“Hey, Yumi.” Malic calls me, waving a hand as we enter the guild after a nice few days of rest and relaxation since our return to Karshis.

“Huh?”

When I see him, I walk over. “Hi, Malic. What's up?”

“Yumi.” I go stiff at Master Liina's tone. “You can't just run off like that,” she scolds me, then gives me a swat.

“Eep!” I squeak. Damn it stings when she does that!

I blink away the tears on my eyes and lower my head. “Sorry, Master.”

“And you,” she sighs at Malic. “I get that you're friends, but please, a little propriety now that she's my slave?”

He winces, turning a small apologetic look to each of us in turn. “Sorry, Liina. I'll be more careful in the future.” That's right, she's never said it explicitly, but slaves definitely aren't supposed to speak casually with people, especially when their master is present...

I think it slides a little among adventurers since the communication is important for accomplishing quests, but that's work, not, you know, socializing...

“Well, now that we're here, what is it?” she asks.

“Ahem,” he clears his throat a little. “It's just that I had a promise to fulfill. If you remember, I promised Yumi to tell her what happened to Keane.”

“Ahh, that. So, what was it?” she prompts.

“Here, he went out on this quest. It just got recalled because another group failed,” he pushes a flier across the counter and Master Liina hisses. Looking at it, the flier is just an orc subjugation quest. From what I know, they aren't terribly powerful. However, there are two big red marks on the flier, indicating that two groups failed it.

Looking a little closer, I ask, “It's in... the Edin Valley?” I don't know that area.

“It's an area out in the wilderness, way out there,” Malic notes. “Five day walk from here.”

“Huh... So both groups failed? Against orcs?”

“Presumably, no one returned from either group.”

I blink up at him. “No one?” Closing his eyes, he shakes his head, then points at the flier again. “See these marks? They indicate that no one returned.”

Oh, now that he mentions it, a strike just means it was failed, these are big red Xs. So they mean it was a total wipe... Now I understand Master Liina's initial reaction...

I glance up to her-

Oh shit.

Master Liina looks pretty annoyed. She just told us to act properly and we've basically just fallen right back into casual conversation, practically acting like she wasn't even there.

But I really want to talk to him, and this is important... And he's my friend... Even if I think back to Limmera or the others at the bar, they were like, coworkers. Malic is my only friend.

For just a moment, I'm reminded of my mother and how she repeatedly drove off my friends, and a dark, angry knot forms in my stomach.

“Yumi, what is that look for?” Master Liina asks. Her tone dips one level below stern, actually sounding harsh, and I flinch. I was just glaring at her, wasn't I?

My moment of defiance is ended swiftly by her dangerous tone, and I lower my head, but there's a burning resentment inside me now.

“Don't make me repeat myself,” Master Liina warns.

I stay silent until my crest flares up. I grit my teeth, then grumble, “Malic is my only friend.”

“Yes, I understand that. But that doesn't explain... this,” clearly referring to my current attitude.

Still staring at her feet, I mumble, “My parents tried to drive away all my friends...”

As soon as I say it, she deflates. “Oh.” She hesitates, and I glance up at her to see she looks conflicted. Eventually, she speaks again, her tone softer now. “Yumi, I have no intention to driving off your friend, or hurting you. It's just, I can't overlook behavior like this. You must understand, it just isn't proper for a slave.”

I bite my lip. “But... but then what do I do? How can we be friends if I'm not even allowed to talk to him?”

Her conflicted look doesn't change. “I'm sorry, I don't know.”

“Huh? W-what do you mean you don't know?” I ask, dumbfounded by a response like that. How could she not know?

“I'm sorry, the truth is, I'm still new to this myself, so I don't actually know how to deal with this situation...”

I have absolutely no idea how to respond to that one.

“If I may make a suggestion?” Malic suddenly speaks up. “Giving her express permission to hold a conversation with someone, then stepping back to let her do so, could be a good place to start. Of course, until you decide to step back in again.”

Master Liina stands, considering it deeply for some time, before she nods. “That sounds acceptable. Her attention returns to me, her tone hard again. “Now, Yumi.” She frowns and says, “Punish Slave.”

The pain surges out. I shake, a hand to my chest as it washes over me, makes me grit my teeth as I groan, trying to withstand it.

Master Liina's words come quickly, sharpened by the burning heat through my whole body. “I understand it relates to your past, but you should talk to me about these things first. Defiance like that is unacceptable.”

“Yes, Master,” I answer obediently, and the pain recedes. It leaves me panting lightly, still holding my chest.

“Lastly,” she goes on – There's more? “As suggested, I may give you express permission to hold conversations with people. Talking out of place still bad behavior. As such-” She smacks me on the ass, and I flinch and yelp again. “That's for speaking out of place earlier, don't do it again.”

