The Legacy of the Greyrats
Random snippets where Paul's affairs (and other Greyrats) with other women around the world start biting Rudeus in the ass.
A lot of lines are taken from canon as things have a huge butterfly net but the next chapters are all in the same timeline.
And yes, I'm adding this to the update cycle of the fanfics I'm writing now.
What started as a cracky project became a touching one.
Chapter 1: A Horrible Realization
K 420,
Rudeus Greyrat POV
Suddenly, she glanced my way. Our eyes met, faces so close that our noses nearly bumped.
Her face filled my vision, and I found my reflection in the blue of her irises. "That's why…um…you can do it." I shoved her down onto the bed. There was no etiquette, no manners.
I didn't think I used too much strength, though. I forced back my eagerness by reminding myself I wasn't a virgin anymore and moved as gently and kindly as I could.
I acted meticulously—cautiously—so as not to make any mistakes.
So the past wouldn't repeat itself. I laid her down, kissed her, caressed her, removed her clothes, caressed some more, kissed her again, and then peeled off my own clothes. That was when…
"Huh?" I realized something felt wrong.
"…Huh?" I finally realized what had been pinging in my head all this time.
Sara's body was slender, toned, beautiful, and white, with distinct tan lines drawing borders where her clothes had been. There was no issue with her at all. She had a gorgeous, wonderful body that left nothing to be desired.
In fact, it even reminded me a little about the best qualities of Eris, Zenith, or Norn. Wait, why was I thinking about that?
It wasn't like she had a stick of meat between her legs where there shouldn't be one, either.
No, there was nothing wrong with her at all.
The problem was with me. My body was the one raising a red flag.
Or, to be more precise, It wasn't raising a flag. It wasn't raising anything at all. It was completely unresponsive.
"…What?" Normally, in this type of situation, my member would be saluting proudly as if it had been awaiting this moment.
This was my son, my comrade-in-arms, who had been with me for the last fifteen years.
"…Eh?"
And he wasn't standing up.
We tried a variety of things. I tried stimulating myself. I tried having Sara touch me. I tried rubbing myself against her.
Still, it just continued to hang limply. Finally, once we were exhausted, we pulled away from each other and wordlessly maintained some distance.
Somehow, I felt like I was horribly violating some law of nature.
My head was an absolute mess.
"Rudeus, I need to ask you something," Sara called out.
"Huh?" I brainlessly asked.
"Remember when I asked you about those Greyrats?" Sara looked me in the eyes.
"Yes, you said you hated them for what they did to you," I asked tentatively.
"Are you saying that you hate Greyrats so much that we can't…." I looked at my sleeping dragon. Was Sara so disgusted by my lineage that my member felt it?
"Uhmmm… there's more to that…" Sara continued, even quieter than ever. However, I noticed she was starting to wear her underwear again, as well as her underdresses and other clothes.
"Which Greyrat are you related to?" Sara asked. I started thinking of a horrifying conclusion. Why is she asking which Greyrat I am related to? Was she some illegitimate relative of Eris?
Cast away in the Boreas Greyrat infighting? Did she see the same thing in me that Eris did? Wait, no, I think she was from the Milbots region… Is she related to Pilemon?!
This was totally weird! Why this, all of a sudden, after it had been so naughty and unruly up until now?
What was happening to my body? My vision narrowed, and my mouth grew dry. Only my heart continued to pound strongly as I sank into confusion, aware that my face must be pale as a sheet. I felt pathetic, anxious, and grief-stricken.
"Ww-well, I worked for the Boreas Greyrats, as I mentioned before. Lord Sauros and Lord Philip were great men, although they died shortly after the displacement incident." I tried to give a practical answer. After all, I doubt she knew anything about my Father…
"So you're a Boreas Greyrat? An illegitimate child of one of them? Tell me honestly!" Sara started glaring at me; something about her gaze felt so familiar. Was she one of their illegitimate kids?
"N-no, my Father quit the whole nobility thing, but I'm only their cousin. A-are you an illegitimate Boreas Greyrat by any chance?" I probed carefully.
"No! Uhmm, wait, I guess? But not really! What I want to say is that while my dad taught me how to hunt with the bow and died with my mother due to that stupid PILEMON NOTOS GREYRAT!" Sara said with added hatred towards the end.
