Demons and Botched Rituals Part 14 (Patreon)

"Are you going to use the hat or just keep staring at it?" Harry asked as he pulled the last reasonably sized chunk of scrap metal out of the sand and dropped it into his new scrap chest.

"Sorry." Franklin reached up and set the hat on his head. "I was just thinking about my new class." He focused on the words and gestures of the rabbit summoning spell that he could suddenly 'remember' and cast it.

Harry watched as Franklin finished his spell and a tall pink haired young lady with almost knee length white rabbit ears appeared out of thin air wearing a leather duster. He stared as the teenager turned and he realized she was only wearing a translucent blue silk halter top for clothes.

"Bethany Bunny reporting for duty," the girl said as she saluted Franklin.

"Hello cowboy," Jessica said playfully after noticing the strange revolvers the other rabbit girl was wearing. She glanced down at Jessica's soft leather boots that didn't quite fit the cowboy image but looked a lot more comfortable. "I'm Jessica Rabbit and this is Harry Potter."

"Pleased to meet you," Harry offered, trying not to stare when he saw her guns.

Franklin pulled his attention off the girl's rather generous breasts and looked at her face, not terribly surprised that she looked a bit like his first girlfriend considering how much Jessica resembled Harry's frost golem. "Welcome to the team, I'm Franklin."

"Pleased to meet you boss," Bethany assured him.

Franklin took the top hat off and tossed it to Harry. "Keep it."

"Are you sure?" Harry asked as he put the hat in his inventory. "You could probably make a fortune selling access to the rabbit spell."

"I don't trust any of the guilds to give me a decent price and I can't afford to buy the type of wards I'd need to keep it safe which means it's safer with you."

"I'll keep it safe," Harry promised.

"Do you have any special skills?" Jessica asked Bethany.

Bethany shook her head. "Sorry, I didn't get any nifty abilities from my father's side of the family, I just shoot monsters and annoying ducks."

"Annoying ducks?" Franklin asked.

"It's a family tradition." Bethany glanced around the arena. "So, where are we going?"

Jessica gestured towards the door set in the wall with the exit sign over it. "We might as well leave unless we want to steal from a dragon or keep searching the maze?"

"There's no point in being greedy," Franklin said as he started walking towards the exit.

0o0o0

Buffy walked into the library and froze as she saw Xander talking with a mauve skinned demon girl wearing a bright hawaiian shirt and silk loincloth that didn't hide much if anything while a red faced Willow ate a taco. Her gaze jumped to the portal against the wall then over to Giles who was standing behind the counter where a girl with dark hair was talking on the phone. "Are we having a party?"

"I love you too," Fred assured her parents before hanging up. "Thank you for letting me use the phone."

"It's no trouble," Giles assured the young lady as he turned to look at Buffy, hoping she didn't overreact. "How was your patrol?"

"You know, the usual," Buffy replied as she walked into the room, wondering what was going on. "What's going on?"

"Fred needed to call her parents, she was trapped in a hell dimension," Willow explained after finishing her last bite.

"We're having tacos, do you want one?" Fred offered as she practically bounced over and grabbed another taco.

"I just got back a few minutes ago," Xander cut in before Buffy said something to offend the girls, "they should still be hot."

Buffy glanced over at Giles, surprised that he wasn't more concerned about the demon then looked at Fred. "How did you get stuck in a hell dimension?"

"I read a book in a library," Fred admitted. "A friend of Ruby's rescued me."

"Why?" Buffy asked as she studied the demon.

"What do you mean why?" Ruby asked. "Generally speaking, you don't leave people in hell dimensions unless they deserve it and Fred is a decent person."

"Most demons I've met don't go out of their way to help people. What type of demon are you?" Buffy asked, wishing she had a nice method of detecting magical influence because everyone seemed a bit too comfortable with the strange demon.

"I'm a succubus and no, despite the bad press we've gotten in various locations, we generally don't drain people to death," Ruby assured her. "Even ignoring the moral issues, it would be bad for repeat business."

"Have you ever killed anyone?" Giles asked as he walked over.

"Do evil priests count?" Ruby asked.

"That depends, how evil we're talking?" Xander asked.

"They're still people," Buffy argued.

"The bastard was planning on sacrificing a bunch of virgins to summon one of the nastier greater demons in a large and messy ritual, because he wanted to increase his power," Ruby explained.

"Nevermind," Buffy replied. "Wait, you're a demon, don't you want demons running around?"

"There's a difference between summoning a party girl for a night of fun or because you need to entertain your child with a tea party and summoning a fiend that will plunge a country into war and corrupts the land just by walking on it," Ruby said as she stretched her arms over her head, drawing everyone's gaze to her breasts.

"You did the right thing," Xander assured her.

