Laura woke up in her bed in the infirmary after a night of rest. Her mind was clear and the effects of the synthesis seemed to have worn off. The doctor discharged her much to her delight. The doctor was an old woman of about seventy with a gentle demeanor.
"You've done well child, synthesis is known to kill people if given in doses like the one you took. Now I do suggest you take some more time to rest and recover before you try to fight someone else. I wouldn't want you to die on me."
The doctor smiles kindly at Laura and then ushers her out of the infirmary since she has a lot of patients to take care of after yesterday's fights.
Laura walks out of the infirmary and makes her way toward Roderick's office. She enters his room without knocking and finds him staring out the window with a glass of wine in his hand overlooking the city.
"Morning Roderick." Laura says in a cheerful voice.
Roderick turns around with a smile on his face.
"Good morning Laura, you look well rested. Are you feeling better?"
"I am."
"Well that's good, even though demons have a stupidly high drug resistance I was still worried about any lasting effects. So it's nice to see you're okay."
Roderick turns away from the window and leans against his desk while sipping his wine.
"Now then since you're feeling better I guess you can go out and explore the festival. Since it's the second day and many of the top fighters are fighting other top fighters today more people are bound to show up so it's going to be even more crowded then yesterday."
Roderick continues to sip his wine as Laura sits in one of the chairs across from his desk.
"Also Laura, a lot of people bet against you yesterday."
That was a little surprising to Laura since she figured Anton's fourteen fight losing streak would deter people from betting on his victory.
"A lot of our regular bettors in the audience noticed you were acting strangely so they went with Anton, normally people would bet against Anton and make the betting pointless. So maybe you being drugged was a blessing in disguise. Though I honestly can't believe that he not only lost to a twelve year old with no fighting experience but he couldn't even hit you when you were drugged up on Synthesis. He really was a lost cause."
Roderick reaches behind his desk and pulls out a bag of coins.
"Here you go, this is your wage. The more you climb the ranks the more money you'll make."
Laura stares at the bag of coins and comes to a realization.
"So wait, if I don't win I don't get paid?"
"No, I pay everyone fair wages. With the rates I charge for sponsorships and also the merchandise I sell I could probably retire now and live decently for the rest of my life but I'm not gonna do that since I love my job. Even though everyone in this place wears a slave collar it's mainly just to prevent incidents from occurring, I'm not into that whole slavery business but this is a necessary evil."
Roderick laughs heartily.
"Anyways, I think I'll give you permission to go out and enjoy the festival. During this time please do you utmost to hide your horns out in public, don't draw attention to yourself and don't do anything to embarrass me."
Roderick lays out his ground rules to Laura who listens to them with undivided attention.
"Also we're currently looking into another personal maid to assign you. It was quite unfortunate that you were assigned one of the worst possible choices last time but we couldn't make a switch since we didn't have anyone trained well enough to do so. But rest assured we're doing our utmost to get you a new maid. Now go have fun and make sure to watch the fights later."
Laura grabs her bag full of coins, leaves Roderick's office and heads back to her room.
"By god..." Laura whispers to herself. "I've never seen so much money!"
Laura and her mother had been living by themselves in a poor village all her life with her mother only able to do odd jobs for money so the money in the bag was the most amount of money she had every laid eyes on.
When she returns to her room she dumps the coins onto the floor and stares at them for a good five minutes before coming to her senses and picking them all back up. With this amount of money she could more than likely enjoy a majority of festival activities.
She spends the next few minutes sitting by the bedside staring at the bag.
"It's ridiculous how much money I just made."
Laura gets up from the bed and stands in the middle of the room.
"Ok Laura," she says to herself in an authoritative tone, "today's the day you're finally gonna explore the capital."
She had always dreamed of seeing the capital city ever since Krone brought her back a book that described it's history. She had always been working towards being able to visit this place and now that dream was within reach.
Laura walks over to the large bag of coins and slips a dozen silvers into her pocket.
"That should be enough for one outing. I'll take these with me and save the rest for emergencies."
