Aoi and I remain knotted for a couple of minutes, allowing me to feel her insides gradually absorbing my cum. She rests her large, blue body against mine, and though she's heavy, it's far from being uncomfortable.
I can feel how the strength of this draconic form of mine is at a completely different level when compared to what I can do as a humanoid. Even though my arms are short and lack the "Dexterity" of human hands, they hold a lot of power in them, which is why Aoi can swing halberds or sledgehammers, but not anything more delicate.
My neck has so many muscles that it's obviously been made specifically to allow me to rip off chunks of meat I've bitten onto, while my claws are clearly for digging into flesh and holding my prey still while I tear them apart, piece by piece.
But if I were to act like that in a real fight, I'd be asking to get killed as humanoids have many tools to break through my scales and pierce through my hide. It's why I've made Aoi use a halberd, because attacking from range is better than grappling and biting in basically every conceivable situation.
She starts to feel sleepy since she's too comfortable on top of me, so I wake her up and undo the knot.
"Awn… it felt really good inside me," she moans as she shrinks back down to her usual size before jumping off and stretching her limbs with the elegance of a cat.
"We can't laze around too much, you know," I gently point out.
"I know…" She hums back and begins conjuring her ball of water for practice.
I return to my humanoid form and give Alissa a kiss and a hug. She can't train her bow with her hands the way they are right now, so now that she's finished her daily [Illusion Magic] practice, she's going to call for Kahura and finish her treatment.
She's dreading going back because she's tired of sleeping all day, and even with [Purify Body], drinking the sleeping potions still makes her feel a bit sick, so our hug is extra tight to comfort her a bit.
"Thanks, husband," she whispers sweetly in my ear, and we separate, then she waves as she leaves.
I watch her walk away, her fluffy tail swaying alluringly with each step, but then I remember something. "Right, Aisco wanted to talk."
--
After a quick [Clean], I use [Telekinesis] to float up towards our mini High Tree, which I enter on the floor the Officers have been given. Then I walk down the corridor towards the most isolated room, and it quickly becomes obvious why he chose to sleep so far from everyone else as the muffled sounds of explosions reach my ears. He's a bit of a mad scientist like Roxanne, so I think I need to come up with safety guidelines before he kills himself or hurts someone…
I stop before his door and sigh. Then I knock, and the explosions stop.
After a short wait, the door opens, revealing the creepy elf with his lifeless eyes and thousand-metri stare, his pale skin dirtied by patches of soot and some sort of cream that I believe is for treating burn wounds.
"Your Highness," he slowly greets with a nod, then immediately gets down to business, "I want to study the designs of your cannon."
I blink once, caught by surprise at his straightforwardness. "What for?"
He promptly launches into an explanation, his tone so flat and boring that I almost zone out, "I helped develop the Supersonic Penetrator, the heavily enchanted weapon that wounded you and Lords Ciel and Aoi when you attacked my previous place of employment. Your design is a lot more elegant, so I desire to study it and review the Penetrator."
I hold back a childish giggle. "Your 'Penetrator' has more power than my sabot cannon."
He nods slowly. "Yes, but it's extremely expensive, as you should know, whereas you made that cannon in a single day, showing the potential for it to become a far more standardized weapon than the vanity project my former peers treated the Penetrator as."
I rub my chin in thought with my padded claws. "Hm… do you know [Manipulate Metal]? That cannon needs extremely precise proportions or else a lot of power is lost to attrition."
He suddenly becomes so still that it's almost like he's stopped breathing, likely because he understands the implications of what's to come, and we stare at each other for an awkwardly long moment. Then he quietly admits, "No, I don't…"
I hold back a sigh and lay down the rules, "If you're going to ask for help from the court mages, you'll need to assure me that you won't cause any accidents that could hurt someone. I know you and Roxanne are quite reckless with experimentation, and this is too dangerous to let you play with it unsupervised."
His lifeless eyes gain a bit of fire to them, but it's because of annoyance rather than excitement. "I understand…" He begrudgingly accepts.