"People actually summon you for tea parties?" Willow asked in surprise.

"Now and then." Ruby shrugged. "Most of them wanted a couple of hours of peace and quiet then a massage so it usually worked out nicely for everyone. On that note, I promised to show Xander and Willow around the pocket dimension, do you want to come make sure they're safe?" Ruby asked Buffy, noticing how tense she was.

"Sure," Buffy agreed, wanting to make sure Xander and Willow didn't get into trouble.

"In that case, let's go," Fred said as she grabbed the bag of tacos and headed for the portal.

'At least Fred doesn't seem to be under any mind control, still I should probably keep an eye on them,' Giles mused as he walked over and locked the door and turned off one set of lights, seeing no reason to let someone find the portal.

0o0o0

Eric grinned when two half naked girls with rabbit ears on the top of their heads stepped out of the portal after Franklin and the purple skinned demon. "And there's another 192 silver in my pocket."

Franklin turned to look at the warlock sitting in a comfortable looking chair. "How many people bet that I'd die?"

"Seven," Eric replied with amusement as he appreciated the view. "Not that I can really blame them, your demon has already 'lost' two warlocks."

"It's not my fault they were greedy little shits," Harry replied as he glanced around the stone room. He knew that some of the order would be disappointed in him for letting his previous summoners die but he wasn't going to spend the next fifty to sixty years bound to a couple of idiots if he could help it.

"Which is why I bet that Franklin would survive," Eric replied as he marked Franklin's name down in the ledger. "Let me just send a quick message…" he trailed off as he noticed Harry's troll-like arm when Jessica moved out of the way. "What happened to your arm?"

"I wasn't quite fast enough," Harry grumbled, thinking about the stupid disco ball of death.

Eric shivered as he thought about being turned into a troll. "I'm suddenly glad my trip through the dungeon was boring."

"Now if you excuse me, we're going shopping, the girls need clothes." Franklin grinned as he headed out of the room, looking forward to picking up a bunch of leather and seeing how many levels of Enchanting and Leatherworking he could grind before running out of patterns.

"Best of luck." Eric waited until they were gone then cast his message spell and sent it to his professor. 'Franklin survived and came back with two rabbit eared beastmen and his demon seems happy enough.'

0o0o0

"Any luck?" Selena asked as she walked into her bedroom and saw several small stacks of silver coins lined up in a row on her desk next to the large book Hermione was reading.

Hermione looked up from her enchanting book and stared as Selena shut the door with her foot and slipped out of her robe. She pulled her attention back to her summoner's face as she realized she'd asked her a question. "What?"

"Did you make any new skills?" Selena asked as she put the robe on the back of the chair to dry then walked over so she could read over Hermione's shoulder.

'Don't be like Ron,' Hermione reminded herself. "I was trying to make some tokens for your brother."

"Nice, anything good?" Selena asked as she sat down on the edge of the desk.

"Two tokens of a Beast Hunting skill that boost your archery damage against beasts by 5% a level, a copy of my Monster Training skill, three Monster Capture coins, two Tracking tokens and three Stealth tokens that might be useful to hand out to your family if they don't already have it."

"Dad and Zarena have Stealth skills, the rest of us don't. Which one is the Stealth token?"

Hermione grabbed one of the coins off the stack of Stealth coins and handed it to her. "Here."

Selena rubbed the coin with her finger then licked it, causing it to vanish. "Thanks."

"Any idea how we're going to explain the tokens?" Hermione asked as she gave Selena one of the tracking tokens.

"I'm sort of partial to 'Hey guys, we found a bag of skill tokens in the dungeon, don't ask stupid questions," Selena suggested.

Hermione laughed. "You think that will work?"

"Not a chance," Loki said from the hallway.

Selena sighed as she jumped off the desk and grabbed her robe. "How much did you hear?" she asked as she pulled her robe on.

"Enough to know your demon is awesome," Loki offered.

"Get your ass in here, now!" she ordered after tying her robe shut.

Loki slipped into the room and closed the door. "So, skill tokens?" he asked with a grin.

"If anyone asks, we found a small bag of them in the dungeon and we've already used them all, got it?" Selena asked.

"I wasn't planning on explaining shit," Loki replied with a shrug as he walked over to see what they were working on. "How hard are they to make?"

"Would you believe me if I said, insanely difficult?" Selena asked with a grin.

Loki shook his head. "Right now, I'm not sure I'd believe you if you said the sky was blue."

Selena glanced out the window at the night sky. "Probably for the best."

Hermione grabbed one of the tokens from each stack and made a stack in front of Loki. "This should help."

"How do I use them?" he asked.

"You lick them after sticking them on your forehead for a couple of seconds," Selena lied.

Loki glanced at Hermione. "Is she telling the truth?"

