Dawn- An age of Darkness

"You don\'t understand adventurer." The lion guy chuckled. "You realize, I\'m the son of your employer, correct?" His tone changed. From a girly guy to a very serious, but still girly guy. I actually didn\'t notice that there were about a dozen or so of his monkey men in the trees. 

The leaves rattled and I had a feeling they could snipe. 

No wonder this guy was walking freely in broad daylight with only two guards. Then again, this wasn\'t daytime. 

I really had to think about my surroundings before acting rash. 

\'Son of the employer huh?\' I could almost snort but I controlled myself.

.

But seriously though, I couldn\'t take him seriously. 

"And you do realize you\'re in public right? You don\'t want that pretty face being puffed up on your way home, correct? Oh and I already gave my regards to the Baron, so." I smiled through my teeth. "First class isn\'t just for show man." My grin was very life threatening. I could probably pass for a third-class villain. 

Actually, in the heat of the moment, I might have just said some rather confidential stuff. Only after saying that did I realize it and now I was sweating. \'The hell did I just say?\'

Didn\'t I just declare myself as their enemy and openly admit I kind of almost killed the Baron?

Ah... I might have just done something rather terrible and stupid.

The girl gripped tighter. I guess she was scared of where this was going. After saying what I just said, I was scared too. 

The lion guy clicked his tongue. "I\'ll see you in court tomorrow," He grumbled. 

And he left. He almost sounded like a lawyer. 

I actually expected him to attack me and stuff but he didn\'t. His men left too. Though I had a feeling we\'d be followed. 

But seriously, he didn\'t do anything?

I breathed a sigh of relief and wiped the small beads of sweat. This could have gotten a lot more ugly.

"Was that really okay?" The girl spoke softly. She put on her hood pretty quick. 

Wasn\'t she the one who didn\'t want to go with the guy?

I sighed and walked on. "Beats me." though I acted nonchalantly, my senses were on overdrive. 

The girl followed me while the passersby all got up one by one and gave me a glance. I could almost see them being proud for some reason as the girl held my hand within hers.

\'Yeah, it\'s not what you think, okay!\'

If anything this felt like I was walking down with my little sister or something. 

***

This city really was colorful and though it was close to midnight, people were still going about their days: still no sign of any bunny girls. Sigh. 

I kind of wanted to know how lively it was during the day too, assuming we were going to live that long. So far, I didn\'t notice any followers but, they were probably out there. 

Meanwhile, the girl acted like a ten-year-old as she gazed at various stalls and saw stuff. She had change and we used that to buy some food. Mostly just deep-fried junk food. I didn\'t complain though. 

If it tasted good, it was good in my book. 

\'Maybe I should have head over to the guild and exchanged the currency?\'

Anyway, we needed to head to the castle and get this over with. 

It was roughly twelve and I wanted to get into the palace right now. 

"No, that\'s a bad idea." But the girl insisted we don\'t. She was afraid that things can happen in the corridors of the castle during the night. 

And I was afraid that things could happen no matter where you are. But then again, going in broad daylight might have been better. 

But now that people knew- at least the few that were there knew- that this girl was actually a princess, was it really the best idea to not head to the castle and just go into a generic inn?

I sure didn\'t know. 

But we went into an inn anyway. The name, \'Night\'s honey.\'

It was anything but generic.

And I had a distinct nostalgic feeling that this wasn\'t just an inn. 

\'Shit.\'

Shit indeed. \'Not again.\'

***

An ordinary inn?

Yeah, no, this was the inn of dark elves. And almost every single one of them had large chests and skintight short dresses: all the staff was female. There was a lot of tanned skin on show. 

And they were serving booze to the men in the corner having fun. It was too late for dinner. 

This world just kept on surprising me more and more. Even after nearly eight and a half months, I was still getting surprised. 

Something really was wrong with me, huh?

"I think we should look for another place?" I said, barely maintaining my composure. I had decent self-control but it wasn\'t infinite. 

The girl beside me cleared her throat- softly. "I know the owner. So this will be the safest for us," She whispered. 