And then I give him a little encouragement, to the dismay of the two girls, "Lina and Aoi are working on smaller cannons that can be carried by hand, so you can think of ways that your work could aid them, too."
Then he finally stops looking like a corpse as some excitement appears in his expression. "Ooh, I see, I see… big plans."
I flash a smile and continue, "I don't have design papers for the cannon since we built it directly from my imagination, but I'll draw them for you."
He freezes, his mind seemingly stalling out in confusion. "Why didn't you draw up any design papers?"
Cause I'm a fucking nerd who spent too much time on Wikipedia, that's why.
I just smile and walk inside.
Aisco's lab is an organized mess. It's filled with tools, alchemical supplies, burned junk, junk that's burning, and junk to burn. Everything clearly has its own area, it's just that the things in those areas aren't organized. I can relate to him quite a bit since I'm not much better, but at least the things I study require very little in the material department.
I sit down at the one clean table, which is clearly the area he uses to write down his experiments as it's full of papers. Then I pick a blank sheet and start drawing the schematics for the cannon, the casing of the sabot, and the dart that it fires. The APFSDS works better with a smoothbore cannon, but I also include a drawing for the miniaturized and rifled cannon, and for the bullet that goes in it.
Lina and Aoi will perfect the rifle and the APFSDS cannon and make them ready for mass production, but Aisco can help by improving the Draconic Climax that Roxanne developed.
I find it funny that the Climax was based on Dawn of Fire's explosives, and now it's returning to Dawn of Fire through Aisco's further development of it.
Once I've finished the drawings, I give the sheet to him, which he just silently stares at for a long, awkward moment.
"Any questions…?" I hesitantly ask.
He slowly begins, "The 'cartridge' and the… 'APFSDS' round-…"
"You can just call it a sabot."
He clears his throat. "Yes, the 'cartridge' and the 'sabot'… they're just casings for the explosive, which propels the bullet and dart."
I hum, "Exactly."
He lifts his eyes from the papers and stares at me. "Those casings require extremely precise construction."
I chuckle softly in excitement. "Exactly, and that's what Lina and Aoi are developing: the methods to construct these things in massive numbers at a reasonable speed."
He hesitates for a couple of seconds as he thinks. Then he concernedly continues, "With a casing this thin, the metal is very delicate and vulnerable to blowing up inside the cannon, potentially damaging it."
I nod once again. "Exactly! Which is why the propellant needs to have a precise amount of power so that we aren't forced to drive up the cost by reinforcing the cannon magically."
His pupils widen in excitement as he understands his role. "I'll develop many prototypes."
"Talk to Roxanne when you're done." Then I tap his arm, which he visibly doesn't enjoy a single bit, and leave.
--
When I return to the yard that the girls are training in, Roxanne receives me with a very gloomy look, strikingly similar to Lina's. They kind of don't want to work with Aisco.
"Stop being such a baby," Hana grunts as Romy pummels her with a hammer.
"You wanted to study my [Chaos Breath]?" I gently ask, trying to get my mad scientist succubus to think of something more pleasant.
"Yes, of course!" She happily exclaims, instantly cheered up.
But to actually use [Chaos Breath] again takes a lot of effort from me. I unlocked it while I was the angriest I've ever felt, so it's no small task to recreate that condition. I even have to recruit Gify's help to flash painful and enraging memories at me to build up the anger.
Suddenly, it "clicks," and I feel the power building up within my throat, so I open my mouth and let it out at the hay target. The beam hits its chest, and the energy balloons into a turbulent ball of light, ripping apart any matter it touches just like an Arrow of Annihilation, except a lot more chaotic.
The explosion causes a shockwave that lifts dust and scatters the bits of hay that have managed to escape the destruction. Once all of the chaotic energy has been spent, we can see that over 90% of the target has simply disappeared.
Then I collapse on the ground and groan in exhaustion. Roxanne kneels before me, and I shrink down so that she can scoop me up and pet me while I recover.
She happily remarks while her long fingers run along my mirror-like scales, "Through [Sense Presence] and [Sense Mana], I saw something interesting happen within you, so I think you should give me [Sense Soul] for the next one. I also realized that since my [Explosion] draws upon my emotions, it's almost certain that I can learn something from you."
