(A/N) So, funny story: it took a little longer than expected for my computer to get fixed. Even funnier story: the computer that I was using is, more or less, incompatible with FF Net's Doc Manager and I couldn't post this chapter as anything other than indescript code instead actual words.
Technical difficulties aside, this is the final chapter of Book 1, not counting the epilogue. Once this and the epilogue get posted, I'll make good on promise and put everything together in a single, cover-to-cover book as their own file under the MonMusu tab, and to open it up, I'm going to do a preface explaining my journey writing this story. Instead of putting it at the end of this story post-epilogue, all that sappy goodness where I thank my readers for supporting me this past year, talk about the ups and downs, the goods the bads, and the constant boners while writing this will open up the next book, same as most published authors do at the beginning of their books.
As for this file, I mentioned that this will be the final chapter for Book 1, but personally, while I do have my issues with prologues, I don't really consider a story complete without an epilogue. Not for my own writing, anyway. I feel as though the final "chapter" should be a storytelling device, another notch on the belt of the tale you're trying to spin, if you will. The epilogue, though, should round everything out to hard conclusion. While the story's central conflict can be resolved in the last real chapter, the epilogue should show where the characters go after everything is taken care of, how they've evolved, and show the readers the fruits of their labors and all they had gone through over the course of the story.
Whatever works for other authors is fine by me. As for myself, "The Girls of MonMusu Book 1" won't be complete until the next, and final, update. After that, we can start Book 2! Hope to see you all there, Wholesome Hosts, and as always, enjoy the update.
Chapter 21
The forest seemed to stretch on forever. Sashenka's tracks were easy enough to follow, but the further in we went, the more the air around us seemed to thicken and become murky, as if we were wading our way through a swamp. After awhile, I knew we had gone far enough into the woods that we should have landed back into the city. The woods in the park weren't this big, and by no means were they so thick that they could block out any and all traces of urban living, or blot out the sun above it. It was as if the forest had expanded far enough to become its own biome.
Either that, or we weren't in the same woods anymore. I began toying with the thought that Miia and I had somehow faded into a completely alternate plane of existence, and given how odd my life had been in the last year or so, the possibility didn't seem that odd to me. For all I knew, Sashenka might have been slowly dragging us into the Demon Realm. To be fair, the only conclusive evidence that I had for that to be the case was that Miia and I had already been chasing her for a full mile, and the Park in its entirety was barely over half that size.
The more I thought about it, the more it began to feel like Miia and I were walking into a trap.
"Miia, stop for a second," I told her, patting her tail for her to let me down. She pulled up to a stop and wrapped herself around a tree, extending her height a bit to try and both protect herself and get a better view of the land since we were in hostile territory.
"What's wrong Darling?" she asked, "If we don't keep moving…"
"I know. She'll get away and this whole thing will have been for nothing," I agreed, crossing my arms, "But doesn't this situation feel… off to you?" She leaned over and gave me a confused look.
"What do you mean?" she said simply.
"I mean that we're already too far away from the others to get help if something were to happen," I explained, "For all we know, she's got another twenty henchman hiding in the trees surrounding us, and is just leading us into a trap. I don't think… Look, we already know she wants to kill me, and if we give her the advantage that I think she's trying to gain, then this fight won't end how we want."
"Don't you want to end this now? There's no way to guarantee that she'll win if we chase her down!" she pleaded.
"True, but there's also no way to guarantee we'll win either," I continued, "We don't have any information about what we're getting into, which means the cards are completely in her hands." Stepping over to my lover, I gently stroked her cheek. "I would fight legions of demons and other monsters for you and kill anyone who would try to get between us, My Love, but I won't die for you, and I'm not going to let you die for me either. Even if we constantly have to look over our shoulders in the coming months, I'd rather get the chance to continue living my life with you than die in your arms here and now."
Miia sat there and thought for a moment. Turning her head into my hand, she kept her eyes on me, linking her fingers with my own and depressingly biting into my fingers. I knew this wasn't what she wanted either. She was just as adamant as I was about protecting our family, but she knew that if she died here, than what would be the point to it? As much as neither of us wanted to admit, we had been outmatched.
"Alright, fine," she allowed, "Then, let's go back the way we came." Smiling, we began retracing our steps, sprinting to try and get back to the others.
"I love you, you know that?" I shot out.
"I'd hope so," she teased.
"We should hurry," I implored, checking my watch, "We've only got a few more minutes until midnight."
"What happens at midnight?" Miia asked.
"I don't know, but Sashenka mentioned something about it before she tried to kill me, so I'd rather not stick here in this transdimensional space long enough to find out."
Just then, I felt the world around me shrink It hit me as if someone had tied a vice around my head and stopped both me and my partner in our tracks, skidding us to a halt quickly enough to almost make us fall over. Grabbing our heads, we pushed through the headache. Looking around, we could feel a very noticeable change in the feeling of the area, the woods becoming more solid, feeling as though there was some kind of substance in the air and removing that lifeless feel to it from before. Visually, I wasn't sure what it was, but the trails and trees seemed to shorten as well, as if my field of view had changed.
Something was off. Pushing my coat back, I drew one of the guns from its holster and put my back to Miia who was already in an expert fighting stance. We looked around. The world around us was still as we felt several pairs of eyes on us, chills running down our spines as we sensed the presence of a fight.
