Chapter 6: Guns And Greatswords

Waking up in a house wasn't what I expected today, considering I'd gone to sleep in a sleeping bag, in a forest, it shouldn't have been possible at all. Here I was though, on a couch in a fairly modern living room.

Sitting up I made sure everything was still on, you could never be too careful here. Satisfied with my level of non-nudity I took a moment to look around. The flooring was wooden, mostly, tiling instead in what looked like a kitchen to my right, around me was a living room of sorts. TV hanging from the wall, fireplace under it, the walls were purple painted plaster and dark wood.

I now realized just how big the couch was, easily fifteen feet long, it was a nice red color. Everything looked way too modern for the world I'd been living on for the past three weeks.

Turning around I found a wide hallway. Deciding that yes, I was going to see what the hell was going on, I walked through. It was short, maybe ten feet, on the other side were three doors, one to my right, left, and directly in front.

I reached out for the door in front, only for it to fly open before I'd even touched it.

"Oh, great! It worked!" A mildly disheveled dark goddess said, standing in the doorway to what I could see was, an office?

"Worked?" I wasn't sure whether I should be scared shitless or not, this could easily be a bad thing.

Alipheese inhaled, "Dream talking, you know the thing Ilias does with Luka?" Somehow I'd envisioned it having a slightly more sophisticated name than 'dream talking'. Alipheese took a moment to clean herself up before speaking again. "I wanted to see how everything was going, you have no idea how boring it gets here, even with the entertainment from other worlds."

I wasn't really sure what I'd expected, but being pulled into a dream with a dark god to chat, was not it. "Uhm, uh sure, why me though?" If she could do this with me, then surely she could do so with basically anyone right?

"I've already interacted with your soul, which makes it much easier to do again. I'd have to put in a lot more work to talk with another person who's died." She could only talk with the dead? I asked.

"No, I can most certainly talk to the living, otherwise how would we be speaking? It's just easier, especially when dealing with alternate worlds, to talk with souls that have already left their corporeal bodies."

I blinked, "Alright then. So, anything you want to talk about specifically?" I wasn't really sure what topics a god would be interested in.

"I'm curious how the journey's going, I can't just watch over you, the seal would have to be broken for that."

This was confusing, "But you can just pull me into a dream instead? How's the seal allowing that?"

"Oh that's easy, since you're not from my world the rules are a bit more malleable, speaking of, I didn't fuck up your body right?"

"No, same as it was before I died. Why? Were you expecting something to be wrong?"

She shrugged, "Eh, my energy doesn't mix well with most things. Since I needed to make sure you didn't die from disease, magic overload, or any of the other effects a transition from one world to another could have, I wasn't sure what exactly would happen." She looked me over, "You seem fine though, you're not a girl at least, dark magic tends to favor that."

A thought entered my mind, "What about your blessing? What's that do?"

"Oh that's easy, you'll find it easier to use dark magic, the elements, and basically any magic that isn't light. Basically the opposite of Ilias' blessing, because it's mine." She smirked, "You'll also be more attractive to any monsters, and you'll taste better."

Oh, well shit. "And uh, if I don't want to be raped by any of your creations?"

She grinned again, "Then you'd better find some way to defend yourself."

Eventually the two of us moved out of the doorway, I wasn't sure how long this dream would last. In real time, most dreams only last seconds, but I'd had dreams that seemed to last days before. Now I was back to sitting on that red couch, recounting our, Luka, Alice and I's, journey to Alipheese, who was making breakfast in a kitchen.

"I'd have thought you would like, I don't know, materialize food or something?"

She looked over the countertop, "I have absolutely nothing to do here David, I could just wish something into existence, but then I'd have even less to do." Made sense to me, I'd be bored too if I'd been forced to sit in a house for a thousand years.

I'd just gotten to my retelling of how our party had gotten to Port Natalia, we'd seen the bombing of course, and Luka had run off after Lazarus. I'd tried to help the local mermaids and humans caught in the blast, but there'd been less destruction than I'd thought. Of course, Alipheese already knew this, turns out she didn't just know about the visual novel, but had played through it.

She'd mostly been interested in what I'd changed, which, up until now, hadn't been all that much. She'd laughed at the encounter with Alma Elma though.

After that I'd given her the whole story about Kraken and the marriage. Her reaction was less about the pledge, and more about Kraken's current state.

"I swear that's the most idiotic, altruistic thing I've ever heard, how does she expect to rule the sea if she can barely remember where it is?!"

"Uhh, didn't you already know this?" She'd have to, since she'd played the game.

"YES! And I still can't believe there's someone this stupid!" Something made a decidedly bad noise from behind the counter, "Fuck, nevermind, just keep going."

I went ahead to the mansion, and all the crazy shit that'd happened there, normally Luka would have visited there after San Ilia, but we'd heard about it while in Port Natalia, and Luka insisted we go there first.

