Rubble and dust had settled around the dungeon’s entrance, making it blend into the environment with no real discernible way to find it without already knowing where it was. Coming out of its entrance, both Zephyr and Aura dusted their clothes and guised themselves with magic to appear human.
A young boy with dusty clothes and a carriage full of strange goods, traveling alongside his human slave, who helped him everywhere he went. That was to be their story, a perfect ruse giving them plausible reasons to enter any town to sell goods. Riding on a carriage driven by bicorns, which too were masked with magic to appear as regular horses, they made their way towards the nearest town with Aura holding the reins.
Only she knew how the terrain had shifted around them in the last five hundred years. Earthquakes, the change of seasons and manmade constructions that had torn their way through nature’s creations. Such and so had malleated the surroundings into something completely different from what Zephyr remembered.
A sea of ash and gore left behind by him after his last battle against the forces of the gods was now replaced with rich soil and a thick forest with more animals living in it than he’d ever seen in his entire life. Birds chirped on tall branches, and numerous other critters and beasts watched them from a safe distance.
"Animals...they’ve always been sharper than humans when it comes to assessing danger." Smiling to herself at the sight of the predators keeping their distance, Aura waved her hand at the animals. A gust of magic was whiffed from her hand, sprouting fruits on the trees and berries on the bushes. "I’ve always had a soft spot for animals. Too bad they live such short lives."
"We can always change that if you really long for another pet that much," tracing the surroundings with his eyes as well, Zephyr was reminded of the many animals that they’d kept as pets. "You would have to promise to keep them safe, though. That one time that wolf died, you cried for a fortnight."
"Mhnm~ Maybe some day..." Aura contemplated, wondering what kind of fur her new pet should have.
Her contemplations, however, came to an abrupt end.
"AHHH! G-GET AWAY FROM ME!!" The scream of a woman bounced off the dense forest trees and reached the two as an ear-piercing screech. At first, they were ready to pass on by. Unflinching in the voice, as it was merely yet another victim of circumstance. A devil has no empathy nor interest in mortal suffering, but curiosity? It was a devil’s snare. And as another word came out of this distant woman, their curiosity quickly turned to interest. "H-Hestia, help me!"
"Hmm...Seems like we’re still in that last goddess’s territory," tugging on the reins, Aura jerked the line to hasten her horses. "Upup! After the voice boys."
Following her command, the disguised bicorns let out a neigh before steering off the main path. Leading the carriage through the woods with their hastened hooves, they tore through trees and trampled bushes and everything else that came in their path. The beast and the animal, thankfully, kept their distance. Upon coming upon an opening with a pond and a cornered woman, the same couldn’t be said for the pack of goblins, brandishing their weapons at the woman.
With goblins in front and an algae-ridden pond to her back, the screaming woman seemed horribly conflicted between drowning or allowing herself to fall into the hands of the goblin pack. Her eyes darted back and forth, judging the depth of the stale water and the sheen of the goblin’s rough blades. A cold plunge that might drag her into its pit because of her heavy clothes, or a slow and gruesome death in some cave where the monsters kept their female captives.
The rising tents in their crude tunics and the nasty smirks on their faces finally gave her the answer that she needed, and so with her hands clasped together, the woman turned towards the pond and looked to the heavens.
"I-I’m sorry, but I can–I don’t want to be captured!" Tears flowed down the woman’s cheeks, and right as her eyes opened to her own reflection in the pond, she saw herself–pale as a ghost, as if she’d already gone and died. "HAA!!"
Her body recoiled with a gasp, and she fell on her plump rear. Slowly, as she recovered from the pain, the voice of the goblin stepping closer and closer became clearer. Wearing terror on her face, the nun turned her head. That moment of realization of her fate was what the fiend had been waiting for, as saving her when she wasn’t looking would not serve him in any way.
"Good luck, master~" Aura whispered as Zephyr jumped off the carriage.
Stepping forward with but a wooden rod in his hand, he was still disguised as a measly human with no more than common training with a blunt weapon. A merchant with a wooden stub in his hand–hardly a saviour, or so the distressed woman imagined.
"R-run! Don’t fight them!" She screamed, not wanting to involve any more tragedies beyond herself.
’Too stupid to take help? Or just another proud zealot who thinks their god will save them if they pray hard enough?’ Glancing at the woman, the fiend masked his face with a false look of nervousness. ’I might have to hold back. Too early for anyone to know that I’m awake again.’
"I-I’ll be fine!" He said, his voice that of a somewhat squeaky young adult.
"N-no...please just–" Before the nun could say anything else, the enraged goblins charged at Zephyr.
Swinging their blades at his face, one of them managed to graze him. Jumping back with clenched teeth, the fiend clicked his tongue to keep the pretence of a tough battle. Even so, having to lean into a goblin blade so that it may hurt him was, needless to say, frustrating.
’Can’t even hit a standing target without getting the victim’s help. Imbeciles.’ He thought as another goblin came swinging at him. Using his legs to kick the beasts into his own tribesmen, Zephyr knocked three of them out at once. Closely watching as their bodies hit the floor, he cursed under his breath, for even while holding back, the goblins were making him seem more than just another travelling merchant.
"Y-YOU! HURT...MY TR-TYRIBE?!" The crude words that the leader of the pack could barely screech out pulled the fiend back into the battle. But this time, as the beast charged, instead of using his legs–the strongest part of his body, he simply lowered the club on its head as if bonking a child on its head.
"EUGHHH!" Biting its tongue from the strike, the goblin’s body sank a few inches into the ground. A goblin-shaped hole–the sight was enough to make Zephyr wonder if this rescue was about to turn into a murder, so that he could avoid any rumors spread through any nearby towns.
Glancing over at the shaken woman, he noticed a look of disbelief in her eyes. Her hands were clasped in prayer, and she appeared to be too frightened to even comprehend what had happened. Even so, returning his gaze to the goblins that he’d knocked out, Zephyr decided to put on more of a show.
Pervading the minds of the unconscious goblins, he straightened their spines and forced them to stand back on their feet. Using their bodies as puppets, he made them spread out and charge at him from nearly all directions.
"SHIT!" He faked, trying to dodge their now much more accurate swing.
Leaping away and crudely blocking the strikes with his wooden stick, he pretended to be struggling, and with the magic mask of illusion already shapeshifting him, it was much easier to bring out cuts, sweat and all kinds of tears in his clothes as he stayed on a defensive foot against the goblins.
Finally, as the woman snapped out of her dazed mind, she extended her hand towards Zephyr and yelled.
"O’ BLESSED MOTHER OF LOVE AND PASSION, CAST AWAY OUR WOUNDS AND, HEALLLL!!!" Casting a healing spell of holy nature, she unknowingly did some damage to the fiend. However, with his magic defences being beyond any living creature, nothing happened to him, not even a small eyetwitch.
’This is pathetically easy.’ Having to cast himself in a healing glow, Zephyr eyed Aura, and in turn, the succubus lifted a crossbow from the back of the carriage.
"Shoot them while I have them distracted!" He ordered while striking another goblin’s head.
"Leave it to me, master!" Standing up on the carriage, Aura aimed her shots and began shooting unevenly at the beasts. After a few shots that she missed intentionally, Aura easily took down the monsters with her master’s help.
Falling on the ground, pretending to be tired from the fight. Zephyr sat in the dirt with his body covered in cuts and dripping blood. It was then that the busty nun approached him, and getting a better look at her now that she was closer, Aura–his wife–knew that they were about to have another new member in her master’s already long harem.