So she was part Boreas Greyrat?
"My real father was a Notos Greyrat… who had his way with my mother for one day, promising sweet nothings and leaving her the next morning to go somewhere else on an adventure." Sara looked at the floor.
A Notos Greyrat?
Pilemon must be one hell of a scumbag to take advantage of Sara's mother and leave her alone, even letting monsters kill her family.
"Lord Pilemon must be one horrible man to let his illegitimate daughter and her mother undefended in the village." I tentatively said.
"What? Yes! Pilemon is a horrible man, but he isn't my father." Sara said as she started touching my face and looking at the sides.
"Rudeus… do you know about the runaway heir to the Notos house? Paul Notos Greyrat? I heard he was hiding away in Millis with his notice all over the guild hall looking for…. wait…" Sara froze as she remembered something.
"No!" She pushed me away.
"No!" She looked at me and vomited.
Something horrible in me clicked.
I remember the time I talked to Zenith right after Paul cheated on her with Lilia.
Flashback
K 410
For a moment, Zenith was taken aback, but then she grimaced and gently patted my head. "I know, sweetie. I would never have fallen in love with a man who was that terrible," she said.
"Your father's got a weakness for women, so I'd prepared myself for the day something like this might happen. It was just a bit sudden, is all."
"Father has a weakness for women?" I asked, playing ignorant.
"Yes. Not as much in more recent times, but back in the day, he was pretty indiscriminate. You might have older brothers and sisters out there that we don't know about, Rudy."
She exerted a bit more pressure with the hand that was ruffling my hair. "Make sure you don't grow up to be someone like that, okay, Rudy?" She rubbed—
End Flashback
"Sara… is your father… also… Paul Greyrat?" I asked as Sara collapsed on my naked, vomit-covered form.
"Y-yes…" Sara continued as I placed her gently on my bed while I stood in the corner to clean myself up. I decided to dress up after hearing this.
Perhaps I didn't have a dysfunctional penis after all; I had no attraction to my sister, even when I cleaned the naked, piss-covered half-sister Aisha back in Shirone all those years back.
"Why? I was just supposed to thank you, just an obligation for what you did to me, that's all." Sara promptly ran away and slammed the door behind me.
I heard her shout, "I almost had sex with my brother!?" after she left the room.
Where did I go wrong? I must have messed something up again, right?
Had this perhaps been how Eris had felt, too? Had she actually been entirely unwilling that night and merely endured her distaste until the very end, for my sake?
Did she think we were too closely related? I quickly remembered that Sauros' sister was my Dad's mother, so that made Eris and I cousins, too, not just from the same Greyrat name.
Why was this happening?
Was this how things were always going to be from now on?
"It's cold."
Feeling chilled, I pulled my underwear back on, donned my pants and shirt, and shrugged the robe back over my shoulders.
Even then, I still felt cold. It was the kind of cold that froze you all the way to your core, the kind where you simply couldn't get warm no matter how many layers of clothes you had on.
It was the kind of chill that needed something else to drive it away.
"I guess this will work."I picked up the flask I'd left on the table.
Okay, that wasn't enough.
An hour later, I was stumbling at a random bar, asking the bartender for his strongest drink.
"For a kid? We don't have—" He started to object, but his expression turned to one of surprise when I plucked an Asuran gold coin from my pocket and deposited it onto the counter.
Asuran nobility, right? Did Paul pay Sara's mother? I bet he didn't. All he did was manipulate her and trick her into sleeping with him. Didn't he do that to Lilia, too, the first time anyway?
Why was I judging my father so bitterly? I wasn't that much better than him.
Philip offered Eris if I helped him rescue his sons, and if I had an ounce more self-confidence or ambition, or maybe even alcohol, I would've taken the offer myself.
Surprise was soon replaced by disgust, as he immediately reached for a bottle on the shelf behind him and set it down in front of me.
"Well, if you can pay like an adult…" The bartender spat.
Hey! I wasn't that bad.
I drank straight from the bottle, hoisting it, throwing my head back, and gulping it all down. I'd never drunk alcohol like this, but it felt surprisingly good. My head was spinning round and round.
I should've worried about alcohol poisoning, but should I even care when I almost had sex with my sister from another mother?
