Fire Night Atrina

Chapter 7: Going Down Below

Katrina chuckled as she saw Beld dropping down his sword and shield as if they were useless garbage.

"You know, you ought to treat your weapons with respect," the nude redhead said, gently patting her sword, "otherwise, they may repay you in kind in the worst moment."

"My only weapon is this bad boy," Beld proudly showed his dagger, "simple, deadly, and very personal. Very fast, too."

The little elf took a step forward and put the blade forward, in a mere second his dagger was touching the redhead's nipple. In the next second, she made him put it away by igniting her boobs with a loud spark.

"Not fast enough, however," Katrina wagged a finger.

The two were about to head out, but the shortie said he still had one thing left to do. With these words, he knocked into the local captain's watchpost and went on with nonsensical formal phrases. Before that, Katrina caught an odd move on Beld's part: he took a jar filled with something gray from his waist and covered his hand with it. The sticky good engulfed the skin and, in a blink of an eye, the hand disappeared! The captain let Beld in, and the latter started talking to him about something unimportant while moving his invisible hand through the table. He reached for the quill, carefully touched it, making it disappear as well, and wrote something in the journal. After a minute, Beld exited the watchpost with a winner's smile.

"I still kinda had to take part in the training session, but I decided not to," the elf let out a laugh and washed the goo off his hand, making it visible again, "so I had to... Uh, excuse myself."

"How did you do that?" Katrina pointed at his arm.

"Oh, this? Our local potion sellers have mastered an invisibility potion some time ago. It's expensive as hell, though, and very hard to make."

"This might be useful," Katrina judged, "well, I suppose we're free to go?"

"You bet we are, cupcake!"

The short elf took a couple of minutes to change his watchman uniform to his regular dark clothes and a hood, which made him look like a thief. As they exited the training camp, Beld told the redhead where they were going. He was about to show her the other side of Zardiw, the one where all the poor dwelled, such as the older residential district and the slums. This area was the result and a grim reminder of "the four wars", a dark period of chaos and senseless violence that engulfed the entire Tholcing Kingdom and its neighbors about twenty years ago. The mayor was about to get rid of these places and renovate them street by street, but the mage craze took a toll on these plans and practically locked the people living there out of a better future. Katrina furrowed her brow as she heard the tale, details like this truly made her remember why it was so important to restore order in Zardiw.

The first place they walked by was the solar church, where its followers, sunwielders clad in long, white robes, worshipped their sun as a gifter of life. The church was different from the typical human ones: it didn't have a roof, allowing the sun to freely shine over the hall, and was surrounded by massive stones the cize of houses with ancient runes and writings carved on them. It reminded Katrina of altars of the old gods one would expect to see in the lands of western tribes. Yet, here it was all very civil as if a mixture of the old and new ways of faith. She saw nice-looking elves form a circle near the stones and start doing various stretches, reminding the redhead of her own exercises.

"Sun salutations," Beld said with a bit of skepticism, "our faithful folks consider this stretching a nice way to interact with the sun. It's an important part of the religious rituals here. Some think it's weird, but I love it. Just look at all this beauty!"

Beld pointed at several young elven women changing poses under the sunrays. They occasionally lifted their butts up into the air, made quick moves that highlighted their breasts, or simply took poses that looked very suggestive. No wonder this church gathered many followers.

"I usually come here at the time of a morning salutation to spectate," the shortie grinned.

"You're disgusting," Katrina scolded him.

Yet, the knight couldn't help but visualize Sophia doing these exact poses, only completely naked. With her cheeks all rosy from embarrassment, her boobs bouncing with each move, and all that. The mere thought of this made Katrina smile at her companion's sheer cuteness. She was ought to ask her priestess to do these salutations together.

"Hey, you here?" Beld jokingly snapped his fingers in front of the redhead's face.

"Yeah..." She scratched her head, "I was just wondering... It's interesting to see the church so close to the slums."

"Ah, yes. The planners had some favoritism. The human church of the many-faced god is closer to the noble quarters, while the elven one is here. But people don't really complain. On the contrary, they like to help the poor and the like, sometimes you can get a bowl of soup if you just look bad."