That's when dozens of monsters of all types began walking out of the trees. All mixes of sizes, colors, and extra body parts littered the area. Some of the monsters surrounding us had wings, tentacles, scaly tails, entire lower halves of animals other than humans that spoke of their nature as liminals, and I thought I recognized some of them. There were harpies, centaurs, dullahans, angels, but there were also many that I had no chance of understanding. Some of them spoke true to the term "Eldritch Horror," making me question H.P. Lovecraft's ties to the government, assuming the masses of eyes and jagged mouths were that of the shoggoths of his creepy mythos.
In the center of all of these monsters, however, came the person Miia and I had been looking for aside two others. In the center was a woman on an obsidian throne that walked forward with a life of its own, the person sitting in it not having to move a single inch. The woman herself simply seemed like an older version of Sashenka. Her skin was an alabaster white, similar to her hair that was riddled with streaks of grey, with the occasional wrinkle around her lips, and her eyes flashing all different kinds of colors at me dangerously, similar to her daughter's. She had four arms, the lower set resting on the arm rests of her throne, and the other two crossed curiously as she examined me. I couldn't see much with her sitting down or behind her dress, but I could tell that her body was fit with possibly centuries of training and storing magic power, because even just looking at her, I knew how dangerous she was. My ability to sense energy could pick up on that way too easily.
On her right, however, was someone who terrified me even more. Whereas everyone surrounding her was a normal, female liminal, this person was a man who looked entirely human. There wasn't a single shred of monstrous features anywhere on him. It was painfully obvious to me that this man was the same monster species as I was because no matter species a liminal is, there is always some small feature showing them to be a monster, even if its only a pair of fangs or pointed ears, and yet this man had none of that. Physically speaking, he was completely human.
This raised a question about why a normal human would be associating with the queen of all demons, but the answer to that question is the same as how I knew the woman on the throne was as powerful as she was- he reeked of monster energy. There was no doubt in my mind that he was an incubus, and the Demon Queen's husband.
The scarier part, though, was that I didn't need to be able to sense energy to know that I was out of my depth fighting him. Despite being outnumbered, I was pretty confident that Miia and I could defeat the twenty or thirty monsters that had surrounded us with enough firepower and a bit of luck, but the Demon Queen at least twice as strong as every one of her soldiers combined, and her husband was at least comparable to her. What scared me, though, wasn't his magic power but that he was a master warrior. On an instinctive level, whether that was because I could see the way he carried himself or there were subtle things about his body language I was subconsciously picking up on, I knew full well that I wouldn't be able to beat him one on one. Throw his wife and daughter into the mix and, well…
Miia and I were screwed.
"I see you've picked up on our little game, haven't you Kayo?" the Queen said to me lightly, almost happily.
I stepped back. Her voice was young and childish, which was the first part that caught me off guard, but then I felt a burst of power with every single word she spoke. Was this what a Queen level monster's power was like? My legs began shaking so bad that I thought I was going to fall over. My limbs became light, feeling as if they were about to fly off, and i recognized the feeling as pure adrenaline.
It was fear. Feeling afraid before going into a fight is a natural reaction, but fighters train for years, sometimes their whole lives to try to control that feeling so their fear doesn't overcome them. Personally, I hadn't felt this scared going into a fight since middle school.
Then, I looked over to Miia. She had just almost as much training as I had and never had a problem throwing down with someone in the past, but looking at her now, I could see just how badly this woman's presence was hurting her. She looked like she was about to cry. Seeing the love of my life look ready to forfeit her life like that snapped me out of whatever funk I was in. Biting back my own fear, I grabbed her hand. She jumped, turning to me with tears already threatening to spill down her cheeks, so I gave her a supportive nod, and with just a small rise in our confidence, we turned to face our enemy together.
"A game? Really? That's what you think this is?" I shot at her with a cocky smirk. She grinned and licked her lips at me, showing off that same familiar feature that Sashenka had with the way her mouth curves.
"No, you're right. That isn't the case," she said, "A game would require two players. This is more cat and mouse."
She gestured around the clearing to her soldiers who were watching us carefully. They pressed their fists together and gave us a series of arrogant chuckles because they knew that the numbers advantage all but guaranteed their victory, not even bothering to ready their weapons as they were so assured of their iminate victory. This confidence of theirs gave them a stark contrast to their leaders, though. The Queen and the two people at her side, her husband and her daughter, didn't show the same pride as the rest of their legion but instead were still treating us like the threats they believed me and Miia to be. The incubus didn't move. He didn't crack a smirk or relax the tension in his muscles, holding onto the sword at his hip tightly. Sashenka mostly hid behind her mother, knowing already what I was capable of, but the Queen showed the starkest difference to the rest, showing how in control of the situation she was, but not once leaving an opening for me to charge her and attack. Unlike her daughter, she didn't have the air of superiority that spoke of an all but guaranteed victory.
She was someone who knew that the fight wasn't over until one of you couldn't walk away, and that made her real threat.
"So, what was it? Illusions? Portal?" I asked, trying to stall.
"Something like that," she said, "The material and the astral planes, the fae realm, the various elemental expanses- they're all connected on a winding spiral, and in some places in the world, the metaphysical barriers connecting these worlds are thin. Demons have a rare ability among liminals to traverse these planes easily. A little magic here, a little spatial manipulation there, and we can make you believe a small forest is ten miles larger than what it really is."