"Glad to help…" I weakly groan and close my eyes.
--
It takes me a whole hour before I can fire another beam, and afterwards, I'm even more exhausted, so I decide to have some not-earl-gray to help me relax, and Alissa returns just in time to keep me company.
But while I eagerly await her hug, the first thing she does is run her fingers through my hair. Then she grabs my horns and starts massaging them.
"Oh, yeah, that's the good stuff…" I moan as her now dexterous fingers pressure them in a wave-like motion.
But she's too excited to concentrate on the massage, so her hands go down my face and under my shirt. Then she starts massaging my muscular chest, her tail wagging uncontrollably with how happy she is.
So I pull her hands up and give them a few kisses, then I push her fingers into my mouth and suck on each of them individually just like how I suck on toes. Her hands are so sensitive that she feels repeated pleasant chills, and the sensuous way I'm sucking on them starts to make her aroused.
Her fingers are young and pretty again, and they don't resemble her mom's anymore, but they're… different. I'm not complaining since she's back to full "Dexterity" again, and her hands are as beautiful as the rest of her body, but I know every centimetri of her body, and they look slightly different.
I just need a bit of time to get used to them.
After I finish sucking on and memorizing each of her new fingers, I [Clean] them all. Then I pull her onto my lap so that I can fill her face with kisses, and she rewards me with the angelic sounds of her giggles.
When I finally let her rest, she looks at her new hands and wonders out loud, "Maybe I could ask Kahura to 'improve' them a bit more later, but I'm really tired of being forced to sleep, so I think they're fine as they are, at least for now."
"I'm glad you're happy with your hands," I whisper lovingly.
And she smiles back, though it's a bit bitter. "I hated being left behind for the battle, so I'm excited to use my bow once again."
I nod in understanding and kiss her lips, and then we enjoy tea time together.
--
I manage to release a third and final [Chaos Breath], and by the time I've recovered, the sun is already going down, so we take a quick bath, eat a snack, grab Cleinias' rotting head, and take an [Eternal Gate] to the upper level of the Throne, all without saying a single word to the Enforcers.
Normally, the noble area inside the Throne is always busy with pompous, self-important nobles, like a hangout spot for the cool kids, but since the Purification is underway, this place is almost a ghost town. The overly-expensive shops are still open, but I doubt they've sold anything.
The attendants do their best to ignore the floating, rotting head the golems are carrying through [Telekinesis], but Gify confirms that the moment there aren't any eyes on them, they start murmuring and staring.
As we walk, we notice something that makes us all very happy. The handful of nobles here are all reading from a familiar, long sheet of paper. It's a list of names, paired with who the named person targeted through Katasko's underhanded actions. There's also a considerable number of these copies scattered about, some glued to the walls, and some even thrown on the floor.
I bet the nobles of Katasko all came together for safety as I'm sure those who have read our list are hurriedly writing down these names on their own, personal shit lists. We even get a supporting nod from one of the nobles, a weredog who most likely didn't have a good relationship with the human supremacists of Katasko.
We enter the bird-cage-like elevator, and the attendant pales as he makes an effort to keep his food inside his stomach when he sees the floating head.
"To the Throne," I order, and he immediately turns, activates the elevator, and doesn't turn back.
When we reach the top, our guide shows a stronger stomach with his lack of reaction to the head as he takes us across the Emperor's estate. Then we're told to wait in the same red, carpeted waiting room as before. Except this time, there are no Empresses to receive us, but Caterina is still quite the sight for sore eyes even though she isn't like the perpetually naked (and mouth-wateringly delicious) Empress Piscila.
"Hey, there," Hana greets with a sensuous tone.
"Hello, Hana, Ryders. Everything is ready," the armored Templar Captain coolly replies and flashes Hana a subtle smile. There's a mage behind her, a well-built imperial man with the menacing eyes of a Punisher. Even their mages look like they could kill someone with their bare hands.
