Chapter 121 - The Sleepless City and a Night on the Town
We picked one of the shops at random from the long line of them and went inside. The interior was set up like a standing bar and was bustling with countless customers. Waitresses weaved nimbly through the crowd, looking busy. They were topless, carrying mugs of ale on trays and taking orders. In the central, atrium-like space, a throng of similarly topless women danced to the rhythm of a live band. We claimed one of the standing tables, paid three silver coins for our ale, and watched the women in the hall.
"This is heaven!"
A man can achieve a state of pure bliss just by gazing at breasts.
"I don't know what heaven is, but I know this is the best."
We toasted again, all three of us.
"By the way, Mash, what kind of girl are you looking for?" Beers asked me. I turned my gaze to the dancing women. There were women from various races, but none of them particularly piqued my interest. For a moment, the faces of Marmie and Patricia flashed through my mind.
"Let's see. An elf or a woman of the Flower-Kin would be nice."
"You idiot! If that's what you want, just ask them yourself!"
Beers burst out laughing. It seemed my thoughts had been embarrassingly transparent. But there was no way I could ask them, so I kept my mouth shut.
"Elves and Flower-Kin are hard to find here... Elves are especially rare, and the Flower-Kin are a race that lives at the western edge of the world. You won't find any around here."
"What about you, Fang?" Beers cut in, interrupting Fang who had started to give a serious explanation.
"M-me...? I'd like a girl like Mizuki..."
Whether from the ale or his own agitation, Fang looked down, his face flushing red. It seemed he was genuinely in love with Mizuki.
"N-no way! Mizuki's mine!"
"...I know."
"I-I'm serious! You can't have Mizuki!"
Fang nodded painfully. Seeing him like that, I was struck by an inexplicable anxiety and became intensely flustered.
"A beautiful, unspoiled girl like that wouldn't be selling her body in a place like this," Beers added, twisting the knife.
"I-it's not like I'm after her specifically. Someone with a similar vibe would be fine."
Fang turned his face away from Beers's finishing blow.
"What about you, Beers?"
Not wanting to continue the conversation about Mizuki, I turned the tables on him.
"Me? Cecily and Aira."
"You guys are horrible! Why are you targeting my girlfriends?!"
"N-no, it's not like that. It's just... I can't forgive their attitude toward me when I was a slave. I want to pin them down and make them scream."
"..."
Right, I thought, that attitude of not seeing people as people is just wrong. Whether it's toward slaves or other races. But then, as someone who was about to buy a woman myself, I wasn't in any position to preach, so I kept quiet.
"Look, it's not that their attitudes were exceptionally bad. I feel like they've changed, thanks to you. So it's not like I'm holding a grudge. Besides, Mizuki was gone by the time I joined Wind Blade, so I don't feel anything toward her."
Beers, likely interpreting my silence as anger, started rattling off excuses in a rush.
Just as we were leaving the first establishment to check out other places, it happened.
"Let go of me!"
A dog-eared girl was surrounded by several men. One of them had grabbed her arm, and she was struggling desperately to get away. The people around them gave the scene a wide berth, passing by as if it were a common occurrence here.
"If you bumped into me, then apologize!" the man shouted in a rough, thick voice.
"I already did!"
"If you're really sorry, then pay up!"
The dog-eared woman was wearing normal clothes. She didn't look like a prostitute. The men harassing her were probably adventurers.
She was clearly older than Fam, and her features were completely different, yet for some reason, she overlapped with Fam in my mind. I unconsciously took a step to intervene, but Fang caught my shoulder and stopped me.
"Stay out of it."
But by the time Fang shook his head, it was too late. The adventurer-like men had turned their gazes toward us. Fang clicked his tongue.
"What? You got a problem?"
"How about you let the woman go?" Fang said, speaking for me. It seemed he was ready to accept the challenge.
"What did you say?"
Just as the men began to look menacing, another dog-eared man appeared. Without a word, he beat them all to the ground. His movements were swift and brilliant. He was a young man, probably in his early twenties. Unlike Fam, he had white, fluffy ears. A brass bracelet set with a light-blue stone on his arm caught my eye.
"Sorry to make you worry. But we of the dog-eared race will handle our own problems."
He put an arm around the dog-eared woman's shoulder. She visibly calmed down and showed no signs of resistance. It looked like we could leave things to him.
"I don't recognize you. Are you adventurers?"
Fang nodded in my place. He clearly had no intention of letting me take the lead. Among the three of us, he was the strongest. I decided to keep quiet and follow his lead.
"I'm an adventurer, too. I explore Longhorn Trail. I won't forget that you tried to help one of our own. If you're ever in trouble, come find me."
