THIS IS AN X RATED STORY THAT INVOLVES COERCION, RAPE, INCEST, AND FETISH CONTENT SUCH AS LOLICON, SHOTA, MILF, IMPREGNATION, AND POSSIBLE OTHERS. EVERY CHARATER IS 18 YEARS OLD OR OLDER, AND ANY TEXT THAT SUGGESTS OTHERWISE IS A FUCKING TYPO. THIS IS FICTION. NOTHING IS REAL. DO NOT REPEAT ANY OF THIS SHIT IN REAL LIFE, MAY DEATH FIND THAT FUCKER QUICKLY AND MAY HE SUFFER AS HORRIBLY AS HE POSSIBLY CAN.
Still wanna read? Enjoy at your own risk.
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Me, William, and Joshua were all getting faster and faster with each Eshkalrak we killed. The first ones we killed were each a fight of their own, and after ten, then twenty of them, we were killing them in a few calculated slashes rather than a dance of finding an opening.
The first time we walked into this zone, William and Joshua were nervous. This second time, they were scared. William wouldn't let his guard down for a moment, and Joshua had to take deep breaths frequently. I don't think the zone has gotten any more dangerous… perhaps they didn't realize what kind of environment a zone really was, but now they do. It was clear Joshua wasn't familiar with this air pressure and that William had been in zones far more dangerous than this one.
"You doing alright buddy?" I asked Joshua. He nodded in response.
While there was clearly some fear in his eyes, there was also something else. There was a sort of pure focus in his retinas, one that took in every detail around him. I'd seen Joshua be observant before, but this was different. What I'd seen before was an innocent curiosity and desire to explore the world around him. There was no doubt in my mind that whoever it was that he belonged to had abandoned him.
Liza grew up with parents that wanted her to understand the world around her, and because of that she's very keen in the ways of a world of risk, but Joshua seems to have been raised opposite. In a way, me and Joshua are the same. We were both raised in a world of stasis, the kind of world that just is, rather than one that changes and destroys those who get left behind. While I was rich in that world, Joshua was poor, but regardless, our world was the same one.
William was not like us. He understood the place we had stepped into in a way that took me at least ten years to understand. Knowing this made what little worries I had that much smaller. As for Joshua, I don't think he knew these kinds of details just yet. He hasn't been training as long as I have in this body. Even though I'm not anywhere near the same strength I was, it was still leagues ahead of him.
Maybe I should have held him back and kept him home, but it wouldn't have helped. It would have just made his situation worse. Training in a safe environment can do a few good things such as teach discipline, consistency, repetition, and fundamentals, but it can't teach things like instinct, focus, combat flow, and spatial awareness.
Spatial awareness is especially hard to explain and teach, because it isn't about just paying attention to everything around you, it's about knowing when there's something behind you, when something beyond the horizon line is watching you, or if something was there before you were.
These are things you'll only be able to truly learn in extreme environments like this one. That's why I brought Joshua with us, because the sooner he develops these skills and senses, the stronger he'll get. I could already see the change taking place in him. From an outsider's point of view, it would probably look something like terror, but to any trained eyes, they would know it was fear refining the senses. William suggested it was too much for Joshua twice, but he hasn't made that suggestion again for awhile now. I think he finally gets it too.
The first day, we slew a total of about 50 Eshkalraks. the next day, it was about 60. There were two types of zones and dungeons. The first kind was the swarm kind. These were ones that had large quantanties of monsters and seemed to be the kind that we were in right now. The second kind were the layered ones. The layered ones were a lot more dangerous as they usually had less monsters that were stronger as a trade-off.
By the third night, both of them had calmed down, and by the fifth they could actually sleep. In five days we had killed a total of about 300 Eshkalraks, which sounds ridiculous to an outsider, but about right for a swarm zone. The difficult part wasn't even the Ereshkalrak's themselves anymore, it was carrying the spoils. By the fifth day we had about three bags full of rare parts we could sell and trade, which would sell for a pretty decent amount of money, as long as you sold it to an honest buyer.
The sixth night was when things started to get weird. A strange noise hung on the air like someone shouting for help. I tried to ignore it, and when William mentioned something about it, I suggested it could be a siren, but Joshua thought differently. Joshua took off after the sound after listening to it for about an hour and we had to chase after him. Maybe it was a siren and it had taken hold of William because he was the weakest. Regardless, a siren was bad news. If there really was a siren, then this wasn't a low guard rank zone, but closer to a high guard rank zone.
