Chapter 59 - Meeting of the Minds

Gren helped Yun bring Annie to the bed since she seemed to be struggling to hold her up. "I would never abandon you, Annie." Jasmine and Tahloh were at the doorway, waiting to be of assistance. "We're going to have a meeting soon and I would like to have you there. It's going to be about creating our very own mercenary guild."

Annie recoiled a bit when she heard his last sentence. "A mercenary guild? Who's backing it?" She was worried that the backer would be someone like that perverted merchant.

Gren was reminded of Annie's past history and quickly answered her. "It will be a completely independent mercenary guild. All of the money for it will be coming from me and the requests that are fulfilled."

Annie was happy with Gren's words. The idea of a mercenary guild completely run by women was attractive to her. "If you can afford to run the guild then I would love to help you in any way possible. What kind of big sister would I be if I just left you to do everything by yourself?"

Gren gave her a hug. "Thanks, Annie. Don't worry about the money since I have it covered. In the beginning I expect to lose money but I can easily make more money outside of the guild. I'm not good enough to heal you yet but I have been studying healing magic." Gren showed off the green glow from his magic.

"Come on, let's go." Gren wanted to keep talking to Annie but Jasmine didn't want everyone to keep waiting. "I'll pick up Annie while Tahloh gets Faith. Gren, you and Yun can walk on your own." Gren gave an awkward smile to Yun as they were left behind before following the other women out of the room.

Gren saw the magician woman on his way back to where the meeting was going to take place. "Thanks for letting us know that not everybody was there. The name's Gren, what's yours?"

The magician woman was surprised for some reason. "Your name is Gren? But everybody kept referring to you as Ratslayer." Gren didn't want to go over this right now and waited for her to give her name. "Anyways, my name is Aqua. My parents thought it'd be a great idea to name me that since they were both water mages and wanted me to follow in their footsteps."

After greeting Aqua and finally getting her name, Gren finally went downstairs and got ready to discuss the creation of the mercenary guild. Most of the demihuman women could be seen on the lower floor with the rest looking down from above. The feeling of everybody's eyes on him reminded him of the feeling he got when in front of the cameras on stage but this was real life and there were no second takes. He would have to make sure that this meeting ended with the women looking forward to the future.

"Is there anything you'd like to say before we get started?" Jessica asked Gren to see if he wanted to give an opening speech but he decided against it. It was Jessica that researched the mercenary guilds and how to create one so he'd wait to gain more information before adding his input. "Okay. Everybody! Welcome to our first group meeting! If you have a question then raise your hand and you will be called on. Feel free to ask questions about anything you want as we go on but please try to be courteous and don't interrupt others."

There were a few women that raised their hands at the beginning and Gren pointed towards one of them. "You, the woman with purple skin and a horn." Gren decided to ignore the fact that she has one eye when he was calling on her. "Sorry, I don't know everybody's name yet but you have a question?"

She slowly lowered her arm and spoke softly to the point where Gren could barely hear her. "What type of meeting is this? Do we even get a say in what happens as slaves?"

Gren was glad that someone asked those questions. "This meeting is to discuss the mercenary guild that we're creating and, as for your status as slaves, I don't care. Everybody gets a voice here and I plan on freeing you all soon anyways." Gren made sure to speak loudly so that everyone could hear. Other women raised their hands while a few lowered theirs. Gren pointed towards a mermaid this time.

"Do we have to fight? I don't think that I will be much use outside the water." The mermaid required enough water to keep her body wet so outside of rainy days she would be incapable of even surviving outside.

Gren had already thought of this problem earlier when he realized that the dryad wouldn't be able to move around and couldn't even be here for the meeting. "No. The decision to take a mission will be discussed between all of us and we will only take it if we have enough people interested in participating. I'd rather not risk someone's life by forcing them to do something dangerous. Taking missions will make it where I free you earlier but I will eventually free everybody even if they do nothing."

Gren noticed that one woman's hand had been raised from the beginning and decided to call on her next. She had bat wings and a furry bottom half. "Will there be any men joining the guild? I haven't had sex in over a month and it's driving me crazy."

Gren remembered something written in the notes that the slave company gave him; this must be the succubus. "There are three men that are going to be joining. While you're free to have sex with whomever you like, they have to be willing. I don't want you using pheromones or aphrodisiacs to force them to have sex with you. Don't bring anybody back to the house if they're not part of our group." Gren didn't like answering those sorts of questions but the succubus seemed happy with the answer.

Annie raised her hand so Gren picked her next. "Three men are joining? Can you tell us more about them?" Annie wanted to make sure that they wouldn't be any trouble.

Gren nodded and told Annie the truth about their identity while hiding their motives. "The three of them were knights belonging to the Church of Healing Knights. They decided to join our mercenary guild when I told them that I was creating it. I don't know where they'll be staying yet but we've got time to figure that out." Gren's answer satisfied Annie's curiosity. If they were from the Church then they wouldn't be the kind of men that she'd need to threaten to keep in control.

