Chapter 1 - I take over here, shield hero.

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the copyrighted works used here. I am writing this story for my personal pleasure only, without receiving any profit.

"Blah" speeches

Blah thinking

#"Blah"# Seraphim language

'Blah' telepathy

$"Blah"$ Discussions with the shadow plane

/Blah/ Old Draconic

Ϩ Bla Ϩ Parseltongue

Blah₱ Translated Pokémon language

[Bla] Pokédex entries

"Bla" Bijuu and other creatures

Bla Bijuu talks to their host

"[Blah]" Zoids

"b̶̧̺̲̟̞̭̲̘́̒̎̃̈̂̊̐l̡̙͕̱͚̭̠͙̼͌̐̽̽͘͜͝a̘͙͓̩͉͚̰̭̔͊͛̎̇͛̋̌͘" distorted voice

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Anoth woke up lying on the ground.

Someone had just summoned him.

What was going on here?

Where was he?

It took a while before he sorted out his thoughts.

Then he remembered.

It was a circular letter for all of the world lords of the great council. Strange summonings and dimensional portals leading to a single dimension have been discovered several times. But for some reason the lords couldn't enter that dimension themselves.

Anoth had noticed one such summoning in progress and had unceremoniously connected with the portal so that he was summoned instead. At the same time he broke off the summoning of the other person.

And now he was here.

Here…

Well not really there but in an intermediate world.

Apparently, many of the mechanics in this world were equivalent to those of an RPG. That meant he had to tweak his stats a bit.

Even if the result was nothing more than a well-crafted deception.

Levels: ERROR

HP: 458,055,051,201/458,055,051,201

SP: 182,046,505/182,046,505

Manna: 605,741,848/605,741,848

EXP: ERROR

-{Attributes}-

Attack: ERROR

Magic: ERROR

Defence: ERROR

Magic Defence: ERROR

Skill: ERROR

Strength: ERROR

Perception: ERROR

Endurance: ERROR

Charisma: ERROR

Intelligence: ERROR

Agility: ERROR

Luck: ERROR

That was about what he expected to see.

Time to deceive and trick a little.

After that, his stats looked like this:

Level: 1

HP: 120,356/120,356

HP: 65,556/65,556

Manna: 91,452/91,452

-{Attributes}-

Attack: 850

Magic: 650

Defence: 3,750

Magic Defence: 700

Dexterity: 900

Strength: 740

Perception: 890

Endurance: 1210

Charisma: 1020

Intelligence: 940

Agility: 980

Luck: 850

He probably won't be able to press them any deeper.

He could manipulate them a little further by using a deception. And that made sure that all stats are reduced by two digits. Instead of 100 you only saw a 1. The two zeros had become invisible. For the three top values even by three digits.

Now his stats looked like this when someone applied the status request spell on him.

Even if they were completely fake.

But they didn't have to know that, right?

Level: 1

HP: 120/120

HP: 65/65

Manna: 91/91

-{Attributes}-

Attack: 8

Magic: 6

Defence: 37

Magic Defence: 7

Dexterity: 9

Strength: 7

Perception: 8

Endurance: 12

Charisma: 10

Intelligence: 9

Agility: 9

Luck: 8

Level 1 was required by the supposed "Legendary Shield". It wasn't really that legendary. It was something Anoth knew as an absorption and adaptation weapon. And he knew a few versions of them. Often other beings were trapped or sealed within these weapons.

Mostly they came with the restriction that he wouldn't be able to use any other weapon.

That was annoying but not unexpected.

So much for the point.

Now to the next.

Let them now complete the summoning.

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Unknown place.

.

Where was he?

Anoth looked around and very quickly found some magicians apparently standing in front of a platform on which four people had now appeared. Anoth included.

A look at the ground was enough to tell him that the seal was a summoning seal.

As Anoth got up, he looked at the other three.

And wasn't impressed.

These weren't men. The oldest was maybe in his early 20s.

In fact, if he had to guess, the other two were probably between 16 and 18 years old.

And the way they stood there also told him that they had no combat experience whatsoever.

These were youths.

Cannon fodder.

And they should stop the waves of destruction that the magician was just rambling about.

What?

One had a sword.

Another had a bow.

And Number three a spear.

And Anoth... He had a shield.

Not necessarily the most powerful weapon, but used properly, a shield could send someone under the ground as quickly as any other weapon.

"O great heroes help us." shouted one of the priests or mages or whatever they were.

Heroes? They? Oh my...

