Viktor's back protested with a sharp crack as he straightened, the two-or-three-mile walk having taken its toll. Night had fallen completely—around nine or ten o'clock by the look of the stars scattered across the darkening sky.

The manor loomed ahead, a crumbling monument to neglect and desolation, but he'd made it.

They'd all made it.

Behind him, Kaida was being pulled along by the glowing purple chain, and she wasn't taking it well.

"Oi, can't those slimes melt this thing into them?" she asked, frustration thick in her voice as she yanked forward, testing the chain's resistance like a caged animal.

Viktor glanced back at the two gelatinous creatures perched on his shoulders—Rusty and Rustina, the purple and pink slimes that had somehow become part of his motley crew. "You can try it."

Kaida grabbed the purple slime off his shoulder and pressed it directly against the chain binding them. For a moment, Viktor thought it might actually work. The slime wobbled, pulsed, seemed to be acknowledging the contact.

Then Rusty simply... bounced.

Right over Kaida's head.

He landed several feet away, back to his cheerful bopping around, completely unbothered by the chain or the woman's growing frustration. Rustina chirped from Viktor's other shoulder, and if slimes could laugh, Viktor was pretty sure she was doing exactly that.

"Piece of shit slime," Kaida muttered, her scarred face flushed with irritation.

Bella followed behind them both, her silver hair catching what little light remained. But her head was down, her golden eyes unfocused. She was thinking. Thinking hard about what Viktor had said earlier on the road.

*"What will you do if I remove your status as a slave?"*

The question circled in her mind like a predator. She didn't know. Technically, she didn't know what she would do. Her entire existence had been defined by servitude—first to her original master, then to Elena, then to the orders to kill Helena. Slavery was the only framework she understood.

But the thought of being free? Of being 'nothing' instead of a slave? That twisted her insides in a way she couldn't articulate. A status of nothing meant no protection, no purpose, no belonging. At least as a slave, she existed in relation to someone. Without that definition, she was just... empty.

Her ears flickered nervously as they approached the manor.

The candles gave it away first.

Several of them were burning along the corridor, casting dancing shadows across ancient stone walls. Someone had been here. Someone with access to resources—most probably that merchant, Aldrin, who seemed to have an infinite supply of goods that shouldn't exist in this desolate territory.

Viktor entered first, his eyes scanning the interior with the practiced awareness of someone always anticipating threats. The great hall was dim but functional, the candles providing just enough light to see that Elara was seated on an old couch. Toby was asleep against her side, his small fevered body finally still, finally peaceful.

"What happened?" Viktor asked, nodding toward Kaida to settle near the entrance.

Elara looked up, her dark eyes sharp. She scratched her chin thoughtfully. "Nothing. Toby was playing with me, and he fell asleep."

Viktor nodded. That tracked. The boy was still recovering, still weak from his illness, though the herbal treatments were working better each day. But something about the way Elara's gaze flickered to the chain caught his attention.

She clearly wanted to ask about it. But then her eyes met Kaida's, and whatever question was forming died on her lips. Kaida's glare was sharp enough to cut glass.

"By the way," Viktor said, moving past the moment, "where is Aldrin?"

Elara straightened slightly, her bearing shifting to something more businesslike. "He went to the market to sell the clothes that Miss Meera had stitched. He wanted to check their quality and see what price he could fetch for mass production."

Viktor blinked. Then a slow chuckle escaped him.

"What?" he asked, amusement dancing in his dark eyes. "Isn't it? Whose idea was that?"

Elara's lips curved up slightly. "Lady Helena said she wanted to know the price of the clothes Lady Mira stitched. So the boss kind of went to find its real value."

Viktor exhaled, already knowing the answer but clearly somewhat surprised as he thought it would be Mira's initiative not Helena's.

After all, in his 100x abilites, there was silver tongue mastery too which he used passively like when making Aldrin silent today in carriage, whixh he got from Mira.

To be frank, Helena brought him domestic mastery and stability.

But Mira—Mira brought survival skills like production, about value, about building something sustainable due to her surviving day by day.

100 times a basic sword strike gave him sword dance that was very strong but in the end 100 times 1 is 100 not 1000 as making his all 100x abilites somewhat limited overpowerdness as they sounded but still they were indeed good enough to be considered among awakened abilities once he started using them more often.

Of course, 100x of Kaida's abikties or a Saintess just might show him real capabikites of his system.

But who cares about power when he needed some rest... in arms of his lovely wives.

He turned sharply toward the stairs.

"Sigh, they both are just..."

Kaida's arm jerked forward as the chain snapped taut. "Hey, don't pull me!"

"Come on," Viktor called back, already climbing. His tail swished with barely contained energy—anticipation for what Mira might have devised. "I need to see what she's—"

"Stop, can't you see it's night!? Let me here to guard the house!" Kaida yelled as, due to seeing candles around, she sensed something suspicious, so suspicious that her instinct told her not to go upstairs.

"Oh, now that you mentioned." he recalled as really given how they dealth wuth bandits, noone knows what danger come at such time, he yanking the chain as he moved toward the stairs passed orders "Hey, you both take care of the house. Protect it."

Kaida yelped as she was pulled forward. "Don't pull me like that, you bastard!"

Her red eyes were clearly furious but also suspicious as she couldn't do anything except get pulled, especially due to his body weight being more than hers, which created instability. As she tried to add, "Can't you just call them—"

But Viktor was already in motion, and the chain gave him no choice but to follow. As they passed through the hall, he gestured sharply to Rusty and Rustina.

"Stay. Guard."

Both slimes bounced off their perches—one landing on Viktor's shoulder with a soft squelch, the other on Kaida's head.

Then they dropped to the floor and began their patrol.

One remained in the great hall, settling near the entrance with a protective posture, while the other bounced toward the back entrance, effectively covering both main approaches to the manor.

"Did those monsters just... understand and follow his orders?" Elara muttered to herself, her mouth twitching in disbelief. Her sibling expression mirrored her own confusion.

Meanwhile, the moment Viktor and Kaida disappeared up the stairs, Elara turned her gaze toward Bella, who had remained by the doorway, watching the two ascend.

"Are you not going to follow them?" Elara asked, something knowing in her tone.

Bella flinched. Her ears shot upright, then flattened immediately. She shook her head slowly, her voice barely above a whisper. "I can smell it."

Elara's eyes raised in interest. "Smell what?"

Bella's face flushed a deep crimson. Her silver cat ears rested flat against her skull, and her golden eyes trembled as she squeezed them shut, her voice coming out in a mortified mumble that barely escaped her lips. "Um... it's... personal. I can't tell to a man."

Elara's mouth twitched as understanding dawned.

"Come on, sit beside me then," she said, patting the space next to her on the couch. "I'm ordered by Miss Helena to not come upstairs anyway."

Bella's face flushed an even deeper crimson as she made her way over, each step heavy with embarrassment.

She settled down carefully at the far end of the couch, as far from Toby as possible, her entire body tense.

Her ears drooped further with every passing second, and her yellow eyes stared straight ahead at nothing, unfocused and distant.

Elara watched her for a moment, noticing the way Bella's shoulders trembled slightly, the way her hands kept clenching and unclenching in her lap.

Something was going on upstairs. Something that had Bella's beast-kin senses going haywire.

Bella, trying to steady her racing heart, finally closed her eyes and took a shallow breath. She could smell it—that unmistakable scent flooding from the upper floor, carried through the manor on invisible currents.

The musky, intoxicating aroma of arousal.

Her golden eyes opened slightly as the reality set in, and her voice came out as barely a whisper, a statement of fact that only Bella could hear.

"Lady Mira and Lady Helena are... wet."

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