Demon's Virtue

"...excuse me..?" The receptionist asked with a wry smile on his face, "I'm speaking of the monster that gave birth to all the spiders in that forest."

"Yes, so am I." Eiro replied with an annoyed tone, "You don't even need to seem that surprised bud. It's not a misunderstanding. I did kill that monster. You literally have some of its carapace in front of you. If you want, you can send someone to confirm it, I'll draw you up a map to let you know where it was. Either way, that spider is dead now."

"A single B-Rank party... made up of four C-Ranks... actually fought against waves and waves of spiders and a noble monster?" The receptionist asked, rather suspiciously, and Eiro loudly groaned. He pulled out a piece of paper and a pen out of his satchel and placed the paper down flat on the counter in front of him. He quickly started sketching up a simple map of where the Spider Queen was before. The cadaver was still there right now, after all. Eiro didn't really take that much of it.

Once he was done making the simple map, he handed it to the receptionist, "There you go. Send some people to check it out if you want." The Demon pointed out. And after looking down at the piece of paper, the receptionist nodded his head.

"...We will, yes. Either way, due to this mass amount and variety of materials, I don't think we can get through everything today. Come again tomorrow or the day after tomorrow, by that time we'll also have verified your claims." The receptionist explained, in response to which Eiro simply nodded his head and looked at James.

"You heard him. Then let's go." Eiro said, turning around and making his way over toward the door already. James followed him outside while the guild workers were grabbing all of the materials that Eiro placed down in front of them and tried to preemptively sort through it.

When Eiro and James were outside, they met back up with Krog and Jess, telling them what was going on, and gave them back their Guild Cards.

"What? We need to wait for the materials to be sorted through?" Jess asked annoyedly, and Eiro lightly shrugged, "I'm not so sure. I think they may be able to get through it in an hour or so, but they probably just really want to make sure that the materials are actually from the Spider Queen."

"Ah..." Jess muttered quietly, and Eiro looked further down the road, "Well, anyway, we'll head to the castle for now. I think you three will have to wait outside with the cart, since I doubt they're going to let me through with it. I should have a place ready where we can bring it, but I need to make sure first."

"You're not just getting a storage lot?" James asked, and Eiro shook his head, "Why would I? The place we're moving to is more than big enough to keep everything."

Hearing what Eiro was speaking about, Avalin excitedly turned her head around toward them, "Mhm! We went to see it once before, and it's huuuge! It was bigger and better than anything I've ever seen!"

"But the castle is bigger?" Leon pointed out in response, and Avalin turned toward him with a light glare, "I said. It was bigger. And better." She said with a light squint. Eiro lightly sighed and looked up at Avalin sitting on Lugo's back, "Of course it is. It's a pretty nice place. You three are going to see what we mean." Eiro pointed out.

It didn't take long for the group to reach the castle's gate, at which point Eiro just grabbed Avalin and Leon from Lugo's back and grabbed their luggage off of the stag's body as well, "I'll be right back. Lugo, Gobo, behave." And while hearing an annoyed bellowing from behind him, Eiro stepped up to the gate. He showed the brooch to the guards and was quickly let inside together with the two children, making his way to the castle itself.

At some point, Eiro started sensing his children all around the castle. Arc was outside, practicing some of his sword swings, Rudy was in the kitchen cooking, Sammy was in the library with Felix, and it seemed like Clementine was alone with the young prince Charles.

Eiro wasn't entirely sure what they were speaking about, but Eiro was still a bit curious. And nervous. He didn't like that a boy he didn't know too well was alone with his daughter. Felix was a different case by now, since Eiro had the chance to observe him for 24 hours a day during their travels, so he could make sure that Felix was actually a pretty good kid, but he still wasn't sure about Charles. It was said that he was a rather unlikable person, after all.

The Demon climbed up the stairs in front of the castle and stepped through the doors as they were opened to him by a servant. Eiro looked down at Leon and Avalin with a smile and helped them climb up the stairs to the second floor.

Eiro walked up to the room that the children were staying in until now and opened the door up, directly walking in on Charles and Clementine simply speaking to each other.

"Don't worry, I purposefully didn't listen to what you were saying." Eiro exclaimed the very next moment, and Clementine jumped up before he could even finish his sentence.