Laura smiles as she places the bag into her empty dresser. Realizing she has no changes of clothes she glances down at her outfit. It was the same one she wore yesterday. Just some plain clothes and a cloak to hide her demon horns.
"I need some new clothes."
Since Laura had no other sets of clothes on hand she figured buying clothes would be a good use of her time.
"But where would I start?" Laura thinks to herself. "What kind of stores are here? What should I look for? Where are the stores even located?"
Alas Laura was completely clueless about the city so she had no clue where anything was.
"Well I guess I'll just have to wing it."
Laura puts her hood up and leaves her room.
The streets of the capital were packed full of people even this early in the morning. Stepping out of the colosseum the sight of all these people caused Laura to freeze for a second.
"This is crazy..." Laura mutters to herself. "There's more people on this street than there are people in my entire village. The fights don't even start for another couple hours and people are already in line."
As Laura stares at the crowd frozen by culture shock a voice calls out to her from behind.
"What are you just standing around for?"
Laura turns around and sees an attractive young girl in her early twenties with long black hair tied back in a ponytail. Her skin is a dark tan and she has a sword around her waist. She the same woman who Laura met in the bath a few days ago.
"Eleonora? Why are you here, shouldn't you be preparing for your fight today?"
Eleonora scoffs. "My opponent today is a scrub, he won't even last ten seconds against me. What sort of preparation should I do for some random dude who won't even put up a fight?"
Laura giggles a little. "Sorry, but what brings you here?"
"Oh I was just bored so I decided to follow you."
"Follow me? You mean like stalking me?"
"I wouldn't exactly say I'm following you, but yes I am following you."
Laura blinks in confusion at that answer. She hadn't noticed Eleonora trailing her at all.
"So Laura, what exactly are you doing?"
"Well I was thinking about going to buy some new clothes and then I was going to enjoy the festival before going to watch the matches."
"Sounds like a great plan to me. I'm coming with you."
"B-But why?"
"Because sitting around waiting for my match to start is just boring."
"Hm... Well if you insist..." Laura says taken aback by the sudden intrusion.
"Well then let's go." Eleonora says as she grabs Laura's arm and starts dragging her through the crowds of people.
So much for keeping a low profile. Laura thinks to herself.
After being dragged through a dense crowd of people for several minutes they arrive at the shopping district.
"Wow! So many different shops!"
"Yeah, there's tons of stuff in this part of town."
The shopping district is decked out with shops that sell pretty much anything a person could want and the despite the crowd it still feels spacious since it's the largest district in the capital.
"Let's see here." Eleonora says as she scans the area. "There's a ton of clothing shops in this place so let's check them out first."
"Alright."
The two of them head for a random clothing store and enter the shop.
Inside the store there are rows upon rows of clothes laid out on display racks. There are shirts, pants, dresses, jewelry, and basically everything else imaginable. Laura's eyes basically sparkle at the massive assortment of options.
"So Laura what clothes are you looking for anyway?"
"I've never bought any clothes before so I'm not really sure."
Eleonora chuckles to herself. "You can't tell me that you don't know what kind of clothes you want. You were planning on coming here alone weren't you? Don't tell me you didn't have a plan."
Laura sighs. "No I wasn't prepared for this. I thought I'd just pick something off the rack, try it on, and buy it. There's just way too much."
"Well since you're going to be fighting a lot more from now on we need to get you something durable and easy to move in."
"So you think I should wear armor or something?"
"That's not the only option."
"Really? What other options do I have?"
Eleonora laughs. "Have you ever heard of metal spider silk?"
"What?"
"It's special silk harvested from a rare type of spider monster, it's light as silk but it's as durable as metal. It's what I'm wearing right now."
Eleonora's appearance which could be considered the definition of the best defense is a good offense. Since her clothing is rather light, exposing her midriff and only covering her chest and thighs. Her arms, legs and stomach are all exposed but her torso, chest and butt are all covered.
"My fighting style focuses on speed and power. Having heavy armor mess with my speed and joints isn't the best option for me. So maybe you can take some pointers from my outfit."