"Yeah." Again, Fang nodded for me.
"I'm with a party called 'Thunderclap.' You can get in touch through the guild."
The dog-eared man left. The men he'd knocked down remained sprawled on the ground.
As if nothing had happened, the people who had been keeping their distance started walking closer again, and the flow of the crowd returned to normal.
Fang shrugged. We hadn't done anything. If anyone was going to get in trouble, it would be the dog-eared man who had beaten them up. He had sucker-punched them, but I decided to consider it an act of unavoidable force. We composed ourselves, left the men where they lay, and headed for the next establishment.
The next place also had topless waitresses, but it was set up with booth seating.
A woman guided us to our seats. After we handed over three silver coins, three glasses of ale were placed on the table.
"What's your order?"
She was probably asking what kind of girl we wanted. "Bunny ears," I replied, picking something at random.
"Got it. I'll go call one for you."
I'd seen a woman with long ears on the beach earlier, so I took a guess, and it seemed the rabbit-eared race was a real thing.
I didn't really understand this place's system. Looking around, I saw that each man had a woman with him. All topless, of course. The men were drinking while fondling or sucking on the women's breasts.
I'm not a heavy drinker. Thinking about what was to come, I decided to take just one sip of my ale.
"You're into non-humans, huh?" Beers asked. I thought it was a natural impulse to want to do lewd things with various races now that I was in another world, but then again, I had no experience with women before coming here. After some careful thought, I came to the conclusion that as long as she was willing to do lewd things with me, anyone would be fine.
But I kept that to myself for now. I was in the mood to touch a bunny-girl's butt and fondle her breasts. And if she had a tail, I wanted to touch that too. It was a fine choice, if I did say so myself. Just then, a woman peeked her head into our booth.
"Ta-da! How about a high school girl?"
A topless woman wearing a black, knee-high pleated skirt suddenly entered our booth.
She looked older than Mizuki. Probably not quite twenty yet. She had black, shoulder-length hair, red lipstick, and heavy makeup that made her eyes look wide. She seemed to have something applied to her skin as well, maybe to hide blemishes.
Seeing her, Fang scowled.
"Get lost! We're waiting for a bunny-girl."
Fang's voice was laced with anger. Was he secretly a passionate rabbit-eared race enthusiast?
"Aww, what's wrong with me? Just let me talk for a little bit!"
The woman forcefully squeezed in next to me.
"Hey you, you reacted to the words 'high school girl,' didn't you?!"
She touched my chin with her index finger, then trailed it all the way down to my crotch. Then, she started rubbing my crotch through my clothes with the palm of her hand.
"Woman, don't touch him! Mash, you don't touch her either!"
Fang got behind the woman, grabbed the arm that was caressing me, and twisted it.
"Ow, ow! Okay, I get it, stop!"
The woman winced in pain, but Fang twisted harder and didn't let go. Beers and I exchanged glances, stunned by his sudden and violent change in demeanor.
"Fang, stop. I'm also deeply disappointed that the bunny-girl didn't show up. But there's no need to get this angry, right?"
As I spoke, I thought. Would Fang really get angry over something like this? He's a quiet guy, but he's not the type to resort to violence out of the blue. He's calm and reliable. Come to think of it, he did challenge us to a fight when we first met. But this situation was completely different. Was he angry because she touched my crotch before touching his?
Then, a flash of insight struck me. Could it be that the 'play' has already begun? Is this Fang's style? Was I wrong to try and calm him down? Maybe the correct move here was to ride the big wave he'd created and torment the woman.
Her chest was thrust forward as she tried to escape the pain. Her breasts weren't as big as Mizuki's, but they had a beautiful shape that looked like they'd feel good to fondle.
This was a golden opportunity provided by Fang. To 'ease her pain,' I pinched her slightly large, cherry-like nipple and rolled it between my fingers.
"Mash, no fair!"
Beers, seeming to have noticed my compassionate gesture, pinched the nipple on the other side.
"Nngh, my arm hurts, but it feels so good…"
The woman let out a cry of pleasure. This choice was a resounding success. Beers, beside me, was gleefully toying with her nipple. Fang was clearly a master of the craft. This was a situation that made everyone smile.
"Hey, what are you doing? Stop. And I'm not angry about something so stupid!"
Fang roared at us.
"Hey, you call it stupid? Mash and I were looking forward to the bunny-girl. Weren't you? And you have the nerve to call that stupid?"
Beers's point of anger seemed a little off-base, but the content of his statement wasn't wrong, so I just nodded sagely in agreement with his words.
"That's not it. I can tell by the smell. This woman has a venereal disease. You want to catch it?"
"..."
Beers and I snatched our fingers away from her nipples in a panic.
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