SelkieMyth
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Chapter 651 - Countless Joyful Dawns V
🕑 Added 2025-05-05 14:00:10 +0000 UTC102 Years after Elaine became a professor at the School of Sorcery and Spellcraft
I slowly walked down the road with Custodus, greeting everyone on our usual patrol route.
“Morning Agrippina! How’re the kids?” I waved to the first lady I saw.
“Dawn!” She chuckled. “They grew up and moved out years ago.”
I cheekily smiled.
“Yeah, but they’ll always be your kids, and I’ll always ask.” I finished our usual greeting. Agrippina laughed.
“They’re doing well! Came over last week, I’m going to be a grandmother.”
“Oooh!” I cooed, wanting to stay and chat. My head was almost entirely swiveled behind me at this point, having never stopped walking to chat. “Congratulations!”
“Caius.” Custodus greeted. “Any issues?”
The young man shook his head.
“No sir! Work’s going well. Staying on the straight and narrow. Might be having discussions with a girl later on.”
Custodus was being a hair of a hardass on Caius, the young man having been a [Thief] when he was younger and more desperate. I didn’t quite agree with the methods, but the results were spectacular - he’d gone from stealing to selling.
“Good lad.” He said. “Let’s grab a drink at the end of the week, and you can tell me all about it.”
“Sir!” He threw a sloppy imitation of a salute, and a passing pair of [Legionnaires] laughed at him. I kept an eye and [The World Around Me] on them. It wasn’t just [Adventurers] that caused problems - soldiers were almost as bad! And more immune!
Fortunately, the pair was wearing the insignia of the local garrison. Given that they had to live here, they caused significantly fewer problems than the Legion that passed through a few years ago.
We continued on, talking with nearly everyone. Being a trusted member of the community meant people could bring problems to us, and we were trusted to use our best judgment.
My ears perked at the hue and cry of “thief!”, and I patted Custodus’s shoulder. A long-established signal that I was about to do a Dawn Thing. Then I zipped off at high speed, expertly weaving my way through the crowd that seemed stationary. It only took me a moment to see the situation, and I refrained from sighing.
I planted myself in front of the girl, and bent back as she tried to plant herself face-first into my leathers.
Do no harm still applied, and on a takedown like this, I had to be as gentle as a lamb. Slowly bleed off her speed, slowly bring her down. In a neat trick I’d picked up, I just needed to flick a length of rope, and it tied itself around her hands. Go dexterity!
I whistled sharply, letting Custodus know where I’d gone to.
“I’m sorry Drusilla.” I told the girl with as much kindness as I could. “This is the third time in two weeks; we’ve got to take you in.”
It helped knowing her and her family situation. She didn’t need to steal. She was a dumbass teenager doing it for the thrill, or had possibly been so dumb as to take it as an actual class.
The girl grumbled as Custodus came over.
“I’d like to swing past the temple on the way to the Guardhouse.” I told my partner. He smirked.
“Looking to get a kiss for a job well done?” He teased. I put my hands on my hips and pouted at him.
“Well, now that you’ve mentioned it, yes, yes I am.” I tapped Drusilla with my foot. “Real reason, I want to check if she’s been extra dumb with her class and skill selection or not.”
We did a bit of cursory work. Handed back the stolen goods to the man who’d been robbed, accepted our accolades from the locals who’d witnessed the takedown, chatted for a minute with one or two people. We weren’t just the enforcers, we were the trusted members of the community, and that required talking with people. Not just taking people down and vanishing into the night. Or broad daylight, as the case may be.
“And Guard Dawn’s the reason this is the single safest district to live in!” Phocian boasted.
“Only until I get rotated!” I cheekily answered back.
“Ah lass, we’ll miss you when you’re gone.” He said. “You should settle down with that pretty [Priestess] of yours.”
Custodus snorted as he choked back a laugh. He knew I was a bored Immortal fucking around. Everyone else saw me as a young lady with excellent hearing and multiple stacked speed skills. There were occasional rumors that I had to have more, that it was impossible to move as quickly as I did, even with multiple dedicated skills, and every time I overheard the conversation I wanted to applaud their inquisitiveness and reward their System knowledge.
I had a whole list of people who’d mysteriously find a few onyx coins under their pillow one morning when we finally moved out.
“Are you going to walk, or will we have to drag you?” Custodus asked Drusilla. The girl got up with a grumble, and we hustled over to the temple. A lot of dirty looks were shot towards the girl, and I could see her reputation rapidly tanking. I shook my head.