Laura examines Eleonora's outfit and shakes her head. "That'd be way too embarrassing for me. I'd prefer to get a better cloak."
"Personally think the excess fabric gets in the way but whatever, you're the one who's gonna be fighting in it. Alright then, how we go do a custom order?"
"I heard from Krone that custom ordering anything is really expensive."
"Krone? Who's that?"
"He's a merchant who lives in my former village. He'd always bring back gifts for every child in the village."
"Sounds like a pretty decent guy."
"Yeah he's really nice."
"Anyway, back on topic. Since you're going to be starting at the bottom of the ranks and since you're going to be growing out of any clothes you do buy I'd recommend going with something cheap that's easy to move in. I'd recommend saving your money incase you need to make some emergency clothing purchases in the future. That cloak you have on seems to be of decent quality so it isn't that urgent of a purchase."
"Alright I'll keep that in mind. So I should go for stuff that's durable, cheap and easy to move in. Also since I'm going to be wearing my cloak over it most of the time the overall style doesn't matter."
"Well then let's get started."
After an hour of shopping the two of them are able to pick out some outfits that meet Laura's standards. They leave the store with a bag full of clothes and head back to the colosseum.
"Thanks for your help Eleonora."
"Haha, anything for my little junior rookie." Eleonora replies with a smile while rubbing Laura's head.
After trudging through the still dense crowd of people they arrive back at the colosseum.
"So what are you going to do now?" Eleonora asks.
"I'm going to take these clothes to my room, grab some more money and enjoy some more of the festival."
"Sounds like a plan, but you'd better not miss the fights today."
"I won't."
"Alright then I'll be going now."
Eleonora heads back inside while waving goodbye. Laura watches her go with a smile on her face.
"She's not scared of me, seems like she really meant what she said when she said she had no reason to be afraid of me."
Laura heads back to her room, when she arrives she places the bag of clothes on the floor and makes a beeline for her dresser when she stored her money. She pulls out some more coins from the bag.
"Time for lunch."
Laura woke up in her bed in the infirmary after a night of rest. Her mind was clear and the effects of the synthesis seemed to have worn off. The doctor discharged her much to her delight. The doctor was an old woman of about seventy with a gentle demeanor.
"You've done well child, synthesis is known to kill people if given in doses like the one you took. Now I do suggest you take some more time to rest and recover before you try to fight someone else. I wouldn't want you to die on me."
The doctor smiles kindly at Laura and then ushers her out of the infirmary since she has a lot of patients to take care of after yesterday's fights.
Laura walks out of the infirmary and makes her way toward Roderick's office. She enters his room without knocking and finds him staring out the window with a glass of wine in his hand overlooking the city.
"Morning Roderick." Laura says in a cheerful voice.
Roderick turns around with a smile on his face.
"Good morning Laura, you look well rested. Are you feeling better?"
"I am."
"Well that's good, even though demons have a stupidly high drug resistance I was still worried about any lasting effects. So it's nice to see you're okay."
Roderick turns away from the window and leans against his desk while sipping his wine.
"Now then since you're feeling better I guess you can go out and explore the festival. Since it's the second day and many of the top fighters are fighting other top fighters today more people are bound to show up so it's going to be even more crowded then yesterday."
Roderick continues to sip his wine as Laura sits in one of the chairs across from his desk.
"Also Laura, a lot of people bet against you yesterday."
That was a little surprising to Laura since she figured Anton's fourteen fight losing streak would deter people from betting on his victory.
"A lot of our regular bettors in the audience noticed you were acting strangely so they went with Anton, normally people would bet against Anton and make the betting pointless. So maybe you being drugged was a blessing in disguise. Though I honestly can't believe that he not only lost to a twelve year old with no fighting experience but he couldn't even hit you when you were drugged up on Synthesis. He really was a lost cause."
Roderick reaches behind his desk and pulls out a bag of coins.
"Here you go, this is your wage. The more you climb the ranks the more money you'll make."
Laura stares at the bag of coins and comes to a realization.
