Author's Notes:

It has been years since I last wrote anything. Time marches on and lives get busy. Then, sometimes, an idea is spawned and just will not leave you alone. Those afflicted by this know the power of a Plot Bunny. This one has been gnawing on my ankles like the slightly less terrifying grandson of Caerbannog. To stop the chewing, it must be unleashed.

Poor Naofumi. He gets crapped on by just about everyone and everything from the moment he arrives in Melromarc. Few are those that help him behind the scenes. Fewer still are those that help him openly. Catastrophe looms large over the world with a country ruled by a corrupt and fractured royalty. Who would risk helping the runt hero, why, and what might that look like? This will start as a somewhat AU soft cross-over with the potential of being a multi-cross if the story continues. Who knows what may sprout from certain seeds in isekai worlds?

WARNING: For those having found this story other than via Rising of the Shield Hero, the topics in the canon story are brutal. PTSD, racism, false sexual assault allegations, torture, and slavery are in *the first two episodes* of the anime alone. If any of this is beyond your comfort level, this is your chance to turn back now. While there will not be graphic violence or on-screen sexual encounters, there is the potential for very adult topics to follow. For this reason I am setting the story to Mature from the start.


The Rising of the Shield Hero: The Material Plane

Chapter 1: Friends in Low Places


Naofumi's face is set in a hard stare for several reasons. The only reason his arm's aren't crossed over his chest in disgust is the shield attached to his right forearm makes the pose rather uncomfortable to hold for long.

The first reason for his expression is where he has found himself. His immediate surroundings are a moderately sized canvas tent big enough to contain wooden tables, desks, and cabinets, all lit with flickering lanterns attached to beams and poles above. Beyond this tent is a much larger circus-style tent containing the monster and slave market. The faint scent of flowers is only partly covering the smell of unwashed flesh, fur, and bodily waste coming from the larger tent.

The second reason for his look is the other occupants of the smaller tent.

A dirty mangy raccoon girl cowers on the floor by one set of cabinets, her ears drooping and frazzled tail pushing against the floor. All she had to wear is a loose hempen sack as a ratty dress and three metal shackles, one each around her wrists and the last around her neck. She is turned away from the tent's last occupant, her arms crossed below her chest protectively.

The last occupant of the room is the slave trader Belokaus, kneeling next to the raccoon girl. He is clothed in a black circus master's outfit complete with top hat and tails. His vest is purple matched by large purple feathers protruding from around his neck, hiding the collar of his jacket. The man's eyes are obscured behind a pair of spectacle glasses and a constant crooked grin adorns his face. In his white gloved hands are a small paint brush and a saucer sized dish with a murky dark liquid.

Belokaus dips the paint brush into the dark liquid before reaching towards the girl, painting a circle of the liquid into an intricate purple brand on her chest. The liquid sizzles and the purple brand glows, the raccoon girl whimpering in obvious pain. His work done, he stands back up, still keeping an eye on the cowering raccoon girl.

"What's with that?" Naofumi says in a low and hard tone, matching his facial expression.

"Nothing to worry about," responds the trader with his eerie crooked grin. "The pain will dissipate soon. That slave crest on her chest will make it impossible for her to defy you."

Naofumi found the changes and pop-ups to his status magic HUD from the crest more than slightly disturbing. Seeing stats for a new party member and the party display was fairly normal from a game mechanic perspective. That the slave interface prominently displayed command and punishment options was not.

"There you go good sir," continues Belokaus, moving to the opposite side of a table now between the two of them. "She is all yours." The pained whimpering from the far side of the tent changing to a fit of coughing was all but lost on the hero.

"Thirty silvers, right?" half asks, half snarls Naofumi to the trader as he drops a coin sack on the wooden table. Not waiting for an answer, the Shield Hero turns away from the trader and walks toward the raccoon girl still on the floor. He stops a couple feet away from her, his figure looming over her.

"There is one extra in here!" pips up the trader, leaning over the table to better look at the hero and his most recent sale on the floor.

"That's your commission," Naofumi states, not turning his attention away from the girl alternatively whimpering and coughing on the floor. "You were going to wring it out of me anyways weren't you?"

"You certainly know your stuff!" the trader declares with a small amount of glee, clasping his white gloved hands together.

"Well, I guess I am supposed to know what your name is, right?" the hero asks with the same hard tone looking downwards. He waits only a moment as she continues to cough before stating more than asking, "Well, tell me your name."

"I said, what's your name?" he demands more forcefully, taking a half step towards the little girl.

She doesn't notice the movement, eyes closed and focusing on getting a lung full of air to abate the coughing. She sits up a little though still cowering, arms again covering her chest protectively. "I'm called Raphtalia," she gasps out in a low and squeaky tone.

"Raphtalia, huh?" Naofumi ponders almost rhetorically, leaning down and putting a hand out to drag her up. He has every intention of leaving this disturbingly clean tent in the middle of an appalling dirty place as quickly as possible.

