Chapter 6: Surprise
Walking through the streets of Orario, my problem with the guild solved, though I have no doubt the fact that I am on a list means that it won't be the last time the organization will come knocking at my door, I return to the church to prepare myself for my excursion to the dungeon. Hestia should have already left the building to go to her work for the last time, therefore I'm not expecting to meet anyone.
However, my expectations are trumped once more when I sense someone snooping around the church from afar.
'Again?!'
I clench my fists in irritation at the thought of having to deal with some idiots so soon after the first time, but I felt relieved at the fact that I was able to sense them.
I wonder, is it because I improved thanks to the little cultivating I did yesterday or is it just that whoever is moving around the church isn't disguised. The answer comes to me the moment I catch the church in my sight, having run a little bit in fear of the intruder doing something to the building or breaking in, I see a small silhouette standing in front of the door of the church.
I catch the telltale signs of nervousness with my enhanced sight, letting me see from much further than a normal level 1 adventurer should be able to. The figure is shifting around with no real purpose and seems hesitant to knock on the door. Also, the figure is distinctively…
Feminine.
My gaze becomes more and more curious with each step I take towards this person, seeing certain characteristics of her appearance that I don't remember seeing in any woman in the anime.
'Maybe she's someone from the books that I just don't know about?'
The white hair she is sporting draws my gaze immediately, it is rather long, easily reaching the middle of her back. Even if it is somewhat messy, the wavy length was rather attractive as it swayed around with every movement the girl made. I would easily put her at around 5'5'', which is distinctively average.
Depending on her age of course. From the back, I couldn't tell how old she is, but considering the rather protruding buttocks she displays, there is no way she isn't an adult, or at least close to it.
I sneakily approach her, somewhat expecting hostility from her, because she was trying to pry into something related to my familia. I notice the fact that she seemed, somewhat… out of shape. No, out of shape is not the correct term, she is simply rather normal. Her arms display just the tiniest amount of definition, which look more like what would come from someone doing hard work around the house than battle-hardened adventurers that would rely on the strength of their arms to survive.
The women in Orario are extremely lean most of the time, displaying a fair amount of definition here and there. The kind of lifestyle an adventurer has to go through means that there is little chance for fat to develop, even if they want to. That also means that the curvaceous aspect of most women here are put on display more easily.
This girl right here is certainly curvy, maybe not as much as some of the girls I've seen around town, but she could hold her own. However, her figure tells me that she is either a mage or a simple civilian. Of course, once I realize this, I tense in anticipation, because I have no idea what a mage could do. Since magic is personal and linked to a person's status, that means that every mage is essentially a wildcard. Stealth is my best option here, even if she is higher level than me, I am confident in being able to take her down
Plus, she doesn't have the feeling most higher-leveled adventurers give. Of course, now that I know that ki and magic are somewhat incompatible considering that I can't successfully sense and understand magic, it could be that she is a high-level mage and that I can't sense her strength correctly. But if that is the case, then there's not much I can do if she decides to attack me, therefore I might as well try to take the initiative.
Of course, I won't attack her outright, but if I can manage to come close to her, close enough that I can react if she tries to initiate a chant, then I can maybe weasel my way out of this situation.
It's also highly possible that I'm overreacting to the presence of what is a very, very cute girl, I realize now that I'm close to her, and that she isn't a danger whatsoever to me and Hestia.
Better be safe than sorry, just wish I applied this to my previous actions so that I wouldn't have had to pay so much money to the Guild.
Once I'm behind her and she seemingly doesn't react, I cough in my hand to gain her attention.
"Eep!" She jumps in surprise as she lets out the most adorable noise I have ever heard.
Scared out of her mind by my sudden apparition, she turns around in fright and I'm greeted with a face that completely short-circuits my brain. I can't help but gape once I realize the implication of who I'm seeing.
The white hair and now the red eyes. Even though the person in front of me is female, the shape of her body and the two protruding objects in front of me proving that the innocent face and the color scheme reminiscing of a white rabbit that even I saw scurrying around when I first entered the city.
"B-Bell Cranel?" I nearly shout, still astonished by the change of gender of the main character.
"M-My name is Bella Cranel, um, mister…" she says, now having calmed down from the scare I just gave her. She looks at me in confusion, probably not understanding how I know her name, even if slightly mistaken.
I let the information correctly travel through my brain before I continue this conversation.
