“That’s right, he wanted to introduce you to your Heavenly Mother and Savior—me—”
A crisp, pleasant female voice, tinged with an unmistakable, lazy smile, echoed lazily outside the wooden hut.
The bandits turned their heads in unison.
The courtyard of the stronghold, which should have been heavily guarded, was deathly silent.
The dozen or so brothers who should have been standing watch at the outposts were now all sprawled behind the woman in strange poses. Peaceful, foolish grins were plastered on their faces, and they were mumbling something incoherent under their breath.
Outside the kicked-open doorway, bathed in the dazzling golden sunlight, a silver-haired girl leaning on an umbrella and a black-haired girl stepped inside.
The former wore a modest yet practical light dress and an exquisite blue Magic Top Hat. She appeared quite ordinary.
Sophie leaned her Oil-paper Umbrella against the doorframe and lightly tapped her feet at the threshold to shake the dust off her boots. Then, smiling at the group of dumbfounded bandits, she spread her hands in a perfectly reasonable manner.
“...this New Moon Lady beside me,” Sophie added with mock solemnity, tilting her head toward her companion.
“Why do I feel like an afterthought?” the black-haired girl, draped in cold moonlight, grumbled in a low voice.
The black-haired girl’s beauty was so ethereal it felt surreal. Her delicate, jade-white ankles were bare and defenseless, hovering an inch above the ground. An invisible moonlight barrier separated her from the filthy mud and wood shavings on the floor.
The bandits in the hut instinctively reached for their weapons.
They couldn't make sense of these two girls.
One looked perfectly ordinary, yet she had the audacity to casually dust her shoes at the entrance of a bandit council room.
The other was too beautiful to be human, yet she seemed completely ordinary, with not a single ripple of mana emanating from her.
More terrifyingly, they didn't seem to view the room full of blades and axes as a threat at all.
Sophie took half a step closer to Miaoyue.
Miaoyue couldn't help but snap, “And Saint... Sophie! What kind of nonsense are you spouting now? Who gave you permission to acknowledge such a strange doctrine as a 'Heavenly Mother'?”
Sophie thought: But that's exactly what Modi told me.
“Teacher, this is a field training opportunity,” Sophie whispered with a serious expression. “Rule three of love training: when outsiders have a misunderstanding, one should observe the other party's reaction to judge whether an intimate form of address causes emotional fluctuations.”
“This kind of misunderstanding shouldn't be observed at all!” Miaoyue lowered her voice, her ears already flushing red. “And who is a Heavenly Mother? I am only the New Moon Lady! The New Moon Lady!”
“But they're calling out to you so devoutly.” Sophie pointed at the nearby Toby, whose face was filled with rapture, and spoke with a pained expression. “If Teacher denies it too quickly, it will hurt the simple faith of these new believers.”
“Then you definitely shouldn't encourage them!” Miaoyue glared at her. “Sophie, do not mix sect propaganda, love training, and taking advantage of a goddess into one thing!”
“Oh? Teacher can already accurately distinguish between the three.” Sophie blinked. “The educational results are quite significant.”
“This is not an educational result!” Miaoyue nearly stumbled off her moonlight barrier in frustration. “Also, do not call me Teacher in front of enemies!”
The bandits in the room were stunned.
Hearing the title 'New Moon Lady,' they had initially thought some cultist enchantress or a mad noble lady had barged in.
Now, it seemed they had to add another possibility—
Their relationship was suspiciously close, and they were incredibly bold.
Leader Buck stood there with his mouth agape, forgetting to wipe away the sparks from his pipe that had fallen onto the back of his hand.
He looked at Toby, who was lost in bliss, then at his brothers outside, who were slumped over and clearly under the influence of mental magic, and finally fixed his gaze on Sophie and Miaoyue.
An unprecedented sense of crisis suddenly exploded in the heart of this wilderness veteran.
The white-haired girl's power didn't seem particularly strong, and he couldn't sense any power from the black-haired girl at all—she seemed as ordinary as any commoner.
Two lunatics?
What was going on?
Normally, he would have just seized them, but given the current unrest in Solitude...
“Who... who the hell are you?!” Buck forced himself to stand up, his hand gripping the steel blade at his waist, his voice trembling.
Sophie turned around with a smile, pulling her blue Magic Top Hat down slightly to reveal a gentle smile full of mockery.
“Don't be nervous, gentlemen.”
Sophie pointed at Toby, who was still wearing a lecherous, foolish grin, and sighed with an innocent expression. “We are just travelers passing through. Earlier at the foot of the mountain, Brother Toby here was simply too enthusiastic. Even though I did nothing, he took one look and insisted on joining our New Moon Sect, crying and shouting for the privilege.”
Sophie blinked and pointed a slender finger outside.
“To be honest, the New Moon Lady and I are on our way to Black Gallows to take care of some business. It just so happens that our alchemy carriage is short a few... ah, no, it's short a few strong, energetic beasts of burden to pull it. I see that your temples are bulging, your muscles are firm, and you possess extraordinary frames—you're natural-born carriage pullers. I wonder if you gentlemen would be willing to contribute a modest amount of your strength to our sect and, while you're at it, cooperate with us for a friendly, comfortable, and physically and mentally pleasant ‘interrogation’?”
The air in the room froze instantly.
“Pulling a carriage? Interrogation?”
Leader Buck laughed out of sheer rage. He gripped the rough steel blade at his waist, the scar on his right arm twitching with fury. “I've survived in the wilderness for twenty years, and I've never seen anyone dare to walk into my stronghold and tell me and my brothers to pull a carriage like animals! Men, seize these two wenches!”
A flash of cruelty crossed his bloodshot eyes. He had ten thousand ways to break these two women in.
Rate on N.U.