We wait for just a couple of minutes before a maid opens the door to the Main Throne Room. "The Holy Emperor says that only one is to kneel. The rest are to wait back here," she politely requests, then eyes the golems hesitantly.
I sigh and grab the head by its gray hair. Then I walk forward while the girls stay near the entrance. Gify pops out of existence and reappears in Alissa's arms, but I don't complain because I know she'll just smugly retort with "only one."
"Gih."
Hmph.
The floor isn't a mirror anymore, now an ominous, pure black, while the walls still have that same enchantment that displays a panorama of Mac Gantus.
I begrudgingly kneel on the dais using Cleinias' head as a support for my hand, and his stump leaves a mark of dried, flaky blood on the floor, which amuses me greatly. Then Caterina also kneels a meter behind me and to the side.
The enchanted dome opens up again just like it did at the gathering, revealing a crowd of angry human nobles to my left, a curious crowd to my right, and straight ahead, the Emperor and the Empresses, all sitting on their ornate, red velvet thrones, which look more like spiky quarter-spheres due to the sun ray ornaments at their backs.
Then the Emperor's reflection appears on the dark floor, but only his and not his throne, making it seem like he's sitting in the air. This is a shame because I really wanted to stare at the naked Piscila again.
The Emperor simply glances to each side, and the crowds of nobles are instantly silenced. Then he turns to me and announces with a stern tone, "Crown Lord Wolf Ryder, you're to represent the Ryder family against the accusation of the unlawful murder of Centum Cleinias Alkimeonids. Seeing that you have his head in your possession, we'll discuss the lawfulness of your act, not whether it happened or not."
His voice is always sickeningly charismatic, making it actually a bit unpleasant for me to listen to him.
"I accept," I coolly reply.
"Then rise." I obey and leave the head by my feet.
The angry nobles promptly start barking like dogs, complaining about my treatment of Cleinias' body.
"You crucified him like a miscreant, like a heretic!"
"You dishonored a family as old as the Empire."
"Prostrate yourself, and beg for forgiveness!"
"Crucify him at his home as atonement."
Some recognize Jarn and focus on her.
"She stabbed me in the gut!"
"My knight had to have his arm reattached because of her."
"My daughter had her lung pierced!"
"I almost died!"
But most of them are focusing on the most important thing.
"He violated the Purification."
"He spits on our laws!"
"The Ryders have asked for war."
"That was an attack on all of us!"
"A life for a life."
And the nobles on my right simply stare, their expressions mildly amused at the outrage from my left.
"Silence," the Emperor calmly commands, and the Room becomes deathly silent, everyone simply unable to disobey. Then he turns to me, giving me permission to speak.
But I just turn to Caterina and nod. She rises from her knee and signals the Space mage by the door, who walks forward and starts casting [Gate].
Everyone stares at him curiously, and Alissa and Yunia notice that a few of the Katasko nobles seem to know what's about to happen as they breathe deeply and clench their jaws.
When the spell finishes, the large Amethyst dragon appears along with two orcs, a hobgoblin, and a goblin, all pregnant. They've been put asleep on simple beds, and their bodies are naked, exposing the scars and wounds of abuse for all to see.
Then it strikes me that these monsters are all… rather attractive, even the goblin. The average monster isn't very aesthetically pleasing, but breeder types are usually attractive, so maybe these are breeders?
No matter. It's time to begin my speech.
--
Intermission – Aoi
--
Wolfy's strong voice echoes across the room, filled with the pleasant tone of someone with high "Charisma" and openly infused with [Godly Language], similar to what the Emperor does.
"We found these monsters in a secret room inside Cleinias' home, and only the Gods know how long they've been tortured and raped, for even the monsters themselves have lost count of the days… and of how many children they've birthed."
"I confirm how we found them," Caterina adds, and the nobles gasp in surprise.
"Why would the Punishers invade his home?!" A brave fool questions, but the Punisher's intense and challenging gaze shuts him up immediately.
"Suspicion of Wickedness. Are you going to claim that you can look at this and conclude that there aren't any grounds for it?" She asks so threateningly that even I understand the implication of arguing against her.
