Seems I 'screwed the pooch' on this one.

I eyed my shaggy little acquisition with care. It felt like a long time since I'd fought the Huntsman in that blasted cave. I almost missed those times when I thought about everything I'd have to try juggling henceforth. Finding ways to kill bugs seemed easy in comparison to babysitting and looking after myself.

This girl was in rough shape. I had so many questions. It didn't help that she looked like she'd keel over if I slapped her a few times. To make things worse, I lacked the social delicacy to smoothly deal with this situation, there was no 'people' food to give her, and she seemed to be a hot mess.

I'd have to approach carefully or else she might run away or begin to hate me.

I should attempt to act 'caring' and be a parental-type figure who can offer security to counter-act that possibility. Imposing, warm, reliable. Alright, let's give that a whirl.

"For starters, are you thirsty?" I asked, "I can use magic to make water."

I waved a tendril toward her, gesturing. A sniffle showed that she was still clogged up and her eyes were a bit puffy. She seemed to be doing better now at least.

"I-I can do that too. My Father had me learn some magic. Water is essential for survival, he'd always say."

Oh? Dog-girl can do some tricks? Well, that's not a bad start. Perhaps I can teach her to roll over, or slayeth mine enemies? A nice thought.

"Your Father sounds wise. Do you know any other magic? Or have any talents that would help out here?"

"Th-that's ... I can handle a sword. And uh, I ... I know what's safe to eat around here."

When I asked this question she looked a bit downtrodden. So that means no magic, can swing a stick and eat berries. Great.

While I was trying to form a plan of action for raising such a child into something usable, my thoughts were interrupted.

"Miss Slime, ... Rozalin, I should get going soon. I need to start getting away from here as soon as possible."

Huh?

"Why are you in such a hurry?"

She fidgeted around for a moment before I got both curious and impatient.

"What's troubling you? Didn't I say earlier to share your concerns with me? I'll take care of them if I can, so speak up."

The dog-girl flinched, one hand tightly grasping and tugging on her wrist in what I assumed was anxiety. I wish she'd stop beating around the bush so much.

"Those men put a Slave Shackle on my ankle. They said something about a boss. If there's more of them, they'll probably ... come after me once they realize those two are missing."

My brain faltered. Slave Shackle?

So what my new pet was telling me was a bunch of armed men were likely to come and try taking her back to their camp or dungeon or whatever they called home. Fan-fucking-tastic. Seriously, are there any other bits of fine print I missed in this whole 'Royal Guard' nonsense?! Ghh.

"What is a Slave Shackle? What does it do?"

For a whole three seconds, I endured having a young teenager look at me like I was an idiot. Excuse me for being uncultured! I bet you wouldn't know what a smartphone was even if I shoved it up your nose!

"That's ... Slave Shackles are put on slaves to track them and punish them if they don't follow orders. There's a rune on them that connects to a runestone or runestone node."

I looked at the metal band wrapped around her leg. Her mud-caked boots were worn and the bottoms of her cloth pants torn and frayed. Around her ankle was indeed some sort of shackle.

"Even if I can outrun them, I'm not sure how I'll ever get it off. A blacksmith or enchanter would have the tools, but removing a Slave Shackle without the owner's permission is..."

It appeared to be made of iron or steel. When I looked at it with my Magic Sensory there were some faint blue lines carved into it. Looked harmless enough.

"I-If I can escape, I might be able to remove it eventually! There's still hope. I've got my identification plate, so ... so maybe ..."

Yeah, I'm just gonna try devouring it.

I rolled over towards the girl's leg, "Stay still. This is going to be hard enough without accidentally eating your leg."

Her eyes bulged, "Eat my leg!?"

"It's just a metal shackle. Why are you getting so bent out of shape? I'll dissolve the rune-whatever carving then work on the metal."

She backed away.

"A-Are you sure that's a good idea!? I'm uh, I'm not so sure about this!"

I sighed, "Relax. It sounds like this would be a pain to get off. Bear with it. If it starts to hurt, tell me so I can stop."

Why is she being such a baby? This is the most logical conclusion to her problem. If she's afraid of a little pain, she's never going to get anywhere out here. Still not sure how she's managing to have a nervous tic while speaking telepathically. Seriously, calm the fuck down.

I reached a tendril out toward her ankle, "Hold still. I need to concentrate."

It was difficult enough to focus on this strange lump of metal. There were etchings on the inside of the shackle, likely to make it harder to damage. It folded together like a circle cut in half, with a bolt on one opening holding it together. On the open end were two latches and another set of etchings that almost seemed to act like additional magic adhesive.

This was extremely interesting. I got to work examining the shackle, picking at it with small applications of Devour and checking the results with Magic Sensory. I'd obviously never seen anything like this before so I got a bit engrossed in my work.

My tinkering was disrupted by the girl's incessant squirming.