After some back and forth with the other three making quite a few demands, they found themselves before the king.

What none of them knew was that Anoth had already sent some of his shadows out to explore the area and gather important information.

And the first information he got was about the royal family and about the kingdom itself.

"Look, so these are the four holy heroes from the Ancient Legend. I'm Aultcray Melromarc XXXII. Nice to meet you."

Liar. The country is a matriarchy. The queen is in charge here. Thought Anoth without flinching.

"Speak dear heroes. What are your names?" continued the king.

The boy with the sword was the first who introduced himself.

"My name is Ren Amaki. I am a high school student and I am 16 years old."

Then the one with the spear stepped forward.

"I'm Motoyasu Kitamura. I'm 21 and a student."

Then the one with the bow.

"I guess I'll be next then. I'm Itsuki Kawasumi. 17 years old and also a high school student."

Anoth just wanted to introduce himself as well when the king forestalled him.

"Ren, Motoyasu and Itsuki then yes?"

Well, if he doesn't want to hear my name, then not. Then I guess I'll pass as a shield hero. Thought Anoth. For him, this behaviour was another warning. Apparently they had something against the hero with the shield.

What followed was an explanation of what was going on here.

The Waves of Destruction.

An event that (as its name already suggests) occurs in waves. The kingdom had already experienced a first wave and managed to ward it off.

Barely.

Apparently there were so-called dragon hourglasses that can show when the next wave should occur. And an already active wave only ends when all the sand has run through the hourglass or the respective boss monster leading the wave has fallen.

The next wave will be much stronger than the first and will come in less than a month.

It must be those dragon hourglasses sending out those magical and dimensional disturbances that I've been feeling since I have arrived. I should pay one of them a visit. Thought Anoth. There has to be more behind it.

"I have to admit that we greatly underestimated the predicted waves. It was only when we faced one together that we finally realized that you four Holy Heroes are the only ones who can do anything against them." the king continued. "That's why we followed the legend and summoned the four of you here. Time is running out. We can't wait any longer."

Why do I have the feeling that he's not telling the whole truth once again? Thought Anoth.

"Alright, that explains a lot." Ren said while waving his sword around and almost stabbing himself in the foot in the process.

Idiot. Thought Anoth.

"But surely you didn't summon us with the expectation that we'd do it all for free." Ren continued.

"Of course not." Replied one of the king's advisers. "If you have fended off the waves, a generous reward awaits each of you."

"Oh I see." it sounded now from Motoyasu. "Then let's hope that you keep your word and don't want to trick us."

"If you keep to this agreement, we are ready to accept your terms." It came from Ren.

"I can only agree with that." It finally came from Itsuki. "We want you to treat us with respect."

Anoth, on the other hand, was silent. He didn't give a damn about the money.

"Well, then we're agreed." said the king. "Next we want you to check your status."

After some minor hiccups, everyone had their status in front of them.

Level: 1

Shield hero.

HP: 120,356/120,356

HP: 65,556/65,556

Manna: 91,452/91,452

-{Attributes}-

Attack: 850

Magic: 650

Defence: 3,750

Magic Defence: 700

Dexterity: 900

The limiter worked.

Even if his stats were just too high for someone at level one.

But if you consider that Anoth was not a human but a being whose years of life were generally measured in galactic years...

(One Galactic Year: Approximately 250,000,000 Earth years.)

Such values were to be expected.

Then again, when someone else queried his values, he got these to see:

Level: 1

HP: 120/120

HP: 65/65

Manna: 91/91

-{Attributes}-

Attack: 8

Magic: 6

Defence: 37

Magic Defence: 7

Dexterity: 9

The Deceiver worked as it should.

Then they got the information. Especially that they had to travel separately because the Holy Weapons had a quality that repelled them from each other.

That wasn't unexpected.

A little later they were led to their rooms by one of the housemaids (she wasn't a housemaid by the way she moved. She had been trained very well. She was an experienced fighter. Beautiful and dangerous at the same time.).

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Several hours later.

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Anoth sat outside on the balcony railing and looked down at the city.

During the time he sat there, Anoth had also sent out his sirens. And now Observer Alpha was with him to brief him on things already found. At the moment, though, it was little more than general knowledge and a dictionary. Immediately afterwards, the siren disappeared again.

This shield was more than it seemed.

Anoth had dropped some of his blood on the jewel of the shield and it was immediately sucked up.

The whole shield had then mutated.

Holy King's Shield of the Immortal Emperor

A pretty fancy name.