"Sorry… I thought that you were someone with malicious intent since I saw you snooping around our familia base from afar," I say, before realizing that I didn't give her my name yet, "The name's Tian by the way."
"A-Ah, n-no problem, I would be pretty worried if I saw someone suspicion around my familia base as well…" she starts, before looking down and gripping her hand in what seems to be embarrassment, "Not that I have a familia to speak of…" she whispers, but I'm able to easily hear it.
"B-But," she continues, " How did you know my name?"
"Well, the thing is… I was in town when I heard something about a cute girl looking like a rabbit wandering about in the city…" I throw out, hoping that it would do the trick. Considering the way her cheeks burn in embarrassment and that she hides her face from me, not an ounce of suspicion in her demeanor, I feel myself letting out a sigh of relief.
'Saved…'
"C-Cute?" she stutters, "W-Who said I was cute?" She asks me, only letting her eyes out through her fingers, trying to hide the blush that took over her face.
'Way too easy, this girl.'
"Of course, after seeing you with my own eyes, I am forced to call you cute, Bella," I say, giving her a bright smile. When she somehow becomes even redder than before and is making cute noises that only an anime girl could make, I consider my work done.
Still, seeing someone in real life using anime gimmicks feels surreal to me.
"You-Are you sure that you think I'm cu- Ah no! That's not what I came here for!" she says to herself, slapping her already red cheeks to focus on her objective. I raise my eyebrow in confusion, waiting for her to tell me what she wants to say.
Wait a minute… She comes here, looking for something when she doesn't have a familia…
Could it be?
"Um… Mister Tian?"
"Just Tian is fine, Bella."
"Yes, um, Tian… Are you part of the Hestia familia by chance?" she asks me, looking very nervous all of the sudden.
"That is the case. Why, do you want to join my familia?"
"Yes!" she exclaims, before retreating into her shell, "O-Of course, that is, if you'll have me…"
"You know that we are a familia composed of just me, a level 1 adventurer, and my goddess Hestia?" I say, mostly to verify her situation, knowing that a gender change could modify a lot of things in the life of someone.
"Yes, the guild told me that you were a familia that wouldn't necessarily discard the opportunity of getting a new adventurer like, um… me," her voice drop a little bit at the end of her sentence, but I'm more surprised about the fact that the Guild has already taken care of recruitment.
"Wait… did they tell you that I am in the familia?"
"Yes, they did say that goddess Hestia had one familia member that was level 1, l-like me."
They work fast even though they ripped me off, I'll give them that.
Still, "Why are you repeating 'yes' at the beginning of each sentence?" I couldn't help but ask.
"Ye-Uh I mean, I don't, um, I don't know," she answers me. She is becoming more nervous the more this conversation goes on. She is collapsing on herself like someone that has had very few interactions with people in their life. At her reaction, I decide to not question her anymore, since I feel like she might break down if I go too far.
"Alright Bella Cranel, even if my goddess isn't here yet, I hereby officially welcome you to the Hestia familia!" I state confidently, knowing that Hestia wouldn't refuse her considering how I stressed his, no, her importance in the grand scheme of things last night.
It takes her a bit of time to realize what I just said, before she jumps in joy and gets close to me, "Really?!" she asks, a bit in disbelief, probably because she was rejected by a lot of familias in the past.
"Yeah Bella, what, did you have trouble finding a familia before, or did you just arrive in the city?"
She slumps down in relief at my words, feeling a bit incredulous that she managed to find a normal familia.
"Well, every decent familia refused because they said I looked like a weakling, and the ones that were willing to take me in…" she squirms in discomfort, before saying in a much smaller tone, "Wanted me to be a prostitute to the members that were above level 1…"
I sigh, having guessed what this was all about when I saw her reaction. The city wasn't a place full of good people. You'd be hard-pressed to find one person that doesn't care only about themselves after all the advertisement of this town was 'Come get riches and fame'.
Not the best way to attract honest and good people to be honest. It is far from unusual to have new female adventurers having to prostitute themselves before being able to go to the dungeon and get experience in fighting. More often than not, they are kept at level 1 intentionally so that they couldn't refuse the advances of the tensed-up men that are on the frontline of the familia.
They are also kept as 'gifts' for other familias sometimes.
Truly, a couple of conversations with the folk living around here, and you learn a lot about how fucked up the situation is. I don't know if it is because it suddenly became real, or if it is because the show was intended for children, but the anime hid a lot of the darker stuff from the viewers.