"Asking her name may be the first decent thing you have done since coming here," comes a boyish if oddly rumbling voice from behind him. Naofumi stops mid-motion, not having heard that voice since he arrived in the large slaver tent.

"What?! How did you get out?!" exclaims Belokaus, the surprise in the man's voice causing Naofumi to turn towards him. His expression is one of confusion, his perpetual grin replaced with an open mouth. Naofumi's eyes follow the trader's gaze to see what has intruded on the occupants of the tent.

At the back of the tent a canvas flap is fluttering from having been moved. Standing just inside it was what Naofumi realizes is a beastman child. Unlike Raphtalia that has human skin over most of her body with a couple animal traits, this boy is covered from pointed feline ears to furry padded feet in dark gray and dirty fur. He too is wearing a hemp sack but more like a skirt tied around his waist and down past his knees, a long thin tail swishing behind him. The sack being on this lower body leaves his furred chest exposed. Like Raphtalia he has shackles around his wrists and neck though unlike her the chains are still attached. His face leans decidedly more animal than human and reminds Naofumi of a larger wild cat, his mouth and nose protruding a bit. His eyes are noticeably feline reflecting lantern light below a furred brow pulled down into a scowl. The boy's posture is of someone trying to stand tall but for which doing so is laborious.

Naofumi takes only a moment to look at the newcomer but that is enough time for the trader to have apparently noticed something else. Belokaus's tone is far less shocked coming over Naofumi's shoulder, now sounding a mix of caution and curiosity, "Where has your slave crest gone?"

That got Naofumi to focus on the boy's chest. The fur of his upper chest behind the chains is plain gray and undistributed, no sign of a purple crest on the fur or below on the skin that can be seen. Instead Naofumi notices the shape of some kind of metal object sandwiched between the chains and the gray fur below. The implications of a missing crest catch up with Naofumi who brings his shield up defensively, putting himself between the boy in front of him and the defenseless Raphtalia behind him. This isn't just a slave that got out of its cage. It is a loose child beastman staring at them, potentially upset for a number of reasons Naofumi doesn't want to ponder. 'Correction,' Naofumi thinks to himself, 'he is staring mostly at me.'

The feline boy spares the trader a glance at his question before looking back to the hero. "It got replaced with something else," the same boyish voice rumbles gently, taking a couple more steps into the tent, chains hardly making a sound. "You both will be thankful for that in a minute."

"Why are you looking at me like that?" Naofumi demands of the interloper, his tone firm and somewhat threatening. "I haven't even seen you before." Naofumi wants to keep the boy's attention away from the trader that has kept him locked up. The hero isn't sure how well the trader can defend himself without the protection of a crest. If the trader ends up dead while Naofumi is in the tent, the rumors about him will only get worse. The already infamous Shield Hero should be able to defend himself from a child beastman, at least until the trader can summon help from other cages.

"I wanted to see if you really are the Shield Hero," the boy replies, reaching a hand up to move the chains on his chest. With the rings pushed to the side the metal object underneath is more visible. It looks like a stylized golden star with beams of light coming out in long twirling ribbons and a face in the middle of the star. The metal star is about as wide as the boy's hand and hanging off a thin chain the boy's fur is mostly obscuring. "Protection Amulet!" the boy exclaims and the amulet glows, shifting to a silverish oval metal plate of a similar size with the symbol of a sword stuck into the ground on it. "Cast Sanctuary," the boy follows with.

An icon appears next to Naofumi and Raphtalia's names on Naofumi's HUD. Focusing on the icon causes a notification window to pop-up.

[Status Effect "Sanctuary" active. Attacks on caster may fail and the caster cannot attack while the effect is active.]

"A magic amulet," the trader comments aloud. Naofumi turns his head just enough to see the other man out of the corner of his eye while watching the boy. A gloved white hand is stroking the man's chin as he looks down the furnished tent, his earlier shocked expression replaced by a decidedly neutral one. "No, it must be much stronger if it removed your crest and is allowing you to speak like this in such a short amount of time. Then there is your improved health too."

"Glad you noticed how bad off this body was," the feline beast-boy replies in a deeply sarcastic tone. "Speaking of healing," he continues, looking to Naofumi and then nodding to Raphtalia while raising furred hands in an apparent show of not being a threat, "I intend to help everyone in this tent in one way or another. With your permission Sir Shield, may I start with her?"

The 'Sir Shield' comment strikes Naofumi in two ways. One, an obvious attempt at showing respect. Second, it hearkens back to how Myne referred to him before betraying him so spectacularly and thoroughly. While having more than enough reason to say 'no', the possibility of this encounter leading to a deeply discounted price on a healthier companion gives Naofumi pause. Those thoughts focus Naofumi and make his choice somewhat nuanced. "If you hurt her in any way, you will regret it," he says, pulling back the side of his cloak to reveal a couple orange balloon monsters chewing on his side.