It retained the standard features of the normal Holy Shield. Only that it now had a slightly golden shimmer and was constantly active.

It also boosted all other shields to around double to ten times the strength and released the option for additional shields. At the same time, it automatically switched all shields below level 100 to Mastered and removed the weapon restriction.

But he still had to look for the materials to get the respective shields

Hmm...

Anoth picked up the cutlery and china from the table and fed them to the sign.

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Camping Shield

"Prepare something tasty everywhere."

Cooking +3

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Cutlery Shield

"Have you misplaced your fork again?"

Always have the necessary cutlery at hand.

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Fruit Press Shield

"Anyone want fresh juice?"

Squeeze any common fruit to get its juice and new crafting recipes.

(Also works on monsters that have a lower level than you (at least 5 levels lower) and on monsters who's HP has dropped below 10%)

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The last one must have come from the cup of wine that still had something in it. Anoth also found a copper coin in the sofa and fed it to the shield as well.

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Bank Shield

00 gold

00 silver

01 copper

"The safest save in the world."

Store your money in the shield and never get robbed.

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Useful.

Anoth tried to get the coin out again and the shield spat it into his hand.

"That will come in handy." Anoth put the coin back into the shield.

Then Anoth found a burned out match and fed this to her as well.

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Fire Maker Shield.

"Have you broken your matches again?"

Light a fire wherever you want.

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Let's see what else he could find here.

But he didn't find anything really interesting anymore except a candlestick.

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Light Shield.

"Are the flashlight batteries dead again?"

Brighten up even the darkest area.

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After that he went to his room for the night.

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The next morning

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Anoth's room looked a little different than before.

The bed and the cupboard as well as the table and the chair that had been in front of the window were gone.

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Bed Shield

"Now do you want to compete with Laffey?"

Sleep whenever and wherever you want in a bed and regenerate.

Not possible when enemies are nearby.

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Inventory Shield I

"More junk to take away."

More storage space is always good.

Direct sale from the inventory is possible but only for a fifth of the actual value of the item.

+250 to standard inventory.

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Of course he also fed what was on the desk to the sign.

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Desk Shield

"You need space to write… no problem."

Always have a good space available for paperwork, no matter where.

Works with the chair shield.

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Chair Shield I

"You have to sit down? Of course."

Plant your tired butt wherever you like without having to sit on the floor.

(max. 1 chair)

Works with the Desk Shield.

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Paper Shield.

"Time to doodle."

Always have paper on hand when needed.

(Written pages are added to inventory.)

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Quill Shield.

"Used the feather to tickle others again?"

Always have a pen handy.

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Inkwell Shield.

"Did you knock over the inkwell again?"

Always have ink on my man for writing.

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Pencil Shield.

"Broken the tip again?"

Always have a well-sharpened pencil of any colour on hand.

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Message: Office sign series complete. Now use all these shields simultaneously.

"Interesting." Meant Anoth. "So there are sets."

During the night he had also sneaked into the other three heroes' rooms and made copies of their weapons.

They weren't as powerful as the original weapons, but still.

And it was only possible because he unlocked the Holy Shield of the Immortal Emperor. However, the stats of the weapons were based on the shield.

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Creation of bound vassal weapon SUCCESSFUL.

Spear Shield

"Plant the tip on the shield and there will be pain."

A shield with thorns and properties similar to the spear.

The spear can also be retrieved from the shield.

(Bound vassal weapon)

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Creation of bound vassal weapon SUCCESSFUL.

Sword Shield

"A shield for chopping vegetables or enemies."

A shield with a retractable blade.

The sword can also be taken out of the shield.

(Bound vassal weapon)

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Creation of bound vassal weapon SUCCESSFUL.

Bow Shield

"It was definitely just the wind."

A massive siege bow with tremendous power.

(Bound vassal weapon)

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Very interesting. So it could make copies of the original weapons. But only as vassal weapons. These didn't have quite as much power as the originals, but they weren't to be underestimated either. Bound in this case means two things. First, these weapons were bound to Anoth itself and could not be used by anyone else, and second, these weapons gained their abilities from the shield and could not be levelled separately.

He had also made a detour to the "church".

It was easy for him to sneak into the church and get the dragon hourglass.

Seconds later he was out of the building again.

Back in the castle, he dropped some of the clock's magical sand into his shield.

The clock itself refilled the sand that was taken out so that there was always the same amount of sand in the hourglass.

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Dragon Hourglass Shield

"Huh? So late again?"