The idiot. Our reputation was good. People knew if we were hauling her off, she’d really screwed up. There was a solid justice system in place, but the concept of ‘innocent until proven guilty’ had never really percolated through. She was already judged and determined guilty in the eyes of her friends and neighbors, and the poor reputation she was gathering today was going to follow her the rest of her life. Custodus was lecturing her the entire way on the topic.
“You idiot. Why? Your family’s in good shape, and you’re ruining your life over what? 24 arcs of makeup?”
Drusilla muttered a non-answer. We were fairly certain there was no abuse or anything of the like going on - I knew way too much about my neighbors and what happened behind closed doors, and I had a low tolerance for a number of issues. We paused in front of the temple.
“Be back in a moment!” I bounded inside the temple, waved to [Acolyte] Lucretia - they came and went so fast - and found Iona in a closed door meeting. I pulled back [The World Around Me], not wanting to eavesdrop on the private counseling.
Everyone knew the religious aspects of what [Priests] and [Priestesses] did, but it never failed to astound me just how much ‘center of the community’ and ‘trusted figure’ they were. Before going to the legal system, before [Mind Healers] were involved, before arguments ended up at the attention of the [Guards], so many things were resolved by [Priestesses].
I waited until Iona left with the couple, and my stomach did a flip-flop as she just lit up when she saw me.
“Love!” She hurried over, her delicate robes fluttering. It amused me how our usual roles were reversed - I was wearing the hard leather armor.
“Oh venerable [Priestess].” I half-bowed, a smile twitching at my lips. “I’ve… okay, I can’t think of a fancy way to ask. Got a kid we keep catching stealing. Can you peek at her skills, so we know how hard we have to come down on her? Maybe stick her on the straight and narrow?”
Iona sighed.
“Only so many people we can take in at a time.” She said. “At a point, people do need to face proper justice.”
I snorted.
“Most people would prefer proper justice to your reformation if they knew all about it ahead of time.” I teased. One of the [Acolytes] that overheard our conversation barked a laugh and commented.
“Ain’t that the god’s honest truth around here.” He said, continuing to walk off.
“Alright, show me, tell me what’s going on.” Iona said. We walked through the hallways, getting back to the entrance where Custodus was holding Drusilla. Iona took one glance and sighed heavily.
“She took an entire [Beginner Pickpocket] class.” She said wearily. I groaned.
The girl was level 40. In other words, she had 84 more levels of stealing stuff before she could begin to think about changing her class. Either a ton of time thinking things over and getting back on the straight and narrow - frustrating when effectively down an entire class - or she’d rapidly get to 64 and 128 before being able to change her class, stealing the entire way and getting more involved in the lifestyle. In other words, a mess, and she’d fucked up her life in a big way.
I’d rebelled hard against the idea of my parents picking out everything for me when I was a kid. Now that I was older and less dumb… I absolutely wanted to pick things out for kids. Sara hadn’t been an issue, she’d had a driving passion and knowledge of what she wanted, and I wasn’t worried about her. The average kid was going to have me tearing my hair out though.
Iona and I traded a look that communicated everything we needed to say.
“Alright Custodus! Let’s take her down and hand her over.” I said.
Ciriel, please set her on the straight and narrow, let her be a productive member of society. I prayed up to my goddess as we escorted and booked Drusilla.
I’m a miracle worker, but that might be a little beyond my abilities. Ciriel half-joked back. I rolled my eyes and continued on with my day.
===========
I poked my head into Auri’s bakery. The place was as large as a city block, but she just didn’t have the customers to properly support it, poor thing. She’d dreamed big, had a vision of ‘the one bakery the city needs’, executed on it, and… it hadn’t quite worked out. Mostly because ‘walk forty blocks to the Phoenix Bakery or walk one for Octavius’s Bread’ was an easy calculation for most people. She had won the city bread contract though, which kept her ovens busy. The phoenix grumbled about how boring and samey it all was, but it was a fuckton of bread.
I walked in, and didn’t need to dodge a single person or table as I made my way to the front. The three employees were busy as could be, to be fair… but an entire city block worth of employment was more than three people’s worth.
“Hey Auri! Picking up the usual.” I called out to my friend in the kitchen, sliding my payment with a generous tip over the counter.
