19 Predicament, predicament, and enemy?

Resolving Megumin's current predicament required me to ensure a minimal amount of shaking while walking. That's why the last half of the journey back to the city took twice as much. Fortunately, when we reached the city gate we found a very kind female guard who helped Megumin.

I thanked Eris-sama for this lucky encounter. Wasn't Goddess Eris' domain luck? Maybe I should consider joining Her church and start praying regularly to offset my low luck stat?

When Megumin was done with her business, the kind lady guard gave her back to me and I headed towards Megumin's house. Similarly to the day before I put her on the couch, according to her request I covered her with a blanket and without staying for another round of 'tea' I headed outside. As I was touching the door's handle I noticed Megumin's cat - Chomusuke sitting quietly near her empty food bowl so I poured her some cat food from the package nearby.

With everything taken care of, I exited Megmumin's house. While looking around for the nearest alleyway I noticed the old lady looking at me from the shop with a fancy bow on the display. For an old lady, she had some really good eyesight. Not thinking about it too much I just nodded in her direction and moved to some alley I spotted.

When out of sight of any eyes around me I transformed into an owl and took flight. I still had some reservations about using my power out in the open. I probably have read too many novels with the main character desperately trying to hide their abilities. Maybe if I shot lasers from eyes I would have to hide it but all I can do is change into animals or different races with the added possibility of acquiring multiple jobs.

For now, the effects were rather tame but I was predicting that in the future when I accumulated more forms and more levels the skill would shine!

I used the free time I had to look around the city from a bird's perspective. Contrary to the things I've read about cities in fantasy books, there were no random thugs waiting around every corner just waiting to rob your stuff and put a dagger in your ribcage as a greeting.

The city was rather clean and peaceful. Which begs the question… what Demon King invasion? I couldn't spot a single sign of that during my little espionage.

What I have spotted though was a weird cafe. Well, the cafe was located in a weird spot - not in the street but in the alley - that otherwise looked normal. The weird thing about it was the clientele.

I wouldn't have spotted that cafe if not for the familiar head full of blonde hair walking suspiciously around the entrance of the alley like if he was checking if someone was tailing him.

The Dust guy seemed to have come back to the city without problems. I was tempted to talk to him but the sun was getting lower and I wanted to check one more place. And I had to definitely do it before it got dark.

My next destination was a cemetery. My first thought when I started to want to take revenge against the innkeeper - lady Tayla, was to let her try some of her own medicine. That meant scaring her with a ghost. The ghost in question would be me imitating a ghost with my power. Buuuut… after today's findings about my power not working with dead bodies, the possibility of that happening was probably zero.

Not minding the fact that I didn't know how to have PHYSICAL CONTACT with a ghost in the first place.

So… the second, very desperate idea was to lure the ghost to the inn. If that was impossible I would consider talking with Kazuma who seemed to be good at thinking out of the box and probably wouldn't be against helping me with this matter.

Talking to Darkness who seemed to have some authority was also an option but I was... kinda scared of her.

Megumin… She would be a good person to ask if I wanted the inn blown up.

And bringing Aqua into a dispute with an Axis Cultist didn't feel like it would end well for me.

Yeah, my options were either ghost, Kazuma's help or leaving the matter to rest entirely.

I spotted the place I wanted to see. The cemetery near Tayla's inn. There was indeed one, that part of the Innkeepers' nightly spiel was real.

There was no soul in sight though. No relatives mourning the dead, no zombies moving around eating brains. It was an eerie sight. There was a row of more fancy graves called crypts in the middle and I decided to sit on the roof of one of those crypts and observe.

The whole area seemed really gloomy. There was even a dried-up tree without leaves although the trees in the forest were fully green. This fact only added to the eerie feeling this area was giving out.

Out of the sudden a female voice called out loudly:

"Who is there? The cemetery is closed for the entire day. There are signs all over the entrance. Please leav-"

As I didn't come in normally, but flew in, I didn't know about any signs.

The woman who came out from the smallest and the rightmost crypt stopped when she noticed me. I didn't make any sounds while looking around so I honestly had no idea how did she spot me - a random owl - from inside the building.

"That's weird… animals don't come here because of death aura. Hmmm-" The woman in purple robes kept scanning me while I observed her as well. She had long brown hair and kinda pale skin.

She focused on the left side of my face, immediately moved her hands in the universal "Oh, I get it!" fashion by hitting an open, vertically aligned palm with a closed fist.

"Ah, right! Today is a monthly report day! Please tell others that everything is fine and I am alright here!" The woman happily said with a smile.

I cocked my head to the side to show my confusion. What was this woman talking about?

She looked done with her 'report' and turned around while stroking her chin and whispering to herself. "Why did they change the messenger again? Porotopolypelous-san was kinda funny."

Suddenly a black bullet flew down with high speed and charged right in front of the woman's face without colliding with her. It stopped one meter to the woman's left and started flapping its wings.

"Hello, Wiz! It's me, Poro-ro-ro-rotopolypelouuuuus! You missed me so much that you think of me in your free time? Haha, sorry, I am in a perfectly happy relationship with a very, very cute vampire girl. I know it has to be hard to live in this town full of walking blood bags so let me find you some nice and only partially rotten-"

The woman was shocked at first but then started becoming flustered as the… the guy … kept speaking and finally caught the bat-like creature with her hands and closed its mouth forcefully.

