Chapter 14

Resting her hand on the head that itself was resting on her lap, Rosa idly patted Vesna's head.

It hadn't even been a few hours, but his Base Loyalty had already risen from 67% to 93%, thanks to a few things. Firstly, 10% for bringing him clean, brand new and comfortable clothes to wear. Another 5% came from the large hot meal she had also brought along. And then, every few minutes, it went up another percentage as she stayed with him. She expected that after another hour or so, his Base Loyalty would be at 100%, and it made her...uncomfortable.

But, at the same time, as much as she fucking hated it, some dark part of her liked the fact that he would be perfectly loyal to her even without her Charisma influencing him. He would become someone who would unquestioningly follow her orders to the letter, and wouldn't betray her secrets. She liked that, and didn't bother trying to convince herself otherwise, even if she really didn't like acknowledging that fact. Having someone to rely on who would do anything she asked was both appealing, and terrifying.

But, for right now, that didn't matter. Vesna was her first test, and he was a resounding success. When he was at 100% loyalty, she intended to have him be the starting point from which she would acquire other acolytes. He would be their leader and would keep things on the straight and narrow whilst she worked their loyalty up to a base of 100%. Early on, he wouldn't be as needed, she could personally raise the loyalty of the other two acolytes she intended to get, but later on...well, later on she'd probably have already found other, better acolytes, so in actuality, it was more sentimentality than anything, he was her first true acolyte after all.

Putting that aside, Rosa contemplated her future steps. She had a stable source of income, she had her first acolyte, and she had a method to perform rituals to empower herself. She had no desire to upset the apple cart, and so, unless her next quest required it, she fully intended to stay at just three acolytes. Three was a good number anyway, not too many mouths to feed, especially when she had few tasks for them to accomplish. Vesna obviously didn't know how to seal stuff like a shinobi could, and she doubted her other two acolytes, when she eventually got them, could do so either, so it was best to leave the courier duties to shinobi who could transport bulk items with ease.

As such, her future steps were simple. Use her acolytes for one of the few tasks they could do, which was the search and recovery of items to sacrifice. Anything that looked esoteric, old or strange, she wanted, and they would get for her. Other than that, she intended to slowly expand her production, producing more than just kunai, and making more money from it as well, which in turn could be used to buy more ritual items to sacrifice, a circle of increasing power.

Running her fingers gently through Vesna's hair, she contemplated the other discovery she had made. In her acolytes menu, she was able to select Vesna's individual stats, and could spent ritual points to upgrade them. But, she was holding back, admittedly out of a slight case of greed. His stats were literally at the bottom, as low as they could go aside from Endurance. Upgrading them was debatably not as valuable as finding another acolyte with better stats, training them to 100% Base Loyalty, then upgrading their stats instead.

But then, she thought about it more. If she upgraded Vesna's abilities, wouldn't that make him even more loyal? But his loyalty had now increased again to 94%, so if she got his loyalty to 100% and then did something like that, wouldn't it be wasted effort? It'd be better if she found a powerful acolyte with low loyalty, promised them more power if they joined her, then improved their stats and bolstered their loyalty through that? It was all just confusing and annoying and she kind of wished there was some kind of manual for how loyalty worked, but alas, there was not, she just had to muddle her way through it.

Skimming his stats, it would take 11,220 points to upgrade his stats all to F+3. She had 20,960, so she could afford it, but was it worth it to upgrade him? Rosa rolled her lip between her teeth, arguing with herself. On one hand, it would be a massive expenditure and they would possibly be wasted. On the other, she could make those points up again, and having a helper like him who was completely loyal, strong, durable and fast could be really helpful.

With a sigh, Rosa closed the menu and continued to brush her hand across his head, the internal argument continuing.

When Vesna's Base Loyalty hit 100%, simply through being in her presence whilst her Charisma was in full-effect, Rosa made her decision.

It was worth it to experiment, to see what would happen, and that worth had more value than saving the points for herself. Vesna was already 100% loyal to her, so even if he just got improved in power without being somehow more loyal, that was still a perfectly acceptable outcome. She ran her fingers through his hair one final time, then spoke. "Vesna, how would you like more strength?" He blinked up at her, probably not understanding what she meant. "I could make you stronger, if you wanted. I want someone who could protect and help me, and if you'd like, that person could be you."

He nodded rapidly, not saying a word as he stared at her unblinkingly. Smiling lightly, Rosa opened the acolyte menu again and began to upgrade his stats. For a moment, she considered not upgrading them all in one go, but since all her stats were at E-2 anyway, she could easily control him if she needed to, and so she set all of his stats to F, leaving her with a healthy 9,740 points.

Closing the menu again, she could see the change in him instantly. His body literally grew beneath her hands, muscles coming to form across him as his entire body adjusted to resemble what F+3 stats were capable of. Whereas before he was a short, clearly malnourished and feeble young man, now he was a well-muscled, fit and in-shape young man, who looked as though he had been born exercising, walking out of his mother lifting weights and drinking fitness shakes. Slightly embarrassingly, his sudden transformation meant the clothes he was wearing, which fit his far smaller body, tore themselves apart as he grew, not that he paid any attention to that.

