Stray

Duran Vergil sat still on the floor. The miscellaneous things he was carrying behind him fell to the ground. After a series of noises and collisions, things finally calmed down. He stretched out his waist and took out a prepared small drawing board from his pockets that had a thick parchment paper that was well glued to it, making it light and convenient. The man hastily supported the drawing board on his knees with his left hand, took out a piece of charcoal with his right, and began to paint the lively scene in the branch hall.

The team called Tumbleweed was greener than he thought.

He subconsciously thought the captain of the team would be older, like Savage or Cross. When he thought about it carefully, Oliver Ramon was just an ordinary fugitive from a small town on the border and he didn’t have much appeal or leadership. On the other hand, as far as the tasks his team had completed, they weren’t as eye-catching at first glance, but the ending of the mission regarding Adrian Cross was truly crazy. It proved that they had the ability to infiltrate the Garland dungeon and was good at escaping.

Their search mission in Vincent Town seemed successful as well. It looked as if they had been toeing the minimum standard required for each month to take on a single task and they had no ambition of further expanding this. Savage’s strength and low profile were well-known in the industry, and no matter how strong Adrian Cross was before, he couldn’t make a splash now that had lost his powers. Although Jesse Dylan’s reputation wasn’t good, he had never made any notoriety with regards to money.

There was also a demon worshipper among them. In terms of acceptance of faith, he couldn’t find a more suitable team.

Virgil thought casually as he took out a piece of stale bread and began to rub the forked part on the parchment.

He needed to be careful. Virgil sighed. He had to stay away from Adrian Cross to prevent his deformation from being noticed. In case his identity was revealed, he didn’t know whether the team was willing to take his task.

However, Duran Vergil’s concerns had become a reality.

After being told of the client’s situation, to Nemo’s surprise, Oliver didn’t show a particularly surprised look. Their leader only raised slightly raised his brows.

“Well, Mr. Virgil doesn’t look like a mage.” Oliver thought with a calm expression. “I wonder if he would mind telling us his purpose of entering the burial chambers of the Abyssal Church.”

“…You’re thinking about picking it up?” Nemo didn’t hide the changes in his voice. “Ordinary clients will be safer.”

Oliver glanced at him deeply, with a complicated expression. “Of course we need to talk to Ann and the others first. Mr. Cross should be able to give us some suggestions.”

Oliver probably didn’t have a reaction, Nemo thought firmly. He himself had no problem pretending to be a demon warlock but dealing with a real demon warlock was a different matter. It would be better to take on an ordinary task from an ordinary person as it was the right way to act as cautiously as possible. Maybe the other two could express their views on this…

Ann Savage laughed for three whole minutes. Her voice was loud and unceremonious.

“Oh, isn’t this just great,” Ann had finally got her fill of laughter as she beat her chest to calm down. “God, we should take a picture of his face. Nemo, what are you nervous about?”

“Bagelmaurus has been with me all this time and it’s also because of me that we need to find information from the Abyssal Church,” Nemo said dryly, turning his face away from embarrassment. “In general, I don’t want to cause everyone too much trouble—”

“Since that gentleman himself is a demon warlock, he should have a good understanding of the Abyssal Church. Things will be easier to do if we do it this way.” Adrian didn’t seem to protest the idea, but his expression was equally subtle. “Personally, since I have discovered that a demon warlock is in disguise, I hope to figure out what his purpose is. After all, it’s tantamount to a superior demon who’s about to appear.”

“That’s right.” Ann wiped the tears from the corner of her eyes. “Nemo, a demon warlock isn’t a superior demon. If necessary, you can directly suppress him. And no matter what you exposed at that time, it’s absolutely impossible for a demon warlock to snitch to the other surface sects. Have you ever thought of suppressing him?”

Nemo laughed dryly, scratched his head, and responded to the question with silence.

“Looking at Mr. Virgil’s attitude, he seems to want to keep a low profile.” Oliver hurriedly shifted the attention away from him. “It’s fine just to look at the contents of the mission. At least we don’t need to kill anyone.” The tasks of killing the believers of the Abyssal Church was still fresh in his memory.

“I am in favor of taking this task,” the knight sighed, “but let me be frank; this is for a personal reason. I can still follow and monitor Mr. Light, but this one… Now that I know about him, I can’t act as if I’m not aware of him.”