"It's not like that. I really like this town and also please don't call people 'walking blood bags' around me or I will get angry!"

The bat seemed to free his mouth because soon I heard. "Okay okay, geez, Wiz, chill out. Though I imagine you are perfectly cold. I am here for your monthly report to the Demon King."

Both me and Wiz were stunned for a second.

'To the Demon King' - I thought absentmindedly while Wiz suddenly snapped her head towards me. I had no time to react while she pointed her finger at me. Suddenly a layer of ice appeared around me and I got trapped inside a ball.

"What was that?" I could still hear their conversation.

"Nothing much. Ekhem, please report the usual for me."

The ball with me inside was silently rolling to the edge of the roof and soon fell down. I thought this was just a lucky coincidence that would break the ice and let me fly away but as the ball was right above the ground it was stopped, put on the ground, and gently rolled behind the wall of the crypt.

"Got it. If you want you can come to a banquet I will be holding next week. My daughter is a fan of yours! She would love to meet you."

"Hahaha, I will think about it." I could hear the woman laughing awkwardly.

"Now… would you please release me?"

"Ah! ...Yes. Have a nice trip back, Porotopolypelous-san."

"See you next month, Wiz."

The guy-bat answered as silence descended in the area. Meanwhile, I was trying to break that layer of ice with no effect. I had no idea if transforming into for example Giant Toad would break it and if it didn't break I was wondering what would become of me. Definitely not something kids should be seeing while visiting a family grave.

The sound of steps resounded after a short while. Although I couldn't see much through this thick layer of ice soon anything I could see was a purple color and I felt the ball being picked up and I was transported somewhere dark.

I was sweating bullets by the time the ball was placed on the ground. Mentally preparing for the worst I heard the ice breaking but what I saw totally dumbfounded me.

The subordinate of the Demon King who just had a meeting with his messenger was currently bowing before me.

"I am very sorry! I almost got you into grave trouble."

I was very confused at that point.

"If Porotopolypelous-san heard what I told you he might've killed you."

That bat thing was a problem? He didn't look like much-

I unconsciously moved my head questioningly and Wiz somehow picked up on my doubts. "He might not look like much in his bat form but even the strongest party in this city would have problems with taking Porotopolypelous-san down."

…

Okay, then indeed I might have been in trouble. But how is that the woman's fault and why is she apologizing. To an owl to boot.

"You are an adventurer, right? Then I even wouldn't be able to intervene."

How did she know I wasn't a simple owl? I was kinda scared of transforming into any of my humanoid forms to reveal my identity to someone connected with Demon King.

"Could you come out so we can talk, please?"

But she went exactly there. An awkward silence descended in this dark room as I tried acting stupid but soon I could see the woman's lips twitch and she started begging with a crying voice.

"Come on, please! I don't hurt humans! I just want to ask you something!"

Oh boy, how was that woman connected to Demon King… I had no idea. Before she started flooding the room with her tears I caved in and transformed into my Crimson Demon form, deeming it more expendable.

"!"

Well, the woman didn't react as I expected her to. Suddenly she seemed terrified herself.

"Crimson Demon-san I was saying the truth, I am peacefully coexisting with humans in this town! I am also not a Demon King's spy or anything like that!"

"How did you know I am-"

"Your eyes are shining with crimson light and only a Crimson Demon would be clothed like this."

My eyes were shining? They definitely didn't when I was picking out the outfits. When I thought about it I saw Megumin's eyes shining as well when she was talking about Explosion Magic from time to time. Another quirk of the race?

"Who are you?" I asked, trying to use the moment in which the woman seemed to think I was dangerous.

"My name is Wiz. I am a magic-shop owner in this town. And my secret identity is that of a lich."

"What are you doing here, Wiz the lich?" I had no idea why I phrased it like this. I thought it was cool or something.

"I am helping lost souls find the way to the afterlife."

Wasn't that a priest's job was my immediate thought but I tried avoiding asking whatever came to my mind to not loose my, apparently, 'domineering' aura.

"And why a lich wanted to speak with this Crimson Demon?" My speech pattern seemed to get weirder and weirder with every sentence. What the hell was happening with this form. I could already see a little bit of crimson light emanating from my eyes in this darkness.

That fact seemed to disturb Wiz more than a little.

"Please, don't attack! I just wanted to ask you to not tell anyone about me!

A sentence. "Why would I ever agree to any deal with a lich?!" wanted to come out of out my Crimson Demon's mouth. My blood started boiling in that form and similarly to the time in the outfit shop I was about to lose control of my own body to those weird tendencies. Even though I had no job, no skills or weapons I felt as if I wanted to jump to the lich and start swinging...

I had to switch to a human before I did something under the influence of those weird genes. I definitely had to properly ask Megumin about those urges.

"What?!" Wiz exclaimed seeing me change my attire completely in the fraction of a second.

"How have you changed into a human?!" Apparently, she saw through the race change as well. Well, the lack of red neon lights probably helped her with that.

"Ummm, so if I promise to not tell anybody about you, will you let me go?"

The sudden change in attitude completely dumbfounded Wiz and her jaw fell even lower than after seeing my transformation.