Reborn as a witch in another world [slice of life, isekai] (ch. 87)
Blurb:
What does it take to turn your life around? Death, of course!
I died in this lame ass world of ours and woke up in a completely new one. I had a new name, a new face and a new body. This was my second chance to live a better life than the previous one.
But goddamn it, why did I have to be a witch? Now I don't just have to be on the run from the Inquisition that wants to burn me and my friends. But I also have to earn a living?
Follow Elsa Grimly as she:
- Makes new friends and tries to save them and herself from getting burned
- Finds redemption from the deeds of her previous life
- Tries to get along with a cat who (like most cats) believes she runs the world
- Deals with other slice of life shenanigans.
--
Chapter 87. Snow White, Cinderella and Baba Yaga vs the Iron Snakes (part 1)
“Yes, the police are with them,” Cuthbert said as if he was revealing that he had been hiding a terminal illness and buried his face in his hands.
“Now what?” Enola asked, her fingers fidgeting with the front of her dress. “The police must be here to take him because those men paid them to do that.”
“It's okay,” I said, rising from my chair. “Mrs. Cuthbert, take Carla to the basement with you. And Mr. Cuthbert, come with me.”
“What are you going to do?” Enola and Eugene asked in unison.
“What we had come here to do all along,” I said. “Now do as I told you. We don't have time to waste.”
Enola took the child downstairs to the basement with her. I turned to Eugene in the middle of the hallway. “You are going to open the door,” I said. “And you are going to invite them in.”
Eugene's pale face turned paler. “I-Invite them?” he stuttered.
“Yes,” I said and turned to Smokewell. “Go out from the kitchen window and see the police carriage. See if they have any other men who are not in the Internal Police uniform. See if any other carriages have been parked around theirs.”
The cat nodded. “I will. And stop barking orders at me.” She slipped out of the kitchen window and disappeared into the night.
“W-What am I supposed to do after inviting the Internal Police inside?” he said.
“Nothing,” I said with a reassuring smile. “Cinderella and I will handle the rest.”
The man swallowed hard, wiped his forehead with a handkerchief and moved towards the sitting room. He opened the door while Lily went and stood next to the frame.
“Yes?” Cuthbert asked politely.
“Mr. Cuthbert,” a voice said from outside. “Sorry to interrupt. Is your family home?”
“N-No,” Cuthbert said.
“Oh? Is that so? Where are they?”
“Why do you ask?”
“Nothing in particular. We wanted to take you to the station with us,” the man from the Internal Police said. “We had to discuss something with you. It's about your problem. If you know what I mean.”
“Oh…”
“So, would you kindly step out with us, sir?”
Eugene froze in his spot for a second. My heart skipped in that instant. I hoped he wasn't going to fumble such a simple task.
He didn't. He cleared his throat and said in a neutral tone, “Of course, officer. Actually, why don't you step inside for a drink with me first?”
“A drink?” the officer said.
“Yes. I know why you are here. My nerves are all shot from anxiety. A drink would help me calm myself and prepare my mind for what’s about to happen.”
“I see.” The officer paused.
That's when Smokewell climbed back in from the kitchen window and stood next to me at the entrance of the hallway. “Two carriages along with the one the Internal Police came in. But it’s just this guy at the door and a constable behind the wheel of his carriage. The other two vehicles have four men in each. Fairly muscular men.”
“Eight men, huh.” I raised an eyebrow. This was going to be a quick job.
That's when Eugene swung the door wide open and let the officer in. The man from the Internal Police couldn't see Lily because the door gave her cover. She didn't move while Eugene slid the bolt home.
I stepped out into the sitting room. And the officer's eyes fell upon me. He was a man with thinning gray hair and a triangular gray mustache. But despite his partial baldness and the grayness of his hair, he seemed to be in good shape. His shoulders were broad. His limbs were long and seemed lithe under his steel gray uniform. And he smirked when he saw me. He couldn't see my real face because of my enchanted mask. But the rest of my body was the same as always. He took his time roving my form with his gaze. “My, my, Mr. Cuthbert. You did say your family wasn't home and your nerves were shot. I can see why now. Heh.” He leered at Eugene. Then took off his uniform cap and held it to his chest. “Senior Inspector Bernard Wilkerson,” he said. “A pleasure to meet you, madam. And you are?”
I gave a wry smile and looked over his shoulder where Lily was standing. “Cinderella,” I said.
And before Wilkerson could have even a moment to be confused, Lily stepped up behind him and grabbed both of shoulders in an iron grip. Then she snapped them harshly. There was a sound similar to that of someone cracking a celery stick.
Bernard Wilkerson howled in pain like a dog and went down on his knees. “What the fuck was–”
His cries of agony were short when Lily stomped down on his calf and this time the sound was similar to dry cereal getting crushed in a bowl.
Eugene stared in horror. “What did you do that for?!” he said with a trembling voice as he stepped back from the howling inspector, writhing on the floor.
“He could've grabbed his gun. Or tried to run away.” Lily shrugged.
“You stinking bitch–”
“Cinderella, take Inspector's gun and make sure he doesn't get in our way,” I said as I moved up to the door and parted the curtain over the bay window next to it. I saw the constable jumping out of his carriage and rushing towards the house. “One man,” I said to Lily. “Don't let him come inside.”