“I also agree,” Ann said very excitedly while patting Nemo on the back. “You have to get along well with the client, Nemo—”

“Shouldn’t we ask for Dylan’s opinion?” Nemo tried to deflect, “or wait, there may be a safer…”

“Are you still nervous?……Wow, you’re still nervous?” Ann blocked her mouth with her hands. “Pffft… Sorry, I need to laugh a little more.”

“Alright,” Oliver decisively took the task with a sullen face and grabbed the parchment roll that appeared out of thin air. “Let’s go meet the client.”

Duran Vergil was still sitting where they left him. As soon as they entered the hall, Nemo gave the other members a general description of the client’s situation. The reactions of the two veterans did not bring much peace of mind.

“This degree of deformation is quite small.” Adrian nodded. “He shouldn’t be the type who’s too crazy.”

“That’s my kind of type,” Ann whistled. “Nice figure.”

Nemo completely abandoned the last glimmer of hope. He took a few deep breaths and followed Oliver’s steps and tried to mask his expression so it wouldn’t come off as too suspicious.

“I remember, isn’t there another one?” Duran Vergil put away the painting he was working on and stood up. His movements were so fast that he was almost dragged back to the floor by the overly heavy package behind him. “Oh… Sorry, I got a little too excited.”

“In the toilet,” Ann lied without hesitation. “Just forget about him.”

“Let me introduce myself again. My name is Duran Virgil. Painter, also a part-time exorcist and I have no fixed beliefs.” He bowed slightly. Nemo who was staring at him closely bowed stiffly in return then straightened up quickly like a spring.

“An exorcist?” The female warrior raised her brows and pulled the back collar of Nemo’s robe. “So Mr. part-time Exorcist, what do you want us to do for you?” She emphasized the word ‘exorcist’.

Adrian frowned but didn’t say anything. He looked solemnly at the messy gadgets on Virgil’s belt.

“I need to enter the catacombs of the Abyssal Church. I think you already know this.” Virgil’s tone became serious. “I won’t ask to you take risks… Don’t you have a demon worshipper? I need Mr. Light to go with me. Sneaking into the catacombs requires at least two people but other demon worshippers weren’t willing to take the job.”

“Can’t an ordinary human do it?” Oliver asked.

“Not possible. If there’s no demonic aura on your body, you’ll never be able to mix into the Abyssal Church.” Duran shook his head with a wry smile on his resolute face. “I know what you want to ask… In a sense, I’m indeed a demon worshipper.”

“An exorcist who has a demonic contract?” Ann said with interest. “It sounds like there’s more to this than you let on.”

“Sort of,” Virgil replaced his wry smile with a normal one. “In short, thank you for taking on my task… God, you don’t know how important this is to me. Please rest assured, I will definitely guarantee the safety of Mr. Light!”

Nemo tried pull up the corners of his mouth but failed to put on a smile, so he continued to remain expressionless.

“Speaking of which, Mr. Light where’s your demon?” Virgil patted his head. “According to the information provided, it says it’s a parrot. Can I see it?”

“The parrot lost its temper and had run away for a few days now,” as soon as Nemo was about to answer, Oliver quickly stepped in. “It had caused us quite a bit of a headache.”

“…That’s a bit difficult. If a demon worshipper doesn’t use his demon…”

“Just pretend he’s a demon warlock,” Ann said meaningfully. “Can the Abyssal Church tell?”

“Theoretically, no.” Virgil shook his head. “But it’s dangerous! Without a demon, demon worshippers can’t use Abyssal magic. If Mr. Light needs to cast spells…”

“Oh, that shouldn’t be a problem.” A new voice chimed in. “Mr. Light has a great staff that he can use to cast Abyssal magic. You can be rest assured.”

Jesse walked over slowly while playing with a few pieces of parchment paper in his hand. There was a little contract like writing from the gaps of the pieces of paper. “I’m back from the toilet.” He purposefully lengthened his voice and glanced at Ann with his beautiful eyes only to be met with an eye roll.

“…If you say so,” the tall dark-skinned man hesitated for a moment before nodding. “We shouldn’t be there for long.”

“We need a little time to prepare.” Nemo took a deep breath and finally managed to keep his voice calm. “When do you want to leave?”

