Fulton turned out to be a rather officious-looking gnome with large, goggle eyes and a ridiculously bushy mustache. The high priest of Metethys was so buried in his books that he brought two of them with him even when greeting Jadis. He and Myron, the Golem she’d already met, were the only two high priests of their goddess in the empire. While they were the only two at the top, compared to Villthyrial’s following, there were far more lower-level priests present in their temple. More than there had been in Lyssandria’s temple, even.
When Jadis had expressed her surprise over how many priests there were, Myron had explained that many of the individuals were not actually priests or clerics but were instead scholars from the Imperial Academy who had taken the opportunity to come and meet the famed Nephilim.
Meet might have been the wrong word, though. Everywhere Jadis looked she saw men and women with pens and journals, all of them furiously writing down notes and observations concerning her. While they all seemed nice enough, she could tell that they were far more interested in her as a unique case study, rather than a person. Of course, that attitude extended just as much to Alex as it did to her, and even to Tegwyn, much to his bemusement.
One particularly enterprising young woman even approached Alex directly and started interviewing her with a series of carefully worded questions that focused on the Demon’s physical and mental status. Once Alex showed that she could answer those questions, albeit haltingly, she quickly had a crowd of scholars and priests all grouped up in front of her, calmly asking questions while writing down her answers.
It almost reminded Jadis of some kind of press interview. All that was lacking were the cameras. Though, when she looked off to one side, she could see that at least two people were actively sketching portraits of Alex, as well as her.
While many of the priests focused on Alex, Myron and Fulton did what they could to answer Jadis’ questions concerning Guardian Soul Grubs, Demons, and also a few questions on Nephilim history.
Metethys’ temple held a massive library within its walls, one that spanned multiple levels and had to contain tens of thousands of books and scrolls. However, according to Fulton, the Imperial Academy had even more books on its shelves. The temple usually housed the older, more valuable tomes, while the academy had more copies of the books so that multiple were available for both students and the public to read. Many of the temple’s tomes were original volumes from which copies were painstakingly recreated by hand before being sent out to other libraries. The printing press was not a thing yet on Oros, though from what Jadis saw she could understand why. There were people with classes whose whole skill set were centered around being able to quickly copy and reproduce books. They weren’t anywhere near as fast as a modern printing press, but they were far faster than any normal person when it came to writing and rewriting words on a page.
The books that Myron and Fulton showed Jadis on the guardian grub were all the same as the tomes Old Tom had shown her. In fact, they were exact copies of the same volumes. While they didn’t have any new information to provide, they did have a few of their scholars with the right skills quickly copy the relevant chapters into a blank journal so she could take the info back to her room to review with the rest of her companions.
As to Demons, Fulton was able to show Jadis an extensive collection of tomes, manuscripts, and essays written by scholars and researchers over the years regarding the Spawn of Samleos. The vast majority of the written works were focused on cataloguing the different types of Demons, the abilities that they manifested, and their usual behavior. All with the purpose of making it easier for others to kill those Demons, of course. While there was a frankly overwhelming amount of information on the different types of Demons, Greater Demons, and Demon Matriarchs, there was surprisingly little concerning Demon intelligence.
One promising book did catalogue a series of experiments where a group of researchers had attempted to raise several Demons in a controlled environment, but the experiment had apparently ended in disaster when one of the scholars was killed by one of the Demons they had raised. The book was huge, hundreds of pages long, and was written in a style that favored complicated words and scientific jargon. Reading it was slow going for Jadis due to the differences between written English and Imperial, but she received permission to take a copy with her. Jadis hoped Aila would have better luck with the tome and would be able to summarize the more important bits for her.
Fulton also gave Jadis several other books regarding Demons, including several that outlined the types of Demons that were being commonly seen on the mainland battlefields, according to reports. He also gave her books that talked about the Demon Lord, the Cult of Samleos, and a book on courtly etiquette for some reason. Jadis got the feeling that Fulton would have forced more books on her but was restrained by Myron.
