Enlightenment Through BDSM

It seemed quick to being off again, but that was apparently the life of an adventurer. We weren’t going to be gone too long either apparently, just a couple day trip to the cave, the time on the job, and then the trek back. The only prep we needed was to buy some rations the Guild had handy, and then set out.

“Job’ll be a piece of cake,” Emi said, leading the way with two of her bags on instead of three, the small fanny pack and the giant satchel. The third, well, I was carrying it, since Kalia apparently didn’t have room in her inventory and I hadn’t learned how to do that yet except with my Job card…

“Just remember,” Kalia said, “what I say goes, and not just when I’m ordering you around with my skill.”

“You know, you need to not be so picky about that kinda stuff. If anything blows up this trial run, it’s gonna be yer attitude!”

Hung over or not, I could see Kalia fighting the headache in her mind that was Emi.

“She’s just joking,” I whispered. “I think…”

“How did you ever even get invited on that dragon hunting mission?” Kalia eventually said, maybe trying to get to know Emi, maybe just genuinely baffled. “I mean, you don’t have a party.”

“I did, back when the job started. But I got kicked out. They didn’t appreciate a mouse of my talents.”

“Breathe, Kalia, breathe,” I heard our leader muttering to herself.

“Did you all really kill a dragon?” I asked, trying to change the subject, maybe paint her in a good light?”

“Nope! Coward flew off when it saw me approaching, fleeing into the night sky! Betcha it could smell the raw destructive power contained in this here bag,” Emi said, smacking her sack and causing another chorus of jingles, myself and Kalia both witnessing, bracing for some giant explosion that, thankfully, never came.

“Can you not do stuff like that?” I asked, feeling a little bad even as I knew I was making a very reasonable request.

“Like what?” she said, shooting a look of confusion over her shoulder.

“Rattle explosives? Smack them?” Kalia said, frustration still mounting in her voice. “I mean, that’s why you got kicked out, right? You said you drop shit all the time.”

For only a moment, I saw Emi’s face sink again, right before she turned back to the road. “No, that wasn’t it actually. They said I was too annoying.”

Even Kalia was stunned by that comment. It was hard to respond to, honestly. I mean, I liked Emi and all, but even I kind of saw what they meant by that, you know? For Kalia, even if she agreed, she didn’t seem eager to rub salt into that particular wound.

“I joke about dropping explosives and stuff, but it’s really just smoke bombs,” Emi eventually continued. “I’m always careful about my actual dangerous stuff, which is why I don’t let other people carry it anymore, but I can be loud, make jokes at not the greatest times, don’t really read when I’m getting onto people’s nerves real well.

“And then there’s the whole ‘not a real adventuring Job’ thing. I like to think that doesn’t matter, but it does to a lot of people. Like, Big Greenie is an oaf who’s real blunt and stuff, but he still found a party soon as all those other people rolled in.”

“Dreck already had another party last night?” Kalia asked, mind seeming preoccupied.

“Course he did! Big Orc with an axe, what’s not to love? Small mouse with a bag of bombs? Not so much. Even though I’m really about the same as your average explosion-magic fanatic in practice, people don’t really like the idea of it.

“But I was born for this, you know? I mean, what good is Calculated Lob going to do me as a court Alchemist? I’ll tell you what it does, it gets you fired for ‘wasting materials’ and ‘almost burning the atelier down.’ Like, come on, it was a controlled fire!”

I was honestly a little unsure whether this was making her case with Kalia better or worse, but I certainly felt bad for Emi. I knew what it was like having some talent in something, but feeling like you were pressured to use it in a way you didn’t really want to.

“If you can do the job, I think you should be allowed to,” I eventually said. 

“And I can! I made it to level two without giving up, you know? Most adventurers kick the bucket before then, and half the ones that live end up working as guards for the rest of their life. Real cushy job that, if you got a big axe. Funny enough though, town guards aren’t real interested in hiring me either.”

“I mean, that makes sense,” Kalia said.

“Yeah, no harsh feelings there. Bombs don’t make for good arresting tools.”

We’d seemed to reach some sort of accord, and understanding that would get us peacefully through the mission. Whether intentional or not, Emi had endeared me to herself even more, and Kalia didn’t seem as gripy or grumpy about the situation anymore. Still, as we walked I had one other thing on my mind.

“Hey, uhm,” I started, not really sure how to broach the question. “Are Cave Goblins… people?”

Emi shot a confused look back at me, about to speak, but Kalia beat her too it. “Reborn Amnesia, really bad, remember?”

“I mean, I do remember that, but she don’t know the difference between monsters and people?”

“We’re from before the Demon Lord’s rise, remember?”

“Oh, yeah, guess that’s so. Man, that’s weird; what was it like?”