"You're back!" She yelled out, rushing over toward Eiro and enveloping him in a tight hug, "Yep, I'm back." He replied, and Avalin clung onto Clementine's leg before anyone knew it, "Don't only hug daddy, I'm also here!"

"Of course you are! Sorry, come here, you two!" Clementine said with a bright smile on her face as she let go of Eiro and knelt down on the ground and hugged Avalin and Leon instead.

Meanwhile, Eiro turned his head over toward Charles, "Nice to see you too." He said, and the prince quickly stood up. He still had a few issues with his new leg, but that was completely fine in the end. He was handling it well enough, as well as Eiro expected. His body was really messed with, after all, energy-wise. Whatever curse was placed onto Charles seemed to have made it that he was able to adjust to things far worse as well, and at the moment, the rest of that curse were still showing a fair amount.

"Nice to see you again as well." Charles said with a light smile. Eiro never really saw him smile genuinely like that before, he was usually just so slighty tilting the corners of his mouth upward, but it was never a hearty smile like this. That was nice progress, as far as the demon was concerned.

Either way, Eiro turned back toward Clementine, "Either way, I'm sorry, but can I ask you to take care of these two for a bit? I want to see Solomon and ask about the Manor."

"Right, of course! He actually came to us and said that it should be ready for us to move in while you were gone!" Clementine exclaimed excitedly, and Eiro lightly smiled, "Really? That's good to know. Thanks for telling me." The Demon replied, similarly excited. He was glad that they would have a place that they could potentially call home again soon.

"Well, then I'm heading over there now." Eiro said and turned around again with a smile that was hidden under his mask, but Charles quickly stopped him, "Wait! There's someone with my father at the moment. I don't know who exactly it is, though. She seems to be quite important though?" Charles explained, and Eiro looked back at him with curiously.

"His mistress?"

"What? No! Not his mistress! My Father doesn't have a mistress!" The young man exclaimed, so Eiro lightly shrugged.

"Then there shouldn't be an issue if I barge in. Thanks." And with that, Eiro turned around and left, closing the door behind him. He made his way through the hallways of the castle, soon reaching Solomon's office. But Eiro was incredibly suspicious of the woman inside.

Because it was far, far harder to sense her compared to Solomon. For a little while, actually simply didn't sense her, despite the fact that she didn't seem to be doing anything that could cause that. She was simply standing there, even slightly walking around here and there. She was moving and speaking more than Solomon was, but Eiro had such a hard time noticing her presence.

And so, the Demon just knocked on the door, "Solomon. It's me." Eiro said, and without really having to wait at all, the door was opened up by the woman in question while Solomon stood up at his desk.

"Eiro! Nice to see you're back! Perfect timing, actually. There's someone I would like you to meet!" Solomon explained, and pointed at the woman that was holding the door open for the Demon.

"That is Evelyn James. Similar to you, she is one who will be joining in the tournament next summer, and is also a prime candidate for the top." Solomon explained. Eiro stared at the mature woman in front of him. Eiro didn't know why he thought of her as mature, as she just looked to be around 25 or so years old, but that was just what he instinctively thought. She was just a bit shorter than Eiro was, and had a body of proportions that Eiro didn't really see that often. The term 'Seductress' came to mind, and Eiro continued wondering if she maybe wasn't actually Solomon's mistress.

"I see..." The woman spoke. Her voice also had a mature, but pleasant and melodic tone to it, "Another Card Owner. Interesting."

Eiro glared at the woman, looking all over her body. He instantly knew that she had a card herself when he saw her, and he also knew that she had the card on her body in its activated form. There were small differences to the feeling of cards when they were active to when they were not, and this was definitely active.

And then, Eiro spotted the amulet that Evelyn was wearing.

"The Queen of Wands, the Bloodstone. I don't think it was supposed to be an amulet." He pointed out, and Evelyn slowly shook her head with an impressed chuckle, "It is not, but I have contacts that were able to arrange this. It makes it far more efficient and easier to use, you see? I need to make sure that it's in top form. I'm a Bloodstone Sorceress, after all."

"Bloodstone Sorceress, is that so?" Eiro repeated. He didn't really care all that much about what she was calling herself. He knew that he had to keep close to this woman, since the amulet she placed the red bloodstone gem into was covered in the same Arcane Runes as the small metal ball that Eiro found inside of the Spider Queen's body.