I could die feeling this drunk, but at least I won't focus on my shame and disgust.
Was I that bad in my previous life? I didn't touch my niece or anything, but what I saw on the computer screen before my brother broke it was…
"Hey, you shouldn't be drinking like that." The bartender said as I grabbed another bottle.
"Lay off! Hurry up and bring me the booze!" I snapped back, so the barkeep just shrugged and provided me with the next bottle after that.
"I guess the rumors are right that he's a noble kid playing adventurer." The bartender muttered to his assistant. "Just bratty and spoiled," the assistant replied.
Ahh, this sure brought back memories. This was exactly how things were in my previous life. I'd lash out in anger, and my mom and dad, terrified, would do exactly as I asked.
Hah, after living in this world for so many years and coming this far, here I was, repeating history again.
Dammit, dammit…!
I took more swigs of fiery hot alcohol and ate some of the roasted beans he gave me.
"Oho, what's this?" As I was greedily popping these beans into my mouth and chasing them down with alcohol, I heard a voice behind me.
"Well, if it ain't Quagmire. It's unusual, ya know, for you to come drink here at a bar we frequent all the time. But hey, you'll ruin the booze if you stay here. So get out. You listening to me? Hey! Look at me; I'm talking to you." Soldat came and plopped himself down on the stool beside me.
I looked over. He wore the same maliciously mocking expression he always did.
We ended up in a fight, or at least that looked like a fight, because Soldat let me punch him again and again without knocking me out with a single punch.
"Hey, Soldat… Don't pick on the kid too much."
"R-right." Everyone in the bar, including the members of Stepped Leader who were drinking in the back, and even Soldat himself, were all completely dumbfounded as they stared at me.
"Sorry. It was my bad. I screwed up. Maybe you really do have it worse than everyone else. Don't cry. I'm sure good things await you in the future."
"What the hell would you know?" I spat back.
"Hmm… Ah, uh, well, drink up. Then you can tell me about it. Maybe then we can figure something out, or you can at least get it off your chest. So…dry those tears," he said, smacking me on the shoulder.
And then, somehow, before I even realized what was happening, Soldat and I were drinking together. "So, basically, you couldn't get it up, and the girl dumped you, huh?"
"Sniff… What, you trying to make fun of me?" I asked accusingly.
"Nah, not at all. It's just important when you're feeling down to figure out what exactly caused it."
"I guess so." To my surprise, Soldat quietly listened to me as I sobbed and recounted what happened. He even kept the other members of Stepped Leader at a distance and led me to a corner of the counter where it was just the two of us.
I was about to tell him the main cause of the problem, the nearly attempted incest, when—
"So, Mister Soldat, what really had me so terribly upset was—"
"Just loosen up," he interjected.
"Huh?" I asked.
"Just a moment ago, you were talking like a normal person. You don't gotta put up a mask by speaking all stiff and formal. You're just lying to yourself when you do that," Soldat explained.
"All right…" I acknowledged him.
"You keep lying to yourself, and it's like a poison that builds. It's fine to be polite, but be yourself." Considering last year, maybe he had a point.
"So what got me so down was what actually happened. I found out, or should I say; she found out first that…"
I paused as Soldat looked at me closely.
"We have the same father, and she was so disgusted by it that she vomited all over my naked body." Soldat stifled his reactions.
"N-not that I would've wanted to; I'm absolutely sure I'm not attracted to my sisters or my mother." I defended myself a little too quickly.
"So she's your half-sister, huh?"
The casual way Soldat asked me felt like an insult; isn't he naturally repulsed by the idea of unknowingly having sex with your own sister? Even if we had a different mother. Fresh tears were bubbling in my eyes, and Soldat stopped me from drinking another cup.
"I said, quit the tears. Anyway, if you're crying about it, that must be the source of your problem. You've been holding on to this tonight, and it's what got you where you are now. Okay. I get what happened. Now come on, bottoms up. Drink back those tears," he said, pouring more of the expensive liquor into my cup. I threw my head back and guzzled it.
My stomach felt completely numb. I had no sense of just how much I'd drunk, though my tears were beginning to subside.