"I understood some of those words!" I said confidently. Miia was silently wrapping her way around me, not so tight that I couldn't move if it was necessary, but trying to put some kind of barrier between me and the others.
"You're in the demon realm," she said through a smirk, "My realm. My kingdom. Only partially, though. Technically speaking, there are… complications to bringing non-demons any further than this."
I bit my tongue. I was an idiot. Chasing after Sashenka to begin with was a bad idea, but I had inadvertently dove right into enemy territory with zero hope of having any back up. Even worse, I had involved Miia in this as well. Glancing at her, feeling several beads of sweat rolling down my head, she was taking it surprisingly well, though. She didn't seem scared. If anything, she seemed ready for a fight. Her pupils were slit, the skin around her face was so intimidatingly tense, crinkled into a dangerous glare that the skin around her eyes began darkening monstrously. Her fangs extended, and her tail was rattling to push her enemies away. I hadn't seen that since we got jumped on our first date.
As for me, I was losing it. It wasn't that I was about to go crazy, angry, or lose control and start making bad decisions by attacking the closest liminal. No, I was losing the will to live. I had lost. I had put myself into an unwinnable situation, bringing the love my life down with me, and even if I managed to get out of this alive, there was no way it was going to be back to my old home. Either I would die, or I would be enslaved. How hilarious was that? I didn't even have the energy to raise my head, let alone my arms and fight back. Maybe it was best if I gave myself up so they could kill me?
Miia put her hand on my shoulder. She tightened her grip so hard that at my old human strength, there was no doubt in my mind that the bone would have shattered, and she tightened her tail around me only briefly in a hug. She looked me in the eye. Her face lightened up so the monstrous appearance was gone, but her eyes were digging into my own so seriously, sending a clear message.
I tightened my fist and pulled my head back up, staring the Queen in the eye with a bright smile.
"I have to say! I'm impressed!" I said with an elaborate bow, pushing myself further than I ever thought I was capable of, "I'm glad to see that someone here has some kind of brains to them."
"Oh, stop it! You flatter me!" the Queen said, waving me off.
"Please, my Queen, you must honor me with your name. I can't keep calling you Queen when this is all over."
"Hm? And why's that?" she seductively ran her hand through her hair.
"Because once this is all over, you and I will be on much more personal terms than that."
I felt the energy of everyone surrounding me and Miia spike, shocked that I had addressed their leader in that way. Sashenka's tail stub flicked up, fully erect, and she turned to her mother with an expression so fearful as if she was worried about getting caught in a coming explosion. Her husband seemed especially perturbed, grinning angrily. The Queen herself had the most unique reaction, her smile only growing as she seemed pretty flattered by the sentiment. Miia, though, snickered and scratched my back, thinking it was funny.
"You may call me Kalisis," she greeted, dipping her head down and pulling on her skirt to curtsy.
"And you may call me Kayo," I responded, "But just so you know, you'll be screaming out 'Daddy.'"
That got the demons to move. They started roaring and screaming at me, some of them even drew their weapons and started to charge me, but not a single one of them followed through with their attack. That was because the first one to reach me was the King. He drew his sword and dashed for me, raising his blade high above his and bringing down at me in a powerful arc, but before it could connect, I drew Drakmor and blocked the strike, the following force making sink into the ground.
The anger of the horde died down. The King raised an eyebrow at me and ducked under Miia's tail as she slashed it out at him, and with a single bound, jumped back to his wife's side. Kalisis perked up. It looked like I had finally gotten one over on her.
"Who might your mother be?" she asked simply, and I felt a burst of magic hit my brain, compelling me to answer.
"Claribelle Ghirahim," I said beyond my will. Miia wrapped her tail around my waist and pulled me close to her, draping her arms around my neck protectively. As for Kalisis, a warm smile struck her face.
"Clara," she said gingerly, "I remember her. You come from a powerful line, Kayo." She turned to Sashenka. "You've done well. Not only did you acquire a second incubus for our kingdom, and snag yourself a husband, but you also managed to find possibly the most powerful incubus to ever live."
"Thank you, Mother. My plan worked perfectly," Sashenka said confidently, suddenly becoming sure of herself and stepping out of her shadow.
"I'm sorry?" I asked, my own strength finally running aground, "You mind running that by me one more time? Just to make sure I heard you correctly?"
"Oh, was that not clear?" Sashenka laughed, then leaned forward and crossed her arms cockily, "I. Tricked. You. After I learned that you were an incubus, and that your mother had one of the highest body counts in the entire history of the Interspecies Wars, I figured that with how rare incubi are, there wouldn't be another one of your kind in history any stronger than you are. Do you know how long it is until midnight?"
I looked at my watch. The second hand was only ticks away from the twelve, the implied time coming in only a few breaths.
"My plan was simple," she said, "Step one was to observe how you interact with your harem for a long time. Step two would be to expose you to demonic energy, in this case through combat, and kickstart your transformation wouldn't take three years, and then step three was to approach you and get your attention. At that point, it was all about acting and making you think you were the one in control, and then make you believe that it was your idea to bring me out here and fight me. In order to do that, I just had to appeal to your more altruistic nature. You're a selfish being, so I knew that trying to make you see the greater good wasn't go to make you come to our side. Did you really think I was that stupid?"
Finally, she turned to me, her hands linked behind her back and her tail stub flicking behind her excitedly. The second hand finally clicked to midnight. That's when the pain hit me.
