On the Road Again

"Are you sure you want to transfer to another hero team?" Tomoko asked as Citrinas nodded with a determined expression. Currently, Tomoko, Ruya, and Alka were standing outside Mathias' estate, waving goodbye to Citrinas and Verdi as they boarded the carriage to leave for Alka's homeland.

"I'm sorry I'm leaving. I just... I have my reasons." Citrinas said as Tomoko glanced over to Verdi. Currently, the alchemist was busy using ice magic to create two surprisingly realistic miniature ice knights and making fight to the ****, cheering them on as though he wasn't in complete control of the fight. Some of the estate's local servants were also watching the fight, with some even jokingly tossing coins to bet on the outcome. It was a mystery to most of Tomoko's party just why a hyper-active person like him would be with someone as reserved as Citrinas, but they opted to chalk it up as opposites attracting.

"You should never feel bad about doing what you want." She said while grasping Citrinas' shoulder. "If anything, we're happy you're branching out." She said as Alka walked over and slapped Verdi on the back, distracting him as one of the knights he was controlling beheaded the other.

"I ought to kick your ass! We thought you got her pregnant!" She shouted as Verdi shouted, his miniature knight raising its blade in a show of triumph.

"No! You killed Sir Chilly! You'll pay for that!" He warned as Alka snorted at him.

"What are you gonna do? Chill my boots?" Alka asked, amused at the alchemist's hubris. He merely smirked and crossed his arms while cocking his head to the side.

"This." Verdi said while shifting the snow around him. Suddenly, the white snow began coalescing upwards and compacting itself into a pair of smooth, muscular legs. Soon, Alka shouted as he created a perfect 1 for 1 sculpture of her flexing her arms with an ice copy of Mathias standing next to her and praising the beauty. There was even frozen sweat droplets on the sculpture, his fine magic control reaching new levels of precision.

"Gah! You bastard!" Alka said while punching the statue, her superhuman strength shattering it in a single blow. Sadly, the statue merely regenerated itself, forcing her to unleash a flurry of blows at the ice statue.

"Go ahead and break this one. You'll never find the rest." He said, causing her to stop attacking the statue and glare at him.

"... The rest?" Alka asked as Elmeria walked in through the front gates with a puzzled expression on her face.

"Alka, question. What would you do if I said the city was full of naked statues of you?" She asked as Alka looked to the grinning alchemist.

"I think the nude form is the purest form of art. I think my brother would agree it's quite tasteful." He said cheerily as a vein bulged on Alka's head.

"BASTARD! ELMERIA, I'LL CATCH UP LATER!" Alka shouted while running off into the city to destroy the rest of his supposed art pieces. Citrinas just sighed as Verdi and Elmeria burst out laughing at their little prank on Alka, the supposed art pieces he made never actually existing. They didn't coordinate this little prank, but they were both the type to think on their feet.

"How long do you think it'll last before she notices we're just fucking with her?" Verdi asked.

"I'll give her an hour before I send someone to pick her up." Elmeria said as Ruya stood next to the carriage with her arms crossed. She threw a glance to Verdi before entering the carriage.

"Hey, keep her safe, alright?" She said as Verdi scoffed at her.

"... You expect ME to keep her safe." He asked as the dragonkin froze.

"... Citrinas, keep him safe."

"I will, I will." Citrinas reassured as Verdi snapped his fingers in realization.

"Oh, hey, can you do me a favor?" Verdi asked, suddenly reaching into his pocket and taking out the earnings he made from the alchemy guild. "Can you take this money and buy a BUNCH of Colchik while you're at Alka's?" He asked as Elmeria grabbed the coin pouch.

"You damned drunk." She said while pocketing it. "Yeah, I'll hand it off next time we meet."

"No, actually, can you send it to Mathias if you can? I feel REALLY bad for drinking all his liquor." Verdi added, the request startling the priestess.

"Yeah, I'll call some friends up." Elmeria said as Verdi nodded, oddly interested in maintaining his friendship with Mathias despite his usual sour personality to everyone else. It seemed he was quite fond of the swordsman despite the immense level disparity between them. As they said their goodbyes, the party spotted a pair walking towards them.

One of them was a muscular woman with olive skin clad in furs with long, disheveled white hair. Even with the scars on her body, she was a breathtaking beauty that could gain the attention of anyone she passed by. The other person by her side was her polar opposite, being a hulking giant clad in soot colored armor and equipped with a two handed sword engraved with strange runes. The helmet he wore concealed his face while any appraisal skill like God's Eye only returned threatening messages, a fact Verdi was keen to remember.

