The First Legendary Beast Master

While Rae spied on the intimate lives of the City Lord and his mistress, Karl began to jog towards the city walls.

The farmers were all busy setting up their irrigation equipment so that they could make the most of the influx of water, so they wouldn’t have time to stand around and chat, even if Karl had more questions.

On the other hand, the city guard had many questions for him.

“Overlord, a moment of your time, please.

We have been informed that you have some knowledge of the recent events involving a curse on the region, a massive rainstorm, and then the flooding of the irrigation canals.” The gate Guard announced as Karl approached.

“Of course. Perhaps I should call out the rest of my group for this. It might be easier if you got the story from everyone’s perspective.” Karl offered.

In response, Hawk dove from the sky and shrunk himself to land on the wooden fence rail near the side of the road, which confused the Dwarf, as the bird would obviously not be answering any questions.

But when Karl opened the Tiny World, and the ladies stepped out, along with Thor in his humanoid form, plus Cara and Remi, it made much more sense. The bird wasn’t there for input, he was just part of the group.

Karl cleared his throat and began. “The people of Barukth asked us to help them out by making it rain. The curse had prevented any regular rain, and greatly limited the amount of water that the locals could create.

But the effect wasn’t as strong on new arrivals, and it didn’t stop us from creating the storm, which didn’t quite reach you, but did drop significant rainfall.

That caused the curse to react, which was the green flames you saw, and the Shamans nullified the curse after it revealed itself.

It is believed that Bomgon was behind the curse. There were some spies captured in Barukth, and they admitted that they were working for Bomgon before suffering a tragic accident.

The flooding of the irrigation canals was a request by local farmers. I granted them a boon in exchange for information, and they wanted water.”

The Dwarf shook his head in dismay, then sighed. Flooding all the irrigation canals might have caused some side effects, but he could completely understand why the farmers would pick that as the boon to be granted them by a Cat Demon.

“So, you watched it all happen?” The guard asked, directing the question at Remi.

{Saw it? We did it. All those things, it was us. Well, me and Karl. We’re the ones best with water magic.}

The Dwarf made a note on the ledger at the gatehouse and motioned them forward.

“Thank you for your time. Please enter the city, and enjoy your stay in Banar.”

Karl led the group through the gates, and found that the city of Banar made the city of Barukth look positively pristine and modern. The whole city was filthy, stinking, and crumbling.

How the Dwarves could stand to live with crumbling stone buildings was beyond Karl, but perhaps there was some reason for it.

{Perhaps we should make it rain here, even though the curse has broken.} Remi suggested as they walked through the bustling city streets.

Karl saw a sign for an Inn, and considered getting a room and just leaving the bodyguards in it while they went to the Tiny World. But when they stepped inside, the smell faded, and the interior of the place was clean and well maintained.

Karl wiped his boots clean on the mat, and nodded to the waitress, who gestured towards the mostly open tables.

“This whole city is beautiful.” Dana noted as they took their seats.

Lotus nodded in agreement and Ophelia shrugged.

“There’s something off about it.” Tessa disagreed.

Karl turned to Nachtia, who had a pensive look. “There is an illusion over the city. I don’t think it actually looks like this.”

She gestured around the room, and Karl shook his head.

“The interior seems to look like I see it, but the outside is crumbling and filthy. I thought that everyone was just used to it, but if you don’t see it, that makes total sense.” He explained.

Cara came out to explore the city of illusions, prime territory for a Void Badger with time to kill.

Starting with the Inn.

[Nullify] spread over the building’s interior, and the waitress’s dress went from plain to ragged, while a young Dwarven woman shifted to become a much older Goblin woman. But the room was otherwise unchanged.

The Goblin woman’s date screamed in horror at the new appearance of the target of his affections, and the waitress paused to stare at her dress in confusion.

“What the hell?” The Innkeeper asked as he stomped out to the main room, looking around furiously.

But Cara was already gone, out into the streets and on a hunt for the source of the illusion, or shiny things.

Whichever came first.

Unable to find the source of the issue, the Innkeeper’s anger quickly faded, and he came over to speak to Karl and the ladies.

“My apologies, it appears that all of the vegetables suddenly rotted. I suspect that there has been some curse put on the city, so it might not be possible for us to provide dinner tonight.”

Karl shrugged. “I can ask the lovely Priestess Lotus to help you with your vegetable issues, but I wouldn’t suggest using anything from storage today. Even if it appears fine, it might actually be rotten.”

The Dwarf frowned, and looked toward the ale kegs with trepidation.

“I have never heard of ale going bad. Do you know when it was brewed?” Karl asked.

“Aye, this is this summer’s vintage. Still fairly fresh.”

The Innkeeper went over to pull a drink, and Karl stealthily cast [Nullify] on it. But the ale appeared to be fine, and the Shopkeeper didn’t keel over when he drank it.

“Can you tell me more about the city?” Karl asked once the Dwarf was assured that his valuables were fine.

“Oh, I can tell you a lot about the historic city of Banar. Not long ago, the city looked nothing like it does today. It was a ten thousand-year-old desert outpost, weathered by time, worn to the nub, and protected by heritage regulations, so everything must be rebuilt back the way that it always was.

Only fifty years ago did we finally get approval for the renovation, and the City Lord brought through a team of Earth mages to redo all the major structures of the city.

Every historic building was revamped, refreshed back to as good as the day it was built. I put in nearly a thousand hours updating the inside of my Inn, so it would look as good as it does now, but you can see where I left the old stones, with their chipped and pitted edges.”

Karl nodded. Indeed, he could see that. The Innkeeper had done a wonderful job on the inside of the building. But he was not going to be happy when the illusions broke, and he saw what the outside of all the buildings actually looked like.