It was like my bones had turned to sand and my blood being set on fire without any build up, a forceful pain hitting me all at once. I could feel my arms, my legs, and my ribs snapping in half. Then, they snapped again and again and again until I knew they had been completely shattered into dust. I felt my organs melting from the inside out and my spine shrinking and growing rapidly until I was brought to the ground, flailing and rolling around in utter terror.
"Darling! Darling, no. Don't let this happen. Fight it!" Miia yelled, dropping down and holding me, "You have to fight! It's OK, you're going to be OK! You have to keep fighting, alright? I'm here. I'm here, I promise I won't leave!"
I couldn't scream. I couldn't even breath. It felt like I was melting from the inside out, and my mouth dropped open in a silent face of agony. When the individual types of pain in my limbs rounded out to a general stabbing, I felt different sensations in my back and skull. It was like there were things trying to shoot out of me.
"Do you know why we chose this night?" Sashenka continued, "It's midnight on Friday the Thirteenth. You humans already know that this particular date is spiritually powerful, in good ways for some and bad ways for others, but demonic energy is particularly high on this day, even for a partially transformed incubus. All that came next was pouring even more mana into you through either fighting or sex, and waiting until this particular time of night when demons are their strongest, and the energy became too much for even you to handle."
I was finally able to scream at this point. When a pair of rocky horns sprouted from forehead, draconic wings from my back, and a scaly tail from the base of my spine, the force of them splitting my skin in half was enough of a shock for me to get a single breath. How fast they grew didn't exactly hurt, though. Instead, it just felt weird, similar to a cat clawing at your legs, or rolling down a hill until you no longer have enough control to stop it.
"Nice job cutting off my tail, though," she finished, "I got sloppy and you took advantage of it. Good opening."
"I will kill you," Miia growled at her, "I swear to the Ancient Gods, that I will kill you!"
"Is this too much for you to handle, sweetheart?" she teased, "Does it hurt knowing that all of my energy is swirling around inside of him? That my hot, sticky mana is all over him?"
"Shut up!" Miia demanded.
"Will it make you feel better if I tell you that he's effectively my husband now?" she said.
Miia went silent.
"That's right!" Sashenka cackled, "I put so much energy in him that he can't resist me now! Even if he ever tried to fight back, my mana makes up so much of his aura that he wouldn't even have the strength to make a move on me. He's under my spell now. Your so-called boyfriend is now my imprisoned love slave!"
I started standing. A pair of horns as long as my forearm curved upwards from the top of my forehead, just under my hairline, showing off the power within me by sparking a small blue flame between them. Stretching my back, I expanded my wings as far as I could. They needed to breath. Flapping them a few times, I felt the strength within every leathery fiber, kicking off the ground a bit because I didn't know how strong they were yet. Then, there was my tail. It was so weird feeling something twisting and turning around there, a brand new prehensile limb flicking back and forth. The bright white and blue scales shined in the moon all the way down to the knifish spade. Testing its length and its power, I slapped it on the ground a few times, cracking the forest floor beneath me after only two strong whips. Claws on my fingers, a tail long enough to slap my face with, even a sharp set of fangs that were serrated on their edges.
This. This was power. This was the type of strength I had wanted all throughout my life, and I had that beautiful succubus to thank for it. The only question was why was Miia still trying to get my attention?
"Darling, you have to fight! You have to fight her!" she shouted at me, "You can't give up like this! You can't let her win and leave all of us behind! Me, Cerea, Rachnee, Suu, Papi, your parents… We all need you!"
Were those supposed to be names? Was I supposed to care? My family could burn in hell for all I cared now. I was powerful. I could burn, kill, and destroy anything and everything in my path. I could go find and kill those people who attacked me in the park back when Centorea was training me and not have anything to worry about. I think I understood why demons didn't want to join the Interspecies Coalition. With strength like this, why would they? We were clearly stronger than any other liminal species in the world, and even humans couldn't stand against us like this. Not when me, Sashenka, Kalisis, and the King were there to fight with them.
There was no way I was going back to my old life like this. Miia could cry all she wanted, but I wasn't going back to the old life I had, as if that weakness would somehow help me grow.
"Come here, Daddy," Sashenka told me and held her hands out.
I began stepping forward, but Miia just had to get in my path and grab the collar of my shirt. She wrapped her tail around me and sobbed into my chest.
"I can't! I won't let you go!" she cried, "You can't do this to me! Don't do this to me!"
Miia lifted her head up and gave me one strong, passionate, tear covered kiss directly on my lips. It was wet, sloppy, and emotional. It was probably the worst kiss I ever had, and given our past together, it did mean something to me that she was so insistent on getting one last kiss that it… it hurt. It hurt me to see her like that. However, it didn't hurt me as much as that slap hurt her. I backhanded her. The force sent her flying across the clearing until she slammed into a tree, the impact knocking the wind out of her.
"Bitch," I said simply, "Don't ever touch me again."
As I started for Sashenka again, I heard her say one last thing.
"Please don't leave me," she whimpered, "I… I love you. I will always love you. Please come back. Please…"
"You're so pathetic, you know that?" I sighed, and continued on.
"Hmm, you had me worried there for a second," Sashenka mewled, running her hands through my hair, "I almost thought you were going to fall for her games, but you really do hate her now don't you?"
