing I could do! T-There were two of them. Even if I was able to stop one of them, the other one was still b-blocking the door. Jumping out of the window wasn’t a-an option, Brai wasn’t skilled enough for an escape like that! He wouldn’t have survived--”

“Then, you should have thought of something better, you piece of shit, you fucking whore!!”

Brai erupts in anger. He rushes towards Plenty still sitting on the floor and starts hitting her face with his fists. He isn’t a strong man, but even a weak man hitting a young woman in the face can cause pain and injury. Dalm didn’t rise to her rescue.

Plenty felt her consciousness fade as Brai kept striking her.

A few hours later, she woke up in the brothel of Kono, in one of his private rooms. Kono Pritin is a man who Plenty knows is worse than Brai. A man who runs the most depraved sex trafficking operation that Plenty has ever heard of in Linis.

Nothing is off limits there. Children are regularly trafficked in and out, customers can be as violent and depraved as needed, and customers can even buy women to kill them during or after (or before) the act.

Any beastkin in the facility, rather any prostitute, human or otherwise, is treated like a slave.

These sex slaves cannot leave, they cannot escape.

But, Plenty did leave.

Someone at Kono’s brothel, one of his customers, noticed her. She left for yet another brothel, a fancier brothel in a wealthy area meant to cater to sons of privilege and excess. This brothel…

Enough.

Plenty doesn’t want to forget the current moment any longer.

She focuses once again on her hatred instead of remembering her wretched past. Plenty feels hatred for Brai, towards the man who was just assaulting her, towards… towards Inalim and most of all… towards the ones who killed Inalim, the ones who… who brought this to her.

She feels defiance towards them all, to the whole world, to life itself.

Plenty came to a realization when Brai betrayed and abandoned her. She realized that, for her entire life, she had avoided death and hardship in such a pathetic manner. She wanted to live so badly. She wanted to… to do something… something with her life. Didn’t she?

Nevertheless, in the end, clinging to life didn’t get her anywhere. It didn’t gain her any goodwill with the human race, it gave her no semblance of salvation. She threw aside even (and especially) her dignity. She threw it away and it was lost for such a long time.

Why did she live like this?

She pledged to regain her dignity. The one thing she could give herself that no one could take away. Not even life was important anymore.

When Plenty first woke up in Kono’s brothel and before coming to this new hell, she had pledged to escape Kono’s brothel, to find Brai, to kill him, to kill him, to kill him, to kill him, to kill him. At the very least, she pledged to--

“Ah, shit! That hurts! You fucking bastard!”

Plenty is brought back to reality once more as she feels the man sitting on the edge of her bed start to pull her hair. She wasn’t even doing anything. She had stopped screaming hatred. She looks at him in anger, and sees his scarred face.

He’s still smoking that odd drug.

“Come on! Keep screaming, this is doing a lot for me, you have no idea! Start crying, start crying, will you? Is today the day when you’ll finally crack? Is today the day when--”

Plenty spits in his face. The man on top of her doesn’t feel any offense, rather, he takes his right hand and covers her mouth, muffling her cries.

This man… This man who has paid for Plenty owns her right now. He wants to dominate her. Plenty is a truly defiant beastkin woman after all. She’s someone who he would feel satisfaction breaking, truly.

He wanted her to start crying and begging him to stop while he was in the middle of the act. Then…

The man sees something as he stares into Plenty’s eyes. There is no weakness in them, no sign of cowardice.

“...Well, I guess today isn’t it either, huh. Alright, then. I’m getting kinda bored, I’ll just try again tomorrow.”

Plenty opens her eyes wide. This man is about to knock her out and defile her unconscious body once again to end today’s session; just like how he’s already done for the past three days that he’s bought her.

Plenty sees his left hand raise and she closes her eyes, in anticipation for the moment where she will fall into dreamless slumber.

If he’s not careful with the power of his swing, he could kill her. Maybe, that would be better… better than…

Hm?

Plenty opens her eyes. The man is no longer on top of her, he’s standing up off the bed now. He’s… looking towards the door entrance to their private room.

Plenty looks towards the door as well and notices it’s opening slowly. A lot of light is flooding in through there as well. She squints at the light… is it fire? The light isn’t steady, rather, it’s moving around a lot, flickering in different colours and casting an odd set of shadows.

It’s fire. A bright, reddish-white fire. Rather, a burning head? Plenty sees the body of a beautiful woman, wearing a red dress. Instead of a head however, she sees a roaring fire, as if her head and hair are burning currently.

“Who are you? Why are you interrupting my fun!?”

The woman enters the room and closes the door to the room. Then, the fire that was burning over her whole face, recedes from it to reveal her facial features. Her nose, mouth, cheekbones and chin are clear as day to Plenty right now.

Her eyes and hair are still burning in flames however; Plenty can now recognize her. Plenty wouldn’t forget this person. She would never forget this person.

“You… What are… What are you doing here?”

Plenty asks this question, completely unable to react to this reunion.

“Well, I’m here to kill this man, Plenty. You’re Plenty, right? Plenty Hill--”

The man rushes towards the woman that Plenty recognizes, the woman named Shaula.

He’s taken by rage at the current moment. Rage for being threatened by this woman, rage at the brothel for being unable to do anything about her intrusion, and rage at the fact that he was ignored so easily, a man like him.

He’s not just some civilian and he’s not some weakling. He’s a soldier, a decorated warrior who’s killed many demons. This woman would dare to ignore him? Him?

