"Ah! We've finally reached the castle, doofus! Look over there!"
Effie pointed towards the castle from afar.
"Just because you have the height of a beanpole doesn't mean we can't see it!"
Currently they had reached the outer settlements... and it was completely empty.
It had been a week since Caster began shifting people after all.
However, the place was a mess. So many marks and trails were left behind, most of them of blood from the stored food.
Effie walked leisurely through the mess, though. Not minding it at all. Why would she? She's seen worse.
'I wonder if the official announcement happened already or not...'
Sunny, Nephis and Cassie, all of them followed behind Effie as they had all along the way.
Nephis spoke up, as rare as it was.
"Caster from the Han Li Clan is the lord of this place?"
Effie had mentioned that a while ago, however, Nephis was still processing it, it seems.
"Yes, like I already mentioned earlier, princess."
When Effie mentioned that, Nephis seemed to be in deep thought for some reason, however, Cassie and Sunny were both glad to hear his name. Caster was the only one to show them kindness without asking for anything in return.
Even more so for Cassie, because Caster gave her the [Poetic Mantle], an awakened ranked armor. It saved her life multiple times so she was extra grateful to Caster.
With that, eventually they reached the castle gates, and as soon as they reached it the guards there saluted to Effie.
"Good to have you back Huntress Athena."
The guards were ones that worked at the camp, so they had immediately recognized her.
Afterwards, one of the guards left and the other guard led them in. Just a couple minutes later they met with Caster.
Caster was wearing his black armor and the white cloak he had. However, he had a very rough look. The last few days had been hectic for him.
Effie imediately noticed that and got near him, almost extended her arm to cup Caster's face in them, but she stopped.
Because Caster's focus was momentarily on the people behind her.
Not her.
She secretly ground her teeth in dissatisfaction, but didn't let Caster find out.
However, unexpectedly Caster gave her a light, side hug. He pulled back almost immediately afterwards before speaking up.
"You're back in time. Rare."
***
As Caster pulled back from the hug he had a slight smile on his face.
"Huh? I'm always on time!"
Effie replied casually.
Caster laughed together with her, before walking over to the trio who was observing the act in front of them.
After that he simply ruffled the hair of both Sunny and Cassie.
"I'm glad you guys are safe. I was really worried when I found you two were on this shore."
Sunny, swatting the hand away from his head, spoke up.
"Thanks for your concern! But I'm good. Get your hands off of me."
'Tsundere bastard.'
Cassie, however, didn't do anything. She let Caster's hand stay. She seemed to like it.
Caster, smart as he was, did not keep ruffling their hairs. It was a patronizing action and would most likely not fit his personality, not to mention, the other party may be uncomfortable with it.
"How did you know we'd be here?"
It was Nephis. Her voice was flat and it seemed like she was just asking curiously. At least on the surface.
But Caster knew that it was not the case.
Nephis was, wary and cautious of him.
'As you should be.'
"There's someone with prophetic abilities here."
It wasn't a lie. It also wasn't the answer to her question.
'But she doesn't know that.'
Nephis simply nodded.
And after that, Caster decided to lead the trio and Effie to their rooms.
As he was walking through the hallways, together with the others, he noticed only now. The beauty standards in shadow slave are incredibly high.
'Sunny doesn't look as bad as the novel made him to be. I guess it just showed his low slef esteem?'
He was around three of the most beautiful women he has seen on the forgotten shore, which never happened in his previous life, so this was... an experience as well.
'Let's check the shard count for each of the following.'
[Soul fragments: 1000/1000]
He knew Effie had already saturated her core, so he didn't need to check hers but he still did for some reason.
[Soul fragments: 301/1000]
Cassie, as expected had a much lower amount of fragments.
'All of them must have been give to her by Nephis.'
[Soul fragments: 902/1000]
And Nephis, as expected, had a lot.
'She does have the greatest advantage as compared to anyone else in this regard. How unfair... already almost a monster.'
[Shadow fragments: 489/1000]
Caster was honestly baffled by the difference Sunny made.
He had about a hundred fragments in the novel, this is mealy five times that amount.
He really put in much more effort in killing things.
'Oh, that might be the reason why Nephis has so much more as well... after all Sunny gave Nephis every shard he got so Nephis got nearly 500 shards from Sunny... which she must have distributed to Cassie as well, but mostly to herself seeing how little shards Cassie has as compared to the others.'