For one thing, Alice's mom, holy hell that had been just about the most emotional I'd ever seen her. Luka and I, not heeding my own advice to stay far enough away from those two, had offered what we comfort could, even if Alice had been as stoic as she could manage.

Alipheese did not care, in the slightest. "So they've banned necromancy, again yes I know, still odd to see happen to my own home. Back when I'd been down there it'd been common, almost to the point of being an everyday thing for many monsters."

She'd finished making breakfast by this point, not that it was actually morning, I wasn't really sure if there was a time here, and was currently sitting on the couch, her tail taking up the entire thing. The end of which flicked me in the face, "You can continue now."

After that we'd left Port Natalia, once Alice finally woke up from her fright induced nap. Currently we were almost to San Ilia, a place where I'd hopefully be able to figure out a plan, and arm myself. As Alipheese had said, I was going to need it.

"Oh, you have ideas? A sword? Bow maybe? Use the library to learn some magic?"

I smiled, a genuine smile laced with excitement, "I'm gonna build a gun." Alipheese looked at me like I was an idiot. "What?" She shook her head, and then snapped her fingers.

I was jostled awake by a red tail, which then proceeded to slap me in the face. I was up quickly at least, though Alice's methods of doing so leave much to be desired. Luka was already packing up his bedroll and the supplies we had with us. I got out of mine and began to do the same.

"We should be in San Ilia later today, right?" It'd been about four days of walking from Port Natalia to get here, we couldn't have had much more to go. So far we'd been assaulted by more monsters on the journey to San Ilia than the entirety of Ilias continent, that didn't bode well.

I'd not really been able to defend myself, and more than often stayed far back while Luka fought, it made me feel like shit honestly. Hopefully I'd be able to change that soon, almost all monsters here were stronger than the average man, much like a man was stronger than the average woman. So melee combat was off the table the moment I got here, which left range.

I'd considered getting a bow or something similar, but then I'd had the great idea of making a gun, a shotgun to be precise. It's funny, but basic firearms are pretty easy to make, they'd already managed muskets and flintlocks here. I'd actually learned the basics of making a break action rifle, just curiosity, but it was quickly becoming a very useful tidbit of knowledge.

The harder part would be making ammunition, though even that is significantly easier than most people would believe. First off I'b be using brass shells, which are reusable, materials to make the primers would be harder to come by, and putting them together would be trial and error, but I was sure I could do it.

Luka spoke up, breaking off my line of thought, "Yeah, we should be there in a few hours."

"Great!" I would have a bit of time to start my project then, I think it took a few hours for the king to summon Luka.

Alice looked at me oddly, "Great? I thought you didn't worship Ilias, what could be so important for you there?"

"I think I found a way to fight, but I needed somewhere to actually make it, San Ilia should have what I need."

"Hmph, finally. I'd thought the fake hero would be the only one, why now though?" Alice raised an eyebrow.

"I didn't have much time before, and I didn't have the design down yet." I'd spent a few days planning out the design in my journal, it was simple, lacking many features more modern firearms had, but it would work.

Luka joined in the conversation as we set out toward the city, "So what is it?"

"Oh uh, I'm making a gun" I realized now that, despite the advantages most monsters had over humans, they were still meat, guns hurt meat. Thus, a firearm, something that humanity had proven works, would probably do quite well.

"That's… not what I expected." Luka sounded concerned, considering his adversity toward violence that made sense.

"Don't worry, there's ways I can make it non-lethal, though it's still mostly a last resort." I was keeping it mostly for exceptionally strong monsters, not really sure how it'd do against a Knight though.

"And how exactly does that work?" Alice chimed in, raising an eyebrow.

"Uh, rubber ammunition, or beanbags sometimes. It still hurts, but it won't kill someone."

"Hmm, ok then." She didn't sound entirely convinced, but at least it sounded like she would allow it.

Luka spoke up again, "So… anything else?"

"As self defense? Or stuff in San Ilia?"

"San Ilia" He clarified.

There wasn't that much I wanted to see, though given Alipheese' talk about spirits and how I could control magic somehow, I figured I'd take a look. "The library probably has some interesting information in it. What about you?" I was a bit desperate to get the conversation off me.

"Oh," Luka perked up at that, I forgot how excited he'd been to get to the city, "I wanted to get an audience with the king, maybe he can help me on my journey as a hero? Also San Ilia apparently looks amazing, and it's the most religious of the cities!" He sounded excited, good for him.

Alice, was decidedly less enthusiastic, "Yay, more blind worship. As if naming all your cities after that goddess wasn't enough."

The conversation kinda fell off after that, Luka seemed to think it wasn't worth it to argue that point.

The gates to San Ilia were absolutely massive, stone walls that looked solid enough to withstand any medieval siege weapon. In front of them stood almost a dozen heavily armed guards, this place took its security seriously at least. Other than them, there were almost double the amount of, what i assumed were heroes.