"Why do you keep moving? I'm trying to remove this, so please be more still."

Had I a mouth, I'd be frowning right now. It was convenient I only had to worry about the tone of my mental voice, apparently. Emulating body language would be beyond exhausting.

"You're ... You're tickling me."

Huh?

I broke concentration to look up at the girl's contorted face. Tickling?

"O-Oh. I'll try to ... Rather, you'll have to bear with it. I'll be done in a few minutes."

If I had a desk, I'd smack my head off it. This was idiotic.

I began devouring the shackle's bolts in earnest, taking as much care possible not to accidentally start dissolving her leg. That was not something I was ready to deal with, and I was positive she wouldn't look kindly upon it. If I could remove this Slave-thing then she'd be more indebted to me and I'd appear more capable. This could only be a good thing.

The restriction of not being able to use my corrosive toxin in conjunction with Devour made it take longer than expected. After nearly 10 minutes of tinkering, the surprisingly hard bolt soon began to give way under my prodding. Seriously though, what was this thing made of? I was getting a slime-ache. Magically reinforced metal did not taste good.

Doing the human equivalent of gently sucking on metal for so long was a bit odd, but I'd gotten used to it. Not like dog-girl knew to judge me for it. She'd settled down about halfway through and was looking at her ankle in earnest. Multi-tasking to make sure no one snuck up on us while eating the thing was stressful, so I'm glad I still had a Domain anchor up.

Finally, with a satisfying jingle, the shackle fell to the ground.

"And there you have it. See? That wasn't so bad, was it?"

She rolled around her ankle a few times experimentally. Rather than the expected praise, I was met with questions.

"I'm amazed you got it off so easily. ... Really though, why are you helping me? This doesn't make sense. I've never heard of talking Slimes before, let alone friendly ones."

Ah. She just cast suspicious eyes at me. I'd given her too much time to think. Am I ... going overboard with the whole 'helpful' schtick? It's possible a sprinkle of honesty would do well here. But how much?

"It's good to be suspicious of others. Unfortunately, my motives are fairly simple. I wanted some company."

"Some company?" she scoffed, seeming to not believe me.

"Ah, some company. You try living in a cave with a bunch of things that want to eat you. It was horrible and nearly drove me crazy. You looked like you could use some help, so I thought it'd work out for both of us."

She went quiet momentarily, "So ... what happens now? What's this 'Royal Guard' thing?"

"Now? That's mostly up to you. If you have any goals or places to be, I'll accompany you and offer support. In return, I hope you'll cooperate with me. I can only appoint one Royal Guard every year, so I hope you'll stay with me at least 'til then. I can't speak with anyone but you.

As for the Royal Guard, it is literally my personal guard. It's a Skill I have that enables conversation and increases your abilities when you're near me. Do you feel any different now? Better or stronger, perhaps? I'm curious."

"That's ..."

The look on her face seemed to confirm that was the case. That was satisfying to know. It also increased my perceived value to her.

"I've many more questions for you and I'm sure you've some for me. We'll have to sort through them one at a time. Just know that as long as you hold no ill will or prejudice toward me, I will do nothing to hurt you."

I felt like what I'd said was reasonable. Perhaps this girl was less emotional than I thought. If she was surviving out in the wild or what-have-you, there's no way she'd do so by being an idiot. A smidgeon of respect formed in my mind toward her.

Amalia, huh?

Silence ensued. Rather than telepathy, she whispered her next words.

"I hate prejudice. People judging before they know things. It would be unfair after all you've shown me to judge you just for being a monster."

"I may be a monster," I replied, "but I think you're likely to find none other like me. I pride myself on being rather rational and reasonable. More importantly ..."

My gaze went up to the top of her head.

"Why do you have dog ears? And a tail?"

Anger clouded her face, "They're not dog ears! My mother was a proud wolfkin surveyor and scout!"

Erm. ... Seems I struck a nerve. Mental note taken.

"A-Apologies, I've never seen one such as yourself. I'm not familiar with the world. So are you, ... was your Father also one of these 'wolfkin'?"

Her face remained stern and forlorn.

"You really can't tell? ... No, Father was a Knight-Captain, working in Kulve to the north. He was human. I'm what they call a half-beastkin."

Beast-what? So let me get this straight, people are mating with animal-people in this world? And then popping out fuzzy half-animal-people? I really shouldn't judge considering I've seen giant, 5-foot spiders and all, but this feels kinda ...

Ah, whatever. So she's a wolf and not a dog. I can accept this. I've seen plenty of weird shit so far.

"So I'm assuming humans generally dislike beastkin? And humans practice slavery too? That's rather ... primitive. Do they have nothing better to squabble over? Religion, politics, money? So inefficient."

I rattled off my woes and slung a few insults that I figured she'd like to hear. I meant every one of them, too. Wars, racial divisions, and the like were all an enormous waste. What kind of backwater lands did I get tossed into?

