Our challenge was finally over and Zio and I presented our work to the scam vendor. Unfortunately, he had scammed more people while we were crafting our asses off. The world is so unfair.

  “That was fast. Are you sure you’re not a scammer?”

  I had to hold back so much as I was this close to punching him.

  Stop being an ass and inspect these swords.

  “Or what? You have this kid beat me up?” The vendor said as he flexed his many arms. He was of the same race as Zio so Zio stood no realistic chance.

  No… I will beat you up… just do your job…

  The vendor grumbled, called over his friends and inspected the swords. “You! Where did you get these swords?!” he asked as he inspected them in awe.

  I am so close to kicking your ass! I crafted them, that was the challenge, right?!

  “You must be the new coming of the Silver Torrent! This is marvelous!”

  Zio poked me. “Why don’t they know that you’re the Silver Torrent?”

  Because he’s a moron and maybe because of my passive skill. Hey scammer! Now that I won this bet, stop scamming people!

  “How dare you call the products of the Silver Torrent a scam!”

  The vendor's friends and some bystanders ganged up on me.

  You must be deaf… I never said those products were a scam… I said that you’re a scammer.

  “The value of these products is near priceless! They should be happy that I sell them for 5 gold!” The vendor said, and his friends seemed to agree.

  They are not scarce though…

  “They are over here!” They said calmly. some even grinned.

  I opened my dimensional pocket and let the completed swords flow out. I never got the chance to send a clone to deliver these. The scarcity might be due to my forgetfulness.

  People grabbed at them and confirmed their validity.

  Here have them for free, they were taking up too much space anyway. Nobody will buy your overpriced products now.

  I collected our 10 swords and gave 2 to Zio.

  One is for you and your boss. They should sell for 10 gold. You can keep them or sell them, it’s up to you. Become a great blacksmith. Get even more popular than me, so these guys will stop harassing me.

  I said as I pointed at the people surrounding us.

  “Uhh, I will try. You haven’t taught me directly, but I learned so much!”

  The crowd wanted me to sign the swords they just got for free. Complying will cause the least problems, right?

  Go home before these crazy fans get strange ideas. I will sign their free swords…

  Zio nodded and ran off. Please don’t take too long before becoming popular! These fans are annoying!

  A heated finger was used to sign them. This sure was boring. How do the idols do this shit all the time?

  Something disturbing happened shortly after.

  Who the fuck just pulled my tail?! And I don’t mean figuratively?!

  I activated my Elgards eyes and froze a suspicious individual to the floor and walked over to him.

  You have 1 chance, don’t blow it. Why did you pull my tail?

  “I…I wanted to see if it was real!”

  Are you pulling my tail?

  “N…not anymore!”

  I mean figuratively…

  “I…I don’t know that idiom, sorry!”

  Ugh, never mind. Why do you want to know if it’s real?

  “Uhm…”

  Let me warn you, you have 1 chance, don’t blow it!

  I readied a [Fireball].

  “W…wait! I’ll talk! We from Sapient belief that all non-humans are unnatural and that they need to be removed! That’s why I needed to know!”

  You sure are stupid…so how big is this cult of yours?

  The idiot gave an unnerving smile. “Oh, but we’ve already surrounded the city. Our members have also successfully infiltrated this city, there is nothing you can d…”

  I turned him into ash.

  Stupid cults, when I find a Dimsha that can ban objects and magic out of existence I will have it ban Potatoes, sand, lasers, brainwash magic and cults in that order!

  I cleared my throat and raised my voice.

  Guys! This guy wasn’t deceptive! A cult is targeting this city! Please stay calm and…

  Everyone panicked, and the crowd started to rampage.

  Why am I so shit…

  Something struck me. He did say that all non-humans should die, which means this cult consists out of only humans. But that means that dealing with this should be easy, right? These new races could all kick their asses easily…

  Then again, they attack this city knowing that humans are weaker than these races, they must be morons otherwise. Expecting incompetence in your enemies is an easy way to get screwed over. And! This situation isn’t my fault this time!

  I walked amidst the chaos, dodging panicking individuals. This cult sounds bad, but do I even need to do anything? Shim is a mythical beast too. He could probably fix this himself. I’m also curious what these legged beasts can do. I think we will just spectate.

  But…

  I stopped

  They pulled my tail, this can’t go by unpunished! I will just go ‘assassin mode’ sow some chaos under the cult members and then spectate.

  It's sewer investigation time! A [Fade] and into the sewers I went. They were new and clean, but… not S-tier.

