Lilith: Origin of Succubi

Chapter 232

Chapter 232<~> Chapter 232

Click. The first door was unlocked. I drew my sword in case anyone inside turned out to be hostile. Torien moved away and stood next to Silva who was leaning against the door, listening for anyone coming nearby. I cautiously opened the door to reveal two beastfolk, a thin rabbitkin man and a larger demi-wolfkin man. The two of them eyed the sword I was holding warily. The room they were in was a small cell with two straw beds, a chamber pot, and nothing else.

"What is this about?" The demi-wolfkin asked.

I looked over them, both had pretty neutral karma which was normal for people who had low-level classes. Both of them were much weaker than us, the difference in mana between us was obvious. I wasn't sure if they knew it as well, but the sword I was holding was deterrent enough.

"The Order of Lilith is here to free as many slaves as possible. May I approach to remove your collars?" I asked.

The two looked at each other in disbelief for a moment before the rabbitkin stood up and took a step toward us. "I'm not yet too broken to look for hope in your words. What do I have to do for this?"

"Escape and flee to the Northern Greens. Don't hurt civilians but you can protect yourselves from guards. Don't run yet, we're going to free as many as we can and flee all at once." I reached up and channeled my mana through the bracelet before touching his collar. The collar popped open and fell to the floor in a racket making both slaves stare at it in shock.

I sheathed my sword and looked at the wolfkin. "May I free you as well?" I asked.

He nodded and held his neck out without getting up from the bed he was sitting on. I reached over and touched his collar. Like the rabbitkin's his collar fell off the moment my fingers made contact. He immediately reached up to rub his sore neck. "None of you are actually dogkin, you smell wrong."

I looked at him with a raised eyebrow. "Keep that to yourself."

"It was a warning, your disguises aren't perfect." His ears went back in submission.

I took a step back. "It's fine. They're good enough. Do either of you have any skills that would help the rest of us escape?"

"I can help keep watch, I have keen hearing," the rabbitkin offered.

The demi-wolfkin just shrugged. "I'm a baker..."

"Go wait by the door with... them," I said gesturing to Silva. We hadn't come up with aliases or anything before coming in here. I hadn't considered if it would be necessary or not. "No names," I said to everyone. The two slaves we had freed nodded as if I had been talking to them.

Walking back to Torien I crouched by the door while she worked on the next lock. After a bit more waiting the door clicked open revealing two more beastfolk men. A foxkin with tan fur and scabbing wounds marring his arms. The other was some kind of scaled beastfolk that was one of the rarer ones I had seen around the capital. "Are all these the cells for the beastfolk men?" I asked Torien.

"Looks like it," she replied.

"The Order of Lilith is here to free as many slaves as possible. May I approach to remove your collars?" I asked these two.

Like the last two, they warily accepted and allowed me to remove their collars. Once their shock at being freed had come I turned to the foxkin. "Go over to her for healing," I said pointing to Bella.

Bella looked over the gashes in his arms before channeling nature magic through them and healing his wounds the rest of the way. "I can't do anything about the scars but your fur should come back in over them," she told him.

He rubbed his scarred arms before looking over our group. "If you have spare lockpicks I can help you open the cells."

I shrugged. "I wouldn't be surprised if people hear about the Order of Lilith after this, if they already know it's us then what's one more sign? I'd rather not tempt my alliance with him by not holding to my word." She nodded and went back to the door as I closed the bodies in the first cell.

I took stock of the prisoners we had rescued so far. Everyone here was low-leveled and none seemed to have any combat training. The benefit was that most of the people here had mostly neutral karma meaning I didn't need to worry about that moral quandary yet.

Torien pulled me aside. "Where do we go with this many people? The guards would just slaughter them if they tried to fight back."

I nodded. "It would have been better if we found some fighters first."

"I know where they keep the combat classes and higher levels," a cougar beastfolk said, joining our quiet conversation.

The two of us turned to him. "Are they close?"

He nodded. "They split us up by race, the ones on this side of the building are all men and the ones closest to us are the beastfolk with fighting classes. That's your best bet if you're trying to get everyone out of here at the same time."

"Good, what's your name?" I asked him.

"Quinn, Miss. You guys seem strong and know what you're doing, but it doesn't seem like you know your way around this place. Let me help you."

I sized up this guy. He was on the higher end of the levels in this room but the farther off from your own level, the harder it was to gauge accurately. Possibly around level ten, impressive for a villager but not really on the same level as any of the adventurers we had run into, and that's only assuming his class is useful. He had the head of a mountain lion and bright blue eyes. He had lean muscles and looked kind of like a pretty boy. It was still hard for me to predict how attractive others found different beastfolk but I could guess that he would be considered handsome based on my own appraisal. Like all of the other slaves, he wore a simple rough cloth shirt and trousers but didn't wear any shoes which was common for beastfolk that had paws instead of human-like feet.

"You want to help?" Torien asked suspiciously.

He smiled. "I wasn't looking forward to being a slave so I'm thankful you're here trying to rescue us. It's best for both of us if I can tell you where things are. Then maybe I can tag along with you guys when we get out of here. I've lived in human lands all my life, I don't think leaving to the land of the elves and beastfolk would suit me."

I frowned. "We can talk about that last bit when we're leaving. Let's focus on what we're doing now."

Quinn nodded and pointed toward one of the walls. "The male combat prisoners are down the hallway that way and to the left."

"How do you know that?" Torien asked.

"My class gives me access to an ability that allows me to see outside of my body and through walls. I've been looking for a way to escape since I got here. All I've really been able to do is look around though, there haven't been any chances to get free until now and my range is limited. But I can probably be helpful if we're trying to sneak around."

It sounds like some kind of... astral projection or something similar? I'm curious about the ability but it's rude to ask about that stuff and now really isn't the time. Maybe I can convince him to tell me about it later.

"Alright, you can help us. Our goal is to get everyone that we can out of here. The larger the group we can put together, the easier that'll be once we can't sneak anymore."

Quinn smiled. "Great, lead the way then."

We organized the group into rows of two to follow us with Lorriene leading and Silva in the back. We should have more time to react from the front and Silva is better than Lorriene at fighting multiple people at once making her the better choice to watch for ambushes from behind. We explained that trying to escape with us could be dangerous to the former slaves but none of them here expressed any interest in staying behind, it was harder to make them stay organized than it was convincing them to leave with us. Lorriene, Quinn, and I led the group as we headed toward the combat slaves. Quinn assured me that the keys we found would open their cells too, so it should be faster this time.

Just as we were approaching one of the corners, the entire building rocked again as another explosion could be heard. What is happening in the bazaar right now?