I pat her head, trying to calm her down. I have an epiphany that I'm using this method a lot ever since I came to this world. It could be because both Hestia and Bella are small enough for me to do this, or it could be because something dark is awakening inside of me.
The power of the lewd.
Considering Bella's pleased expression at something that would be considered at least only irritating and mildly condescending and at most sexual harassment if I did it on a woman that I barely knew back in my old world, certainly some social rules don't apply here.
I stop before it becomes too embarrassing, both for me and for her, and I cough to get her out of her satisfied expression.
"A-Ah, why did you sto-" She puts a hand in front of her mouth before she can finish that sentence, and simply blushes, refusing to look at me the eyes.
Now I'm started to get scared… Is this the rumored protagonist's power, or is it that she's simply too innocent?
First off, why would I hold some sort of cosmic protagonist power, when she's the main character of this world. Second, I doubt a teenage girl would react to patting this way, maybe an actual child, and even then I'm not sure about this.
'Wait for a second…' I pause, looking at my hand. Then I realize I had been using ki in each pat I administered in this world.
'So that's the effect of ki when passed in little quantity inside another body?'
Passing pure ki inside another's person body… Isn't that dual cultivation?
I look at Bella once again, and shrug, wondering if there could be any after-effects of this in her body. At the same time, I don't feel like asking a young girl to describe how she felt after I patted her head.
"Anyway, cough, let's get inside Bella, I'm going to make you visit the small church," I start, as I walk into the building with the cute white-haired girl following me, "It's not much," I say as Bella observe the first floor of the church, "But it's home for me and Hestia."
Bella looks around and I can feel her take a deep breath, probably feeling the same way I did when I first entered the church marked by Hestia's divinity, even if it is sealed away.
She smiles beautifully and says emotionally, "Yeah, it feels like home…"
I look at her beautiful face for a few seconds, seeing her eyes dart around and taking in the sight, before I gesture for her to continue following me, "We're going to the second level now…" I pause, "Now that I think about it, except if you want to sleep with Hestia or me, we're going to need another couch in this church… I wonder how much they cost."
Hearing no answer, I turn around to check on Bella climbing the stairs with me and smirk when I see her red face. She is too easy to fluster.
We enter the room where I slept this night, and I take the opportunity to ask her about her experience in the dungeon, "Bella."
"Um?"
"Did you go into the dungeon yet? Or are you a completely new adventurer?"
"I, um, I never went into the dungeon, couldn't because I didn't have a familia…" she hesitantly answers me.
"Hey, don't worry Bella," I try to reassure her once I notice that she is anxious that her lack of experience will block her from entering this familia, "Yesterday was my first time going in the dungeon as well."
"Really?! But my guild adviser told me that you managed to defeat plenty of monsters by yourself!" She exclaims, with stars in her eyes.
However, I narrow my eyes at the new information Bella just gave me.
"D-Did I say something that I shouldn't have?" she asks me, confused and fearful. I calm down due to her reaction, she isn't the one at fault.
"No don't worry, it's just that I didn't expect my exploits to already be common knowledge," I say sarcastically, feeling quite angry at the guild's lack of discretion regarding my case. I knew that it was because of the way we handled the guild investigation and that they technically didn't have to hide these pieces of information, but it didn't make it any less douchey.
"Who's your guild advisor by the way?" I can't help but ask.
"Oh, it's a half-elf named Eina, she's super kind but sometimes she's too strict," Bella says, reminiscing some sour memories considering her expression.
"I see," is my only comment.
"W-What, do you have something against Eina-san?" Bella inquires after seeing my expression, which must not look like a pleased one.
"No, I don't, I didn't even know her before you told me about her, it's just that… You know what, let's change the subject," I answer her, not willing to continue this conversation.
"Sure…" she remarks, suspicious.
I shrug my shoulder at her reaction and talk to her about my plan for today.
"Now that you're here, I can't exactly go into the dungeon and leave you here alone, however, Hestia should be able to come back earlier from her work since it's her last day, therefore we should wait for her," I say before I get an idea of an activity that would allow me to learn about Bella more in details, "In the meantime… Are you interested in some window shopping?"
The way her eyes lit up at my words makes me wonder if I am about to realize that some stupid cliches are real in this anime world.
Still, Bell being a woman in this world?
'How convenient.'
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TheHiddenSword
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