The closer we got I could see the detailing on the stonework ahead of us, it was intricately designed with beautiful patterns covering the wall. Luka audibly gasped at the architecture, though Alice didn't seem quite as impressed.

One of the men ahead of us stepped ahead of the group, raising a hand in greeting, "Are you three also here for an audience with the king?"

Luka responded, "Yes. Are those all heroes?"

The man nodded, "Yeah, if you were hoping to see his majesty soon then I apologize, it'll probably take a few days." At Luka's dejected expression, the guard handed out a piece of paper with numerous signatures on it. "You can write your name on here for now, you'll be called to see him when you can. Until then just enjoy the city."

Luka wrote his name down, the soldier looked at me.

"Oh, I'm not here for an audience. Do you guys have a blacksmith here?"

"We do, once you get in the gates, take a right down the street, you'll see it."

I nodded my thanks, "I appreciate it."

With that we were finally in the city walls, I had to get to the smithy so that I could get the parts and pieces necessary for my gun made, it would probably take a day or so. Luka wanted to go see the different parts of the city, but we agreed to meet up at the castle when we were both done.

Alice, to my surprise, chose to see what exactly it was I'd be making.

"You think I want to look at all of this "beautiful" art? It's all just the same crap, religious nonsense." I couldn't exactly say no, so here we were.

Opening the door to the blacksmith's shop, a little bell rang from the doorframe. I heard some grunting and scuffling from behind a door leading to a room apart from the shop. The forge probably.

Out came a man wearing a leather apron over a normal cloth shirt, tall, heavily muscled and his skin was dark, his eyes stood out, a very bright blue that almost glowed. He was behind a counter that separated the main shop from the door to the forge.

"Who're you two?" His voice was deep, almost a brassy sound.

"Ah, I'm David, I was hoping I could get something made here?"

"I'm Jerome, and that depends, what'd you want made?"

I stepped up to the counter, pulling out my journal. I'd written a blueprint up for the shotgun I wanted to make. Placing it down in front of him he looked it over. I made to ask him something and he raised a hand preemptively, I'd give him a moment then.

I turned around to look at Alice, who was inspecting a sword on the wall. I stepped over to her, she looked, concentrated, I wanted to say.

Before I could say anything she looked away from it, "This is enchanted." Oh, that was interesting.

"Is that a good thing?"

"Maybe? I'm surprised, I wasn't aware that humans could do something like this." She looked genuinely confused, that was a first, aside from Luka's meditation that is.

"You have a good eye girl!" Jerome called out from across the room, "Enchantment's my specialty, not many people can do it so I'm pretty popular around this region."

"Where did you learn this? I can feel at least four different effects on the sword."

He chuckled, "You're a mage huh? I learned it back when I was younger, I'm from Grand Noah, so there's plenty of teachers. You haven't been there before?"

Alice shook her head, "No, what's so special about it that you could learn this?"

"Heh, if you don't know I won't spoil the surprise for you." He smiled, then waved me over from behind the counter. "This sure is an interesting device you've got planned here. Got me thinking."

"About what?" I asked.

"Well, I think I can improve it a bit. It'll take me a day or two, but It's similar to a blunderbuss right, a firearm?"

I nodded, "Yeah, just easier to use, and a lot more efficient." I pointed to the design for the shells, "self contained ammunition, uses black powder in the casing to fire the bullets."

"I figured that was the case, let me keep this for a bit, come back before sundown, i'll see what i can do."

I raised an eyebrow, "Don't you need payment?"

"Ha, if you're right about this 'shotgun' of your's, it won't matter if you pay me or not, this thing is revolutionary."

"Uh, alright then." I ripped the page out of my journal and handed it to him, "I'll come by later."

"Do that, I'll see what I can put together in the meantime." He walked back into the forge with the blueprint, presumably to start making it.

I and Alice walked out, the little bell ringing again on our exit, we began moving down one of the streets to the San Ilia castle. "Grand Noah. I wonder what's so special about it?" Alice seemed to be very interested in that.

"Is enchantment really that hard to learn?" I was curious because of how surprised she'd been earlier.

"Well no, not really among monsters. Many of the monsters that use actual weapons get them custom made with enchantments to help out. But for a human to know how to do it? I've never heard of it before." She explained.

"Why though? If you guys can do it then why would it be so hard for us?"

"Not really hard, just uncommon I guess. It relies on using the four elements, and some dark magic in certain cases. While you can bless a sword with holy energy, there's much more application with other energies."

"So if Ilias blessed a hero's sword, it might do more damage to monsters. But if someone enchanted a sword using other things, it'd be able to, what? Set itself on fire?"

"That is an incredibly simple way of thinking about it. You could make it lighter, harder to break, maybe even shoot out energy when swinging." Oh, that sounded useful.

"Hey! Over here!" I looked toward the voice, Luka was sitting by a massive statue of Ilias at the entrance to the castle. "You guys took a long time. I was worried you got lost."

