I had a good childhood, even if it was unconventional in several respects. Then again, thats the thing. It was normal for me, because in no small part that was all that I ever knew. To be sure, some of the people I've come across since have called me a broken psychotic monster and the product of a warped children full of sexual abuse, but honestly? I don't see it. Different formative experiences I suppose, but given how I was an infant in the Infernum, in a real of fiends and damned souls, and given my mother? I love her, but its a wonder she didn't just eat me out of boredom or for the thrill of it.
Which, given how she had taught me to hunt, to kill when I was barely three years old, to revel in the feel of blood on my claws, the taste of the preys fear in their heart? Sure, my mother may not be a warrior at heart, more than content to have others between her and the rush and churn of battle... and yet she made sure that I was ready. She tended to me, cared for me, helped me with my initial hunts and kept me close and able to grow.
Oh, to be sure, I lost every form of virginity to my mother, she is a Succubus after all and I am hers, and some would say that I was, in those early years, as much a toy as a son. There are... well, side effects for such a heritage, and among them was an early awakening of sorts, as soon as she partook of her carnal appetites. If there was trauma there, as some say there must be given my age and the fact it was my mother, well, at what point does it become normal? Become just another part of existence no different than the screaming burn souls falling from the skies?
I still remember the first time I saw a sky that was not lit by the clouds of drifting ash and embers, how alien it seemed, how utterly unreal. To say nothing of the first time I encountered someone who was neither damned soul nor fiend nor undead. Well, there were the celestial animals that my mother had found a way to call from their high abodes and into the infernum somehow, but they lacked that spark that made them a person.
Mortals. I may be partially one, particularly with how my mother had gone out of her way to infuse with the chaotic essence of the abyss, to allow me to strive with that same desperate burning passion... and yet I will confess that my first encounters with mortals were both exhilarating and disappointing. Something new, something so similar to the damned souls I was aware of... and yet also so fragile, so weak, with little of the hunger and drive I took for granted. But, much like mortals themselves, that passed soon enough.
In truth, the forests of Tarn were a place of testing, as my mother left me for the year after having taken me through the passage blindfolded before she took flight. A place for me to learn and grow, to survive in a land I knew nothing of, that was alien to me. A place far from all that I knew. All save the hunt. All save for the need to grow, to drink in the blood and sin with the dying breathes of others. In truth, I may have spent the first little while just reveling in the bloodlust, in the ripples and reactions of each death.
It was fascinating, just watching the webs, the chain reactions as grief and terror struck the community, to see what elicited what reactions. Still, I did as my mother taught me, as she warned me, and made sure not to draw things out too much. I was young after all, and while I was a killer, there was no telling when various Heroes could arrive and there was no telling how powerful they could be, or even if I was to be a part of some destined heroes tale. Best in the end, to simply be another bloody mystery.
To be honest, I am still unsure of what it was that pleased her the most from that first outing. The skull of a priest and the village shrines humble relics, or the skull of a mother who had been tempted and broken, who had desperately offered the hearts of her own children wishing that I would say that I loved her. Granted, of the two, she has made sure that I keep the mothers skull. She had taken a delight in having it watch as I kissed her, as I told my mother I loved her as I lay in her arms.
That little excursion also marked what could be considered the... not quite end of my childhood, but also something close to graduation, as my mother had more tasks for me. There was of course, waging war on other demons, or fighting devils. And there were of course, the times she had me go on... well, she called them panty raids? But what I grabbed in those cases was young, virgin noblewomen of various races, there to be taken back to her, that they could be husked, their souls fashioned into clothing and accessories. This often happened after she visited some of her other succubae friends.
Odd to be sure, but at the same time? I have ling learned that women are strange and with motivations not for men to know. Much less hassle to simply focus on what needed to be done at the time. Which incidentally, would lead me to conquering an orc tribe, establishing a cult dedicated to my mother and razing a city to the ground in a night of raping, looting and murder. In all honestly? That had been one wild end to the year and I blame the Mrog for what happened that night. You see, I had never gotten drunk before.
Looking at the former healing maidens chained to my throne, my mother in my lap and preening? It was a very good night.