"Look, I can't say I almost accidentally had a thing with my own sister; my mother won't tell me anything about my father, and she ran away from her past, but it was a one-time thing anyway. You can't waste time wondering what the reason is behind a woman's every move. Women are like cats. We're more like dogs. There's no way dogs and cats can understand what the other's thinking, right?" Soldat said a strange piece of advice
"But still, why? For what reason… this doesn't have anything to do with what I was almost about to do earlier?"
"Look, let's fix it. If you were worried about having something with your family, let's go to a place with a woman that your father certainly never touched." Soldat told me that my alcohol-induced thought processes imagined it was a great idea.
At Soldat's suggestion, we headed off to Rosenburg's pleasure district.
It was my first time here, and Soldat helped clear my anxieties.
"We're going to bring you to a special brothel, one where you can live your desires and do anything you want. We can clean up your failed interactions with that sister of yours and replace it with a skilled professional." Soldat continued as he brought me to a fancy blue-colored building.
We had a short conversation about how his party and clan banned relationships between men and women to keep their performance professional.
He gave me a brief introduction to the establishment, the Blue Rose Palace, and a good idea of the rates of these prostitutes.
The highest end was dressed like Asuran nobles. However, I was sure I had more than enough to afford their services.
The host explained the exact mechanics of their establishment, and I started to choose from the most expensive women around.
Four of the seats were empty, which probably meant those girls were already seeing other customers.
Even so, I felt a bit uncomfortable feeling up someone who was smiling at me, so… "I guess…I'll go with her."
The girl I picked was the second from the left. She looked just a bit shy of twenty and was a tad shorter than me.
She had sizeable breasts, a tight waist, and a nice round ass. Her facial features looked Asuran, nobility even, with elongated eyes that slant down slightly. She was a picture of refined beauty.
"You have exquisite taste, choosing the most expensive and sought-after hostess of the night. Some even pay just to talk to her." Profen, the manager of the establishment, told me.
"She is allowed to decline unworthy clients, but the look on her face says she wants to stay with you. You are a lucky man, Lord Quagmire."
Soldat also whispered to me about her legendary and nearly exclusive reputation. Even nobles wanted her on a permanent basis, but she's been able to hold on for now.
She had a confident air about her and reddish, curly hair that was set in waves.
In other words, her physical appearance resembled Eris'. "I'm Elise. A pleasure to be in your company."
Even her name sounded similar. No—it probably wasn't her real name, anyway.
It couldn't be, right?
"I'm Rudeus." I didn't want to introduce myself fully; everyone forgot I was a Greyrat, and after what happened between me and Sara, I don't know how much I want others to know my name and face in this region anymore.
"You're Eris—Elise, right?" I tripped on my own tongue.
Elise appeared to grimace when I called her Eris, but I guess that's what happens if you call a girl by someone else's name.
"Well then, Lord Rudeus, I look forward to serving you." Elise wore an enchanting smile on her face as she quickly turned on her heel and sauntered into another room.
"Well, good luck," said Soldat. "I'll come back for you when your time is up."
"O-okay." Once he said that, Soldat selected the furthest girl to the right and disappeared somewhere else.
I felt suddenly helpless now that I was alone.
"This way to the bath. Please feel free to take your time cleaning up; it doesn't count toward your allotted time with me." Elise explained.
I brushed away the feeling of loneliness and followed the guide, wandering deeper into the building. The bathing area included a tub overflowing with warm water and two girls wearing what amounted to bathing suits.
One was quite young, perhaps a year younger than me too, small-chested and lacking the body of a mature woman's figure. The other one looked like a woman matured; she could easily get clients of her own, but why did she decide to bathe me? Was this part of the full-expense VIP treatment?
The two of them silently set about washing me. One of them looked strangely familiar, while the older one looked similar to her. Overall, those two girls gave me a very strange feeling. They had brown hair and seductive brown eyes.
Perhaps these girls were apprentices, not yet old enough to take customers but merely learning the skills as potential candidates to become escorts themselves. But the older one seemed well-developed enough to take clients. Maybe she's also being reserved for a high-ranking client, just like Elise.
They scrubbed every inch of my body. And when I said they cleaned every inch, I meant it. They even brushed my teeth and polished me until I sparkled.