“Brrrpt!” Auri called back from the kitchen, five dozen [Mage Hands] working hard. One of them materialized in front of me for a fist bump, and I bumped it as one of the employees handed me our usual order.
“Cheers! We’re going to the park after work, come meet us there!” I told the bird.
“Brrpt!” She acknowledged, and I was off to have lunch with Iona at the temple.
==============
“Busy day?” I asked my wife, handing over her usual pie, trading her for the drinks she’d acquired. Holy wine hit differently. Iona sat down with a sigh.
“Oh, you have no idea.” She said, eating half the pie with literally one bite. By the miracle of dexterity, she was able to talk while eating with her mouth closed. “If people had just a little more empathy, could see things from other angles just a tiny bit more, and if they listened to each other, I could spend my entire day in prayer and studying the holy texts. But nooo, when someone says ‘I need help cleaning the kitchen please,’ that goes in one ear and right out the other, and they bicker and fight over it until they come to me, and I get to tell them ‘clean the kitchen has no deep, hidden meaning, please help clean the kitchen’, and IT’S A MIRACLE! Communication works!” She ranted. I patted her arm.
“I get it. Believe me, I get it. Wanna bet on how much contraband I find this afternoon, because people think money is more important than stability?”
“Arcs or pounds?” Iona asked.
“Hmmm… let’s do arcs today.” I said.
“16,000 in material cost, 32,000 in market value.” Iona said.
“Oooh, big day for me.” I rubbed my hands together. “I bet… 4,000-8,000 split, but I’ll find something unusual and exotic.”
Iona shook her head, taking a sip of her drink to wash down the pie.
“If it’s unusual and exotic, it’s going to be expensive.” She said.
“Poison dart frogs are unusual, exotic, and not super expensive.” I said.
“Nobody’s going to be smuggling in anything that’s not super valuable!” Iona protested.
“Humph. It’s my bet, I can lose it if I want.” I said. A smile danced across my wife’s face.
“Love you.” She said.
“Love you too.” I agreed. “What are the rest of the bets?”
Iona pulled out a sheet of paper and handed it over to me. She’d doodled a cute drawing in the corner of us kissing, and I promptly snipped that away and stuck it in the fourth gallery room.
“You don’t have to save all my drawings.” Iona said. I stuck out my tongue at her. Maturity was optional.
“I absolutely do, and I can, and I will.” I said, reading the actual bets. I whistled at one.
“Who thinks I’m going to find over a million arcs in contraband in one shift?” I asked.
Iona laughed.
“Well, if they win, I’m sure you’re going to have questions for them.” She said.
“Oh yeah.” I agreed in a heartbeat. “Either they’re getting information directly from their god about it, at which point I’m calling foul, or they’re in on it. Which is another type of foul.”
Lunch was lovely, then it was back to it.
“Custodus, you’ve got the magistrate this afternoon, yeah?” I asked.
“Gods, yes.” He pinched his nose. “Four hours of standing around, three minutes of talking. Don’t say it too loudly, but court’s the worst. I don’t know how you manage it.”
I carefully kept my mouth shut on how I actually did it. I’d tried to do court proceedings ‘properly’ exactly once, and hadn’t even made it halfway through before I started reading books in my storage. That had broken open the floodgates, and I merrily read anything and everything I could get my hands on instead of trying to wait patiently for when I was called as a witness.
“I’m just incredible at everything I do.” I flipped my hair back with a charming smile. “It’s a shame you can’t be as amazing as I am.”
He rolled his eyes at me.
“Whatever you say, Dawn. What’s the pool on today’s haul?” Custodus asked. I handed over the sheet, and he skimmed over it.
“Mmmm… alright, here’s my bet.” He said, scrawling out the number.
It was utterly unfair that he got to bet last. A minor perk of being my patrol partner. Ciriel knew I had a stick up my rear about proper procedures often enough, being able to be flexible on the small things here and there helped smooth the social aspects.
“Good luck with court, don’t get caught staring at all the men.” I teased.
“But they’re so handsome!” He protested. “And there’s nothing else to do!”
I laughed.
“That’s why I said don’t get caught. Cheers!” I waved, and started to walk off, picking a gate at random.
“Cheers! See you tomorrow.” He said.
I made it to the gate, tapped the senior officer, then faded into the shadows. No skills needed, just raw skill.
