Black Shadow | Souei

Chapter 17: The Gathering

"H-He didn't want to disrupt you since you were relaxing in the bath," Rimuru quickly added. Kumiko glared at Shion and Shuna as Rimuru said the word 'relaxing.' Their ability to squeeze information out of her was horrifying.

Kumiko sighed, and then stood up with a bow to Rimuru. If Rimuru said so, then she supposed it had to have been somewhat true.

"As you wish, Rimuru-sama," she said before she disappeared with the damp cloth still in her hand. The rest of the group all sighed as she left, then proceeded to huddle together in the middle as Shion and Shuna filled them in on the details that Kumiko had so willingly given up.

~~~

Kumiko had made a small detour to her own room to get changed first, putting on the normal black long-sleeved turtleneck with a pair of stretchy black shorts and thigh-high socks. Her hair was still damp, but she decided to deal with it later as she made her way to Souei, the small towel still in her hand.

Souei made no movement or sound as Kumiko sudden appeared next to him, her damp hair dripping a bit of water onto the branch the two were perched on. He was standing on one of the branches higher up in the air with his right shoulder leaning against the trunk and Kumiko to his let. Below them were the training dragonnewts with one of Souei's doubles. True to his word, he made sure that Soka maintained a respectable distance from even his double during training.

"I was told you were waiting for me," Kumiko said as she stared down at the training. Despite not liking Soka, she had to admit that her and her group of servants were praiseworthy for having trained for the majority of the day and into the night. Though, she couldn't say that they were exactly acceptable yet. Since both she and Souei were spies, that meant that their subordinates, in this case the dragonnewts, would have to maintain that same stealth. Of course, they could never reach the level that Souei or Kumiko were on, but it wasn't like they were anywhere close to being able to go on an espionage mission anytime soon. Plus, if the dragonnewts hadn't sensed Kumiko and Souei's presence up in the tree yet, they still had a long, long way to go.

"I didn't say that though?" Souei looked over at Kumiko, a bit confused. "I would have just told you directly."

Kumiko sighed as she realized that she had been tricked, although she supposed that neither Souei nor she minded that they knew some small details. It was more that the two of them were embarrassed to recall the memories aloud.

"I was tricked by Benimaru and Rimuru-sama," she explained to Souei. "Shion and Shuna managed to squeeze me dry of details about what happened while we were in the bath."

"Why didn't you just use [Spacial Travel] to get away?" Souei couldn't help but notice how Kumiko was blushing slightly. He used his hand to lightly touch her warm cheek with the back of his hand and she reflexively leaned towards his hand.

"I was enjoying the bath," Kumiko defended as she stuck out her tongue at Souei. "While you boys were chatting about serious things, we were relaxing in the warm water and I didn't want to leave." Despite being captured and held down for information, the warm water really had relaxed her. Even to the point where she could stand on this branch in close proximity to Soka without wanting to boil the lizard alive.

Souei smirked as he dropped his hand down from her cheek and flicked her lightly on the forehead.

"You're just bad at dodging their questions. I got away without having to say a single thing," Souei looked at her victoriously while she glared at him and lightly kicked his leg.

"You know how Shion and Shuna are. I'd be shriveled inside that bath had I not given them the information they wanted." Souei hummed as he couldn't help but agree with Kumiko's statement. Truly, those two other female kijin got what they wanted through any means necessary.