We chased Joshua shouting his name, begging him to come back , but no matter what we said, he wouldn't turn his back. After about three kilometers, something came into view that none of us were expecting at all. Something had slipped our mind, and after seeing it in front of our faces we couldn't even act. We could only stand there and stare as Joshua went in to take care of the unique problem in front of us.
It was a girl about Joshua's age running away from two Eshkalraks. Miasma zones were dangerous, but that didn't mean that people never wandered into them, in fact, normal people wandering into them was a big issue, and that's why Miasma Zones had to be reported and taken care of as fast as possible in order to minimize casualties.
The girl was terrified and roughed up, with scapes, bruises and dirt scattered all along her body and dress. He hair was probably pink, and her eyes were definitely blue. Her face was red and teary-eyed, but as Joshua stepped between her and the monsters her eyes filled with shock, and then hope. After killing these things for the last five days, it would have been embarrassing if Joshua couldn't handle two on his own, and handle them he did. He may have missed his mark a few times, but it wasn't even two minutes before he had them both lifeless on the ground.
He then turned to face the girl and then just stood there like an idiot, but she clearly wasn't paying attention, because there was pure awe in those eyes of her. I had to step in and ruin the moment because Joshua obviously had no idea what to do here and I extended my hand out to help the girl.
"Are you alright? That was pretty scary wasn't it?" I said to her.
She took my hand and held onto it as I pulled her onto her feet. She looked past me at Joshua and went red in the face pressing her knees together and looking away and down.
"It's not safe here sweetie. Are you from around here?" I asked.
She nodded. "I wandered into here from my village. I didn't go far into here, but these monsters blocked me from getting out and chased me here."
"Do you know how to get back?"
"No. I think I'm lost now." She explained.
"Hmm… let me see… it was a village you said? Was it the one near a river? Or was it the one with a well?"
Her face lit up. "It was the one with the well!"
"Got it. Well then boys, let's make a small detour north so we can get this girl to safety!"
We really needed to press further into the zone, but getting this girl out was more important to me, and William and Joshua seemed to agree. Her name was Lauren Garret, she was eight years old, almost nine, and her parents were carpenters in her village. We escorted her to the edge of the zone while she made eyes at Joshua the whole time, and then instructed her to make sure that everyone in her village knew about the zone.
Lauren made sure to grab Joshua's hand and look at him directly. There was a spark between them, something there that looked like gratitude, but that also looked like something more. She thanked him and then pulled him into a tight hug. Joshua looked tense. When she finally let go of him the tension slowly faded. She then took off.
Two days passed, and we pushed further than ever into the zone killing more and more Eshkalraks until we found the one we were looking for. It was bigger than the others, and it was red. Anything red meant one thing. It was the boss, the king, the queen, the leader, the whatever. It was the one thing we were looking for and the thing we needed to kill to shut this zone down for good.
I didn't waste a second and charged in as fast as possible. Was it foolish? Maybe. Would I get hurt? Likely, but someone I respected didn't care about any of that. I learned how important it was to just headfirst into situations from Molly. She wasn't the smartest, but damn was she strong and had fucking good intuition! It didn't matter how strong the opponent looked, Molly was the first one going at it with all the tricks she could summon.
She got hurt a lot doing that, but she would also get in critical strikes that no one else could manage to get. Without her intense rushes, we would have lost a lot of major battles. Even when she had no idea what to do, her actions gave Maka the visual and logical info he needed in order to figure out what we should be doing.
The strikes and body slams I blocked were heavy. This fucker wasn't like the rest of them, he was faster, stronger, heavier, and a whole lot bigger. I got in some good hits on his underside that he didn't like at all so he did this weird jerking motion that was able to hit me.
I fell to the ground with a crash getting a gash on my arm and a mouth full of dirt and dust. Oh yeah, that fucker was going to pay for that one. As I pulled myself up and leaned in, William held me back with an arm.
"Stand down my Lord. I'll deal with this one."
Normally I would have pushed back, but this was the first time William had ever called me 'My Lord'. Something changed. His tone was different and he started to listen more. It seems I did something. Something that's changed his opinion of me, something that's earned his… respect.
William went at him with such speed and force that it became a spectacle in itself. I took a look at the gash. Yeah, that thing looked pretty bad. I tore something off my leg and wrapped it up while I sat down watching William make stab after slash at the Eshkalrak Boss. Joshua stood at the ready trembling. Yeah kid, I think you've done enough for now. Just watch William. After about fifteen minutes the fucker was finally dead and my man William stood over it exuding aura. I clapped my hands.
"Well done ser. Well done."