The noble swallows heavily as he shakes his head before stepping back, not wanting to call more unwanted Punisher attention towards himself.
"Monsters aren't under the protection of the Sins," an older, and wiser, Katasko noble asserts. Wolfy uses [Sense Soul] on him and discovers that his name is Apeiltik Tavros, level 84, but none of us recognize it from among those on the list. He's well-built, and his level says he's a high-ranking noble, so we're all wary of him.
"Why?" Wolfy calmly responds, daring him to answer.
But another, more hot-headed noble interjects, "Are you a fucking idiot? It's because we're at war! Not for territory or conquest, but for our right to exist! These monsters would kill each and every one of us if they could!"
Wolfy stares intensely at the fool, and the glorious warmth of our husband's aura restrains the lower-level man's unruly attitude. Then Wolfy slowly explains, "And yet, I've converted one of them. I've given my wife a system, and soon, she'll also learn skills!"
The young noble fiercely resists the attempt at intimidation. "Your 'wife' was a tamable monster, but these aren't." And his tone actually makes me very displeased.
"How do you know?" Wolfy tries to trap him, and the noble immediately clamps his mouth shut.
But another noble who seemingly has [Sense Presence] saves him, "I can sense that they're normal monsters."
So Wolfy immediately launches into a heated speech, "And that makes it okay to indulge in evil acts against them? To imprison, to torture, to rape these monsters, all for the crime of being born as minions for the God of Destruction?" Wolfy looks around as his anger builds up, his tail lashing about in reflection of his mood. Then he releases it all in an indignant shout, "WHY DOES THAT MAKE IT OKAY TO PERFORM WICKED ACTS UPON THEM? IS WICKEDNESS NOT THE ACT ITSELF RATHER THAN WHO IT'S DONE TO?!"
I never understood this part of the Sins because I asked myself this exact question. People who deserve to be killed aren't protected by the Sin of Reckless Murder, and it's the same for the other two Sins, though I don't know how someone would ever deserve rape, but what did monsters do to deserve any of the three Sins?
And then the silence makes me confused. Everyone knows the answer, so why don't they admit it? Why do they all act like the truth is uncomfortable?
"Admitting it in front of the Emperor and a Punisher would be very 'suspicious,'" Ciel kindly explains.
Hm… what is that word…?
"Disingenuous. Every noble is like this," Yunia dryly answers for me.
Yes, they know the truth. They just won't admit it unless it's convenient for them.
And seeing that nobody will answer, Wolfy finally reveals, "THIS IS WHY I MURDERED CLEINIAS! TO ME, HE WAS WICKED!"
"Did you confirm his Wickedness with a bounty tablet?" Apeiltik calmly questions once again.
Wolfy stares intensely at him, but he knows that this human won't be intimidated with just that, so he slowly explains with a measured tone, "I didn't, for it doesn't matter whether the Gods consider him Wicked or not. I consider him Wicked… AND I'LL MURDER ANYONE WHO THINKS OTHERWISE!" -Wolfy points a claw at him- "ARE YOU GOING TO ARGUE THAT HE WASN'T WICKED?"
The Room instantly becomes quiet… too quiet. Alissa and I can't even hear their breathing, and then we notice the Katasko nobles tensing up, so my sisters and I sharpen our attention, preparing for a fight. Even the other nobles to the right seem to tense up.
Then everything blurs as my eyes are drawn to the Emperor against my will. I simply can't look anywhere but his face, and it's really annoying, but his eyes feel like spears through my limbs, pinning me in place, and that makes me anxious.
"Your existence has triggered quite the uproar," he speaks directly into my head without moving his mouth.
All of the wives jerk their heads towards him and glare. The only one who can force us to do anything is Wolfy.
"How is that my fault?!" I growl back, my anger supported by everyone's presence in my mind.
I didn't want things to go in this direction, and I didn't want to cause problems for anyone, but I can't stop Wolfy. I won't stop him.
The Emperor glances at my sisters, noticing their supportive glares. Then I see his chest twitch in a silent chuckle.