Security didn\'t matter, honestly. As long as me and the bunny were with her, I didn\'t think anything bad could happen. Then again, whenever I was involved, something bad happened anyway. And besides, we were already on their radar, so no matter where we went, they\'d keep an eye on us regardless. 

"Welcome!"

And before long, two beautiful elves came and grabbed my arms, or they would have if I had two. Only one of them got that privilege and she led me to the counter against my will. It wasn\'t totally against my will though.

Tanned body, short clothes, voluptuous bosoms, and long ears. Yeah, it was a lie to say, it was totally against my will.

The bunny was still on my shoulder, looking at all this, a bit glassy-eyed.

I didn\'t choose this, okay!

Oh, wait-

Anyway, once we were at the counter, the girl behind it took a good minute to process all this, as she stared at the princess, her eyes going wide: she probably didn\'t notice at first since the princess had her hood on, but now she knew. "My god." She quickly signaled one often girls and they led us to the upper floor. 

Things happened a bit too fast.

Once up, the girl politely bowed. "It\'s been too long, your highness."

It was a two-bedroom and probably one of the best ones of this place. The door and windows were closed. 

Only the three of us were here. Oh wait, the bunny was here too. 

The princess smiled. "Yes."

I had no idea what happened so I just kept quiet. 

"This gentleman is?"

"He rescued me and is currently acting as my bodyguard according to Maye\'s wishes. He\'s trustworthy."

Hearing the word trustworthy was kind of weighing down on my conscience though. 

"And what happened to Maye-" She stopped. "I see. Anyway, please use this room and I ensure you, nothing would happen to you whilst you\'re here." She smiled. "Would you like dinner?"

Her smile was superficial. There was no doubt about it. Though I didn\'t sense any hostility from her. It was almost as though she was sad. 

"We\'ve already eaten," Viola said, declining politely. 

I wouldn\'t have minded some more meat though. 

"Well then." The girl went to the door but before going she stopped. "Young man, if you feel thirsty, do drop by."

I had a feeling she wanted to talk. 

I sighed and closed the door. 

The window was closed and now we were alone. 

I took off my armor and the shirt too. It got too sweaty. This place was a lot warmer than I thought. I opened the window. \'I stink huh?\' And I didn\'t need to sniff myself to know that. 

Currently, I was shirtless but I had a feeling the girl didn\'t have any problems with that. And even if she did she couldn\'t do anything about it. Then again, it would have been a bit sad if she started to complain about my smell though. Cause I smelled a bit rancid. 

It probably wasn\'t that bad though, probably. 

"By the way," The girl came close. "She was Maye\'s- that maid\'s sister."

Oh, that made sense, somehow. I mean that maid really wanted this girl to be safe and it was natural her sister would want this girl to be safe too. I still had no idea why. "Who was that maid?"

That maid was really something. She was willing to risk everything, just in order to make sure of this girl\'s safety. 

"She was mother\'s maid and friend. When mother passed away, she took care of me."

So, her mother was already dead? Suddenly her selfish nature made a lot of sense to me. 

"Well, tomorrow we\'ll be meeting your father. So cheer up a little." And I again remembered I didn\'t know how to properly console people. 

I didn\'t know a lot of stuff. 

"You had something to do in the capital- are you really here for my uncle? You work for him?" She looked at me, totally innocent. I guess she had her own reasons to come to that conclusion. 

Wasn\'t she bothered by this sweaty smell?

"No, not really. If anything, I might end up-" I went closer to her ear. "Overthrowing him," I whispered and winked. I took out a new shirt, wore it, and headed for the door. "The bunny will protect you, so stay here. I\'ll be back in half an hour or so minutes."

"Okay." She probably took it as a joke. Though I did say it jokingly, I was totally serious.

And with that, the bunny jumped off my arm to the bed. She did look at me with a bit of frown but she didn\'t complain. Well, she couldn\'t even if she wanted to. She was a bunny after all. 

So, with a smirk, I just headed out.