Naofumi and Raphtalia watched in disgust as Marius was still eating his fifth meal.
"For someone who think he's high and mighty, you sure lacked table manners" Naofumi thought to himself, while looking over Marius's stat trying to figure out how it works.
"Are we still gonna keep him around?" Raphtalia whispered to Naofumi.
"Just endured it, okay?" Naofumi whispered back.
Filo, however, was envious of Marius.
"How come this stranger gets to eat five plates, but I can only have one?" she poutted.
"This meal. I like it." Marius said, after he finished his meal and tossed the plate aside.
"Waiter! I would like to request anot-"
"Could you please order a drink or something!" Naofumi interrupted Marius before he blew up his food budget even more.
"You're right. Waiter! Bring me your finest wine!" Marius shouted.
"You know, when master Naofumi said you can have anything you want. He didn't meant you can have as many as you like." Raphtalia said to Marius.
"I thought he'd be more generous." Marius said as he helped him with the expensive wine he ordered.
"Okay, here's the deal. You will work for me until you're able to pay off all your debts. That included the money I paid to free you and all the food you ate. Including the wine." Naofumi said.
"And once I payed all my debts?" Marius asked while enjoying his cup of wine.
"Then I'll let you go and we'll never see each other again. But until then, you will follow us everywhere and obey my command." Naofumi said.
"Very well...", Marius took a big sip from his wine glass, "... I shall stay loyal to you until I draw my last breath. Or after I pay off all my debt."
"Guess it settles then... Do you have a weapon?" Naofumi asked.
It was a normal day for the old blacksmith. As always, adventures would come in and buy weapons and other equipments for their journey.
The shop door opened and Naofumi entered the shop along with Marius. Erhard was surprised to see a male member in the shield hero party.
"Well well. For once you got yourself a guy in your party." said Erhard.
"I don't want people think I'm building a harem. The again, I'm not planning on keeping him around forever." said Naofumi.
To which Marius responsed with, "Likewise."
"I see. Well, if you need help finding a weapon for you I can always help." Erhard said to Marius, who's still browsing the weapons displayed.
"I can help myself..." Marius said as he looked for a weapon.
"Alright, I hope you find anything you like." Erhard then ushered Naofumi to get closer to the counter.
"Tell me, kid. Where did you find that guy? He doesn't look like he's from around here. And I've been to many countries myself. And that armor." Erhard observes the exotic armor on Marius, "I've never seen that armor before in my life."
"We've found him dying on the road this morning. Brought him to town after I healed him but he's already causing trouble. Have to pay the guards to get him out of jail. Wasn't cheap either." said Naofumi.
Erhard was a little confused on why Naofumi would helped a troublemaker. But knowing Naofumi, it's probably a good reason to do so.
"That's why he's temporary, uh? Any ideas where he come from?" Erhard asked.
Naofumi rubbed is chin, thinking for an answer, "Well, he actually looked like the people that lived in my world. Except in a different country. And his armor kinda reminded me of an ancient empire."
"I see. So you think he might be from your world aswell?" Erhard asked.
"From a different time period, I guess. But I'm not gonna assumed that." Naofumi said.
Marius picked a short sword, similar in length to his old gladius, and swung the weapon left and right with great form. Even switching between different grip types for different combat form with the short sword.
"He's pretty handy with that weapon. Guess you don't need to train this one." said Erhard, impressed by Marius's skills.
"He did said he was a soldier on the way here." said Naofumi.
Satisfied with his new weapon of choice, Marius approached the counter, "I'll take this one."
After a long tiring day the group decided to stay in the inn they've always visited. This time, Naofumi rent a bigger room with four beds.
Marius walked to the last bed at the very end and started taking off his armor. From behind, Naofumi noticed the cape on Marius's back. It was ripped in half by some monster judging by those claw marks.
But Naofumi can still see the emblem, albeit a little obscured. It was the hilt of a sword and a top of a skull on it's left side.
"That emblem doesn't look roman.", Naofumi said in his head.
Marius took off all his armor and placed them on the floor beside his bed. Without the armor, Marius now has white-colored tunic on instead but the left sleeves appeared to be ripped off aswell, exposing the 'SPQR' tattoo on his left shoulders. And Naofumi can see clearly how well-built the centurion's body was, as expected from a strong warrior like Marius. Naofumi couldn't help but felt abit of jealousy.
Marius can finally relaxed his whole body after wearing his armor for too long. He sat down on his bed and started inspecting his armor and his new weapon.
"There's no denying it now. He's definitely roman." , Naofumi thought. "But the emblem on the cape still looks out of place."
Throughout the night, Marius just minded his own business while still glued to his bed. Even ignoring Filo's bombardment of questions.
However, Marius was hatching a plan in his head. Just waiting for the right moment.
After everyone was asleep, Marius quitely put on his armor and sneaked out to execute his plan.