"Are you saying Selena would lie about something important?" Hermione asked, curious about her summoner.

Loki took one of the coins and placed it against his forehead. "How long do I have to leave it here?"

"At least a couple of seconds," Selena replied, trying and failing to keep a straight face after a couple of seconds.

"You just have to lick them," Hermione cut in before Loki tossed the coin at Selena or stormed off.

Loki licked the coin and blinked when it vanished, half expecting a prank. He quickly pulled up his skill window and looked at his new skill. "Beast Hunting: 5% increased damage against beasts per level. That's a nice passive, you're the best."

"Twins forever," Selena assured her twin.

"Always," Loki agreed then quickly went through his stack of coins. "How does your skill work?"

"I add two related skills from my collection of skills in my synthesis menu and add the physical token then push the button and hope for the best," Hermione explained.

"What else do you have?" Loki asked eagerly.

"Do you want a mining skill?" Hermione offered as she added her mining skill and her Libromancy skill then conjured a blunt adamantite arrow and dropped into the catalyst box and hit the button.

"Sure," Loki replied, not seeing a problem with picking up free skills. "Did you just conjure a blunt arrow?"

Hermione stared at the resulting description, ignoring his question. "Metal Drop: Gives a small chance of creating an ingot of metal appropriate to an enemy's type every time you kill a creature."

Loki stared at Hermione. "Are you seriously telling me that you just created a loot drop skill?!"

"Best demon ever!" Selena said as she leaned over and hugged Hermione.

"Let me guess, they're rare?" Hermione asked as she returned the hug, happy that she could help.

Loki nodded. "I've heard legends of various skills that drop crafting material or gems but there's no proof for most of them. The only loot drop skill I know exists for sure is the skill certain high level Rangers get that create arrows, mostly because one of the trainers has it."

Hermione pulled the arrow out of her box and broke the shaft, causing the arrow to vanish and adding the new skill to her collection. "In that case, you should probably avoid showing off."

"I wasn't planning on it," Loki assured her. "Speaking of showing off, can you teach me the spell you used to conjure the arrow or is that a secret?"

"I doubt you'd want the spell to conjure blunt arrows considering the cost but I should be able to get a copy of my magical arrow conjuring," Hermione offered, wanting to get to know him a bit better before she gave him a skill that could get him tossed into a gilded cage if someone found out he could conjure adamantite.

"Thanks." Loki grinned as he pictured running through a dungeon destroying monsters with exploding arrows.

Hermione added the Metal Drop skill and the Libromancy skill and used one of her conjured journals as a catalyst. She grinned when she read the description of the Metal Drop Token. "There's another Metal Drop token. I just need a couple more."

"Actually, given the value of the skill, he should probably give us a third of the metal he gets for at least the next year," Selena teased.

"See what I have to put up with?" Loki shook his head. "My own sister, trying to get me to keep notes."

"You could just give us all of the metal for the next year," Selena joked.

Hermione pulled the journal out and handed it to Loki. "Here, she's just grumpy because she didn't get enough sleep."

"Do I lick it or break it?" Loki asked as he walked to the door, holding the book like it was a delicate piece of artwork.

"Just open it," Hermione replied as she added the Metal Drop skill and Conjure Blunt Arrows (Silver) skill, tossed in another conjured book and hit the button.

"Thanks! If you ever need something, just ask," Loki offered as he opened the door and left.

"You're lucky," Hermione said as she handed Selena the new Metal Drop token.

"He could be worse." Selena opened the book then gestured towards the door and locked it. "Can I talk my favorite demon into giving me a back massage?"

"Sure," Hermione agreed as she stood up and stretched. "I need to let my mana regenerate anyways."

"Thanks." Selena untied her robe and tossed it on the chair then flopped down on her bed. "You're the best."

Hermione smiled as she walked over and sat down on the bed next to Selena so that she could give her a shoulder massage.

0o0o0

The old lady behind the counter smiled at Harry and the two rabbit girls as they walked into her shop. "How can I help you?"

Harry glanced around the shop filled with fabric and various partially assembled articles of clothing then focused on the old woman that reminded him of a pumpkin, mostly because of her almost jack a lantern smile, extra weight, orange dress and her green knit hat. "I was hoping I could buy some patterns and fabric."

"Of course," the woman replied cheerfully as she pulled a stack of notebooks out from under the counter and spread them out on the counter. "I'm going to assume by your lovely purple skin that you're not a member of the Tailor's Guild, correct?"

"No, is that a problem?" Harry asked, hoping it wasn't.

"Not at all, it just means you don't get a 20% discount and that I can't officially sell you some of the higher patterns."

Jessica pulled her attention off a red silk and silver chain loincloth. "You don't seem bothered about the fact that he's not a member of the Guild."

