D.E.M.O.N.S: Getting Summoned Weekly isn't so Bad

--- Kat ---

After clearing the are out it was quiet run back to Kamiko and Lily. This silence continued once they met up because Lily had been keeping track of Kat's approach. In fact, Hunter and Kat didn't even stop. Lily and Kamiko were ready to move as soon as the other two made it back to the road.

Well, Lily did have to be handed over so that Kamiko had her hands free for the reigns, but that was a minor detail. Once moving they headed straight for the nearby town. It didn't even take them a full hour before their destination came into view.

The town was made up of squat, solid stone buildings that looked to be thicker than strictly necessary. There was no wall, but in a pinch those houses looked like they could manage almost as well. Ringing the edges of the town were large wooden watch towers. Each of them had a giant gong in them, though that was hard to see from the ground.

At a glance, it seemed like the towers were originally built some distance away from the edge of town, but a number of buildings had crept closer to them over the years. It made the town look almost like it had bites taking out of it, as the town grew closer specifically to the towers leaving a concave shape between them marking an absence of houses.

One such watchtower was right next to the road, and it seemed larger then the others. It had a small gatehouse at the bottom with a board looking guard leaning against the side awning. This clearly wasn't one of the more active posts. The man in question had his spear leaning against the wall next to him as he brushed his scales with a little brush.

Oh he wasn't completely hopeless, he did give the approaching group a glance but seemed unconcerned with their approach. His companion at the top of the tower looked a lot more alert and… rather confused. Kat could see that the guard in the tower was glancing backwards at something regularly and watching their approach closely. He wasn't doing anything just yet but he seemed concerned.

Seeing this, Kat started to obviously slow down. Hunter kept up the old pace for a little bit before a glance backwards lead her to being on the same page as the other three and the group slowed to a much more normal pace. They kept that up until they were right next to the guard who didn't even look up as they approached. "Um, excuse me," said Kat.

"It's fine, you're all free to go, we don't check ID or ask for tolls here," said the man with a wave.

"Um…" Kat glanced over at Hunter who shrugged. "Actually we have a minor report to make about some potential issues in the forest that we've dealt with. Or well, should have been dealt with at any rate,"

The guard sighed and looked up for the first time, finally noticing Kat's rather obvious demonic features. His eyes then quickly scanned the rest of the group as he took their appearances. "Right… is this official business?" asked the guard.

"While we are on official business, this was not," stated Hunter as she slithered up next to Kat. "I have a rather personal dislike of the monsters in question and they were quite near to the town. I suspect I got them all, but I am not totally sure.

Just having them in the area is cause for at least some concern so we thought you ought to know," Hunter notably didn't mention the workshop they found, but with the person responsible clearly long dead it didn't seem wise to spread that around.

"Ah…" said the guard finally putting away the brush he was using on his scales and steadying himself "I'm just a junior here… and I've got this post because it's mostly for slackers and they don't trust me to watch for real threats. Um… hmm… I'm not actually sure who you'd need to talk to about that at the moment…"

The guard tapped his cheek a few times. "See the old mayor past away the other week. Nothing questionable, he was an old man and his heart finally gave out… but his granddaughter was meant to take over the post. Which sounds nice, until you realise that she's on vacation to visit family at the capital. Original it was to get some help for the old man… and well…"

The guard waved vaguely at the back of the town. "Of course, he wasn't the only person keeping this place running I just… yeah I don't actually know who's handling things at the moment…"

"Crpmon! You dolt!" shouted a voice from above. "I swear you've got so much space for information in your head because it's fucking empty! Honestly! Even if you didn't know that they should probably tell the head of the local hunters, you should AT LEAST know to direct them to the guard captain for further information if you don't know it!"

"Well look, the captain's off work today for that thing with her niece…" started the now named Crpmon.

"Don't you give me that shit," interrupted the as of yet unnamed guard. "You know very well that the vice captain is in today, and you'd be sending them to the same place! I wish I wasn't so surprised, but you continue to lower my expectations of you,"

"Hey, now you're just being rude," said Crpmon.

"Oh? I am, am I?" asked the guard. "Well how about this. Seeing as we've been colleagues for over a year and I'm almost always the one to watch over you because apparently I'm the best at babysitting you… tell me what MY name is and I'll stop being angry,"

"Um…" mumbled Crpmon.

"Come on. I introduced myself to you regularly when we first me…" Crpmon looked slightly nervous. "Just last week when we had dinner at my house my wife called me by my name…" Crpmon coughed awkwardly and looked away. "When I report in at the end of the day, with you, the captain, or the vice thank me for my work… BY NAME," Crpmon had decided to the ground just looked fascinating.

The guard above sighed. "Why do I ever bother? Whatever. Just head into town and look for the only building with metal bars on the windows. That's the guard house, as well as the town jail. You can report there, and they might be able to tell you where old man Jnkns is at the moment.

He's in charge of the hunters for the town,"

"Thanks…" said Kat slowly. Part of her wanted to ask what the older guard's name was just to find out if it was particularly hard to remember… but decided it wasn't worth the hassle. Kat gave them both a slight wave and then headed into town, with Kamiko dismounting as they transitioned from 'highway' to 'town' just to be polite.

Entering the town, it seemed… very quiet. There was one house with a large curtain over the front instead of a wall that seemed to serve as the local grocer, with a moderate display of fresh produce and a few people hanging around that… but otherwise there was nobody in sight. Kat wondered a bit about that as they made their way forward.

The guard house was pretty obvious. It was just a bit taller then its surroundings and the bars on the windows did stand out once you knew where to look. Kat and crew angled towards the building and knocked on the door. "Come in!" shouted a gruff but feminine voice.

Inside was a woman in mage robes sitting behind a large desk. She had a number of scars across her exposed arms and a large one that went from her temple to her ear. As she was covered in scales, they were quite obvious. Especially because the scales that had grown back were clearly a slightly different colour and out of alignment with the rest of them.

Even still, the woman smiled slightly on seeing them. "How can I help you today demons?" asked the woman. Kat looked over at Hunter and nudged the lamia forward.

Hunter resisted a bit but moved forward and began her tail. "We were traveling as a group along the main road when…" Original content from M-VL-em|p,yr

Hunter went on to describe, most, of the recent massacre as well as paying special mention to the fact there was clearly a workshop at the end they had intentionally burnt out. Throughout the story, the woman had listened intently, but a frown had grown over time. "That is… a serious concern.

We've been calling them 'Puppet Worms' and we thought they'd just moved into the area recently… they weren't too much of an issue just yet… or so we thought. Hmm… are you sure you got them all?"

"No, as I indicated before despite their natural inclination being to puppet corpses they ARE still worms. I expect they will be hunted by the local wildlife, and I myself tried to get all of the major pockets but the issue with anything worm-like is that they are hard to completely route out with personal efforts," explained Hunter.