Provides an overview of all dragon hourglasses that exist and the areas they monitor.

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Anoth immediately activated the shield and several dozen countdown clocks appeared in front of him. When he then switched to the map view...

All he saw was a grid of dozens of octagons.

A countdown clock ticked in each of these octagons. That was the time until the next wave in each region.

In order to see exactly which areas it was about, he first needed the map shield.

So he needed a map from this world from somewhere.

What he also noticed was that some of the octagons only contained the message "ERROR". And for some others, the countdowns were unreadable.

The dragon hourglasses were probably destroyed or badly damaged.

He also discovered that he could use this map to teleport to any dragon hourglass. However, that was only possible if he had already been to the respective dragon hourglass at least once.

At the moment only Castle Town, Melromarc's capital, was open as a fast travel option.

Then he also noticed that some of the sand from the clock had ended up in his inventory. He could later use it to construct a mini hourglass. But he still lacked a whole range of materials.

He could then use this mini hourglass as a marker to get back to where he had used the function should he want to use the fast travel function.

Without these, he could also use them, but then had to find his way back to the place on old traditional catfish.

He spent the rest of the night reading the dictionary and learning the written language here. Although it was only a dictionary for children, it was always there. It gave him at least a rudimentary insight into their writing.

.

The next morning

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The group was called back to the throne room.

Today their journey began and companions were assigned to accompany them.

They were said to be the best fighters the country had to offer.

Somehow Anoth had his doubts about that.

Long story short: Anoth didn't get any companions and the ones she wanted were rejected. Which she didn't seem to like. Anoth didn't mind that very much though.

Because the lady was Malty Melromarc, or as she introduced herself, Myne Sophie. The second princess of Melromarc. Her younger sister Melty was the Crown Princess.

It was just odd that some of the texts referred to triplets and not just Malty.

Malty was here, that was good. Because the aura of twins or multiples were very similar to each other. Now that he knew Malty's aura, it allowed him to send a discrete detection pulse through the ground.

The hit report he received from Malty was to be expected. But that he received two more hits from a part of the castle he identified as the cell area was something else entirely.

Had Malty gotten her own sisters convicted?

From what he had learned from her aura alone, he could only draw one conclusion about Malty. She was a spoiled, ruthless little brat who would do anything to get the throne. Including actions against her family. She was NOT trustworthy.

That was ultimately the reason why he had turned down her offer to join him.

There was also a nice amount of starting money.

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In the city

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Anoth's first stop.

The blacksmith.

He needed some blacksmithing supplies. And a good blacksmith might have at least a few of them.

On the way to the smith he found a broken mirror lying on the side of the road. On the spur of the moment, he took one of the shards and fed it to the shield.

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Mirror Shield

"Have you examined your face today?"

Create a mirror image of the object you want to absorb and then devour it.

(No item destruction when fed to the shield for single-level shields that only need one item.)

Ability: Curse of Clumsiness

"Seven years bad luck for you!"

(Reduce your opponent to laughing stock.)

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Practically.

That meant that he could feed legendary items to the shield without losing them.

Anoth surveyed the forge shield menu.

All he needed was the Corresponding Tool and all that only once. After that, the attribute "Blacksmithing" was available for levelling up.

He will definitely need that.

A little later he found a blacksmith.

His name was Erhard. And with a little bargaining with him, he got access to the forge. A little later he had completed the blacksmith's shield series and rewarded Erhard with over 200 silver.

This allowed him to melt and process materials on the go. And Anoth had more than enough experience as a blacksmith. Even if the attribute didn't show it at the moment.

Now it was time to find the necessary raw materials and he could forge something.

The next place with a mine was the village of Riyute, also known as Lute. But he'll probably only get there later.

In addition, Anoth procured a piece of light armour and a simple sword, which he immediately fed to the shield.

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Bladed Shield

"Don't cut your finger."

+15 Attack -25 Defences

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Nice. Would certainly be useful if his stats weren't as high as they already were.

Maybe he could convert it to percentages somehow. That would be a lot more helpful.

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Sometime later

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Anoth was out in the fields and...

Tinkered?

He had killed several hundred of these strange balloon-like monsters and fed some of their remains to his shield.

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Orange balloon sign

"Did it burst already?"

+2defense

Ability: Jump Boost.

"Hooray! I'm a kangaroo!"

Jump 50% higher and ignore fall damage.

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It really wasn't much. The Jump Boost was the most useful of these. Now he made a ball out of the leftovers. That was simple enough.

