The Trap - Part 1

Well, Olivia had a feeling something was going to happen. To be honest, all of them did, so this really came as no surprise. The only question was, what was the problem and how would they deal with it?

"What is it?" Olivia asked as she made her way over to Ameril, who then beckoned her to follow.

Heading into the dining room, they reached the midpoint of the room, standing by the dining table they had eaten at not long ago. Wondering what was happening, Olivia looked over at Ameril, who just stood there and pointed towards the wall.

"Do you see that?" she asked.

Olivia looked in the direction she was pointing at, and by this point, the rest of the girls had made their way into the room. All Olivia could see, however, was darkness. And even as her eyes adjusted to the lack of light, all she saw was the dull wall and the window that looked out into the darkness of the night.

"I…what. It's just the wall."

"The window. I don't know how we missed it before, but can't you see what has been done to the window."

No, was the answer, Olivia was about to give, but rather than let the lack of lighting be the cause of her lack of understanding, she made her way over to the window to figure out what the problem was.

As she got close, she looked out through the window, and again, just saw darkness. It was pitch black. What you would expect for a world where there were no street lights to brighten things up.

It took a few moments, but that was when she realised. It shouldn't be this dark though. Her eyes were adjusted to the light, so she should be able to see at least the outline of some of the buildings outside. Plus, the moon was out. How it could be this dark with the moon up in the sky was very strange.

Almost pressing her face right up against the window was what it took to finally see what the problem was.

The problem being that wooden boards were covering the window.

What made it worse, however, was that the board covering it…was on the outside of the window.

Wooden shutters were rather an uncommon thing to see on a house. It was possible that some houses had wooden shutters on the outside to protect against storms, but with all the villages she had been in, this was the first time she had seen something like this.

And there was no storm outside.

There were other reasons that she could come up with for the shutters, but most of them required them to be inside the place, such as to prevent burglars from getting in.

These may well be for protection against storms or something similar, but right now, there was only one reason she could think of that explained them being shut. A reason that also made sense given the lack of people in this manor house, aside from the prisoners that had been left behind of course.

…it was to keep them in.

"Crap."

At that, Olivia headed off up the stairs, heading towards the last room that they had all steered clear of. It was a foregone conclusion, but she felt that they had to check there. If anything, to make sure there were no more prisoners in this place, or in case people were hiding and waiting for them.

"Wait…what's going on?" Beatrix asked as she watched Olivia head away.

…

As she moved up the stairs, she heard Ameril explain what she found, as well as ask how she and Kathleen were, and why they were still in the building. Behind her, Olivia could hear footsteps as one of the girls followed after her. A quick glance over her shoulder let her know it was Lyrika.

At the top, she and Lyrika headed towards the room they would rather not be entering, where they both took out their weapons and stood beside the door.

Like when they were in the basement, Lyrika used her night vision to peer into the room as Olivia slowly opened it, all the while holding her dagger at the ready in case someone jumped out.

But, like with the basement…no one did. With the door fully opened, they found what they had expected. An empty bedroom. Which ended up being quite like they had expected. Garish and lacking in taste.

It was really out of place compared to the aesthetic of the house. Although the aesthetic of the house was decrepit and falling apart, so there wasn't much you needed to do to clash with that, but this room was on another level.

A massive four-poster bed sat in the middle of the room, with drapes hanging down it on all sides. Tapestries alighted the walls, along with several pictures, all of which were from different angles of the same person's face. The current chief of this village.

Egotistical and garish.

Ornate candelabras were spotted all over the place. The problem was that there were too many of them, all dotted around the room making them look out of place. 

It really was horrible, and Olivia was sure that no woman would willingly subject themselves to a night with that man once they saw this room.

While it was nice to be able to see another dreadful aspect of the man, even though the enslaving of girls topped pretty much everything else, the salient detail was that he was gone just like the rest of the household. This meant that even with his brain being controlled by what was clearly his overcompensated small tool, he had left his home sometime after they had entered their rooms, to enact… whatever it was he was going to do.

It was at this point, that Olivia headed over to one of the nearby windows in the room, and found the same thing as they did in the dining room. Boards covering it up from the outside.