“The sooner the better. Let me see… How about eight tonight?”

“Alright,” Oliver said. He stepped forward and briefly shook hands with Duran Virgil and handed him the task paper. “Let’s meet here at eight tonight.”

“I have to prepare well too.” Virgil smiled. He carefully stuffed the task paper into a smaller package, and then waved his hand boldly. “Then see you tonight?”

He didn’t linger around and walked out of the branch hall lugging the big bag on his back.

“Where’s my so call staff, Mr. Dylan?” Making sure that Virgil’s figure disappeared from the door, Nemo slowly grabbed Jesse’s collar. “If I had it, it would be here from the start!”

“Don’t you have that bone spur from the arthropod lizard?” The blond young man smiled brightly. “Just find a staff and replace the magic stone. In theory, it could be use as a medium to allow a certain limit of ‘surface magic’ to pass through and be converted.”

“That’s a good idea,” Ann mused. “By the way, you need to change your outfit Nemo. Currently you look like everything except a mage.”

“…” Nemo pulled his coarse cloth robe embarrassingly.

“Well,” Oliver murmured, “Ann, can you please go with Mr. Cross to prepare the staff? Nemo and I will go buy some clothes that are more ‘mage-like’.”

“What about me?” Jesse shouted. “Mr. Captain, you can’t be so cruel to your new members!””

“The fuller goat needs to be taken care of.”

“I can take it and go with you! Tell me truthfully, do you really know what a senior mage should wear?”

“I know—”

“No, you’ll miss some details!”

“…Take him with you, Oliver,” Ann coughed. “He’s right.”

Two hours later.

“Interesting, why are you holding the goat here?” Ann stopped outside the clothing store. She was holding a slender package and Adrian was walking next to her holding his stomach as if he had a eaten something bad.

Oliver, who was next to fuller goat, also had a bad look on his face.

“Because Mr. Dylan claimed that Nemo and I have ‘no aesthetics’, ‘poor taste’, ‘like a country mage dug out of a swamp’.” Their captain gritted his teeth and said, “he was making too much noise so I couldn’t bear it.”

“I’m only telling the truth,” Jesse said lazily. “That kind taste is simply a crime. The Abyssal Church will sentence Mr. Light just by the way he’s dressed.”

“If you don’t shut up again,” Nemo’s voice came from the store with the same gritted teeth, “I’m really going to beat you, Mr. Dylan.”

As he was talking, Nemo stepped out.

‘Okay.’ Oliver thought, ‘They really did have bad taste.’ Nemo now looked like a full fledge evil mage. Not to mention how gorgeous the clothing was, the style of the black robe was simple. It was only decorated with simple silver runes where it was necessary and was adorned with a neatly styled hood. It was extremely contrasting to what they had previously selected.

Nemo’s original temperament was soft, but now it was twisted into gloominess by this outfit. With the hood, he no longer had a neat short ponytail, but had simply let his hair loose. The ends of his hair hung down along his shoulders and was slightly raised. The carefree feeling, he had exuded completely disappeared, turning into a faint aura of danger.

“Mr. Light is too sturdy for a mage.” Jesse cleared his throat. “If he wore clothes that fit too well, people would think he’s an agile warrior. His previous hairstyle was bad too, just like from– Ahem.” He stopped just in time under Nemo’s cold stare.

“Well done. Keep that look in your eyes Nemo.” Ann clapped her hands and threw the slender package over. “It’s similar. Try this.”

Nemo opened the package.

Inside was a strange-looking staff, about twice the length of a normal cane. The bone spur of the arthropod lizard was grounded into a yellow-white bone ball and was embedded into the top of the long staff. The body of the staff was heavy metal and didn’t have a luster. The black metal was carved with delicate and strange patterns, which didn’t look like any rune of magic.

“This is?” Nemo tried to make a few gestures.

“A pole from a lamppost,” Ann cheerfully said. “I told you, our team is underfunded.”

The knight beside her finally move to bury his head into his hands.

The author has something to say：

Nemo finally has a weapon. Now everyone has a weapon.

——————

Nemo: …This is different from what was agreed.

It’s a pity that there is no ultimate artifact for Nemo…

This is the lamppost that’s about to become a legend! （×

Kinky Thought:

LMAO. Which poor lamppost did they tore down to make Nemo that staff?