The Oracle Paths

Less than an hour later, a hooded man left the inn where Jake and his group had temporarily taken up residence. A ray of artificial sunlight surreptitiously illuminated the underside of the man's face, revealing attractive and harmonious features, but mostly deep emotional distress.

This man eloping like a thief from the inn, frequently looking back, was indeed none other than Kyle, the Myrtharian Nerds' playboy.

As Jake and Will had feared, their comrade had not been convinced by their explanation and had decided to take the matter into his own hands rather than let his sister suffer another minute.

Taking a deep breath to give himself courage, he walked with grim determination toward the Bhuzkoc palace, of which Will had told them the location earlier. As he was running straight into the wall, he didn't notice the figure watching him in the shadows at the other end of the street.

"Sigh... You still took the bait in the end, Kyle." Jake muttered with a look of pity in his eyes.

It was his job as a friend and leader to keep his companions from making mistakes, but the Oracle Cities rules prevented him from physically intervening. Because they were from the same faction and he was his superior, he could theoretically give him irrefutable orders if it affected the direct interests of the faction, but there was absolutely nothing to stop Kyle from resigning if he refused.

Rather than bickering and creating unnecessary tension between them, the easiest thing was to let him learn from his mistakes the hard way. His role now would be simply to make sure he was not in danger and eventually wipe his butt after the mistake he made, without forgetting to gently sermonize him, perhaps even to console him. This was the best way to avoid such an incident from happening again.

Keeping a good distance between them, Jake moved from rooftop to rooftop, using his light mastery to refract photons around him to become virtually invisible. As the sun set, visibility had fallen and the resulting effect was as good as he could have hoped for.

Occasionally, a vigilant Evolver walking through the streets would look up abruptly as he passed by before resuming his business with a baffled expression. More than once, he also felt powerful consciousnesses scanning the area where he was in search of a mole.

A few times he was spotted, and he merely shielded his mind while continuing his surveillance. Violence was forbidden, so any Evolver who was a little too curious could only let him go.

During this stalking, Jake noticed that the Evolvers here were of a much higher standard than those at the Outer Shelter. A little too high, in fact. He had already counted several hundred Evolvers whose Aetheric signatures were at least as powerful as his own. It was confusing in a hellhole like this and confirmed the looming catastrophe of the Dungeon Digestor.

Oddly enough, such presences were reassuring to him. Unless they were completely ignorant and arrogant, the presence of these powerhouses meant that the situation was not completely lost. There might even be benefits to be gained from this misfortune for those with sufficient power.

This general law seemed to apply everywhere in the universe: the rich would become richer and the poor poorer. The same logic applied between the strong and the weak. The question was whether Jake and his group were the weak or the strong for the upcoming incident.

A moment later, Kyle entered Bhuzkok territory and a dramatic change in atmosphere occurred in the Oracle City. Many aliens with fluorescent hair and mud-colored skin swarmed the streets, as did many other aliens like Grosh with pig-like attributes and features.

Many of these humanoid aliens were accompanied by beautiful female slaves and from their absent expressions, it was clear that they had already become numb to their torment.

And yet, most of them were trying to smile and serve their ugly masters. Jake could see the signs on some of them of being brainwashed by all sorts of conditioning and Soul Skills, but the vast majority were doing so of their own free will. Clearly, when choosing between two hells, they had chosen the Oracle Playground over the Outer Shelter.

Once in Bhuzkoc's territory, even Kyle found it more difficult to make progress without drawing attention to himself. Compared to the neutral Melkree neighborhood, Bhuzkoc was an extremely distrustful, belligerent Nawai who was currently in the midst of a conflict with Shaktilar, a mysterious alien known to be equally violent and unreasonable.

As a result, despite their propensity for fornicating and boozing, most of the Evolvers were on their toes. Every new head was immediately on their radar and it became hard to progress without announcing the reason for their arrival.

