We just looked at each other. "Well the Bandits were defeated, and there was a Diamond Mage." Sol tilted her head to the sack. "Helen over achieved on this instance."

"Very. Let's debrief the mission quickly and get you to bed. You must be tired after this ordeal."

We spent the next hour detailing the plan, the intentional capture and being brought to the camp. "Argentum was selling them as sex slaves." Sol said.

Charlotte just nodded. "Had I known it was such a despicable felon, I would have handled this mission myself. Sol, keep her company tonight, you earned this." Charlotte placed two large coin purses.

I just stared at the size of it in shock. "H-how much is this?" I asked.

"Six hundred thousand jule." She said. "The higher ranked a squad is, the higher the starting pay." She explained.

"Be sure to send money back to your church." Sol said with a smile.

I just swallowed hard. "I will."


Chapter 15: A day to... recover

I laid down in my large bed, only having removed my armor as I rolled myself up in my blankets. I had the day off as I had hard a first mission. I let my head sink into the pillows as I tried to repress what had happened. A knock came at my door. "Helen, may I come in?" Sol asked through the door.

I stayed quiet for a couple seconds. "Yes." I said loud enough for her to hear. The door opened as she walked in a left the door open behind her. She sat at the edge of my bed, a plate of fruit in her hands.

"I thought you might be hungry." She set the plate down on my bed. "I saw that you sent money back home. How much did you send?" She asked.

"A third of my pay, I'll be putting a third of it in the bank as well." I said as sat up letting the blankets fall off of me. "I'm fine."

"I didn't say I pity you. I went through something similar before I joined the Blue Roses. Then I was lucky that Captain Charlotte was nearby to save me from those cruel men." She said as she moved closer to me, my face becoming redder as she did.

"I just feel... hurt." I said.

"Hey." She smiled at me. "Why don't I show you around the city? I know you don't have much experience with the big city and all that. It's good to do stuff." She placed as hand on my shoulder, I tensed up for a second before I let out a breath.

"Oh... okay." I sat at the edge of the bed taking the plate, the fruit tasted really sweet, almost too sweet for me.

"Helen. Slow down, your going to choke." Sol laughed as I cleaned the plate.

"Sorry, Just, new flavors after a lifetime of potatoes, not that I didn't like the food home." I said a little too quickly. "Thank you Sol."

She just laughed it off. "Oh, something I noticed while we were in Hage, you only really talked about your family and the blacksmith and his wife, did you not have friends?"

"Well... no one wanted to be friends with a freak like me. A girl with a tail, and not a clue where she came from, so I became the town pest, pulling pranks on people so that... well that they wouldn't ask where I had gone when I had left. Only Erik and his wife Lily saw past this." I left out some things, but I didn't lie.

We walked out of the room, talking with each other, my grimoire held in my curled tail. We flew into the town market. "So what do you want to get?" She asked.

"W-what I want?" I asked.

"Surely you want something more then just clothes, you have money, so let's make this the best day ever for you." Sol smiled as we waked along, people giving us a wide are due to the Blue Rose Robes.

"Is that the new Rose recruit?" I heard a man whisper.

A woman responded, "Yeah, I thought the tail was just a rumor. So... unnatural, and I heard she's from the edge of the common realm..." We moved on from tat are before I could hear the rest of it.

"I heard she defeated a Diamond Kingdom mage, well, even if she is a freak, at least she is under our kingdom's control." As we went from shop to shop I would here remarks like this.

'Did rumors really spread that fast?' I asked my self as we turned of the street towards a side ally. "Where are you taking me?" I asked.

"Shh, just follow my lead." Sol said as I followed her to the next street over, she opened the door and inside was a bar full of people. Sitting at a poker table was Yami and Magna with a pair of drinks each. "To the old man." The said solemnly before downing it.

Before we made it past them, "Wait, is that Asta's sister?" Magna said catching my attention. "Helga was it? Come on over, we'll play doubles!"

"It's Helen." I muttered.

Sol just glared at them before sighing as Captain Yami spoke up. "Know what, that might be fun. Marron you showing your little girl friend around town?"