Caster shook his head slightly before stopping midway, trying not to let others think that he's deep in thought.
'It might just be that Sunny gave a portion of his shards to Cassie, rather than all of them to Nephis... because they became friends before going to the forgotten shore.'
Soon, Caster opened the doors to the biggest complex in the Castle. It was where Gunlaug lived, but now Caster does. Together with Kai.
"So everybody. This is where I live for the moment. How about we all stay here? The complex has enough rooms."
Effie already seemed to have plopped down on a chair nearby.
Nephis, Sunny and Cassie however, seemed to be in thought. While they were thankful to Caster, they couldn't fully trust Caster. Especially Nephis.
"Fine, if you guys don't trust me, you can get shared rooms with the others. I assure you, there's no empty room left."
"No! We'll stay here."
It was Cassie that spoke up. She really didn't like the idea of having to share rooms, so she accepted it. And even if not fully, she did trust Caster a fair amount.
That caught Sunny and Nephis off guard, but they gave in too.
"Yes, we'd like to stay here as well."
"Hmph, not anymore. You guys didn't trust me."
Caster pouted and turned his face away from them, startling the three. This weirdly cute behaviour was so different from what they were expecting.
Effie noticed what was happening and was barely keeping it in.
But she gave in and laughed out loud, simultaneously with Caster.
"Haha, I'm just kidding guys, don't be so serious."
The trio seemed to sigh in relief.
"Anyways, let me lead you all to your rooms."
The first and most excited one of them was Effie. She was tired of her hut's terrible conditions and constant need of repairing.
She ran around the complex and saw all the rooms, wanting to take the largest one but it was already taken by Caster.
"I want this room."
Caster simply smiled at her.
"Go fuck yourself."
Sunny and Nephis seemed to be observing the dynamic between Effie and Caster closely.
Afterwards, Caster pointed towards another room.
"That will yours, Sunny. The room next to it belongs to someone, so nobody's getting that one. I'll introduce you guys to your roomate soon. Effie, you take the room opposite to it."
After that he turned towards Nephis and Cassie.
"There's no more rooms on this floor of the complex, follow me."
And they did. Along with Sunny. Effie seemed to have plopped down on the bed to rest.
After reaching the second floor, Caster pointed towards the only two rooms on the floor.
"You guys can take either of the rooms. The ground floor will be for the boys."
Sunny spoke up, slightly confused.
"But Effie's gonna live on the ground floor too..."
"She's not a woman."
Sunny suddenly got concerned. Nephis and Cassie closely heard him as well.
'Not a woman? Then... a flaw that changes gender!?', thought Sunny. His face seemed to pale in live time. He had lusted over Effie after all.
Nephis, seemingly interested, spoke up.
"What do you mean by that?"
"She's a beast."
Sunny interjected, in relief.
"OH! That's what you mean."
"Why do you sound so relieved?"
The one who asked that to Sunny was none other than Cassie. She had seemingly caught something from Sunny's tone.
Nephis joined in too, not too happy with Sunny's reaction for some reason.
"True... why?"
Sunny's face seemed to pale again, this time in borderline fear.
'Oh Sunny... you might have messed up.'
Sunny seemed to be getting ganged up by Cassie and Nephis for an answer.
Worse for him, he couldn't lie.
However, Sunny was resisting that for as long as he could.
"Be-Because... I'm interested in women only!"
Nephis glared at Sunny.
"So were you... shocked because you thought that the one you're interested in was not a woman?"
"Yes... But... but I'm not interested in her!"
"But to me, it sounds like you are."
Neph's voice, seemingly flat, had a tone of bitterness in it, unbeknownst to changing star herself.
"What's it to you?"
Sunny replied hurriedly. A mistake.
'Sunny! What did you just say? No!'
Trying to give him some backup, Caster chimed in.
"He must have lusted over her, slightly, yep. It's hard not to lust when you're full of stress, right Sunny? Don't think too deeply of what he just said."
'I absolutely can not let the Sunphis ship die. She's already seems interested in Sunny as well, her jealousy is on full display right now. Wait... didn't she suspect him of being ordered to assassinate her? Is she into stuff like enemies to lovers, what the hell?'
Nephis glared at Caster.
"You stay out of this."
"O-Okay... I'll see myself out."
Caster let out a nervous chuckle an turned around to leave hurriedly.
'You're on your own with this one, buddy.'