In addition to Shiroi’s 58 wolves, she brought about 200 wolves of different species. Treants who were basically male dryads that looked like wolves, Elecza wolves which were the tinier out of the bunch, but fastest with nasty claws and the regular timber wolves. They were led by a new type of wolf. He was also of the faerie wolf species, but a variant just like Shiroi. An Inugami from what I could see.
“I have arrived with allies, Master.”
Shiroi came up front and bowed before me, as did the rest of her pack. The leader of the other wolves came up front with three other wolves from the different species behind him. Unlike her, he didn’t bow. Since no one spoke, I came to the conclusion that I would need to speak to him after my speech.
My attention once again returned to everyone looking at me.
‘That’s odd. I don’t feel anything from their gazes.’
What I meant by that was the fact that for some reason, I couldn’t feel shy in front of them. As if that kind of feeling was completely erased from my mind. This wasn’t simple overcoming my fears.
“Hello everybody!”
With [Sonic Cry], my voice was sure to reach everyone. It would have been easier to use [Thought Projection] to speak to all of them, but my instincts were saying I needed to address them with my voice.
“Been an awkward past few days, huh? Lost some friends here and there and ton of injured people. Kinda makes you wish you could take a clock and turn back time, huh?”
…
‘The joke was a miss!’
‘Tough crowd.’
‘God, I thought that’d land.’
‘Then again, how did we see this to be a joke.’
I cleared my throat and straightened my back.
“Hard times are coming. Goliath has fallen, Minerva is missing, the demon lord is dead and tensions between the humans and demons have never been so high. At any point, I wouldn’t be surprised if Krull decides he wants to come back to finish what he started. Humans will start coming here in droves, killing you, your friends, families. They will steal your resources and destroy your homes for the sake of war and greed.”
I could hear mummering amongst them. Diana glared at me, thinking that this wasn’t the right thing to say at the time. Well, she was probably right, but I would never know.
“To be honest, you are all too weak to stop them from doing anything. With the gift you got from me, you should have all evolved by now, but some of you still haven’t. You aren’t strong enough to actually fight against adventurers. And your former means of safety is no longer here for you.”
They were getting nervous and restless. I could hear shouting from one side. A lot were offended, but couldn’t refute the truth. They were weak and that was going to get them killed. The goblins in particular.
“I turned my back to you guys when you needed help. Some of you may say I’m cruel for thinking about something else when you were all in pain and needy and to those some, I say you are right.”
I gulped and straightened up.
“And to that very “some”, I say you are cruel as well. Who takes advantage of a poor defenceless creature because they are connected to someone strong and shoves all their responsibility on that person out of nowhere, expecting them to have no issues with it? You were all grieving, and so was I. Yes, I’m ranting to you guys because I need you to understand that my friend too was kidnapped. Still, I was also wrong. I shouldn’t have accepted the responsibility of being in charge of all you when I wasn’t ready to protect you. I assumed it was going to be all fun and games. I would build the strongest nation in the world with no problems and everyone would be happy. But reality is often disappointing.”
While saying this, I saw multiple expressions on a certain dryad’s face. The urge to smirk was almost too great to resist, though no one would see a bird smirking.
“Honestly, I’m not ready to be your leader, but I live here too. I have friends here too. People I wouldn’t want getting hurt. And these humans, demons and outsiders will come here to tear that all up. I don’t know about you guys, but I don’t want that. I don’t want a repetition of previous events. We can’t erase past events, so I propose we destroy our old contract to each other.”
[Are you certain you wish to remove all members of the familia?]
>[YES]/[NO]
I had been giving this quite some thought and the best I could come to was that I wasn’t meant to lead them. Having a familia was not the right thing to do since it bound them to me against their will. I feel they only chose me due to Diane’s manipulation so indirectly, I was still being manipulated by her. If there was one thing I learnt from my trip, I really, really hated being manipulated.
[YES]
[You have removed all members from the familia]
[All ex familia members will no longer have access to the system]
[Your Familia level is now 0]
[Your Familia Status is now non-existent]
There was a large uproar in that moment. All of them exclaimed in shock and the new comers who had no idea what I had just done just looked on in confusion.
“Rather, let us forge a new relationship as partners and not master and servant. I mean, I had never liked the concept of being someone’s underling, so I don’t see why I should have underlings myself. Together, let us protect Larm. We grow stronger as comrades and not subordinates. If you ever need my help, I will answer the call and vice versa. There will be effective communication, to hell with masters and servants. So, will you guys help me so we make Larm a safer place?”