Rubbing at the new stinging spot, I bow. “Yes, Master.” My heart is sinking. She's punished me more in the last five minutes than she normally does in a whole day. I just keep messing up...

“Now, as I promised: You have my permission to talk to Malic now.” She gestures to him, then takes a step back from the counter, making it clear that she's not part of the conversation right now.

Still wiping the pained tears from my eyes, I apologize, “S-sorry, Malic. I'm not usually so bad... I guess I'm just used to acting differently around you, and a lot of those habits aren't really good behavior for a slave...”

“Yeah, I guess so. Still, I'm surprised. I mean, I saw your status for myself, but it's still a surprise to see someone acclimate to slavery so quickly.”

I give a wry grin. “I'm a high rated slave for a reason. My childhood really fu- uhh, messed me up in the head.” I throw a glance back when I almost curse before catching myself, but Master Liina is still standing passively. “I was having full-blown panic attacks over everything until I decided I could trust Master. Once I got past that, well, slavery is surprisingly comfortable for someone like me.”

He gives a small whistle. “Wow. Sounds like it.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just the way you talk about it. You can hear it in your voice, you have absolutely no resentment about it at all. I'm sure you can understand that's abnormal.”

“Heh, yeah, Having my freedom stolen bothered me a lot. I can only imagine how bad it would be for other people.” Normal, non-broken people.

Malic just chuckles, showing some of his pointed wolf teeth in the process, and shakes his head. “Well anyway, enough catching up, your master will get impatient.”

“R-right,” I nod quickly.

“So, I think I was saying... Keane died on this quest, in the Edin Valley, about five days walk southeast of here.”

Part of me wants to go investigate, but that would be stupid. Two full parties already wiped on the... quest...

Wait, what?

“Did you say a five day walk?” I ask.

“Yeah, five days southeast.”

“But Keane's slave crest disappeared about two days into my quest. So, that means he never even made it there.”

Malic blinks a few times. “Oh.”

“Do you think that goes for everyone?” Was it something along the way that took out two full groups of adventurers? That sounds more likely than some ordinary orcs...

“I don't know, it's hard to say. He could have died in a bandit attack along the way, but... no, he was their healer, they would have turned back if he died. I think you're right, something must have attacked the groups heading out there. Bandits or monsters maybe, something strong enough to wipe out both groups without leaving survivors...” Malic stares down at the at the marked up flier.

“Hey,” suddenly, Master Liina's hand is on my shoulder as she speaks. “I smell a quest.”

“M-Master?!” She doesn't mean-! “B-but, two parties were wiped! A-and, actually...” When it hits me, I turn to look back over at the quest board.

How many other quests take adventurers out that way?

“Malic-” I cut short when I start to address him directly again, reminding myself that Master Liina just laid out the rules for this. Addressing them both instead, I say, “What other quests go out that way? There might be even more groups that have already been lost.”

Malic and Master Liina both have the same reaction to my question, instantly grimacing. With a few words, they gather the help of a few more guild members, and head over to the board. I stand back as they cut a large swath through the crowd, drawing a big commotion from the surrounding adventurers.

There are some complaints, but mostly murmurs of confusion, as the guild members begin pulling quests down. When they converge on the counter again, it's clear that the problem is larger than was originally obvious.

Among all the quests they removed, they lead to a wide sprawl of locations, but all would require the party to travel along a similar route partway to their destinations.

In total, five groups have been lost. And that's before a guild member thinks to search through quests they'd already recalled, raising the losses to nine adventurer parties.

Breaking into a flurry of activity, they check through their records and work up a tally, coming to a total of fifty one adventurers, ostensibly lost to whatever might be happening in... a map is thrown over the counter, cross referenced to find the location. An area about two days' travel southeast of Karshis, a small pass between shallow mountainsides called Kevitra Pass.

Once they pinpoint it, someone rushes into the back, eventually returning with... someone I've never seen before.

The massive man, a lion-altra with a huge golden mane despite his otherwise human appearance, steps into the center of the guild and takes a deep breath, a few nearby adventurers already turning wide eyes on him. Who is he? Someone important like the guild master maybe?

Then his voice explodes, a roar that brings the hall to silence as he announces, “The adventurer's guild is announcing an emergency quest. We require the investigation and subjugation of an unknown danger in the Kevitra Pass. The pay is fifteen gold. Anyone interested, please come to the front counter to sign up.”

The stir is immediate. Adventurers head toward the counter in droves, and Master Liina pulls me along as well. We aren't going, are we? I mean, we came here to look for a quest, but isn't this one really dangerous?

But I follow along, standing obediently as Master Liina signs up.

It's not long after that most of the ones who showed interest back off, once they're told about the current death toll. Plenty of others sign up anyway, and before we know it, our group has grown to over thirty members.

What is this, a raid group?