The mist started to lift, and with it, the pressure from the zone slowly started to ease. Joshua fell to the ground as his adrenaline gave out, and I laid back on the ground looking at a glowing purple sky of dusk above. My territory was free of the danger, and we had a fuckload of spoils to sell. It wouldn't really add a whole lot to our funds, there was only so many things you could do with Eshkalrak shit, but it would at least be something.
William approached me, sword in hand. He then knelt in front of me. I had to sit up and see what this was about. He gave me an intense look.
"I want to make a pledge, Lord Fermillion." he began.
"A Pledge? What for?" I asked.
"For myself mostly."
"I'm not sure I understand. You're acting like I'm some sort of hero on a quest to save the world. I'm not. I'm just a selfish Lord in charge of a territory nobody cares about. I'm just trying to make things stable."
"That's just the thing. Lords don't go out of their way to make their position stable without a desire to grab as much power as possible. You're not doing it for power though."
"Hm? Go on."
"You don't make demands. You set rules and pressure us to keep them, but you also try to cut down on the distance of the relationship you have with your servants. You don't treat us like we're beneath you. You ask for our input and give us tasks that are reasonable and fully within our power to do. You don't get angry when we mess up and when someone doesn't want to do a job, you find someone else who is more willing."
"A lot of men have written books, and those books will more often than not, tell you all the right things to say and the right things to do. I've met good people William. Truly good people. Not people who pretend to be good, but people who genuinely don't want anything more than to do their best and give whatever they have to people who don't want or deserve it. Men like me… we like having things. We hate to lose. We don't like to give. There are people who would pay you good money and make you feel like you meant something."
"I have no interest in money, Lord Fermillion. With my skills I don't need to work for any Lord. I could make more than enough money clearing Miasma Zones and Dungeons. I know I haven't told you my sword Rank… but I believe I'm at King rank now."
My eyes widened and my heart dropped as I heard him say 'king rank'. William wasn't just exceptional, he was an anomaly, a talent that only appeared every 100 years or so. The amount of people his age who had reached King Rank at his age could probably be counted on one hand, and not even in the Kingdom of Noxefaron, but in the World itself.
"King Rank? The second to the highest one? Why would you want to stay with me then?! That doesn't even make any sense!!"
"Seven years ago, my father made me pledge service to your father as long as he lived. He had a debt to your father, so my service was contracted to him in order to pay that debt. Once your father died, I was no longer bound to that contract. I had no interest in serving some boy, so I was going to leave… but then something changed in you. It wasn't immediate… but it was rather quick. You started changing the order of things, started training your body, started reading, and started to grow in every way. I can only imagine losing your father shook you in some way… that it woke you up. You weren't the boy I'd grown accustomed to. You'd become a man in calculated quick bursts. A little strength training here, a little reordering of the order of command there.
"You didn't just casually break things in an effort to take control for yourself and grab new power you hadn't had before. You slowly introduced new orders, slowly transitioned the mindsets of the staff and enforced new rules that created a new social environment for everyone in the manor. My father taught me a lot of things, but he never taught me men were capable of anything like this.
William planted his sword in the ground with a forceful slam.
"I once believed I was exceptional…that there weren't any men like me. I thought I was intelligent, that I was moral, and that I knew how to handle myself in life, but I can't. Not like you can. You heard there was a Miasma zone in your territory and you ran to it.
"You actively pursued a dangerous place for the mere chance it could make you stronger, and no matter how many monsters you killed, you wouldn't relent. You wanted to see it to the end yourself. Even when faced with a monster much bigger than the others, you didn't hesitate to charge at it before we even had a chance to catch our breaths.
"There are lots of dangerous things in this world and many mysteries. There may come a day when I'm faced with something I don't understand or that I can't defeat in a few blows… and now… now I know that when that day comes I won't be ready. Not like you will. You're stronger than me Lord Wayne. I see that now."
I let out a sigh. "Yeah, but I'm not really a great guy. I raped Heather."
"I never liked Heather." he replied.
"What's wrong with you?" I shot back.
"Will you accept my loyalty, Lord Wayne Fermillion?"
I sat there for a moment pondering then stood up. William still knelt beneath me, and the stars started to come out in the night sky. Joshua was sprawled out on the ground beside me, and I was starting to feel the pain from my arm. I had Liza on my side, and now, I had William on my side if I but acknowledge him. Any fool would do it, but only a true fool would turn him away. Seiji might turn him away, but I wasn't Seiji. I was Wayne Fermillion, and Wayne Fermillion was a greedy bastard. I held out my hand and uttered two words.
"I accept."