The remains of the balloons were a kind of leathery rubber in their consistence and made a fairly stable ball when properly assembled.

Anoth decided to produce them right where he was simply because each ball brought in more money than the individual pieces of balloons. At most you got a copper coin for two. A finished ball consisted of about 50 of them and quickly gave a silver coin. That quadrupled the value. So it was well worth doing.

And the higher the quality, the better the price.

Some of the balloons had meanwhile decided to bite Anoth. Anoth used these as pillows after manoeuvring them to where he wanted them to be. They were surprisingly comfortable.

After completing eight such balls and killing over 600 of those balloons, Anoth got up again and marched deeper into the meadow. He found out over time that his shield was capable of storing inorganic monsters. Even if only a maximum of 50 of them.

Interesting.

The only thing he needed to unlock it was a certain bark from which monster traps were usually built.

It wasn't very hard to find the requested tree. They grew everywhere here. Only these were young trees. He needed the bark from an older tree. The older this tree species became, the more resistant the bark became. Therefore he could not use the young trees.

It took several hours before he found a suitable tree and was able to scrape off some of the bark.

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Monster Catcher Shield I

"Today a monster, tomorrow another monster, at some point my collection will be complete."

Catch up to 50 Inorganic Monsters. Each additional level gives +10 additional monsters.

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Tada.

The Monster Catcher Shield.

That might still prove useful.

On the way to the tree, Anoth killed a few more monsters and fed their remains onto the shield.

None of them really resulted in anything impressive or worth mentioning.

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Many hours later

.

Anoth was on his way back to town.

He had found some interesting things. Some of these were interesting ingredients for potions. Others just rubbish. Like when the ground gave way under him and he fed dirt to the shield.

The result was the Dirt Shield which gave an increase in Defence, and the "useful" remark "Congratulations! You've found Dirt!" +3 Defences.

Thank you, I would never have thought of that now, Captain Know-it-all.

It was easy to find a bar that also offered rooms. Anoth paid for one of the rooms and then marched straight into one.

He had taken something light to eat and destroyed it on the way to his room. Now within the room and lying on the bed he started planning what he should do next.

His gear lay neatly folded on the table. Should anyone think they have to steal these; well... Anoth had attached seals to them, which would give the thief a very unpleasant surprise.

The reason for this was quite easy to explain.

The Hero of the Shield wasn't exactly loved here in Melromarc, not to say hated outright. A theft could not be ruled out. That's why the door and the window were firmly barricaded and additionally secured by a spell.

Better safe than sorry.

.

The next day

.

Anoth lay awake for a few more hours to plan his next steps. Mainly via the Map Shield, which he was able to unlock because one of his sirens was able to give him a copy of a map she had found.

But then he eventually fell asleep.

When he woke up again it was already day again and judging from the first glance everything was still where he had put it.

Anoth had just finished putting on his clothes when there was a pounding on the door. When Anoth opened it, there were several guards.

Before Anoth could say anything, the leader of the guards started yelling.

"HERO OF THE SHIELD YOU ARE ARRESTED!"

.

In the throne room of the castle.

.

Anoth looked around as the guards led him inside. The "King" sat on his throne and the other three simpletons stood in front of the throne. In addition, there were also some nobles in the room.

Anoth said nothing the whole time. He just waited.

The soldiers had surrounded him and were aiming their trident-like spears at him. Only to be completely ignored by Anoth.

Anoth already knew what this would be like here.

A show trial.

The king held his head with one hand and then spoke: "Forgive me, Myne, but could you repeat your statement again."

What followed was a statement that could hardly be more wrong.

He allegedly drank too much and then broke into her room and then tried to rape her. Whereupon she somehow managed to escape and then ran to Motoyasu.

There were several errors in the statement.

1. Anoth couldn't get drunk from the alcohol they served here. You had to take a special alcohol for that. Only that alcohol was 100% deadly for humans. It was something like Ryncol, only a lot stronger.

2. Real rape victims don't behave like this. Not at all. He had seen more than enough of them in the many, many wars he had fought in.

3. After entering his room, which was at least an hour before the others entered the establishment to begin with; he had already gone to his room and then never left it again till the next morning.

4. His sirens had overheard Myne plotting the whole thing with a "church" representative.

Bottom line, Anoth was completely unimpressed.

And so there was only a slow malicious clapping to be heard from Anoth.

