The Inadequate Summoned Hero

Chapter 9

I don't immediately rush out like she probably thought I would. As I look out I see a minuscule amount of people walking on the dirt and gravel street. I notice they are the same kind of being as Lucy but different races. On the other side of the street, I see multiple of the same one-story building just in different colors. They look like houses. The street is all that is there between the building, not even front yards or sidewalks. I step out and continue looking at the buildings across the street. I look left and I see more houses. I look right, more houses. Most seem to be the color brown.

I run out to the street and turn around to look at Lucy's house. It's the same, including what I'm assuming is the standard color brown. When I look, I see this entire place is just the same house over and over again. "Don't worry the whole town isn't all houses. We have the same buildings all the others have. Come on I'll show you." She steps out of her copy of house, closes the door, and locks it. Well, I'm assuming her raising her hand and waving over the door handle means she locked it with magic.

"This way." She walks into the street and immediately takes a left. Shortly after we turn left again into some sort of alley in between houses. At the end of the passage, I can see a lot more people, all the same species as Lucy. There might not be any humans here. When we finally reach the busy street, Lucy picks me up carefully and I stare at her. "I don't want you to get lost. This is only temporary. Unless you don't want it to be. I could hold you forever. Hey, did your eyes change color?" I quickly look away.

What finds my eyes is all of the different buildings. None of them are houses! Some of them are even two stories tall. Lucy points to a bright yellow, two-story building directly across the street from us. "That is this town's Mercenary Hall. It's only connected to our own species' halls because if we connected to the humans' then we'd all die." Her face darkens slightly. "Those bastards have been killing us for centuries, for no reason." Woah, that was unexpected. What is going on here? Her expression returns to the way it was beforehand. "Anyway, most of these other buildings are shops of some kind. You don't need to worry your cute little self about them."

She turns around and immediately heads back to her house. What was that just now? Are these people being hunted by humans? That means if I show anyone that I'm actually a human I might be mercilessly slaughtered. When we get back to her house, she unlocks the door and enters before finally setting me down. "You'll probably be spending most of your time in this room, other than when we sleep together." Wait, what? "Alright, I'm off now!" She exits and I hear the door lock.

"What am I supposed to do here? She expects me to just wait here with nothing to do? Screw that." I think the words and feel myself being to gain the height I lost when I became a fox. Becoming a human again won't be an option so I'll have to make myself look like I belong here. I might as well keep the same ears and tail. "At least she hasn't tried to name you yet." "That would not work for me." After fully changing, I go to Lucy's storage and grab some gold. I don't exactly know how much this is worth but it might come in handy. I go back to the exit and look at the lock on the door. It looks like a deadbolt so I turn it and hear it click. I slowly and hesitantly open the door a crack.

I look out to see if the coast is clear. I doubt this will go well anyway. Seeing nobody special, I slip out and close the door. All I need to do is be back before Lucy and she'll never know. I hurry down the street, the same direction we went earlier, and turn the corner. I keep going, heading straight towards the mercenary hall. It takes longer than needed to cross the road with so many citizens there.

When I enter, the only thing that comes to mind is café. The whole place is full of round tables with people scattered among them. There is a sign connected to the ceiling, however, that says Mercenary Hall with an arrow pointing up a set of stairs in the back left corner. I carefully maneuver my way towards and up the stairs. What greets me is an almost empty room. There is a window along the far wall which points towards the houses, a counter on the right where there is a woman with her head on her hands leaning on the countertop and looking bored, and a very large billboard with papers stuck to it.

"Excuse me?" The woman at the counter jumps and faces me. "Sorry, you startled me How can I help you?" I could tell. "I was just wondering how this place works." She looks at me like I just asked her what cheese is. "How could you not know? Literally everybody else does." I sigh. "I'm not everybody else." She sighs next. "Alright, you see that billboard? That is where people can take a request made by others and fulfill it, or not. If you don't fulfill the requirements and you're still alive, you have to pay a fee. You're only allowed to take a request if your mercenary rank is high enough. If you want to raise your mercenary rank, you need to do more requests. That about sums it up. Now if you want to sign up then you're going to have to come over here."

I don't think there is really any point in that. "Actually could you tell me if there is a library anywhere here?" She looks like she is about to lose it. "If you aren't going to be professional then you should just leave and take your dumbass questions somewhere else. If you seriously don't know these things you should go back to school." Sorry, I guess that's a touchy subject then. I decide to leave and just try and find a library by myself. Unfortunately, after a couple of hours, I have no luck in finding a library and decide to return to Lucy's house.

It's easy to return because there is no other building just like the mercenary hall. Upon returning, I find the door still unlocked and I open it. "Has my baby returned!" The tear-stained face of Lucy greets me. "Uh, hi I'm Charlie. It sure is nice to meet you." Her face quickly turns to anger. "You're the one who took my baby from me! You should have thought twice than to steal from a master thief!"

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