But he didn't realized Raphtalia had been pretending to be asleep the whole time, and she had been keeping her eyes and ears on Marius. And now that Marius was up to something, it's time for the demi-human to take actions. She went to Filo's bed to wake her up,
"Filo! Wake up!" she said quitely so she won't wake her master up.
With only the light of a small candle to help him navigate in the dark wagon, Marius stuffed everything he found useful into a sack.
"Think you can boss me around, uh? I'll make you regret your actions."
After he exited the wagon with the stolen goods he was surprised by a very angry demi-human and a filolial queen.
"I knew you were up to something! Now return all of them, and master Naofumi won't have know about all this!" Raphtalia threatened Marius.
Marius, however, just giggled at the demi-human, "I must commend you for your vigilant, Reptilian. A very wise move indeed."
"It's Raphtalia! And after all master Naofumi did for you this is how you repay him?! Stealing everything and running off just like that?!" Raphtalia yelled at the top of her lungs towards Marius.
"Perhaps that master of yours should becareful who he choose to trust." Marius dropped the sack to the ground and draw his sword. "But if you wish to defend your master, than you may cut me down. If you can."
Challenged by Marius, Raphtalia pulled out her sword and ready to attack. "Filo! Get ready!"
"Right!", Filo transformed into her filolial form, which shocked Marius.
"Very well! I take you on! And the little witch!" Marius goes into his combat stand, keeping his eyes on two of his opponents.
Raphtalia was the first to attack, dashing forward to delivered a damaging blow on Marius. But Marius blocked her attack with ease and the two skillfull fighters were engaged in a intense sword fight as each attack were blocked by one another.
Seeing an opening, Raphtalia thrusted her sword towards Marius's chest but Marius quickly catched the blade with his left arm and sword. And with a surprised move Marius push the blade upward, causing Raphtalia to loose balance and tumbled backwards.
Marius took this chance to slashed Raphtalia's face but she evaded the blade before it can reached her face. But few strained of her hair took the hit and fell on the ground between them.
Filo landed infront of Marius and attacked him with a series of fast claw attacks. Marius evaded and blocked her claws but one slash got through his defenses and leave a three long scratches on his torso armor. Filo then stomped the ground hoping to put Marius off balanced with the shockwave but it only blew Marius few feet away while he's still on his feet.
And out of thin air Raphtalia appeared from her Hide-Mirage magic trick that took Marius by surprise. As she reappeared her sword was about hit Marius from above. He quickly tried to blocked the attack with his sword but the larger blade got through and it scraped on Marius's mask.
As Raphtalia's sword hit the ground Marius striked her blade near the hilt, causing Raphtalia to lost her grip on her weapon. Marius delivered a powerful jab on Raphtalia that caused her to fall on her back.
Marius lunge at the downed demi-human to delivered a killing blow. But before he can land a fatal stab, Filo kicked Marius mid-air and he landed hard on the ground.
Marius got back on his feet, sword still in hand. Raphtalia recovered from his previous attack and was also on her feet again with her sword. And Filo braced herself like an animal ready to attack.
Suddenly, a burst of energy hits Marius, causing him to felt dizzy. As his vision slowly turned blurry, he turned around and saw Naofumi standing in the distance.
Marius then fell to the ground and all his sense were slowly disappearing as everything around him turned to black.
Not only he felt cold, but he can also felt something wet moved in a circular motion as if someone was painting on his chest.
He slowly opened his eyes and saw a man with a strange hat and a weird circular glasses on each of his eyes.
"That should do it. He'll be an obedient slave from now on." said the Beloukas.
"What?! Slave?!"
The Slave Crest on Marius was then activated and a painful burning sensation started spreading on his chest. Ignoring the pain, he quickly gets up from the chair he was placed on and grabbed Beloukas by his throat then pinned him on the wall, "You dare make slave of me!"
"Hey hey! Take it easy now!" Beloukas tried desperately to calmed Marius down.
"You left me with no choice, you know!"
Marius heard a familiar voice from his left and saw Naofumi standing there with his arms crossed.
"You will pay for this!", Marius charged towards Naofumi in anger but he felt a painful electric shocked emitting from his chest. He tried fighting the pain and slowly walked towards Naofumi but the slave crest shocked him even more, and Marius dropped to his knees begging for the pain to stop, "BY THE GODS! PLEASE STOP THIS PAIN!".
"Wanna stop the pain? Act like a proper slave! From now on, you will obey my every order and never ever try double cross me! Unless you wanna die painfully!" Naofumi yelled
Eventually, the slave crest stopped the electric shock, "I will obey you... Till my debt is paid..." he stands up on his feet, the well-built young man stared down at Naofumi, "Master...".
Marius eyes showed great hatred towards the shield hero, after bringing him down to a slave level. To Marius, this was a big insult to him after all the glory he had back in his own world.
Death could be alot better than this.
But Naofumi didn't care. He didn't care about who Marius is and what he did before.
Marius owed him money, and he as to work for him to pay it all off. Even if it means making him a slave.
Resentment grew even stronger for both young men that night.