  My hand went over the wall. These sewers were not built by the Yttroz Industries. I could tell. 30 seconds in and I already found something suspicious. Why would they build the sewers themselves? What do they have to hide?

  It reminded me of Boshi town sewers. It didn't match the city above. Boshi had a good excuse as it had been there for centuries, maybe even millennia but this city…

  No sewer lifeforms. It was deserted. The only sounds were of water flowing.

  I didn't find anything after 2 hours. Isn't this suspicious? Sewers always have something. Or am I biased, due to my many unfortunate sewer adventures?

  But where are the cultists if not here? They like to hide underground. Did they upgrade and go deeper, or are they hiding in the sky?

  I arrived at the electromagical system that purifies the water.

  Nothing odd with this either. It's not dumping garlic oil or something suspicious into the purified water either.

  Did I overreact to some crazy guy? My deception detection doesn't work if he truly believed that he’s a part of a cult but isn't. Delusion is an effective way to get around this detection.

  It's too early to write it off as delusion. I did see more humans appear in the city. It struck me as odd but thought nothing of it. Maybe the cult is hidden in plain sight.

  Discrimination is non-existent because of the racial variety but… most things aren't bad because they are but because it's unjustified or excessive.

  Discrimination has a negative connotation, but if a city is made for the new races, in a human world, that’s technically discrimination; favoring the new races over others.

  This is not bad of course but… what if humans want to live here and unintentionally take over because they become the majority. Do you kick them out or don't allow them to enter? Isn't that discrimination? Would it be justified?

  They have a whole continent to live on, but they choose this specific spot, a special spot for those who aren't as numerous.

  This is why I dislike being a leader. Only leaders get hit with these kinds of problems. This isn't my problem luckily, but Shim sure is having a rough time. It also makes me understand my mother better. She got forced to be the empress and lead Hourai. She must have gotten so many problems I can't even imagine just because of that, while she normally wouldn't have to deal with them.

  Note to self: never become a ruler of a country or a leader of a big group of people.

  The sewers were suspiciously clean and empty, so I had to give up on them. [Fade] wasn't needed, so I just wandered around. Since it's clean and empty, I could use it to travel from A to B without dealing with people and buildings on the surface.

  Maybe this is a good thing! I can come here to think and be undisturbed. The smell wasn't bad, so I had no issues snacking.

  So they're not in the sewers, where else could the cult be? Abandoned building? But the city is new…

  Corrupt leadership and it's hidden in a mansion of an important figure? But the city is new… who gets corrupt in 1 week and builds a cult in such a short amount of time? Aren't most locations getting eliminated because this city is new? The most logical location is squeaky clean.

  I don't know much about cults, do I? Are they truly hidden in plain sight? They need a base, right? I reached my destination which was the bakery.

  A manhole lifted, and I peeked to see if someone was around. I was in a dark alley.

  Look left! All clear! Look right! All clear! Look behind! All clea… wait…

  All I saw were black heels and what seemed to be laced knee socks, but I could guess who this was from this alone.

  Uhh, hey Yv… do you come here often?

  “What are you doing in the sewers…”

  Yv pulled me out and had the expression on her face which was getting quite popular among the idols of team Hourai; worry.

  I was looking for cultists. How did you find me by the way?

  “The air disturbances you make are quite unique as… they're nearly non-existent. They disappeared near a manhole and reappeared when you lifted that manhole there.” she said as she pointed.

  You made it here fast then; I also didn't hear you.

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  “That's my specialty. I move in a way that I can't hear myself.”

  Sounds difficult.

  We walked into the bakery and the cheapest piece of bread was 1 silver.

  Hey, is bread becoming scarce? Some guy in Alledra pulled this same stunt. 1 silver for bread is insane!

  “I'm sorry lad, I'm suffering from success, so I made them more expensive, so my stock can recuperate. Something happened to the supply chain and I have to survive for 2 weeks with what I've got.”

  The baker looked like a goat with 6 horns. He was standing like a human, but was a goat for the rest. He had hooves as hands. How the fuck does one make bread with hooves? His skill must be out of this world.

  Ah… a unique problem. Very well, how about those cinnamon rolls? What do you want Yv?

  “Those strawberry cakes look delicious!”

  Ok, so cinnamon rolls, those chocolate cream puffs and strawberry cake please.

  The goat baker packed my order swiftly, and my eyes were glued to his hooves. It didn't seem to hinder him at all. Are fingers overrated? Surely not, right?

  “That's 2 silver.”

  I paid the goat and gave Yv her cake.

  “A bit expensive but delicious!” She said while eating.

  It still surprises me how much she changed. She changed the moment she gave up on Greg. What is going on in this woman's head?