"So wait, if I don't win I don't get paid?"
"No, I pay everyone fair wages. With the rates I charge for sponsorships and also the merchandise I sell I could probably retire now and live decently for the rest of my life but I'm not gonna do that since I love my job. Even though everyone in this place wears a slave collar it's mainly just to prevent incidents from occurring, I'm not into that whole slavery business but this is a necessary evil."
Roderick laughs heartily.
"Anyways, I think I'll give you permission to go out and enjoy the festival. During this time please do you utmost to hide your horns out in public, don't draw attention to yourself and don't do anything to embarrass me."
Roderick lays out his ground rules to Laura who listens to them with undivided attention.
"Also we're currently looking into another personal maid to assign you. It was quite unfortunate that you were assigned one of the worst possible choices last time but we couldn't make a switch since we didn't have anyone trained well enough to do so. But rest assured we're doing our utmost to get you a new maid. Now go have fun and make sure to watch the fights later."
Laura grabs her bag full of coins, leaves Roderick's office and heads back to her room.
"By god..." Laura whispers to herself. "I've never seen so much money!"
Laura and her mother had been living by themselves in a poor village all her life with her mother only able to do odd jobs for money so the money in the bag was the most amount of money she had every laid eyes on.
When she returns to her room she dumps the coins onto the floor and stares at them for a good five minutes before coming to her senses and picking them all back up. With this amount of money she could more than likely enjoy a majority of festival activities.
She spends the next few minutes sitting by the bedside staring at the bag.
"It's ridiculous how much money I just made."
Laura gets up from the bed and stands in the middle of the room.
"Ok Laura," she says to herself in an authoritative tone, "today's the day you're finally gonna explore the capital."
She had always dreamed of seeing the capital city ever since Krone brought her back a book that described it's history. She had always been working towards being able to visit this place and now that dream was within reach.
Laura walks over to the large bag of coins and slips a dozen silvers into her pocket.
"That should be enough for one outing. I'll take these with me and save the rest for emergencies."
Laura smiles as she places the bag into her empty dresser. Realizing she has no changes of clothes she glances down at her outfit. It was the same one she wore yesterday. Just some plain clothes and a cloak to hide her demon horns.
"I need some new clothes."
Since Laura had no other sets of clothes on hand she figured buying clothes would be a good use of her time.
"But where would I start?" Laura thinks to herself. "What kind of stores are here? What should I look for? Where are the stores even located?"
Alas Laura was completely clueless about the city so she had no clue where anything was.
"Well I guess I'll just have to wing it."
Laura puts her hood up and leaves her room.
The streets of the capital were packed full of people even this early in the morning. Stepping out of the colosseum the sight of all these people caused Laura to freeze for a second.
"This is crazy..." Laura mutters to herself. "There's more people on this street than there are people in my entire village. The fights don't even start for another couple hours and people are already in line."
As Laura stares at the crowd frozen by culture shock a voice calls out to her from behind.
"What are you just standing around for?"
Laura turns around and sees an attractive young girl in her early twenties with long black hair tied back in a ponytail. Her skin is a dark tan and she has a sword around her waist. She the same woman who Laura met in the bath a few days ago.
"Eleonora? Why are you here, shouldn't you be preparing for your fight today?"
Eleonora scoffs. "My opponent today is a scrub, he won't even last ten seconds against me. What sort of preparation should I do for some random dude who won't even put up a fight?"
Laura giggles a little. "Sorry, but what brings you here?"
"Oh I was just bored so I decided to follow you."
"Follow me? You mean like stalking me?"
"I wouldn't exactly say I'm following you, but yes I am following you."
Laura blinks in confusion at that answer. She hadn't noticed Eleonora trailing her at all.
"So Laura, what exactly are you doing?"
"Well I was thinking about going to buy some new clothes and then I was going to enjoy the festival before going to watch the matches."
"Sounds like a great plan to me. I'm coming with you."
"B-But why?"
"Because sitting around waiting for my match to start is just boring."