I grabbed Eugene by the arm and led him towards the basement. As I opened the door under the stairway, a large white direwolf stood in our way, baring its teeth. Eugene yelped in fear. “Don't worry, she is with us,” I said. “Pearl, stay,” I said. The direwolf stopped glaring at us and let Eugene walk past her down the stairs. “Stay with your family until we come down to call you folks.”
“A-Alright…” he said nervously. But before entering the basement, he turned to me and called. “Another thing. The guns that the Iron Snakes use–they aren't normal. The bullets…they don’t just pierce. They explode.”
I frowned as I got a sense of deja vu at the memory of seeing a bullet that could blow up a reinforced steel door. I considered what Eugene had told me and quickly moved up next to Lily, who was peering out the bay window now. “How is it going?” I said.
“Aqua handled the constable before the man could even knock at the door,” she said. “But the thugs are coming towards the house now.”
“You didn't make Aqua kill the constable, did you?” I said.
“I was supposed to?” Lily said.
“No, keep the policemen alive. We can use them later,” I said.
“What the fuck are you bitches talking about?!” Wilkerson snapped through teeth clenched in pain. “What do you mean by ‘use them’?!”
“Do you want this, Miss Snow White?” Lily offered me the Inspector's revolver.
“Might come in handy,” I said, taking the firearm.
“That's my gun!” Wilkerson yelled.
I fired a shot on the wall next to his ear. A stunned look came over his face. I knew he won't be able to hear anything right now. So I hit him with the universal gesture of a finger to the lips. “Shhh…”
Then I turned to Smokewell. “Have any spare souls to charge yourself with?” I asked.
“Not right now.” She spun her ivory pipe over her paw.
“Then snatch the souls of any thugs that Cinderella kills. But don't engage in combat directly,” I said.
“I won't.” The cat nodded. Then she hissed. “And stop ordering me.”
I didn't answer her and instead closed my eyes. I became the center of all the abysses I had stationed in their bottles around this house. I felt their presence as if they were the planets that orbited a sun that was me.
I heard footsteps stomping through the gates, rushing through the side yard and moving towards the back. I opened my eyes. “Cinderella, four of them are coming from the back. Four from the front,” I said. “Do what you are good at.”
“Will do, Miss Snow.” She gave me a salute and I ran to the kitchen in the back, tucking the gun under the belt of my dress.
I heard a gun shot go off. A crack was beaten into the wood of the back door. A moment passed. The door blew up in a thousand splinters. I jumped back, bringing my arms up to cover my face. Two men with handguns rushed in from the new entrance they had torn themselves.
I didn't waste any time and charged my voice with malice. “Percutiens,” I said and the red paper doll I'd pasted to the wall behind me was activated. Its arms burnt off and in a blink two long and sharp spikes made of brick and mortar flew out of the wall behind me like solid tentacles. They bent around to dodge me standing in their way and pierced right through the faces of the two gangsters. Blood splattered and tiny pieces of rubble swirled in the air as the two men crashed dead on the floor as the spikes went back into the walls.
I pulled out my revolver and took cover behind the half exploded wall. I peered out carefully. There was a shadow of a man on the perimeter wall on the opposite end. cast by the moonlight. I closed my eyes and saw him through the abyss that was in the bottle under the plant he was standing next to.
I activated the doll I'd pasted to the perimeter wall right in front of him. “Impedirent,” I said. There was a loud slam, the sound of a tomato being squashed and then there was blood. A lot of blood, painting the walls and the floor. This was the spell corresponding to the doll’s leg. It wasn’t as flexible as the arm spell. But it was more powerful, reserved mainly for more brutal attacks. I knew the man was dead so I didn't pay much attention to it. I had already heard something from another abyss I'd posted in a bottle on the other end of the backyard. Footsteps. And they were coming close, slow and cautious.
I closed my eyes and I saw the back of a man approaching the blasted entrance in the back with careful steps. He had pressed himself flat against the wall to avoid being in the clear sight of gunfire. As if I was going to use the gun.
I had hidden another doll in a small box and put it by the perimeter wall in front of the backdoor. “Arca,” I said. The word meant ‘coffin’ in Old Tongue. This was the most powerful spell in the entire body of the doll. The backyard opened up like a chasm from one side and soil eroded deeper into the earth. The man lost his footing, clawed at the wall behind him frantically before tumbling into the pit that had opened up. The ground closed itself shut like a coffin soon after. And the floor shook a bit. Yep, that would be natural fertilizer soon.
All four men were dead. I surveyed the backyard a bit just to make sure before I went back to the living room. Aqua was slamming a dead gangster against the floor on the porch. Three other men were lying dead on the living room floor with their necks twisted to grotesque angles. “Good boy, Aqua!” Lily said, patting the frog as he finally let go of the corpse.
Wilkerson was lying on the floor, shivering and pale with fear, mumbling, “Crazy bitches” over and over again.
“All eight of them are down,” I said. “That was a bit easy.”
Lily nodded. “A little too easy.”
The silence lingered around us only for a second when I heard a roar. Several roars. Not of beasts. But of engines.
Lily and I walked out of the front door to see at least two dozen motorcycles racing towards the house.
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Posted Dec 25, 2025, 6:00 AM UTC