The Normal Farmer - Completed

Chapter 9 - Trouble in Durant

Duza became bright red. Being called ‘dear’ was too sudden. But she smiled with a sparkle in her eyes. She then pointed to a nearby stall where some bags of potatoes and rice were exposed.

In the next stall, there were vegetables and dried meat. While Ronald was asking the price for those, Duza noticed four Border Guards walking in the market, talking loudly, with one of them trying to kiss a young seller woman. Since she refused to be kissed, one guard slapped her while shouting that she should be honoured to be kissed by someone who is always protecting the border with that dangerous forest.

Duza turned to look at the rice bags while watching from the corner of her eyes at those four rude Border Guards. Then, one of the Guards noticed her, and he elbowed the one next to him, pointing at her. She saw them walking towards the stall, and she swiftly went near Ronald, grabbed his arm, smiled at the seller, and guided him along the market.

She disguised and increased the speed of the walk while pointing to a store. Ronald thought something was happening, but before he could say anything, she pointed to an alley and spoke in a loud voice, so that the pursuers, who were only three meters away, could hear: “Let’s go through there; it’s a short-cut to a beautiful shop in the backstreet!”

Ronald didn’t say a thing. Riattus also saw the Guards approaching, and he was the first to warn him that trouble was coming.

When they entered the alley and were almost in the middle of it, one of the Border Guards shouted, “You two, stop! You are looking suspicious!”

Duza stopped, and she looked at them with a weird smile. “We are the suspicious ones? What about you four, annoying every woman in the market? And when you saw me, you decided to try your luck with the fragile young woman in the green dress? I don’t want to ruin my beautiful dress with your blood, but you are pushing your luck a little too far by interrupting our walk. You may not recognize me, but I know who you all are. Your deeds and poor reputation precede you, but no one does a thing because you are Border Guards. And you abuse the goodwill of our people. Unlucky for you, I hate people that disgrace the amazingly good reputation of the Border Guards…”

While talking, Duza was pulling her dress up, raising the bottom until it reached her knees. She quickly tied the excess fabric with the two strings on both sides, which Ronald thought were only for decoration. Only at that time did he realize that Duza had that dress prepared for a fight, if needed.

She quickly grabbed the two daggers that she was hiding on her thighs, and she lowered her body a little and bent her knees. “So, who wants to be the first to die?”

As soon as the Guards approached with their hands on the swords, Ronald moved at light speed. He put his hand under Duza’s dress and took from her underwear the Spell Card she had over her breast.

He then shouted while throwing the Card to the front between them and the Guards: "Duza, close your eyes! Light Ray!"

A blinding light spread from the Card, as bright as the sun. Ronald closed his eyes and covered them with his hands. The Guards were shouting in panic: “Aargh!... I can’t see… What’s happening…”

When Riattus told him it was safe, Ronald opened his eyes and ran towards the Guards.

When Duza opened her eyes, she saw him holding a Guard in each hand and bumping them against each other, knocking them out. He then punched the third one and kicked the last one in the groins. A karate chop on the back of his neck knocked him down, too.

When he finished, he bent over to get Duza’s Spell Card from the ground. He gave it to her with his face all red. “I am sorry for what I did… I had no second thoughts about touching your breast as I did; I just wanted to get the Card to protect you, and I know you don’t need to be protected, but you were going to kill them and ruin your beautiful dress. You look very pretty with it; I would prefer if you could use it another day.”

Duza turned bright red, and she put the daggers on the leg sheaths again and let loose the strings of her dress. She put the Card under her underwear with a slight smile. “That’s okay… but try not to touch my breast so suddenly... Next time, at least kiss me while doing it… But I am not an easy woman. You will have to work a lot for me to be willing to be kissed or touched by you.”

“Well, I don’t mind the extra work. So, what do we do with these guys?”

Duza looked at both ends of the alley. “No one saw what happened, but when they wake up, they will try to find out who did this. Sooner or later, they will know who I am. A lot of people saw us getting out of the Guild. We could have a lot of trouble because of them…”

“They were the ones to cause all this. We just defended ourselves.”

“Yes, but no one saw it. It’s our word against four Border Guards. Because of their line of work, everyone will believe in them.”