She seemed confused by my reply, so I decided to keep the conversation going.

"I really don't care if you're half-beastkin or whatever. As such, I hope you don't hold the fact I'm a Slime against me. For now, let's get moving. If there are more thugs around then I'd prefer not encounter them. Where are you headed?"

"You're ... You're really planning to come with me?"

"Yes, and I won't take no for an answer. Not yet, anyway. If you're intent on being rid of me, then perhaps after I've asked you more questions we can part ways. I'm rather lost right now, and while that doesn't bother me terribly, it'd be nice to know my surroundings."

I retrieved the sword I'd 'borrowed' off her from underneath a nearby bush, before lightly tossing it beside her. She took hold of it then shakily got up. After surveying the surrounding area, she asked another question.

"Rozalin, what happened to ... those men who attacked me?"

This caused me to pause. I didn't want to come off as an experience-hungry monster who ate everything in sight. Even if that was about 40-percent accurate. No good excuses came to mind, unfortunately. There were still some light bloodstains that had seeped into the ground that she'd locked onto.

"They're gone. I didn't want their corpses to attract animals or scare you when you woke."

"Why ... did you kill them?"

She gripped the sword close to herself tightly. Was she nervous? The atmosphere changed.

"Because they were vile men. ... Do you pity them?"

Seems I had a bit of edge to my query, as she seemed taken aback.

"O-Of course not, it's just that ..."

"They were going to hurt you, Amalia. I apologize if it disturbs you, but I won't lose sleep over their deaths. As I said, 'If justice fails you, then enact it yourself.' I think it good advice, so keep it in mind. I don't want to see you wind up the victim of some fool's 'justice'."

It was a good thing there isn't some form of child protection present, because they'd likely interfere with my corruption of a minor. I couldn't have her being all soft towards survival. Life is hard, you need to do what's necessary. While my speech may have been rather disastrous, most of the ideas behind it were sound.

An eye for an eye, take shit from no one, do right for yourself the best you're able. Simple.

In the very least, she needs to take care of herself. The thought of anyone abusing or snatching away my guard made me most annoyed. So long as I could help it, I wasn't about to let someone ruin this for me. I'm not sure if I could recover from such a setback. I'd sooner gouge their eyes out first.

"Justice, huh?" she muttered.

Well, she seems to be reflecting on it. That's fine for now.

"I've been thinking about how best to travel with you. I'm going to hide under your clothes, so stay still."

"Y-You're gonna what?"

"Exactly as I said. It's the most logical course of action and I can even heal your gross injuries while we travel. Stop backing away."

"S-Stop that! That t-tickles! You're going somewhere strange!"

"If you would quit squirming so much this would be easier. Do you think this is pleasant for me? It's hard to get my body uniform, you know! Stop doing that with your arms! Now just—hngh, ah, there we go."

I'm glad I couldn't smell. I'm sure her clothes and body were filled with germs, even after my 'cleaning session' last night. At least I was relatively safe here unless she decided to plunge her sword into her own chest, or someone shot her somehow. Meatshield acquired!

"You're cold! And that feels weird! Please get off me!"

I poked my 'head' out from her ragged shirt and shawl, directly below her chin.

"Stop being so childish. I'm sure I'll warm up after a while. You feel rather nice, by the way. I'm going to start working on your tooth infection, so pretend I'm not here."

"M-My what? And how am I supposed to pretend you aren't there!? You're heavy and cold!"

H-Heavy? Did this brat just ...

I unconsciously squeezed her a bit, "I'm not heavy! You just need to work out more! Look how thin you are. I can feel your ribs! We are going to fatten and bulk you up until you decide I'm not 'heavy' anymore."

She crouched down, clutching her head for some reason.

"This is stupid! I don't understand anything that's going on anymore."

"Stop worrying so much and decide where we're going before those thugs find us. What was your destination before we met?"

She paused, hesitation obvious.

"I was ... going toward Berrios, then east to Eigach. I wanted to see if they'd accept me as a knight cadet."

Huh? This dog—err, wolf-girl wanted to enlist in some army?

"You want to ... join the military? Are you sure that's a good idea?"

"W-Well ... it's not like I've got a lot of options, and I've always wanted to ... to be a knight."

"Do they even allow women to be knights?" I asked out of curiosity.

"Of course!"

How oddly progressive.

At this remark, Amalia puffed up her extremely modest chest in what I assumed was pride. Was this related to her Father? Apparently, I was rather cold, as I felt two small peaks had formed. Can I regulate my body temperature somehow? This feels ... annoying.

Have I seriously been reduced to a magical, pink sports bra? I could use some more bandits to stab right about now. I know hiding underneath here was my idea, but still!

Her odd enthusiasm aside, the military did not sound like a place I wanted to be. I'd have to deter her somehow or make it work.