Were my lower half in its proper state, my comrade-in-arms would have surely stood at attention and saluted the heavens. However, as always, he was completely silent.
I was escorted to a dark room lit by candles and with an enticing, romantic smell.
At the edge of the canopy bed was Elise, dressed in dark, sheer clothing.
"I've been waiting for you, Lord Rudeus. Please, come this way." She smiled softly as she approached me, taking my arm. Elise was clearly different from Sara, with the way her prominent chest pressed against my arm.
My heart drummed furiously. "Shall we begin immediately? Or would you prefer a bit of conversation first?"
"Uh, um…" I stayed dumbfounded.
"It seems you're nervous. In that case, why don't we chat a bit? Don't worry, the night is still young. There's no need to rush."
Ahh, so this was a professional. It was easy to tell by the way she conducted herself and spoke as she settled beside me on the bed.
With practiced hands, she took a bottle of alcohol from the table and poured it into one of the provided cups. "Would you like to have a drink?" she asked.
"Uh, yes, I would."
She didn't drink with me, but that was because there was a rule that companions couldn't drink with their clients; it would dull their skills and often lead to regrettable activities on both sides.
However, she offered me a cookie, which she also ate.
When I did as Elise suggested and ate one, she giggled. "I've heard of you before, Lord Rudeus."
"Oh, yeah… Well, I have become pretty famous at the Adventurers' Guild. That's true. I guess you must have heard of me from another adventurer?" That little boost to my self-esteem was great.
"No, from my little sister. You once healed her wounds without asking anything in return."
"'Once'?" I echoed questioningly. "I heard it was last winter, as you were helping clear the snow."
"Ohh." Something like that had happened, come to think of it.
"Adventurers are kind to us when we dress up like this, put on make-up, and touch skin to skin, but many of them tend to be quite violent otherwise. Particularly toward the young understudies here, who have no money, whose clothes are in tatters, and who are often mistaken for orphans. Many adventurers don't stop to consider that, as those children get older, they will be taking patrons and that those very same adventurers may become their customers."
"I think you must be right. I admit, I thought they were orphans too. However, aren't they the ones who helped me bathe earlier?"
"Yes, in fact, those two were my younger sisters; you healed the youngest one, Paula. But my middle sister Saura wanted to see you too." I paused at the revelation; it was good I didn't feel lewd feelings towards them, right? Still, what an odd choice of names.
"But you were different from the rest," she insisted. "You sought nothing in return and helped what you thought was a penniless orphan out of the kindness of your heart. You are an incredible person. There's been talk that some girls would go the extra distance to please you if you happened to visit them in the future." This definitely had to be lip service, I was sure. Still, it was nice to hear.
"I am sure the other girls will be jealous once they hear that I was the one who got to sleep with you." Yeah, she was definitely laying it on thick, but it was helping me.
She started stripping and attempted to do the deed with me.
My little companion didn't cooperate.
We spent an hour trying more and more methods, even those that weren't on the list, and no matter how much I loved the things she tried, something felt utterly wrong.
It wasn't the same as my revulsion towards my brand-new sister, Sara.
But she reminded me a lot of Eris.
Far too much. All the nightmares I had about her abandoning me started to resurface.
An Eris that would do everything I demanded and more, every fantasy in my mind, Elise tried in front of me, but I couldn't get a rise.
"I know what would cheer you up, Lord Rudeus. my Mom had a 100% success rate when she told it to my father." Elise told me.
I was waiting for it; all her other attempts failed so far.
She suddenly did a cat girl pose and said, "I want to have your kittens, Meow."
Not only did my thing stay flat, I think it even shrank inside.
Was I hallucinating? Er-ELise, did I feel like a Japanese man again to mix up the letters?
I lost my sexual desire all at once and even wanted to cry.
However, our time was up, and I shoved my thoughts of Eris away.
"No, Miss Elise, you did your best," I assured her sincerely.
"Even so, I… Oh no, what should I do…" Eris—- no, I mean Elise, panicked.
"I'll pay the fee. For the things that weren't listed as well, if you'll tell me the cost." I genuinely appreciated her attempts to get me up. Still, even if Elise, the most valuable and famous (if Soldat's side comments earlier were true) companion in the North, couldn't help me, then I was truly, utterly screwed.