“So, Goblins and the like weren’t around until a few decades ago,” Kalia said, though I wasn’t sure who she was answering. “There have always been generic beasts and creatures like rabbits, dragons, hogbacks, but not really most of the sentient monsters we see today, Goblins, Trolls, Gnolls. Then Demon Lord rose to power about fifty years ago, and brought them along too. They kind of are people, but not in the usual sense.”

“They got people’s souls in them!” Emi continued for her. “Dead people’s souls!”

“Dead souls?” I said, more in shock than as an actual question.

“Yeah…” Kalia said. “Souls here, they’re supposed to be reborn here.”

“Like you two! But normally with a lot more amnesia than even you have, Pinky, and also normally as babies.”

“Right, being born, in other words,” Kalia clarified. “Not Reborn like us, just the natural life cycle. But the Demon Lord did something back then, messed with the order of things. Now a bunch of souls that should be going back into the life cycle are getting trapped, twisted, turned into monsters.”

“And we… we have to fight them?” 

“And kick the souls right out of their butts!” Emi said, pumping her fist into the air and jumping. “Helping good folks like these miners and releasing the souls of the dead along the way. It’s a win win!”

That didn’t sound right, not quite as clean as Emi was making it out to be anyway. I’d heard enough lies about the afterlife in my time to not really be trusting of anything I heard, and Kalia’s nervous face wasn’t doing much to quell my fears.

“There’s more to it, I think,” she eventually whispered to me. “We’ll talk about it alone though, has to do with Earth.

“But Emi’s right,” she continued in a louder voice. “Cave Goblins have the souls of people, but they aren’t acting of their own will. Killing… it’s not easy, especially not at first. But here, it’s the only way to help them, short of taking out the Demon Lord directly.”

“Yeah, and we gotta be at least level three before we go thinking of doing that,” Emi said.

“Three’s enough? How many levels are there?” I asked. Three didn’t seem too unattainable, after all. Was four the max?

“At least ten levels that we know of,” Kalia said. “And Emi is making another bad joke. Three is most certainly not enough. No one’s reached higher than eight in recent memory, and even those that did and tried could beat the Demon Lord.”

“Aye, but they didn’t have me,” Emi said, still walking with confidence. 

Kalia shook her head, but did chuckle a little. “I don’t know if I’ve ever met someone who believed in their own hype this much.”

The rest of the day was long. Lots of marching, little breaks here and there for food, water, bathroom bushes, but mostly a whole lot of nothing once we made it outside the town walls. Still, night did come, and Kalia and Emi started the special Wardflame to keep any supposed monsters at bay while I fumbled with our tent.

“It ain’t fair you two get a tent and I have to sleep out in the cold!”

“It’s already meant to be a single person tent,” Kalia said as she bit at her bread and dried fruits. No stew tonight, since we didn’t have time for a full grocery trip with our late start to the morning. “Once we’re done with the job, you can buy your own with your cut.”

“Oh, we didn’t talk split, did we? Fifty, twenty, twenty alright? I’m the specialist here, after all.”

“Very funny,” Kalia said. “We’re doing an even split, the standard assumption if no one offers something else before the start of a new job. And also, those numbers don’t even add to a hundred.”

“I meant fifty seeds for me, twenty for each of you. The rest goes towards my restocking ingredients, of course.”

Kalia paused for a moment, then shook herself back to attention. “Wait, how much shit do you intend on using for this job?”

But Emi was already sticking out her tongue. “I’m just messing with ya! My alchemy lives off the land, for the most part. But occasionally I do have to restock on things like quicksilver dust, goldfire powder, and the like, stuff I can’t just scavenge out on missions. If we do become an official party, we’ll have to work out how to pay for that stuff.”

I was a little worried that might be another added friction, but it didn’t seem to phase Kalie. “Fair enough,” she said, standing up and stretching. “Standard party equipment rules will apply there, I guess. We can discuss it once we see if this is gonna work out. You coming to bed, Mai?”

“Yeah!” I said, standing up as well. I was relieved that Kalia seemed to still be entertaining the idea of sticking with Emi, at least. Hopefully everything goes well. 

We made our way over to the tent as Emi pulled out some tools of hers, along with some herbs and a couple vials. I was honestly interested in watching her work, but also, was I really going to tell Kalia, “No?”

Once we got inside, Kalia stripped her jacket off again, leaving her in just that very tight, very skimpy shirt again, and of course the pants as well.

And then those came off too, an unbelievable sight as they struggled to make it over her ass and thighs. I wondered how they ever even made it on in the first place. Soon, she was standing there in just a black thong, thin with the straps high up on her waste, and the shirt. 

“Well, we have some time. Why don’t I teach you how to use your inventory?”

“Huh? I mean, uhm, that does sound good.” I looked around blushing and trying not to reveal how distracted I was, realizing that I didn’t quite have any belonging to store. “But with what?”

“We can start with this,” Kalia said, popping the yellow dress she’d bought me at Woodland Designs into existence, handing it over to me. Then she grinned, adding, “And after that, we can do it with the rest of your clothes.”