Ronald looked at the Guards. She could be right, but he had so little knowledge of the World that he wasn’t sure what to do.

Riattus hovered to be next to the four Guards, and he spoke with a concerned look on his face. “You know, she is completely right. Even if you all go tomorrow on that journey, these guys will make a mess in the Guild, looking for you both. They will for sure try to catch you before you leave the country, and if they don’t achieve that, they will wait for you to come back. Or they will go after the Guild Master, since he is her father and all. There are only two things you can do. Do nothing or make them disappear for good. Because even if you hurt them or threaten them to not tell a thing, sooner or later they will recover or break the agreement. And these guys look like the vindictive type. If it were me, I would prefer to make them disappear, but it’s your call.”

Ronald looked at Duza and then at the Guards and mumbled, “Maybe make them disappear inside a deep hole…”

Duza heard him. “What do you mean by that?”

Riattus pointed at her with his right thumb. “If you do that, she will get suspicious. But from what I saw so far, she is well level-headed. A strong woman in this dump of a World. I think you can trust her. On her companions, I don’t know. In my experience, Church fanatics like Reylom always caused me more problems than I thought at first. As I said, it’s your call. I will help you with everything I can; you know that.”

Ronald turned to Duza and placed one hand over her right shoulder. “Duza, I am going to make sure these guys don’t cause any more problems for you. But I need you to promise me that you won’t ask me anything, and you can never tell anyone what I am about to do, including your father and sister.”

“But, what are you…?”

Ronald placed one finger on her lips. “No questions. Can I trust you?”

Duza slowly nodded. Ronald went near the four knocked-out Guards and from the Card Box in the inner pocket of his combat vest, he took one Card that he threw to their side and activated it.

A dark, deep hole appeared on the ground. Ronald quickly threw the Guards inside before the baffled look that Duza had. When the hole disappeared, he picked up the Card and placed it in his Card Box again.

Duza pointed at the ground where the hole used to be, and she stuttered: “A ‘Bottomless Hole’ Card… You had one of those… but… you shouldn’t have enough Mana for it after using my Spell Card, how…”

“Duza, I warned you, didn’t I? No questions and no talking about this to anyone. Or I will disappear immediately. Can I trust you to keep this for yourself?”

“Yes… But, will you explain this to me one day?”

“Of course, when I am sure that it’s safe. It may take a while; I hope you can wait for my explanation.”

“I guess… Thanks for this; I could have a lot of problems because of those bastards. And my family… I knew it was a bad idea to put on this dress. If I had my normal clothes and my tied-up hair, they would know who I was, and they wouldn’t dare to mess with me.”

“But I would never have the chance to walk around town with you today, looking so astonishing. Not that you don’t look good in your normal clothes, but your dress is very beautiful, and it suits you, together with your loose hair. Besides, if they hadn’t come after you, they could have gone after another woman, one that would have a lot of problems with them. So, before I forget, let me just pop those Mana Orbs. I need to get stronger fast, right?”

Ronald touched each ball, one after the other, feeling the familiar tickling. He then smiled at Duza and went toward her. “Well, shall we continue our walk? Don’t you forget, this never happened.”

“Yeah… But you can use the Status Sphere the Guild Master has for assigning…”

“No, he could ask about how I managed to get more Status Points and I don’t want to answer that. Don’t worry; I will take care of it another time. So, shall we go?”

Duza followed him, more intrigued than when he first entered the Guild. He was indeed very interesting, with so many questions appearing when so many others had already been answered by their talk at the Guild. She hid a smile; maybe he could turn out to be her mate. She already figured out that he was interested in her, but she wasn’t sure if she felt the same way or if she was just impressed by his mysteriousness.

They went to the Market again, checking the prices of every supply they would need. When it was almost lunchtime, they returned to the Guild.

As soon as they entered, they noticed the silence all around, with everyone who was at the tables looking to the front desk, where Woof was growling at a pair of Knights that were escorting a young boy in shiny clothes full of frills. Next to Woof was Mira, holding his neck scarves, and the Guild Master, who looked angry.

Ronald heard him, and from that, he could almost figure out what was happening. “No, you can’t have this wolf. He is not ours to begin with. He belongs to one of our members. But we all consider that he, too, is a member, despite being a wolf.”

