NOVEL NEXT Chapter 96: Slowly Becoming Schizophrenic
Good Morning! Today, in yet another session of "The Adventures of Darius Moonlight", we are visiting the commercial center in search of something that fits me well. Dear viewer, you might be wondering why the glamorous and sexy Darius would need to dress up as a woman to get to the criminal orc, but alas, the answer is simple!
We are dealing with an area where every movement is suspected, and due to my fame as a great playboy son-of-a-bitch store destroyer, in addition to my overly flashy appearance because I'm handsome, it would go very wrong to go up to that place as I do everywhere else.
Therefore, I need the supreme disguise, I must break the barriers of what I understand as gender and free myself from these antiquated conceptions!
In other words, I need to become a woman!
Okay, let's stop with this schizophrenia, I am going crazy with each passing day and my contact with the villains, I must sound like an idiot. Fortunately, no one can read my thoughts, so I can let my head flow with thoughts of how Elizia's ass hypnotizes me even in the middle of the street.
What we are doing now is going after an ideal dress for me, taking advantage of the madam's help and the people from the brothel to make it easier to go up to the orc's headquarters. I didn't know Elizia could arrange contacts with other people so quickly, maybe that's what happens when you work in the same area for a long time.
Anyway, we enter an establishment supposedly controlled by the same madam. She is quite a natural businesswoman to control so many businesses, to be honest. As soon as I set foot inside, a girl behind the counter approaches me with a measuring tape, wrapping it around my arm, chest, and thighs so fast that I think I'm going to be mummified with the tape.
After what seemed like less than ten seconds, she backs away, analyzing me from head to toe.
"Elizia, do you want any specific type of dress?" she asks the woman beside me.
"Ohhh, I do!" The damn woman hops forward, observing the other dress models. "We want Darius to look like a noble lady! She must look like a sensitive person and a virgin girl, maybe shades of white and blue will work!"
"Hey, I did not agree that I want to look like a virgin girl!"
"Ah, Darius, please, we need to draw the attention of the right person! The crime boss of this place has a weakness for noble ladies..."
Why does everyone in this city have some fetish, and it seems to be a large part of their personality? My goddess, just stop trying to make me weaker than normal, I can't stand acting like this! I can handle seeming cowardly, or being a cursed manipulator, but playing fragile is a pain!
The stylist and Elizia keep discussing the design of my new disguise, while I try to remove that uncomfortable feeling of being put into a dress by free and spontaneous pressure.
I was trying to distract myself by imagining anything but what would come next for me to try on, like high heels or false eyelashes, when something outside caught my attention. It was a huge shadow, one so large that it passed over the window display and blocked the sun while in motion.
The veins on that thing's biceps were popping as she moved, revealing her bronze-green skin shimmering under the UV rays, while three bastards who looked like flour sack carriers orbited the giant, like a solar system where the sun governs all the other planets.
My gaze stuck to the figure. It was a massive orc walking calmly, as if the street belonged to her. Honestly, if I had to go head-to-head with someone like that, I really would say the street was hers and run for it, because one squeeze could crush my head considering how much muscle she had.
I swear I only realized she was a woman because of the cleavage in that outfit, which was somewhere between tribal and social. The lackeys were scrambling behind, trying to keep up, but her wide strides and the constant tremor in the ground with every step seemed to hinder them.
Her face was also too aggressive for my stomach, she had the face of someone who split a person in half with a single palm strike for breakfast and destroyed mountains for dinner.
Before I could jump in fright because a giant literally walked past the store, Elizia glanced at me, noticed where my eyes were focused, and sighed.
"Ah, did you see? That's Ragna, our dear target of the moment."
Sure... dear my ass! Are you seeing the size of that maniac?! Are you not realizing you're sending me to combat a colossal titan with two swords that have the durability of a pencil?!
I frowned, but internally I started planning my escape from this city without Elizia, and I was hiding all the cold sweat pouring down my face.
"Is-Is that the orc we're going to approach?"
"Approach?" Elizia laughs, all excited, taking two steps to the window to get a better look while the stylist grabs another dress. "My love, we are going to kidnap her."
I feel my brain shut down. Did I hear that wrong?
"Kid-what?"
"Kid-nap." She clicks her tongue, as if explaining the color blue to a dog. "Ragna is a criminal, so if we knock her unconscious and take her to the local authorities with a good argument, they'll arrest her instantly. One more big problem solved, especially if we inform the King and the Duke about it."
I look at the orc again. She is big. Very, very big. She could throw me across the entire city using just one hand. This is going to be such a huge mess…
"Okay, but... if she leaves, someone else will step up in her place. These things don't stop, Elizia; This business of collecting protection fees must involve good money, so a replacement or a civil war to see who takes that spot will emerge. Wouldn't it be dangerous for the people in the city to just kidnap her without a backup plan?"
She turns her head to me, giving me a chill with a hardened face, with a pair of eyes I've never seen on Elizia before. Is there some kind of ghost accompanying this woman? Where did so much terrifying energy come from?
I swallow hard, only to feel one of her fingers tracing circles on my chest, accompanied by a smile I can only call cynical. She tilts her head to the side.
"Darius, my sweetie, everything will work out."
A chill runs down my spine. At first, I feel that urge to insist and open my mouth to explain that things won't end easily and that, in the worst-case scenario, there will be a kind of civil war in that shantytown we passed, but her gaze combined with her expression zip my mouth shut with an invisible zipper.
"Now, come back here" she says, snapping her fingers to call me back as if I were a cat stuck in the window. "We are between this model and this model. Do you prefer delicate lace on the shoulders or something more puffed, huh, Daria?"
I look at the two options, one looks like it came straight out of a painting of a traumatized princess, the other looks like it will explode in celestial purity the second I put it on. Regardless of which one it is, neither suits me.
The pure one will be stained by all my impurity, and I don't have enough trauma to be a princess.
"I prefer to leave."
"Wow, I prefer the puffed one too!" Elizia shakes her head, agreeing with no one, ignoring my existence as she hands the dress to the stylist. "Also prepare hair extensions, we'll leave him with long braids. Oh, how could I forget! I need small earrings and a necklace, a simple, small ring will do too. We must give him a graceful appearance."
I sigh so loud that my lung almost folds. I, Darius Moonlight, the terror of the stores and the pride of masculine irresponsibility, am going to be transformed into a fragile doll to meet a criminal orc who walks around with lackeys. You know, this whole thing puts me in a constant dilemma between calling for help from Duke Moonlight or simply swallowing this and ensuring that nothing I did in this city leaks out.
Oh, I can even imagine the scene: Daria Moonlight got a bad-boy boyfriend named Ragna, who takes her to all the greatest pleasures possible, but Duke Moonlight doesn't approve of such a relationship with his daughter. Now the two lovebirds must face this conflict with the patriarch of a rich family, where Ragna shows all her love, despite being a troublemaker, and protects her from all harm.
Seriously, I want to cry just imagining a plot like that, because that's almost exactly what I'm about to go through. My life is a constant rollercoaster, truly, I just can't stand that I am literally plunging at high speed.