Straw Man

The rumors of a new saintess coming to the capital spread like wildfire after glimpses of an unknown woman were seen inside the royal carriage with the crown prince.

The relations between the church and the crown had always been stiff, but the good press benefitted both of them greatly, and would very likely manifest itself in ways that would later burden Callisto.

Though she wanted nothing to do with it, she needed to at least pretend to be amicable with the church and the new saintess, so she sent a letter, delivered by a wondrous horse in gold armor with the emblem of the Azel dukedom, to the Church of Lux.

Hopefully, they would get the message and not refuse her request to be a part of the new saintess' emergence. With most things on the back burner, she could focus on some long-term goals.

As soon as she could get those damn knights off her trail.

Apparently, running off without knight accompaniments is 'dangerous' and 'selfish'.

Regardless of such flimsy threats, she was able to sneak out into the night, wearing a simple white blouse and trousers, hidden by a large brown cloak that hid most of her features.

The rich districts of the capital were heavily guarded, preventing even the thought of poverty to make its way near nobility, and Callisto was not a very stealthy person. She had to knock out several guards with conjured chloroform on her way to the de facto border between rich and poor, and she faced a stand-off with the large magic barriers to prevent poor people from sneaking in.

It was a little sad to see.

Speaking of sad, the capital was not all rainbows and sunshine as the romance game had made it out to be. Despite the colorful adornments of magic and fantasy radiating out of every crevice of the world, Lux must have been heavily inspired by London weather, because the capital was quite dreary.

Fog set low upon the city made of gray stone brick, and a ghostly light reflected on the helmets of patrolling knights, giving off an unsettling feeling.

Back to the task at hand. Callisto was only good at spells that were useful in battle, so the only possible ways she could get through was to blast a section of the barrier, which would attract immediate attention, or take out all the guards, which would *eventually* cause a lot of attention. No good answers. She briefly thought about pretending to be a servant, but then looked at her well-trimmed nails and soft skin. There was no way that would work.

"Need a hand?"

The white-haired girl jumped, clasping her hands over her mouth to prevent herself from screaming. Callisto turned around and saw a woman with short brown hair standing behind her, waiting for her answer.

She radiated an aura of maturity and intelligence, despite Callisto not being able to see much of her. Maybe because of that, the girl found herself nodding, subconsciously trusting the woman after constant encounters with weird men.

"Drink this."

The woman handed her a vial of clear liquid, and Callisto downed it immediately, like she was taking a shot. The woman looked at her like she was crazy.

"I didn't even- Okay, it's an invisibility potion. We can get past the guards." The brown-haired woman downed a similar vial, before motioning for Callisto to follow her to the guarded entrance.

It was convenient that they were still able to see each other, and Callisto concluded that the potion must have been made with strong magic.

'Wait, isn't it a magic barrier?' Callisto thought, but as the other woman walked in front of her confidently, she decided to just trust the process. The woman stopped right in front of the entrance, stopping Callisto with an arm.

"Give it one second." Before Callisto could ask what they were waiting for, she heard a loud 'Boom!' as an explosion went off in the distance, and the woman grabbed her hand, running through the entrance as the now-alerted guards ran towards the sound.

"That wasn't sneaky in the slightest!"

"When did I ever say it was going to be sneaky?" She dashed through narrow, crowded streets, and Callisto followed suit, ducking under wheelbarrows and jumping over barrels.

At a fork in the road, Callisto took a right and gave a nod of acknowledgment to the brunette as she headed off in a different direction. The woman looked at her and smiled, waving a hand before dipping into the shadows and disappearing.

'I wonder who that woman was...'

After the castle debacle, Callisto made sure that she was prepared and knew the location of what she was looking for. It was a worn-down-looking tavern called 'Moonshine's Ale,' near the edge of the capital, where eyes were few and poor were many.

The fighting ring was quite well-known by nobles and common folk alike, talked about under breaths and between lines.

Everyone, besides the occasional rough merc, was wearing a mask, helmet, or some other facial garb to hide their identity.

Callisto herself was wearing a knight's headpiece that covered the top half of her face, and she saw other people in masks going behind the tavern into a hidden entrance going down below the earth.

The underground was furbished with comfortable seating in the rafters for nobility, placed far enough away to be removed from the twisted pastime they partook in, but close enough to see the action.

Everyone else watched from the frontlines of the battlegrounds itself, where the no-holds-barred fight had the potential to spray blood and guts on anyone in the splash zone. Death was expected, but so was wealth. It was a risk many would take, and more loved to see.

Callisto had forked over a good sum of money to become a patron to some of the top fighters, and because of her efforts, she had finally earned a seat beside other patrons.

Flashing a gold card to the attendants, she waited idly at her assigned seat and adjusted her headwear a couple of times. It was a bad habit of hers to fiddle around with whatever she was wearing when she was anticipating something. It led to a lot of threads being undone in shirts, crumpled-up documents, and a boyfriend complaining about how tight she was gripping his hand.

Her champions were unconventional, but perfect for what she needed.

The first was an archer that seemed to be cursed with youth, claiming to be fifty-two years old despite looking barely older than Callisto herself.

His sniping skills even at a short range were impressive, and she patted herself on the back mentally for making such a good choice. With some weapon upgrades, he would be a valuable asset to her team, if Callisto could convince him to devote himself to the Azel estate.

The second person was some sort of zealot, but not to Lux, based on Callisto's correspondence with the nun. The noble lady didn't really know how to break it to her sponsored fighter that Lux was indeed real and the only god of the world, but at least she knew that if anyone would be willing to kill anything, it would be a religious fanatic.

For the six months she was sponsoring the two, they not only remained alive, but also won many competitions. This was the first time she was seeing them in person, as well as the first time she would offer them job contracts as her personal soldiers.

Really, this was just a victory lap.

So why was she staring at a winner that wasn't either of them?

Why was there instead some rainbow-haired prick who showed up out of nowhere and swept the competition away?

And why on earth was he looking at her??