"Oh fuck. Is Varrick in her party?" Verdi asked with a panicked voice, still remembering the knight from his first day in the city. He'd been using God's Eye at random up until he saw the knight call him out by name. From that day on he banned himself from ever using it, still terrified of the giant. Just looking at him made his monster instincts scream that he was bad news.

"How do you know Varrick?" Citrinas asked cautiously as Verdi looked away from her, scratching his neck awkwardly.

"I... Kinda used God's Eye on him the first day we came. He gave me a scary message. I think I pissed him off." He said as Citrinas sighed.

"... How do you keep getting into trouble this quickly?" She asked.

"It's not on purpose. Life just wants me to suffer." Verdi said indignantly, refusing to accept responsibility for his stupid stunts.

"Well, Harvin said that he explained the situation to Varrick, so you should apologize before this gets weird." Citrinas said as Fenri walked in between them.

"Fuck are you two whispering about?" She asked as Verdi spoke up.

"Can you tell the big scary armored guy to piss off?" Verdi asked as Fenri looked back at Varrick.

"Hey, piss off!" She shouted.

"No." Varrick answered in a succinct tone. Fenri sighed while shaking her head.

"I want him gone too if it makes you feel any better." She said as she began walking forward. "Come on. We're going." She ordered as the trio began walking along the streets of Kolderia for the last time. Verdi seemed to cling to Fenri as they walked, unwilling to stand close to Varrick. Varrick, on the other hand seemed to ignore his fear as they walked to the city's gates. As they left the city, Verdi seemed to perk up as the city's debuff was removed. Despite being at full strength, he was still clinging to the female members of the party as he glanced around the area, as though he were looking for something. It was only when they left the city and began marching through the snow that he made his complaints known.

"Hey Fenri, where the hell are we even going?" Verdi asked as she stopped and sniffed the air. She seemed to notice something as she walked forward.

"I'll tell you when I find out. I'm following Fox-Bitch's scent right now." Fenri answered as they continued to aimlessly wander about. They ended up veering off the main roads, the well protected trails patrolled by elite guards replaced with vast, unending snowfields. As they marched the snow around them steadily increased in height, eventually reaching past their knees and slowing their trek to a slow crawl. Of the group, Citrinas was the only one that seemed to be affected by the harsh terrain, her body ill suited for such exertions.

"Light walk and you're already tired?" Fenri asked as Citrinas began panting, her breath fogging up in front of her as she tried to catch her breath.

"I'm fine." She said between breaths as Verdi sighed as he walked in front of her.

"Get on." He ordered while getting on a knee and placing his arms behind his back to carry her.

"I can keep up." Citrinas said, as Verdi shifted the snow underneath her feet, causing her to fall forward. Her chest pressed into his back as he picked her up in a piggyback ride.

"No point in wasting your energy, considering I can't feel tired anymore." He said, taking some solace in his current incarnation. Erosarkics were built to endlessly seed their prey without rest and healed far too quickly to feel fatigue. He wasn't very fast or strong, but he did have stamina.

"Not even 6 hours and she's dead weight." Fenri spat under her breath while Verdi carried Citrinas on his back.

"Keep talking and I'll make you dead meat." He warned as Fenri stopped and sniffed the air.

"Good news princess, you get a break. There's a dungeon up ahead." Fenri said, continuing to walk forward as Verdi sighed.

"So? We'll walk around it." He said as Fenri shook her head.

"Nope. We're walking around. YOU are going straight in." She declared before shoving him forward.

"What? Why do I gotta go in alone?" He asked indignantly.

"Because you're underleveled and need the training." She answered casually, only for Varrick to take a step forward in protest.

"Fenri, he's an alchemist. Sending him into a dungeon alone is cruel." He said, surprisingly empathetic as Fenri shrugged.

"He has a level in a knight class. Plus, I have faith he can handle a dungeon on his own if I could." She said.

"Fenri, you're a hero with the blessings of the goddess of the hunt. He isn't." Varrick said.

"Also, I don't have a knight class." Verdi said before looking down and casting God's Eye on himself. "Wait... I do. How the hell did I get that?" He asked, puzzled while Fenri and Citrinas looked away from him.

"Who knows?" Citrinas mumbled while still on his back.

"Either way, sending him in alone is cruel. We're following him in." Varrick said, refusing to budge on the issue.

"If he screws up, you can go save him. Until then, Just watch." Fenri said, trusting in her new party member's competence.

