The sound of his footsteps echoed inside the cave and as if in response, there was a flustered and hurried movement.
Zach steadied himself and surveyed the inside of the cave with eyes that were still not used to the darkness that the cave was shrouded in.
Zach found nothing out of place near the entrance so the last bit of caution struggling inside him disappeared without a trace. The frown on his forehead and his raised eyebrows eased back to their usual appearance and a flood of relief spread throughout his body relaxing every pore and every cell of his body when he saw Luna standing towards the end of the cave as if waiting to welcome him in.
In fact, Luna had heard his footsteps when he came in and had recognized him from his scent. Therefore she had hurriedly adjusted her condition to look even slightly more presentable so she could welcome him back.
Of course Zach didn't know and couldn't see that. He still hadn't gotten used to the darkness of the cave when compared to Luna who could see everything clearly. Her eyes had already adjusted to the darkness like some nocturnal animal while Zach fumbled his way in based on pure instinct and his memory of the shape of the cave as he blinked with some force as if trying to jump start his vision.
Holding the back of her left hand with her right hand, Luna stood respectfully like a graceful receptionist at the entrance of some high end five star hotel. She waited until Zach was right in front of her before respectfully getting down to her knees as if it was the most natural thing to do in this situation.
Zach had noticed her silhouette in the darkness and had therefore approached her with his hands in front of him since he still hadn't gotten rid of the temporary blindness.
As his vision returned to him, the first thing that entered his sight was the kneeling figure of Luna. She prostrated in front of him like a cult worshipper with a serene expression.
"What the hell?" Zach wondered if she had been recruited into some cult that had managed to brainwash her in the small amount of time he had been away from her.
Unaware of his inner thoughts, Luna continued to display her affection towards him by using both her hands to grab his ankles as if they were the most precious things in the world to her. Rubbing her hands against his feet gently, she beamed at him with the most serene expression on her face. Her innocence made Zach want to pounce on her immediately even though he wanted to figure out the reason why she was acting like this suddenly.
"When I left, she was still very normal…well normal for a succubus. But why is she acting like a nymphomaniac with a foot fetish as soon as I came back. Did something happen while I was away?" Zach imagined countless scenarios that could have taken place in his absence but none of them could explain what he was experiencing.
"Did something happen while I was away?" Zach asked Luna who was reveling in her foot fetish.
"Nothing happened, Master." Luna replied in a heartbeat as if she had been waiting for him to ask her that question.
"Then why are you acting like this all of a sudden?" Zach asked her helplessly.
"Our relationship is different now. I should do at least this much to earn Master's love." replied Luna with an angelic smile as if it was the most natural thing to do. She even failed to notice the odd look that came over Zach's face as she uttered the word 'Master'.
"Master?...hmm…MASTER??" screamed Zach inside his head. Previously he had been feeling that something was wrong with the whole situation but he had subconsciously ignored the fact that Luna had called him 'Master'.
But when his focus shifted away from his feet and the succubus worshipping them, he finally figured out ground zero.
Countless thoughts ran through Zach's head as he tried to make sense of the mind boggling situation. So many questions that he couldn't find any answers for.
"Why is she calling me 'Master' out of nowhere? Maybe it's because we had sex? She did start calling me that right after she woke up though." thought Zach as he tried to trace the origin of this sudden change in her treatment of him.
"It may be another one of her fetishes? She looks like she is having fun massaging my feet. No respectable and normal woman would do something like this. Either there is something wrong with her head or it is a side effect of me absorbing the energy that was hidden inside of her. There is also the fact that I have that annoying ability named 'Casanova' that passively increases my charm towards other women." contemplated Zach with a deepening frown that almost merged his two eyebrows into one huge arc over his eyes.
"There is another factor that I have absolutely no knowledge about…her race. She is not a human. I keep comparing her to a normal and mentally stable human woman but she is a succubus. I know that succubi have to feed on semen but that does not require them to go all the way with the source. Something may have changed once we decided to go all the way. As far as I know, succubi are a lustful race. They maintain deadly carnal relations with human males but none of them act the least bit devoted to their partners. Not to mention that they are the dominant ones in the relationship unlike Luna who is practically giving herself away to me." Zach wanted to rip his brain out in frustration as he pondered on the many intricacies of the problem he was facing. Even though all he had to do was ask Luna the reason for her behavior, he had been procrastinating, fearing that she might get hurt by his questioning words.
Therefore he softened his words and asked her in the most gentle voice he could have mustered, "Luna, why do you keep calling me that? Is something wrong?"
Luna looked confused as she tilted her head towards one side; as if asking what he meant by that question. But the smile on her face never wavered as if it had been soldered on it permanently. It might have looked cute in other settings, but in this situation Zach found it creepier than a centipede crawling over his naked body slowly
"I mean…you keep calling me 'Master' ever since you woke up. Is there any specific reason for that? D…Don't get me wrong…I just feel that the change is too sudden and without any explanation. You know I have been in the mountains and barely know a thing. So if this is something that is common knowledge and I am blowing it out of proportion…just educate me…ok?" urged Zach seriously.
Nodding obediently Luna sat up on her knees and looked up at him before answering his questions one by one.
"First of all, I call you 'Master' because you ARE my master. In our entire lives my succubus race strives ardently to look for the one person who qualifies to be our master. There can only be one master for each of us. As long as we meet our fated master we are able to break away from the curse of lust that we are born with. We follow the one person who can break our curse and call him master and remain eternally devoted to that person."
Luna took a break from divulging all that information and took a long breath before she dove into the treasure trove of information once again.
"Once we manage to find our master, there can be no man other than him. We belong to our master and so do our heart, our body, our loyalty and… our very existence. Most of the succubi spend their entire lives looking for their fated masters but end up dying disappointed. Some also try to avoid meeting their masters in hopes of retaining their freedom. Most of them are the fallen ones though, who have dived too deep into their carnal desires and are unwilling to settle for one master."
This bombshell pulverized Zach who had never expected the truth to be so different from his imagination. Luna was not at all affected in any way. She was in fact quite in possession of her mental faculties even though she seemed insane to Zach due to the different racial ideologies.