No, instead, he rose from where he was laying, far, far taller than he had been previously. He didn't stumble or falter, presumably his new Dexterity and Intelligence helping him along, and as he turned to look at his new form, Rosa could see quite clearly that his entire worldview had just been shattered. To be fair, just a few moments ago he was feeble as shit, still recovering from his pneumonia, but it was still funny to see.

Checking the menu, there was no change in his loyalty or anything else, which was a shame, but she kind-of expected that. 100% loyalty meant exactly that, he was 100% loyal, he wouldn't betray her and would do his hardest to serve her. If it went above that, it would diminish the value of loyalty greatly, so she wasn't too upset. Plus it meant she knew she could use stat empowerment to encourage acolytes to work for her. However, it did leave her with a massive question. She was able to improve Vesna's stats immediately, so what was the reward for three acolytes going to be?

It couldn't be empowerment, she was already able to do that...so she was quite frankly stumped. Or, maybe it would be a temporary ability, one that let her buff them to a higher degree but only for a short period, with a cooldown? Whatever the case was, she was kinda looking forwards to finding out exactly what the reward would be. If it was just ritual points she was going to be quite frankly pissed, since getting three acolytes wasn't exactly easy.

Then again, the only reason it had taken so long was because she wanted to establish herself first and secure her safety, which meant having to wait a whole month to avoid suspicion...which she was probably already under since she didn't hire any more guards despite Katsuki reminding her. Nothing to do about it, obviously, but she hoped to stay under the radar for as long as possible, appearing to be just an innocuous but mysterious young woman.

Closing the menu, Rosa watched as Vesna sat down again, laying his head back on her leg, though the difference between sickly and frail Vesna and the current Vesna was rather astounding and amusing. "Alright, well, I think, after I get you some more clothes-" She said with amusement, glancing down and back up his form clinically as he blushed, feeling his embarrassment and shyness through the bond she had with him. "-we can go and find others like you who I can help." He frowned then, but she gave his head a quick pet, placating him. "You'll always be the first, but I can help others who were in the same situation as you." She said, not really offering a good explanation, but he still nodded slightly and accepted her words as gospel.

In his mind, she could feel that he was...not 'more' devoted to her, he was already willing to do anything for her and that hadn't changed in any fashion, but it felt more rigid. 100% Base Loyalty compared to loyalty imbued through Charisma was different in a tangible fashion, his mind not being altered in any capacity to obey her words. She had him sit up and got up herself, watching him rise and walk with her to the door. "Alright, you stay here, I'll be back soon with some clothes for you. I know-" She said before he could speak. "-you want to follow me and protect me, but I think you'd attract even more attention to me if you went out like that." He bowed his head, and she could feel his shame and frustration at not being able to follow her, which brought an unbidden smile to her face.

Giving him a brief hug, she exited the warehouse, not locking the door behind herself, trusting that he would obey her orders. Sighing gently, she pressed down on her inner self-loathing and headed towards the nearest male clothing shop. As she walked, Rosa contemplated what she was doing. She...didn't like the fact that it felt right and good to do what she was doing, even if her logical brain was agreeing fully. She was literally saving people from a hellish life on the streets, giving them strength and power and food and shelter. All she asked for in return was their obedience and loyalty, was that so much to ask?

The whole free-will part was still horrible though.

After buying a set of clothes that she figured would look nice on Vesna, she headed back to him, and once he was clothed, the pair went back to the slums.

Her Charisma was off for the time being, Vesna didn't need her influence and it'd stop other people from fixating on her, and so they went mostly unnoticed, stopping at a soup stand to collect some takeaway, an idea forming in her head. Vesna looked...vastly different to his previous appearance, hollow cheeks and sunken eyes replaced with a healthy and colour-filled face, and of course, his body itself was so different that if he stood beside his previous self, people would assume they were estranged brothers at most. Once they were in the slums, Rosa picked around for a while, searching for any destitute and in-need people she could save. Her intentions were to find two other people and knock the quest out in one day, and after an hour of searching, she found what she was looking for.

Two skinny and frail young boys sat next to each other. Through the grime and the hollowness of their faces, she could see the familial resemblance, marking them as brothers or perhaps even twins, they were so thin that she couldn't tell honestly. Neither had a sickness in the way Vesna had, but what they had was arguably worse, they were both heavily malnourished, to the point she doubted they could even stand up any longer. It only took the withdrawal of a box of takeaway from her inventory to immediately attract two extremely hungry gazes, and a promise of food, shelter and safety to get them both obediently laying in Vesna's arms.

Her Charisma wasn't actively needed, though she assumed the other, weaker effects were still helping convince them. Neither fought or struggled at all as she had Vesna bring them back to the warehouse. Once inside, she let her Charisma go to work, their eyes regaining a small level of clarity as they focused on her, succeeding in seriously freaking her out. She doubted she would ever get used to the unnatural devotion they felt towards her, but she tamped that down as she fed the pair with soup, careful to make sure they didn't cause themselves any problems by eating too fast.