"It isn't." He whispers into my head. Then he stands and turns his eyes to Wolfy, who feels his anger freeze over as the Emperor gives him a disapproving stare. "You've taken it upon yourself to expand the reach of the Sins?" He asks out loud, the commanding tone of his magical voice sounding quite grating for both Wolfy and I.
But my husband shows how admirable he is by grinning in the face of the ruler of all while taunting him at the same time, "I have. Is everyone here too craven to admit that this is the right thing?"
The nobles scoff. They all scoff.
I walk forward until I'm standing beside Wolfy. Then I sit on my hind legs and glare at every single one of these… craven. "Say it to my face that I don't deserve to be protected by the Sins!" I challenge, and I almost smile when I see the lower-level nobles reel back at the power of my voice.
"You're different," Apeiltik once again interferes, infuriating me.
So I turn to him and glower. "I had a family, parents, siblings! If I wasn't a hatchling when I was taken away, do you think it'd have been easy for me to love and respect humanoids?"
"We only train tamable dragons if we get them when they're young. The older, wild ones are simply too unruly," a different noble remarks out loud.
Wolfy immediately uses the change in topic to continue his speech, "And those aren't much smarter than animals. What about the monsters who can speak with us, who can understand our language like Crown Lord Aoi Ryder can? How can we try to build peaceful relationships with them when we treat them like that!" He points at the sleeping monsters.
"You're trying to 'befriend' monsters…?" A familiar voice echoes from behind the Katasko nobles, and when we turn to find the source, we see "Little" Alki walking forward.
We all hold back our anger to not launch ourselves at the spawn of the evil old man, Wolfy's anger turning cold as he slowly explains, "It's not our purpose to exterminate them. Creation gave birth to us so that we could grow and rise ever higher despite the interference from the God of Destruction, so getting the monsters on our side is invaluable for our future."
Alki, the Little, snorts dismissively. "More mouths to feed."
Wolf, the Great, confidently retorts, "More potential to be realized."
"More problems to solve."
"More allies to help."
The intensity with which the two are staring at each other increases, and we all unconsciously notice the subtle signs of two men preparing to kill each other.
"Did you know what your father was doing…?" The Emperor suddenly interjects, his words and magical voice breaking the tension completely.
"I didn't…" Alki hesitantly answers.
"I'll take you to the Seekers," Caterina immediately asserts, and Alki takes a step back in surprise.
He turns to the Emperor, his eyes begging for help, but the ruler of all simply stares down at him without showing any reaction as the Punisher takes him away.
The nobles start to murmur in disbelief, but the ruler sits down on his seat with a smug smile and remarks, "It disappoints me that any of you thought I'd ever side with the Alkibiades."
And with that, there's nobody left who has the courage to stand against Wolfy.
--
Intermission end.
--
--
Hall of Fame of Patrons
The patrons who support Rupegia shall have their names sung by the bards for they deserve the glory and honor. Their names are:
Prince PreownedFIN.
Prince Owldente.
Lord Andrew Meyers.
Lord Novgarod.
Lord Michale Erwin.
Lord Bakerdea.
Lord Maurice.
Lord Mattirro Draca.
Lord Sean Drake.
Lord Mike Bartter.
Lord Warwulfv.
Lord Khristopher Welsh.
Lord Tenebris Lupus.
Lord Paul Daval.
Lord Paul Daval.
Lord AndreyUC.
Lord Tmac.
Lord School Work.
Lord Gwendolyn Simmons-LaRose.
Lord CopeyDunt.
Lord BlindTactic.
Lord The Tallest Joshua.
Lord litalmexy.
Lord Tyler Mills.
Lord Philip.
Lord d3235.
Lord Freddie.
Lord Mike Bartter.
Lord Sean Drake.
Lord Shaun McDonough.
Lord William Clark.
Lord Sam.
Lord Ddraig Wynn.
Noble Salty Panda.
Noble Mild Fracas.
Noble Aclys.
Noble CarlBaxter.
Noble Andrew Hebreard.
Noble Tony Starrk.
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