"Interesting story, lousy acting." Anoth said in a tone that told everyone in the room that he didn't feel even remotely threatened. "I am surprised that your father believes you at all. After all, you are known to be a pathological liar Malty S Melromarc. Second princess of Melromarc who has no right to the throne."

"You beast!" shouted Motoyasu.

Anoth ignored the idiot on the cheapest place and also what the other two of the idiot trio had to say.

Malty, meanwhile, was glaring at him. But Anoth didn't care about that at all.

"Then again, I shouldn't be surprised. Your hatred for the heroes of the shield is well known, Luge or Aultcray or whatever you call yourself now. After all, you had the last hero murdered. Isn't that so, vassal of the staff?"

"SHUT UP. BE QUIET!" the king roared only to be ignored himself.

"Oh but I completely forgot about that. The vassal-staff hasn't served you since you gave the order to kill the shield hero. Isn't that so?"

"BE SILENT!" shouted the king again. "IF YOU WERE NOT A HERO WE WOULD KILL YOU RIGHT NOW!"

One of his ministers explained this in more detail.

"Here in Melromarc, even attempting to molest a woman is punishable by death."

"Which is because this country is a matriarchal country." Anoth continued. "And that court clown there with the crown is just the warm keeper of the throne. Queen Mirellia has the real say here."

He could hear a low, amused, stifled snort. Probably from one of the Queen's shadows.

"But whatever I'm saying here doesn't make any difference at all, bottom line. Does it?" Anoth spoke in a voice as if he were discussing the weather with someone. "What do you want to do now? Send me back to where you summoned me from?"

The king was then forced to admit that they could not, and they could only summon new heroes once the current ones had all died.

"It seems we are facing a problem. The waves are coming and you need the heroes to stop them. To make this possible you can neither lock me up nor execute me. There aren't many options left."

As much as Aultcray disliked agreeing with the hero of the shield, he was right on that point. He really didn't have many options open to him.

"People shall all know about what you've done. Everywhere you go; your life will be made hell. It doesn't matter where you go. That should be your punishment." said the king finally.

"So, ruining my reputation. Well, there's hardly much more left." said Anoth. "I assume this is the end of this waste of time. But whether I will help Melromarc is still questionable."

"What does this mean?!" cried the hero of the sword. Ren anything. Anoth hadn't bothered to remember the name. "Are you just going to run away like a filthy coward?"

"The four of us can save the world, but suddenly you want to give it up and disappear!" said the hero of the bow.

"You-"

"Oh I didn't say anything about that." Interrupted Anoth Motoyasu before the moron could open his mouth. "Melromarc is just one of many kingdoms. And the others are also being hit by the waves and need protection. The way I see it, Melromarc already has three heroes. That should actually be more than enough."

After that, Anoth left the throne room without even turning around.

Even if the king yelled something at the end, they could just sit and stand like the petty idiots they were.

.

In the street

.

Anoth stretched and then marched down the street. He had some items worth selling.

Maybe he should have done that before.

Doesn't matter.

He was now officially a convicted criminal. So it didn't matter if he beat up a dealer or two to get a fair price, did it?

However.

Anoth first decided to sell the remains of the balloons and the balls he created. However, he kept one of the balls for the time being. It was more of a gut feeling than anything else that made him do it.

But first he needed a sickle to harvest herbs.

It seemed as if the blacksmith was already waiting for him.

"I envy you, you know that?" said Erhard.

"I take it you spoke to one of my sirens?" asked Anoth.

"Yes. A beautiful one at that, Editor was her name. I didn't expect them to go that far." Admitted Erhard.

"But it was to be expected." said Anoth.

"That's probably true." Erhard agreed. "Anyway. What do you need?"

A few minutes later Anoth was on the road again with a new sickle in his luggage.

Next stop was one of the general stores.

Before Anoth there was another customer at the booth who was also selling some leftover balloons. He ended up selling two remains for a copper coin.

Then it was Anoth's turn.

"Hmm. I'm counting 100 of them here. How about a copper coin?" Anoth could hear the contempt in the trader's voice.

In response, Anoth revealed his aura. This changed the dealer's opinion significantly.

"50 copper coins!" he cried as he dropped to his knees in front of him.

"Good men." Anoth tapped the merchant on the head while he ducked in front of him, restoring his aura to its normal level. "If you don't try to rip me off I might even give you a discount in the future."

"Understood."

"Let your colleagues know that too."

The trader just nodded as he stood up again.

After that, selling the balls wasn't a problem either. And this time the merchant's eyes really lit up. Because these were very well made balls that will bring in really good money from the nobility. So Anoth also got 50 silver coins per ball.