The last book Jadis was given came from the Golem. It was a book that covered the history of the Nephilim, stretching from the creation of the world to their eventual extinction some two thousand years ago. It wasn’t a detailed account, more of an overview than anything else, but it was precious information as far as Jadis was concerned. While Jadis had been reborn as a Nephilim due to the whims of a god and therefore had no true connection to the original people who had once lived on Oros, she was intensely interested in knowing more about who the Nephilim once were. She didn’t know anything about their culture. Did they even have a distinct culture from other races? A different language? Different laws or beliefs? Jadis had no idea, but she happily took the book Myron offered her so that she could get at least a small inkling as to what the lost children of Lyssandria were like.
While she was there, Jadis managed to arrange a date where Aila could speak with some of the imperial scholars about her research journal. Her lover still wasn’t entirely confident she wanted to share any of the notes she’d taken regarding Jadis’ class, much less the class details of everyone else, but Jadis wanted Aila to at least talk with the scholars. Class skill research was something Aila was obviously interested in and Jadis wanted to encourage her favorite redhead’s intellectual pursuits. Even if she didn’t publish any info on their classes in the end, Jadis still thought it was worthwhile for Aila to talk with the kinds of people who regularly wrote the manuscripts that she so genuinely admired.
With a fairly large pile of books to read, Jadis returned to Lyssandria’s temple so she could tuck right into the tomes without delay. Tegwyn didn’t join her and instead returned to Villthyrial’s temple with a few books he was interested in. The Dryad was more comfortable with the nature theme of the temple than he was with pure stone buildings, so Jadis didn’t press him. He’d explore the city more when he was ready. Alex stuck with her, naturally, and even had a couple books of her own that were intended for children.
As Jadis briefly reviewed the books she had, she wondered if maybe she should start by reading the children’s books herself. While she could read Imperial, it still wasn’t as easy for her as it was to read English. Children’s books weren’t exactly engaging, but practice made perfect, after all.
When Aila and Kerr returned later that evening, they found that their entry into the room was blocked by several dozen priestesses all gathered around the open doors to the honored guest chambers. Of course the women quickly dispersed once Jadis’ two lovers asked to be let through, but even then, several still lingered to watch longingly as Jadis continued to read storybooks out loud to an attentive Alex.
Jadis had made the mistake of leaving the doors open when she’d returned and by the time she’d realized that she had an audience, she felt it was a little too awkward to shoo them away. Once she had finished the first book, several of the priestesses had fetched her a few more books, these ones more like simple novels than children’s tales, and had encouraged her to read those aloud as well. And so Alex and the priestesses had been treated to a three-way performance as Jadis’ selves narrated the books, each body performing different voices for the characters.
She wasn’t sure which priestess had slipped a smut novel into the pile of books, but Jadis had to admire the woman’s taste and made a mental note to read the intriguing work of fiction when she didn’t have such a large crowd listening.
“Tell me this isn’t what you’ve been doing all day,” Kerr groused as she collapsed onto a couch while shooting the last of the lingering priestesses a dirty look. “Because that would just chafe my arse.”
“I was just practicing,” Jay defended herself as she set the novel down, making sure to mark the page so she could return to the adventure story later. “I have actual information to share.”
“That’s good,” Aila quipped as she removed her cloak and hung it up. “Because we do as well. Some of it is actually good news, too.”
“That sort of implies some of the news is bad,” Dys frowned at Aila.
“True,” Aila agreed without hesitation. “But nothing too bad.”
“Which do you want first? The good or the shit?” Kerr asked as she kicked her feet up on the coffee table near where Alex was sitting on the floor. “Though I guess it doesn’t matter that much really—hey!”
Kerr yelped as Alex lifted her legs up off of the table, using her tentacles to pull the archer’s boots off before setting them aside and then shifting her feet so that they were resting on an ottoman. Placing the boots near the hearth, Alex met Kerr’s incredulous stare with a serious look of her own.
“Dirty…”
“I may have read a few pages from an etiquette book to her before I got bored,” Syd admitted.
“Fucking Ulya’s tits,” Kerr grumbled as she made herself comfortable in her seat. “You better not turn all polite and prissy on us, Alex. We’ve already got enough sticks in the mud for one harem, thank you very much.”
“Harem…?”
“Not important at the moment,” Aila interjected before they could become further sidetracked. “I’d like to review what we accomplished and what we learned today. Though, should we wait for the others? Actually, where are Eir and Thea? Did they go out?”