"**** driver." Verdi mumbled as he sensed the dungeon ahead. Unlike his own dungeon which was a vast jungle, the dungeon ahead was massive mud pit with little to no footing for anyone to walk on. The minions that spawned to protect the dungeon were massive boars 10 feet in height and weighing several thousand pounds. Their tusks were larger than a full grown man while their skin was thick enough to parry even a trained knight's blade. Since he knew that complaining would do nothing to convince Fenri to change her mind, he set Citrinas down and walked forward while deciding on a course of action. Spotting one of the boars in the distance, he lowered himself to the ground and decided to test his new knight ability out.

"Taunt." He thought to himself, hoping to feel a surge of power in him and attract the boar to attack him. Nothing happened. He tried molding magic power into his body hoping that would activate Taunt. Though he could feel slightly more resilient, the boar was still unaffected.

"What are you doing?" Varrick whispered, watching Verdi mutter taunt under his breath.

"Trying to use taunt?" Verdi answered before shifting his magic power around, hoping to activate Taunt on accident.

"So why aren't you moving your spirit power?" Varrick asked as Verdi stopped and looked to the knight.

"... What's spirit power?" He asked under his breath as Varrick looked to Citrinas and Fenri.

"You haven't taught him about spirit power?" He asked as Verdi continued experimenting.

"No. Why would a mage need to learn about spirit power?" Citrinas asked as Verdi felt something click in his body. Randomly shifting his magic power was doing something. It was probably taunt.

"Okay... Taunt!" Verdi said, channeling his power and feeling his magic power take on a strange characteristic unlike his usual ice magic. Rather than feeling his body's resilience increase, black tendrils shot out from his hand and wrapped around the boar, grabbing it as it squealed in terror. The squeals echoed through the area as the black whip continued to wrap around the boar, compacting it tighter and tighter until the boar was no more. The only thing left of its body was...

"WHAT THE FUCK!?" Fenri shouted, her voice attracting every monster in the area as they found the boar now reduced to a massive dildo.

"Oh, damn. That wasn't Taunt, was it?" Verdi said while staring at the dildo, more confused by his inability to use Taunt than by his spell. Meanwhile, Fenri was busy panicking at just what he'd done, focused solely on the massive dildo on the ground as it twitched every few seconds.

"HOW WAS THAT IN ANY WAY TAUNT!? WHAT THE FLYING FUCK DID YOU JUST DO YOU CRAZY FUCKING BASTARD!?" She exclaimed as Varrick unsheathed his sword, spotting a horde of boars stomping towards Fenri's shouts.

"Oh, Verdi, don't use magic power. Taunt is a knight specific skill that uses spirit power." Varrick advised as Verdi continued to shift magic power around.

"We just gonna ignore he turned that fucking boar into a cock!?" Fenri exclaimed before looking to Citrinas. "Did you know he could do that!? Fuck, could he have done THAT to me when we fought!?" She asked as Citrinas shrugged.

"He's never used it, but I kind of assumed he could considering he has Status Effect." She said as Varrick casually walked forward, slashing away at the boars attacking them while Verdi tried stabbing at them with instinctive magic. Though he was quite precise in aiming at their hearts, he was far too weak to penetrate their thick hide, forcing him to target their eyes to deal minor damage to them.

"Status Effect gives him immunity to instant **** and raises stats, not the power to turn things into cocks!" Fenri said indignantly.

"The effect depends on which goddess' hair is sewn into his core. Melanoche's hair gives immunity to lethal status effects while Carnachias' hair gives him mind control and... This weird spell." Citrinas said as the black tendrils grabbed ahold of yet another boar and transformed it.

"FUCK!" Verdi shouted in the background, the pile of dildos now piled up waist high. "TAUNT DAMN YOU! TAUNT!"

"Why doesn't he use this for everything!?" She asked in disbelief as the pair got to work killing the boars, Varrick doing the lion's share of the work while Verdi continued to try using Taunt.

"It's mostly for low level monsters and people who aren't resisting. Any opponent that's remotely trained in using spirit power or magic power can resist it. Plus, the effect dispels after 24 hours or if the target's new form is destroyed, like the humanity skill. It's mostly a skill to humiliate than kill." Citrinas answered.

"TAUNT!" Verdi shouted as he fired another black whip from his hand, transforming another monster into a dildo. "Damn it! Again!?"

"Shouting the ability won't make it activate dumbass!" Fenri shouted.

"Then how the fuck do I use it!?" Verdi asked as he turned another boar into a dildo. "I just wanna use Taunt!" He shouted as Fenri sighed, watching the dildo pile grow by the second.

"Varrick, go teach him how to use spirit power before he turns this dungeon into a sex dungeon." Fenri ordered as Varrick nodded, grabbing him aside to give him a lesson on Spirit Power.