Much more than he expected.

With the problem out of the way, Anoth made his way outside of town. Yesterday he had seen a field with herbal plants which he now wanted to examine more closely.

When he started examining the plants, he quickly found out that there were several species of medical plants there.

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Leaf Shield

"It's always amazing what miracles nature can produce."

Improves plants.

Harvest +10

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

A leaf must have fallen on the jewel. Anoth decided to test the ability and switched to the Leaf Shield. When he then touched the plant he wanted to harvest, it suddenly became much stronger and of higher quality.

"Very convenient."

He found more plants and soon he had enough together to be able to brew a small healing potion.

Which he did immediately.

Everything he needed for this was in Anoth's large storage dimension and was fed to the shield within minutes. With that, he toggled the Alchemist base set to complete. The set didn't really give any attributes, but the possibility to brew simple potions as long as the necessary ingredients are available.

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Mortar Shield

"Have you ground something to dust today?"

Allows you to grind ingredients to unlock new potions.

[Part of the Alchemist Core Set]

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Pestle Shield

"Stamp, stomp, stomp, today I'm doing munch."

Crush ingredients for more recipes.

[Part of the Alchemist Core Set]

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Alchemy Table Shield

"Brew, brew, brew...boom!"

Brew potions wherever you want.

[Part of the Alchemist Core Set]

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Alchemical Flask Shield

"Today I'll pasteurize. Tomorrow I'll filter and the day after tomorrow...?"

Brew better and purer potions.

+20% potion duration

+20% potion strength

[Part of the Alchemist Core Set]

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

.

In the evening

.

Anoth had set up camp in the forest. Some of the potions were still brewing a bit. But what was in there was just basic mixes that he had made on an experimental basis. None of them have shown anything outstanding so far. He was thus able to dismiss this series of experiments as failures.

Oh well.

It was worth a try.

After disposing of the remains of the potions, he lay down to sleep in a small tent he had procured from his storage dimension. Nothing special. A simple leather tent for one person.

.

The next day.

.

Anoth had just completed his visit to the Apothecary, selling multiple potions and a whole array of herbs.

Now he was on his way back out of town.

On the way to the city gate he suddenly stopped.

Those were screams he heard there.

He immediately ran in the direction from where the screams were coming. On the way there, Anoth caught a smell that he knew all to well.

Blood.

When he turned the corner he saw what was going on. A woman with fox ears?, he couldn't really tell what they were, it was already getting too dark for that, lying on the ground with a sword in her stomach, badly injured, while a soldier from the city guard was about to take off his pants and two more were in the process of tearing the clothes from the heavily hurt girl.

Anoth already knew how this would end.

When one of the guards then also babbled on that the Demis were only good to have fun with and that she would feel a "real man" before they killed her, it was more than clear that Anoth's initial assumption was correct.

Time to crack some skulls.

He was already an enemy of Melromarc. Then why should the lives of some worthless corrupt guards bother him?

These weren't even city guards, as he noticed on closer inspection.

These were a nobleman's private guards.

He didn't know the coat of arms, but that didn't matter at the moment.

He'll find out later.

Anoth now stepped completely around the corner.

"Look, what do we have here?" asked Anoth as he stepped closer to her. "Worthless corrupt scum."

One of the soldiers turned to Anoth and laughed when he spotted the shield on the person's arm.

"And what are you going to do about it, shield hero?"

"Cut your head off, for example." At that moment, the shield moved from the left to the right arm and took the form of a sword. Anoth didn't give the guards enough time to think about it when he started to attack.

The actual fight, if you could call it that, was over in seconds and three now headless and very dead soldiers were lying on the ground. He ripped the emblem off one of their armours before disintegrating all three with a flick of the wrist, removing the blood from the street as well.

Now his attention was on the on the ground lying Demi girl.

Her condition was not good.

Anoth set her under stasis and then carefully lifted her up. Not far away was an empty house that he had seen. Exactly to this he was marching now. As soon as he arrived he kicked in the door. Inside were some streets were bandits. A few punches and kicks were enough to convince them to look elsewhere. With the house now empty, he lifted the injured girl he had set down on the floor before, onto a nearby table that still looked reasonably stable and began the treatment.

Health potions were very helpful here, as were Anoth's own healing spells. Thankfully, her injury was a relatively easily treated stab wound. That made it easier. In addition, it wasn't very deep, but it still required some work.

In the end it was enough to save her life.