"Fine, we'll play but just because you are one of the Captains." Sol said as we sat down a waiter coming over.

"What would you like to drink?" She asked.

"I... um... ale?" I didn't know what to ask for.

Before long we had our drinks, and a dealer at the table. Sol quickly explained to me how poker worked. "Okay, I think I got it." I said.

The cards were dealt and in the five in my hand I held a pair of red kings, a spade two, a clubs four and diamond six. I watched as around the table people took cards out of their hands and put them down. 'Okay, the kings I want to keep right?' I took the three cards out of my hand and laid the down, dealer served me tree more and I picked them up and... a king and two aces. 'This is good right?' I asked my self as the round went on.

When we revealed our cards Magna groaned. "Beginners luck." He said before he pushed his small bet of coins towards me. And we went on for hours, money going back and forth until it was just me and and the two black Bulls playing, Sol not willing to lose any more money then she had already, slowly the piles in front of me and Yami grew as Magna's only shrunk and he was out of money.

"Helen, you don't have to go any further." Sol said as the visibly irritated captain looked at the piles of money.

"But I'm having fun." I said.

"See! The newbie has the spirit!" Magna said. "But you aren't going to beat the great Captain Yami Sukihiro of the Black Bulls with luck and fun alone punk!"

By this point we had attracted a crowd of onlookers, people were placing bets on the out comes of the rounds. Apparently people didn't just go toe to toe with the Captain often. "One more round. All or nothing, plus the loser has to clean the winners headquarters for a month." Yami smirked.

I nodded as the cards were dealt, and I Sol's eyes widened as she looked at them. On the other side of the table Yami and Magna chuckled.

I didn't take any cards out of my hand, and neither did Yami. We exchanged looks, and placed our cards down, I had four Kings and Yami had... four queens.

I didn't have a sack large enough to carry my winnings. "I'll be. Tell Captain Charlotte to expect me soon." Yami laughed as I sat there looking at all the gold coins.

The bar keep gave me a large sack to carry the gold. "I can't believe it Helen! That was amazing!" Sol said as we left the building.

I could only laugh as I held the sack of coins. "I really enjoyed this Sol." I said as we walked down the streets to where we had left our brooms. "Can we do it gain next week?"

"Sure, it's a date then." And that's when I started to get flustered.

"Oh, I uh.. guess it is. Um... since you see it like that." I went on like that for a full minute.

"Helen?" Sol asked. "Are you okay? You turned as red as a tomato." She placed a hand on my forehead. "And your burning up."

"Oh... it... uh must be the ale. I d-did drink quite a bit." I stammered as she stood close to me. 'Why is my heart racing! Am I about to have a heart attack?'

"Then you shouldn't be on your own then. You can stay in my room. Can't have our new recruit being sick all alone her room." She took my hand and pulled me along. "Oh.. uh... if that's okay with you?" She asked me.

All I could manage was nodding to her question. "Y-yes. I don't mind... staying with you." 'What am I saying!?'

We flew back to headquarters, Sol insisting that I ride on her broom. "You said your self you drank a lot. I don't want you falling out of the sky. now quite being stubborn and hold onto me." She made me hold her around the waist as my broom dangled from a rope. "We're almost there."

When we landed she quickly reported the... victory over the Captain of the Black Bulls, I swear she almost had a blush to her cheeks at the mention of him. "I must say, beginners luck was certainly in your favor. You keep surprising me. Now go rest up." She ordered and Sol brought me to her room where she just took off her blue roses robe.

"It's late, so we'll change in the morning. Come lay down on the bed." Sol said... and for some reason I listened. I curled into a small ball my tail wrapped around me as she got under the covers with me.

"Goodnight." She said before closing her eyes.

I took a few breaths before I relaxed and got in close to her, much to Sol's surprise.

"What are you..."

"Tell anyone, and... I'll... I'll." I didn't know what to say, my face burning red.

"Oh... I see." Sol smiled. "That explains a lot."


Yeah... you can guess the main pairing.