Smuggling was way down in Mare City compared to most other places, by sheer virtue of me catching most of them. Fortunately, there was a steady trickle of bad out of town [Smugglers] who kept thinking ‘oh hey there must be a market in Mare’. Fun experience, kept everyone on their toes.
This was almost as boring as court for the most part. The vast majority of people were honest, hard working men and women, who grumpily paid their taxes and entered the city. I kept myself entertained partially by reading, and a lot of drawing. Most people were illiterate, and I had to get creative with my drawings.
A quick sketch of the latest wagon appeared in my book as my hands flew over the pages, both a perfect rendition and somehow worse than Iona’s lazy attempts. I switched to red ink, scribbled in a wheel and one of the upper supports, then swapped over to orange and colored in a few planks that were starting to rot. [Teleporting] it to the [Farmer] would’ve been too easy, but I didn’t have [Teleport] as one of the skills I was using as a [Guard]. Instead, I quickly folded the paper into a paper airplane, and sailed it right into the donkey’s harness. A little bit of extra help and service to the community!
People went in, people went out, and the sun continued its march through the sky. A whole caravan approached, and a pompous [Senator] rode ahead of the column on a relatively high level horse. A decent number of soldiers accompanied him.
“Senator Zenon. I wish to see the [Guard] in charge.” He said.
The senior [Guardsman] approached, and the two started to talk.
“Here is the manifest of goods.” The [Senator] handed over a thick set of papers and a large bag of coins. “Here’s the total. I’d like to request, given the size of the caravan, that we skip the inspection to keep things moving along. No sense in delaying traffic for everyone, they’ll vote me out of office in a week if I cause a traffic problem.” He joked, and the guards laughed with it. The [Guardsman’s] eyes flickered over to me, and I twitched a finger in acknowledgement.
“Of course you may go through.” He said.
Four wagons in, annnd contraband. Well, technically not contraband, but goods significantly more expensive than what was on the manifest… and all the associated unpaid taxes. What a surprise.
She who lives by the tax fraud, dies by the tax fraud. I briefly wondered how many times I’d be on different sides of the issue, then refocused on the problem at hand.
“Excuse me! Senator!” I went with friendly at first. “I believe there’s a problem.”
He sniffed at me.
“There’s no problem, girly. Your boss has already acknowledged what’s going on. If you were paying attention to your job instead of slacking off in a corner, you’d know what was going on.”
Oooh… I was going to ruin his day. I grinned at him as one of the other guards ordered the caravan to halt. They knew me, and I could see a few smirks developing as they waited for the entertainment.
“Well… I might not be paying too much attention, but the manifest has various grains and corn. Yet, the wagon there is filled with tunics and dyes hidden behind the wheat. You can see where the confusion comes in.”
The senator was cool as a cucumber, I had to give it to him.
“I apologize if the manifest was incorrect. I’ll flog my accountant over the mistake. Let me pay the appropriate amounts to fix it.”
I traded a quick unamused look with the senior guardsman, who briefly shook his head and made a throat-slitting motion. I sent up a small duststorm as I sprinted up and down the caravan in five seconds, getting a full look at all the cargo.
“I’m sorry, but no.” I told him a moment later. “The discrepancy is too large. You’re under arrest.”
The clubs, swords, and spears came out at that announcement, from both sides. The [Senator] laughed in my face.
“You don’t have the authority to arrest a [Senator]! Only a [Ranger] can.”
One of the guards started to laugh, utterly ruining things. I smirked up at the [Senator], and did a slow twirl, using my [Halo] skill to make myself glow. I swapped out my equipment, ending up with my full Sentinel gear.
“Hi! Let me introduce myself! I’m Sentinel Dawn, and you’re under arrest. Drop the weapons.”
A clatter of dropped weapons heralded Senator Zenon fainting dead away.
This was fun! I wondered what career I’d try out next?
[ding! [Everywoman] leveled up! 800->801]
Comments
Roombot
I wonder if there has ever been a Sentinel Surprise, and what their build looked like 🤣
Hodge Wasson
Good catch
Harry Hirsch
Aaah steamrolling assholes never gets old!
enderman
That or train the thief girl so that she can cross class into a smuggler and have her stop any truly bad items from being smuggled.
tr13ze
Thanks for the chapter 😁
Ryan
Like one about joining a traveling circus 😁
Ryan
Join the traveling circus fire bug!! Ice and fire, enough levels to be magicians by any other name
Ryan
Join the circus would be a fun one
Roombot
Alright folks place your bets, what’s she gonna do now? Become a merchant? An artisan? A POLITICIAN?!?