I opened my mouth to respond, but she put her finger to my lips.
"Don't say anything," she ordered, "Just kiss me."
I didn't even hesitate to bring my hands around her neck, one resting over the other. I didn't bring my body any closer to hers, though, and she didn't make that motion either since she was so focused on mimicking the same affection that Miia had earlier. She moved in slowly, closing her eyes and parting my lips. I did the same. I pulled her head closer to my own by her neck.
Then, I pushed her head down and brought my knee to her jaw.
"Ow, what the-" Sashenka stammered after stumbling back. She brought her fingers to her lips, and when she retracted them, she saw that blood was dripping down them and felt it fall from her chin.
"Are you alright, my Love?" I said, freaking out over Miia's condition as I knelt over her, "I'm so sorry! I had to make it look realistic!"
"I should have known," Miia said, coughing up blood.
"Here, let me help," I said, and placed my hand on the nape of her neck, pouring my own energy through her. My mana flooded through her. All of her bruises and her exhaustion drained away from her, and through my new sixth sense, I could feel her strength returning to her, her bones snapping back into place. She had no idea how to react, only able to look herself over dumbfounded.
"How… How?!" Sashenka demanded, looking like she was hyperventilating.
"Power of boners," I said tritely.
"What?!"
"I already told you, didn't I?" I said with a cocky smirk, "I'm the incubus. You can't tell me how to live my life. Plus, I've been engaging in three to one with Miia, Rachnee, and Cerea for over a year now. It doesn't matter how much of your mana you splooged into me. All Miia had to do was kiss me for her energy to overpower yours. Hence, power of boners."
"I didn't expect for this to happen," Kalisis cut in, finally stepping off of her throne to reveal her eldritch tentacle lower body, "Although, I suppose it makes sense. When Ragnar became an incubus, I was his only partner, so it made sense for him to become fully devoted to me, and we were… how do you put it? Raveling up each other's little balls of yarn? Without using that to infect you, my daughter never stood a chance of brainwashing you, even if her energy is more powerful than your lovers and more compatible with your own." It was the first time Kalisis shot me a smile that I didn't find threatening. "If this had been your plan all along, I would congratulate you, but the truth is this is just dumb luck and random chance working in your favor. Even so, I'm excited to see what you do next over the course of your life now."
For a second, I thought I imagined it, but apparently I wasn't the only one who saw the implications in that last sentence.
"Mom?" Sashenka asked.
"I'm not going to help you overpower him," she said, "This was your plan, and you failed to follow through. As far as I'm concerned, he can just walk away with his life and his fiance without any issues. If you truly wish to beat a dead horse and try making him your husband against his will, then you will have to do so on your own since I only helped you as much as I had out of necessity. Fight him if you wish, but any aid from me is now lost to you."
Kalisis waved to her soldiers, and with confused but understanding looks tossed to each other, they readily stood down. They backed away and dipped their heads, no longer threatening me and Miia. Even the King stood at attention and gave me a quick, informal salute by tapping two fingers to his head, and when his wife made sure that everyone was calm, she turned to me with a properly royal demeanor.
"You have bested us, Lord Ghirahim," Kalisis greeted me, bowing lowly from her waist, "Forgiveness for my daughter, for our entire race even, may not come easy, but should you find it in your heart, I pray that you give us your mercy in that regard, and if I may, I would like to stay in touch. We will be taking our leave now. May your days be filled with love."
She didn't wait for me to respond. Even if she did, I wasn't sure if I would have wanted to keep her here any longer than necessary, but after they were gone, there was one more issue to take care of. Sashenka.
Miia leapt to my side when she turned on us. We watched in both horror and amazement as an explosion of red aura enveloped her entire body, completely masking her from view, and then died down just as quickly after she swiped it away. Standing in her place now, was someone entirely different. Someone who was much more dangerous opponent than the one I fought earlier
Her leather corset had turned into an obsidian breastplate, darker than any other substance in the world and absorbing all forms of visible light. Her thigh high boots, thong, and shoulder high gloves were made from the same material. The majority of her skin was exposed with this transformation, and much akin to my own, two horns sprouted from her skull, but these came from the back and curled forward while mine came from the front and upwards. Her wings were darker now, riddled with spikes. Differing from the usual demon aesthetic, though, were two purple hearts tattooed against her skin underneath her now radiating, glowing pink eyes.
I knew she was a succubus, but this was… A little much. It bugged me, and not in the way seeing Rachnera fresh out of the tub and drying off her perky chest bugged me. This was just annoying.
"What? What is this supposed to be?" I asked.
"It's my demon form, you moron!" she snapped, stomping her feet.
"I get that, but what's with the thong?" I pressed, "Is it armor? Is it supposed to be some kind of magic, or…?"
"No, it seduces…" She started, but then rubbed her eyes tiredly, "Yes. It's armor. It's not its primary purposes, but this form increases my aura enough that most conventional weapons won't hurt me. Actually, you would need several high-impact explosives to even get through it, let alone kill me, but other than that, the thong, boots and all of this is biological. They're not clothes or armor, they're part of my body. Satisfied?"
"I… No," I said.
"I'm going to kill you now," she said.
"Fair enough," I agreed. Really, I understood how she wanted to kill me after body shaming her that hard, no matter how video-game-logic the get up was.