Katrina glanced at a post near the church, where two blondes, a man and a woman, stood beside a massive cauldron and handed out free stew. A large line of poorly-dressed commoners formed in front of it, each eager to have their portion. On the other side, she saw an entirely different picture, as there was a fully armored knight in black conversing with the priests. His face was hidden by an imposing helmet, yet Katrina could hear his imperative attitude through the sharp tone of his voice. The priests discussed something, they called a woman clad in a white robe, who looked a bit unsure. Soon, however, the priests convinced her and she got on the knight's horse. The man seemed satisfied.

"Seems like they're gonna have a bond," Beld smirked, "lucky guy."

"A bond?" Katrina raised her brow, "sorry, I'm unfamiliar with your solar churches, spent my entire life believing in the many-faced god."

"Oh, a bond is when a church-approved knight gets like a helper from the church. The priests who do this are called "sparks" and follow their knights from the moment they, uh, bonded. They have an entire ritual for that or something. Usually, it's to heal the knight's wounds and spread the word of the sun god everywhere he goes, but well... I think some also look for other bonuses in this kind of relationship. Especially when they choose pretty girls like that one!" Beld explained.

"Do the priests choose the bond themselves?" Katrina asked curiously.

"Well, sort of. I think sometimes their main priest decides that, if there's the sun god's will for that. Not sure how that's established," the shortie shrugged, not caring at all, "but yeah, once they've bonded, it's for a long time. The priest can't leave the knight, that'd be breaking the oath and the church hates that."

"Huh," the redhead felt a stream of thoughts and suspicions rush through her mind, but decided to leave that for now.

Soon, the good part of Zardiw finally ended, and they stepped onto the dreaded slums with their piles of crooked, tiny houses and chaotic bumpy streets. The unpaved roads filled with mud and litter weren't pleasant for Katrina's bare feet, to say the least, sometimes she had to go ankle-deep into the dark filth. The folks here also didn't feel as nice as in the other districts. Of course, the gorgeous nude warrior was still showered with gazes, whistles, and some comments with various degrees of vulgarity, but the majority of people didn't seem as excited about her, focused more on their own problems.

A good portion of residents didn't have anything good on their minds at all, Katrina saw it clearly through their tired eyes. No wonder, the redhead thought, given their conditions. The redhead didn't feel safe here, even though she didn't have to worry about anything with her abilities. Yet, each time someone's hand neared her body, she felt like it wasn't to call her or playfully slap her butt, but instead to either hit her or try stealing her expensive sword.

"No worries, sweetheart, I'll keep you safe," Beld wrapped his hand around her waist with a confident smile.

"Oh, sure, I'm sure our enemies will run from you in terror!" Katrina played along and put her hand on the shortie's shoulder.

"You're joking, but speed here is valued far more than strength. Be wary, by the way, because the local pickpockets are very swift with their moves."

"Oh, good thing I'm immune to that!" Katrina rhythmically slapped her nice-looking bare hips.

"Yeah, but there are other dangers you need to be wary of. Like... That?" Beld suddenly shouted and took to the right.

Katrina tried to follow him, but it was too late. A wave of dirty water covered her body from head to toe with a loud splash, forcing the girl to jump away in disgust. She looked at the top and saw an old woman who just spilled an entire bucket of kitchen slop right on top of the redhead.

"Why did you do that?!" Katrina shouted as she heard people laughing around her.

"He-he, sorry, didn't mean to, I'm almost blind. You better wear something next time, your body doesn't look too good when covered in garbage." The woman gloated in response.

"Oh, that does it!" The knight freed her blade with a graceful move and lit it on fire. The gloating crowd of gawkers dispersed right away, fearing the naked warrior's wrath. Katrina looked at the window again, the woman went back inside right away.

"Hey-hey-hey!" Beld waved his hands on the redhead, "we don't wanna burn the entire street down, do we? Gerda will have me hanged for this!"

Katrina looked at Beld, then at the window, then let out a sigh and extinguished the sword.

"Sure, I didn't mean to harm anyone," she said, trying to clean her breasts off potato peels, "just a little outburst, that's all."

She regretted this emotional action, but another part of her also told her that it was the right thing to do. Violence wasn't the answer, but some people were keen on mistaking kindness for weakness, and inaction could mean an even worse consequence later on. For a girl who constantly was the center of attention, both literally and figuratively due to her position within the Supreme Judge's ranks, she had to make this choice a lot. And she often had to remind herself that to be a good hero, one must know exactly where to draw the line. It wasn't always easy.

"A-anyway, is there any place where I can get clean?" Katrina turned around, looking at her dirty body, covered by litter and food remains, "I think I now look bad enough to get a bowl of stew, but that's not a good thing!"

