Then, once the sun goes down, I land in a small park where there is no one around. Once I am on the ground I shift into the black wolf form, but I don't immediately leave the park. Instead I stay hidden in the trees and try to get used to the wolf form.

Not only has it been a while since I used this form, but lately I have only been using the eagle and meg forms. Once I feel a bit more comfortable in the new skin I sneak out of the park. I carefully make my way down to the shipyard and take a look around.

Work has stopped, but there are still guards at every entrance, so I jump over the wall. Once I am inside the wall I sit down in the shadows and wait for a while, but no patrols come by. Since it seems safe I make my way over to the warship that is almost complete.

Luckily, since the deck isn't complete, I have no problem getting inside the ship. The guts of the ship aren't complete, allowing me to crawl around and examine everything. Most of the techniques used won't help me, but a few of them will be very useful.

*DING*

Congratulations! Skill Woodworking has progressed to level 7!

Woodworking

Level 7

Agi +7

You can make tools or structures from wood.

'Well, I wasn't expecting that, but it will help!'

Once I am done examining the ship I climb out and leave the shipyard. Then I start sneaking my way around the docks, using my nose to locate elves. On the docks I find three separate locations where elves are being held.

On top of that I locate a slave market in the city where there are elves. As I search the rest of the city I find five mansions with the scent of elves around. There is also another building with the scent of elves, but I am not sure what it is.

It is hidden away in the warehouse area, so it is probably not anything legal. That gives me a total of ten locations with elven slaves, that makes it complicated. If I am going to stage a rescue, then I need to get them all at the same time.

Coming back a second time would be much more difficult and I want to avoid that. So I need to come up with a way to hit all ten locations and get the elves away. It will be pretty difficult, but with some planning I don't think it is impossible.

After searching the entire city again to make sure I didn't miss anything, it is almost dawn. So I find a quiet spot and drop the shapeshift so I can meditate to recover my sacred power. By the time I am done the sun has been up for a couple of hours so I return to the eagle form.

Once I am back in the sky I once again start studying the city's layout looking for routes. Since it is an unknown, I start my plan from the building in the warehouse area. From there I plan a route to the five mansions, then the slave market, and finally the docks.

That just leaves a ship to escape on, my eyes instantly swing to the warship sitting in the harbor. It is certainly big enough and it should be the fastest thing in the harbor. I would much rather steal it than have it chasing us, especially since I don't know how to sail.

However, I don't plan to try, instead I plan to just tow the ship in meg form. At least for the first part of the escape, once we aren't being chased we can try to figure it out. In fact, having a ship for the elves to practice with is probably a good idea.

Besides, stealing the warship will give me more weapons to use on my ship. Not seeing any downsides I go ahead and make the warship the target for the plan. Now I just need to figure out the details and plan contingencies for when things go wrong.

Because something always goes wrong, no plan ever goes perfectly, especially my plans. So I do my best to think of everything that could possibly go wrong and how to handle it. One of the things that puzzles me the longest is how to get the elves to trust me quickly.

Not only do they need to trust me, but they also need to listen and obey me. Going in as myself would waste a lot of time explaining, but going in as a human won't work. No matter what I say, the elves have no reason to trust a human, at least not quickly.

They would be much more likely to trust my beast forms, but those won't be able to remove collars and manacles. As soon as I change forms in front of them, I will be back to wasting time explaining. The only thing I can think of is to create a new form, an elf form, so I picture it in my mind and try it out.

Shifter Form added: Elven Warrior

The new form feels just a little off, but after a few minutes I get used to it. Just like when I use the human form, my armor stays visible and adjusts to fit me perfectly. The thing that is bothering me is, why is the form called elven warrior, why not just an elf?

Unfortunately, the reasons behind my forms are something I will never get an answer for. Ever since I got the ability to shapeshift I have had lots of unanswered questions. Anyway, at least with this form the elves should trust me on sight and listen to my orders.

While I wait for dark I meditate and recover my sacred power, then I switch to the eagle form. Right before the sun goes down I fly out into the harbor and land on one of the warship's masts. Then I just sit and wait until it becomes fully dark and the ship's crew has settled down.

Then I shift to elven warrior form, draw a knife, and start moving quietly around the ship. The sentries on the ship are mostly just leaning on the railings watching the rest of the harbor. They are not on guard at all, making it easy to sneak around and kill them one by one.

Once the sentries are all dead I head below decks and take care of the sailors. I feel kind of bad for killing them in their sleep, but I don't have time for anything else. Once everyone on the ship is dead, I spread my wings and fly to the warehouse district.

When I enter the building I am planning on keeping things as quiet as possible. That all goes out the window as soon as I see what kind of place it is, a brothel. Not the nice kind either, the slaves that aren't elves are all children.

As soon as I see that I draw my sword and start killing everyone who isn't wearing a slave collar. The human slaves cower and try to hide, the elves on the other hand start cheering. I move through the building like the wind of death, only the slaves survive.

Once everyone else is dead I gather all the slaves and remove their collars. The problem is what to do with the humans now, they are children so I can't just abandon them. The elves also don't look like they are willing to leave them behind, which is a problem.