"No, you don't have to worry about that. I did that because I genuinely wanted to help you." She explained.
True, I hadn't asked her to do those things. But I got a clear sense that she normally wouldn't have done them without the appropriate compensation, though.
"Are you sure?" I asked, uncomfortable with the thought of unpaid service of that level.
"I meant what I said to you earlier. Some of us swore we would put in more effort to please you if you were to come here."
I couldn't hide my disbelief. "Oh. Really?"
"I heard you were still quite young, however, so I didn't think you would be coming here for some time," confessed Elise. A mix of flattery and truth, then.
"I'll take your word for it," I decided.
"But since it's true that I wasn't able to satisfy you, would you at least stay and have a chat with me and my sisters outside the rooms," Elise asked with sincerity.
She led me to a private table with a comfortable couch.
This must be the room where her clients pay to just talk to her.
She noticed the look on my face.
"No, I won't charge you for talking with me; I owe it to you." She gestured for me to sit beside her as the two girls in bathing suits approached me.
Come to think of it, they all looked similar; Elise just had red hair and a striking resemblance to…
"Hi, I'm Saura; nice to meet ya!" Saura leaned on my left shoulder as she plopped herself beside me.
"Hey! No fair! You and Elise took both sides of him!" The youngest girl sat on me instead.
"I'm Paula! Thank you for healing me, big bro!" It felt really odd but less awkward than whatever we had earlier. It was as if Aisha was sitting on my lap instead.
I suddenly recognized Paula—pretty sure she was the girl whose frostbite I had healed. She looked different when dressed up for a client.
"I guess what you said earlier really was true," I remarked with surprise.
"You didn't believe me?" Elise said with a slightly tsundere attitude; she was definitely not talking to me for work right now.
"I thought it was lip service." When I answered her honestly, she just coiled her fingers around my upper arm and stroked it.
"To tell the truth, it partly was." She confirmed
"I figured." I wasn't able to continue because Paula started squirming on my lap. Once again, if I had a functional buddy down there, she'd be Pole dancing already.
"But ten years from now, when Paula starts taking customers of her own, I am sure what she will give you will be sincerity, not flattery," Elise told me.
Paula smirked at me, but I felt like I would be defiling Aisha too. Bleeegh, too much incest on my mind.
Soldat popped up in the room, apparently done with his service.
"So Quagmire, how did it go? Did you forget about your long-lost sister now?" Soldat said as he ignored the three women around Rudeus. Soldat was used to the fact that these women were trained to make no comments and to keep all secrets during work hours.
However, Soldat was coldly received by the women in the room.
"Lord Soldat, I would like to warn you that I am not on duty right now, nor have I invited you here." Elise glared at him.
Soldat gulped and promptly apologized to me.
Elise shooed him away.
"After all my effort, he made you remember exactly why you are like this, didn't he?"
I spent the next thirty minutes crying and recalling my horrible failure with Sara and the look of revulsion on her face.
Paula, Saura, and even Elise felt more like sisters comforting me as I cried.
They even shared a very personal secret of their own.
"Rudeus, what we would tell you should NEVER be told outside these walls; if you do, every woman in the pleasure district would ostracize you, and every male adventurer, and a good amount of female adventurers, would hate you," Elise said with a very serious look in her eye.
"Us companions keep our private lives only within our circle; I want you to take this seriously." Elise continued her warning.
I nodded nervously, and Elise smiled.
Paula looks outside and gestures an "all clear" sign.
"Me, Saura, and Elise were an extremely fortunate set of sisters. In our line of work, we would normally be half-sisters, but my mother was supported by one man who loved her so much despite their massive social differences that she was able to buy her freedom from her job and support us with his money." Elise started sharing.
"However, after the displacement incident, we lost all contact with our father, and with that, our financial support dried up." Saura continued, as I felt sad for them.
"Our mother has been depressed and sickly ever since she found out our father died, and we had to support ourselves. As the eldest sister, I had to do what I could to support Saura and Paula. We've been able to reduce our interactions with men to the bare minimum by attracting such high-value clients that we earn enough to sustain ourselves for months at a time, but you were the first one we felt connected to. It is like we have a link. Our mother's gone now; the previous winter was too hard on her, but now I'm doing my best." Elise explained. I felt so sorry for them.