“They did, before I got back,” Jay nodded. “Aurea said that Eir wanted to deliver a few responses directly, and then she’d be back before dinner. I haven’t seen Sabina and the others return yet, either. But go ahead and tell me the news now; we can fill them in once they get back.”
With a nod, Aila filled Jadis in on what she and Kerr had been up to all day.
The bad news, as Aila had called it, wasn’t really all that bad or unexpected. Most of the mercenaries that were in the capital were either already contracted to other companies or were entirely unsuitable for joining Fortune’s Favored. Those numbers were already small to begin with, since the vast majority of mercs in the empire were on the front lines rather than in the safe inner territories. Not that there hadn’t been a few contacts Kerr had managed to look up who might have worked out, but after the initial interviews Aila had preemptively dismissed them from further consideration. Even putting the peculiarities of Jadis’ class and relationship with her guild aside, Aila still had standards when it came to who could join the company. Anyone who looked like they wouldn’t be able to keep a secret or be trusted with sensitive information was automatically taken out of the running, which turned out to be most of the candidates.
The good news was that Noll had come through with his own promise to find suitable candidates. Again, there hadn’t been many to choose from, but two experienced mercenaries he’d kept tabs on had happened to be in the city and looked like they were exactly the kind of people their mercenary company was looking for.
Nevan and Orla Dunntree were a couple of gnomes who had met each other while adventuring and gotten married some ten years ago. The two were middle-aged for gnomes, very in love with each other, and very monogamously so. Neither were prudes, but neither would have any interest in joining in Jadis’ debauched circle of lovers nor were they likely to feel any envy or jealousy. They were extremely committed to each other, which was part of why they weren’t currently contracted with a mercenary company. The last one had tried to split them up for a long period of time, so they had broken their contract and paid the fine to get out of it rather than be parted.
Both had decently high CLRs, though neither had unlocked their tertiary class to gain elite status. Noll had vouched for their martial skill though, commenting that while neither was particularly outstanding solo, as a duo they had wonderful synergy and were extremely effective against strong single targets. Nevan was a swordsman who wielded a rapier while Orla used a dagger and a whip. Neither had any magical affinity and their classes were entirely martial in nature, but as Noll had proven, that was hardly a handicap. The two usually made their living taking down powerful magic beasts for bounties, but were willing to consider joining Fortune’s Favored as they were interested in fighting more Demons and wanted to reach CLR sixty.
An experienced couple who could work as part of the team but would also be able to handle themselves without Jadis’ help did sound like a great fit. Aila had only briefly spoken with Nevan, but he hadn’t set off any red flags and he’d agreed to bring Orla by the temple the next morning for an interview. Jadis genuinely looked forward to meeting the two gnomes.
As Aila wrapped up her report on the day’s outing, Eir and Thea walked through the still open doors. Sabina, Bridget, and Sorcha were right behind them, the trio of women still talking animatedly while Eir and Thea looked more nervous than anything. Well, Eir looked nervous, while Thea looked like she was experiencing nerves by association.
“What’s up?” Syd asked as she watched the group enter the room. “How’d everything go today?”
“Sort of a mixed bag,” Sorcha said before the others could say anything. “But nothing that takes precedence over the red lass here.”
Syd raised her eyebrow at the goblin, but instead of responding she simply turned her gaze onto Eir, the question clear in her expression.
“I’m sorry Jadis,” Eir said, bowing her head in an unexpected gesture of regret. “I made a promise that you will attend a ball.”
Jadis mentally blinked at the odd apology. A ball? Sure, a formal dance wasn’t something that Jadis was particularly interested in attending, but that was the kind of formal event that she had always figured she’d probably have to suffer through if she ever went to the capital. It really wasn’t that big of a deal, so long as she didn’t have to wear some kind of poofy dress.
“What’s so bad about this ball?” Syd asked in confusion.
“My parents are hosting it,” Eir explained, her face still turned downward in a bow. “They want to meet you because I may have unintentionally revealed that I intend to carry your child, so they expect that you will be asking for my hand in marriage. I’m sorry.”
Jadis stared with all three of her selves, her mouths hanging open while the other women in the room shifted awkwardly from side to side. Finally, Sorcha broke the silence by pointing at Eir.
“See? Way more important than whatever shite I was about to tell you about.”
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