Alice snorted, "Lost? With that stupid thing on display?" She said pointing to the giant statue.

"Stupid? That's the Magnificent Ilias Goddess Statue, it's famous. Ilias gifted this statue to the first man and woman to lead them; it guided humans for thousands of years."

"That's stupid, can I destroy it?" Alice scoffed with annoyance.

"What?! No! One of the five commandments is 'point your sword at the goddess and thou shalt cry'. I've been careful not to point my sword at it since we got here." Luka said, gesturing to the abomination on his hip.

"Still stupid, of course the master wouldn't want their slaves to attack them."

"Eh, okay how about we do something else?" Luka was trying to steer the conversation away from the statue.

I finally spoke, "Maybe we should check out the library, there's probably something interesting to see there."

Luka nodded, "Yeah! There has to be something interesting in the castle at least."

Alice grumbled to herself, "I can't eat books." Luka and I both shared a glance, of course.

The inside of the castle was somehow even more extravagant and richly decorated than the outside, Gold inlaid most of everything I could see, from the lamps and chandeliers, to even the doors and floor. Almost everything was either marble or some other white stone.

"Are they trying to blind us?" Alice complained. Every now and again sunlight shone through a window at just the right angle to do just that, it was incredibly annoying.

The castle was massive, absently I wondered how the Monster Lord's castle would compare to it. If it was any bigger then I wondered how no one got lost walking through it. Eventually we came by a scholar who was carrying a large stack of books, whom we asked for directions.

"The library? It's in the basement, but you probably won't be able to get in today." Oh, I'd forgotten about that.

"What do you mean?" Luka inquired.

"Well, seeing as it's the largest library in the world," Alice scoffed in the background, "the safety of its knowledge is incredibly important. Why, I wasn't able to get permission until I'd been here for almost a week"

"Oh, well that sucks." Luka frowned, "Thanks anyway I guess."

With that we kept walking, still looking for something to entertain ourselves while we waited. It couldn't be much longer right? Eventually the king called for Luka.

It was almost night now, apparently I was wrong. Remembering Jerome and his suggestion to come back around now, the three of us set out back into the city, all of us wanted something to do other than walk aimlessly.

Luka in particular seemed interested in seeing the enchantment capable blacksmith. And Alice looked like she was contemplating eating the castle walls. So we made our way down the dark streets of San Ilia.

When we arrived, a familiar jingle came from the doorframe. The door at the other side of the counter opened up and Jerome came out with a bundle of cloth and metal in his arms.

"You're a bit late, but it's fine." He set the cloth down on the counter and began unwrapping what it contained. "I see you brought a third?"

"I'm Luka, nice to meet you." Luka was looking around the shop with barely restrained awe, "Are all of these enchanted weapons!?"

"Ha! No not all of them, I make normal stuff too. Not everyone can afford a fancy weapon, and I wouldn't make much money if I only sold expensive swords."

He finished unwrapping the bundle, it was about half a shotgun, though different than what I'd drawn up.

"David, right? You have no idea how much money this idea of yours is gonna make me." He grinned, "Everything I'm giving you is free of charge like I said, I'll make more than enough back anyway."

The components on the table didn't quite resemble a break action firearm, and with some amazement, I realized why. It was a PUMP action shotgun. "How?"

"I told ya I could improve it. Though i was thinking more about enchanting it back then, I made some changes to the design after looking over it a bit, this-"

"It can hold more than one shell." I interrupted him, "And it looks a lot nicer than my rendition."

Not at all annoyed Jerome continued, "Yep! It can hold five in total. I cleaned up the design so that it would be easier to fire, have less recoil, just some overall upgrades. Once it's done I'll show you how it works."

"I thought you'd never seen anything like this before?"

"I hadn't, the design kinda just came to me as I was making the different parts. Now come here I wanna show you the enchantments I added." That was a bit suspicious, but I wouldn't complain about it.

On the counter were the receiver, the tube for the shells to be held in, and a few shotgun shells themselves. Luka and Alice both stepped forward with me to look at it all.

"Alright, so for the gun itself I made it lighter to hold and a lot sturdier, pretty basic stuff."

"If the frame's lighter wouldn't it have more recoil?" Alice asked, not any bit scathing or mean, so she was actually interested, huh. Then again I would be pointing it at her subjects most likely.

"Well yes, if I actually decreased the weight, this just uses wind magic to lighten the feeling of holding it. Earth magic is obviously making it less breakable. Now here's the fun stuff." He swept his arm over the assorted shells, each one light brass with a colored stripe around the shell, red, blue, cyan, and white, along with a plain brass shell.

"All of these have different effects when fired, red is for fire, blue for wind, cyan for lightning, and white for ice. The plain shells can be loaded with any sort of 'shot' as you called it.

"So there's non-lethal options?" Wind and ice didn't sound so bad, all things considered.

