This chapter builds a bit more on the relationship and social side!
"Aarghh!! That's IT. When that guy comes back I'm turning him to casserole!!"
"Hey good idea Filia! I'm starving."
Gourry was fixated on the sign, which turned out to be a simple directory. The road to the left took them to a town called Vault, while the road to the right wasn't specified, but had the look of a huge town afar, though it was hard to tell.
Lina, distracted, went to crowd around the board with the others.
"Let's take the road on the...right. No wait it's facing me, so it's the left. But it's a road, so...uhh...huh?"
"We're going THAT way, Gourry." Lina pulled one side of his face and pointed straight at the road to the left.
"Harh? Barh Whhry?"
"Because it brings us to a town and not to the middle of nowhere, jellyfish brains!"
"Barh, Rhina, ah hrink whee shoo'l go tha' whay."
"Why?" Lina said with everyone else, releasing Gourry and facing him.
"The town in that direction is unspecified and obviously further away, Gourry, if it really is there."
"Well...It's like this, you see... Back in my mercenary days, I ran into this situation before."
"You were here before, Gourry-san?"
"Well not really, but I remember this mercenary saying that we should follow our hearts, and something's telling me that we should - "
Lina thwacked Gourry over the head.
"That's IT? You had some feeling that we should go to the middle of nowhere instead of a town??"
Lina grabbed Gourry and shook him hard.
"A town has INNS! Soft beds! FOOD!"
"And the left is closer to the heart Gourry-san! So..."
Gourry held a finger to his face like he'd just understood something.
"That feeling's gone now, for some reason..."
"You can be really unbelievable sometimes, Gourry-san," Filia said, shaking her head. She remembered the first time they met.
"I know Xellos is hardly leading us to a normal town, but right now I couldn't care less. Let's go, Amelia."
"We're gonna leave you behind, Gourry!"
"Hey wait up, guys!"
The Slayers were walking through the town and its crowded inhabitants almost as though it were any other.
"They don't seem to like us very much," Filia noted.
It was true. A hushed silence fell over wherever they went, and people stared.
"Maybe it's because we stand out..." Amelia was looking about. "They seem poor, Mr Zelgadis.."
Indeed, most were dressed in typical peasant garb. Only a handful wore less-than-presentable cotton clothing.
Everyone was being unnerved by the suspicious looks being thrown at them, and it didn't help that whispers were heard the moment they walked by..
"I'll go ask around," Amelia said, resolved to try and talk to the locals. She approached a couple.
"Hey! Um, Mister!"
The man turned around, and shook his head before turning back to his wife, who seemed rather stunned.
"How strange!"
Filia bent down to talk to an approaching little boy.
"Excuse me, could you tell us where - "
"I'm sorry, miss. My mother told me not to -"
A lady caught the boy about his waist, hoisted him up and threw the Slayers a sharp look before hurrying away.
"Well that's not very nice."
The group continued their sightseeing with growing anxiety.
"There's an inn over there," Zelgadis said suddenly.
"Well they can't throw customers out! Oi! Innkeeper!" Lina threw open the door to a double-storeyed, decent inn.
"Lina!" hushed Gourry.
People in the inn were all staring. After a few moments, more than half the customers left the inn and those who stayed were well and hurrying up with their food. In minutes, the inn emptied of customers.
"Ehe..."
Lina strode confidently to the counter, and rang the bell loudly.
"Hey innkeeper!"
A short, stout and stumpy man hurried over with a towel over his shoulders, reached for something under the counter and flashed it to the Slayers.
It read: "Lunch Pies are 2g each and Dinner Pies are 3g each with dessert. Rooms are 15s a night."
"Ya don't gotta push it that far..." Lina sweatdropped.
"We want five portions of Lunch and Dinner pies each. Ooh and two rooms please!"
The fat innkeeper stared at the princess for a few moments, then nodded and bustled off to what seemed like a kitchen. In moments, everyone was seated at the decent tables on decent chairs and sturdy decent floors.
"So Amelia," Lina began, after having swallowed a generous portion of meat pie. " What exactly did Xellos say to you before we left? You sure seemed a lot happier afterwards."
"Yeah. You've been in a good mood all day, Amelia." Gourry too was shoving several pieces of pie into his mouth at a time.
"You can not trust what a monster says! They just keep telling you what you want to hear and deceive you. Don't listen to that pile of rubbish Amelia!" Even with a numbing hunger, Filia was eating pie like mooncake and drinking plain water like tea.
"Oh, it's alright Filia! Xellos-san was really nice."
Suddenly, all the three Mazoku lords and their immediate underlings leaned forward in their thrones as they observed the scene.
"Foolish child. Since when has Zelas' little servants ever been nice?"
Sherra maintained the appropriately stiff stance, moving only her head as Dynast walked towards one particularly shiny wall. An ice wall meant a mirror, and there were few better things to see than Dynast himself. In his opinion, anyway.
"That Xellos must have complimented on her exquisite beauty and superior intelligence like me."
Sherra lowered her head as she sweatdropped. One of her duties was to polish the 'mirrors', and this wasn't the first time she found out why...
"Xellos always knows how to treat a girl!" Dolphin was smiling quite widely and still rocking in her throne. "Don't you think so?" She directed the question to no one in particular.
"Tch. That guy is just -... " Riksfalto faltered under her glare and kept quiet.
Then she became mad with cheer again.
"He must have told her what a cute young lady she was!"
Dolphin hummed a cheerful tune while gazing intently at the portal she was looking through.
Zelas leaned sideways on her throne and softly rubbed the edges of her wine cup with her index finger casually.
"Whatever he did, it's way better than what the other two are coming up with."
"He told me that he was just using my services as a human with heartfelt emotions, and that Justice really triumphs because I believe in it! Wasn't that sweet of Xellos? That was the nicest thing anyone's ever said to me!"
"Ahh," the Mazoku lords echoed in understanding.
"Well, I suppose that would work," Dynast, intelligent, tall, dark (in an evil way) and handsome said, turning pointedly away from his general.
"It's the same as saying she's cute and pretty anyway!" whined Dolphin with her doll face.
"Well - "
Zelas purred contentedly, knowing that this reflected well on her own wit and charm.
Xellos was grinning happily on the rafters, unnoticed and unseen by the Slayers, swinging his legs.
"Whaat?!"
"Amelia, don't tell me you - "
"Lina, what's going o – oww."
"The best thing anyone ever said to you was a monster?!"
"Oh come on, Lina. You shouldn't stereotype monsters like that.. we must judge them on a case-by-case basis!"
"If that happened, Amelia, the whole world would be chaos by now."
"But doesn't everyone think that Xellos might be a little -"
"NO!!" yelled everyone save Gourry, who was more interested in some of Filia's leftover mooncake pie.
"Well, not really.." Filia mumbled.
Everyone stared at Filia, including Xellos who watched intently.
"Filia..?"