Chapter 30
Seeing that after my changes I did not return to the same state as after acquiring my previous skills, Indiana and Big Mommy decided that our journey should end here. Indeed, during our travels together, I had grown accustomed to my new memories, and now, having received the memories and experience of the sage Lona, it felt as if the missing puzzle piece had finally returned to the collection of my previous memories. Even though Sage Lona's path was extremely difficult, she showed me that it was possible to reach a level of power that allowed her to enjoy decades of relatively peaceful and, in some ways, even happy life—albeit living in a tower, isolated from the world. But honestly—a personal mage tower is such a classic trope for wizards. And, just as importantly, she left me a new goal to strive for. The time loop. If I can figure it out and save this cursed island, that could be considered a happy ending for this world. Moreover, I will have an advantage that many of my predecessors did not. A promise.
The promise of the angel, according to which, once I acclimate to this world, I will be able to visit other worlds, and that means I will not be limited by the power system of Lona's world. Sooner or later, I will be able to solve the problem.
The trip from the goblin camp to Merimi's tavern took us a full day. The tavern was still as noisy as ever—drunks wandering everywhere, vomit and trash in the corners, and a half-naked girl dancing on stage, who, like so many others in pursuit of money, would inevitably be used by men too drunk to control themselves. Business as usual. Well, maybe not everything was the same. At Merimi's usual spot now stood her husband, who was first counting coins on the table with a smile, but as soon as he looked towards the entrance, his happiness vanished, replaced by despair.
"Were you already hoping I was dead?" the big woman snorted before striding up, sweeping all the coins off the tabletop into her inventory, and then with a single jump, landing with a crash on the other side of the counter, shoving her husband toward the kitchen. "Go on, get to cooking, I'm done with my business."
"If you say so…" the scrawny man sighed sadly and went to the black cauldron.
"I don't get how those two ever got together," Indiana muttered.
"I don't know either, and honestly, I don't want to know," I shook my head, grimacing slightly at the many lecherous looks directed my way. After all, I had a mature body now, and the cat ears atop my head made me even more attractive thanks to their exotic charm.
Although, there were a couple of glances that were simply curious. Looking in that direction, I spotted a red-haired girl who screamed, "I'm an aristocrat!" and beside her stood a huge, dark-skinned man dressed in a butler's suit, his ears suggesting he was a mix of human and goblin. Still, his main distinguishing features were his sheer size and the eyepatch he wore; he was even bigger than Merimi, and that's impressive, especially since part of Merimi's size was fat, whereas he was pure muscle.
"Tsk," the aristocrat clicked her tongue in annoyance when I started looking at them in return, and turned away. Smiling slightly, I made my way to the guild administrator.
"You know her?" Indiana asked quietly.
"In the future, we will become companions," I replied calmly, and he just nodded, accepting my answer.
"I take it you are Lona, then?" asked the man behind the counter marked for the guild.
"That's right. Good job recognizing me—after the changes I've gone through, I thought it would be harder for anyone to tell who I am," and I really was surprised, since looking at me now and comparing with my previous appearance, at most someone might assume I was a relative of Lona's—or maybe even her young mother. In this world, early pregnancy is nothing unusual; Lona herself is a vivid example.
As I was speaking, I once again felt a curious gaze prickling my back, and it wasn't hard to guess who it was—clearly that aristocrat who overheard our conversation. Judging from what I know from the game and Lona's memories, she must have already heard about me, so these changes surprised her. Moreover, her appearance in the tavern now also means she'll soon fall into the hands of slavers; I'm just curious whether this time her companion will come to me for help.
"So, I assume you found the caravan?" the guild administrator asked.
"Yes," I nodded. "The girls, as you probably already know, we handed over to the guards. Unfortunately, no one else survived, and we cleared out all the orcoids."
"Here's proof of all the orcoids killed, including the ones from the abandoned fortress," Indiana placed a sack stuffed full of orcoid ears on the counter.
"That's… a lot…" the man murmured, peeking inside the sack. "I'm afraid we'll need some time to calculate your reward. Please wait in the hall, and we'll call you when everything is ready. In the meantime, here's your reward for clearing out the bandit groups."
He handed us two gold coins—not all that much, considering how many bandits we actually killed, but the fact remains that we'd already grabbed a lot of loot from the camps—altogether we made 100 gold, of which 20 went to Merimi, 60 to me, and 20 to Indiana. In fact, we could leave this island right now, but for me, that wouldn't make sense: the center of the time loop is on this island, and if I want to solve the problem, I have to stay. As for Indiana…
I glanced thoughtfully at the elderly man, sipping beer from a wooden mug. Honestly, even though I'd miss the old fellow, with my future plans, it'd be better to send him home to where his family was waiting. But first, I needed to keep my promise.
"What's up?" Indiana asked, noticing my gaze.
"Remember, I promised to show you some ruins?"
"I do," Indiana nodded slowly, interest lighting in his eyes.
"I think I'm strong enough now, so maybe we could go visit the Tomb of the Slayer of False Gods. What do you say, do you want to go?"
"Of course!" the archeologist shouted excitedly, drawing glances from around the room.
"In that case, when we're ready, we'll head out—all we need is to buy a map, the rest I remember."
"Great. I'll handle the preparations," he got up from the table.
"Wait, don't rush. We'll take care of the preparations tomorrow, and today, we should just rest," I stopped him.
"...All right, you're right," he said after a short pause, sitting back down and downing his beer in one gulp, then shouting to the bar: "More beer here!"
At his request, Merimi nodded and sent one of the staff to bring him another drink.
"Miss Lona, your trophies have been counted," a guild worker approached me with a bow, making me think with a wry smile, "When did I become a lady, anyway?" Still, I quietly got up and with a peaceful smile followed him to the counter; honestly, I was curious myself how many orcoids we'd slain in these two weeks, especially considering that I was responsible for 80% of them.
"So, according to our calculations, in the past two weeks, you have killed..." the administrator began, and the tavern suddenly went silent, making him hesitate, but after clearing his throat, he continued, "Ahem, you have killed 326 orcoids, 20 of which are of the ogre subspecies."
"Holy shit," muttered the hunter sitting near the bar, voicing everyone's thoughts. "But honestly, that's about what you'd expect from Big Mama."
"I didn't kill them," Merimi rumbled. "The girl killed them, I just made sure she didn't get herself killed in the process."
"Merimi… are you kidding?" her husband spoke up, panicked at the thought there might soon be another crazy girl like his wife.
"Do I look like someone who jokes?" she squinted at the weakling beside her. What a disappointingly cowardly and feeble man he'd become; then again, she knew she'd long since lost her beauty, and couldn't really criticize her husband.
"Hey, Merimi, drinks are on me tonight! Everyone, raise a glass to our catgirl's success!" a quite tipsy Indiana tossed a gold coin to Merimi.
"Heh, what a foolhardy spendthrift," Merimi snorted before shouting: "You heard him, bastards, come get your drinks!"
After that, the tavern practically exploded. Who would have thought you could get free booze at the tight-fisted Merimi's place? Of course, remembering what had earned the free drinks, they all kept raising toasts in my honor. Some were so off-putting that I wanted to fireball the speaker.
"Here's your reward," the guild administrator handed me five gold coins, clearly waiting until the chaos started so there would be fewer prying eyes.
"Thank you," I said briefly, then, ignoring the invitations to join the festivities, went to my room. Tonight my plan was to get a good night's sleep.
And meanwhile, while one catgirl slept, a certain red-haired beauty went off looking for trouble, deciding she could handle things alone. But as it often happens, trouble found her much sooner than she expected.