Joshua Little
Thanks for the chapter.
DeadicatedReader
The girl was level 40. In other words, she had 84 more levels -> 88 levels to 128.
C Gillan
Magic girl sentinel transformation activate!
puppy0cam
qualified immunity exists in the United states. any public official acting in the capacity of their job is mostly protected from lawsuits that arise as a result of doing it. So if a police officer fucks up and accidentally kills an innocent bysstander, they can't be held personally liable for it. The stupidest part is that it is a rule entirely made up by the courts. It doesn't actually have any basis in law.
Striving Spark
I've got to wonder what sort of conspiracy theories have popped up about Elaine over time, and how this is going to affect them... Like. Will someone come up with the theory that it a deep cover sting operation all along? (I feel like people are more likely to make up something outlandish than accept the reality of "bored immortals.")
Mad Dessert
Thanks!
Roombot
Definitely the 1 million arcs bet, who totally didn’t have insider knowledge 😉
darrel morris
so... who won the bet?
Hayden Pech
Haha 🤣
Syrahl
Pulling the "Sentinel Suprise" seems to be much more effective now that Elaine can pull the entire uniform out of thin air in an instant, instead of just the badge.
Jake
Did Everywoman somehow go down in level? Back in chapter 647 it leveled up to 865 but here it’s 801.
Ronny Cook
Guards unable to arrest senators? What sort of law-drafting body would make up a silly rule like that? Next thing you know the head of state will be completely immune to the law, and what sort of half-baked republic would do that?
extantCadence
Well, at least one of the guards knows she's a strong immortal, but the last line kinda makes it sound like this might be the end of the road for her guard life. Not sure she's actually ever gone full sentinel in her time there.
extantCadence
The passage of time is actually very explicit in the chapter, though? We can assume she became a guard in year 72 since she started teaching (or shortly after that) because that was how the last timeskip was marked. This chapter is marked as year 102 by the same metric, which means she's been doing this for ~30 years.
Reshi
I need this cute slice of life stuff to continue for forever :3 My heart needs it!
Roombot
Poor Auri!
Kurosov
That guys bodyguards were above the average intelligence of their profession. No stupidity, instantly dropped their weapons
Anonymous
Ya I feel the same way. There have been so many interesting events that we’ve missed, like Lumornor or talking to Night about Aion’s letter or even Sara finding out
SwitchBlaze
Lovely Chappie. Thank you.
Tilen Praprotnik
Thanks for the chapter
Pariah Devalis
Hah! Going full magical girl transformation for the lulz.
Lucy Severine
I hope she has a plan in mind for how to build up some local structures to deal with smuggling, or they're gonna have an absolute EXPLOSION once she's gone and there's suddenly no-one practiced at restraining that market around
Andrew
Thank you!
Simon Sitron
The passing of time is a bit unclear in this chapter. Supposedly it's the same year as she became a guard, but she has know community members for years. Also, I feel like the "new profession next week" thing came out of the blue
Julian
Ooh, that one bloke definitely had some insider knowledge.
TheBotler
Ha! Lowly guard can't arrest me!....wait she's a sentinel!....*faints* hahhahaa good chap. Thanks for that.
Khal Lee
The poor senator!!! Muwahahahahaha!!! NOT! Yeah! Full sentinel!!! Zap!!! Thanks for an amusing chapter on bets and zapping "officials"
John Lentner
Lol, the sentinel twirl swap was great. It seems like she's done this at least a couple of times before, she's clearly not In deep cover on this life stint.
Lena During
so. was the one in on it?
DocSmitty
Ooooh OK I hope Iona and Elaine have long term bets going! One of the best things we stole from How I Met Your Mother - we have a box of long term bets, but ours are measured in years, not centuries….
CringeWorthyStudios
Okay, that was amazing. Sounds like she’s done as a guard now though. These chapters have been good, but I have to admit that it feels very… fast? Compared to the start of the series. Honestly, ever since the big timeskip it’s felt a lot like it’s rushing to the end and there’s a lot less slice-of-life than in the first five or six books. Heck, we didn’t even get to see Sara grow up after she turned eight. Just one chapter she was joining the school and the next she was married and seventy years old. Thanks for the chapter, I just wish it was a bit less rushed.
DocSmitty
TFTC!