I hadn’t mentioned my secret agenda to still find Minerva.
There was silence.
‘Aish, looks like we flopped the speech.’
‘Ugh, now it’s just weird.’
‘T-this is why p-public speeches aren’t f-for us!’
‘Well, we said our piece. At least, we officially don’t have the responsibility of looking out for them.’
Diane was showing visible frustration. It looked like she was about to snap, but after a while she simply sighed.
“Hi-”
She was about to say something, but then Shiroi stepped up and spoke.
“Master, remember what you said to me while we were travelling to the South?”
“You don’t need to call me maste-”
“Excuse my impertinence, but I will call you master because I have chosen you.”
She was coming on a bit too strong.
“In the South, you asked me what my honour is. I still am not sure of what the answer is, but no one had ever made me question such a thing. I believe through serving you, I will find what my honour is.”
I remembered little to nothing of what she was talking about. Hyakkun replayed the memory for me and I cringed up.
“Lady Hinotori.”
Reiman came up from wherever it was that he was hiding. He was clothed in what I presumed to be human adventurer gear as he was now as big as a human was.
“Reiman?”
“You are an immature leader with little to no care for those under you. You’re reckless, inexperienced and too curious. You are not fit to lead anyone.”
‘Aish. That was too heartless.’
‘Should have toned it down a bit.’
I winced, feeling my heart being crushed by his words.
“Is what I would say if you weren’t visibly different.”
“E-Eh?”
“You have grown from your short trip. Still inexperienced and you might have more flaws than I know off, but what kind of General lets his Master go astray? And in the most unexpected times, you can be wise and cunning. I will be needing your help, Lady Hinotori.”
He bowed to me.
‘W-What is this?’
“You are right. We came to you begging that you protect us, so it is not in our place to get angry at you for thinking about yourself first.”
Tsuna spoke up, also coming forward.
“Kekeke, you blessed us with your presence and that is more than enough reason to serve you.”
Nukeme with his usual cackle joined in.
“You gave us the power to get stronger in short time. You helped us when the tyrant Krull sought to enslave us. We have more than enough reason to willingly want to follow you.”
Taiku went down on one knee.
“The energetic youngsters have spoken. It would seem this generation is luckier than mine to have been born when you were around. Besides, it’s not just anyone who can garner this much devotion from my lovestruck pupil.”
Yuuna, the old hob-goblin teased Tsuna, poking her with the staff she held.
The biggest one out of the hob-goblins, Oki came up to me. Ichi and Ni moved to protect me, but I ordered for them to stand down.
“I, Oki, leader of Krav and chosen warrior of the demi-god of war, choose to follow you!”
He made an open declaration to everyone. His mind was blank and as such, I couldn’t tell if he was still plotting to betray me.
“Of course, I’ll serve you mawstewr.”
Kawaii jumped on me from heavens-know-where, as did Ulva.
“I will always be on Big sister’s side.”
“No, no. You guys aren’t supposed to be-”
“Don’t make this weird, Chicken. Just accept us back.”
Yokino who had snuck past the defences of the treants and was holding my shoulders whispered in my ear.
“You guys-”
“Before you say anything further, we must warn you.”
Reiman rose his head.
“We shall not take no for an answer.”
“Never!”
As a united front, they all spoke to me, asking for me to take them back.
‘Guys?’
‘Well, logically we see no reason why not.’
‘Y-Yeah. M-More people means o-our safety.’
‘And it’ll be easier to survey the area as well as protect the forest from humans, demons and outsiders.’
‘Since a war is coming, it’ll be best to monopolise on all resources we can muster.’
‘That i-includes living resources and our s-surroundings.’
‘You’re in charge though, so whatever you do is what we’ll work with.’
They made a good point. Rationally, there was no reason for me to refuse them, especially when they were obliging so hard, but-
“Lady Hinotori! P-Please don’t abandon us!”
Saddened yells came at me. What I saw was the shocking sight of Kara and Sylvie, both crying. Both whom I’d assumed didn’t even speak to each other said the exact same thing at the exact same time with the exact same reaction. If not for the sight of them crying, I might have been creeped out. Like speak of déjà vu.
It was personally an embarrassing sight given the number of people watching us at this very moment.
‘Oh… to hell with it.’
“Yes. Fine. You guys win. I’ll do it, and I’ll do it right this time. So… please stop crying.”
<A/N: Please give me your power stones, golden tickets, comments and reviews. Also, join the discord so we can interact more.>