Most of the questions were minor ones dealing with simple issues they had with their living conditions and Gren made sure to note them down so that he could help make them all happy. The biggest request that couldn't be fulfilled so easily was for individual rooms but Gren decided to use dividers as a temporary solution. This would at least allow them to have privacy even if they couldn't have their own room.

With that the main portion of the meeting was complete and Jessica could explain their first mission. "In order to be accepted as a mercenary guild by the kingdom we need to fulfill a request by them. Here in the Adier Dukedom, most of the simple requests are fulfilled by the soldiers. The easiest request I could accept was one to kill rock lizards that have taken over a mine. Is there anybody interested?"

Ahk immediately volunteered but most of the women chose not to join in on the discussion. The leader of the dwarves decided to ask about the request and the rock lizards. Her experience in a mine would be useful but she didn't want to risk her life.

Gren decided to take the women interested in the mission to Jasmine's room. He had a book that should have more information about the target: The Amazing Bestiary of Creatures and Demihumans. After pretending to pull it out of one of the drawers he opened it up and turned to the entry on Rock Lizards.

"The exterior is covered in scales that resemble rocks. They'll often stay still and ambush unsuspecting victims. Their underbelly and their mouth are their weaknesses. They can grow to be up to three feet long and they don't have sharp teeth but their claws can rip through leather and skin with ease and their bite can sometimes cause broken bones." Gren summarized the entry for the women. "Any questions?"

The dwarf leader raised her hand but then decided to just ask the question once she noticed that nobody else had their hand up. "It sounds pretty dangerous to go in unprotected. Do we have any weapons or armor?"

Gren already had a plan about how to arm them. "I will be supplying you all with weapons and we'll get someone to make you a full set of iron armor if you're planning on going." Gren wouldn't get points for the armor protecting them from attacks and he didn't have enough points to supply them with both weapons and armor so he decided to use the points on their weapons and buy the armor with money.

Three of the dwarves agreed to go. With them, Jasmine, Ahk, the living statue, and a blue-scaled lizardman they had a solid team built. Gren handed Jasmine the money and their paperwork from the mayor's office that Jessica prepared so that they could go buy the armor. After they left for the blacksmith it left Gren, Estella, and Annie alone in Jasmine's room.

"Hey, Gren? Can we talk for a moment?" Gren put away the Bestiary and turned around to face Estella. "It's pretty important. I'm not entirely sure but I need to tell you this." Estella was finding it difficult to tell him. She touched her belly to give her courage "I... I think I'm pregnant with your children."

Gren was surprised by what Estella said but not nearly as surprised as Annie was. "Ehhh? How? How could a girl get another girl pregnant?" Gren hadn't had a chance to tell Annie the truth earlier which only made Annie's brain shut down when she heard that Gren had impregnated someone.

Gren was too focused on Estella to answer Annie. He placed his hand over where her womb was but couldn't tell if there was any change. {Can you scan people as well? I want to find out if she's pregnant.} Gren decided to rely on the system for the first time in a while.

<Master must get the subject's approval before the subject can be scanned>

"Estella, do you mind if I check your body to see if you're pregnant?" It was a weird question but Estella agreed, knowing that he wouldn't harm her.

<Approval received: scanning subject>

<Four life-forms detected inside subject's womb>

<All four life-forms share Master's DNA>

Gren hugged Estella and kissed her belly while tears were in his eyes. "It's true. Our children are in here; four of them. I'm going to be a father."

Estella didn't know how he confirmed it but she believed him. He was always capable of doing things she thought were impossible even if he was unreliable at times. Seeing that he was happy to become a father helped alleviate Estella's fears. As long as he was there by her side then she wouldn't be so scared about the future.

Annie figured everything out by watching their interaction. She was slightly angry over Gren lying to her until she thought about it. Not once did he say he was a girl and he just lied about his name after she had already assumed that he was a girl. The only thing that changed was that she gained a little brother instead of a little sister--that and she would soon become an aunt. Annie was looking forward to her nieces and nephews being born.

———————————

The mission was a success and Jessica submitted the proof along with the application for their mercenary guild. Gren heard that the mission was tougher than they originally thought it would be; Gren was worried about how she didn't want to talk about what happened at the village but he still stayed by her side and helped to comfort her. Jessica was officially made the leader of the newly-formed Flours Mercenary Corporation--or FMC--and they slowly improved their arsenal as Gren earned points from the women doing missions. At times there would be injuries but Gren's skill with magic continually improved over the last three months and he was now able to reattach limbs. Gren's mother remained unconscious but her body was showing signs of recovery.

The last few months had no real issues but Gren couldn't help but think that was about to change as he watched the snow begin to pile up.