Unsurprisingly, Kyle was quickly interrogated and then "escorted" to the front of Bhuzkoc's palace. With his excellent hearing, Jake heard everything of this exchange and almost facepalmed when his comrade stated honestly the reason of his coming.

'If this works... No, I better get ready to intervene.'

Jake intended to continue stalking them when he felt a murderous intent hovering over him. Stiffening, he turned and met the icy gaze of a huge humanoid alien 4m tall with pig-like features. If Grosh, whom he had met earlier, was an adorable piglet, this fellow was clearly the alpha male of a boar tribe.

His skin was thick as leather, dark brown and grainy with short, needle-like hairs. His muscles were bulky and prominent and the alien was equipped with thick, rusty-looking plate armor with a huge greatsword in his hand. His long snout, short tusks combined with his long, greying beard and oily hair might have looked comical if Jake didn't only reach his belly button.

"Who are you?" The alien rumbled as he enveloped him with an overwhelming mental pressure. This abomination was definitely stronger than he was.

His cover blown, Jake took one last look at Kyle, who had already disappeared inside the mansion, before sighing again. Reluctantly, he deactivated his magic and his figure appeared on the roof of the building where he was perched.

"A simple Evolver protecting a friend." Jake answered honestly. At this point, it would be hard to make up for Kyle's screw-ups.

Following his gaze, the giant realized something as he stared at the entrance to Bhuzkoc's palace.

"Who are you to this human?" He questioned coldly.

"His boss, I guess?" Jake answered with a wry smile.

After a few more questions, where Jake repeated Kyle's words with a few clarifications, the giant realized that this man had nothing to do with either Shaktilar or Melkree. Understanding his situation, the alien withdrew his vigilance and became much more cordial.

"You shouldn't have let your comrade in. It will make things worse." Grash grunted as he pulled out a huge bottle of cleaning alcohol from Earth and chugged it down. Who knew where he'd gotten such a delicacy... "Ahh, a human from the Outer Shelter sold me this for 1000 Aether points the other day. I was told it's a valuable drink on your planet."

Seeing Jake's transfixed look of disbelief, Grash assumed Jake was jealous of him and instantly experienced tremendous satisfaction as a result. It wasn't every day that he could show off in front of other aliens. If he knew what this human was really thinking, he would probably have coughed up a mouthful of blood.

'I almost want to meet the genius who dared to sell cleaning alcohol to this monster...' Jake enthused inwardly. 'Maybe I was a little hasty in my judgment. There are probably some brilliant people in these Outer Shelters.'

"That human still lives here?" Jake asked casually.

Thinking he was interested in his supplier, Grash felt flattered and was quick to share everything he knew about this "exceptional" individual. As he listened, Jake's eyes flashed with excitement.

'I definitely need to introduce this guy to Will.'

While the human and the alien exchanged small talk, the situation inside Bhuzkoc's palace had a very different tone.

*****

"Who's that?"

Kyle, who was trembling with rage, had long since lost his temper at the shameless behavior of the Nawai before him. After explaining why he had come, he had surprisingly been directly and politely escorted before Bhuzkoc himself. For a brief moment he had almost believed that he had a chance to solve his sister's problem peacefully.

The reality was cruel. When he had arrived in the main hall, a naked Bhuzkoc was waiting for him there on a rudimentary golden throne, several sex slaves serving him brazenly without any concern for the new intruder.

Two naked Nawai slaves had their faces plunged into his crotch, while another was sitting bashfully on his lap, one of her milky breasts squeezed bossily by the barbarian's wandering hand. Finally, a last one was calmly massaging his back while whispering soft words in his ear, exchanging from time to time a passionate kiss with the lustful warrior.

This erotic vision coming straight out of the fertile imagination of an x-rated movie was much too much for Kyle, but it was not what had put him in this state. None of this would have mattered if one of those female slaves wasn't the sister he had sworn to save!

"Who's that?" That was Bhuzkoc's shameless response after Kyle showed him the picture and mentioned his sister's first name.