I drew Drakmor one more time, hopefully the final time. When I first picked it up, there was this vague feeling of unease attached to it, but now that I had fully transformed and could sense energy easier than ever, I could see the overwhelming sense of dread within this blade. I could hear the screams. This wasn't a weapon that made for protection of the user, for self defense, or anything of the sort. This was a blade made for killing. The more I saw the ghosts of all that my mom had killed with it, the more I saw their faces writhe in eternal torment, the more it sunk in that the only reason Drakmor should ever be used was if I intended to kill with it. Knowing that, I put it back in its sheath. It was too much for me. Only when I took Sashenka's life would I let it breathe again.
Miia grabbed my hand and we faced our final battle, our true final battle, one more time. We weren't going to let each other down. This time, I wasn't giving up.
Sashenka's powered up version was much stronger than she was in our first fight, and it showed. The very second we connected with each other, a blast of energy shot from us and threw the forest into a craze. I threw the first punch. She blocked it and tried to counter, but I slipped under it and caught her in the jaw. Then, as if it didn't even matter, she circled around me and brought her leg up, and I tried to block the kick, but she hit me hard in the back of my head, right in my blindspot.
I went flying across the woods, rolling over several times. I curled up, ready to defend myself from the next attack, but Miia came to my protection and dashed for Sashenka, constricting her entire body. Her monstrous mug crawled over her face again. She was so strong as she wrapped around Sashenka, I could hear her muscles tightening and Sashenka was straining to push her off. I extended my wings and flew at her. Propping myself on Miia's tail, I flipped myself upwards until I was facing the ground, and brought my knee on top of Sashenka's head with the full weight of gravity coming with me.
It didn't work. It really, really did not work. Sashenka used her demon fangs to bite right through my jeans and into my knee, blood spurting from it in droves. It scared Miia to the point where her grip loosened, and Sashenka grabbed her face and threw her hard against the ground, almost knocking her out cold.
I got back up and sent a ton of healing energy to my wound. Sashenka came at me again, but not quick enough to stop me from healing, and I met her easily enough to match her attacks. She clawed my chest but my coat blocked it. She went to punch me in the face and grazed me a few times, but didn't do much damage, and when I saw her throw a hook just a little too wide, I took full advantage and moved in. Grabbing her neck and arm, I threw her over my back. I was hoping she'd hit the ground, but she clearly knew how to handle an attack like that and righted herself with her wings until she was on her feet. I had a plan, though. Jumping away from her while the opening presented itself, I flipped over and put my hand on Miia's waist, firing off enough energy to heal her in an instant and she coiled out of the way just in time before Sashenka impaled her fist in the ground.
I moved in and threw a kick, but Sashenka got out of the way just in time. She went for a jab-cross, but I slipped under her attack and moved in. I didn't grab her, and I didn't attack. I pushed forward until I was pushing her back, keeping her moving and not letting her sit. She thought she saw an opening. When she moved to my back, she went for a kick, and I brought my tail up to block it, hitting it to the side, and then followed it up with a kick of my own.
This one landed easily, and sent her flying. Her footwork was fantastic, though, and unlike me, she stayed on her feet. She looked up at me, but I pressed forward. I threw a barrage of punches, following her head movement, and catching her when she tried to block or dodge. She wasn't keeping up anymore. Now that I had gained the upper hand, I was starting to hurt her, but now that I was, she took the flight to the air.
Flying for real couldn't be too hard, could it? I flapped my wings a few times, then jumped and lifted off into the air. I didn't know what I was doing at this point. I was a white belt fighting a master in aerial combat, and it showed, seeing how she brought me to my metaphorical knees in a matter of seconds. She was faster and got around me. She knew the leverage and circled under each attack to counter me. I was bleeding and my right eye was swollen, and I couldn't heal myself fast enough to keep up with her, and at some point, my arms dropped. I knew I had to run, but she wouldn't even let me drop from exhaustion, let alone let me hit the dirt intentionally. As she watched me there, trying desperately to keep afloat, she smirked, and charged again.
We must have gotten lower as the fight went on, because a familiar pink tail slapped her and got her off balance. I let myself fall. My wings went limp and I began falling backwards, letting Miia take Sashenka's attention, the succubus unable to harm her while she was stuck in the trees. Then, an instinct hit me. I had healed myself up enough, and at this point I was starting to get tired, but there was something else I could do.
Throwing my arm up, I shot a cord of webbing out of my palm and wrapped it around Sashenka's arm. Miia must have seen what I was doing and wrapped her tail around her leg, and together, after Miia jumped from the branches and we both continued to fall to the ground, we pulled Sashenka with us as hard as we could. We pulled her so hard that she hit the ground before us and so hard that a small mushroom cloud boomed from the impact. Trees began to fall down towards the impact, thanks to the aftershock. As if trying to follow through with that superhuman judo throw, I dug my hands into the nearest tree, pushed my tail into the ground and pushed as hard as I could to throw it into Sashenka's body. Miia did the same, leaning back into the ground and using her tail to push her tree over.
We waited for the dust to clear. Sashenka was clearly not done with this fight, but after that barrage, she looked like she was in just as much pain as I was, being barely able to get to her feet. She smiled tiredly at me.
"Super strength, a prehensile tail, and spider webs?" she gasped, "You really do have traits from each one of your partners. That's just… That's not fair."
"I don't have anything smart to say to that," I said through ragged breaths, "I'm just about done with you."