I wanted to speak, but Saura interrupted me, teary-eyed and sobbing.
"Rudeus, try to talk to Sara and reconnect with her as a sister. Her mother and her adoptive father died thanks to your uncle, but if you apologize to her properly and talk like mature people, you can bring her back to your family. Your dad has to pay for what he did, but at least he's alive." Saura was openly crying at this point.
"Yeah! What they said, I only remember seeing daddy once, and I was young. He wanted to see me more but said that he was busy with his other daughter at home." Paula said as she cried on my shoulder.
"That bratty girl should appreciate the love everyone gave her. If we had half the attention, we would've been the best daughters our daddy would've had." Saura sniffed, but I hugged her in return.
"Yeah, she even got her Saint-ranked cousin to teach her magic, but she barely learned more than a fireball! My mom still has some of the old letters from dad, but she cried on the newer ones too much and ruined them so we couldn't read them." Paula whined as my brain started to spin.
This sounds too familiar. Please, please, let this be a coincidence.
"She even has my real name! Not the one I sell to clients. Speaking of which, don't call Paula and Saura their names in public, either. They're only known as Blue Rose girls because they haven't chosen a public identity." Elise continued.
I started sweating; I had a sinking feeling about where this was leading. But between all the alcohol and emotions I felt, I didn't know what to do.
"Rudeus, how are you related to Sara again? You never mentioned your family name, but you'd have to acknowledge her to start mending your wounds." Saura asked as she wiped my sweat away.
"Uhmm. Greyrat, technically Notos Greyrat, but my dad ran away from his responsibilities and dropped the Notos Greyrat name. We used to work under my uncle, Lord Philip Boreas Greyrat."
The three girls piled on me again, suddenly asking so many questions.
"How were we so blind! Of course, the great Quagmire Rudeus is the saint-ranked Greyrat our daddy talked about." Saura commented.
"So you really are related to me. You can be my older cousin, but we're not too closely related, so that I can pay you back with interest in ten years." Paula snuggled too close to comfort.
"Y-you're the one who converted my namesake from a wild monkey into a passable princess?" Elise looked at me eye to eye.
I wanted to downplay my connections with Eris, but this wasn't the right time and place. The three of them were begging for acceptance.
Even I could see that.
"The last letter from our father said he was supposed to make the extremely powerful tutor marry my namesake so he can use his power to free his sons too, then have enough power to bring us to live with him in Roa." Elise sadly said.
"Our mother was so happy that she was about to travel south when the displacement incident happened, then news reached us from his steward that our father died in the conflict zone." Elise was covering my shoulder in tears as she said it.
Oh no. UNCLE PHILIP WAS THEIR FATHER!
ERIS is their sister!?
"You said Mom destroyed the last letter!" Paula angrily accused Elise.
Saura seemed to understand, although she was still sobbing.
"N-no, I just didn't want your hopes to get so high, only for it to be crushed by what happened to our dad. We even ran away from Asura because we knew we'd be in trouble after his death." Elise said with the voice of a dependable older sister.
Noooo, I just can't take all this.
The three girls noticed I was staring at them with blank eyes.
If the displacement didn't happen.
If I accepted Philip's offer.
I would've saved them, too. Too many what-ifs.
"I'm so sorry," I told them.
The girls looked at me, puzzled at my reaction.
"It's not like you could've done anything about it, Rudeus. The displacement was something none of us expected," Elise explained.
She was right, but I could've done something. Maybe Philip would've told me about them if I accepted the deal, I could've saved them a bit sooner instead of wallowing in my selfish self-despair around the north.
"I was too selfish… I could've accepted Uncle Philip's offer and had a wife, and maybe he would've told me about the three of you. Instead of wallowing in my despair, I could've rescued the three of you sooner. If Paula asked me, I could've even healed your mother last winter."
Elise shushed me with a finger.
"Stop dwelling on what-ifs and the past, you keep having those in your mind. It's dragging you down to the point that you're barely a living husk of a person." Elise held my hand and looked at me again.
"Please, please don't end up like our mother. She was consumed by the weight of her past, and she lost her will to live in the future." Saura piped up.