"The other tailor kept demanding to know which idiot taught him tailoring," Bethany complained.

"Let me guess, middle aged, pinched face and blonde?" the shopkeeper asked dryly, thinking about the woman that ran the shop down the street.

"Yes," Harry replied as he looked through the collection of patterns, surprised that everything was reasonably priced or at least he was assuming a couple of copper pieces per pattern was reasonably priced.

The shopkeeper snorted. "That's because she doesn't know anything about demons, demons end up with all sorts of interesting skills. The more interesting and expensive patterns are towards the bottom of each notebook."

"How do they work?" Jessica asked, saving Harry from admitting that he had no clue.

"A tailor basically just follows the directions or studies it for a couple of minutes depending on their skill level," the old lady explained. "You'll probably want a couple of bolts of cloth to practice with."

"That would be helpful," Harry agreed as he pulled a bag of gold out of his inventory and set it on the table. "What can you get me for this?" he asked as he opened the bag and showed the shopkeeper the coins.

The old lady grinned as she pulled another notebook out from under the desk. "I can't sell this to you as you're not part of the Guild but it has some nice examples of my work in it, so feel free to look it over. I'll be right back with the cloth." She grabbed the bag of coins and headed into the backroom to start collecting bolts of cloth with a smile on her face.

Harry tapped the book that she wasn't supposed to sell him with his troll-like hand and whispered, "Gemino." He stuck the duplicated notebook into his inventory then flipped through the notebook of things she couldn't sell him. "A shirt that can't be cut by arrows, pants that can't be cut by daggers. I can see why she'd want to advertise."

"Do you think Franklin would buy me a loincloth that makes me ethereal?" Bethany asked, fairly sure the answer was no considering the ingredients looked expensive or at least hard to acquire.

"No idea," Harry said as he looked over the ingredients. "I'm not sure how you'd get the essence of a ghost, silk from a phase spider or mithril. Not to mention the instructions don't really make sense."

"In other words, it's probably expensive," Bethany muttered as she walked over to look at the collection of loincloths on the wall. "I'm surprised loincloths are actually in fashion."

"They're less popular in the north and during the winter but they're popular with adventurers and demon girls, mostly because the magical versions tend to provide far more protection than beeches or pants," the old woman explained as she brought out a decent sized bolt of linen cloth and set it on the counter. "That's harder than it used to be." She glanced between the bunny girls. "Can I talk one of the girls into helping me?"

"Sure, I'd be happy to," Bethany said as she walked around the counter and followed the old lady into the back.

"Get as many different types of fabric and colors as you can," Harry said cheerfully, figuring he'd just use the genimo charm a bunch so they wouldn't waste material while they tried to level their crafting skills. He turned to look as Franklin walked in, floating several large bolts of leather in front of him. "Any trouble?"

"No, the tannery doesn't care who they sell to and the Leatherworker Guild knows better than to piss them off," Franklin replied with a grin. "I sent the rest of the bolts home, these are for Jessica, feel free to toss them in your inventory."

Harry reached out and dropped the largest bolt in his inventory then grabbed the next largest. "Thanks."

"You're welcome, it's the least I can do for getting me through that death trap. I just feel a bit guilty that I'm sending you back to hell," Franklin admitted.

Harry shoved the last bolt of leather into his inventory. "Don't worry about it, I completely understand." He couldn't really blame Franklin for wanting a female demon, he wanted a female summoner. "Do you know where we can find an unenchanted crystal ball?"

"There are a couple of shops, it shouldn't be hard, why?" Franklin asked.

"I want to try making a better crystal ball," Harry admitted. "I need to check on a friend of mine."

"We can hit it on the way to the Second Chalice shop, I want to sell the loincloth we got from the minotaur," Franklin said, fairly sure they get a halfway decent amount despite the flaw as demons regenerated between summons and some of them weren't as picky about what they wore.

"It's almost worth wearing," Harry grumbled, thinking about the Filthy quality on the otherwise amazing loincloth.

Jessica shook her head. "Yeah, no. I don't care if it's amazing and cuts the damage of any melee attack in half before factoring in the amazing armor rating it gives your legs, it's filthy enough it would rot your family jewels off and I'd like to borrow them now and then."

Harry opened his mouth to ask why she'd want to use the loincloth then realized she hadn't been talking about borrowing the loincloth. "I said almost. Actually, I might be able to learn something once I've increased my Enchanting, how much do you want for it?"

"That's a good question," Franklin mused. "Let's check with the Second Chalice shop, the shopkeeper is decently honest and should be able to give us a rough idea even if he's not willing to buy it."

"Sounds good," Harry agreed, figuring it was worth keeping around until he could reverse engineer it.