I pulled my guns on her and fired every shot I could, my inhuman eyes and dexterity being able to make using two guns easy. I prevented her from getting close and kept her moving. She teleported several times through mist and kept trying to move forward, but got hit a few times, her aura not stopping the force dead so it hurt her but not impaling her. When the clips were empty, I moved towards her. We grabbed each other in hulking masses of limbs and tried to roll over one another, and she got me first. She pushed me off and threw a few punches that all landed. At that point, all I could do was push forward.
She began moving back, and my own strikes couldn't keep up. I hit her a few times, but now, she was able to dodge and block me pretty easily, not countering me, but I wasn't winning anymore. Miia moved in alongside me. With her at my side, we started making headway since two on one was never easy, and starting with a slap, she was thrown off.
Miia slapped, I jabbed. Miia chopped, and I kicked. We both used our tails, we both used our hands, and at one point, Miia actually bit her. Sometimes, Sashenka tried to push us back or get around us, but against the two of us on even ground, with several more limbs of all shapes and sizes helping us, she wasn't even able to put up her guard anymore. Instead, she threw her arms out and let out a terrible roar.
A blast of energy exploded from us. At this point, anything that might have resembled a forest now just showed a barren wasteland of death as any trees that were still standing, any grass that was still living, was now utterly annihilated by Sashenka's magic. Miia and I were pushed back ourselves. With that chaotic magic, I felt my skin ripping apart, cuts appearing all over my body as if my soul was being stripped away. Unfortunately, Miia got the worst of it. She wasn't knocked unconscious, but I watched as the only thing she was able to do was push herself up just enough to lift her head to see what happened next.
I was brought to my knees. At this point, it would have taken everything I possibly had in me to stand, let alone fight back, and the worst thing that happened to Sashenka was that she was brought to her knees. She was still able to push herself back up.
Throwing her head back, she let out a roar of triumph and started tumbling towards me. I assumed she wanted Miia to watch as she killed me, or brainwashed me, or whatever she was going to do, and while I winced in pain, I was helpless as she pulled up by my coat's collar. I saw a sickening smile spread across her lips. I could only watch as she closed her eyes again and brought me closer her to her so she could kiss me and bring me under her control.
I did all I could. I threw all I had left in me and headbutted her as hard as I could. It was weak, but unexpected. It wasn't much, but it was enough to make Sashenka let go of me and stumble backwards, grabbing her nose and glaring at me dangerously.
"Would you… would you just stop already?!" she demanded.
As I tried to stay on my feet, black spots running through my vision and Miia looking as though she was slowly going to sleep, I met her eyes. That's when I saw the truth of it. I was seconds away from passing out, and she had more than enough energy left over to kill me several times over, fully outclassing me and ultimately winning this fight, but what I saw in her eyes wasn't victory or anger. It was fear. She was one move away from winning, and she was afraid.
That gave me enough strength to move forward. All I needed was one final assault, and I trudged forward as best I could to push her back. She only hesitated for a second to meet me. Luckily, her first palm strike didn't knock me out and it didn't knock me over, so I met her with a punch of my own, connecting with her jaw. My hand broke from that and I grunted, but she was still scared. In fact, she stepped back. I pushed myself even further and grabbed her collar so I could headbutt her one more time, and she didn't even bother to block. She hid behind her arms, holding them out in front of her. I slapped her, I punched her, I bit her and I beat her, and the more I pushed myself beyond what I was capable of, inching further and further to my own inevitable collapse, the more scared she became.
"Enough! I give up! I surrender! You win! Please stop!" Sashenka pleaded.
She was… she was crying? Miia somehow managed to drag herself over to me and switched between trying to hold me up and keep herself up. I smiled. Did we really just win?
"Is that all you've got?" I insulted her, "After all this, you make us fight for our lives, get us this close, and that's all you have to give us? Your surrender?"
"Please, I- I'm sorry, just- just don't hurt me anymore…" she continued to sob.
I wrapped my hand around Drakmor's sheathe. This was it. We had won and it was time to take her head as my prize. This was what I had been fighting her- peace. Miia grabbed my other hand in support. When I looked in her eyes, Miia's normally motherly and tender caring eyes, it made me uncomfortable. That wasn't her. Murder and domination wasn't who she was.
"No," I said and rubbed Sashenka's head affectionately, "You stop. Leave us alone."
"OK! I will! I promise! You won't have anything to worry about from me anymore, I swear!" she agreed, a panicked smile spreading across her face.
Without wasting anymore time, she opened a portal and disappeared through it, but that wasn't all she did, even though I was pretty sure the after effect was unintentional. The forest around us became alive once more in the blink of an eye. Literally, the blink of an eye. With Sashenka's magic taking her away from us, Miia and I were forced to blink our eyes, and we watched as the woods around us turned from a barren wasteland into the familiar pines of the park by my house. Once again, I was able to sense the auras of my friends and family.
I turned to Miia with the biggest smile I could manage, but just like the rest of my body, even my mouth had trouble getting it up, pun intended. Wrapping one arm around each other, we started walking. The one place we both wanted to be was with the rest of our family.
"It's over now," Miia stated, "Isn't it?"
"I guess so," I said, "I can see why humans have been such a threat to liminals now. You guys… monsters… you don't know how to push yourselves, do you?"
I thought that might sound offensive, but Miia nodded as if it wasn't an issue.