  Hey Yv, if you had to find a cult, where would you look?

  Yv looked at the ground. “Underground, but I assume you didn't find them. Hmm…”

  Her ears moved around and took a deep breath.

  “There are too many people and voices in the city wall. The airflow suggests that it's a large ring-shaped building…”

  I activated my Elgards eyes and she was correct. That's pretty suspicious.

  “Sapient? Purge? They seem to be making plans for tonight.”

  You heard all of that?

  “It's faint. I could only hear bits. There are too many walls and barriers.”

  My vision was partly hindered as it was likely that I needed different filters or to crack down those barriers.

  Thank you. You make information gathering much easier. Is there any chance you can hear through ancient technology? Those make my eyes useless…

  “I don't know…”

  That's fine, I'm sure you'll have a chance to test it out.

  So these cultists are hidden in the walls. The escort through the walls to reach Shim should have tipped me off, but the city walls are just 1 large circular building. But… shouldn't it be filled with guards?

  Yv and I snuck into the walls and I used [Fade] on us.

  “W…what is this? It's as if we stopped existing!”

  That's the point. We can relax, nobody can find us like this.

  “No wonder it's near impossible to find you…”

  It's a survival tactic.

  We walked and walked and walked. This place was huge and relatively empty. Some guards, builders and management staff. Even a canteen!

  Yv stopped me from raiding the canteen. She is right, we can raid the canteen after we've dealt with the cultists!

  “Why are you after that cult anyway?” Yv asked while chomping on a carrot.

  Yv… you told me to not raid the canteen, yeh?

  “Uh huh.”

  Then where did that bag of carrots come from?!

  I pointed at the bag of carrots Yv was carrying.

  “From the canteen, silly.”

  But…

  She shut me up by pushing a carrot in my mouth. “Everything you do turns into chaos. Also, I need these for my soul container.”

  She munched 3 more carrots before I could finish mine.

  Just carrots? That easy? Is that why you have so many lives? But you sure must love carrots.

  “I have 672 lives now. I need to eat 4 carrots to get 1 added and… I hate carrots…” She ate 5 more and stopped. “But I like being alive more than I hate carrots.”

  4 for every life… 672 lives… that's a lot of carrots… that might actually cause you to hate them if you're forced to eat them…

  “I just suck it up. Other tailed beasts don't have the ‘luxury’ to get to hate their soul container food like we do. A draft is coming from there!”

  Yv pulled me to a wall. I didn't feel anything but… I shattered an illusion, revealing a staircase.

  This illusion is sloppy.

  Yv's scouting abilities overlap a lot with mine, but now that we're being sneaky together I noticed some important differences.

  Things like hearing and feeling are omnidirectional and active at all times. I have to look for these things with the correct filters, which can cause me to miss things. If I'm not looking at it or for it, I probably won't see it, which makes sense.

  Sound and feel work differently. It doesn't matter if you pay attention or not, if something makes a sound or a draft sweeps in, it will get detected. Yv is covering the weaknesses of Elgards eyes and causing me to use them less or more effectively. Also… her hearing is insane. I wonder if she has something like an Elgards ear or something.

  “Wait!” She spread her arm in front of me. “Do you smell that?”

  Hmm it smells like those junkshooters.

  “A lot of gunpowder… are they trying to blow up the city?”

  Then they're fools, the Yttroz Industries built this. It would've worked otherwise. They surely can't be this stupid, right?

  I walked in. Yv wanted to protest, but we were still [Faded]. We could dance in front of their faces, and they wouldn't know.

  We walked around the group and sat down in a corner. This large room was filled with barrels of junkshooter powder. This isn't enough to blow up a city…

  20 men were drinking and smoking. I was wrong, they are morons…

  “Hey, Xander, is this really enough to blow up all those freaks?” A man said as he almost fell off a barrel.

  “Of course not! We have 20 times this amount of gunpowder. Although we have to wait till the higher-ups give us more details.”

  I cleared my throat and impersonated the voice of the first guy, as he seemed stupid.

  What was our task again? I forgot.

  Yv had a look of surprise, but I just shrugged.

  “Then stop drinking, you doofus!”

  A guy who was smoking grabbed the bottle of the drunk guy. “We will set these off in the city and use the chaos to hit them with this skill they taught us.”

  Smoker showed a magic skill.

  Yv grabbed my hand. “What's wrong? You're shaking.”

  This is worse than blowing up the city… that skill he showed seems to be some modified [Berserk]. They probably want the inhabitants to tear each other apart… from the outside it would look as if they're savages and not that they got hit by a terrorist attack or something.