"I won't hurt her," the gray feline boy remarks. Keeping his hands held up, he slowly walks over to where Raphtalia is sitting on the floor. Her coughing and whimpering have given way to labored breathing, likely some adrenaline from the encounter allowing more air into her lungs. She starts pulling away as the boy comes near who is himself being followed closely by her new owner. The human looms over them both while the beastboy kneels and then sits down next to her. "Hello Raphtalia, my name is.." he pauses, tilting his head for a moment as if in thought. "Please call me Panthro for now."

That name sounds familiar to Naofumi making him take a breath in but not saying anything, to focused on how close the feline is to Raphtalia. The hero is ready to jump in and help her at the slightest sign of trouble. He has repositioned the arm with the shield over his chest, muscle tensed and ready to backhandedly smash the boy with the shield if he is anything but true to his word.

Raphtalia looks from the boy up to her new owner and back again, unsure what to do. The boy seems to be examining her over while her new owner watches closely. After a subtle approving nod by her owner, she lightly wheezes, "OK Panthro." She mostly resists pulling away when the boy reaches out a furred hand and places it delicately on her shoulder.

"Healing Amulet," he announces, the same golden star with a face symbol returning from earlier. Naofumi notices the status effect icon disappear from his HUD. One final look between the boy and the girl brings the boy to a conclusion. The boy's eyes lose focus, staring through Raphtalia as his voice deepens and he intones; "Divine Plea: Lesser Restoration". His body illuminates with a pale golden glow. The light concentrates down onto his arm, then hand, then passes into Raphtalia. Her breathing eases significantly, the raccoon girl sitting up straighter and taking several deep full breaths.

Naofumi opens his mouth to say something when the beastboy teeters and partly falls over, catching himself on the furred hand opposite the one that had been on Raphtalia. Panthro's partial tumble and a fit of his own coughing has Raphtalia standing up and backing away.

"Note to self; don't make divine pleas often," wheezes the boy, visibly steadying himself on the floor while the tip of his tail frizzes into a convincing imitation of a wire brush.

"Divine," Belokaus repeats, the suited man having walked up to stand near Naofumi. "Just what is that amulet boy?"

A few deep breaths and the feline boy straightens up, a passable imitation of Beloukas's own grin on the boy's face. "At the moment, this is the symbol of Pelor, a deity known for many things including mercy, healing, and fighting evil. My old Dungeons and Dragons group would be freaking out about now."

Naofumi realizes that is the second reference to another world the cat has dropped, his eyes widening ever so slightly. His mind flashes back to his first night speaking with the other Legendary Heroes, each trying to figure out where the other came from.

Looking down at the still struggling furred boy, Naofumi decides to see if his suspicion is right. "Where did you go to high school?"

"George Washington Senior High School," the boy returns with a half smile. He reaches a hand up to the cabinet behind him and uses it to help pull himself back up. "It's in the Appalachian Mountains, inland from the east coast of the United States."

"American?" Naofumi ponders, letting his arms relax, the shield once again coming to rest at his side. "Who won World War Two?"

Panthro flinches, his furred face scrunching up in a grimace. "We did with help from the British and Russians in the west. As for the east, well, we introduced the world to nuclear weapons. Twice."

"How did you end up in that body? Naofumi questions, his eyes narrowing ever so slightly. "You sound like you are from another world, maybe mine, but we don't have beastmen."

"Something I want to know as well," Belokaus interjects, looking between the beastboy and the much improved Raphtalia. "How much more of my merchandise do I need to check?"

Panthro points up to the metal star resting on his chest, a short claw slipping from the end on an index finger to tap the metal. "Best guess is whoever put this on me. I was a much bigger and older human until one night I went to sleep and woke up here in a small furry body. That was a few days ago." He lets his arm down until it is sticking out in front of him, opening a furred hand palm up. The cat turns his attention to the trader with a frigid glare. "I woke up sick, alone, and in a cage. How should I know if any others are like me? I was about ready to try escaping when the grumpy green giant here walked through with you. That changed things."

The beastboy's eyes move in a curious pattern before a blue glow envelopes his upturned hand. Something small and shiny materializes as the glow subsides. A flick of a wrist has three gold coins tossed up onto the table, his gaze returning to the trader. "I know where I am now and who you are. That is payment for my freedom and a down payment if anyone else like me arrives."

Belokaus snaps up the coins from the table, turning one of them over in his hand to inspect them. "Not a coin I know but gold spends all the same. If there is more where that came from, I look forward to their arrival!"

Panthro huffs and promptly coughs, a hand coming up to cover his mouth for a moment. "For their sake I hope none do."

Composing himself as best he can, the small grey feline stands to his full if diminutive height. "Now for the last person here," the boy states, feline eyes staring up at the looming Naofumi. "Hello Hero of the Legendary Shield. I am the Hero of the Artifact Amulet and I think I have been sent to help you on your journey."