"That depends, the real neat thing is that those shells are loaded with pure energy, the enchantment on them converts it into an element that can be fired out." He elaborated on my question, "The different elements will react according to what you shot em at. So while some monsters, or humans, might resist fire, ice might do better against them."

"Is there like a purely non-lethal one?" I didn't want to accidentally kill someone with the wrong shell.

"Oh, you mean if you just don't want to kill someone? Yeah I got ya, wind should be the best bet, mostly just force, just don't push someone into something sharp. Other than that, ice probably. The lightning ain't actually that strong either, more to stun people, but it could kill someone if you hit em right."

Okay that was good, I actually heard Luka sigh in relief behind me.

"That's great! So when'll it be done?"

Jerome hummed to himself, "I'd say, probably tomorrow. Come back around noon, and I'll have it assembled for you."

"Will do, anything else?" I asked.

"Nope, you all take care." We all said our goodbyes and left to go sleep.

We'd rented a room at an inn for the night after it became clear we weren't going to see the king today, hopefully it didn't actually take the estimated three days. Two rooms were bought, one for me, and another for Luka and Alice, thankfully Luka wasn't "raped" by Alice that night, and I actually got some good sleep.

The three of us got up early the next day, courtesy of a royal messenger that knocked on our room doors.

"Hello," he looked down at Luka, who was just barely awake, "You wouldn't happen to be Luka would you?"

"Y-yeah," He yawned, "That's me."

"I am here to tell you that the king will be seeing you as soon as possible, please make your way to the castle whenever possible." And just like that, he left, kinda rude honestly.

That woke him up real quick, "H-Huh?! Already?!" He ran back into the room, shouting at Alice to get up. A moment later after what I could have sworn was genuine snake hissing, a loud thump came from their room.

Luka ran out with Angel halo clumsily strapped to his hip, and in the middle of putting on his cape. I was in the middle of putting on my boots and grabbing my pack when Alice, nearly knocking the door off its hinges, stumbled, as much as a snake could, out of the room.

Luka's eyes shot wide open, "Alice!" Realizing literally the entire inn would hear him he whispered, "you still have your tail."

I laughed, Alice wasn't a morning person it seemed. A few moments later, a flash of light came over the hallway and Alice was in her human form (that was still very noticeably not normal at all).

Blinking away her tired expression, the two of us moved to follow Luka, who had already started leaving the inn. As we left the doors to the inn I glazed over at Alice, and almost choked on laughter.

"Alice," How she'd had the time to do this I had no idea, "When did you have the time to get breakfast?"

Alice looked up from the veritable mountain of pancakes, eggs and bacon, all stacked up like the world's most delicious skyscraper. "I always have time for food David." An entire pancake just slid into her mouth, "Hmm, tasty."

Averting my attention from the nonsense beside me, I ran up ahead to catch Luka, who was waiting at the castle entrance. How he was so fast for his height I would never know, well I did actually, legendary hero and angel heritage does crazy shit to your body.

"How?" Was about the only thing he said as the two of us watched Alice basically deepthroat ten stacked pancakes.

"Do you really think I have answers for you?"

"Does anyone?" Probably Tamamo I'd wager, questions for later.

"Why are you two looking at me so oddly, it's creepy." Alice asked, as her tongue came out to lick the syrup off like a windshield wiper. Idly I thought about what a lucky bastard Luka was.

"No reason, no reason at all."

The walk from the entrance of the castle to the king's throne room took a few minutes, but one of the guards helped us find our way there when we asked about it. When we arrived the guards stayed outside the door, waiting just in case.

If the town of San Ilia was nice looking, and the castle itself was as extravagantly designed as possible, then the throne room was somehow even more absurd. The throne itself was solid gold, with precious gems embedded all over, the room, the walls even were inlaid with so much gold and shiny metals that I had to avert my eyes for fear of blindness.

The king was sitting on the throne, his pope garments covering a frail old body, a far cry from the San Ilia king of Paradox that was for sure. He pointed a finger at Luka.

"Traveler Luka, I have a question for you… are you unbaptised?" His voice was stronger than I'd imagined, though it was still very airy.

Luka panicked, "Ah, yeah. I'm not baptized… I'm sorry!"

The king's eyes widened, "So it's true! It's just as Ilias said!" He said in awe.

"Eh, what?" Luka was confused.

"Last night, Ilias came to me in a dream! She was beautiful, with her perfect face and beautif-"

"No one cares, get to something important." Alice interrupted, annoyed.

"Hey! Watch what you say to the king, Alice!" Luka scolded her. Ignoring the fact that Alice was in fact also royalty.

"Ah, okay well Ilias gave me a revelation that a young unbaptized traveler named Luka would show up in this city, and that he would be the one to defeat the monster lord!" The king exclaimed.

"I…will?" Luka asked, confused.

"Now I shall tell you the path you will take! There are three wise men on this continent, you will demonstrate your power to them and receive their blessings. Once you have done so I will bestow upon you THIS!" Pointing to an extremely gaudy sword.