"Yes, big bro, please don't get so sad. I really like you." Paula snuggled to me. Her adoration really reminded me of Aisha after I rescued her and Lilia years ago, although Paula was a lot closer to my age.
It was a spur-of-the-moment decision.
Was it fueled by alcohol?
Their sob story?
Or maybe my own attempts to rebuild my family that Eris ruined.
I remembered my past life too much, all the regrets I had for what-ifs and missed opportunities.
I remembered my selfish decision years ago not to help Uncle Philip when he did so much for me.
"Why won't we make a family and live together? You don't deserve to live this life, and I owe so much to my Uncle Philip that I'm obligated to help you." The three girls gasped at my offer.
"No! That's too much!" Saura was the first to respond.
"No, Rudeus, we would stain your reputation and your family. You will never be respected as a noble if you did this." Elise was a voice of reason.
"But Rudeus is a great big bro! Plus, he really doesn't look like he wants to have sex with us. Isn't that what you were looking for, big sis Elise?" Paula said although a glare from Elise shut her up.
"L-look, please, don't give us an offer you might regret. I really, really don't want to sell my body to men, but it's the life of people like us. Our mother pleased men before our Father Philip; her mother and grandmother before her did the same thing. Once we're born into this, men never respect us." Elise tried to rebuff my offer.
"Please, don't make us remember the promises our father gave us. We might not be his noble daughters, but I was named after my grandfather for a reason." Saura looked at me with a look that promised pain if I lied.
"L-look, I made so many mistakes in my life, even you told me to connect to my family…" I started tearing up as I remembered something else. "E-Eris, the other one, I mean, wanted to be my family after she heard her parents died, and even though it didn't work out, I still yearn for a complete family. I'm out here in the north looking for my mother. I found everyone else from my family, but she's still missing. Your father took me in after my father kicked me out of my home."
Maybe I was looking into my past with the Boreas Greyrats with rose-tinted glasses, but it still happened.
Philip had every reason to reject taking in the extremely volatile and dangerous competition to the Notos Greyrat lineage when he was busy trying to win the Boreas Greyrat leadership. Eris… not this Elise… my mind is in a doozy thinking of two Erises in my head.
But he took me in. Hilda wanted to adopt me before the displacement incident, and Lord Sauros was about to declare war on the Notos Greyrats for my sake.
"Please, Rudeus, don't break our hearts. It might just be the alcohol speaking right now. You don't need to owe us this much." Elise tried to reject my offer.
I needed to move forward and keep others from suffering like I did.
I threw away my family in my first life.
The way I acted these past few hours, I was about to throw away my family in this second life, too.
"Look, didn't you say that I should take you out of pity or remorse? I owe your family a lot, and not only that, I've been taking my family for granted. I want to repair things while I still can. I can take care of the three of you, maybe find education for Paula or help you start a business with Saura." I stopped them from interrupting me this time.
"I can buy out your contract for this shop too, and the contracts for your sisters too. I'm not asking for your body; you can leave me for wherever as long as you have a new life in safety."
Paula was staring at me with puppy dog eyes. Saura was whispering to her.
"You know that we'd probably live together in a shared home, right? Once we quit this establishment, we're on our own. While I appreciate the opportunity for us to start a new life, in this situation, three attractive girls going out on our own would just lead to our slavery." Elise said with a calculated expression.
Somehow, their quiet acceptance of my offer buoyed my spirit, or was it the large amounts of alcohol I drank?
"You know what, help me talk to Sara, and we can all live together. After a few months, we can move to Ranoa, and the three of you can study there and learn magic and other skills. Who knows, maybe we'd be the Greyrat exile adventurer's party." I chuckled at my attempt to lighten the mood with a deal.
In any other situation, I wouldn't have the courage or recklessness to do it.
I was surrounded by three crying women who accepted the offer.
But with enough alcohol and shitty situations, I have adopted a family.
We exited the room to find a dumbstruck Soldat, who was apparently eavesdropping on our conversation.
Author's notes
I have enough relationships between Greyrat men, and more are coming up.
A chunk of the dialog comes from canon, but it's edited to adjust it for the new situation. The rest are totally from my end.
Did I mention just how much Rudeus drank and how messed up
I have 9 chapters planned out which reach TP 4. You'll definitely see a lot of familiar faces more closely related in this fic.