"Hm... Well if you insist..." Laura says taken aback by the sudden intrusion.
"Well then let's go." Eleonora says as she grabs Laura's arm and starts dragging her through the crowds of people.
So much for keeping a low profile. Laura thinks to herself.
After being dragged through a dense crowd of people for several minutes they arrive at the shopping district.
"Wow! So many different shops!"
"Yeah, there's tons of stuff in this part of town."
The shopping district is decked out with shops that sell pretty much anything a person could want and the despite the crowd it still feels spacious since it's the largest district in the capital.
"Let's see here." Eleonora says as she scans the area. "There's a ton of clothing shops in this place so let's check them out first."
"Alright."
The two of them head for a random clothing store and enter the shop.
Inside the store there are rows upon rows of clothes laid out on display racks. There are shirts, pants, dresses, jewelry, and basically everything else imaginable. Laura's eyes basically sparkle at the massive assortment of options.
"So Laura what clothes are you looking for anyway?"
"I've never bought any clothes before so I'm not really sure."
Eleonora chuckles to herself. "You can't tell me that you don't know what kind of clothes you want. You were planning on coming here alone weren't you? Don't tell me you didn't have a plan."
Laura sighs. "No I wasn't prepared for this. I thought I'd just pick something off the rack, try it on, and buy it. There's just way too much."
"Well since you're going to be fighting a lot more from now on we need to get you something durable and easy to move in."
"So you think I should wear armor or something?"
"That's not the only option."
"Really? What other options do I have?"
Eleonora laughs. "Have you ever heard of metal spider silk?"
"What?"
"It's special silk harvested from a rare type of spider monster, it's light as silk but it's as durable as metal. It's what I'm wearing right now."
Eleonora's appearance which could be considered the definition of the best defense is a good offense. Since her clothing is rather light, exposing her midriff and only covering her chest and thighs. Her arms, legs and stomach are all exposed but her torso, chest and butt are all covered.
"My fighting style focuses on speed and power. Having heavy armor mess with my speed and joints isn't the best option for me. So maybe you can take some pointers from my outfit."
Laura examines Eleonora's outfit and shakes her head. "That'd be way too embarrassing for me. I'd prefer to get a better cloak."
"Personally think the excess fabric gets in the way but whatever, you're the one who's gonna be fighting in it. Alright then, how we go do a custom order?"
"I heard from Krone that custom ordering anything is really expensive."
"Krone? Who's that?"
"He's a merchant who lives in my former village. He'd always bring back gifts for every child in the village."
"Sounds like a pretty decent guy."
"Yeah he's really nice."
"Anyway, back on topic. Since you're going to be starting at the bottom of the ranks and since you're going to be growing out of any clothes you do buy I'd recommend going with something cheap that's easy to move in. I'd recommend saving your money incase you need to make some emergency clothing purchases in the future. That cloak you have on seems to be of decent quality so it isn't that urgent of a purchase."
"Alright I'll keep that in mind. So I should go for stuff that's durable, cheap and easy to move in. Also since I'm going to be wearing my cloak over it most of the time the overall style doesn't matter."
"Well then let's get started."
After an hour of shopping the two of them are able to pick out some outfits that meet Laura's standards. They leave the store with a bag full of clothes and head back to the colosseum.
"Thanks for your help Eleonora."
"Haha, anything for my little junior rookie." Eleonora replies with a smile while rubbing Laura's head.
After trudging through the still dense crowd of people they arrive back at the colosseum.
"So what are you going to do now?" Eleonora asks.
"I'm going to take these clothes to my room, grab some more money and enjoy some more of the festival."
"Sounds like a plan, but you'd better not miss the fights today."
"I won't."
"Alright then I'll be going now."
Eleonora heads back inside while waving goodbye. Laura watches her go with a smile on her face.
"She's not scared of me, seems like she really meant what she said when she said she had no reason to be afraid of me."
Laura heads back to her room, when she arrives she places the bag of clothes on the floor and makes a beeline for her dresser when she stored her money. She pulls out some more coins from the bag.
"Time for lunch."