In the acolyte menu, she could already see the pair, whose names were Asahi and Aoki, had 52% and 56% Base Loyalty, modified by 100% by her Charisma again. Both of them had all F-3 stats, even worse than Vesna, who at least had F-2 Endurance, so her theory about her Charisma being influenced by their own Charisma and their Intelligence was still untested, but she assumed it would be so, otherwise she could use her Charisma to ensnare any person she came across.

She had looked at the menu whilst walking down the street, and couldn't just take anyone as an acolyte, so she assumed they had to either be vulnerable and willing to submit to her, as Vesna and these two young boys were, or alternatively if they directly opted to become her acolyte, that might work as well, she would need to do more testing. For the time being, she took both boys as acolytes, watching them closely for a moment.

Then, she opened up the quest reward, and with great fortitude and will, Rosa very calmly did not throw a hissy-fit.

The Leader - Acolyte Upgrading Cost reduced to 10% of base cost (Price rounded up to nearest 10)

That was so utterly bullshit and unfair that she genuinely wanted to punch a wall.

She had just spent 11,220 points upgrading Vesna, and now it was telling her that she could do it for 1,122 points, what kind of fucking bullshit was that? Inhaling deeply and exhaling slowly, Rosa resoundingly did not punch a wall. She did however cast a very venomous gaze towards Vesna's torso, towards his body which was practically made of wasted ritual points. That was so unfair she honestly was feeling like she had been scammed completely and utterly.

But, as she carefully and very, very fucking calmly inhaled and exhaled, she opted to look on the bright side. Upgrading the two boys from F-3 in all 7 stats to have all F-rank stats would have cost 22,680 points, which was a hefty expenditure she couldn't even afford currently. But now, it would only cost 2,268 points, which was far more reasonable. Well, 2,270 since it'd be rounded upwards, but that was so much cheaper it was honestly just hilarious.

And also really fucking worrying. She could upgrade ten acolytes for the same price as it'd cost her to upgrade once. The system was quite obviously pushing her towards empowering others, and the on-the-nose title of the ability, 'The Leader', was all but confirming that. That honestly kind of worried her, because she didn't want to put her faith in others, she would much rather hoard the power for herself. 100 Base Loyalty or not, she didn't outright trust Vesna, and probably never would. But there wasn't much she could do about it. If she upgraded her own stats, she was actively neutering her own power level by making a massively cost-ineffective expenditure.

Gnawing at her lip, Rosa smirked as she recalculated the cost of upgrading the two boys, after realizing that she'd miscalculated it. Each upgrade would actually cost a hell of a lot less than she assumed, since upgrading a stat to F-2 would cost 12 ritual points, F-1 would be 18 and F-rank would be 24. If they were rounded up and added together, taking a stat from F-3 to F-rank would cost 70 points. With 7 stats to upgrade, each boy would take 490 points, for a total of 980.

Closing the menu, she gave both boys close looks, then spoke. "Would you two like it if I made you both stronger?" The two boys froze mid-bite, looking at her in bewilderment. "I could make you stronger, bigger, and tougher, all I want in return is for you two to obey me. It won't hurt, I promise." The two looked down at their soup containers, then at each other, before in-sync nodding. Her Charisma was active, and that was presumably why they had accepted so quickly, but it didn't matter much to her, she wanted to test her theory.

Re-opening the menu, she upgraded both boys to F-rank in all 7 stats, dropping her points balance down to 8,760. Shutting the menu, she watched as they grew, their soup dropped as they both became quite considerably shocked. In the span of a few moments, they grew at least a few inches each, muscles emerging subtly from their frames. They were both younger than Vesna, the pair both being 14 years old, both on the same day and proving they were twins, and so their bodies did not become quite as muscle-bound as Vesna's owing to their younger age.

Still considerably well-built for their ages, and again, they looked nothing like their previous selves, their bodies becoming far healthier and well-formed than before. Standing their pair beside their previous selves would not draw much of a comparison at all, they had changed so much. Smiling lightly, Rosa retrieved another two containers of soup and handed it to the pair, watching them hesitantly eat, obviously very disoriented by the sudden change. Their Dexterity and Agility were probably the other reason they hadn't broken the spoons they were using to eat, but that didn't mean they weren't having any cognitive dissonance.

Checking their loyalty, Rosa's smile grew far wider when she saw that the pair were both at 100% Base Loyalty. To be fair, she had expected it to occur, but it was still satisfying to see. She had given them unbelievable power, and for that, they would obey her unflinchingly. Looking at the pair, she noted that whilst their clothes were clearly too tight for them, their bodies had not grown to quite the extent that Vesna's had, again presumably because of their ages as well as the fact that there was a vast difference between F-rank and F+3. With a smile, she reached out and gave their heads a quick ruffle, unable to resist acknowledging the fact that whilst she didn't like what her Charisma did, the feeling of having true obedience?

...It felt really good.