Chapter Six News in the Night (Patreon)

A knock on the door disturbed the peace of the royal bedchamber. With a heavy sigh, she rolled over, before slipping out of bed. She idly noted her husband's absence, but the King had to deal with the consequences of Reiko’s blunder. As such he was over in Ironbarrow personally smoothing things over. The young man she had attacked wasn’t part of the main royal family, but he was still of royal blood, and had some influence. That incident was nearly a political disaster, that stupid girl should have put some more thought into how she rejected a potential suitor. But no, she had to pick the absolute worst way to do it. It was why she had Reiko sent off to the Royal Retreat, so she could cool off, and more importantly not do harm. While her husband did damage control. Honestly, that girl was lucky she didn’t start a war by doing that. If the guards hadn’t stopped things before she went much further, it might have been a different story.

With a heavy sigh, she made for the door. Part of her had to wonder what was going on that would require such a disturbance in the middle of the night. Even when her husband was here, it was a rare night when someone knocked at this hour. Hopefully, the emergency wasn’t too dire, and she could get back to bed. Running the kingdom in her husband's stead was exhausting, and if she didn’t get her sleep she would end up falling asleep on the job. Which would be downright embarrassing. On the other hand, she had some newfound respect for her husband. Idly, she also hoped that this wasn’t another case of her daughter doing something foolish. Her eldest was unlikely, as she was past her troublesome years, and wasn’t even at the castle. She had gone to Rosewood for a diplomatic meeting, and after that she was to meet her Fiance in Bluewood. By now she had a feeling that her daughter was in Bluewood.

As for Reiko, she was en route to the family retreat, not much trouble she could cause on the road, which left her second daughter Mei. Mei was still young, and did get into trouble on occasion, but at least she wasn’t downright rude like Reiko. Not to mention she never got into the kind of trouble Reiko did. However,she had a hard time pictureing that girl getting into the kind of trouble to warrant a late night wake-up call.

Reaching the door, she undid the bolt and swung the heavy door open. On either side of the door was a pair of armored golems, magical constructs meant to guard the royal suite. Her gaze didn’t lock onto the ornately decorated golems, but instead upon the petite elf before her. With a sigh, she found herself saying, “Shiori? How many times have I told you not to walk around the castle in nothing but a pair of panties?”

Shiori was the Royal Court mage, but her current attire didn’t exactly fit that description. She was a small girl, about a hundred and forty centimeters tall, with lovely silver hair that she often kept loose, and gorgeous emerald eyes set in a cute elfin face. Her skin was a bit on the pale side with a creamy texture, and thanks to her attire, Shiori’s modest boobs were on full display with their delicate little nipples and cute pink areola. The young queen was suddenly quite glad her husband wasn’t here.

“There is nothing wrong with a little nudity, my queen. I’m certain, I’ve told you that before. Besides, modesty is a human value, why should we care?”

“Please, I’ve told you to call me Eriko when we are in private.”

She looked around. “Of course Eriko, and before we start this discussion again, perhaps you would like to hear what I came to say?”

Eriko paused, “Ah yes, what brings you to my door so late anyway?”

Shiori glanced down, and sighed, “I’m afraid I am the bearer of bad news.”

Now Eriko was feeling a little worried, “bad news?”

“It seems Reiko’s caravan encountered some apparent bandits. Although from the sound of the reports I have a suspicion they are not. I’m afraid most of the guards were slaughtered, and half the servants are dead. I have a feeling this was staged, and Reiko has gone missing, possibly kidnapped.”

Eriko was silent for a moment, as her heart beat faster. With almost a whisper she uttered, “...missing?”

Shiori nodded, “I spoke with the courier mage personally. Apparently, during the ambush, Reiko ran off into the woods, and a few bandits chased after her. No one was able to follow her, as they were too busy fighting for their lives. After they repelled the attack, a search party was organized to go after her. They found her trail easily enough, as she left bits of torn clothing, and a few bodies on the trail. That trail led them to a Dark Shrine in the woods, where they found her bag, and her clothes. There was no trace of her at the scene.”

Eriko felt her legs give out, and she slumped to the floor. Her daughter was in trouble!? No one knew where she was? Worse her life had been in danger? This was terrible, terrible news. Please let this just be a bad dream, she prayed that she would wake up, and find it was all a dream.

