90 The Festival
On that summer night, Vasconcelos seemed like a more beautiful town than usual. Hundreds of families gathered in the main square of the area and enjoyed themselves at the many different games and food stalls.
Young men were looking for girls to flirt with and maybe kiss. The adults had fun drinking and relaxing. The children spent their energy running around.
Nathalia, Luke, and Alexis visited most of the stalls and spent a lot of money. Luckily, Luke managed to keep the two thousand and five hundred silver coins he earned in his inventory, so whenever he needed to spend some money, he took only the necessary amount he needed.
However, Nathalia proved to have the energy of a child and wanted to play in several tents.
“Go Luke, you can do it!” Nathalia cheered for the half-wolf, who was using a paper sieve to try to pull goldfish out of a tank of water.
He placed the sieve in the water carefully so as not to tear the paper. This was already his third attempt. Luke slowly moved the sieve into the water and began to follow the movement of the fish.
As soon as he tried to lift the sieve, the weight of the goldfish tore the paper.
“Ah, my friend! It wasn’t that time! Want to try some more?” The shack merchant tempted him.
The half-wolf did the math quickly and realized that he had already spent fifteen silver coins on this game alone, and he hadn’t even come close to winning.
“N-no, thanks.” He said, fighting his pride. Alexis and Nathalia had a good laugh at Luke’s disappointed expression.
During the party, many looked at Alexis with contempt, disgust, and curiosity, after all, it wasn’t every day you saw a woman with horns.
To Luke’s surprise, the woman didn’t seem to mind it. He had already noticed that Alexis was not afraid to show herself to be a half-beast, but that day she affirmed this even more.
If it were the half-wolf exposing himself, he would surely have attracted the attention of many annoyed people, as had happened on several occasions throughout his life, but there was something different about Alexis that made people respect her.
When Nathalia finally ran out of energy, Alexis put her on her back and began to carry her back to the Strogueher mansion. Halfway there, the Elf slept while being carried.
“It’s no wonder she’s like this. She trained all day and still had so much energy… Ahh! Youth is so good.”
“You talk as if you are an old woman. How old are you?” Luke questioned her. After having fun together, he was feeling more comfortable talking to Alexis.
“Should I talk~? I don’t think it’s a fair trade just me saying.”
“I’m twenty,” Luke answered her bluntly.
“Twenty!? You’re surprisingly young for your looks.”
“Look, I know I don’t take much care of myself, but you don’t have to humiliate me either.”
“AH!? No, that’s not what I meant!” Alexis exclaimed, almost letting go of the hands that held Nathalia’s white thighs.
“Relax, it was just a silly joke.” He said, punched his forehead weakly, and stuck the tip of his tongue out of his mouth.
“You have a sense of humor!? I don’t believe it!” Alexis spoke ironically and brought her hands to her mouth, feigning surprise.
Nathalia fell backward as she was released by the half-dragon. Tomp! The Elf’s back hit the dirt floor. “Ouch, ouch, ouch!” she expressed as she stood up while massaging her back.
As soon as they arrived at the mansion, the servant girl Martha welcomed them. This time, she was not wearing everyday black and white clothes. She wore a long satin camisole that highlighted her body.
Martha welcomed Nathalia into her arms so that she could carry her to her room. “Are you going to sleep now? If not, I can serve you some tea in a moment. At that time, the guards should be patrolling the back of the mansion.” The competent woman said, with Nathalia propped up in her arms, who was about to sleep again.
“That sounds good. Would you join me, Luke?” Alexis inquired, as she removed her white embroidered blouse.
“S-sure.”
Although Luke liked to go to bed early to wake up early, he didn’t have much to do the next day, so he was glad for the invitation. During the time it took Martha to prepare the tea and put Nathalia to her bed, the half-wolf and Alexis sat on the couches in the main living room to talk.
Taking advantage of the situation, Luke decided to clear up a doubt he had about Pontiff Rebecca. “How can she manage to appear so young when she’s that old?”
“Eh… Don’t tell her that I told you about it, but she suffers from a curse. Let’s just say that when I met her she appeared to be older, and over time she was…”
“Rejuvenating.” The half-wolf surmised.
“Yes. Many would think that is a blessing, but I believe that for her it must not be good at all to see everything get older but her.”
“Could she end up turning into a baby? That would be… cruel, to say the least.” Luke theorized.
In the back and forth of several other subjects, Alexis ended up touching on an even more delicate issue than curses.
“So? What did you do for a living before you ended up here?” she asked, as she adjusted the cushion on the couch she was propped up against.
“Do I really need to answer that?”
“Oh, come on! Tell me something about yourself! You already know a lot of things about me, and I know practically nothing about you.”
“You have to earn my trust first. Or do you really think I’ve forgotten that you owe me a wish? We had a bet, and I ended up killing the demon receptacle.”
The half-dragon, instead of backing away as Luke expected her to do, stood up and sat down next to the half-wolf.
“Don’t worry, I can pay for it. What do you think you can ask me?” Alexis asked, leaning her bust forward.
Since she was now wearing a thinner T-shirt, her breasts were well highlighted. Without asking permission, she moved her face closer to Luke’s face. Alexis placed a hand on his thigh and began to move up.
Initially, the half-wolf had no desire to stop her, in fact, he was almost mesmerized by the woman’s red eyes. However, soon a weight fell on his consciousness.
“I can’t do that to Ayumi…” he said, stopping the advance of Alexis’ hand.
The half-dragon also seemed to come back from a trance-like state and stepped back. “S-sorry. I didn’t know you guys were getting like this, you know, in such a serious way.”
“It’s not that…actually, it’s complicated.”
In the end, when Martha arrived in the room carrying the trays with the teas, Alexis and Luke had each gone to their rooms.
A few more days passed and the atmosphere between the two of them became awkward again during that time. Ayumi Yamazaki also did not return to the Mansion, and this made Luke even more stressed and worried, however, he soon focused on what he had to do next.
“Shall we? The emissary from the Church warned me that it is already close.” The half-dragon said, putting on her boots at the entrance to the mansion.