It was quite impressive looking, to an idiot. The sword obviously wasn't very practical, looking more like an art piece than a weapon to be wielded.

"The Goddess sword! The weapon of a true hero, even the monster lord will bow down before the one who wields it!"

Alice, the monster lord, wasn't very impressed by it.

"Now begin your quest to get the blessings of these wise men, and I shall give it to you upon your return!" The king concluded.

"What a stupid quest." Alice scoffed, walking up to the sword.

"Uwah! Alice!" Luka yelled out.

Alice grabbed the handle, holding it up above her head. Dark lightning crackled around the blade, before it shattered into hundreds of pieces.

Now, I'd been thinking to myself this entire time, a shall we say, blasphemous idea, As the sword pieces spread across the floor I ran to pick up three of the larger pieces, not massive, but each a little bigger than my fist. I had a great idea, or a terrible one, I'd have to see.

Snatching the pieces up I tucked them into my pack. Turning around to see Alice lecturing Luka on how the quest was stupid, and what the real way to gain strength was.

"Go to the four spirits and ask for their blessing." Alice declared.

"Four spirits?" Luka questioned.

"The four spirits of the elements, Sylph, Gnome, Undine, and Salamander. They're somewhere on this continent, find them and ask for their blessing." She explained.

"What happens when I ask for their blessing?"

"When you gain the blessing of the spirits, you'll gain a great power from each of them." Alice elaborated a bit more.

"Really? Wait… why are you telling me this?" He inquired.

"Do you really have a choice? The great and mighty Goddess sword is broken already."

"Erk… yeah I guess you're right." he conceded.

I sighed, something that went unnoticed by either of them, and so it began. Goddamnit Alice.

The king was babbling in a delirious state, muttering complete nonsense from the shock. As guards rushed in to investigate what had caused the commotion, one of them stopped to question us.

"What happened here!" he exclaimed.

"Uhm, the monster lord appeared and destroyed the sword!" Luka yelled, loud enough for all them to hear.

The chaos following was deafening, orders being yelled out for more guards to protect the king and the castle to be fortified. In the cacophony us three managed to get out of the throne room and into the hallway.

Suddenly a soldier came running to stop in front of us, "You're heroes right? A monster is attacking San Ilia!" As if to punctuate his sentence, one of the guards was bodily thrown through a door from another room.

The armored figure of the heavenly knight of fire, Granberia, came through next.

"Granberia!? What are you doing here?! Are you attacking the city!?" Yelled Luka.

"Of course not, this place is in the middle of nowhere. I'm here to cross swords with you!" Pointing a scaly hand at Luka.

"E-eh? Now!?" Even with his surprise, Luka pulled out Angel Halo quickly, "Can't we do this somewhere else?"

"No! Now show me what you've learned!"

Luka opened with thunder thrust, parried by the dragonkin, which he followed up with a more normal swing.

Seeing as how I already knew what was going to happen, "She does know this also counts as aggression against humans right? Maybe not Luka, but in the middle of San Ilia?" I wanted to see what Alice would say, she'd been pretty stern with Granberia when I last brought it up.

Alice sighed, "I doubt she even thought about that. It's fine though, as long as she only attacks Luka." As she said this, Granberia slammed the flat of her blade into a soldier's face. Alice clicked her tongue, "I'll talk with the knights about this, later."

Probably a good idea, I was amazed a second monster war hadn't started already without Ilias' intervention.

Luka did surprisingly well for his second bout with the dragon swordswoman, the skill gap, not to mention the physical, was still incredibly noticeable though. While he had learned much more since their first fight, he was still unable to keep up, and I didn't think he landed a single blow.

At the end of it though, Granberia was smiling, "You've gotten better! I look forward to next time." With that she vanished in a column of fire, was there something symbolic about teleportation using the elements?

Luka took that as a sign to lay down on the ground, completely exhausted. Alice and I walked over, the hallway around where they'd fought was completely destroyed.

"Granberia letting a beaten opponent go? She likes you." Alice seemed a little surprised.

"Does she usually show her affection like this?" Luka groaned from the floor.

"It's who she is, as annoying as it can be."

"Great."

Seeing as how Luka didn't know where the spirits were, and I pretended not to, we decided to visit the library in hopes of finding answers. Something made much easier because of Luka's display of fighting Granberia earlier, apparently fighting one on one with a heavenly knight (and supposedly winning), got you a bunch of places for free.

The library was considerably less luxurious compared to the rest of the castle, though still considerably nicer than anything I'd seen on earth. As expected, most of the books here were about Ilias, why wouldn't they be.

"This library smells like monsters." Alice said matter of factly.

"Monsters? Why would there be monsters in San Ilia's library?" Luka questioned.

"Not physical monsters, probably some spirits possessing the books, be careful what you open." She sure was feeling helpful today.

"Right, I'll keep that in mind." Completely ignoring the fact he couldn't tell which were possessed.