Reiko lay there staring at the stone ceiling, her breath a little rapid. She was still trying to figure out what happened, one moment she had been fighting a demon. Next thing she knew it was teasing her, and then... Her skin flushed red at the thought. She didn’t do that? Did she?

The cool air against her skin said otherwise. Not to mention there was a weight on her belly. Glancing down, she could see the demon pressed lazily against her and peeking up at her through her bare breasts with an odd smile.

“Want another one? I could certainly play some more, how about you?”

She gulped, this little demon was dangerous. Yet she found herself nodding. Without even thinking about what she was agreeing to. The still active quest that was slowly ticking down, didn’t even factor in her mind. A moment later, she wasn’t even thinking at all, as a small finger teased her down below.

Misaki turned his attention away from his door. It had been interesting to watch, but honestly, he kind of wanted to participate. That idea reminded him that he had the option for an avatar. Had it for a fair bit, in fact. Maybe it was time that he looked into creating one. With a thought he brought up the dungeon menu, which provided him with a short list of his dungeon tools. He didn’t see it on the menu though, so he decided to check his abilities list. That seemed like a good place to check. With a thought, he pulled up the abilities list.

Abilities:

Initiate Summon Monster Grade C

Initiate Design Monster Grade F
Initiate Create Trap Grade C
Initiate Design Trap Grade F
Initiate Dungeon Shaper Grade A+
Initiate Claim Territory Grade D

Novice Core Magic Grade F
Beginner Inspect Grade C

Claim Creature

Mark Pet

Create Avatar; Note this skill is single-use and will delete itself afterwards.

Contact Patron
Telepathy

There it was, it appeared to be an unranked ability near the end of the list. He blinked when he noted that one of his skills was ranked at novice. He was kind of curious what the difference between initiate and novice was. He glanced at the books Dewari gave him, hopefully, the answer was in one of those. That second-to-last skill sounded like something to contact Dewari with, but something told him it wasn’t meant for asking simple questions like that. Besides, he didn’t want to annoy her unnecessarily. If not, he might be able to find a book on the subject. Since he now had to live with this system, it only made sense that he spend DP to get more knowledge on it.

He mentally noted that he needed to check out the store, and check the book section. It would be nice to have a library, too bad he didn’t get to keep his book collection.  He had some really fun books in there. That reminded him, what was going to happen to his collection, and he was not just worrying about his books, he also had a video collection. He kept it on data disks, portable storage like that was over a century old, but it had proven quite reliable. Superior in some aspects to digital, and most importantly to him easier to keep private. He just hoped no one found it. He also hoped no one looked at his computer, ah crap now that he thought about it that would be terrible.  What if someone saw his desktop? Or looked through his hard drive?

Suddenly talking to Dewari seemed more tempting, but that could wait. He had a demoness and elf waiting for him. With that in mind, he tried focusing on invoking the create avatar ability. Almost instantly a window popped up.

Would you like to create your avatar now?

Warning! This action can only be done once. Once designed your avatar can’t be changed.

He mentally affirmed yes, and was greeted with a new window.

Alert!

Data detected!
...

Misaki, I went ahead and created an Avatar for you. I took the liberty of researching your collection for your preferences. Also just so you don’t worry about it, I took care of it for you. I’ll hold onto it for now since you don’t have anywhere to put it, but when you do I’ll send it to you. I hope you enjoy the effort I put into this for you.

Sincerely, your favorite Goddess Dewari

Almost immediately a form was presented before him. It was apparently his avatar. There was just one little problem. Yes this did fit his preferences, but it was the wrong set of preferences. Projected before him was a young girl about one hundred and thirty-five centimeters tall. Silky light blue hair cascaded down her back and transitioned to silver at the ends which hung just above her waist. She had a cute round face with puffy cheeks, small lips, a cute little nose, and gorgeous crimson eyes. Parting her hairs was a pair of cute little silver horns. She was completely naked with no hair anywhere on her body, with the obvious exception of her head. Her skin was silky and smooth like porcelain with a creamy white coloration. She had well shaped and perky breasts with just the right amount of size and weight to them. Large pink areolas, and a pair of delicate nipples that looked perfect. Down below she had a gorgeous pussy. Her muscles seemed perfectly toned, not too soft, and not too hard. She was the most perfect girl he had ever seen, a truly perfect loli.

“What the hell! Why is my avatar a girl?!!!”