As your crew walks past you to settle in you stand over Delta while Gamma roughly handles her, ripping apart the ropes and slapping her across the face a couple of times to wake the bunny girl up.

“Get on your feet!” you order Delta the moment she opens her eyes. You need to make sure she still obeys you. Delta raises to her feet as fast as she can and then looks around, confused, trying to figure out what is going on.

“You have healing powers?” you ask her. Delta nods in response.

“Good,” you say and point to Pythia’s damaged wing. “Heal this one at once.”

Delta does as you command, coming closer to Pythia and placing both her hands on the melted part. Green light forms around Delta’s slender hands and the melted wings. Slowly, the gap is filled with flesh, and then, new feathers growing from it, flowing seamlessly into the existing ones.

Pythia licks her thin black lips and keeps her mouth slightly open, breathing heavily through it. You can see the blood rushing to the face of the excited bird, whose dinner is literally within reach.

“Pythia!” you call out the name of your ally to return her to reality. It seems to work as her expression changes and she simply lets Delta finish what she was doing.

“Don’t worry, Mr. Demon Lord, I won’t forget our agreement,” Pythia says with a smile.

Meanwhile, Gamma unties her sister, Epsilon, and helps her to her feet.

“Pythia, go inside, and see if you find a place to your liking,” you say to the bird-monster, eager to have her leave your sight. “We will have a lot to talk about in a couple of hours.”

“Ooh, I’ve never been to one of Graf’s country houses!” Pythia exclaims and hurries through the gates.

“Don’t get your hopes too high up,” you say to her back without putting the slightest effort into being heard by her. Instead, after waiting a good solid minute and making sure that Pythia is nowhere close, you turn to Epsilon and cast your level 3 [Submission] spell on her.

“Go lick the feet of every single goblin you attacked!” you order the bunny.

“Hey!” Gamma exclaims, clearly dissatisfied by the way her sister is treated.

“Do you want to join?” you ask Gamma. She does not answer. Meanwhile, Epsilon slowly approaches the goblins, who step back and huddle together in fear.

“Don’t worry—she won’t harm you!” You reassure the goblins and watch Epsilon do what you ordered. Taking a quick glance at your status screen and noting that you do not yet have enough energy for another [Submission] cast, you say to the battle bunnies, “Gamma, Epsilon, you will stay here and guard the gates. Delta, follow me!”

Before you leave you cast two [Hellfruit] spells and throw them to the bunnies, to keep them functioning for a while, and then say, “oh, right, Epsilon, you have no idea what that is. Just eat it, it might just wash away the taste.”

And with that go through the gates of your new home yourself, followed by the pixie-haired Delta. You hurry through the now-lit, and much more lively hall and go to the stairs that lead into the lower dungeons. The moment you have enough energy, you cast [Submission] on Delta, to reinforce your hold on her with a stronger level 3 spell.

The first thing you have to deal with is obvious—Chi and Beta. She followed your order perfectly, but, since her allegiance was never altered, she switched sides to Chi instantly. Well, she never left her “side” to begin with. Rather, you simply distracted her with a task.

And as for Chi... Even before you reach her former cell you could already guess how she escaped. The melted steel bars just confirm it. She has the ability to create some sort of acid. How strong is it? How long does it take to create and in which amounts? It is important to know now so that she does not crawl out of her cell through some hole she melts through. And if you manage to get Chi on your side, such acid could prove useful for your forces.

More importantly, Chi has information. And a lot of it. Not the least of which should be a list of possible hideouts for her brother or other potential allies. But how to approach her? With enough time and effort, you probably could break her like Alpha. Though you realize how lucky you were that she is functional and not utterly brain-dead. Is it even worth trying a regular approach that does not rely on your mind-breaking spells? Plain torture could also be an option, though which is crueler—forcing unbearable suffering upon a person until they’re ready to do whatever you want, or completely robbing them of their free will to make that choice?