Which, was proven right moments later when a book he'd grabbed exploded open, a monster coming out of it to attack, Luka sealed it easily, one hit only. Moving on from that he opened another.

I looked over at Alice, who was stacking books up in a pillar, a singular potato on top. "Alice no."

The stack of books was set on fire, "Alice yes."

The smell of cooking starch caused Luka to look over, "What are you doing!?"

"Cooking, what else are these books good for?" Luka had a look of disbelief on his face. Muttering something to himself, he decided to ignore her and keep searching for a book about the spirits.

Eventually a particularly powerful monster burst out of a book, one titled, 'Four Animists And Their Sources', who declared the book forbidden to read. "On the order of the monster lord, you cannot read this book."

The monster lord in question had just left to get a new potato, unfortunately for Luka.

This fight went on a fair while longer, with the monster being able to take multiple hits from Angel Halo, eventually Luka did something though.

"My hair! Alright now I'm getting serious!" The monster used one of her tentacles to pick a book off a nearby shelf, the other appendages continuing to battle with Luka.

Reading from what I assume was a magic book, numerous sigils and runes appeared around her. I wasn't sure what would happen if it finished, and despite my inability to really fight yet, there was something I could do here.

Picking up a hefty tome, I prepared to use ol', not so, reliable. Chucking the heavy book as hard as I could, it connected! Dazing the monster enough for Luka to get clear of a powerful blast of magic.

"You! That hurt!" She rounded on me, some of her tentacles still fighting Luka. Now I could see her more clearly, she looked a bit like a librarian, if said librarian had tentacles for hair and a spirit trail for legs.

Well… shit.

A dark purple ball of energy flew toward me as the monster read an incantation, I dove to the side just barely avoiding it. The magic itself was obviously pleasure, seeing as I was now rock hard.

Looking past her I could see that Luka was still engaged with her hair, I was on my own.

Now, I don't know if I've said this or not, but monsters are really, really strong. Luka has his whole 'prophesied hero' thing, and he's the protagonist, which basically makes him invincible. I, on the other hand, was an average guy from Florida.

I'd never taken any self defense classes, though I knew my way around guns, and I didn't really lift much, play sports, or do much of anything really. I wasn't in terrible shape, but I was thin and lanky, not really fighting material.

This was made apparent, since I hadn't fought a single monster yet, and as I was running, screaming my head off, from the book/apparition/librarian monster throwing magic at me.

"Get back here!" I dove between two of the bookshelves, barely dodging yet another spell. At least I seemed good at running.

"Ohh fuck." I was at a dead end, two shelves on either side, a wall at the back.

"Found you!" The librarian was at the end I'd dove in from. What happened to Luka? I stepped back, away from the monster and toward the wall, eventually I was right up against it.

"Nowhere to go~. Do you know what I do with humans that cause a commotion in the library?" She licked her lips, saliva dripped from her mouth.

"U-uh, let them go and warn them not to do it again?" I said hopefully.

"Hmm, nope." Her hair reached toward me, her hands lit up with purple energy. "I take them, and wring out all their delicious semen, like I'm about to do with you~."

I was oppressed flat against the wall behind me, now would be a really good time for Luka to make a surprise entrance. The monster finally reached me, her hair coiled around my arms and legs, not that I was moving in the first place, frozen in panic as I was.

She took her sweet time undoing my belt and pulling down my pants, exposing my genitals to the cold air. She blinked, "Oh, you smell delicious, what is that? You're not baptized, just like your friend, but there's something else too?"

I was going to kill Alipheese the next time we met, so this was what she meant by that little tidbit. "I can't put my finger on it. Maybe I'll know once I taste you." She bent down and lined her mouth up with my cock.

"Now then, even though this is a library, don't be afraid to scream~." With that final message, she took the head inside her mouth and began her work.

The first thought in my head was of the incredible feeling, she was really good at this. The second thought was that there I couldn't cum, if I did I was even more fucked than I already was.

The speed of her bobbing up and down increased, I was doing everything I could to hold myself away from ejaculating. It was easier than Alma had been, the sex magic wasn't nearly as potent, nor was the orifice used.

Shit, there was no way, it was coming.

An absolutely horrific sword point burst from between her breasts. Angel Halo, a look of surprise overcame her face, before the sword finally sealed the librarian monster once and for all.

I laid there, on the absolute edge of orgasm, hell if I'd been any happier to see Luka it might've set me off.

The boy in question had a grimace on his face, "Are you alright?! E-er, you should… you should probably put your pants back on." Thanks a lot Luka, didn't notice.

"I'm fine, what happened to you?" I pulled my underwear and pants back up, buckling them back up.

"She hit me with some sort of paralysis spell, I couldn't move an inch for minutes. Then she just left me there and went after you." Again, fuck you Alipheese.

"Hah, well, at least we're okay now. Sorry I couldn't do anything to help."