There weren't any chairs here so in the end Anoth just sat down on the floor while she slept. Night had fallen in the meantime and apart from a few magical candles, which the bandits must have stolen from somewhere, there was no light here.

Sometime during the night one of the bandits came back. An arrow from the transformed bow ended the attempt before it could actually begin. The rest of the group decided that the grass was greener somewhere else than here.

Anoth disintegrated the corpse after stripping it of all valuables and waited for the morning.

.

The next morning

.

Anoth had stayed awake throughout the night, checking his patient's vital signs again and again. Not only did they stay in the green, they actually improved.

Another four hours would go by before the lady slowly regained consciousness.

And it was to be another two hours before Anoth could calm her down. She only calmed down in fact when Anoth revealed to her that he was the hero of the shield.

Her name was Lariana.

She wasn't a vixen either, as he could clearly see now. She was a raccoon Demi.

She was from Lurolona. The village that was destroyed in the first wave.

As she tells it, she used to be quite a successful adventuress herself before settling in Lurolona. When the wave came, she couldn't reach her equipment, which was stored in a chest, because by then monsters had already entered the house and were in the room where the chest was, making it unreachable for them.

Their only option left was to try to escape.

While they were running they were attacked by a three-headed dog, which drove them towards the cliffs. Raphtalia, her daughter, fell off the cliff in the process and she somehow managed to escape after her husband pushed her aside to save her life while sacrificing his own.

Since then she has been looking for her daughter.

Unfortunately unsuccessful so far.

Anoth asked her to join him in exchange for helping her finding her daughter.

She gladly accepted.

However, there was another problem here.

She was a Demi.

And enslaving Demis was perfectly legal here in Melromarc. Especially with this bastard of would like to be king sitting on his gold-studded shithouse.

The simplest solution to protect them: A slave seal.

Lariana wasn't enthusiastic about it, but she saw the need. Because if she wore this seal, it also offered her a little protection.

Even if it required of her to have to trust Anoth not to abuse it.

Then again, he had saved her life.

She had made up her mind.

.

An hour later

.

Lariana drew his attention to a circus tent. This was the tent they were looking for.

Without further ado, they marched towards it.

When they reached it, they saw no one there, so they both just entered the tent. After a quick look around it was clear that you were in the right place.

A slave trader.

Hundreds of man-high cages were stacked on top of each other. Three boxes high in many places. And in many of them were slaves of various kinds.

Anoth cursed inwardly.

He knew that even if he freed the slaves, it was only a matter of time before they would be caught again. Besides, it didn't change the laws of the country. If he really wanted to help them, he would have to change the law.

He had also noticed the seal that all the slaves, some completely naked, wore on their chests.

That's when he heard a soft cough coming from one of the dozens of cages

It was a young girl with raccoon ears on her head and also a raccoon tail. She was one of the creatures referred to here as Demi-Humans or simply Demis.

Lariana, meanwhile, had a very different reaction.

"Raphtalia!" she cried, stretching her arms through the cage. A little later, mother and daughter hugged.

Just then, apparently, the owner came around the corner.

A not very tall man with a stupidly big top hat on his head.

"Ah! A customer!" called a voice. "Found something yet?"

"In fact I have."

The owner had dealt with enough customers to know that further sales talks with him were pointless.

"What can you tell me about her?"

"She has mental problems and she is seriously ill. She probably won't be in this world much longer."

"Mental problems?"

"Her previous owner. He loved torturing his slaves." Anoth could hear a note of disgust in the salesman's voice. Whoever it was, even a slaver like him didn't like him very much.

"What was his name?"

"Idol Rabier. He is one of the nobles here in Melromarc and has his own rather tacky castle in his lands."

As soon as he said that, Anoth got the message that Rabier's castle had now been marked on the map.

Interesting.

"Was she the only one there?"

"No. He kept multiple slaves. Many of them are from the same village. Lurolona."

"Lurolona was destroyed by the first wave, right?"

"Partially. Many of Lurolona's residents were killed in the wave of monsters, including Lord Saetto, who should have ruled in place of the king. And with the lord dead, soldiers invaded the village. They slaughtered all the remaining adults and all the children they could find were enslaved and sold to Rabier. At least that's what it says in circles I know."

Anoth shook his head in disbelief and rubbed his forehead. "Were those soldiers from Rabier or from this bastard here?"

"Rabier." Was the short but telling answer. "But I'm pretty sure the king made pretty good money out of it."

Then I'll probably pay the bastard a little visit.