Beld just nodded, trying his best to hold his laughter, and led the girl to the canal. It was a narrow line of murky water, riddled with dead rickety trees. Not the azure lake Katrina bathed in on the way here, but it was still much cleaner than her body right now, so the knight so it as a win. She jumped right in headfirst and allowed the water to fully engulf her nude figure, reveling in its pleasant coolness which served as a nice contrast to the hot summer sun. Beld couldn't miss this opportunity to grope the lovely redhead underwater, so he also joined in a tad later, albeit with his undies on. Katrina liked this contrast between them, it felt right and natural.

They swam around, splashed each other with murky water, and jokingly fought in the water. Katrina teased the elf and all the passersby with her skillful swimming and sometimes dove down, leaving her magnificent pussy and athletic legs above water, letting everyone see them in great detail. Their fun was very uncharacteristic for this gloomy part of Zardiw, and soon, catching some unpleasant gazes from the locals, they had to get back on track.

After this refreshing dip, the two became hungry and Beld suggested street food, which was being sold from the cart on the next street. A poorly-dressed cook with a stained apron didn't seem like the most trustworthy vendor, but the elf convinced Katrina it was alright and they got two meat chops. The girl even got her for free after letting the vendor grab her breasts, nudity was really an all-around benefit. The meat itself was greasy and a bit tough to chew, Beld jokingly called it "dog dish".

"Yeah, this kind of food should only be fed to dogs," Katrina chuckled.

"Nah, I meant that it's actually made out of a dog. You can tell if you've already tried them," the elf replied in a surprisingly calm tone.

Katrina quickly spat the meat out and threw the chop to the nearest beggar. Nothing in this place should've been taken at a face value. Yet, oddly enough, after all this walking, fighting with the locals, bathing in murky water, and eating junk, the nude redhead felt like she began to understand this filthy underbelly of Zardiw and its inhabitants. The slums had a very distinct feel about them, albeit not a good one. The kingdom's failure to bring law and order after the horrible war two decades ago was on perfect display here, and it became even worse after the mage craze shattered Zardiw's newfound stability.

Soon, another proof of this emerged right in front of the couple's eyes. As they entered a more isolated street with almost no people on it, they encountered an odd scene. There was a rickety inn with a barely readable sign, its owner with sincere horror and his eyes, and several people dressed in black clothing who gathered around him. Their intentions were obviously not good, judging by how aggressively they talked to the man, shouting at him or occasionally shoving him from left to right.

These folks didn't seem like locals, as they were a bit too well-dressed and each of them was holding a weapon of some sort, as well as having other odd details. Beld suggested they just walk by, but Katrina couldn't just let a scene like this slip by. Suddenly, one of the folks grinned and grabbed the poor innkeeper by the neck, driving him into the barely standing wall of his own establishment. Katrina got agitated and instantly counted possible foes: there were five of them.

The first one was a stocky stoneborn, undressed from the waist up. He had a bold head, considerable muscles, and an unmistakenly evil look in his eyes, a look of a seasoned criminal. The second one was a fully armored human with a large beard and an even larger axe on his shoulder, he was the one holding the poor innkeeper by the throat and grinning from ear to ear. The third one was a woman.

A young one, with a pretty face and a very good-looking figure, which was easy to see because the brunette was only wearing a black bikini as her armor, not counting gloves and boots. The fourth one was a hooded man in light armor, holding crossbows in both his hands. Out of all these despicable bandits, he looked the most threatening. The last one's figure was obscured by a broken cart and rampant weeds, but it seemed like he had a dog on a leash. Not very pleasant company, for sure.

"What's happening here, gentlemen?" Katrina asked, confidently putting her legs shoulder-width and folding her arms across her majestic boobs, "I suggest you let this poor man go and resolve your issues with someone of your own skill level."

"Oh damnit, they're from blackhearts!" She heard Beld's quiet voice. It turned out the armored axeman had some sort of an emblem on his chestplate, showing a heart surrounded by darkness.

The company looked at Katrina, but instead of running away in fear, they erupted in a fit of savage laughter. At this moment, the redhead realized that this conflict won't be resolved peacefully. She touched the handle of her sword while the bandits sized her up with their hateful eyes. The folks seemed overconfident, possibly even drunk, but their equipment and scars told Katrina that they weren't just cocky for no reason. It won't be an easy fight.