He looked at me oddly, "You did though. If you hadn't hit her with that book I don't think either of us would be fine." Didn't feel like I'd done much in the end, we still almost lost.

"Alright, alright, do you have the book?"

"No, she dropped it when she went after you, it's probably still where we started fighting." We both ran back, looking for the book about the four spirits.

Luka began digging through a pile of tomes, as I looked around for it as well. In doing so something else caught my eye.

The fire from the book bonfire had started spreading, flames reaching out for more fuel in the form of bookshelves and paper. The entire corner where Alice had done her 'cooking' was ablaze.

"Found it!" I heard from behind me.

"Luka!" I yelled back over to him as he grabbed the book about the spirits, "We really need to get going!"

"What do you- by Ilias, damnit Alice." The two of us sprinted out of the library, bumping into a guard on our way.

"What the hell is going on in there?!" He shouted.

"The monster lord set the library on fire." Luka answered truthfully.

"What?! Not only the holy sword but also the great library?!" He yelled over his shoulder, "Men! Get in here we have to save the books!" A bunch of other soldiers rushed past us carrying buckets of water.

"Why is she like this?" Luka looked at me for answers.

"Don't question it man, you're still sane."

Eventually we met back up with Alice, who was eating one of her baked potatoes. We were now back outside the castle, sitting on a bench to look at the book.

"Alice, you burned the library down!"

"Quiet idiot," She hissed, "do you want everyone to hear you?"

Luka turned his head sharply left and right, thankfully no one had heard. The three of us looked over the book as Luka opened it up, "By the way Alice, the monster in this one said the monster lord forbid anyone from opening it?" He asked.

"I… don't know anything about that." She looked just as confused as us, I couldn't remember if she had anything to do with it or not.

"Huh, well it looks like one of the spirits, Sylph, is in a forest of spirits, it's pretty close by." Luka read from the book, "We should go there next."

"They named the forest where a spirit lives, the forest of spirits?" I asked, a bit on the nose there.

"What else would you name it? She is the most important being there." Alice replied.

I shrugged, I guess that made sense. "Well before we leave I gotta go get my stuff from Jerome." At Luka's confused expression I elaborated, "The blacksmith who made my gun."

"Oh, well we gotta go get more supplies anyway, let's meet up at the city gate when we're done." He said.

Sounded good to me. Alice went with Luka to get supplies, probably to pick out the road snacks.

Walking into the blacksmith's shop, I walked up to the counter. He wasn't out yet, though I could hear some rustling in the back behind the door.

A moment later the large smith came out holding a fully assembled shotgun. Placing the weapon down on the counter he pulled out a container filled with twenty five shells. "As promised, all of this is free, you get the gun and five shells of each type."

"Great, thank you." I picked up the long gun, fully assembled it was about 48 inches long, the barrel about 30 of those inches. It weighed a little heavy, but then again the materials it was made of were probably different than normal.

I picked up the box of shells, each one was a brass shell, the plain ones were filled with typical buckshot, 12 gauge. The elemental ones were filled with an odd crystal.

"Normal ones are the same as what you designed, the ones with the crystals are what shoot the fun stuff. The crystals are activated by the striker when it hits them," I turned the shell around, the back of the elemental shell had a hole in it, leading directly to the crystal inside. "They'll recharge over time through mana in the air." Jerome finished.

"So the normal ones are one time only?"

"If only I could change that, but yeah. You'll have to load 'em yourself once you fire them out."

Good, I had some ideas for what I could do with these.

Looking over the weapon again, I realized something about it. It was almost an exact replica of a model from earth! The colors were a bit different than normal, and the runes and script for the enchantments along its frame made it a bit unique, but it was absolutely still a Remington model. The Model 10 if I was certain.

I guess that answered my question about it being suspicious Jerome just knew how to make one. Thank Alipheese, you beautiful bitch.

I gave my thanks to Jerome as well, leaving the shop with my newly acquired Model 10, and its ammo. The shotgun I slung across my back using a piece of leather, and I'd put the shells in my backpack.

Meeting Alice and Luka at the gate, it was just a little past midday.

"Oh, that looks nice." Luka was staring at the firearm on my back.

"Yeah, I can finally fight with you." This was what made me more excited than anything, I had been almost completely useless throughout the journey, and apparently I was going to be in a whole lot more trouble once I started learning the elements, so having a backup was perfect.

"Can we leave now? I don't want to spend a single second longer near this outrageous place." I agreed with Alice, we needed to get to the forest as soon as possible.

With that, the three of us set out again, on the road to the first spirit, the wind itself, Sylph.

Author's note

Well, this was particularly long. Not sure if this will become more normal, or if this chapter will be special this way. Typically I have set events or scenes I want to do in each chapter, so it all depends on how much each one takes up.

On another note, David chapters will be getting more common, seeing as how a lot of the events after San Ilia are really damn important, so if you like the isekai man, then you're in luck.