Which was rather impressive given that they were on the floor above. Especially, if it was like this for the rest of the windows on this floor.

…

Olivia headed out of the room, and back to the ones they had taken at the start of the night to grab Felixia. Something was going to go down, so now was the time to get the family all back together.

Felixia was still very much asleep, so she had to be slow and careful when she bundled it up in the bed sheets, making a large sash of sorts, that would allow her to keep Felixia close to her chest while also keeping her hands free. She was sure she had seen it on some TV show at some point.

It was at this point that Lyrika brought up that it would be best if she took hold of Felixia. With Olivia being a melee fighter, there was a chance Felixia would get hurt if things turned into a battle. For Lyrika who used a bow and kept her distance, there was much less of a risk. Even with the extra weight and the Felixia getting in the way, Lyrika was still able to pull her bow strings with ease, so Olivia handed the bundle over.

They then headed out to the stairs, but as they started on their way down, a voice broke through the silence.

"Orc! I hope you have enjoyed playing pretend and sniffing around my home, for you will never be able to do so again, as this will be your last night in Khallasia."

Olivia froze. Who wouldn't after hearing someone shout out a threat like that?

She did have a look around to locate the speaker, who was obviously the chief that had hosted them this evening, but he was thankfully not in the vicinity. Had he come into the house at some point, who knows how things would have gone down?

"Olivia, you better come see this."

Hurrying down the stairs, she came back into the dining room, finding Beatrix sitting on the floor with her arms around her legs, along with Kathleen standing nearby deep in thought. On the other side of the room, Philly and Ameril were beckoning her, both looking out of the window, where at some point the boards had been taken down allowing the moonlight to stream in.

Making her way over, Olivia glanced out of the window to find a startling sight.

Several meters away from the house stood the chief, his hands on his hips with a smug look on his face. To his side stood the two men who had been his guards, both with their hands on the pommels of their swords.

But what made the sight truly startling was the numerous other bodies standing behind the man, all of whom had weapons in their hands.

Well, less weapons and more farming tools, and other gear, where it looked like everyone else from the village had been called for this spectacle to make a show of force.

It was a good show, as even with the lack of numbers in the village, they still outnumbered Olivia and her group three or four to one. Even with garden tools, all it took was one mistake for someone to be seriously injured or even killed by someone with little to no combat experience.

By this point, the chief had spotted Olivia's face within the window. That could have been dangerous, as archers could have been nearby, but from the crowd, she saw no bows and arrows, so staying where she was wasn't a problem.

Her face entering the view of the window, causes a couple of the peasants to startle. What made Olivia chuckle was when she saw one of the women at the back of the crowd quickly turn around and speed walk away from the group without anyone else seeing her.

'One down I guess. And all from my looks. I feel insulted.' She quietly thought to herself with a chuckle.

"I know who you are and what you have been doing. Did you think you could fool me?"

"So, he did know who we were. I'm surprised by his acting skills." Olivia said as she continued to watch the scene. After he said that, one of the men started speaking to him, but Olivia couldn't hear it.

"No, he had no clue. The guard is telling him off for taking the credit for their chief telling him about us…and only this evening actually." Lyrika said after having heard the man with her enhanced hearing. Hilly nodded along with her having heard the same thing.

So, as it turned out, the guards that were left by the new chief on his tour, also had a communication orb with them, so they could contact him and vice versa. At some point, the new chief had learnt about Olivia and the girls and decided to inform the chief here, about how they might turn up. It was incredibly unlucky that he had informed them on this exact evening, otherwise, they could have left and this chief would have been none the wiser. Or they would have turned up to probably open hostility and snuck in or steered clear.

Well, nothing ever works out perfectly the first time.

One question was how the new chief had found out about them. But that would have to wait until after they were out of this place.

"Our chief is on his way and shall handle you personally. So, for now, get comfortable, because as much as it pains me to see you inside it, my luxurious manor is going to be your prison for the foreseeable…short future."

And with that, the boards closed shut on the window.

"Well, that sucks."

"He is also really delusional if he thinks this place is luxurious." Ameril quickly mentioned.

This was followed by a resounding agreement between all the girls, as they looked around the dining room, wondering what they could do to get out of this place.