30 Visiting The Succubus’s Maze - Part 1

"Oi…" Tapping his finger on the shop counter, Raven tried to get Darius's attention. "You there? In your own head or somewhere else?"

Still a bit dreamy, Darius let go of his quill and looked up at his friend. Having worked through day and night trying to replicate the scroll of resurrection, he'd grown tired to the point where his own presence escaped him.

"W-when did you come in?" He asked, unsure what was happening.

"A while back, I needed something again–scroll of mind reading to be exact," Raven responded with the coin purse in hand.

Spending at least some of his time doing random quests, he'd managed to gather just enough gold to buy one cheap scroll.

"Why do you need that?" Asked Darius, his head tilted to the side with a look of confusion taking over his face.

Setting the pouch on the desk, Raven leaned closer to the Inscription mage. Looking him in the eye, he glanced around his shop to make sure not even the walls were listening.

"The king will summon me soon, and I intend to find out who killed your fiance and why in the hell it's taking so long for that shriveled old bastard to do anything about it," hearing Raven's response, a shimmer of light illuminated in Darius's dead eyes.

He'd given up on the scroll since nothing seemed to work, but if revenge was still on the table, he wanted to seized it without fail. But, there was a problem, one that glared at him in the face.

"You don't intend to kill the king, do you?" Gulping to the thought, he leaned back into the chair. "As useless as he may be if you do something like that–"

"I'm not an idiot, Darius," rolling his eyes, Raven heaved a sigh and looked back at him. "I just wanna know if the bastard is telling me the truth when I ask him that question, and who knows maybe I'll hear something worthwhile in someone else's mind while I'm there."

To that, Darius couldn't object nor did he want to. The king as of late had just become a headpiece, one that leeched off taxes while doing nothing for those he was taxing. Even his shop had to pay him per sale, so kicking him in the nuts while he had the chance, Darius couldn't let the chance get away.

"I'll make it, keep your coin," pushing the coin pouch back towards Raven, Darius took note of a hint he'd been smelling since he noticed Raven. "Besides, I can already smell perfume on you, probably gonna need that gold more in the maze."

Being caught red-handed, Raven felt a bit awkward. Backing away from the desk with the gold still lying there, he scratched the back of his head while looking away.

"Sorry, it's just a compulsion you know," Raven explained, half expecting Darius to be enraged or straight up complain after what had happened to him.

"It's alright," to his surprise, the mage had no issue with what he did in his free time. "Besides, being part pixie does that to you I've read. They're mischievous creatures for sure, but you'd be surprised by the amount of text on their libido they had back when I was studying in the academia."

Knowing firsthand what Darius meant, Raven moved away from the topic and pushed the bag of coins toward him again.

"Keep that coin, and when we've gotten that bastard who killed her, we'll uncork some fine bottles with that pocket change," with a smirk on his face, Raven lightly cackled.

"Yeah…" Looking at the scanty point, Darius couldn't help but chuckle. "The finest brew for two three pieces of gold, you bastard, ahaha…"

With a deep sigh from them both, Raven left Darius alone to work on the scrolls. Making his way back towards the Inn, he still had a few things to cover up before getting to sprinkle some gold on dancing ladies and depravity of all kinds.

However, getting to the entrance to the Inn itself, Raven noticed Amedith pacing around outside with his hands pressed against his chin. Something was obviously bothering him, and standing out in the open streets in his casual clothes, it almost felt like he was inviting trouble, not from some thug but from the Hero's fanatics.

"What are you doing here?" Raven asked, walking up to him.

A bit surprised by the sudden voice, Amedith instinctively stepped away before realizing it was just Raven.

"N-nothing!" He yelped, but the troubled expression on his face attested against it.

Frowning with confusion, Raven turned to the open Inn door and noticed Moxy looking outwards towards the two. Hiding the moment she saw him, the fox-girl only made his suspicion grow.

"Ey, what the hell happened?" Grabbing Amedith by the shoulder he pushed him further to get an answer. Then turning his gaze back to Moxy hiding behind the door, he called out to her as well. "Moxy, you come here too!"

"EKK!" Realizing that she'd been caught peeking, the fox-girl jumped out to the front.

In the meantime, still unwilling to talk, Amedith peeped not a word, at least until the fox-girl walked up close and spilled the beans.

"Aria took Mel with her to the Maze…I think," having been there herself last night with the proof of her visit now training her butt for anal, Moxy knew the kind of stuff that happened there and what could be the reason for them to be there.

'Aria I knew, but Mel, why?' Raven Wondered.

Unaware of a talk about Amedith's performance every night between Mel and Aria, none of the three present had a clue as to what was happening. Amedith feared the worst, and Moxy and Raven had no clue, however, for the two already there, the answer was very clear. The maze was not just a place for acting out your fetishes, but a hub for sellers to sell all kinds of toys and remedies. In the case of Mel, if only Raven or Moxy knew what the issue between her and her lover was, they could've guessed easily. But for Amedith himself, it was a hellish nightmare and nothing else.

"Fuck this, come with me!" Tired of waiting for the hero to say something at all, Raven grabbed him by the collar and decided to drag him to the maze himself. 

"Wh-what the hell are you doing?!" Amedith exclaimed.

"Just shut up and come with me!" Was all that the Hero got in response.

In any other situation, Raven wouldn't have minded stealing Mel for himself, but if in case the Hero's obvious fears were true, then the playboy mage didn't want her to be touched by some douchebag down in that place.