"Let's head to this 'Berrios' for now. My goals include not exposing myself to people, or at least developing a good cover story. I'll be relying on your common sense. Now let's get moving."

"A-Are you sure about this?"

"Yes, I'm positive. You're my Royal Guard now, so I'm not going to be satisfied until I turn you into an exceptional knight. The first step is to improve your health. We need medical supplies, food, a warm bed, and shelter. A town sounds like the perfect place to gather information and some of those things."

"But what if—"

"No excuses! Now stop distracting me and let's go. I'm trying to examine your body and you keep pulling me out of my concentration."

It took a moment, but I felt the girl's limbs finally start carrying us both forward. This was most likely the strangest form of locomotion I'd ever experienced. Even more so than rolling around as a Slime.

"I feel like this isn't going to go well," she whined.

The thought made me chuckle, "I'm sure it's going to go exceedingly well. Things can't possibly go any worse than they have the past few weeks. I'm sure our journey will be smooth now that we have each other."

I felt the air expel from her lungs.

"Why do I feel like something bad is going to happen, then?"

The girl's pessimism caused me to roll my eyes. While I couldn't be certain, between my Luck stat and having finally obtained a Royal Guard, I felt optimistic. Besides, now that I had some direction, it seemed like nothing could go wrong.

"Relax, Amalia. You're much more secure with me around. We'll make a knight out of you yet."

I heard her mutter, the words barely escaping her lips from up above.

"I can only pray."

Everything had gone wrong.

A chair slammed into the wall.

Opposite from a large oaken desk was an incredibly irate and red-faced man.

"You're telling me that Castella was likely killed!? And Biron's daughter is now disfigured and blind in one eye!? How could I not be upset! This is a disaster!"

Cornelius Pennbright slammed his weighty fists atop that finely-crafted desk yet again.

Opposite of the meaty mountain of a man stood the bearer of such horrendous news. One sir knight by the name of Blake Faust was present, flanked by two additional guards.

"A-Apologies sir. It was all I could do to retreat with Aryana. Our first aid was limited. I made haste to return, but she ..."

"Fucking hells!" Cornelius struck his desk again with an open palm, "Samuel, have the healers do what they can for the girl! Immediately! Their price doesn't matter!"

The leftmost guard quickly exited the room, leaving only three men present.

"Markus, send word to Lord Biron immediately! I'll not have him find out from anyone else. And tell my aide to see me!"

And now, two remained.

"A real fucking disaster!" Cornelius hollered, "Castella dead? A Mirrorback you say?"

Blake's voice seemed to fail him, "A-Ah. A Mirrorback, she called it."

Cornelius shut his eyes and stewed in silence for a long moment, trying to decide on the best course of action. The fact that one of the prominent members of nobility's sole daughter came back a disfigured mess was going to cause him endless pain. That aside, the loss of Berrios' Ice Witch was altogether a different matter.

Castella's death was both a blessing and a horrid curse. The old crone was an incredible headache to deal with, but she was also experienced and competent. Had he sent nearly any other person in her place, it's likely no one would have returned. He silently thanked her for getting the younger two back, at least.

Cornelius decided to have a long, quiet drink in her memory later. Even if none should truly mourn the bitchy old woman, he still thought highly of her. This wasn't how he'd ever intended things to go. The Ice Witch of Berrios deserved at least that much respect, even if she were a sodding cunt most of the time. He'd miss the woman.

The plump man cursed again at the thought. Castella Duval—dead. It didn't make any sense to him. Then again, neither did a Mirrorback in a freshly born Dungeon.

"The Core was there, then? It's definitely a Dungeon, right?"

Cornelius' gaze locked onto the knight, who nodded in grim silence. As one of the younger knights, Blake was not used to the fury of the town Mayor's gaze.

Cornelius grit his teeth, hardly believing the words that had been popping out of his mouth. Things like, 'price doesn't matter' and what he was about to say.

"Knight Faust, you will be helping lead an expedition north to that Dungeon, effective tomorrow. We're sending out a full squad. Your job will be to guide them to the entrance and through the Dungeon. Understood!?"

"Y-Yes, Sir!" the younger man saluted.

"Inform your commanding officer, immediately! 24 men, tomorrow! Have him see me after. You'll need mages and healers and a good night's rest. ... Now get the hell out of my office! I've planning to do and letters to write!"

"Sir!"

Once more, the man saluted, before he made a hasty retreat. Curses were laden under his breath. He'd never expected this.

On the other hand, Cornelius let his curses flow freely like water, rather than hold them in. He was in an extremely foul mood.

As he retrieved the abused chair from the corner of the room, his weighty frame assaulted it once more. He sat atop it and quickly flicked a quill onto a piece of parchment.

And so, Cornelius could only pray things went better this time around.

Pray and wait.