"Humans aren't tied to their biology like we are," she said, "Liminals are tied closer to our animal ancestors than humans are, and while we have some small amount of magic in us, our survival instincts make fight or flight twice as strong in us than it is for you. You saw that today. The only reason you were able to beat Sashenka was because she didn't know how to fight against a human's stubbornness."
"You looked like you were ready to thrown down, though," I noticed, "I don't mean to be rude, but you were way outmatched in that fight, but you fought anyway."
"I'm my tribe's best fighter! I've been trained for years to push that feeling down and fight with all I had, no matter how bad the feeling of flight is. I'm pretty sure I could even give Cerea a run for her money," Miia said proudly, then looked forward and started choking up, "I wanted to run. I knew Sashenka was going to kill me if we ended up losing and I've never fought an enemy that scared me more than she did but you… I couldn't lose you. You gave me the strength to keep fight." I scoffed and rolled my eyes.
"You're an idiot," I said.
"You're one to talk," she shot back, "Why didn't you kill her?"
"I guess I'm an idiot too?" I tried.
"Not good enough," she said flatly, "I want to hear the real reason."
I felt my chest starting to tighten up. I didn't want to share the real reason I spared Sashenka when I so desperately wanted to kill her, when I know I could have easily slit her throat, but if Miia really wanted me, then I had to try.
"I didn't want to," I started, "Don't get me wrong, I would have had no problem with ending her life. I can't physically kill myself, but I have no problem killing someone else."
Miia watched me out of the corner of her eye and whined uncomfortably.
"But I don't want to become a killer when I'm supposed to be a husband, and at some point a father," I continued, "I don't want our family to be based on blood and a pile of corpses, or even just one corpse, when we finally get married."
"Darling, I love you!" Miia squealed and wrapped herself around me, hugging me so tightly that I wasn't able to escape the fleshy pillow prison she was suffocating me in.
"Miia! Miia stop, I can't breathe!" I said.
"I can't believe you are thinking so much about our family like this!" she said, twirling me around with an unfounded amount of strength, "You are so incredible, Darling, and I know you will become an amazing father and you're already an amazing husband! I don't know how you can possibly care so much about us! How could expect me not to fall in love with you when you're like this?!"
"Master?! Miia?! Where have you guys been?!" we heard Centorea's voice and looked over to see her standing in the brush.
"It looks like you guys had fun," Rachnee appeared out of nowhere, wrapping several webs around our bodies to dress our wounds.
"You're bleeding everywhere, and Master! You have horns now! What happened? I demand you tell me these things!" Centorea ranted.
"What the hell are those?" Mom said poking my horns.
"Cute tail," Tio was next, going to stroke my tail, and when a jolt of euphoria shot up my spine, I slapped her with it. There was a time and place.
"This can't be happening," Smith groaned, "I am going to have to do so much paperwork to cover all this. The damages, a new species of liminal, a dozen more criminals to document, a male liminal that is also a new species… Oh, joy. I should just quit at this rate."
"That's what you get when you work for the government!" Zombina said, throwing an arm over her boss's shoulder.
"Hold on, let me see if I can- O DEAR GOD THAT IS WEIRD!" I freaked.
I figured I could hide my monster form somehow, either through magic or something else, and my wings, horns, and tail shooting themselves back into my body was even freakier than when they grew out the first time. It was even worse when I could feel several new bones and tendons circulating around my body internally. Everyone jumped back in surprise, but one person had it the worst.
"Did I just see that? Please tell me you guys all saw that. I don't need to get my eye checked do I?" Mono squeaked. Military sniper or not, that girl had seen way too much for one evening.
"Uh, did it look something like this?" Doppel transformed into a copy of me, wings and all, and then I watched as they retracted in my body from third person.
"That is more unsettling the second time," my dad summarized, "Do it again, please. I need to take notes."
"Know what? I do not care," my mom decided, "All I want to do is go home, shower, get something to eat, and go to bed. It's been a long night."
"Sounds good to me," I decided, "After all that, I could at least use a stiff drink."
Arm and arm, we all left the park, heading back to our homestead for some well deserved rest. As cliche as it might sound, we were at peace again, and the only thing on our minds at this point were the comforts of home. A well-cooked meal, a warm bed, a hot shower, and in my case, several people to share my bed with and give my love to. We had earned it. Not to mention that I was physically exhausted and probably wasn't going to make it to the house without passing out several times.
Miia pulled back for a second, though. While the others walked ahead of us, she grabbed my hand and slowed me until I stopped, the group slowly separating from us while Miia looked deeply into my eyes. The sun was just starting to rise behind her. It gave a type of otherworldly glow to her features that both made her more beautiful, and showed her off as the angelic creature that she was. Placing her hand gently on my cheek, she gave me one more kiss. This was one was dirty, tense, weak, and it had hardly any energy to it after everything we had just gone through, but if I'm being honest, it was the best kiss I had ever had.
"I wanted to correct the last one I gave you. It was too wet last time," she toyed, batting her eyelashes for me.
"You're a mess, you know that?" I teased her.
"And you're an idiot," she said lovingly.
With one more kiss, she started heading after the group again, pulling me along by the hand. I didn't bother denying her last statement. There was no point in trying to deny something that was so clearly the truth.
(A/N) Just the epilogue now, guys. If I'm being honest with you, and myself, I'm kind of freaking out over it a little bit.