Netori: Stealing The Hero's Party!

Chapter 496 A Quick Trip Home - Part 1

"It's finally over, huh..." Relaxing under the gazebo of the 'Phordite mansion with heavy eye bags under her eyes, Ophelia sipped on a cup of soothing green tea while her mind struggled to keep up with the amount of work she had to put in to get rid of the living flesh of the mansion's walls.

"It's done at least," said Amelia, sitting across from her on a bench and not a chair, seeming just as tired, if not even more than her centaurian sister.Nôv(el)B\\jnn

Taking a light sip of their cups, the two heaved a sigh letting out the tension that they'd been carrying for weeks and months at this point. Looking on over to the maids and gardeners moving about through the paths leading to the mansion, the two spend their time just relaxing by themselves and enjoying the warm trickle of the sun beaming down on them through the vegetated roof of the gazebo.

An hour must've passed by the time they were finished with an entire kettle's worth of warm tea and finally turning to Ophelia, Amelia voiced today's task.

"I think we should start managing the books ourselves, the other lords are taking too large of a cut from our taxed land," slowly nudging her head to Amelia, Ophelia's eyebrows squinted to focus. "And perhaps we should send the letters to get Rose, Brenna, Tanya, and everyone else to finally live in the mansion for when Raven returns from his trip. That's what they wanted to live with him, after all."

"The house is cured, but what about their livelihoods? Brenna and Rose especially?" Ophelia asked, but Amelia had somewhat prepared for such a question.

"We have enough funds to transfer Brenna's herb production to the mansion, and I'm sure she'd love a bigger lab to brew herbs and alcohol," hearing the hum of Ophelia's voice, Amelia's chest was puffed with more confidence. "As for Rose, we can arrange for workers to stay there or incorporate a teleporter into the mansion with Linkle's help."

"Isn't the witch gone somewhere? I heard only Vlad's taking care of her shop," as the two continued to converse, a maid who'd spotted the empty kettle and cups began picking up the crockery to take it away.

Ignoring the maid in the middle, Amelia leaned her head to the side to look at Ophelia as she continued with her explanation.

"I checked with Tan, he says she's back and her shop's open again–although for only a few hours every day," speaking of Tan–the racoon boy butler, both the centaurians were reminded of something.

"Besides, Raven said it himself we're not fit to fight and will only get the way, so what's your point in bringing it up?"

Glancing between the two again, Linkel shook her head and let the matter go. Instead with a deep breath and a sigh, she presented the matter that she was there for.

"I need a quiet place to work on something, somewhere where I won't get random people showing up on my doorsteps asking for drugs." Turning in her chair to look at the many rooms of the mansion, Linkle pointed at one of them. "Let me stay and finance my work for a while and I'll help you guys with whatever it is that you need."

Instantly the thought of a teleporter popped up in the centaurians' heads, it felt almost too perfect, but seeing the opportunity present itself, they saw no reason to think about it for more than a few seconds.

"Sure, why not? But you'll have to earn your keep," Ophelia said, but as Linkle turned around with a smirk she began to regret the decision without even knowing why.

"Great! Let me bring the rest of my crew then," Linkle responded, smirking like a devil.

"What crew now?" Amelia asked, only to regret the question itself a second later.

"Darius, Vlad, Shamisha, that priestess Kara if I can find her and ever so often Mono the queen of Elenaris..."

"What?!" The girls yelled out in unison, but before they could say another word, Linkle stepped out of her chair, reached for her teleportation ring and disappeared with the parting words...

"See you soon and please get the maids to prep the rooms." Prep the room for what exactly? Linkle never said, and yet she expected it to be done by the time she returned with an army of people to experiment and quite literally prepare an army to fight against a named devil.