  The cultists…no terrorists continued blabbering and showing off that they weren't the brightest.

  Whoever made this plan isn't stupid. He just made the plan look stupid…

  “Made it look stupid? It's not just an expression of hate?”

  Yv, you should be more upset, the mastermind is planning to oppose what you three did as idols, he wants to show the world that non-humans are as bad or even worse than humans think. After years of work you managed to warm the humans up to non-humans. This attack isn't just aimed at this city, its the spark to a bonfire. A bonfire of fear of non-humans… But…I could be wrong!

  “I hope so… forcing [Berserk] on everyone sure looks like a way to make the city look bad… We need to warn Shim!” Yv got up, but I sat her back down.

  I might be wrong in this too, but don’t you think this plan is lacking? It doesn’t account for what happens if Shim and Shenah appear and put a stop to it. They’re humans, after all... This plan is missing an insurance against strong individuals like Shim, Shenah or team Hourai.

  “But would they know?” Yv said as she pointed a carrot at the men who would most likely blow themselves up before the plan started.

  You make an excellent point, let’s go.

  Smoker was tapping out his pipe and sparks were flying everywhere. It's impressive that they haven’t blown themselves up yet. Nobody is saying anything about it either…

  Yv and I left. She focused and moved her ears around. “I can’t find something useful… I’m sorry…”

  That’s fine. Let's raid the canteen and get out of here. We have the most important details, I think. Let's just keep an eye out for strong individuals with bullshit abilities and notify Shim.

  “Are you ok? I would expect you to blow them up.” She put her hand on my forehead.

  Hey, rude! I like doing nothing more than blowing things up is doing nothing. This is Shim’s problem.

  “Wow…so you do rely on other people!”

  Hey Yv… want me to kick your ass?

  “Sure! I’ll be looking forward to it!” She hummed and skipped along.

  I…I did not expect that answer… what does she even mean with that…

  We raided the canteen and made it to a teleport pad. It was finally my time to shine. I hacked the magical circuits by shuffling mana runes and mana clusters to set the location to Shim’s room.

  I would say ladies first, but we’re not 100% sure if Shim is an ally, so I will go first in case of a sudden attack.

  “Aren’t you more fragile than me? I also have more lives! Let me go first!”

  I ignored Yv and went in first. A room filled with webs appeared and Shenah was bound and hanging from the ceiling in sexy way. A web had also blindfolded her. Yv teleported in and covered her mouth with her hands at the sight.

  Uhm… I seem to be interrupting something important…

  Shim turned into his humanoid form and swiftly unbound Shenah. “Uhm… I thought that I blocked teleport pads toward here, to what do I owe this visit?”

  We have reason to believe that your city will get hit by a terrorist attack tonight, but I’m sure you were already aware of it, maybe not about their timing.

  “Eh?”

  “What?”

  Both Shim and Shenah showed concerning behavior.

  Huh?

  A moment of confusion. Was I wrong in assuming that they knew? Then again, should they do kinky stuff when there are this many issues in an infant city? On the other side, they're mythical beasts, so they could pull ‘miracles’ out of their ass.

  A group of humans have targeted this city. I’m unaware of the details but they want to force some sort of [Berserk] on your citizens, turning this city into a slaughterhouse. That’s all I’m sure of what my speculation is to tarnish the image of non-humans. There must also be something to deal with strong individuals like yourself but we couldn’t find any.

  “Hmm, I did not know about that. Thank you.” Shim stretched out his arm and a spider leg on his back and reached for a spider silk thread and made them vibrate. “Shenah, if you would.”

  Shenah touched the vibrating threads, which started to resonate through the room. Yv’s ears perked up. “This is amazing, these threads are connected to the whole city, I can hear so many things through them!”

  Shenah’s thing was ‘touch’ so she might be able to do something similar as Yv.

  “Shim, they’re right, we need to act now.” Shenah got up and sent something similar to [Eternal Winter] through the spider silk.

  “Thank you, I need to move out.” Shim adjusted his collar and offered his arm to Shenah who froze a light blue dress for herself and locked arms with him.

  You guys look like you’re going to a gala.

  “We take style seriously.” They stepped on a teleport pad, Shim snapped his fingers and they disappeared.

  Damn that guy is cool…

  “Our work here is done. I want to eat more cake.”

  Wait!

  “What’s wrong?”

  Where is your sense of competitiveness? Do you want to be outdone by them? You’re a designer, right?!

  A fire lit up in Yv’s eyes. “Oh, let's show them our style points!.”

  follow if the story is interesting enough.

  Moorland Menace