Into the Tower of Paradise

"You two little girls ready~?" Serabane asks me and Wanjing

"I am, but remind us, why can't you just put those turds in the tower yourself?"

"I'm also ready, meow," Wanjing says as she shifts into her Taotie form, "and I also want to know, Teacher and the others say your a god, but you haven't really done anything other than teleport around."

"But that'd be boring~. Now then, get ready~ and make sure to use those ribbons I gave you, magica magical~ abra kadabra~ teleportation~!"

Making weird poses and saying a weird embarrassing chant, both Wanjing and I find ourselves in what I presume to be the Tower of Paradise.

***Meanwhile back at the Manor of Erudition (Third Person)***

After sending Cordelia and Wanjing away, everyone else gives a strange look at Serabane before going off to do other things, with the exception of Aurelia.

"Was that really necessary? The embarrassing chant, I mean," Aurelia asks.

"No~, I thought it would be fun, but it wasn't as fun as I thought it'd be," Serabane says, "but that's not what you really want to ask little ol' me, is it?"

"What's with the pellets of faeces you want them to spread?"

"You mean F.E.C.E.S.?"

"Aren't we saying the same thing?"

"If only you knew. Anyways~, they're explosives in the form of small pellets of faeces. They go boom~! And bang~! Of course, the blame is going on them," Serabane says as she reveals a sweet smile without a hint of malice.

"Honestly, the fact you can say that without having any truly bad intentions is a little scary, no wonder the two of you got married."

"Don't tell anyone~, it'll ruin all the fun~."

Serabane retains her smile, but the intent behind it has turned sharp as Aurelia can feel cold sweat starting to form.

"I won't," Aurelia says, causing the pressure directed at her to be withdrawn, "although I haven't met him personally, I have memories of my ancestors meeting him, and I have to say, you're just as bad."

"Aww~, thanks~."

Although Aurelia wants to yell out 'that wasn't a compliment' she knows that it would mean much to her and decides to see how the eccentric trio are handling the Big Metal Dragons. And is if it were the normal thing to do, Serabane tags along to annoy them as much as she can.

******

looking out the nearby window and see the tower entrance below us. If I had to guess, we are on the second or third floor. According to the information from old hag who's blatantly lying about her age, the important treasures are kept in the sixth underground floor.

"Wanjing, you put some of the turds in the room yet?"

"Yep, all done, meow."

"Hmm, aren't you a bit bigger since the last time you were last in that form?"

"Seems that way, Aurelia said that I would probably keep getting bigger until I reach my full size, but I can manipulate my current size just as you can," Wanjing says as she shrinks down back to a size that fits in my arms.

I take out one of the red ribbons that Serabane gave us and begin tying it around Wanjing before tying my own hair with it. Of all the things she could have made, why a ribbon.

"So these will conceal our presence? It doesn't feel like anything changed," Wanjing says.

"She makes all sorts of strange stuff, but no matter how odd they looked, regardless if it even made sense, all of her strange inventions worked as intended. If there is anything she can do, it's being one o the greatest annoyances in existence and making strange items. Those turds she wants us to throw around probably does something as well, so make sure you've gotten rid of them all by the time we leave. But we should get moving before someone spots us," I say, picking up Wanjing.

"Shouldn't it be fine if these ribbons work the way they should?"

"They keep us hidden from most detection or sensory ability, but what do you think will happen if people see us and realise we have no aura, is what Lia told me."

Bringing myself closer to the ground, I poke a small hole in the floor and look around for anyone below us. Fortunately, I decided not to make a large entrance and jump down as I see several people walking around in the room beneath us. Closing up the hole, I move towards the door to the room we're in and peek my head out slightly to look for anyone in the hallway. Thankfully, there isn't a crowd of people, but I can hear some footsteps coming from the left.

Gently closing the door, I stand to the side as I hear the footsteps grow louder while waiting for whoever is walking by to pass. But it really is just my luck that the footsteps stop right in front of this door.

Standing right next to the door, I prepare to strike as I create a thick iron bat and raise it into the air. The door swings open and a woman walks in, after a second she notices me, but it's too late as my bat smacks her head, and for good measure, I give her another few hits to make sure she stays down.

Taking a look at her status, she's just a bureaucratic worker here with no sign of combat training. So I may have overdone it a little, but she's not dead. Since she isn't a high level I won't get much other than her soul if I kill her and Wanjing doesn't want to eat as she's still a bit traumatised from the overfeeding Aurelia forced on her, so I decide to have some fun instead.

I tie her up with some metal cuffs, chaining her legs and feet together while putting a tight metal band over her mouth. Stuffing her into the corner of the room, I have Wanjing surround her in those pieces of shit before putting up a new wall to shield her from anyone else's sight. I create three more similar walls in the other corners to make it look less obvious, I just hope no one super familiar with the room enters before we leave.

Having stored the bat and cleaned up the room, I make my way out with Wanjing on my shoulder as we begin our search for a way down.