Li stood with arms crossed and head cocked as he watched Ada and her husband struggle to open the hidden door to the attic where the slaves were held. The husband tiptoed atop a precariously shaking ladder as he used his fist to try and rap at areas of the wooden ceiling, trying to find for hollow space.
Li looked around him. Aside from the main living room where they had talked, there was a small hallway flanked by three rooms. One for the child, one for the married couple, and one presumably for Ivo. The hallway itself was austere, composed solely of undecorated wood with a low ceiling that made Li, on the taller side, hunch his head down a little.
At the very end, the ceiling elevated significantly, and this was where the supposed entrance to the attic was, but it seemed that neither Ada nor her husband knew exactly about it.
"You don't know how to get in?" said Li.
Ada shook her head. "Nay. Chevrette's men come in the darkest and quietest midst of night and leave swiftly. He doesn't tell us to do nothin', and we try and avoid seein' anything either."
Her hands begin to tremble wildly again, and her husband noticed and called out in concern. "Dear, do you need your medicine?"
With his attention diverted while his balance was already on the line, he lost his footing on the ladder and began to fall.
In a flash, Li grabbed the shocked man by the collar, stopping his heavy body from making a ruckus by hitting the floor, and put him aside.
"Move it. I'll do this." Li did not need the ladder. Instead, he focused his ears and eyes, pinpointing where life flowed. He could sense two entities breathing in strangely calm regularity. As he positioned himself under where he sensed these life signatures, he commented, "If Chevrette is trusting you with his product, then I would assume you two would know something."
"He don't need us, just our space." Ada sighed as her husband clasped her hands to his, soothing the fidgeting. "So he doesn't tell us nothing. When he comes by, he tells us to stay in our rooms, and I've had no mind to ever be curious enough to peek out at my sins."
"I see." Li found the hollow spot. "That fidgeting with your hands, by the way, I recognize that symptom from studying about the milk poppy. That's a sign of withdrawal, isn't it?"
"Well, if I'm to be a criminal already, then I didn't see the point of holdin' back." Ada shrugged. "And only milk poppy could soothe me conscience. But the poppies have all dried up out of town, leavin' me with precious little to bury my role in all this."
Li punched upwards, smashing his hand through the ceiling. He watched as Ada and her husband jumped back in fear.
"Relax," Li said. "I've looked enough. This door doesn't open normally. It slides apart with runic magic, and finding the right runic key to activate the opening isn't something I'm willing to waste my time doing."
With his hand stuck in the ceiling, Li forcefully slid open the door. A faint cloud of musty dust wafted down as a pitch black space opened up where before there had been plain wooden ceiling.
Li looked at Ada, at the intense weariness that had settled upon her, marking deep crows feet beside her eyes that belonged to a far older woman. Wrinkles borne from wanting to keep her family safe and yet understanding that as she did so, she let others fall to fates worse than death. She had turned to drugs to soothe that mental strain, but Alexei had been faithful to Li in disbanding his entire drug operation, leaving a supply vacuum that had not yet been filled, nor would it considering the count still controlled all the drug routes.
"And you," said Li to Ada. "It's time you stopped burying your conscience and faced it. What I'm about to do will change everything about your life in countless different ways, but one thing I can guarantee is that you will have a chance to face your wrongs and make them right. I trust you'll make the right decision this time."
With that, Li hoisted himself up into the attic space. The faint lantern light below disappeared, instead being replaced by a thick and cold darkness that told that this space had never seen the warmth of sunlight in years.
Using his night vision, Li could see that the attic was actually rather cozy. There were fur blankets and rugs dotted about, thick and warm in their designs, the type that outdoorsman would wear to a withering winter cold. A shelf stocked with jars packed with dried foods and sealed waters stood in a corner, and beside it, the two slaves lay, huddled up in blankets.
Li approached them slowly, not wanting to scare them, but he quickly realized his concern was for naught. Their slit pupiled eyes glowed in the dark, but they were out of focus, dazed and looking at nothing. He knelt in front of them to get a closer look and investigate.
Both of them were tall, taller than the average human man, and built with lean, wiry muscles lined with faded scars that told of a lifetime of hardship that had just recently been smoothed over with some healing. They were young, but their bodies were developed to the point that it was obvious to tell they were not girls.
They were different in every other measure. One was a Feli with twitching red feline ears and an open mouth lined with short and sharp teeth. The other was a Serpi, her ears pale and pointed, her mouth lined with blood red lips with a pale pink forked tongue lolling out from it. Two particularly long fangs meant for injecting venom curved out from the roof of her mouth.
They did not react to Li at all. They did not even seem to register his presence. Li saw that they seemed healthy enough, their frames filled out well and no fresh injuries on them. Dressed well, too, prettied up in silken dresses that oozed sensuality.
In any case, they were not going to stay here. Li took each one under his arms and carried them out of the attic.
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"Gods, they're a pretty bunch," remarked Ada. "I've never seem em' up close, in the light. Thought they'd be all monster like."
"Can't hold a candle to you, though" said her husband.
Ada flashed a serious stare to her husband. "Now's truly not the time for sweet talking."
"Of course, they're pretty, considering what they're supposed to be used for," said Li as he inspected the beastwomen. He had seated them with their backs to the wall so that they would not fall down.
Reminded of the cruel gravity of the situation, Ada and her husband grew quiet, and Li inspected the beastwomen again. He had been initially careful in the case that they were under the influence of a hero's powers as those were out of Li's expertise, but he quickly ruled that out.
Li had checked their statuses and found that they were afflicted by the Cursed status effect, heavily increasing their susceptibility to debuffs, meaning that a spell had robbed them of their faculties. He could heal them in an instant, but he wanted to know what spell it was exactly that had hit them.
It did not take long for Li to realize what it was. He had an almost encyclopedic knowledge of the vast list of spells in Elden World, and he narrowed that down to debuffs and curses, and that even further to those ranging from levels 10-60, the standard for this world. Among those, he remembered flavor texts that detailed symptoms that matched what the beastwomen faced, and he landed upon a handful of options.
Those, Li eliminated to just one by checking their necks, finding pentagonal red marks embedded at their napes.
Li recognized this as the spell icon for [Mindwarp], a Celesium rank spell exclusive to the Warlock specialization with a minimum level requirement of 45. It functioned like a short stun in game, so it was rather useless unless an unit was cursed, in which case the stun length was tripled. [Dominus] was the upgraded version learned at level 80 that was actually useful as it allowed a player to take control over other players' summons, though even that had a whole host of restrictions and difficulties to it that made the spell too bothersome to slot in.
In this world, though, Li recognized that because flavor and lore text became reality, spell effects were not just limited to simple stuns, but could actually manifest into legitimate forms of mind control, making the spells worthy of learning.
Adding to this, whoever had casted this was no chump in terms of the power levels of this world, and, interestingly, would have to be a Warlock.
Interesting because Li had not seen a single Warlock in this world since he had come here, and he knew it was because warlocks were the very first heretics that the faith of Helius had wiped out almost a century ago. The implications for that, he would consider later.
"I'm going to undo the spell that's making them like this," said Li.
"Are you certain?" said Ada's husband as he pushed his wife behind him while he himself took shaky steps back. He looked around for his sword before realizing it had been broken by Li. "They may fight back. Beastmen are fierce and savage brutes that want nothing more than to feast on human innards. Their instincts may awaken."
"Relax." Li scoffed at the man's superstitious beliefs. "There are a few beastmen working right here in this city, and they haven't drowned the streets in blood. Maybe take some time to think up an apology to them, hm?"
With that, Li opened up his hand and waved it over the two beastwomen.
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