Before the man rushed towards Shaula, he applied a strong body strengthening magic to his entire body. It is so powerful a technique when used in war that it earned him the warrior title, “Holy Guardian Shield”, a name given to only three in the entire Holy Sapioran Federation.

He used such a powerful attack because he sincerely wasn’t underestimating his opponent; the opponent whose head was currently on fire without a care in the world. Mages capable of such finesse using fire magic are few and far between.

He’s never even heard of such a thing being possible.

He prepares a strike to her head with his right hand. The woman he’s facing is actually startled for a moment. She attempts to block it, but it’s a feint!

“AAAAGGGHHH!!!!”

“AIIIEEEEEE!!!!”

Thud.

Shaula’s body hits the floor as Plenty screams in horror.

This man, the Holy Guardian Shield, used his right arm to pierce Shaula’s torso. Then, he grabbed her spine with his right hand and pulled it out of her body, ruining a number of organs in her gut along the way. Shaula’s body then fell to the floor, lifeless.

“Huh… She fell so easily.”

“...”

Plenty knows however. Plenty has seen Shaula. She’s not going to let him in on the secret though.

The torso wound in Shaula’s body closes up. The man jumps back in true shock at seeing her perform this kind of magic. Being able to use healing magic as a corpse is literally impossible, no one has even done it, never even come close to doing it.

Magic can be stored in magical crystals and these crystals can activate magic of different qualities. There have never been magic crystals in the past that can augment and perform healing magic. Or perhaps, there actually are and this woman is in possession of one?

So long as an explanation exists, the Holy Guardian Shield places away his doubts.

Shaula stands as her clearly fatal wound continues to heal itself. The flesh that fell out of her stomach cavity remains on the ground. The man can see the organs in his gut regenerate and repair themselves as if nothing happened.

“You’ve stripped me…”

Currently, Shaula is naked. The man cut through her dress and tore it off while stealing her back. It is of no real consequence however as Shaula simply covers her nudity with a shroud of fire.

That attack just now… that one actually hurt. Enough of this, no waiting or playing around this time. Shaula applies energy to her reflexes, sharpening her reaction speed. She notices the man once again start to move.

He is a trained warrior and his motions are all deliberate and precise, even if he may be moving by pure instinct right now. He’s seen her as even more of a threat now. Shaula realizes the easiest course of action.

It’s a move she’s been practicing. She stares at the man as he continues to move without taking her eyes off of him. Then, she circulates energy into her right eye, specifically her pupil. She pumps as much energy into the small space of her pupil as she can manage.

The act is as much visualization as it is finesse and control.

She tries a special motion. She consciously forces the energy in her right pupil to spin faster and faster. As she manages this, two fifths of a second have passed and this man is preparing his own cross tackle. A move like that isn’t to be trifled with.

With his level of strength and speed, she could even be beheaded. Shaula still doesn’t know if she can survive even a beheading, let alone the actual destruction of her head.

The energy in her right pupil concentrates even more. She pushes as much as she can bear until finally--

“Ha!!”

The violently spinning energy forces its way through her pupil. Her right eye feels a violent shake at the release of pressure.

Its speed is far too instant for the eye to see; but an observer capable enough could see a spiral trail of dense lightning leave her eye and strike her enemy’s head.

Instant death.

The man’s brain crystallized. It was turned to glass.

This move that Shaula’s been practicing for the past few weeks has finally proven itself useful.

Shaula didn’t want any potential opponent to notice the fact that she was going to use a lightning attack. She noticed however that even when charging up a lightning attack in her arm, it showed the characteristic electricity “stream”. She wanted a way to get rid of that.

So she tried making a projectile lightning attack “denser”, more pressurized. That’s when she got the idea of using her eye and the focal view of her eye to create pinpoint-precise aiming, rather than depending on the accuracy of her hand eye coordination.

And so, this move was created.

This is the ultimate benefit of using lightning over fire. Lightning is far faster than fire. It can be charged faster, used faster and offer instant results. Fire was slower. If Shaula tried the same method to create a projectile fire attack, she would have been beheaded.

Nevertheless, fire does have the benefit of wide area strength. Shaula doesn’t have a way to create scatters of lightning without expending large amounts of energy. Creating a blaze in her immediate radius is far easier especially since fire can be spread through her surroundings.

Lightning cannot propagate itself in a forest but a forest fire will continue burning long after she leaves.

Shaula looks at Plenty who has moved to the corner of the bed away from her. Shaula however doesn’t approach her.

Plenty stares at her in true fear. The person that Plenty still hates, still burns in hatred towards. Yet… she killed this man for her. The man who Plenty wouldn’t have ever met if this stupid woman didn’t interfere and ruin everything…

The woman here… the woman must be here to kill Plenty. Fixing a loose end, something like that?

Plenty lowers her eyes. Now would be as good a time as any.

Shaula notices Plenty’s expression of resolve… no, of resignation. She remembers what Plenty tried to do… Shaula sighs. It’s enough. Then, she speaks.

“Let’s go. Oitra has been asking about you a lot. Come on.”

Shaula then walks out of the room. She doesn’t even look at whether Plenty is following her. Plenty doesn’t know what to do. Her dignity… her loss… her pain… what… what should she do? Should she follow this woman?

This woman who Plenty knows is responsible for the current direction of her life?

Oitra… She said, Oitra, didn’t she?

Why did she retrieve her dignity? For who? For the thought, the very memory of--