The boy bumped his right foot on the floor a few times. “Not fair! Why is it that this Guild can have a wild wolf as a pet, but I cannot? If I tell this to my father, he will order you to obey! He is the City Chief, and he has more authority than you and…”

Before the boy could say anything more, Ronald interrupted as soon as he got near them: “Thanks, Miss Mira. I hope he didn’t cause too much trouble. Woof, come here, boy! Miss Mira, can we have something for lunch? We walked for a while, and we are starving.”

The boy spoke, and while looking at Ronald, he made a proud pose. “You! Why didn’t you greet me in the proper manner a Nobel like me deserves?”

Ronald looked at the boy from top to bottom. He then looked at the Knights, who seemed to be a little worried about so many Adventurers nearby. Ronald approached the boy and whispered in his right ear: “Careful, boy… I am in a terrible mood. I am a skilled assassin in disguise, and if you make me angry, I will appear inside your room in the middle of the night and slice your throat. Next, I will go after your mother, and I will r**e her while your father watches. I will then chop off her head and drink her blood before killing your father. Maybe I will r**e him too; I will decide at that time. Now, don’t you say one more word and leave. If I see you again, I will make you regret it for the rest of your very short life! Do you understand what I just said? Nod your head if you do. If I need to repeat myself, I will kill you this instant.

The boy turned pale and slowly nodded his head. He then turned to face Mira. “I… will just take the deer meat you have from my father’s Quest… let’s go…”

The boy left, wobbling a little, followed by the Knights. Ronald frowned while watching him. “Such a rude brat… What was that about?”

The Guild Master took a deep breath. “The usual, a spoiled Nobel’s son. But this one has more power than he should have for someone only ten years old. He is used to having all his wishes granted because if not, his father can cause a lot of problems for someone who doesn’t bend to his whims. What did you say to him?”

“I might have threatened him a little… or given a fair warning. I need to think about this for a while. Maybe I need to have another talk with him so that he realizes I wasn’t joking. Or else he could cause some problems for you.”

“No, he won’t. We may not look like it, but we are a very powerful Guild. This City relies on us to protect them from the Breidan Army or Monsters that come too often from the forest. That boy may not know about this, but I grew up with his father. I warned him a lot of times that his kid was getting this kind of bad habit and that one day he would either die because of it or cause the death of someone. Maybe you should be more careful; you tend to put yourself in this kind of situation more often than you should.”

Ronald agreed with him and remembered that Riattus had said something similar previously. “You are right, but it’s also your fault for having such kind and beautiful daughters that make everyone willing to protect them... Didn’t you notice that Ma Yangfa over there had one hand over his sword? And Ini had an arrow ready? If I didn’t scare him, there would be a lot of blood on this floor again. And Miss Mira would have a lot of trouble cleaning it. You should thank me for my intervention instead of looking at me so worried about my well-being.”

The Guild Master looked around, and he noticed a bunch of hidden smiles and muffled laughter. “The nerve of this guy… Okay, thank you, Mister Ronald, for your kind and thoughtful intervention! Now, Mira told me that Duza went to show the town to you; what do you…?”

Only then did the Guild Master notice Duza approaching. His jaw dropped; she looked just like her mother, in a beautiful dress with loose hair that was floating as she walked towards him with a smile on her lips.

When she got near him, he slowly placed his right hand on her face. “Duza… you… remind me of your mother, like that… why…”

He then noticed she was turning red and was nervously looking in Ronald’s direction. He looked back and saw Mira smiling, with a shine in her eyes. Since Ronald was so serious, he understood immediately. With a small nod of his head, he went to his office again.

That reaction surprised Ronald, and he asked Mira. “Is he angry with me, or what?”

“No, I think he just realized Duza grew up and became a very beautiful woman. Did you both enjoy your walk? I have lunch ready for you, but I didn’t know if you would come back in time or not. Go sit down; I will take care of your meal.”

From Ronald’s back came a familiar voice. “Do you have room for three more? We would like to eat here if possible. Unless Mister Ronald wants to make another mess, of course. That Noble boy and those two Knights almost threw me into the ground in their hurry to get out of here!”