Chapter 1796: A Job Well Done
With all my might, I pierced in half the Cactus Man, his Aura of Red Energies immediately breaking and exploding within his own body, making him dramatically blow up into pieces.
BOOOM!
The explosion was too sudden though, covering me on all his cactus juice and pulp, and... bones?! So they even have bones, weirdly enough.
"Huh, G.o.dd.a.m.n."
I noticed that there were a lot of people down there glancing at me, so I quickly decided to shapeshift into a near invisible slime and dropped into the ground.
SPLAT!
I splattered on an alleyway and then quickly made my way back to Larry"s store, finding the other two strengthened bandits already defeated, beheaded by Benladann and Miranda"s axe.
Larry was still shocked, grabbing the Starlight Stone tightly with his slimy hands, gasping for air as he saw the bloodshed.
"Hahh... Hahh... Y-You killed them... Ahh... I-I... I can barely breath..."
I slowly walked back to him, as he panicked once he saw me go back to my original form from a slime, I guess that"s a bit surprising.
"Y-You"re a shapeshifter too, Drake?!"
"Ah, yeah. Sorry about that, but it was either you or them, Larry. We did what we had to do..." "Oh, no... It"s... fine."
Larry sighed in relief, as Miranda quickly cleansed everything with a ma.s.s of black mold that left everything pristine and clean in seconds. She also snacked on the bandits.
"It"s fine, I"m fine..."
Larry slowly sat down on his seat, sighing.
"I-I guess it"s only fair I tell you what happened there..." he muttered.
As he said that, I noticed new notifications.
[Congratulations! You have progressed through the {Special Trial Storyline Quest}: [Explore the City of Lost Souls: El Perdido]!]
[Explore the Central Plaza and Visit 5 Shops or Restaurants]: [1/5]
[Talk to the Locals and Learn About Their Problems and Solve Them]: [0/3] (Larry"s Side Quest Unlocked)
[Catch Any Evildoer and Apprehend Them]: [5/10]
[Talk With An Important Story Character]: [1/3]
[Discover What The Golden Spire Race Is All About]: [0/1]
[Quest Duration: 11 Hours, 16 Minutes.]
Looks like there"s a Side Quest related with Larry!
Maybe it has to do with what he"s going to talk about?
"Phew..." after taking a big drink of fresh water, Larry glanced at us while giving me the Starlight Stone. "Because my shop hasn"t been doing so well so far, as I told you before, I had to ask for money to some... shady people. I think with the money I earned, I could repay them for everything, but I would be left with very little."
"And so you"re in debt with those thugs, uncle?" wondered Benladra. "That"s bad! You shouldn"t have done that!"
"I know dear, but things are hard around here..." Larry sighed. "If I hadn"t asked them for money back then, all my kids would have died dehydrated. We need to buy a lot of water... or we dry and die."
"Dammit..." Miranda sighed.
"Hmm..." Benladra sighed. "I wish I could have been there, it"s not too hard to conjure water..."
"Conjure?" Larry didn"t understand. "What do you mean with that?"
"Like this!" Benladra said, conjuring water out of her hands.
It was just Water Magic, anybody with Water Affinity can conjure that.
But it seems that in this world people can"t really do that so easily.
"T-That"s incredible! You can summon water out of nowhere?! T-That"s impressive by itself!" Larry gasped. "H-How?!"
"I can do it too," said Kate, doing the same.
"E-Eeeeh?!"
Larry was having a hard time processing what was happening.
"It"s something they can do..." I said. "Most of us can do this. It"s not too hard for our kind to invoke upon basic elements."
"T-That"s not something I"ve ever heard possible before... You"re indeed quite incredible!" Larry said. "I am left out of words... But I suppose you can"t summon that endlessly?"
"Ah, hmm, no," I said, lying. "We can"t... sorry."
My daughters looked at me with weird expressions, but it was better to leave it like that.
What if there"s a rumor of someone capable of creating endless water?
It is bound to bring disasters upon us, disrupting our progress on the trial.
"If water is what they want you can also just call me!" suddenly, I heard the voice of Aegir echoing inside of my head.
She was resting in the ring that possessed her Orb Fragment but could summon herself at any moment if she wanted.
But for now, it was better if she remained where she was.
"I could bring them a whole flood if they want! Maybe creating a giant lake will help them?"
she wondered.
"Leave it at that for now, but maybe later, we need to learn more about this world first," I said. "Also we"re on a hurry, so don"t suggest things that"ll take days to do."
"Days?! I can do this in less than an hour!" she said.
"Even almost an hour is too long, so no!" I told her again.
After that, she started berating me telepathically, but I ignored her for now.
"So who are these thugs?" I asked. "You knew them, Larry?"
"Kinda, they come to ask for the debt and they ask me for advances in money," he said. "I think I"ve paid the debt once or twice! But they always keep saying there"s many interests, so perhaps how much money do I owe them now..."
"They"re obviously lying..." said Benladann. "I bet this is their modus operandi, they get people on a huge debt, people they know can earn money like shop owners, and then continuously extract their money while lying about huge interests. No matter how many times they pay the whole debt, they"ll keep saying you owe them some interests. And even when you die, they"ll move to your kids."
"I-Is that so?!" Larry panicked. "Just what have I gotten myself into?!"
"Well! We can go deal with those thugs anyways. I think I know where they are now..."
Miranda suddenly said, smiling.
I think she probably ate their brains and got their memories, learning where they live and so
on.
That sure is convenient, although a bit wicked, I love her for that.
"Wait, you can?!"
Larry could hardly believe it